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For a long time, managing the relationship between business and society has been one of the main topics of academic and business literature. Porter and Kramer have proposed a new interpretation of this relationship based on the mutual dependence that exists between corporations and society. Trying to put into practice the shared value principle, for‐profit companies engaging in strategic CSR have chosen to implement new hybrid business models. These models include the social business model and the inclusive business model. The purpose of the paper is to understand which characteristics distinguish social and inclusive business models and what kind of benefits and risks (for companies and for communities) are connected to each model.

In order to identify the features of the inclusive business and social business models and the benefits and risks associated with these models, ten case studies were analyzed. Analysis of the business models was based on a theoretical framework developed through the analysis of the literature.

The findings of the research suggest two main conclusions. First, social and inclusive business models are similar in partner networks, use of knowledge and value chain, in the development of innovative distribution models (except for the cases in which the market considered is not in an emerging country) and in terms of social benefit. Second, the social and inclusive business models are different in terms of value proposition, governance systems, profits management model, social risks and economic profit equation.

The first limitation is that the case study analysis is based on documentary materials; for further investigation it might be useful to develop in‐depth interviews with key figures involved in the implementation of business models. Even though this descriptive study has allowed a first important step in taking a comparative analysis between the two business models, further research should strive to extend the analysis to all the hybrid business models that are being developed with the aim of creating shared value.

The final propositions allow entrepreneurs and managers to better understand the characteristics of business models. Moreover, the theoretical framework is a conceptual instrument that is useful in analyzing and evaluating alternative ways to develop new business models – based on the “creating shared value” principle – in developing markets.

The paper focuses on comparing the characteristics of the social versus inclusive business models. Studies that compare business models in the social venturing space are limited. Moreover, the study addresses the similarity and differences between the two business models rather than focusing on the two models separately as the previous researches have done.

An approach to providing an inclusive model for business value analysis is presented, where “inclusive” means that broadly defined stakeholder values are added to conventional financial criteria. A value oriented model is an interesting extension of accounting and information provision, with information seen as the carrier of value. Modelling and evaluation can be thought of as an information process that is central to steering a business towards its goals and maximising its value. The analytical expression of the model deals rigorously with both financial and intangible values, serves as a test‐bed for strategic explorations, can cover environmental and ethical risk, and can optimise a business with respect to both financial and inclusive criteria. Gathering the information and operating a model of this kind is akin to providing a strategic information service that integrates all the information into a single strategic picture. The model is a valuable information resource.

The theory building of inclusive workplace is still in its early stages, particularly concerning the inclusion of the poor in the developing countries. Through the exploration of social entrepreneurial inclusion, this study extends the inclusive workplace theory by featuring the inclusive dynamism of organizations for the poor in developing countries.

A case study approach was selected, as the goal of this study is to build on the theory in an under-researched area. This qualitative study is described as theory elaboration as it expands upon theoretical links that have received little attention among workforce diversity scholars.

We have established a conceptual framework of social entrepreneurial inclusion, which encompasses the following normative themes: organizational perspective for promoting social equality, empowering relationships, a sense of inclusion, organizational access to valuable resources and empowered inclusion.

Although we have taken an exploratory qualitative approach and made efforts to report our data neutrally, we acknowledge that the ethical and theoretical positions taken in analyzing the data may have influenced the outcome of this research and, therefore, our findings can never be truly objective. We also acknowledge that this study was conducted in developing countries, thus the poor inclusive workplace model is not generalizable for the poor in developed countries due to different institutional and ecological settings.

We have illustrated the importance of business leaders leveraging the opportunities in the space between interdependency of individuals and organizations through doing well by doing good. Poor-inclusive workplaces need business leaders who can demonstrate the effective interpersonal skills to develop constructive and personalized relationships with the workers, the family and community members to encourage the idea that the poor be included in the workplace.

The findings from this study also infer how corporations may collaborate with SEs and humanitarian agencies for inclusive growth so they can simultaneously unleash economic value and social value to develop more effective poor-inclusive business models in both sectors. Social entrepreneurs (SEs) and humanistic agencies tend to have situated knowledge of the poor in terms of locally embedded needs and knowledge of the community that corporations do not have.

This paper promotes the integrative workplace models of inclusion where inclusion of poor is empowered through involvement of multiple parties inside and outside workplaces. The empowered inclusion outcomes are strengthened through organizational access to valuable resources at the institutional level.

Food supply chains are facing significant changes and challenges coming from the need to adopt inclusive business practices and foster sustainable development. The current research aims to provide insights related to the inclusiveness of sustainable business practices of a dairy production co-operative where the smallholders are engaging with a traditional business mind-set. The purpose of the research is to deliver insights about the linkages between accounting and business practices in the adoption of an inclusive business model.

