Journey from a Humanitarian NGO to a Social Enterprise in Malta

This paper, via field observations and interviews, explores the implications of running a small scale non-governmental organisation in Malta whose intention it is to establish a social business despite the absence of social business-friendly laws in the national legal system.


Introduction
It has been recognised at the European Union (EU) level that social enterprises as individual constituent parts as well as social economy on aggregate are a growing trend and are expected to be changemakers in addressing social and environmental issues in the near future. The EU's A map of social enterprises and their eco-systems in Europe published in 2015 1 gives an overall perspective of what each member state (plus Switzerland) has done so far in the area of promoting the growth of the social economy. The EU has adopted an operational definition of a social enterprise -commercially active entity with social and societal objective of the common good whose profits are mainly reinvested for social purposes, not enrichment, with a form of democratic decision making. However, the very same report acknowledges that this is only an operational definition and each member state has its own definition -to be precise, only twenty out of twenty-nine countries covered in the report recognise social entrepreneurship as a form of business.
Furthermore, the report speaks in general terms of the obstacles posed to establishing and running a social company. My research zooms in on one specific NGO based in Malta whose aim it is to establish a social enterprise -it is common for NGOs to establish a social business and run it in parallel or become one (change their legal status from NGO to company), according to said report, but it has not been explained why. The EU's report vaguely informs that social entrepreneurs usually suffer from legal uncertainty, denied investment, and weak organisation (European Commission, Directorate E, 2015) which is also evident in my

Social Entrepreneurship
As mentioned earlier, my focus of research, during my fieldwork, shifted towards social entrepreneurship, hence, I felt a natural urge to read to understand what social entrepreneurship entailed. According to Fraisse et al (2016), France has been at the forefront of pro-social business legislation and they claim that social entrepreneurship can take various forms depending on the goals envisioned. A social business can engage itself in: 1) helping disadvantaged and marginalised groups to find employment 4 , e.g. by employing disabled persons; 2) it can also follow ordinary employment practices while focus on how its profits are utilised -charitable donations is the usual goal, e.g. donating all its profits to a cancer research laboratory; 3) or else a social company may focus on rendering services considered non-lucrative yet socially and environmentally important, e.g. providing a clean-up of a contaminated area at the cost price. A combination of two or all three is not uncommon too (Fraisse et al, 2016) . Interestingly, entrepreneurs running the first type of company (provision of employment to the disadvantaged and marginalised) are usually either ex-social workers or relatively recent business programme graduates believing in something bigger and beyond sheer profits as their ultimate mission (ibid).
In countries where pro-social business laws are passed, such companies are granted tax exemptions and other stimuli (Corriveau, 2016)  and what taxes to pay while investors and creditors are more willing to provide financial means to such companies (European Commission, Directorate E, 2015) . In Corriveau's (2016) interpretation, a social enterprise expects the government to create a special regime for such companies for one very important reason: absence of greed -social companies must refrain from enriching its owners; dividends are not paid (or reduced to the bare minimum) -only salaries to its employees are paid.
Unlike a regular company whose operations are defined by the mission of enriching its owners, a social enterprise puts emphasis on its socially beneficial goals. Fraisse et al (2016) provide an insight into the long-established French model of pro-social entrepreneurship legislation which puts certain constraints on such companies, e.g.
the management level employees' salaries are capped at a certain level (the largest salary cannot be more than ten times higher than the smallest salary in such companies), there must be a democratic decision-making process as well as the main prerequisite -profits, if they ever happen, must always be spent on a social mission either directly or via a mediator (100% of profits donated to a charitable organisation). While the government metaphorically holds a stick in the form of such constraints, it simultaneously provides a carrot in the form of tax exemptions for social enterprises. Corriveau (2016) and Fraisse et al (2016) essentially hint at a pact that is intended between the government on the one hand and social entrepreneurs on the other hand: the government gives tax cuts and in return expects social firms to operate greedless-ly. In essence, a social enterprise must always work as a "no-loss and no-dividend" machine -no loss to ensure its survival and no dividend to avoid taxation (Fraisse et al., 2016) . One may ask for clarification as to what the difference between a social entrepreneur and a philanthropist then is.

