Community wealth for public health

SIN Canada, in partnership with Prof. Cam Donaldson at Glasgow Caledonian University and the CIHR Institute of Population and Public Health, will be running a project this autumn on the effects of social enterprise on public health.

A social enterprise is loosely defined as a business (either for-profit or not-for-profit) whose primary aim is to benefit society or the planet rather than to maximise monetary profits for private shareholders. This project will look at the indirect public health effects on the communities in which the enterprises operate, even when the enterprises do not have a health-related mission. For example, a non-profit that offers computer classes for elderly people at a local library may improve their health by getting them out of the house, having them walk around, increasing their sense of community and giving them access to online health information.

This is a relatively new area of academic study, and we aim to bring together key researchers from Canada, the UK and the USA to pool resources from several countries and set a coordinated research agenda. Social enterprise and social innovation are key interests for the UK, so we are very interested in seeing how the various benefits can be quantified.