Social Value and Sociological Perspective on Social Entrepreneurship

The needs of communities are endless and unlimited like the needs of individuals. Societies have to meet their reasonable set of unlimited needs to sustain their continuity. Otherwise, social problems become unsolvable and these problems that become unsolvable can be sources of other problems. In this sense, social enterprises are the institutions that have emerged in order to meet the needs of the society and to solve the problems. The close relation of social enterprises with society and social structure and the “social” expression in the concept make it necessary to look at social entrepreneurship from a sociological perspective. In this direction, the aim of this chapter is intended to create a sociological perspective on social entrepreneurship that aims to contribute to social order and welfare rather than commercial entrepreneurship serving the purpose of individual or organizational interest in economic sense. In the context of sociological perspective, social problem, social benefit, social mission and vision, social value, social capital, and finally, social change and transformation concepts and their relation with social entrepreneurship are examined.