53 Bangladesh e-Journal of Sociology. Volume 12, Number 1. January 2015 E ntrepreneurial Social Work: The Position of Professional Practitioners for Industrial Development in Nigeria Salahu Saliman Tunde1 Abstract: Industrial development, arguably, is a waiver to globalisation. However, part of the controversial debates of globalisation is the elusive conceptualisation and adaptive contextualisation of business entrepreneurship. Indeed, at a global level, entrepreneurship still denotes skilful manipulations of opportunities, which have hitherto culminated in corporate and individualised exploitation, in the name of profit maximisation and industrial development. In sub-Saharan Africa and Nigeria in particular, while industries were developing at a geometric trend, aspirations for social values were conversely developing at an arithmetic trend, thereby creating a huge gap between industrialisation and entrepreneurial social values as well as industrial development and social transformation. These are further buttressed in failed policies on industrial development and counterproductive multinational interventions in industrial development in Nigeria. While entrepreneurial social work as a panacea has become widely accepted and gaining momentum in most parts of the developed world, the position and practices of professional practitioners are still vague and insubstantial in Nigeria. This paper, therefore, challenges the fundamental requirement of entrepreneurial social work and the practice of pragmatic social entrepreneurship, where professional social workers could be exposed to theoretical bases and empirical research as a bottom-up approach to address industrial development imbalances. Keywords: Social Work, Social Entrepreneur, Social Value, Transformation, Industrial Development, Sustainable Development. Introduction Sequel to the emergence of industrial revolution, which paved way for social transformation and gradual reduction of manual labour for individualized machinations, substantial part of the world became relatively wrapped into a globalized community and accountable to consequential 1 Department of Social Work, University of Ilorin. Nigeria.Email: [email protected] 54 Bangladesh e-Journal of Sociology. Volume 12, Number 1. January 2015 development, occasioned by incorporation into the globalizing trend. One of the major contributions of such globalization to sustainable industrial development, especially in sub-sahara Africa (SSA) is the affordability of a transformation mechanism, which ultimately enables development comparativeness among all participating economy across the world. Indeed, part of the ultimate proceeds of this globalization is change; despite the fact that change is endemic in all facets of industrial development, the most outstanding change, according to different studies, is the one propelled by innate skills, or what may be described as entrepreneurial social values (Schumpeter, 2012; Shane,2003; Shane & Nicolauo, 2013); however, when entrepreneurial exploitations fail, researchers and practitioners often resort to social entrepreneurship through social innovation (Akil, 2013;Delmar & Davidson, 2000; Fudric,2008). Despite the growing attention to social entrepreneurship and similarities between various theories and conceptualizations, there seems no universally accepted accord on whether social entrepreneurship exists, or what it is or is not. It is a multi-interpretable concept, and although the use of the terms is widespread, its meaning often contradicts. Moreover, the positive societal connotation of the term social entrepreneurship also seems not to have been helpful as a starting point for scholarly endeavours (Cho, 2006; Nicholls & Cho, 2006; Zahra et al., 2009). Not surprisingly, a considerable amount of scholarly effort is devoted to defining the key constructs of social entrepreneurship (Dees, 1998; Mair & Martí, 2006; Mort, Weerawardena, & Carnegie, 2003; Peredo & McLean, 2006; Perrini & Vurro, 2006). These misinterpretations at some point influenced studies concentrating on the commonalities and distinctions with closely related fields such as commercial or conventional entrepreneurship (Austin, Stevenson, & Wei-Skillern, 2006; Dorado, 2006; Mair & Martí, 2006; Roberts & Woods, 2005), nonprofit enterprises (Boschee & McClurg, 2003),social activism, and social service provision (Martin & Osberg, 2007). At first glance, social entrepreneurship is a mixture of related but different phenomena. However, the incidental increasing popularity of social entrepreneurship subsequently; no doubt, has influenced discourses especially among academics and policy makers who are largely concentrated in the United States, Europe, and recently Asia and Latin America (Defourny & Nyssens, 2010a). Notwithstanding, the outcome of these scholarly engagement has attracted a global insinuation about sustainable industrial development, which incidentally polarised the concept (Industrial Development) along two dichotomies: while one philosophy emphasises basic trajectory factors militating against industrialisation, the other essentially denotes potential ingredients for long-term development, which of course could only be achieved through stringent policies. It is not surprising that this unfolding scenario has informed the emergence of many countries (including the developed and developing ones), struggling for sustainable industrial development at different competitive edges, with different industrial planning and strategies, amidst differential political economy systems (United Nations Industrial Development Organisation [UNIDO], 2007). 