Philanthropy
In essence, social entrepreneurship is a form of philanthropy  , (Harvey et al, 2011) , (Shaw et al, 2013) . Philanthropy has its roots in the Greek words philos and anthropos (love and human, hence, love of people). It centres on: 1) meeting the basic needs such as food, health, shelter; 2) fighting for equality and human rights, 3) democratization, 4) community capacity building, and 5) public participation in decision making (Widianto, Hadi, & Irawan, 2018) . Philanthropy can be carried out by someone possessing the necessary resources (usually money, knowledge, or time) that can be used to help the needy. Philanthropists must possess the will to do good as well (Charitable, 2019) . However, philanthropic activity is not as clear-cut and unambiguous as one might assume. Despite the good intentions of philanthropists, its goals are often short-sighted and small in scale (Blowfield & Frynas, 2005) , (Frame, 2005) and at times, can be plagued by nationalist agendas and fuelled by corruption schemes but these are very rare and special cases (Widger, 2016a(Widger, , 2016b . Michael Edwards (2009) , similarly to Frame (2005), Blowfield and Frynas (2005), elaborates further that the corporate philanthropic actors have a tendency of hijacking the NGO and state aid actors' discourse and agendas. They often tend to behave in a brash manner which is not necessarily inefficient but often overlooks the wider picture, particularly the roots of an issue, and instead concentrate on fixing said problem in a narrow context, e.g. 8 lifting just one village out of poverty in an extremely poor region and not doing enough to fight the causes of poverty in the entire region. Corporate philanthropists believe that market forces, empowerment of the aid recipients (fishing rods instead of fish), and sustainability are the answers to aid recipients' problems. They often dislike aid trends set by governments and donors and they pursue independent paths of action (ibid).  Blowfield and Frynas (2005) speak of philanthropic entrepreneurs who run regular for-profit companies (not social businesses) and devote a portion of their profits to charity.
The emphasis here lies on the word 'portion' and moreover, such portions do not have to be regular -they take place at philanthropists' whim. The difference between a philanthropist and a social entrepreneur exists in the very reason behind the establishment of a particular company as described by Corriveau (2016) and Fraisse et al (2016) -a social business is a social business from day one of its existence -it regularly spends 100% (or very close to 100%) of its profits to address social or environmental issues. And here the emphasis is put on the regularity of spending its profits. In cases similar to that of France with old and deep pro-social business laws, social entrepreneurs have legal restrictions on dividends and salaries in return for the privilege of tax exemptions (Fraisse et al., 2016) . In essence, pro-social entrepreneurship legislation creates a strict corridor with regulations, restrictions, as well as rewards for regular (not occasional) philanthropy.
In the case of my participants, I have not noticed significant monetary resources available for charity. However, I have noticed that the only true resource in their possession is time. It is a resource of philanthropic importance as discussed earlier (Charitable, 2019) . As any resource it has to be managed well - Widianto et al (2018) stress the importance of good management skills in order to ensure philanthropic success. The EU also stresses that social enterprises often suffer from poor business organisation skills (European Commission, Directorate E, 2015) . So what is time? 9

Time & Time Management
Time is a ruthless and unstoppable, yet manageable concept. Humans are unique in their ability to comprehend the notion of time: past, present and future (Engel, 1987) .
It is also a matter of power. In Lucht's (2012) (1993) who in turn argues that different individuals may be performing an identical task while that task serves each participant in its own way, hence, it performs a function. This approach is very much focused on connecting one's personal plans 11 with one's actions in achieving such plans. Clary et al (1998) , predominantly based on the works of Katz (1960) and Smith et al (1956) Almond & Verba (1965) , Putnam (2000) , and Tocqueville (2003)  The four principles must be elaborated on as in their pure definitive form they fail to tell the whole picture. It has been acknowledged by the international community that rescue of people affected by natural or human-made disasters can be labelled as humanitarian provided there is cross-border action present. In other words, if there is a rescue operation taking place within the national boundaries of a country and the rescuers are citizens of the country in question, that is not considered a humanitarian operation (Barnett, 2011) , for instance, when firefighters save the lives and properties of people affected by a wildfire in their own country it does not count as a humanitarian operation, however, as soon as firefighters from one country travel to another country to save people and property, they can be called humanitarians. Humanitarianism must be international by nature. A true humanitarian is not permitted to exhibit nationalistic feelings -he or she cares about those who suffer regardless of their geographic location based purely on the fact that they are humans (ibid).
