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  5. Category E, Reforming and building
Reforming and building

Discipline 11. Community and social entrepreneurs

A broad bearded man in an apron raising a shop shutter with a crate of vegetables on his hip.

Maturity of support

  • 4Codification
  • 4Institutions
  • 4Training
  • 4Communities
  • 4Academia
  • 4.0Overall, mean of the five

These are people who create enterprises focused on improving their community or the place they live. Many come to the work through their own experience of the issues that their enterprise addresses. This can bring people to civic work who would not have otherwise considered themselves as a ‘civic practitioner’.

Some of these ventures are set up to deliver a financial return for those who own and run them; they may look to access social investment funds as part of this. Others are not-for-profit, reinvesting any trading surplus in the enterprise. Some are set up specifically to operate at break-even, run more as a way to keep activities going than to generate profit. Whatever the specific model, these enterprises differ from other types of civic institution in earning their income through trading rather than raising through charitable giving or public sector grants.

Examples

Assessing the supporting architecture

Support for this discipline ranks highly; alongside community organising it is the only other discipline to score four points across all five dimensions assessed. It has well-established definitions, principles and legal forms, a dedicated regulator, the Office of the Regulator of Community Interest Companies, several long-standing institutions including Social Enterprise UK and Co-operatives UK as membership bodies, specialist investors such as Better Society Capital, the Social Investment Business and Resonance, and an international network in the Social Enterprise World Forum.

For practitioners, there are dedicated providers including the School for Social Entrepreneurs and UnLtd, alongside universities delivering significant volumes of training. Financial support and mentoring are available to support those studying, through SSE’s Match Trading grants and UnLtd’s awards. Conferences and practitioner networks are available to develop and strengthen connections. There is no dedicated apprenticeship for this discipline, which is a notable gap in a discipline otherwise well-served by training and qualifications.