55 Bangladesh e-Journal of Sociology. Volume 12, Number 1. January 2015 Globally, industrial development and sustainable development are two interwoven but distinct concepts, it is almost difficult, if not impossible to analyse industrial development without considering the implications of its sustainability. While many countries across the world have surpassed in the area of industrial development, not quite much had exhibited proficient sustenance in its internal potentials and human resources. In Nigeria to be specific, Industrial development might not be a problem, what stands in the way of industrial development and sustaining the development is the perception, knowledge and pragmatic utilization of social entrepreneurship at addressing often neglected industrial challenges. It is arguable to state that Nigeria industrial policies had not only failed at addressing core industrial challenges, (i.e. infrastructural development, skills acquisition, technology transfer, ideals modelling, conversion of opportunities, etc.) they have utterly discouraged pragmatic social entrepreneurship, with which professionals could improvise relative solution to a growing population, with pluralist socio-religious and cultural implications. In spite of the fact that industrialisation is relevant, especially as a result of its valuable contribution to the alleviation of poverty, enhancement of productivity, creation of employment, enhancement of income-generating assets for the poor and diversification of exports as well as reduction of exposure to risk (Anan, 2003; Industrial Development Report, 2004; Sonobe and Tsuka, 2006; UNIDO, 2002), In Nigeria, the reverse is the case, hence, industrial development policies keep changing without commensurate social values, as well as engagement of professional social workers’ (entrepreneur) who could employ differential dimensions at reorganizing and redirecting trained personnel, for effective exhibition and rational social entrepreneurship. Against this backdrop, it is safe to argue that yesterday’s Nigeria’s industrial development solutions are not enough to address today’s industrial needs, which makes the problems a revolving social chimera, seeking alternative industrial development options, for the growth and survival of the Nigerian social entrepreneurship. This paper is divided into six logical analyses which include introduction; theoretical analysis of social entrepreneurship and industrial development; imperatives of entrepreneurship for sustainable industrial society; prerequisites of social entrepreneurship for sustainable industrial development with remarkable consideration and plausible hope to illuminating the missing link in the practices of professional social work in a slow development industrial society. The conclusion looks at future implications. Theoretical Analysis of Social Entrepreneurship and Industrial Development Social entrepreneurship has emerged as a field of considerable interest over the past two decades. However, its rapid growth has resulted in a rather fragmented body of literature that lacks a set of well-established theories by which to predict and explain social entrepreneurship and a connecting set of empirical findings from which commonalities about it can be established. In response, this section exemplifies Resource-Based view and Human Capital Theory to identify the relationship between organisation and individual potential strength at creating social value and innovation. Theoretical Exploration of the Resource-Based View and Human Capital Theory 56 Bangladesh e-Journal of Sociology. Volume 12, Number 1. January 2015 The central focus of social entrepreneurship is that individuals can create novel business ideas to address society’s most pressing problems, such as poor’s access to food, clean water, healthcare, and education (Yunus 2010). It is imperative to state that social entrepreneurs have two logical objectives which are to create self-sustaining enterprises and solve identified social problems. As such, social enterprises (SEs) are known to have a dual identity, which is also known as hybridity. In the present milieu of value creation, engagement in this dual identity is a matter of compulsion. This position contrasts with known traditional venture capital whose primary aim is to provide a return on investment for its limited partners, organisations and individuals that invested in the social sector. Thus, traditional venture capital has the dual objectives of earning both a social return and a financial return on their investments. However, this dual identity poses a challenge for conventional management theories that assume that only one corporate objective namely; profit maximisation, which is the singular objective of