The Practice of Social Entrepreneurship as A Model : Case study between Sweden and China

Abstract: Aim: Social Entrepreneurship (SE) has been widely spread as a global phenomenon, although many researches have been done, the concept is still hard to define. However, it has been proved that SE has a positive effect on alleviating the social problems. The aim of this research is by the means of comparing three prevalent social enterprise models and analyzing the crucial factor in the social value creation process, to find out an appropriate mode for the Chinese organizations to develop SE, with twofold value creation: social and economic.   Method: Three companies are chosen as case study: Gefle Chocolaterie, Göranssonska Fonder and Lenovo. Face-to-face interview and phone interview are used to collect the primary data, also some books and articles are applied as secondary data. The analysis model is social enterprise models, and strategic triangle model.   Result & Conclusions: We find some advantages and disadvantages of social enterprise models, and come to a result that for each case company, because of the difference between crucial factor of the social enterprise model, their strategic triangle model are different as well. There is no fixed social enterprise model for Chinese companies to practice SE, each kind of the model should be adjusted to the specific situation of the company, only in this way, best results can be achieved.   Suggestions for future research: The information we got from the interviewees may be limited to their point of view, also, bias may occur in the research due to authors’ academic point of view. On the other hand, this research was only based on qualitative data, and the empirical study, which was not enough, hence, more quantitative data is needed in the future study.   Contribution of the thesis: After the study, according to the size of the company, we list the potential models for each of them to develop SE. It is valuable and helpful for managers to capture the SE practice model and embed it into the company behaviour.