Constructing Change: The Influence of Education on Female Social Entrepreneurs

Abstract

Introduction: Female Social Entrepreneurs apply their knowledge in innovative ways in an attempt to solve complex problems in communities in order to create social value. The influence of their education or knowledge when they construct change is not clear from the literature. This paper offers an exploration on the social offering of Female Social Entrepreneurs in Africa. Literature review: The Female Social Entrepreneurs (FSEs) in this study yield positive change by constructing solutions to meet needs in their communities. Positive change is conceptualised as social value creation, social value capturing and social value sharing. Material and Methods: The sample is selected from the Ashoka database and 142 female social entrepreneurs from Africa were analysed with quantitative methods from a secondary data set. Results and discussions: Results indicate that education has an influence on how FSE’s in this study construct knowledge and it could be indicative of a growth mindset to enable them to meet the needs of communities. Conclusion: The FSEs in this study seem to construct knowledge to solve problems that relate to meeting needs of youth and children and seem to focus on education and learning. Their competencies enable them to construct positive change and share their value add in some instances via their websites to grow their business.

Keywords

• women entrepreneurship
• social entrepreneurship
• education