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Social enterprises are dynamic businesses that are driven by social and environmental objectives and place community benefit ahead of personal gain.
Essential elements of a social enterprise include:
Social enterprises are businesses with a social or environmental purpose who take measures to ensure that profits go back to helping the communities that they serve rather than lining the pockets of individual shareholders. Across the world, and in the U.K. social enterprises have proven to find solutions to complex problems by using business models to address inequalities such as poverty and ill-health and create employment, training and volunteer opportunities for a diverse range of communities including people experiencing homelessness, mental health issues and disability. Well known examples of social enterprises include The Big Issue, Jamie Oliver’s Fifteen Restaurant and Devine Chocolate.
Operating in a variety of sectors from recycling to renewable energy, child care to transport, social enterprises differ in size and scale but operate all across Scotland, with the Department of Trade & Industry putting the figure at around 1,100 in 2005. A recent, U.K. wide study indicates that despite the economic recession, in 2009, many social enterprises had increased their turnover from the previous year.
 Social enterprises have elements of the private sector in that they function as business but also feature voluntary and community elements e.g. working towards a specific aim (which could be) creating volunteer, training and employment opportunities for those disadvantaged in the labour market. Therefore, a way to help distinguish social enterprises from private businesses i.e. a social enterprise mark (SEM), has been developed for use in England & Wales. There are various criteria that a social enterprise must meet in order to recieve the SEM and the mark is helpful in promoting the concept to the wider public but opinion is divided as to whether or not it should be embraced in Scotland.
For the moment a decision on adopting a 'kite mark' in Scotland is still to be made but a 5 part criteria of social enterprise has been made available through SENSCOT which is helpful in defining the concept (click on the file below) or view: http://www.senscot.net/docs/scottishcriteriajune10wb.pdf
For background on the social enterprise mark in Scotland view: http://www.senscot.net/view_res.php?viewid=9128
To get more information on the social enterprise mark view: http://www.socialenterprisemark.org.uk/
To learn more about the Scottish Social Enterprise Coalition's 2011 Manifesto view:
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