A book by an Indian academic on social entrepreneurship was long overdue. The nascent twenty-first century field of social entrepreneurship has expanded significantly since, among other reasons, Muhammad Yunus winning the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006. He won for his work on microfinance, interest among business schools in emerging markets and business models beyond state and market failure, the increasing flow of global capital for exploring social enterprises, and entrepreneurship as a solution to the problems faced by the poor. This is despite ‘social entrepreneurship’ having had a longer history and the word being popularised by Bill Drayton and his organisation ‘Ashoka’ that has been supporting social entrepreneurs across the world since 1980. There are 599 Ashoka Fellows from India from the over 3300 Fellows, reiterating the need for an Indian perspective despite the rise of specialised journals on social innovation and entrepreneurship internationally.