The other three principles -neutrality, impartiality, independence -are idealistic guidelines for a humanitarian organisation to strive for as they can never be achieved to their fullest. In Barnett's (2011) (Barnett, 2011) .
Also, not all volunteerism is humanitarian or philanthropic -an unpaid intern working in a for-profit company does it in order to learn and to improve his or her curriculum vitae for future career growth (Lavelle, 2010) .

Law & Time
As discussed above in the Social Entrepreneurship section, law plays a pivotal role in social businesspeople's ability to use their profits more freely to help those in need. The authorities, through law, hold the reins to define who pays taxes and who is exempt.  Ewick and Silbey (1998), even people familiar with legal procedures like their interviewee Dwayne Franklin are at times reluctant to make full use of law due to the slowness of legal procedures. Notably, every story that eventually touches upon law has prehistory and epilogue surrounding law and it is not necessarily the case that a given situation will involve law, e.g. a conflict between neighbours can remain at the non-legal stage and even find its resolution bypassing laws.
Law and society scholar Kitty Calavita (2010) , who also makes a reference to Ewick and Silbey (1998), based on her observations and by summarising the works of Weber, Durkheim, and Maine, draws a conclusion that law and society are mutually intertwined phenomena influencing each other on a constant basis -each is a reflection of the other. In her view, if people tend to think that law is something abstract, then it is purely due to the fact that we, people, ourselves tend to make it abstract and believe in it; law and how we live by it is the product of our perception.
Calavita points out that people in general are very law-conscious -they know what they are and what they are not allowed to do. Our everyday obedience of law is an extremely mighty instrument of socioeconomic control. Laws shape the way we think and talk to a large degree. Despite its hegemonic presence and awesome feel, law can often provoke a rebellion that brings about change (ibid). Ewick and Silbey (1998) , besides their stories of individuals who exhibit wariness of laws, provide their readers with the opposite view of persons who feel confident of utilising legal instruments, and even playful. They can be overt rebels challenging existing laws or silent observers looking for the best way of utilising the available inventory. Utilisation of law is not necessarily always something malicious (intent to cause harm to others), rather it can be used to express oneself or express one's relationship towards others -assertion of one's rights (ibid).

Maltese Law
Malta is among the group of countries with no pro-social business laws though provide such unilateral powers to one cabinet minister 6 . Basically, it implies that the given ministerial post of a Maltese government may opt for not granting any tax exemptions to social enterprises at all once the bill is promulgated into law making the entire pro-social business agenda virtually useless as such companies would not be viewed as special vis-a-vis conventional companies. It does not require social businesses to have a democratic decision-making structure either. Also, the proposed version does not impose special salary regimes on social businesses -the most it asks for is the implementation of market level salaries for tasks similar to the ones found in the given sector of the economy 7 . However, the proposed version does possess one typical quality of a pro-social business law -it restricts the use of profits by shareholders (only 10% of profits can be enjoyed directly or indirectly by the owner while 90% goes toward the furtherment of a company's social mission) 8 . In its core, the proposed bill falls short of establishing a full-hearted pact discussed by Corriveau (2016) and Fraisse et al (2016) of sticks and carrots between the state and the social entrepreneur.
The Ministry for Finance of Malta refers to a research report prepared in 2011 by APS consult 9 which claims that one of the aims of a pro-social business law would be to support, empower and otherwise help the volunteer, NGO, co-operative and similar organisations in Malta by providing more space for activity. The proposed bill was criticised in 2016 for the lack of ambition in making social enterprises sufficiently 5 Part IX 34 (2) 6   scientists of the nineteenth century visiting economically deprived western rural areas to explore how the village populations were coping with the impact of the industrialisation and urbanisation, they again refer to the study of othernesscuriosity exhibited by one specimen of a particular group regarding the lifestyle of another group. Moreover, it must not be left unnoticed that their curiosity about otherness assumed -the word of focus here is ' assumed' (assumption) -the explorers usually had, have and will have some assumptions about the people they intend to study. The first and most obvious assumption -that they will be differentthey will not be like us. In the past this assumption was also reinforced by western racist stereotypes -an assumption that the participants would be less developed, less educated and otherwise inferior or even vulnerable in comparison to the observer (ibid).
