Social Enterprises and The Support for Entrepreneurs with Disabilities for an Inclusive Entrepreneurship Ecosystem: The Case of Turkey

Abstract

Persons with disability have the same rights and freedoms as everyone else, yet they have serious difficulties in gaining meaningful employment. Governments are responsible for ensuring social inclusion, accessibility, and equity for the disabled people in employment, but should also encourage them to establish enterprises which will empower them and contribute to their full economic participation.  Businesses generally target able-bodied consumers, even though disabled people as the untapped market, comprise around 15% of the world’s population. Social Enterprises (SE) prioritize social impact and social inclusion, but still require a profit contribution for the sustainability of the business. An SE providing inclusive and accessible products and services for disabled consumers can be run more successfully by a disabled entrepreneur who can internalize the disabled needs. Therefore, how disabled entrepreneurs are supported in their country will be a critical factor in their success. The research objective of this study is to reveal the supports provided in Turkey for disabled entrepreneurs in an inclusive entrepreneurial ecosystem. The findings show that support for entrepreneurship was available in financing, investment, education, R&D and consultancy provided by the state and NGOs. However, accessible support for disabled people was limited to İŞKUR and KOSGEB. Disabled entrepreneurs whose SE targeted disabled consumers were examined as good practice and it was concluded that such ventures should be encouraged, whilst NGOs, social entrepreneurship platforms and the state should strengthen the awareness and improve the accessibility of the opportunities and support available for disabled entrepreneurs.