Social entrepreneurship as a strategic tool in implementing and sustaining Local Economic Development : South Africa's experience

Abstract

Local municipalities around the world face challenges of inequality, unemployment and growing poverty levels owing to the limited provision of basic services to local communities. These challenges are aggravated by international trends and new realities like urbanisation, the technological revolution and globalisation, and the increasing global competitive environment. Creative and advanced policy strategies are necessary for municipalities to tackle the social ills manifested through the high unemployment and poverty levels and lack of access to basic services. There is an increasing need for effective and continuous participation of the poor and the marginalised people in economic processes at all levels, including informal and township economic activities, enabling and stimulating such economic activity, employment and self-employment rather than expecting and waiting for economic growth to absorb the poor and the unemployed into the formal sector of the economy. Using mixed method of analysis, this work argued that social entrepreneurship strengthens the economic and social conditions through solving the social challenges where governments have not been able to effectively meet the needs of the people and concludes that provision of basic services to the underserved South Africans while uplifting their standard of living through the use of social entrepreneurship as a strategic tool to implement and sustain local economic development.