Abstract
While the phenomenon of social entrepreneurship is not new, there remain several ambiguities associated with its definition and theoretical formulation. To understand how social entrepreneurs create value in their quest to resolve social issues, it is important to appreciate the motivations that underlie their behavior. This chapter uses the cases of two social entrepreneurs in responsible tourism in India to identify a range of value-oriented and traditional entrepreneurial motivations. It further identifies how these motivations are intricately woven into a process of identify creation that illuminates the performative aspects of social entrepreneurship. Through their association and dissociation with a host of entities in the ecosystem, the social entrepreneurs tend to maintain their organizations’ legitimacy as heroes, thus adhering to the popular social discourse surrounding social entrepreneurship. While such conformity, validated by the entrepreneurs’ life stories, is beneficial in shaping the social entrepreneurial narrative, we argue that the need to further the social entrepreneurship agenda must incorporate alternative forms of thinking and talking about the phenomenon. These alternative discourses illuminate the duality of social entrepreneurship—its rhetoric as a grand, Schumpeterian style innovation and its reality as bricolage.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Abu-Saifan, S. (2012). Social entrepreneurship: Definition and boundaries. Technology Innovation Management Review, 2(2), 22–27.
Allen, S., Bhatt, A., Ganesh, U., & Kulkarni, N. (2012). On the path to sustainability and scale: A study of India’s social enterprise landscape. Retrieved June 10, 2015, from, http://intellecap.com/publications/path-sustainability-and-scale-study-indias-social-enterprise-landscape
Baum, J., & Locke, E. (2004). The relationship of entrepreneurial traits, skill, and motivation to subsequent venture growth. Journal of Applied Psychology, 89(4), 587–598.
Beckmann, M., Zeyen, A., & Krzeminska, A. (2014). Mission, finance, and innovation: The similarities and differences between social entrepreneurship and social business. In A. Grove & G. Berg (Eds.), Social business (pp. 23–41). Berlin: Springer.
Beugre, C. (2011). Motivation to create social ventures: A theory of moral engagement. In Entrepreneurship: Changing the present, creating the future. Hilton Head Island: United States Association for Small Business and Entrepreneurship.
Bonney, R. (2004). Three giants of South Asia: Gandhi, Ambedkar and Jinnah on self-determination. Leicester: University of Leicester.
Boyatzis, R. (1998). Transforming qualitative information: Thematic analysis and code development. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Brandstatter, H. (2011). Personality aspects of entrepreneurship: A look at five meta-analyses. Personality and Individual Differences, 51(3), 222–230.
Brouwer, M. T. (2002). Weber, Schumpeter and Knight on entrepreneurship and economic development. Journal of Evolutionary Economics, 12(1-2), 83–105.
Concordia College. (n.d.). Muhammad Yunus. Retrieved September 23, 2014, from http://www.cord.edu
Dann, G., & Cohen, E. (1991). Sociology and tourism. Annals of Tourism Research, 18(1), 155–169.
Dees, J. (2001). The meaning of social entrepreneurship. Retrieved August 19, 2015, from https://entrepreneurship.duke.edu/news-item/the-meaning-of-social-entrepreneurship/
Dey, P., & Steyaert, C. (2010). The politics of narrating social entrepreneurship. Journal of Enterprising Communities: People and Places in the Global Economy, 4(1), 85–108.
Di Domenico, M., Haugh, H., & Tracey, P. (2010). Social bricolage: Theorizing social value creation in social enterprises. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 34(4), 681–703.
Downing, S. (2005). The social construction of entrepreneurship: Narrative and dramatic processes in the coproduction of organizations and identities. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 29(2), 185–204.
Froggett, L., & Chamberlayne, P. (2004). Narratives of social enterprise: From biography to practice and policy critique. Qualitative Social Work, 3(1), 61–77.
Grassroutes. (n.d.). About Us. Retrieved September 26, 2015, from http://grassroutes.co.in
Guba, E., & Lincoln, Y. (1994). Competing paradigms in qualitative research. In N. Denzin & Y. Lincoln (Eds.), The Sage handbook of qualitative research (pp. 105–117). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Gundry, L., Kickul, J., & Griffiths, M. (2011). Creating social change out of nothing: The role of entrepreneurial bricolage in social entrepreneurs’ catalytic innovations. Advances in Entrepreneurship, Firm Emergence and Growth, 13(7), 1–24.
Hockerts, K. (2006). Entrepreneurial opportunity in social purpose business ventures. In J. Mair, J. Robinson, & K. Hockerts (Eds.), Social entrepreneurship (pp. 142–154). London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Jones, R., Latham, J., & Betta, M. (2008). Narrative construction of the social entrepreneurial identity. International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior and Research, 14(5), 330–345.
Mckenzie, B. (2007). Techniques for collecting verbal histories. In H. Neergaard & J. Ulhøi (Eds.), Handbook of qualitative research methods in entrepreneurship (pp. 308–330). Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing.
Muir-Cochrane, E. C., & Fereday, J. (2006). Demonstrating rigor using thematic analysis: A hybrid approach of inductive and deductive coding and theme development. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 5(1), 1–11.
Palmas, K. (2012). Re-assessing Schumpeterian assumptions regarding entrepreneurship and the social. Social Enterprise Journal, 8(2), 141–155.
Phillips, N., Tracey, P., & Karra, N. (2013). Building entrepreneurial tie portfolios through strategic homophily: The role of narrative identity work in venture creation and early growth. Journal of Business Venturing, 28(1), 134–150.
Ruebottom, T. (2013). The microstructures of rhetorical strategy in social entrepreneurship: Building legitimacy through heroes and villains. Journal of Business Venturing, 28(1), 98–116.
Seidman, I. (2006). Interviewing as qualitative research: A guide for researchers in the education and social sciences (3rd ed.). New York: Teachers College Press.
Shane, S., Locke, E., & Collins, C. (2003). Entrepreneurial motivation. Human Resource Management Review, 13(2), 257–279.
Steyaert, C., & Hjorth, D. (2006). Introduction: What is social in social entrepreneurship. In C. Steyaert & D. Hjorth (Eds.), Entrepreneurship as social change: A third movements of entrepreneurship book (pp. 1–18). Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing.
Tan, W.-L., Williams, J., & Tan, T.-M. (2005). Defining the “social” in “social entrepreneurship”: Altruism and entrepreneurship. The International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, 1(3), 353–365.
The Blue Yonder Associates. (n.d.). About Us. Retrieved September 26, 2015, from http://theblueyonder.com/
Yunus, M., & Weber, K. (2011). Building social business: The new kind of capitalism that serves humanity’s most pressing needs. New York: Public Affairs.
Zahra, S., Gedajlovic, E., Neubaum, D., & Shulman, J. (2009). A typology of social entrepreneurs: Motives, search processes and ethical challenges. Journal of Business Venturing, 24(5), 519–532.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2017 Springer International Publishing AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Mody, M., Day, J. (2017). Heroic Messiahs or Everyday Businessmen? The Rhetoric and the Reality of Social Entrepreneurship in India. In: Sheldon, P., Daniele, R. (eds) Social Entrepreneurship and Tourism. Tourism on the Verge. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-46518-0_12
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-46518-0_12
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-46516-6
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-46518-0
eBook Packages: Business and ManagementBusiness and Management (R0)