Silvia Sacchetti

PhD Commerce (University of Birmingham, UK) Part-time - 2004

MSc Business Research (University of Birmingham, UK) Full –time - 1998

Laurea, Political Science (University of Bologna, Italy) - a.a.1996-1997

My current research addresses the governance and networking of organisations that produce meritorious goods, within two sectors in particular: 

• the cultural sector, and in particular creative occupations and cultural nonprofit organisations, currently focusing on cultural volountary organisations, music schools and musicians and their implications for communities and stakeholders. In 2020 I was granted Euros 50,000 by the bank foundation Fondazione Caritro to start a research project on music schools, their networks and local development (start December 2020 for two years) to take extant research further. In 2021 I was responsible (with Mario Diani) for a research project commissioned by the trentino Brass Band Federation (Euros 10,000).
• work integration social enterprises and their implications for communities and stakeholders. In 2015 I was granted internal but competitive OU funds on social enterprise governance. This internally funded preliminary research has developed into a successful Leverhulme Research Grant (£10,000) awarded by the British Academy to address work integration social enterprises.

My early research has been concerned with the limits of corporate hierarchies, and especially with the development implications of concentration of decision-making power in production governance in terms of uneven development amongst people and localities. Starting from critical literature, I have studied production governance solutions for the development of inclusive economies and localities, and for building inclusive relations amongst communities of interest at all societal levels. Specifically, earlier research has focused on the study of small and medium enterprises (SMEs), their networks and clusters as industrial development models.

Over the past 5 years specific research lines have addressed:

1. The implications of different governance forms and policy choices for socio-economic development, focusing on:

• The governance and networking of cooperatives and social enterprises
• The features of multi-actor governance with applications to social enterprises and welfare services
• Social capital, and particularly cooperation leading to the rise of networks of social enterprises in Scotland for the promotion of public interest, with applications to welfare services and to bioreserves.
• Inclusive and exclusive preferences underpinning different business models and their impacts over the public interest.
• Inclusive and exclusive preferences underpinning different spatial policies and their impacts over the public interest.

1. Creativity and its context: implications for individual satisfaction and motivations, focusing on the analysis of worker microdata concerning individual wellbeing in the organizations of the social economy. Specifically I have focused on:

• The relation between organisational dimensions (such as membership, perceived fairness and autonomy; involvement, teamwork, training and learning), individual motivations and aspects of individual satisfaction
• The resilience of individual motivations within complex systems (i.e. social enterprise; universities)

Through these streams, my current aim is to build a body of literature that contributes to explain the implications that taking a cooperative and inclusive approach to business and policy can have in terms of development model. I am currently applying this body of work to the study of production governance of health and personal services, as well as in cultural organisations. 

Participation to international scientific conferences and workshops extends from the late 1990s, mainly reflecting the activities of the academic networks with which I have engaged and which is listed in the above section of this CV. Below are showcased some conference participations (past 15 years).

• 2020 EURAM Tranformative interplay and creative self-actualising solutions. What organisations and communities can learn from musicians. Conference Track  Management and Governance of Culture, Heritage and Tourism Online, Dec 2020.

• 2020 SIE Paper title: What can economic coordination do for creativeness and self-actualisation? Conference Track on cultural economics. Online, Nov. 2020

• 2019, Paper title: Lean Production Applications in Work-Integration Social Enterprises. CIRIEC International Conference, “Social and Solidarity Economy: Moving Towards a New Economic System” Bucharest, Romania, June (6-8) 2019.

• 2019, Paper title: The Notion of Social Responsibility in Social Enterprises and Non-Profit Organisations. Virtus Press International conference, titled “Corporate Governance: Search For The Advanced Practices” Rome, Italy (Roma Tre University) February 28, 2019.

• 2018, Paper title: Inclusive Organisations as Producers of Democracy, working group on Social Capital, 9th Annual Conference in Political Economy IIPPE (International Initiative on Political Economy) on “The State of Capitalism and the State of Political Economy”. Pola, Croatia, Juraj Dobrila University, 10-15 September 2018

• 2017, Paper title: Social Poverty and Homelessness in Scotland, working group on Social Capital, 8th Annual Conference in Political Economy IIPPE (International Initiative on Political Economy) on “The Political Economy of Inequalities and Instabilities in the 21st Century”, Berlin School of Economics and Law, Berlin, Germany, 13-15 September 2017

• 2017, Paper title: A Needs Theory of Governance, International Cooperative Allience ICA CCR Global Research Conference on “"Developing inclusive and responsible businesses: Co-operatives in theory, policy and practice" 20-24 June 2017, University of Stirling, Stirling, UK

• 2016, Paper title: Biosphere Reserves as Spaces for Inclusive Territorial Governance 7th Annual Conference in Political Economy IIPPE (International Initiative on Political Economy) on “Political Economy: International Trends and National Differences”, School of Economics and Management, University of Lisbon, Lisbon, 7-9 September 2016

• 2016, Paper title: A Cluster Analysis of The Organizational Determinants of Worker Motivations and Satisfaction. Survey Based Data From Italian Social Enterprises. IAFEP (International Association for the Economics of Participation), Department of International Economics and Management, Copenhagen Business School, Frederiksberg, Denmark, 7-9 July 2016

• 2016, Paper presentation: The Institutions of Livelihood. Cooperation, Deliberation and the Social Solidarity Economy. EMES Polanyi International Seminar on “Societies in transition – Social and solidarity economy, the commons, public action and livelihood”, Paris, 19-20 May 2016

• 2016, Paper presentation: Governance Amongst Social Cooperatives: The Experience of The Consortium In Concerto, Italy. ICA (International Cooperative Allience) Conference on “New Strategies for Cooperatives. Understanding and Managing Cooperative Creation, Transition and Transformation”, University of Almeria,  Almeria 24-27 May 2016 

• 2015, Introduction to panel section: Oltre la rigenerazione di spazi: imprese sociali e sviluppo locale (Beyond spatial regeneration: social enterprises and local development). Saggi brevi, 13th Annual Workshop on the Social Enterprise, IRIS Network, 10-11 September 2015, Riva del Garda (Trento) Italy http://irisnetwork.it/2016/03/wis15-saggi-brevi-sacchetti-rigenerazione/

• 2015, Paper presentation: Multi-Stakeholderhip: An Explanation Around the Costs of Exclusion. 11th SIE (Società Italiana degli Economisti) Conference, Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II, Naples, Italy, 21-22 October 2015.