Organizational Environments Of Operation
Recently organizations are responding to social issues in their environments of operation. Some could not of course, unless they were forced, like the other companies operating in Nigeria. So basically business social responsibility is reactionary; it is expo – facto, post mortem in nature, like medicine after death.
According to Archie (1979) it is based on a social awareness principle, that actions begat corresponding actions, good or bad. A raped “Nature”, a raped environment reacts vehemently to restore balance and such reactions can be cataclysmic and catastrophic as we witness today in the melting of “Ice Mountains” in North and South Poles, drastic changes in weather, earthquakes, Tsunamis, Typhoons, heavy rains, flooding, cyclones, deforestation, desertification and disease that the world had never witnessed before.
Of late therefore world business is acting as moral and ethical agents, but reactive, defensive and accommodating poses, akin to hypocritical grand standing. Social entrepreneurship on the other hand proactive and has a social purpose in all businesses do. The profit motive is secondary. Educational program are the mainstay of social entrepreneurs as they shape and prepare the future as a better place. Their actions are mainly preventive, like the GREEN PEACE movement of the world today. Social entrepreneurs are knowledge and facts based
Impact Assessment On Organizational Environments
Everything that must be done is based on impact assessment, and anything goes contrary to its social mandate or purpose is not accepted no matter the profits that may accrue. The advent of social entrepreneurship marked the end of the era of “Merchantilistic Capitalism”. Since the 1960’s, the so called developed world slipped into “post Industrialism”, and moved rapidly into an era of service and entertainment industries, based on ICT.
We now live in an information and communication age based on technology. It is a world driven by knowledge, and entrepreneurship today is moving into a stage of forming “corporate communities” of NGOs – (Non Governmental Organizations) and many other pressure and proactive groups are examples of socially entrepreneurial Organizations, OXFAM, Red Cross, WHO, ILO; FAO, etc are other examples.
The advent of social Entrepreneurship has announced the end of faceless, exploitative and wicked capitalism. The basis of social entrepreneurship is knowledge. This is because where as capitalism is based on hording profit, social entrepreneurship is based on sharing Capital decreases when shared, disseminated, communicated and put into the hands of as many people as possible, in order to solve their problems. Social entrepreneurship is based on sustainability of knowledge, skill, gift capacity and potentials.
It brings out the best in people when it comes to running their business, and enables people to exploit themselves rather than being exploited by other people. It enables people to become masters of their destinies, rather than being slaves and victims of capitalism. Knowledge can never finish, but raw material such as petroleum upon which Nigeria capitalism is based on finite resources that can finish any time. Knowledge is power, says the Good Book, the Holy Bible. So the future of entrepreneurship must be shaped based on social alliances for effective existence on earth.