Collaborator or competitor: assessing the evidence supporting the role of social enterprise in health and social care

ABSTRACT

In many countries, social enterprise has been introduced into a competitive market-oriented environment as a substitute for publicly owned services, particularly in healthcare. In the United Kingdom, evidence for this move seems to derive from case studies where social enterprise operates in collaboration – as opposed to competition – with publicly owned services. Our systematic review demonstrates that there is no evidence to support the role of social enterprise as a substitute for publicly owned services. However, there is evidence to show that where social enterprise operates in a collaborative environment, enhanced outcomes can be achieved, such as connectedness, well-being and self-confidence.

KEYWORDS:

• Social enterprise
• healthcare
• competition
• collaboration
• coproduction

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. See Nicholls and Teasdale (2016) and Sepulveda (2015) for a more comprehensive overview of social enterprise policies of the UK Government.

2. See https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/display_record.php?RecordID=9524 .

3. The papers did not always highlight the presence of trading in the organizations analysed. Therefore, an analysis of each organization’s website was also undertaken to explore if the organization was involved in trading. Papers were excluded when neither the paper nor the website outlined any trading activities within the organization.

4. Although there is no standard definition of ‘usual care’, for the purposes of this Review we define this as the routine care usually received by patients for prevention or treatment of diseases in a given context.

5. The full search strategy is available from the corresponding author on request.

6. Searches were conducted in: Voluntas, Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, Social Enterprise Journal and Journal of Social Entrepreneurship.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Economic and Social Research Council [MR/L003287/1]; Medical Research Council [MR/L003287/1].

Notes on contributors

Francesca Calò

Francesca Calò PhD is a Researcher at the Yunus Centre for Social Business and Health at Glasgow Caledonian University, UK.

Simon Teasdale

Simon Teasdale PhD is professor of Public Policy and Organizations at the Yunus Centre for Social Business and Health, Glasgow Caledonian University.

Cam Donaldson

Cam Donaldson PhD is holder of the Yunus Chair in Social Business and Health and is Vice Principal and Pro-Vice Chancellor (Research) at Glasgow Caledonian University.

Michael J. Roy

Michael J. Roy PhD is Senior Lecturer in Social Business at the Yunus Centre for Social Business and Health and the Glasgow School for Business and Society at Glasgow Caledonian University.

Simone Baglioni

Simone Baglioni PhD is Professor of Politics at the Yunus Centre for Social Business and Health at Glasgow Caledonian University