every investor. However, the question that strikes imagination is that how could a social entrepreneur maintain dual identity without sacrificing one motive for another? The resources-based view by Barney (1986) states that a firm’s competitive advantage lies in its stock of valuable resources, which cannot be easily imitated or substituted by competing firms. Resources, thus, enable and constrain the specific strategies of an organisation. An important resource that Barney (1991) identifies is the firm’s Human Capital theory by Becker (1964). Human Capital (HC) theory suggests that human capital is of great relevance to a new firm’s survival and early success. Research has also demonstrated that much of a nascent firm’s success is dependent on the human capital of its partnership and founders. Therefore, a logical understanding of both Resources-based and Human Capital theories of social entrepreneurship premise an innovator as a change agent, whom regardless of his financial myth, still stands a double approach advantages. He is a change creator, who harnesses opportunities in return for social innovation, yet organisations rely on his established network of relationship before either “for profit” or “not for profit” ventures could take any viable effect. Sociological implications of these theories, therefore, hang on the inevitable roles of social entrepreneurs as social actors in the drive and development of emerging dimension of social entrepreneurship. While some scholars have criticised these theories on the grounds that human beings are egocentric, as such, they would only commit themselves in industrial development or social change, in as much as they acquire directly, to themselves, both financial and labour values. As rational thinkers, human beings would always want to engage less in ventures, when there are less direct derivations. From this background, one could predict and account for human social actions; from whatever motivational value the actor may be influenced by. Globalization has been greatly influenced by history, language, culture and technological derivations, as result, human society has been exposed to a number of challenges, from social to political and from economic to religious inhibitions; all this pose a direct challenge to existing business opportunities, which leave investors and government to fewer alternatives. This is where the role of social entrepreneurs become imperative, not only as identifier of business opportunities, but also as inventor and modifier of social 57 Bangladesh e-Journal of Sociology. Volume 12, Number 1. January 2015 networks, where plausible engagement could produce self-sustaining interactions, as well as reduction in the gap between large scale industrialization and between government and individuals. Imperatives of Entrepreneurship and Social Entrepreneur A closer look at the international multidimensional business industrial development, especially with its ever-changing facets of internal and external structure, one would but conclude that the basis of entrepreneurship denotes more than opportunity exploitation; it indeed spans from inspiration, creativity, direct action, courage, psychological convictions to, of course, readiness for anticipated risk. The word entrepreneurship connotes mixed orientations; on one hand, it connotes a special, innate ability to sense and act on opportunity, combining out-of-the-box thinking with a unique brand of determination to create or bring about something new to the world. On the other hand, entrepreneurship is hinged on nature and nurture, with nature depicting environmental composition and nurture indicating the uniqueness of ideas required to sustain the established potentials. The position of analysts is that, whether nature or nurture, entrepreneurial activities require a passage of time before their true impact could be manifested (Ahmed, 2007). In the light of the above, it may be difficult to account for the conceptual definition of entrepreneurship, just as attempt to describe entrepreneurial personality traits uniquely, using sociological and psychological analytics could be a dubious validity; as quite a number of other non-intuitive occupations may want to assume the position, simply because of human and material invention deployed. An Entrepreneur is one who “shifts economic resources out of an area of lower productivity and into an area of higher productivity and greater yield,” thereby expanding the literal translation from the French, “one who undertakes,” to encompass the concept of value creation (Jean-Baptiste, 2001). In the opinion of Schumpeter (1975), successful entrepreneurship sets off a chain reaction, encouraging other entrepreneurs to iterate upon and ultimately propagate the innovation to the point of “creative destruction”, a state at which the new venture and all its related ventures effectively render existing products, services and business models obsolete. From this standpoint, while Schumpeter sees entrepreneurs as change agents, Drucker (1995), on the other hand, does not; rather, he regards entrepreneurs as canny and committed exploiters of change who always search for change, respond to it