Article
Why Promote Social Enterprises?
Meaning of Promotion
I. Social Awareness & Consciousness
The government, enterprises and NPOs are all social organizations developed to sustain everyday living for the public during the social evolution.
However, since the business sector is more interested in generating profits in the market, its cooperation with the government in sustaining the society doesn’t work so well. In the fields where neither business sector nor the government is able to get involved, though the third sector, the citizen sector, is expected to fill in the vacancy, its structural insufficiency wouldn’t allow them to do so.
Therefore, it’s the brand new trend to combine the business sector and citizen sector together and form a new organizational structure with social mission in mind, which is the social enterprise.
II. Reflection on Radical Capitalism
Global Financial Crisis caused reflection on the capitalism long been carried out. After that, many took a new angle to view and solve the social problems with social innovation in mind. Contemplation on how to pursue the balance between economic and social goral has been widely discussed. So is the social enterprise.
III. Reformation of Public Service
In regard to public administration, the political meaning lies in social enterprises can’t be underestimated in either U.S or Europe. Take Europe for example, social enterprises there are more inclined to be supportive roles, with purpose to provide a chance to vulnerable groups to get back to mainstream market. Politically, it’s to change the passive relief offering to active ability empowering and financially independence encouraging, which were included into the Ministry of Labor’s business a few years ago.
Current Opportunities
1. Circumstance in Taiwan: a place full of talented manpower, prosperous small and medium enterprises and innovative and creative energy.
2. Timing: The social demands and attention for social enterprises are getting higher and higher.
3. Experience: The ministry of Labor (MOL) has supported the society for more than a decade. MOL can learn from the experience of other countries to respond to social demands.
Experience for International Development
Recently, MOL has been constantly learning from countries, such as U.K., Germany, Singapore and Korea, in social enterprise development. Each of them has their own uniqueness during their social enterprise development. By analyzing those, MOL hopes to set up a suitable model and strategy for social enterprise development in Taiwan. Here, the scheme of development in each country is briefly listed as below. For detail, please refer to “know more”.