Social entrepreneurship and the social economy of Victorian and Edwardian Britain

Taking Northeast England as our proving ground, we argue that social entrepreneurship played a highly productive role in deepening the social economy of Victorian and Edwardian Britain. Social enterprises flourished in the fields of community welfare, education, healthcare, recreation, and religion, enriching innumerable lives, and creating value at scale for both economy and society. Analysis of data relating to 3,919 Northeast social enterprises active between 1835 and 1914 reveals that social innovations spread rapidly from one locality to another in waves, as activists emulated developments elsewhere, within the region and beyond. We identify the factors that made this possible and reconceptualise social entrepreneurship as a collective endeavour led by social activists with support from the wider community and members of the business, professional, and ecclesiastical elites. In demonstrating how resources were once routinely mobilised by social enterprises, we provide a standard against which to evaluate social entrepreneurship in the present.