Theorizing and Strategizing with Models: Generative Models of Social Enterprises

Social entrepreneurship research often relies on presenting narratives of organizations that integrate various actors, actions, contextual elements and outcomes without a clear perspective on why these elements were selected and what can be learned from them. This paper provides a transparent and systematic process of modeling organizations and proposes a validity triangle that adequately integrates analytical, theoretical and ontological dimensions. An illustrative case study demonstrates the choices involved in a valid modeling process. It also illustrates the steps involved in building a generative model of a social enterprise that accounts for the mechanisms that explain how the focal organization achieves multiple strategic objectives.