and exploit it as an opportunity. From this illustration, one may be tempted to agree that entrepreneurship as a concept is rooted in a remarkable continuum of career, where the apex of the structure is industrialisation. In other words, all industrialisation process and development would not have been possible without some elements of entrepreneurship. Regardless of the elusive conceptualisation and adaptive contextualisation of business entrepreneurship at a global level, entrepreneurship, fundamentally, still denotes skilful manipulation of opportunities, which culminates in corporate and individualised exploitation. In sub-Saharan Africa and Nigeria, in particular, while industries were developing at geometric trend, in the name of profit maximisation and industrial development, aspirations for social values were conversely retrogressing at the same trend, thereby creating a huge gap between industrialisation and entrepreneurial social 58 Bangladesh e-Journal of Sociology. Volume 12, Number 1. January 2015 values, as well as industrial development and social transformation (UNIDO, 2013; United Nations, 2007). Entrepreneurs’ characteristics vary, but global assertion to the underlining context of entrepreneurship lies behind an exceptional entrepreneur, whose strong commitment, unprecedented innovation, convincing exploitation and above all, unflinching willingness to bear the risk inherent in the engagement, transform a little conception into opportunity realities (Roger, Martin & Sally, 2007; World Trade Organisation, 2006). Till today, America’s established entrepreneurs are in the likes of Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak of Apple Computer, Pierre Omidyar and Jeff Skoll of eBay, Ann and Mike Moore of Snugli, and Fred Smith of FedEx. In Africa and Nigeria in particular, there are the likes of Cosmos Maduka, of Coscharis Group, Aliko Dangote of Dangote Conglomerate, Mike Adenuga of Globacom, Fola Adeola of GT Bank, Raymond Dokpesi of AIT GroupandFemi Otedola of Forte Oil Plc. This list excludes other great entrepreneur billionaires, who never finished schools, for instance, Late Alhaji Alhassan Dantata, Rasaq Okoya, founder of Eleganza Group, Olorogun Michael Ibru, founder of the Ibru Organisation and Cletus Madubugwu Ibeto, founder of the Ibeto Group, among many others. In the developing world, expectations are that planned small and medium scale businesses are the prime movers of job creation, income, growth, and poverty reduction. Therefore, government articulation for booming entrepreneurship is always a crucial strategy for economic development. According to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development [OECD] (2003; p.21), “Policies to foster entrepreneurship are essential to job creation and economic growth.” It therefore becomes imperative for government to provide incentives that could encourage entrepreneurs to risk attempting new ventures. Among these are laws to enforce property rights and to encourage a competitive market system. Similarly, studies have also shown the implications of culture at determining the success and or failure of entrepreneurship in different socio-ethnic entities (Thomas and Mueller, 2000; Collins, 2003). Hence, if a country ascribes values to its citizens, based on their hierarchy in organisational settings, without evaluating their passion for social value orientation, such country may discourage the value of entrepreneurship, as well as replace originality with mediocrity. Where the principles of self-made success are enforced and rewarded, expectations are that economic development could be monitored and pragmatically designed to subdue poverty and unemployment. At this juncture, it may be crucial to ask why and how do people become entrepreneurs? Why is entrepreneurship beneficial to an economy? How can governments encourage entrepreneurship in order to stimulate economic growth? And what are the appropriate policies to ensure sustainability in the case of digression? Why do People opt for Entrepreneurship? Whether or not taught, key requirements for entrepreneurial success include a degree of optimism, resilience and focused determination in conditions of uncertainty; a willingness to take on and 59 Bangladesh e-Journal of Sociology. Volume 12, Number 1. January 2015 manage risk; a desire to create or seek out opportunities; a willingness to make decisions quickly in a dynamically changing and competitive technological and environment; and the desire and capacity to create an organization to execute the business strategy and grow the business. As Agbeze (2012) noted, entrepreneurial activities and innovative ingenuity abound in Nigeria, many of which remain potentially untapped. Among these enterprises are agricultural/agro-allied activities; where there are foodstuffs, restaurants, fast food vending and others. Solid minerals; where there is quarrying, German stone cutting/polishing and crushing engineering; power and transport; with power generators, Haulage business (cargo and passengers). Information and Telecom business: with manufacturing and repairs of GSM accessories and the printing and selling of Recharge cards. Hospitality and tourism