I, too, had expectations of otherness -I had never volunteered or worked for an NGO, including humanitarian NGOs. I had never written, nor had I ever read, an application for donation by an NGO, nor an application for investment by a corporate 22 company. I had never seen NGO staff work behind the scenes in their offices being able to discuss issues away from the public eye. I was a total outsider to this type of activity altogether. And many anthropologists find it advantageous -it is good to be an outsider who is capable of looking at phenomena and the people involved from a neutral and detached vantage point (Atkinson & Hammersley, 2007) , (Russell Bernard, 2017) . Outsiders, however, can be of two overt types, according to Bernard interested in knowing more about the actual processes attributed to the production of applications for financing as by that point I had been asked on numerous occasions whether I was knowledgeable in this respect by job interviewers to whom it occurred decisive for my employment. It is not unusual in anthropology to be inquisitive about a particular subject to such an extent that it triggers actual research (Atkinson & Hammersley, 2007) , (Zwillinger et al., 2018) .
My assumptions of the participants prior to the fieldwork were based on my literature review, especially on that of CDA (2008) . I assumed they would be preoccupied with searching for the most feasible and attainable financing for their projects. I foresaw that the ones actually writing applications to their donors would be very much focused on satisfying the criteria laid out by donors; the actual needs of their aid recipients would serve a secondary role. I was looking forward to being exposed to a great deal of new vocabulary that I would have a vague understanding of. I also thought that the application writers would be professionals hired purely for this sole purpose of producing good application papers whose structure and wording with slight alterations could easily fit the corporate world of business project production. I was expecting to meet such people, observe their everyday dilemmas and ask them questions about their feelings concerning their involvement in the production of application documents and how they felt it was from a moral standpoint. I was expecting to encounter many ethical and moral considerations for myself too as I would not want to put my participants in an inconvenient position by telling too much about their organisation's financial matters. I knew the topic was prone to numerous obstacles, especially because NGOs receiving donations care about their public image -the better it is the greater the chances of attracting new donations (Wymer & Samu, 2003) . More on that in the Access and Privacy part.
Besides, I found it important to explore the NGO-donor relations in the so-called "natural setting" in Atkinson and Hammersley's words (2007). It is obvious that one cannot put the two groups (NGO workers and donors) in a laboratory setting and observe them interact and demand they answer questionnaires. The alleged corporate nature of modern NGOs (CDA, 2008)

and the indications by Cooley and
Ron (2002)  Hence, qualitative research methodology was chosen which, in many positivists' view, is prone to lacking objectivity (Atkinson & Hammersley, 2007) . The objective versus subjective conflict is redressed by the acknowledgement of the very existence of the subjectivity of the observer/researcher, and hence, the realisation that the observer/researcher is actually not supposed to focus on the subject(s) observed but rather on the process of the observer/researcher encountering the world via the observed (Eriksen & Nielsen, 2001) . And Bernard (2017) also stresses the impossibility of being completely objective -it just has to be admitted and taken into account leaving space for others to reflect upon your work via critique and commentaries of their own.
Moreover, I was advised by my supervisor and also by two other sources - Hutnyk (1990) and Spyer (2015)  On that spring day, our collective common sense expressed in a University auditorium went along the lines that financial matters were too sensitive for anyone to talk about openly, including NGOs. Opportunism is not the antagonist in this account of events. It is, quite on the contrary, the remedy to redress moments of impasse and despair. My supervisor Dr Maurice Said joined the choir of warning voices about the potential hardships and he was the one who immediately proposed the remedy -be flexible with regard to fieldwork and research topics. It was a paraphrase (without a deviation from the main point) of James Boster's (1986) soothing guide for inexperienced field researchers -there will be potential problems with regard to responsibilities toward the informants (privacy), denial of access, than greed to satisfy. This helped me to seize the opportunity to explore the field of social entrepreneurship and move on to plan C (the current plan of this work).
