Connecting the social energy network: multiple narrating of social entrepreneurship in energy poverty

Abstract

The roadmap to a just energy transition faces the challenge of inclusion of vulnerable households. Energy poverty is a complex social problem that affects more than 50 million people in Europe, a number that will grow due to the impact of the COVID-19 crisis, increasing the vulnerability and the inequality gap.Despite the importance of the issue, collective social entrepreneurship has focused on energy problem in a partial, isolated way and with few examples of success in the fight against energy poverty. however, the network may contribute to minimize the problem among the rest of actors. The objectives of this interpretative methodology of interviews to social entrepreneurs are to provide evidence to enrich the understanding of plurality and diversity through the phenomenon of collective social entrepreneurship building on different narratives in the field of energy poverty and how such narratives may affect the network process. Also, it may contribute to the role of social entrepreneurs as coordinator to orchestrate said network. The theoretical lens of the multi-actor network may lead us to the orchestration of this complex problem by social entrepreneurship and provide empirical evidence of phenomena in complex social themes. This empirical research may favor the synergistic activity of all actors contributing to a more holistic approach to energy poverty to explore the present and future of the just transition.