Growth
Home

Expert groups

Expert groups

Expert Group on Social Economy and Social Enterprises (2018-2024)

Call for applications

The Commission’s Directorate-General for Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship and SMEs is calling for applications to select members of the group, other than EU country authorities, which shall be appointed by direct invitation. Interested individuals should read the call for applications and submit their application by 18 May 2018.

Expert Group on Social Entrepreneurship (GECES) (2011-2018)

The Communication on the Social Business Initiative states that 'the Commission … shall … set up a consultative multi-stakeholder group on social business to examine the progress of the measures envisaged in this Communication … this group could be made up of representatives of the Member States, local authorities, social entrepreneurs' organisations, the banking and finance sector and the academic and university sector.' The group (GECES) was therefore set up for 6 years (2012 – 2017), and will be consulted by the Commission on the development, setting up and implementation of all the actions mentioned in the SBI, or further development of social entrepreneurship and social economy.

GECES report: Social enterprises and the social economy going forward

Social enterprises and the social economy going forwardIn October 2016, during the 11th GECES meeting, the report 'Social enterprises and the social economy going forward' has been unanimously endorsed by the expert group. The report is a call for action that argues for a European action plan for the social economy and social enterprises, which would provide new impetus to promote an enabling environment for social enterprises and the social economy to flourish.

Full report, executive summary and supporting documents
Implementation of the GECES report: set of actions

Past meetings

Call for applications

In February 2015 a renewed call for applications was made to select new non-public members for the group.

Call for applications and list of private members of GECES

In February 2012 a call for applications was made to select members of GECES.

Call for applications and results of the call

Working groups

To fulfill the wish of the Commission to adopt a more bottom-up approach that fosters a co-creation process stimulating further actions for social enterprise development, a new working method was endorsed by the GECES meeting of 16 September 2015.

The group will make recommendations for concrete actions by the end 2016 and this work will be carried out via 4 working groups (301 kB).

The recommendations should be based on appropriate rationale and directed to all stakeholders, private and public, national and European.

  • Working group 1: Improving access to funding
  • Working group 2: Increasing the visibility of social entrepreneurship
  • Working group 3: Improving the legal environment
  • Working group 4: Strengthening the External Dimension

The working groups are led by a 'Rapporteur général':

Other links

Social Impact Measurement Sub-group

The Single Market Act II states that 'the Commission will develop a methodology to measure the socio-economic benefits created by social enterprises. The development of rigorous and systematic measurements of social enterprises’ impact on the community … is essential to demonstrate that the money invested in social enterprises yields high savings and income.' The GECES sub-group was therefore set up in October 2012 to agree upon a European methodology which could be applied across the European social economy.

On 3 June 2014, the GECES adopted the sub-group report (also available in DE, ES, FR, IT, PL) in a vote via a formal written procedure. An absolute majority (39 out of 72 members) explicitly voted 'yes'. There was one 'no' vote. It was mentioned in the call for the vote the non-expression of a position would be considered as an implicit vote in favour of the adoption of the report.