An Overview on Social Enterprises and Nonprofit Organizations

The practice of social enterprising has become a critical practice in community development for many nonprofit organizations over the past two decades. Scholars such as Hung et al. and Turpin and Shier (2023) have highlighted the emerging importance of social enterprises to the survival and success of nonprofit organizations, especially in implementing social change in communities. As a result of a combination of funding cuts to social programs from various donors and a change in meeting their social transformation goals, many nonprofit organizations have resorted to social enterprising as an organizational survival tactic. Instead of doing their work in the traditional or conventional way—that is, raising funds from donors to implement planned projects—many nonprofit organizations now engage in social enterprising or business activities through which they generate funds and invest these funds into their community development activities (Pizarro et al., 2022). In this regard, nonprofits are seizing upon social enterprising as a way to fill the gap left by donor cutbacks. Social enterprises help nonprofit organizations to engage in commercial activities to fill this funding cutback (Svensson et al., 2020; Kerlin, 2006). According to Kerlin and others, the idea is to move into more market-driven strategies in order to raise needed funds for social projects.