This research is based on the qualitative case study of a medium-sized production cooperative company operating in the dairy industry supply chain.

This study answers the call for research on accounting and control systems in the food sector, by exploring how management and control system is practised within contemporary supply chains. The research aims to analyse the contextual insights of managerial and organizational practices that facilitate inter-organizational relationships and coordination among actors that engage along the supply chain.

The main limitation relates to the conditions of the time available and the limited number of interviews. Even if key actors were interviewed, a larger sample would have been more beneficial to the research. However, the lack of proper results for accounting tools and software access caused some loss to the research.

This paper emphasizes the effects of the “inclusiveness” of the sustainable business models between suppliers and leading companies by enhancing the sustainable business development within the supply chain, as part of a wider business model in the food sector from an inter-organizational perspective.

Purpose – This chapter considers the question whether firms can contribute to poverty alleviation through engaging in ‘inclusive business’, thereby linking the macro concept of ‘inclusive growth’ to the micro concept of ‘inclusive business’. A key element in this approach is how to take so-called cross-sector partnerships into account. Partnerships are one way of bundling non-market resources in the internationalisation strategies of multinational enterprises (MNEs).

Design/methodology/approach – This chapter is largely exploratory and primarily aimed at validating a general taxonomy of inclusive business. The creation of a multi-level taxonomy of business models of MNEs towards inclusive business takes into account the role of cross-sector partnership portfolios. The taxonomy makes it possible to come to a first comparison of the strategies of MNEs across national and cultural boundaries, distinguish some patterns and discuss determinants of strategies in which partnerships play a role in the inclusive growth strategies of MNEs.

Findings – A first application of this taxonomy on the business and partnership models adopted by the first 100 Global Fortune companies shows that in general firms still adopt very reactive strategies when integrating inclusive business strategies in their cross-sector partnership portfolios.

Originality/value of chapter – This chapter takes a company-specific level of analysis for the relationship between Foreign Direct Investment and development, which is habitually researched at the macro level of analysis. It documents business models as well as the related cross-sector partnerships. Cross-sector partnership portfolios of companies are not yet researched at any systematic level. They form the meso-level link between micro-level business models and macro-level national development strategies.

The purpose of this paper is to reflect upon strategic marketing in emerging economies (EEs). It tries to answer the research question: what new business models are enabled by the Viable Systems Approach (VSA) and Service-Dominant Logic (SDL) perspectives?

The paper is developed by integrating two well-established perspectives – VSA and SDL – and applying them to inclusive businesses.

The integration of these perspectives allows the authors to recognize a convergence toward business models that seem to be consistent with the principles of inclusive capitalism. The authors claim that by shifting between a reductionist/static and a holistic/dynamic view, these perspectives can be integrated, thus revealing an interesting contribution to the understanding of inclusive business. Specifically, they contribute by highlighting how the economic and social dimensions are intertwined and by highlighting that the management-thinking perspective, which has dominated in recent decades, should shift toward a more inclusive vision.

The paper represents an attempt to address an inclusive capitalism perspective in the context of marketing. Nevertheless, the conceptual reasoning developed in the paper should be further supported by empirical research carried out in the context of EEs.

The paper has relevant managerial implications that suggest a rethinking of the business model to market with EEs.

The paper contributes to the research on inclusive capitalism by linking it to well-grounded conceptual approaches to business that recapture a harmonious relationship between the economy and society.

The purpose of this chapter is to call for a better cohesion between development cooperation, on the one hand, and inclusive business, on the other. This contributes to the existing post recessionary debate on development cooperation, in which, (i) traditional aid and partnership effectiveness are being revised and, (ii) the role of the private sector in development is being emphasized. It builds on recent discussions that call for a more strategic use of development cooperation to leverage other development-oriented flows, particularly those coming from the private sector.

The chapter corresponds to a conceptual chapter. Results were obtained through the study and comparison of secondary sources and a literature review. It first explores donor-private sector relations, paying particular attention to the OECD Development Assistance Committee (DAC), and then moves on to the study of inclusive business in relation to development aid.

The study first reflects upon shifts perceived in development cooperation since the Great Recession, and analyses how foreign donors have engaged more widely with businesses for addressing global development challenges. The concept of inclusive business is then introduced, describing how although the development community acknowledges the potential of the private sector as a driving force for development, inclusive business have hitherto been developing, to a great extent, aside of broader development efforts. The final section presents a typology that proposes various ways in which donor agencies may integrate inclusive business support into their private sector programs.

The chapter is of use for both academics and practitioners with an interest in development cooperation and/or inclusive business.

