Social Business: Theory, Practice, and Critical Perspectives

Conceptualized and put into practice by Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient Dr. Muhammad Yunus, social businesses work to address social ills such as poverty, lack of health care, gaps in education and environmental challenges. This book explores the ideation, practice and evaluation of the concept of social business. Not just theoretical foundations but several case studies of social businesses around the world and state-of-the-art assessment of the issues that arise in the planning, marketing and evaluation of social businesses, are featured in this book.

This cutting-edge collection of articles, presented by the California Institute for Social Business (CISB) in collaboration with Professor Yunus, is one of the first comprehensive collections of theory and research on the emerging field of social business. The diverse group of authors come from around the world and from various disciplinary backgrounds, representing the leading academic experts on social business phenomena.

Andrea Grove, Director of the California Institute for Social Business and Professor of Political Science at California State University Channel Islands, received a Ph.D. in Political Science from The Ohio State University in 1999, an M.A. in International Relations and Strategic Studies from Lancaster University (in the United Kingdom, where she was a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholar) in 1993 and a B.A. in Political Science from the University of Georgia in 1992. She primarily teaches in the area of international relations and came to the field of Social Business through her interest in economic development in the Global South.

Gary A. Berg, PhD is Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs at California State University Channel Islands and author of numerous articles on current issues in higher education, public policy and distance learning as well as numerous books including Low-Income Students and the Perpetuation of Inequality: Higher Education in America published in 2011. His research interests fall into two major categories: higher education policy and educational media. Through association with the Good Work Higher Education project based at Claremont Graduate University, Stanford University and Harvard University, Berg’s research on non-traditional universities, published in book form in 2005 as Lessons From the Edge: For-Profit and Non-Traditional Higher Education in America, led to a focus on low-income students and the larger social mobility function and public policy context.