This book illustrates how social entrepreneurship can be used as a tool for addressing grand challenges. Combining leading theoretical insights with rigorous empirical methodologies, the book is the result of field work with 17 social entrepreneurs in the Netherlands and the United Kingdom at various points during the COVID-19 pandemic. Adopting a highly innovative theoretical synthesis to discuss the role of social entrepreneurs as potential agents for positive social change, the book introduces the sociomateriality of space, Luhmann’s systems theory, and the social imaginary as missing building blocks in which disruption is created and navigated for creating positive social change. Concluding with a chapter that focuses on the practicalities of meeting the Sustainable Development Goals, the authors extend scholarship in social entrepreneurship and provide a comprehensive account of insights gained from the pandemic, demonstrating how these insights can enable the navigation of further grand challenges.

Emilio Costales is a PhD candidate at the School of Business and Management at Royal Holloway University of London (UK). His research examines the role of Social Entrepreneurship in the development of Smart Cities and is heavily involved with Systems Theory and Social Innovation. 

Anica Zeyen is a Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) in Entrepreneurship and Sustainability at the School of Business and Management at Royal Holloway University of London (UK). Anica’s research focusses on disability-related topics. Specifically, Anica investigates how (social) entrepreneurship supports societal inclusion of disabled people.