LUBS1010 – Understanding Social Enterprises
🎯 Course Overview
This module explores social enterprises as ‘for-purpose’ organizations that address social and environmental challenges through innovative business models. Students will examine how these enterprises operate in different contexts, their stakeholder relationships, and their contributions to Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The course combines theoretical frameworks with real-world case studies from both developed and developing countries.
📅 Weekly Lecture Themes
- Week 1: Introducing for-purpose firms and social entrepreneurs
- Week 2: Framing societal challenges and the role of business
- Week 3: Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and wicked problems
- Week 4: Hybrid organizations and B Corps
- Week 5: Fairtrade social enterprises
- Week 6: Stakeholder management in social enterprises
- Week 7: Contextual influences on social enterprises
- Week 8: Trade-offs and unintended consequences
- Week 9: Social innovation in practice
- Week 10: Financing and scaling social enterprises
📚 Key Readings
- Disruptors textbook (provided in course materials)
- Holt & Littlewood (2015) on hybrid organizations
- Fairtrade Foundation reports and case studies
- B Corp certification materials
- United Nations SDG documentation
📝 Assessment
100% Coursework: 2500-word report analyzing three social enterprise cases (one B Corp/Fairtrade company, one self-identified social enterprise, and one case from course materials).
Assignment Structure:
- Introduction to three selected organizations (origins, mission, beneficiaries)
- Stakeholder analysis and comparisons
- SDG contributions and implementation
- Scaling potential and challenges
- Future outlook with threats and opportunities
Key Requirements: Comparative analysis throughout, use of academic literature, tables/diagrams encouraged, strict prohibition of AI-generated content.