Social entrepreneurship in Russia

[1][2] Its origin as a phenomenon of the post-Soviet history of the country should be attributed to the first half of the 2000s, [3][4] although similar initiatives of individual enthusiasts occasionally took place already in the 1990s,[5] and prototypes of social and entrepreneurial activity can be found also in earlier periods, up to the turn of the XIX-XX centuries.

[10] A number of sustainable projects are operating in Russia, mainly in the areas of farming, recycling of certain types of household waste, supporting for the disabled and elderly persons and graduates of orphanages as well, the revival of folk crafts, local tourism,[11] but they also cannot boast of an unconditional success, scale of activity, and even more the replicability of their experience.

Large problem areas of paramount importance, such as drug addiction, alcoholism, unemployment, general low living standards, corruption and bureaucracy, are left out of the scope of social entrepreneurs.

The curtailment of the work of international non-profit organizations in Russia since the early 2000s,[14][15] the lack of real support at the federal level for a number of traditional social entrepreneurs activities[16] and the scarcity of the legislative framework also hinder progress in this area.

[18][22] Through the efforts of Baron von Buxhoeveden, and also thanks to the patronage of Grand Duchess Alexandra Iosifovna, the experience of arranging Houses of Diligence was quickly spread throughout the empire.

[18][22] By the time of the October Revolution, which put an end to the public solution to the problems of poverty, there were hundreds Houses of Diligence, they were represented in most large cities of Russia.

[26] The period of a significant softening of the principles of Soviet collectivism fell on the 1920s, after the New Economic Policy (NEP) was adopted on March 14, 1921, by the 10th Congress of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks), which replaced the "military communism" that operated during the Civil War.

One of the earliest examples of a social enterprise should be considered the street newspaper Na Dne (since 2003 - Put Domoi), which has been distributed since 1994 by homeless people of St.

In the first years of its operation, the Center itself worked on the principles of social entrepreneurship, enjoyed the support of the regional administration, and a youth business incubator was created under it.

[29] However, soon, with the exhaustion of grant funds, the topics of the courses shifted towards traditional business management, and then any works in the field of supporting social entrepreneurship were ceased.

[30][31] The first case of interest in social entrepreneurship on the part of Russian business, probably, belongs to 2003 also - the aluminum company RUSAL launched the program “One Hundred Cool Projects”.

[40][49] The Severstal Metallurgical Plant, located in Cherepovets, together with the City Hall, co-founded the "Agency for Urban Development", on the basis of which the "Regional Center for Social Innovations" was organized.

[63] The agency declares support for projects in several areas: innovative business, search and attraction of talented young leaders, promotion and replication of socially significant initiatives.

An annual all-Russian competition of the RUIE is held, reports and round tables at conferences within the framework of the Russian Business Week are devoted to the issues of social entrepreneurship.

[41] The RMC is actively engaged in charity work, its representatives participate in a public discussion on the concept of state support for social entrepreneurship in the country.

[76] Since 2015, St. Petersburg State University has been running a training program for social entrepreneurs, with the opportunity to listen to lectures remotely and with subsequent mandatory certification.

[76] Although attempts to support social entrepreneurship are noted at the federal and regional levels in Russia, they lack consistency,[77] and, as a consequence, the effectiveness of this activity remains questionable.

[81] As of August 2014, with the support of the Agency for Strategic Initiatives (ASI) and the Ministry of Economic Development, 12 social innovation centers began to operate, but the results of their activities for 2015 did not receive wide coverage in specialized publications.

Genuine Russian social entrepreneurs rarely define themselves by this fashionable phrase,[103] while various imitators, on the contrary, actively use it to gain access to grants, loans, various preferences, for the purpose of PR or as a marketing ploy.

The terminological problem caused a large scatter in the estimates for the rest of the survey items and, as a result, was recognized as the basic one for the entire field of social business.

[83] Anton Yaremchuk (ASI) sees the main problem of the Russian social entrepreneur precisely in his “dependent approach, the feeling that the state owes him something personally”.

[83] Due to the insufficient elaboration of the theoretical base in the legislation of the Russian Federation, for a long time there was no separate general legal section on social entrepreneurship.

[84] The next attempt was made on October 16, 2014: a group of parliamentarians from the Upper and Lower Chambers of the Federal Assembly introduced a bill on social entrepreneurship and forms of support to the State Duma, but it was not adopted either.

[113] It was based on a bill introduced a year earlier by Galina Karelova, Lyudmila Bokova and a number of other senators and deputies with the support of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs and its president, Alexander Shokhin, personally.

It was proposed to extend it to small and medium-sized businesses, 30% of whose employees are disabled, single or large parents, graduates of orphanages and former prisoners, and their share in the wages fund is at least 25%.

However, a number of areas that are important and traditional for social entrepreneurship in Russian and world practice were not covered by the law, in particular, environmental activities, projects for the preservation and development of villages, and the revival of folk arts and crafts.

- Oleg Sapozhkov and Dmitry Butrin for Kommersant[126]On the other hand, the law is focused not so much on subsidies as on the support of infrastructure - the SICs,[126] and the regional authorities still have the opportunity to supplement the list of social enterprises by type of activity.

[134][135][136] According to the order, entrepreneurs wishing to receive the status of a "social enterprise" in the "first wave" had to submit an abbreviated package of documents to the regional authorized bodies by March 1, 2020.

[89] Most of the social entrepreneurs included in the register provide childcare services, operate in the field of additional education, sports, health care, physical culture and recreation activities.

Some social entrepreneurs are involved in caring for the elderly, publishing and printing, sewing and repairing clothes (in particular, for the disabled), solving problems of environmental protection, producing technical means of rehabilitation, and working in the field of information technology.