It is a common trend in ethnographic research when a researcher is forced to refocus his or her topic as a result of fieldwork observations (Strathern, 2005) , (Marcus, 2018) . The phenomenon of impactful unexpectedness has been elaborated on by Nordstrom and Robben (1996) . Particularly, they endorse the principles of anthropologist Frank Pieke in whose view sudden twists must not instil fear. On the contrary, they ought to be seized upon implying that the unforeseen developments questionnaire -dry, inflexible, strictly channelled; rather it is an interaction or as they put it in their more recent work it is about hows as much as whats (Holstein & Gubrium, 2004) . The former referring to the process of knowledge production while the latter are the guidelines ensuring the overall content and substance.
Furthermore, I followed the rule of being an informed interviewer -one who has background knowledge of the context and processes the interviewee is involved in. Interview questions must produce a reflection of observations and seek elaborations that complete the observed phenomena with the missing bits and pieces (the whats ), hence, interviews come after observations and not the other way round (Holstein & Gubrium, 1995) , (Atkinson & Hammersley, 2007) .
Respondent selection -firstly, I understood and stuck to the obvious yet often underestimated rule that the interview is about the interviewee and not the interviewer -there is no place for chasing fame and glory as interviewer -interviews are about the other person, the interviewee, and more importantly, his or her meanings -interviewers serve as mere organisers of such meanings conveyed.
Secondly, it is about the assignment of competences -how do we select the most competent interviewees in terms of their ability to deliver the desired whats via hows ? The search for the most competent respondents begins with observationswho is involved (Holstein & Gubrium, 2004) ? Holstein and Gubrium (1995)  Besides the interviews, I received useful unsolicited comments from my participants 33 which often prove to be more important than interview responses as they were natural and spontaneous which many researchers therefore find more useful than choreographed interviews where either side might be interested in presenting oneself in a better light than in reality (Atkinson & Hammersley, 2007) . The next Observation chapter explains the background behind the origin of the questions. A few minutes later, Jane shows up wielding the key to the centre's front door.

Observation
I am able to recognise her since my gatekeeper Rita provided me with Jane's contact number. We have been communicating over Whatsapp and her account is decorated with a profile picture allowing me to recognise her. We quickly confirm my presence during their deliberations today as the rest look on and I feel obliged to repeat that I will be sitting quietly in the corner taking notes. The meeting is going to cover matters pertaining psychological help for refugees and will be chaired by Jane who is a trained psychologist.
We transit through a slightly larger room only to settle down in a smaller room with just one window at which I decide to sit down as there is an isolated chair away from the conference Another three ladies of about the same age appear. One of them has brought her child which initiates a discussion about childcare. They trade the most recent developments in their children's lives and a number of useful best parenting experiences are shared. Jane quickly introduces me to the newly arrived and invites me to comment on my research topic. I am told that some finance will be discussed but in the future, I shall find it more appropriate to seek Nadine's counsel on such topics when she returns since it is her field of responsibility at the association.
The lingua franca of the association is English, but accents and nationalities suggest a myriad of origins. One of the new arrivals, Zoe, has more to say than the others. At times, she uses her lunch box cutlery to reinforce her narrative like an orchestra conductor while speaking. She raises the issues the association faces in the refugee camps in Malta. She mentions that the association is short on psychologists and interpreters to be able to cater to everyone's needs in the refugee camps. Jane confirms that their association is at its capacity and adds: "we have to start considering extra interpreters." The main problem appears to be the diversity of the refugee population for the organisation in question as well as for the entire country of Malta and its government agencies dealing with refugees. The language issues, in Jane's view, trigger intercultural tensions inside the camps too: "West-Africans predominantly speak French and East-Africans mostly speak their own diverse languages. There have been conflicts on the language basis." Zoe continues by disclosing an interesting observation: "kids in the camps are bored, that's why the pencils that are brought by us disappear fast." The other ladies agree that the pencils are actually brought for the psychologists' sessions with the adult refugee females, however, the refugee kids tend to appropriate them in order to be able to draw. Then, Zoe switches to the problem of not having a fruitful session with refugee women when there are their male relatives or husbands present in the same room who tend to express the desire to control the entire process. As an example, she relates how a girl was taken away by her brother when she burst into tears. A lady wearing a headscarf says that the Libyan men are usually like thatthey take care of their women but are tough on them at the same time and do not want their ladies to be seen crying in front of strangers. Jane adds that unfortunately the refugee camp personnel are not of the most helping kind regarding NGOs' activity inside the camps.
