ABSTRACT
This chapter outlines several cases that provide an overview of the challenges that rural communities face in the respective countries, and the activities the social enterprises have created to meet these challenges. This initial overview is followed by in-depth descriptions of the cases, which are based on the three EMES dimensions of social enterprises: the social mission, the entrepreneurial mission, and the governance structure. To enable a detailed understanding of the specific aspects of the Irish social enterprise, the chapter introduces the setting in which it is embedded and identifies the challenges it faces and the answers it provides to these challenges. It describes its business model and offers a detailed description of the case along the three dimensions of social enterprises. Ireland is the most rural economy in Europe and has the most extreme divergence in economic output between urban and rural areas anywhere across the continent.
