ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on social entrepreneurship – the desire by young people to move beyond commercial venture to aid the wider community. It outlines all of the youth enterpreneurs which seek to engage with and improve their own communities through their music and art. The chapter highlights the ways many young people produce and consume music and popular culture as tools of committed personal expression and identity making while strategically enlisting commercial enterprise techniques to fulfil their dreams and ambitions. The youth use their social skills, including their networking, their grassroots-acquired business strategies and a wide variety of media forms to accomplish their goals. A major difference between young entrepreneurs and their older counterparts is the way in which the catalyst for the enterprise is their own engagement and expertise as artists rather than consumers or producers. The creative knowledge economy is one that relies on artistic performance: the production of something that can be created and performed to others.
