Ethics as the foundation of Social Enterpreneurship

Enactus in dialogue with Mariacarmela Passarelli and Giuseppe Bongiorno

Mariacarmela Passarelli is an Associate Professor of Business Administration and Management at the Department of Business and Legal Sciences of the University of Calabria and serves as the University Delegate for Open Innovation and Entrepreneurship. She has carried out research periods as a Visiting Fellow at the HAAS Business School in Berkeley and as a Visiting Professor at Otto von Guericke University of Magdeburg in Germany and at the Manhattan Management Institute in New York.

Alongside her academic activity, she is strongly committed to working with students: she is Senior Faculty Advisor of the Enactus UniCal team and supports numerous student projects focused on ethics and entrepreneurship.

Giuseppe Bongiorno holds a PhD in Economics and Management and is currently a Post-Doctoral Researcher at the Department of Law, Economics and Sociology (DiGES) of the “Magna Graecia” University of Catanzaro. He has supported the Enactus UniCal team since its inception, alongside Professor Passarelli, and is Junior Faculty Advisor of the Enactus UniCal team.

They have collaborated for years on several publications, particularly focused on entrepreneurship, innovation, and technology transfer. It is a pleasure to dedicate this article to them, through which they present their paper on ethics in social entrepreneurship within the Enactus Italy program.

The paper “Social entrepreneurship education for university students: The experience of ENACTUS Italy” sets ambitious goals within the field of research on ethics in social entrepreneurship. What is the research question, and what is the main objective of your work?

Giuseppe Bongiorno: The paper fits within the shared research interests that both of us have been pursuing for some time, particularly in the field of entrepreneurship and, more specifically, social entrepreneurship. On the one hand, we wanted to provide a practical example of what a social entrepreneurship project actually means; on the other, we aimed to connect this case to more theoretical aspects. Our objective was to understand how a social entrepreneurship program can integrate philosophical aspects related to ethics — understood in a broad sense, including personal and ecosystemic dimensions — and how it can contribute to preparing a new generation of social entrepreneurs.

It was an important collaborative effort: how did the collaboration with Dr. Nicolaj Corrado develop?

Mariacarmela Passarelli: From the perspective of knowledge dissemination, we wanted to produce a scientific work that could also be understood by an audience beyond academia. However, we realized that we needed a form of expertise that did not fully belong to our scientific background: philosophy. This led to the collaboration with the University of Pisa and with Dr. Nicolaj Corrado. Together, we worked on the concept of ethics as proposed by Paul Ricoeur, integrating his philosophical contribution with our research background in entrepreneurship and with the experience we have gained as Faculty Advisors within Enactus and other programs.

In the paper, you combine the Gioia Methodology, an approach that allows theory to emerge from experience, with the ethical philosophy of Paul Ricoeur. How did this dialogue between research and philosophy help bring out the ethical dimension of the Enactus experience?

Giuseppe Bongiorno: From a methodological standpoint, we adopted the Gioia Methodology to ensure scientific rigor, in line with qualitative research and grounded theory. Through interviews and collected materials, we were able to identify aggregate dimensions, with recurring references to ethical aspects.

At that point, Paul Ricoeur’s philosophy became an interpretative lens — not an a priori approach, but a tool to conceptualize the most relevant aspects emerging from the data. With the support of our philosopher co-author, we connected the aggregate dimensions to the five macro-areas of Ricoeur’s thought: self-respect, self-esteem, respect for others, solicitude, and just institutions.

Mariacarmela Passarelli: A particularly interesting element was the evolutionary dimension of the model: from the individual, to the team, and finally to institutions. This allowed us to observe how a model of entrepreneurship education should start from the person — through self-respect and individual improvement — then move to the team, through respect for others and “take care,” and finally recognize the importance of institutions, understood as virtuous ecosystems for personal and professional growth. Ricoeur’s thought accompanied us along this path, from the individual dimension to that of the common good.

Giuseppe Bongiorno: In the paper, we also linked these dimensions to the Enactus process itself: from the individual choice to participate, to team formation, and finally to integration within a broader ecosystem, such as the National Competition and the World Cup. One of the questions raised by reviewers concerned precisely this point: is ethics already embedded in participants, or is it the program that develops it? We sought to address this by linking each phase of the process to a specific ethical dimension.

For you, Enactus is also an experience learned in the field. How did the project begin at the University of Calabria, and what impact has it had on the academic and student community?

Mariacarmela Passarelli: When I first encountered Enactus, I immediately felt at home: I found a just institution, an environment in which I recognized my values. Enactus is an ecosystem where people feel good, positive relationships are built, and priority is given to well-being. Results emerge as a consequence of people feeling well. In my view, this is the true added value of Enactus compared to many other entrepreneurship programs I have encountered over the past twenty years: care for people — for students and advisors alike — both from a technical and a human perspective. From this, the quality of projects and the strong engagement of the student community naturally emerge.

Looking to the future, what is your vision?

Mariacarmela Passarelli: As University Delegate for Open Innovation and Entrepreneurship, I will work to give Enactus a university-wide dimension. I believe that entrepreneurship inspired by ethics and the common good should not be the sole prerogative of social entrepreneurship, but should become the dominant paradigm. In this perspective, I consider it essential to further strengthen collaboration among Faculty Advisors within the Enactus network, by creating structured spaces for dialogue, exchange, and shared growth among academics engaged in entrepreneurship education and related research trajectories.

Together with my colleague Professor Alessandra Scroccaro, we are developing a pathway that complements ENACTUS project activities with a dedicated research line. In particular, we are working on the implementation of the Ethical Entrepreneurial Education Scorecard model, which opens up new shared perspectives for measuring, evaluating, and reflecting on ethics within entrepreneurship education programs.

Training the leaders of the future means adopting models of entrepreneurship education based on the well-being of individuals, teams, and ecosystems. Well-being is not just about feeling good, but about feeling good in order to do good. Enactus has been moving in this direction for years.

You can find their article published in The International Journal of Management Education at the following DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijme.2025.101239

Interview by Angelica Giuliani