Regional demand and supply factors of social entrepreneurship

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to empirically investigate determinants of social entrepreneurship. Design/methodology/approach The study uses a large-scale database covering Sweden’s 290 municipalities over the 1990-2014 period. The theoretical analysis is based on the demand and supply theory of entrepreneurship, while the empirical analysis is based on feasible generalized least-squares regression models. Findings The results indicate that the male proportion of the workforce, education level, the presence of entrepreneurial role models, wealth, unemployment rate, age, and urbanization positively influence the rate of social venture creation in a region. Originality/value This is one of few studies that empirically investigate determinants of social entrepreneurship, and the very first in the Swedish context. The study uses a large-scale database and advanced regression methods.