Proposing a conceptual study that tends toward a greater cohesion between inclusive business and development cooperation is a contribution to the literature that has emerged on Base of the Pyramid markets since early 2000s. It is argued that such cohesion may prove valuable for the betterment of public-private relations, turning them more responsive to the challenges of sustainable development in the post-2015 world.

This chapter presents an exploratory study aiming at understanding how the largest multinational enterprises (MNEs) engage small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in their (inclusive) business strategies, either as suppliers, distributors, customers, innovators or as a target of their (Corporate Social Responsibility) CSR policies.

We explore the implicit or explicit strategies of 100 largest companies in the world towards SMEs as mentioned in their annual and CSR reports. This approach takes in particular stock of the ‘narratives’ developed by MNEs as an expression of their intended and (perceived) realised strategies.

The analysis of company statements show a country of origin effect in that European firms are clearly amongst the leaders in experimenting with inclusive business strategies that include SMEs. However, their number still remains limited. Sectors like banking and retail have developed the most interesting examples that are also spread over a large number of functions.

Although the results are not yet very radical, the developed taxonomy for the different types of approaches in which MNEs take a more or less active position towards SMES provides material for further studies. It can be applied in studying leading (better-practice) cases in order to help policy makers and business strategists to develop better business models for inclusive growth.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate and understand China’s rural farmers’ financing intention of inclusive finance, and it examines related drivers like knowledge of inclusive finance, perceived benefits and perceived risks of ordering finance. Besides, the social enterprise embeddedness and digital finance are integrated into the conceptual model to further investigate their moderating impact.

The authors designed an inclusive finance intention model to examine the relations between dependent variable knowledge of inclusive finance, intermediary variables perceived benefits and perceived risks of ordering finance and the independent variable financing intention of inclusive finance. The embeddedness of social enterprise and digital finance were identified as modifying factors. Both exploratory and conclusive research strategies were applied. A structured questionnaire was developed to collect empirical data from the rural areas of China.

It suggests that knowledge of inclusive finance can strengthen both perceived benefits and perceived risk of ordering finance. Interestingly, the embeddness of social enterprise can significantly reduce risk perceptions and improve perceived benefits of ordering finance. Furthermore, perceived benefits of ordering finance can positively enhance rural farmers’ financing intention of inclusive finance, whereas perceived risks can negatively influence the financing intention. Moreover, digital finance as a modifying factor can significantly strengthen the positive correlation between perceived benefits of ordering finance and financing intention of inclusive finance.

The research indicates that a systematic inclusive finance educational project is needed to enhance rural farmers’ understanding of inclusive finance and its components. Moreover, the study reveals that it is crucial to promote social enterprise participation and digital finance to develop inclusive finance in rural China, as the service attributes of social enterprise and efficiency of digital finance can greatly reduce the existing transaction cost of farmers.

The conceptual model would potentially contribute to researchers interested in investigating the financing intention of inclusive financial services relating to rural population. The integration of social enterprise embeddedness and digital finance is the uniqueness of this research conceptual model.

As China has pressed ahead with rural revitalization in recent years, its rural financial sector has also developed rapidly and the financial environment has been greatly improved. But compared with urban areas, the rural financial sector makes rather limited contributions to rural economic development for a variety of reasons, including single types of service providers, narrow coverage, and lack of services and products. The underdevelopment of the rural financial system is closely related to the characteristics of its target customers and the economic system. The deficient rural financial credit system, the low level of IT application, the difficulty in data collection and integration, and the insufficient collateral of farmers pose high costs and huge risks for financial institutions when providing credit and other financial services.

In the present case, fintech and financial innovation complement each other: The application of fintech makes innovation possible, and the need for financial development fuels the development of fintech. Leveraging fintech and new business models, MYbank has overcome the main obstacles in the development of rural finance to provide convenient financial services for farmers and rural MSEs. Fintech is the abbreviation of “financial technology.” It can be understood as the combination of finance and technology for easier understanding, but it is more than that. Fintech refers to the innovation of traditional financial products and services with various technologies to improve efficiency and reduce operating costs. The emergence and development of fintech have led to the creation of new business models, applications, and processes, which have triggered major changes in financial markets, financial institutions, and the ways financial services are delivered, and are reshaping the financial landscapes of countries and even the world.

There are three major problems in the development of rural finance: difficult access to data, difficult risk management, and difficult market penetration. In order to gradually remove the obstacles and guarantee sustainable business development, MYbank has created three new business models with the power of fintech: digital inclusive finance at the county level, industrial finance, and platform finance. With these models, MYbank is searching for a “Chinese solution” to the worldwide problem of rural inclusive finance.