overview

Social change occurs at extraordinary times and places, it occurs at the tipping point of any eco-system that becomes unbalanced and unsustainable for too long. Attributing to the hard work of governments, academia, charities, not-for-profits and development agencies, social entrepreneurship has been a partner and a catalyst of change for the last 20 years.  Social entrepreneurs unleash their ideals and energy, solve social and environmental imbalances using innovative and practical methods of entrepreneurship.

Social entrepreneurs are individuals who challenge the maxim that only corporations and governments can bring about solutions to society’s problems and needs. The promise of free markets is supposedly to increase the well being of humankind, a win-win scenario that would increase competition and distribute scarce resources. Instead, progress has been at the expense of externalizing the environment and at the expense of excluding small, local communities who have had little chance to compete fairly given their limited access to capital and markets. Social entrepreneurship or social capitalism takes it one step further, by undertaking human development and sustainable capitalism as their first pledge.

This overwhelming sense of obligation to society sparks wonderful creativity in social entrepreneurs.  They use this creativity to tackle a variety of problems; including water and food safety, health and sanitation, education for empowerment, housing for the poor, providing job opportunities, inclusion into global trade, access to energy, preserving the environment and financial inclusion of their local communities. Though still anecdotal, models of best practices are emerging and provides valuable insight into a social enterprise success. Factors such as understanding of local community needs, partnering with stakeholders, educating and conditioning new behavior in the local community, utilizing marketing resources, producing a balanced business model, and accessing capital - are crucial in making social enterprises effective and able to acheive significant impact.  The formation of an efficient capital market with investors who understand the risk and complexity of social finance can support innovations and proliferate the work of social entrepreneurs that ultimately benefit local communities.

The Social Entrepreneurship Landscape

The landscape for the global social innovation movement has evolved, from Ashoka recognising the world's change agents and inspiring everyone to be a change maker, to the global network offered by Schwab Foundation to its winning entrepreneurs, to the progressive way in which The Skoll World Forum cultivate ideas and bring together thought leaders from around the globe.  Financial products have become better suited to grass-root communities, notably the Grameen bank institutionalising micro-credit to women in rural areas to Root Capital providing trade finance solutions to farming cooperatives. Online platforms such as Kiva, E&Co, and Microplace have raised the public profile of micro-lending and micro-fundraising through the use of technology. Acumen fund and a number of other burgeoning venture like social funds are also emerging and ready to invest for social impact.

The adage of ‘doing well while doing good’, is also being firmly established in the education system with a number of leading universities conditioning ethical behavior and inspiring students to get involved. There are now courses mentoring social entrepreneurs on technical, commercial or management skills to ensure they have the dexterity to survive and succeed. There are social entrepreneurship programs such as Global Insitute for Tomorrow aimed at company executives to teach issues of globalization through the eyes of Asian social enterprise. These corporates are taking notice of social enterprise not just to send their executives to such training programs, but as an unparalleled opportunity for corporations to learn about new underserved markets.

Intermediaries in the form of information networks, technical service providers and consulting companies are increasingly emerging to meet the needs of the social entrepreneurship market. Intermediaries such as European Ventures Philanthropy Association, Virtue Ventures, Volans and Avantage Ventures are supporting social entrepreneurs and the industry by facilitating greater information flows and transparency, providing advisory services and connecting entrepreneurs to businesses, stakeholder networks and investors. Services geared to the social entrepreneurship industry are growing, and with the multitude of global players coming together, the industry is on the verge of moving from a discipline to the mainstream.

Social Entrepreneurship in Asia

Though there are encouraging signs of social entrepreneurship in Asia, the region is lagging behind Europe and the United States in promoting sustainability and supporting social entrepreneurs. Cultural, historical, economic and geographic factors have slowed Asia’s response to its own social problems. Entrepreneurship in the East is quite different from the West, for those 2.86 billion Asians living below US$2 a day, it is about surviving the next week and month. The majority can not afford the luxury of innovation, till their government, international development agencies or else a social entrepreneur, first solves their immediate needs of food, water, housing and energy.

Below are a few additional socio-economic factors highlighting the differences between the West and the East, and provide clues to why social entrepreneurship continues to grow in the West and why the bulk of development work is done in Asia. With fewer resources available for two thirds of the world's population, Avantage Ventures' has decidedly to focus only on the region and on sustainable social enterprises that provide scalable solutions.