social enterprise for wellbeing and mental health presentation by associate professor jo barraket...

Social Enterprise for Wellbeing and Mental Health

Presentation by Associate Professor Jo BarraketThe Australian Centre for Philanthropy and Nonprofit Studies

Jo.barraket@qut.edu.au

Aims

• A definition and review of social enterprise activity• A quick look at the health and wellbeing impacts of

community-focused social enterprises

Defining social enterprise (from FASES)

• Social enterprises are organisations that:– Are led by an economic, social, cultural, or

environmental mission consistent with a public or community benefit;

– Trade to fulfil their mission;– Derive a substantial portion of their income from

trade; and– Reinvest the majority of their profit/surplus in the

fulfilment of their mission.

Types of Social Enterprise

• Charitable trading ventures• Cooperative and community-owned businesses• Intermediate Labour Market enterprises• ‘New start’ social enterprises

Industries in Which Social Enterprises Operate

Main Mission of Participating Social Enterprises

Targeted Beneficiaries

Barraket and Archer Study

• Looked at impacts of community enterprise on individual and collective wellbeing

• Based on:– Literature review– Online survey (N=66)– In-depth interviews with 10 enterprises (N=21)– Case studies of 4 enterprises– Workshops with 22 practitioners

Findings

• Economic participation– Most strongly emphasised– Individual participation through training and

employment creation or bridging– Area participation through retention of services,

employment and economic flows in local economy

– Prevailing theme: the social context for economic participation

– Tension: market demands vs member/participant needs

Findings (cont’d)

• Social Participation– Strong emphasis on bridging social capital.

There has been a whole lot of social benefit out of it from a whole series of people involved; there has been a series of networks developed between young people and older people…we had a number of working bees where people; the kids who worked on their part of the project and the people who had worked in [the

theatre] 30 years ago, were in the same place at the same time, so that interaction was really good.

– Emphasis on social dimensions of the day to day of doing business

Findings (cont’d)

• Civic participation– Much less evidence of individual civic participation

(consistent with European research)– Some evidence of rehabilitation of public/civic spaces

by community enterprise

Acknowledgements

• 600+ research participants• Social Traders and Westpac Foundation• Victorian Department for Human Services• Victorian Local Governance Association• Dr Verity Archer, Deakin University• Drs Nick Collyer & Heather Anderson, and Matt O’Connor,

QUT