Business First December 2017 December BF Digital | Page 44

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP
Social
Enterprise
a new name
but an old
concept
by Ulster University Visiting Professor Simon Bridge
ecently I came across an announcement
about a ‘Social Entrepreneurship
Certificate Program’ to be run in
Washington DC which, it said, would include
a visit to DC Central Kitchen: the ‘first ever
social enterprise’.
However a look at DC Central Kitchen’s
website reveals that it was f ounded in 1989 ­
and that it only claims to be the USA’s ‘first
community kitchen’.
Did someone really think that an
organisation formed less than 30 years ago
could be the ‘first ever social enterprise’?
This is one example of the apparently
common perception that social enterprises
are a new form of organisation, when in
reality they are a very old.
What is, however, new is the vocabulary we
use to refer to them – which may be why we
didn’t hear about them in earlier times and
why we didn’t afford them any special
recognition.
Nevertheless there have been organisations
we would now consider to be social
enterprises for as long as there have been
private sector businesses ­ and some
surviving social enterprises predate any
surviving private business.
In this context it is interesting that the
organisation which claims to be the oldest
surviving business in the UK, Faversham
Oyster Fishery, is known to have been in
existence in 1189 and was initially and for
most of its existence a co­operative – one of
the main forms of social enterprise.
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42 www.businessfirstonline.co.uk
I don’t know of a social enterprise in
Northern Ireland which is that old but we do
have the Honourable the Irish Society which
was founded in 1613 and still exists as a
grant­giving charity funded by the property it
owns (which includes Derry’s walls) ­ and
examples from the 18th century include the
Linen Hall Library, which was founded in
1788 and is the oldest library in Belfast and
the last subscription library in Ireland, and
the Belfast Charitable Society which was
founded in 1752 and still runs Clifton House.
How many ‘businesses’ can match their
longevity?
Next year will be the 250th anniversary of
the start of the construction of Clifton House
which was originally built as a poor house
and still fulfils the function by providing
residential care for elderly people. And,
speaking of anniversaries, next year might
also be said to mark the 30th anniversary of
official support in Northern Ireland for social
enterprises.
If the relevant documents have been kept, a
search through the archives should reveal
that it was in 1986 that a suggestion was
made to LEDU and the Department of
Economic Development (DED) that it might
be economically beneficial to support
‘community businesses’ (the term social
enterprise was not then widely used), that in
1987 a formal proposal for support of such
businesses was included in DED’s Pathfinder
proposals, and that consequently in 1988
LEDU was administering an IFI funded
support scheme for ‘community businesses’.
Before that it would seem that such
enterprises had not registered on the
economic development ‘radar’ – much as the
economic contribution of small businesses
was largely ignored before the 1970s.
Whereas now small businesses are widely
encouraged and assisted and social
enterprises receive continuing official
recognition, support and promotion Indeed
what stated as the LEDU administered
community business scheme was the direct
fore­runner of the current government
backed social enterprise support provision.
So what happened 30 years ago to
change our appreciation of social
enterprises?
At the time there was a received
assumption about the limits of economically
significant business activity but then
someone working in the community sector
challenged this at a time when enterprise
policy was being re­examined.
The challenge therefore fell on receptive
ears and was credibly made.
Retrospectively it may seem obvious that
social enterprises existed and made an
economic contribution, not least by
employing people, but it needed that
intervention to trigger the change in
perception.
The initial out­workings of this change
included both a realisation that there was a