Scholars have long debated the definition of social entrepreneurship, but disagreement persists. Despite sustained efforts to craft a universal definition, social entrepreneurship has been characterized as an ʻessentially contested concept’. However, little is known about the root causes of this ongoing contestation. Therefore, we delve into the literature's social entrepreneurship definitions to examine this complex issue. Our systematic literature review leverages insights from the philosophy of science and formal logic—specifically, a theory of definition—to present four rules for definitional evaluation in the social sciences. Accordingly, definitions should convey the essence of a concept (Rule 1: essence), differentiate between their defining and defined terms (Rule 2: expression), be phrased positively (Rule 3: explication), and avoid figurative and obscure language (Rule 4: eloquence). Using these rules to analyse 156 original social entrepreneurship definitions reveals varying interpretations of the concept's essence and sheds light on epistemological issues, such as tautological definitions. Integrating these findings into a practical ʻrulebook’ for definitional evaluation significantly contributes to the social entrepreneurship literature and other highly contested fields by helping to understand different sources of contestation. Guided by our rulebook, we suggest future research avenues and highlight diverse theorizing styles, the engagement of opposing and paradoxical definitional views and the role of academic language in shaping the social entrepreneurship field.

中文翻译：

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评估社会企业家精神的定义：科学哲学的规则手册

长期以来，学者们一直在争论社会企业家精神的定义，但分歧仍然存在。尽管人们不断努力制定一个普遍的定义，但社会企业家精神仍被描述为“本质上有争议的概念”。然而，人们对这场持续争论的根本原因知之甚少。因此，我们深入研究文献中的社会创业定义来研究这个复杂的问题。我们的系统文献综述利用科学哲学和形式逻辑（特别是定义理论）的见解，提出了社会科学中定义评估的四个规则。因此，定义应该传达概念的本质（规则 1：本质），区分定义术语和已定义术语（规则 2：表达），措辞肯定（规则 3：解释），并避免比喻和晦涩的语言（规则 4） :口才）。使用这些规则来分析 156 个原始的社会企业家定义，揭示了对该概念本质的不同解释，并揭示了认识论问题，例如同义反复定义。将这些发现纳入定义评估的实用“规则手册”中，通过帮助理解不同的争议来源，对社会创业文献和其他竞争激烈的领域做出了重大贡献。在我们的规则手册的指导下，我们建议未来的研究途径，并强调多样化的理论风格、对立和矛盾的定义观点的参与以及学术语言在塑造社会创业领域中的作用。