Towards the empowerment of women: a social entrepreneurship approach in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

This study was centred on the empowerment of women social entrepreneurs in Saudi Arabia. Specifically, the study answered the following sub-problems: 1) the priority issues of women social entrepreneurship; 2) the characteristics and practices of implementers along social service, social activism, and social entrepreneurship; 3) the challenges faced by women social entrepreneurs in implementing social entrepreneurial activities along financing, regulatory restriction and framework, and technical support; 4) the strategic measures to foster social entrepreneurship along access to funding, socio-economic entrepreneurship culture, taxation and regulatory, education and training, and support coordination. The following were the salient findings: 1) 'skills development training' was the priority of women social entrepreneurship; 2) the characteristics and practices of implementers was 'social activism'; 3) the challenges faced by women social entrepreneurs in implementing social entrepreneurial activities was 'regulatory restriction and framework'; 4) the strategic measures to foster social entrepreneurship was 'education and training'.