Social Enterprises

In the realm of social services, social enterprises are seen as innovative actors that can supplement, or even replace, formerly public social services. This paper analyses this trend in a cursory fashion. It provides a brief overview of the development of social business in six European countries as well as in the European Union as a whole and the possible positive impacts of smart policies in the field. To this end, the first part of this paper looks at how welfare regimes in Europe are changing, especially in the face of the economic crisis. Subsequently, the second part looks at the privatisation of social services during the economic crisis, examines the actors involved (for-profit companies, the third sector, and social enterprises) and discusses the advantages of social enterprises delivering social services. The third part of the paper focuses on the different policy initiatives to support social businesses in various European countries and provides some good examples of social policies to support social businesses.