Later, Zoe complains that the US Embassy in Malta finds it inefficient to help refugees on a project to project basis and Jane replies: "in order to make a project Far where a refugee camp is situated, the people there are in survival mode -they have to survive on 130 euros a month". One of the girls present expresses a more sceptical view: "be careful with how much money they tell you they have -they tend to cheat." Apart from the actual cash that the refugees allegedly receive, the attendees decide to cover other material aspects of the refugees, for instance, they exhibit their frustration with the type of clothes donated to refugees by the Maltese population.
They find it difficult to transfer old Maltese pieces of clothing to Muslim refugee women due to obvious cultural differences -Maltese women generally wear revealing shorts, dresses, and skirts that fail to cover the body parts considered intimate in the Muslim world. Jane reminds the girls present that it is important to save receipts for goods bought for refugees, when Zoe recalls how fast her purchased sweets are consumed by refugee camp children. Such purchases can be reimbursed within reasonable limits, according to Jane.
The discussion flows from what the refugees receive as donations and social benefits toward the possible means of bringing them to self-sustainable subsistence.
Jane announces: "remind the refugees that they must go and attend the English language courses. Tell them there are other activities too: job-hunting and so on." Zoe states: "we need to help men too" to which the lady in the headscarf agrees: "yes, one woman regularly asks how to employ her sons", and as a result of these two remarks the other participants provide their examples of men being interested in the association's services in particular as well as in help in a wider sense.
Approximately an hour since the beginning of the meeting -Zoe and the child have finished their respective meals, and Jane reminds everyone that it is the association's primary task within the current psychological counselling project to provide aid to the refugee women who have suffered from abuse first hand and only after to the ones who have seen the sufferings of others. The participants agree and Jane ushers them to agree on a date for the next meeting. Once a consensus is reached, Jane proclaims the meeting adjourned. Some girls leave while the others remain but move to the adjacent room where they are preparing to host a session for refugee women. I am kindly asked by Jane to step closer to her so that she can briefly explain the overall conditions under which the psychological help programme exists: "I get paid for this -I get a salary. if you're not Maltese; we get funds -volunteer org scheme fund which is very helpful but you can only use a small fraction for salaries (15%); language barrier is the biggest problem when it comes to communicating with the target women; our work is 17 Name changed 38 very casual but we try our best to make it formal". Zoe refrains from providing comments to me at this stage. Agatha, from Eastern Europe, is in her final month of pregnancy. The other unknown girl, who also looks younger than the rest (in her early twenties), turns out to be an intern and she is leaving the organisation soon.
At some point, the ladies tell me that they think that this office room feels like a luxury. They used to have an even smaller room in a different area of the island without a window. For the current room which includes a big window, overlooking the parallel street, they pay by resorting to a witty scheme (creative accounting) which is not illegal, they claim, but it causes inconvenience anyway. Nadine mentions another reason for feeling happy. She can, at last, hire someone to work for her as she officially runs the association now but she cannot technically hire herself because she is a non-European Union citizen, that is, she can only hire EU citizens.
Then, Agatha and Zoe begin discussing potential catering areas. Zoe estimates that there are around 500 workers in Mosta and if they manage to attract around ten percent of them, it is fifty customers daily. So, the girls believe that their future food truck should make preparations on a daily basis to sell at least fifty portions. However, Zoe has her misgivings about the number -what if only fifteen customers show up and thirty-five portions turn out to be wasted. They begin to entertain the idea of running an event-catering business instead. The two options on the table are: 1) sell food in a busy place daily (food waste problem); or 2) catering events (irregularity of events and hence, irregularity of work is the issue). Zoe says: "structuring business so we know there are customers is important". While the two are busy brainstorming about the best business model. Zoe and Agatha are now considering using the food truck officially just for serving and delivering food while cooking off-site. Zoe proposes to Agatha: "if we can't find a kitchen, then maybe we find a garage next to a kitchen which we use as storage and certify the kitchen but don't actually use it." Nadine turns to the two girls preoccupied with the catering business. Agatha believes that the minimum number of people served at an event must be no less than fifteen, otherwise, it is financially unviable. The three fantasise about employing an accountant to keep their finances in order. In their view, it is possible to hire an accountant once a company is registered and it shall be written in the statutes that a certain percentage goes to the accountant and to financing various association projects. Zoe and Agatha mention another member's name (unknown to me) who has found an accountant who might help them. Suddenly, the ladies decide to discuss a potential offer to cater at a Christmas event but there is a problem to find staff to fulfil this mission -most members of the Expat Aid will leave Malta for Christmas to visit their home countries.
