The FINANCIAL — This summer saw the fifth Research Colloquium for Social Entrepreneurship take place in Oxford.
Hosted by the Skoll Centre for Social Entrepreneurship and Centre for the Advancement of Social Enterprise the event was designed to be distinctive in its structure and logic, pushing a unique agenda and set of objectives through collaboration and inclusive critical thinking.
Scholars from all over the world who are engaged in social entrepreneurship had the opportunity to present their work, open up discussion, and develop further research agendas and debates. As Saïd Business School reported, one highlight was the chance to welcome people from countries who, up until now, have not typically been involved in this field. Professor Keneko from Keio University in Japan was one such contributor who said he had never been to a conference like this before.
A key expectation of the Colloquium was to bring forth new theory around social entrepreneurship. Rafael Zeigler from Greifswald University presented his ideas on temporal aspects of scaling social innovation, developing the idea that we need to think about social entrepreneurial impacts not just over space or the immediate impact, but also through a temporal lens. Another of the papers was on crowd funding which uses the same principle as crowd sourcing, but to raise money.
Dr Alex Nicholls, University Lecturer in Social Entrepreneurship at the Skoll Centre, and one of the organisers of the conference, explained the significance of these papers and the surrounding debate: ‘A good deal of our discussion is relevant to policy,’ he says, ‘For example, with the crowd funding piece, with conventional funding and capitalism in crisis, people’s view of banks is as low as it has ever been. Talking innovation in terms of finance and democratising it – that kind of research has real interest and relevance at policy level.’
Keen to work outside the framework of a traditional conference, the event also put a big emphasis on community building and networking. Scholars were able to develop relationships through events such as college dinners, punting and a walking tour of Oxford. Dr Nicholls talked about the importance of including space for socialising in the programme: ‘These things are designed to help the community build; people can meet each other, talk to each other, pursue ideas.’ Silvia Dorado, Associate Professor at the University of Rhode Island, talked about the impact the event had on her: ‘The conference, because of its small size, had plenty of occasions for informal interaction, and the diversity of participants allowed me to identify new and very fruitful ways to push the research and practical agenda of social entrepreneurship.’
The Colloquium is a collaborative event, co-hosted with Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business. Professor Paul Bloom from CASE, who was also one of the conference organisers, said: ‘Saïd Business School and Fuqua are first class academic institutions that have shown leadership in management research and education in many fields. By collaborating on and supporting the Colloquium, we are sending a signal to the academic world that social entrepreneurship is an important topic that deserves attention from talented researchers. It is exciting to see serious scholars with interesting research ideas getting the chance to interact with one another to refine their thinking and obtain encouragement for their pursuits.’
Dr Nicholls summed up the four days: ‘It was a success … there was a great atmosphere, that’s the most telling thing in the end. There was a real energy, a sense of collaboration, a sense of excitement in the room throughout this event.’
A collection of the some of the best papers from the conference will be published in a special edition of the Journal of Social Entrepreneurship.
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