OECD-LEED and Euricse partner to advance social entrepreneurship and social enterprise
Project status: on going
Description
The OECD-LEED Programme and Euricse are now partnering to promote social enterprise development through the engagement of a number of Euricse researchers in OECD-LEED’s project “Boosting social entrepreneurship and social enterprise creation”.
OECD has been appointed by the European Commission to assess and provide tailored advice to individual national or regional administrations of EU Member-States in the design and implementation of integrated policies and programmes for social enterprises. The project intends to make a valuable contribution to Europe’s 2020 Strategy for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth while dovetailing with the European Commission’s Social Business Initiative for boosting social entrepreneurship.
Objectives
Euricse is cooperating with OECD-LEED on various research activities concerning the monitoring and comparison of policy and programme approaches and the collection and dissemination of good practices throughout European countries.
A series of policy reports aimed at policy makers examine issues and policies related to social entrepreneurship. The main goal of these briefs is to highlight the untapped potential of social enterprises and to provide examples of specially tailored policies that are successful in increasing participation that can serve as models for others.
Main results
The policy brief on social impact measurement for social enterprises was drafted by Antonella Noya (Senior Policy Analyst at the local economic and employment development programme – LEED of the OECD) in cooperation with Euricse. The paper, produced by the OECD and the European Commission, presents the issues and ongoing debates surrounding social impact measurement and provides concrete examples of measurement methods. It highlights the concept of proportional measurement, in other words balancing up the costs and benefits of the measuring process. The policy brief also looks at guidance and resources for use by social enterprises and how to create a more widespread culture of measurement among stakeholders despite their often limited human and financial resources.
The policy brief on Scaling the Impact of Social Enterprises was drafted by Stellina Galitopoulou, Policy Analyst, and Antonella Noya, Senior Policy Analyst OECD in cooperation with Euricse. The paper analyzes the growth models of social enterprises coherent with the aims pursued by this form of enterprise. The document is based on a review of the literature on scaling models and on the presentation of case histories of social enterprises that have adopted growth strategies to broaden and diversify their general interest activities.
In addition to the policy brief, the collaboration between OECD and Euricse also included the implementation of national policy reviews and capacity building seminars.
Policy Review on Croatia and the Czech Republic
The reviews provide a baseline analysis of the framework needed for social enterprises, assess the strengths and weaknesses of existing policies and programmes as well as proposals for future policy and programme development.
Two Euricse researchers, Giulia Galera and Yiorgos Alexopoulos, participated in two international review panels comprised of members of the OECD secretariat. Euricse researchers met with key stakeholders from both Croatia and the Czech Republic to learn more about the key policy challenges faced by social enterprises in each country, assess the quality of support policies against international benchmarks and provide recommendations for future policy development in the social enterprise domain. Each study visit was followed by the preparation of an “interim report”, which incorporates information and analysis gathered in the previous steps, as well as key policy recommendations and an Action Plan.
Capacity building seminars. A series of seminars were held for high-level policy makers in the European Union in order to facilitate mutual learning and build capacities related to the development of social entrepreneurship policies.
The Capacity Building Seminar: Building enabling ecosystems for social enterprises was held on 22-23 April 2015, in Brussels.
This high level Capacity Building Seminar focused on key policy areas aiming at supporting the development and growth of social enterprises. At this event key stakeholders, such as networks of social enterprises, social finance investors, policy makers and administrators, invested in a productive international exchange of information on the most successful programmes and policies supporting the establishment of an enabling ecosystem for social enterprises across the European Union. Two Euricse researchers, Flaviano Zandonai and Yiorgos Alexopoulos, participated in the event with presentations that drew participants’ attention to the importance of setting up enabling support structures for social enterprises at national level and providing a framework that fosters investment readiness together with a tailored access to different financial and funding sources.
Publications
OECD, 2015, Policy brief on social impact measurement for social enterprises
OECD, 2016, Policy brief on Scaling the Impact of Social Enterprises
Partner
OCSE