Across the world, attitudes are changing. Old certainties about tightly defined roles for government, civil society and business are dissolving. Charities and non-profits are becoming more business-like, and business is looking to deliver sustainable value.
A number of countries have already created the legal mechanisms to allow for an intermediate type of enterprise, trading for social mission and with most or all profit reinvested into that social mission.
Through Trustlaw, Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffee provided legal assistance to UnLtd, a leading provider of support services for social entrepreneurs, to produce ground-breaking research on the legal forms and mechanisms across the G8 countries that are available to social purpose businesses.
“There is an increasing appetite among some social entrepreneurs to establish social purpose businesses that retain the flexibility to take on investment for growth and to distribute profits, while maintaining a long term commitment to the social mission” said Cliff Prior, CEO of UnLTD: The Foundation for Social Entrepreneurs
The report looks at specific corporate structures that can be used by these social enterprises, the mechanisms to lock in or demonstrate social purpose, and identifies areas for legal reform in each G8 country. It covers the legal frameworks of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan Russia, and the United Kingdom and the United States.
The report was produced at an opportune time as five out of the eight countries are at various stages of changing their law and regulation on the combination of purpose and profit.
“The research has attracted a lot of interest from entrepreneurs, policy makers and the legal community. We hope that it will stimulate legal innovations in many countries, in line with the Taskforce's recommendation that governments should provide appropriate legal forms or provisions for entrepreneurs and investors who wish to secure social mission into the future.” said Cliff.
Read more here.
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This project has been nominated for the 2015 TrustLaw Impact Award. Learn more about the TrustLaw Awards.
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