A Tale of Two Countries - Social Business Incubators in Sweden and the United Kingdom

Abstract: Social business incubators are important elements in the social entrepreneurship ecosystem in most countries. The importance in practice is not reflected by the academic literature, which has rarely researched social business incubators. As actors in the field of social entrepreneurship, they are exposed to the different institutional logics that characterise this field. Social entrepreneurship is highly context dependent and thus the strength of the tensions can vary across countries. By researching social business incubators in Sweden and the United Kingdom, this thesis attempts to answer the research question: to what extent do institutional logics shape social business incubators. To find an answer, the institutional logics constellation in the environment of the incubators is analysed. Secondly, the organisational practices were studied to understand how incubators interpret and reproduce the logic constellation. The findings suggest that social business incubators are not shaped by institutional logics with regards to their goals. However, the institutional logics partly shape the means which social business incubator employ to reach the goals.