business; with hotels, accommodation, resorts centres, film and home video production; in oil and gas business; there are construction and maintenance of pipelines, drilling, refining by-products. In the area of environmental and waste management business; there is refuse collection/disposal, recycling, and drainage/sewage construction job. In the area of financial banking services; there is banking, insurance and stock trading. In engineering and fabrication work; there are machines and tools fabrications. There is also the building and construction, where there are plan and design services and material sourcing. Studies in Nigerian entrepreneurship have also established the fact that Nigeria is facing a number of challenges. Worthy of note is unethical behaviour from entrepreneurs, government agencies, competitors, speculators and customers. It must be recalled that this circle of industrial intricacies is drastically slowing the pace of capital flow in Nigeria (Ogundele and Opeifa, 2004); consequently, development is far from reaching the citizenry. The following figure illustrates the complex nature of entrepreneurship and industrial development in Nigeria. In the diagram below, Nigerian entrepreneurs represent the central circle surrounded by thirteen elements, while globalisation represents the circle; the arrows that navigate out to each of the other elements impact on entrepreneurial development. The diagram below denotes that globalisation has its own distinct effects on each of the elements. The inner double-sided arrows show impacts of the various elements on Nigerian entrepreneurs. The inner arrows with broken lines represent the challenges posed by various elements to Nigerian entrepreneurs. From all indications, they show that each element within the circle is a challenge to Nigerian entrepreneurs; no wonder unemployment and poverty are pervasive in the country. 60 Bangladesh e-Journal of Sociology. Volume 12, Number 1. January 2015 Nigeria Entrepreneur ssrrrrrsrs urs Source: Ogundele, 2004 Perhaps, a decisive way to underline the success and/or failure of sustainable industrial development in Nigeria is to evaluate the contributions of large-scale business to the survival of mass poor (Collins, 2003;Osotimehin, Jegede and Akinlabi, 2012), whom are the end users and beneficiaries of both economic and technological advancement. If indeed, human core values are compromised (as evidenced across different business conglomerates), one could substantially establish the position of a social entrepreneur, who is characterised by altruism and aims for social value in the form of large- scale, transformational benefit that accrues either to a significant segment of society or to society at large. Social entrepreneurship has its origins in the 18th and 19th centuries when philanthropic business owners and industrialists demonstrated a concern for the welfare of employees by improving their working, education and cultural lives (Shaw & Carter, 2004). At present in Nigeria, the role of social entrepreneur is often considered as undeserving and neglected, since highly disadvantaged population could not benefit from the derivative social 61 Bangladesh e-Journal of Sociology. Volume 12, Number 1. January 2015 satisfaction; these are the people who really lack the financial means or political capacity to achieve the transformative benefit on their own (Roger, Martin & Sally, 2007). However, it is essential to note that social entrepreneurs do not completely shun profit making, rather, they propose value ventures creation, where automatic regeneration of income could be maintained, and could be organised as either not-for-profits or for-profit orientations (Thompson & Doherty, 2006; Townsend & Hart, 2008). By implication, social entrepreneurship could be seen as grounded in social rationality; a completely different philosophical perspective that prioritises human relationships above task-efficiency, especially where and when one could justifiably perform a task less efficiently, if the opposite of doing so is the strengthening of a social and community relationships. Globally, social entrepreneurs possess three fundamental components; one is identification of a stable but inherently unjust equilibrium that causes the exclusion, marginalisation, or suffering of a segment of humanity that lacks the financial means or political power to achieve any transformative benefit on their own. Followed is identification of an opportunity in unjust equilibrium, developing a social value proposition, and bringing to bear inspiration, creativity, direct action, courage, and fortitude, thereby challenging the stable state’s hegemony. The third is forging a new, stable equilibrium that releases deprived potential or alleviates the suffering of the targeted group, and through imitation and the creation of a stable structure around the new equilibrium ensuring a better future for the targeted group and even society at large (see Roger, Martin & Sally, 2007). Even though the scholarly field of social entrepreneurship is still in a stage of infancy (Zahra, Gedajlovic, Neubaum, and Shulman, 2009), which renders it with no clear definition of its domain (Zahra et al., 2009), social entrepreneurship literature is still centred on two major levels of individual and the organisation. Quite a large number of authors focus on the individual level, defining the founder of the initiative (Mair and Marti, 2006), who is considered a change agent (Shaw &Carter, 2004), acting upon an opportunity and gathering resources to exploit it. Many have been pointing out different characteristics among social and for-profit entrepreneurs (Austin, Stevenson & Wei-Skillern, 2006). While the central goal of for-profit entrepreneurs is to create wealth for private gain, the goal of social entrepreneurs is to create wealth that could serve as a means to social ends. Generally, the process of entrepreneurship is the same across all new ventures: acting on an opportunity, acquiring resources, and building a team to create something of value (Shane & Venkataraman, 2000). However, for social entrepreneurship, the difference lies in the founding mission and market impact (Neck, Brush, & Allen, 2009), which is the reason social entrepreneurship research should evolve beyond descriptive purposes and geared towards more predictive purposes. Although, disagreements persist about the domain of entrepreneurship (Shane and Venkataraman, 2000; Zahra and Dess, 2001) and adding the prefix “social” further exacerbates this definitional debate (Zahra et al., 2009). In social entrepreneurship, the social component refers to the creation of social wealth as opposed to private wealth creation (Hoogendoorn and Hartog, 2010). Social wealth, therefore, can be operationalized because social value created is offset by social costs incurred (Zahra et al., 2009). 62 Bangladesh e-Journal of Sociology. Volume 12, Number 1. January 2015 The desire to benefit the society in some ways spurs the genuineness for value and wealth creation, for instance, provision of clean water and education to deprived communities, empowerment of women, and providing jobs for disabled people (Hoogendoorn and Hartog, 2010) represent a perfect description of dedicated social ventures. In the level of organisation, social entrepreneurs are the innovators who found new organisations, develop and implement new programmes and methods, organise and expand new services, and redirect the activities of faltering organisations. Therefore, social entrepreneurs are people who realise where there is an opportunity to satisfy some unmet need that the state welfare will not or cannot meet, and who gather together the necessary resources (generally people, often volunteers, money and premises) and use these to make a difference. Similarly, social entrepreneurs represent those who operate in the community and are more concerned with caring and helping than making money (Thompson, Alvy and Lees, 2000; Thompson, 2002). In developing and emerging economies like Nigeria, social entrepreneurs should be designed as change agents for basic and pressing needs, while in more developed countries like the United States, social entrepreneurs have come up with different innovative business models that tended to regenerate deprived communities, provide services and jobs for disabled people, and carry out waste recycling and nature protection (Bosma and Levie, 2010). Ideally, non-profit entrepreneurs are energetic individuals, at different levels, with a higher than average tolerance for uncertainty, and a willingness to pursue their goals in spite of initial obstacles or lack of resources. To creative thinkers, non-profit entrepreneurs focus on vision and opportunity, and use their ability to convince and empower others to help turn these visions into reality (CCSE, 2001). According to Ashoka (2001), the ethical values that guide non-profit entrepreneurs help ensure that public money is well spent, ideas are not corrupted by interests and that they are fully committed to the work of their enterprise, this is fundamentally where sustainable development is actualized, within the social networks of value regeneration and uncompromised discipline and presumption of likely unethical digression of intents and overview objectives; studies have shown that Nigeria is blessed with a number of resource personnel who could best fit in these areas, but more often than not, they are incapacitated by both internal and external stringent conditions. Since these conditions are relatively becoming insurmountable and intervention becoming more complex, social entrepreneurship therefore becomes associated with community enterprise and development, education, churches, mosques, charities, the not-for-profit sector and voluntary organisations. This is why its roles are considered vital to the development and delivery of innovative approaches to social problems that persist despite the efforts of traditional, public, voluntary or community mechanisms (Shaw and Carter, 2004). The argument for and against social entrepreneurship is controversial, different schools of thoughts have advanced diverse arguments to substantiate their position, hence; part of the argument is that social entrepreneurship should be separated from social service provision and social activism. The following section illuminates the core