Unexpectedly for me, a man in his forties appears in the doorway. He greets us. He speaks English with a Maltese accent. He is there to discuss the food truck.
Nadine and the intern remain in the current office room. Agatha, Zoe and the new guest move to a vacant room down the corridor closer to the exit, and I follow them. insists it is better to run it separately in parallel. He also advises to get a licenced restaurant kitchen and use the truck for deliveries. In his words: "it is a cockroach country [Malta]. You have to be one otherwise you die". Zoe and Agatha bring up another counterargument to having a separate business entity -they are concerned with profit transfers from the company to the association (there is no law in Malta allowing one to run a so-called social enterprise). He is indifferent to this comment.
He carries on by saying that they need a good chef to do calculations for their meals, She is convinced that it is of paramount importance for the clientele to ensure that the food sold is prepared in clean conditions. The other participants disagree with her, especially Zoe and Nadine who do not understand why it is so crucial to have such levels of transparency. They decide to leave the design issues for the time being and transfer their attention to the menu instead. Zoe and Nadine are the advocates of having an assortment as varied as possible. Zoe also raises the issue of running an environmentally friendly business -no refuse policy -as an example she refers to their chef consultant who has told her that yesterday's pita bread can be reused today as pita crisps. The rest express their agreement with this policy.
Then, the ladies start to entertain the idea of having a flexible menu allowing some space for clients to design their own dishes by asking the staff to mix several ingredients together in order to create a dish that originally does not exist on the menu. Shakira occasionally warns the rest that she cannot stay for too long today.
Zoe again turns to forwarding messages from their chef consultant who allegedly warned the girls from having too predictable a menu: "don't sell pizza because pizza sells and everyone sells it here.'' According to Zoe, their advisor is encouraging them to find their own niche in the Maltese catering market. One of the potential means of achieving this uniqueness could be a rotating ( Zoe is trying to lead the conversation into a different direction away from the actual food that will be cooked to the pricing policy. She is of the opinion that it is better to set their prices in stone from the very beginning. Shakira protests -to her mind, the opposite approach is going to be a better tactic from a business point of view. Zoe finds Shakira's position unfair towards the newly gained loyal customer base -people must be able to count on their food truck as having stable prices. the event will gather around 150 individuals. Then, he becomes curious about the right way of making a payment for their services as he acknowledges that the association is not a company but rather an NGO. He needs an official invoice for their cooking services but Zoe expresses her concerns that it may not be possible due to not being registered as a company which makes the guest thoughtful at first 43 but then he seems to have come up with a solution -he assures them he has a relative working for a major accounting company in Malta who might advise the ladies on how to redress this problem in question.
The ladies and man agree to keep in touch as he gets up from his chair and leaves. Nadine warns Zoe that she has had previous experience with this gentleman and that prudence is the most appropriate way of carrying out business with him.
Nadine calls it a day and before we leave she informs me that she will meet an accountant who will help them free of charge to make things orderly and she explains why it is important: "we have a system which is not a system". We agree to meet four days later.
That day comes and I arrive as arranged. The minute I drop my rucksack on the floor in their office, I am asked whether I could help them assemble their furniture which will arrive any time soon from their old office. Nadine is holding a meeting with their new intern in a separate room which happens to be vacant, thus, can be used by the Expat Aid -officially the association is renting only one room on this floor of the office complex. Nevertheless, the floor in question contains more than just one room. Two rooms are occupied: one by the Expat Aid; and another one by some firm. The other three or so rooms are not rented by anyone and the landlord does not mind that the association or the firm use them now and then. Agatha informs me that they had a rendezvous yesterday with the accountant who was found by their Italian member (whom I still have not met). When I inquire about the meeting, Agatha replies that he does not feel sufficiently skilful to consult NGOs but he will do his best to help the association.
