The X(X) Factor: Social Entrepreneurship and Gender gap. A Survey on Italian Social Cooperatives

Currently, the gap between male and female entrepreneurial initiatives is still very wide. The prevalence of men in business fields is essentially linked to culture and social structure, which define socially acceptable behaviours for men and women. Studying entrepreneurial phenomena therefore introduced the necessity to consider the environment, in which the phenomenon develops, and the analysis of institutional, social and cultural aspects. Within the institutional framework and with a multi-level research design, aim of this paper is to individuate the elements that have influenced and/or are influencing the constitution and the activity of a sample of Italian female social cooperative, and the relationship between gender and social enterprise's internal organization.