Stephen Ilagan's Blog

In response to Adrian Fung’s blog post “Is Social Entrepreneurship Really Possible?”, I would have to agree that Social Entrepreneurship is just another marketing ploy used by profit-driven businesses to attract sales. Adrian uses the examples of TOMS shoes and their “one for one” campaign. I have no doubt in my mind that this campaign only drives home the point that consumers should buy them as they are not only going to look fashionable, but they are helping other people. Ingenious, really. I side more with Milton Friedman when it comes to theories about how companies operate. The rise in “social responsibility”  is a response to consumer demand shifting to goods and companies that are environmentally and socially responsible. So really, Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” controlling the markets is still at play.

Of course, social entrepreneurs like Jamie Oliver and Muhammad Yunus are at play and do make a nice profit from their enterprises. However, these are extremely rare, and most of these social enterprises are focused on that – a social goal, rather than being a profit-driven business. The reconciliation of both is extremely difficult and most social enterprises end up functioning like charities, rather than businesses.