Postscript: The Legitimacy of Social Entrepreneurship: Reflexive Isomorphism in a Pre-paradigmatic Field

It has become axiomatic in recent years for scholars to make two observations concerning social entrepreneurship: first, that there is no definitive consensus about what the term actually means (Light, 2006, 2008; Perrini, 2006); second, that the research agenda for the field is not yet clearly defined (Nicholls, 2006a, 2006b, 2009; Short et al., 2009). It has also been noted that the community of scholars currently engaging with the subject is small, under-resourced, and somewhat marginalized (Battle Anderson & Dees, 2006). Kuhn (1962) observed that an established academic paradigm attracts legitimacy and resources to a field of action that are largely withheld in a pre-paradigmatic state. Following Kuhn, the current status of social entrepreneurship can be conceptualized as a field that has yet to achieve a paradigmatic consensus and that lacks a ‘normal science’ or clear epistemology. However, despite the apparent constraints of its pre-paradigmatic status, an analysis of social entrepreneurship suggests that emergent patterns of institutionalization can be discerned, each characterized by its own discourses, narrative logics and ideal-type organizational models. Such patterns are characterized here as contests for the control of the legitimating discourses that will determine the final shape of the social entrepreneurial paradigm. This is a particular characteristic of a field that is at a less well-developed stage of legitimacy than the key paradigm-building actors within it.