Social enterprise and their eco-system: A European mapping report of Germany

This report is part of the study “Social enterprises and their ecosystems in Europe” and it provides an overview of the social enterprise landscape in Germany based on available information as of May 2018.

This report provides an overview of the roots, concepts, legal evolution, numbers and ecosystem of social enterprises in Germany and the challenges they face. The first section describes a number of roots and drivers that have paved the way for the current understanding and landscape of social enterprise in Germany. These roots include the associative and welfare tradition, the cooperative movement, the tradition of mutuals, the philanthropic tradition, the roots of work integration social enterprises (both inclusive and integrative), community activism as well as the business and the policy background…