Book reviews: Low-flying heroes: Micro-social enterprise below the radar screen

Alex MacGillivray, Pat Conaty and Chris Wadhams

(London: New Economics Foundation ISBN 1899 407 36 7; 2001)

The flyer reads:

The `radar screen' which measures community activity is failing to pick up huge numbers of small, dynamic, informal groups in Britain's communities.

The book offers glimpses of about 20 small social enterprises and the people who run them. The New Economics Foundation (NEF) carried out interview research in Birmingham and Hastings as well as a review of some British literature on social enterprise, micro-enterprise and the non-profit voluntary sector. The best aspect of the book is its optimism. A certain faith in the strength of local human relationships colours the text with a rosy glow of hope. Not only are local social enterprises surviving, say the authors, they are a growing sector which needs a revised `mutuality' regulatory framework. In the rest of this review I discuss the financial framework proposed and the underlying assumptions of the NEE At the outset the authors pose a contrast of meanings: Business for the sake of profit versus enterprise for the sake of innovation. As proponents of the latter, the NEF recommend that grants be stepped (large ones following successful use of small ones) and application procedures be streamlined. The contrast of the for-profit discourse and the not-for-profit discourse is stressed even more when the authors offer a direct alternative to the accountants' Internal Rate of Return.

� Inspiration

� Resources

� Relationships

These are the three pillars upon which micro-social enterprise rests (citing Perry Walker at NEF).

However the separation of these two viewpoints is belied by details of the NEF viewpoint. Cost- minimisation, borrowing start-up capital and paying market wages are three elements of the for-profit discourse that have crept into this book. Furthermore, the researchers' interview schedule reveals a bias toward "making your project as independent as possible", producing a business plan, and raising funding. Whilst NEF is admirable in building bridges between the for-profit discourse and the non-profit discourse, the bottom line always seems to be commercial self-sufficiency. Implicitly there is a market orientation which ignores the power of state or local government to decide on its social agenda and to act. The authors foresee no growth in the active role of state or local agencies in funding the interesting, valuable, socially desirable activities.

Perhaps the NEF bottom line keeps moving towards a commercial orientation when I would prefer to see it moving away, as advocated by Michael Lerner in his books (such as Spirit Matters and The Politics of Meaning) and within social credit texts.

In the United States, media watchdog Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) reported a similarly gung-ho approach. FAIR counted a total of 44 columns in the New York Times and Washington Post (the two national US papers) that clearly stressed a military response, against only two columns stressing non-military solutions. Overall, the Post was more militaristic, running at least 32 columns favouring military action, compared to 12 in the Times. But the Post also provided the only two columns in the first three weeks after September 11 that argued for non-military responses; the Times had no such columns. (FAIR, ACTION ALERT: Op-Ed Echo Chamber: 'Little space for dissent to the military line', November 2, 2001)

Suggested Action: No specific action recommended.

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