Rise of Social Entrepreneurship Through Populism

This essay instigates a relationship between populism, as a strategic and socio-cultural approach, and the rise of innovative social enterprises. Although there are many negative uses of the concept of populism nowadays, its ideology represents breaking up conventions and a new style of leadership that is more closely connected to the wants and needs of the people. Taking a fresh twenty-first-century perspective on this ideology as well as on new business model practices, it is possible to observe that both aim to give a sense of empowerment to those groups that have felt neglected by institutions. Society and environment are interconnected and interdependent systems, therefore by employing leadership capacities of coaching, facilitating, and nurturing the space for co-creation of value, we can ensure self-organized social systems with local attunement. However, on another level, the current populism-induced mindset can also have a deteriorating effect on the said business model, if the decision at the management level doesn’t consider the growing complexity of the environment. Therefore, in many ways, we can see populism, as an ideology, and social enterprise’s principles closely related; however, there are aspects of the populist trend that create barriers to the social enterprise’s further development. We divide those effects into undermining and synergizing. The paper instigates a relationship between social entrepreneurship and populism by theoretically exploring and comprising these two concepts. It also brings a concrete case of a social enterprise to illustrate how these come together and generate both economic and social value.