Exploring the Evolutionary Paths and Knowledge Networks in Social Enterprise Research

• Main Authors: Shun-Han - Yang, 楊順涵
• Other Authors: none
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2016
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/03769931712776406890

碩士 === 國立臺灣科技大學 === 科技管理所 === 105 === A social enterprise is an emerging type of organization which starts from European and North American countries. The new type enterprise uses innovative business model to solve social problems and create a new way to balance the goals of social problems and profits sustainably. In recent years, the increasing trend of social enterprises have attracted lots of attentions that scholars work on relevant studies on different views. In this study, we aim to find out the trajectory of social enterprise research and explore the critical scientific issues in social enterprise field. Furthermore, we also focus on finding out the factors that explain the importance of the specific literatures and scholars in this field. This study applies relevant keywords to collect data from WOS (Web of Science) database. There are a total of 647 literatures from 1987 to 2015 after removing irrelevant literatures. We use the key-route main path analysis and citation networks to find the trajectory and key issues in social enterprise research. In addition, we also apply linear regression analysis to examine the factors why specific literatures and scholars play an influential role in the knowledge network. Through main path analysis, we find that the issue development of social enterprise research can be divided into the following stages. The first stage (1994-2009) focuses on the origin and definition. The goal of social enterprise is to create social benefits or to achieve social mission. In the second stage (2010-2014), several studies focus on developing operational models of social enterprises in practice and provide the appropriate operating principles and organizational framework for social enterprises. Because the interactions of three types of sectors (i.e. government, enterprise and non-profit organizations) increases, the new and recent development in the third stage (2014-2015) turns to be complex on discussing the social issues. Social enterprises studies seem to blur the boundaries of the three sectors. A new hybrid organizational type appears in social enterprises. The empirical regression models show that the several critical factors, e.g. national originality, published journal, key scholars, play significant roles on explaining the importance of literatures in the knowledge network of social enterprise research. At the researcher level, scholar’s nationality and brokerage roles also help to explain the position of scholars in this field.