While waiting for the delivery company to bring their office belongings, Agatha and I are having a chat about her role at the Expat Aid. It turns out that she is not that heavily involved with the food truck. She is just following developments.
However, her main job is to keep track of finances. The association has a separate bank account for each project and a separate file on their computer for each project's money transactions. She explains that they are not professional accountants but would like to keep things orderly, hence, they find it the most appropriate way of bookkeeping. She adds that this current system makes their lives easier when it comes to producing reports for their donors. She has been a volunteer at the organisation for about one year and she moved to Malta due to her husband's job.
She explains that when she moved, she sensed an urge to get involved in some sort 44 of voluntary activity and the Expat Aid Association seemed like a good choice.
Having chatted for about thirty minutes, we see the movers arrive and deliver the furniture. The day is wrapped up by Agatha sighing that she hopes they will never ever have to move again, except to larger premises. Nadine confirms by adding that she hopes that they will have money to continue to pay the rent.

Analysis
My analysis focused on providing answers to the three most important questions that Entrepreneurship . Zoe's and Rita's answers indicate that their intended food truck would have two objectives: to help migrant and refugee women who struggle with employment and integration in Malta as discussed in the Diversity and Discrimination chapter; and to finance the association's other projects, which leads me to conclude that these aims qualify with two out of the three areas of social entrepreneurshipemployment of marginalised groups and profit allocation to charitable causes. Their primary task is to provide employment and the profit allocation would play a secondary role which reflects the EU's observation that the majority of social businesses begin as integration projects and later possibly expand and refocus (European Commission, Directorate E, 2015) .

Mhm. Alright. OK, why have you decided to have a food truck for your social business so to say?
Like why me? Or why the association?
The association and whose idea was it? Was it your idea, was it..?
No, it was not my idea. It was defined more than a year ago. There was a research project Step Up, I believe, which highlighted that the women we were in contact with had very good cooking skills but a lot of them were not doing cooking as a means of living. And it was also decided. Well, it was not decided but it was recognised that promoting diversity through food was a very efficient way to break prejudices and make talk together even if they are from different backgrounds. It was a nice way to start, you know, promoting a dialogue among cultures and basically we started doing catering events but then we realised: "if we want to promote women's empowerment and employment, events are not enough because it is one or two days during a month". So, it's not, you know, regular income that's enough to sustain someone's life. So, we thought that a food truck would be operating on a daily basis so we could actually employ women with full time contracts.
You employ women who are the most disadvantaged, who are, let's say, migrant women who can't find a job and are probably facing some discrimination?
Well, yeah. That's the aim. Right now, the two women we are employing… Em, yeah, do they? Are they completely the targets? Well, yes and no, like you know one of them has very good experience in cooking and like even managing a kitchen. And I don't know the full story. I just know that she did a couple of experiences. Em, she learnt a lot. She's very knowledgeable in everything, including, the Maltese environment. And… And she wanted herself to kind of keep back. And she is part of this project because she liked the idea. So, she's not the most disadvantaged woman. And the second one, she's from Syria and she never worked as a cook. She's very good. She worked as tailor before.
You know, at the same time she didn't want to get a crappy job without a contract which happened to be the case. She was employed without a contract, you know, for a couple of hours. So, and the ambition is as well to work with refugees. So maybe very soon we'll be in a position to employ another refugee.
As it is evident, their aim is to empower women as an organisation and they wish to expand this ambition through an establishment of a business entity which leads me to question their self-awareness as NGO workers, hence, our conversation moves into the realm of distinction between business thinking and philanthropic thinking and this is where we see that a social entrepreneur is both an entrepreneur as well as a selfless benefactor -a business person detached from greed as defined in the Social Entrepreneurship subchapter.
We are very much thinking business-wise.

Aha!
Well, you know, at the end of the day, if we don't have money, so we don't want to be like a hard-core business. Maybe today is a good example. So, the discussion started business-wise, like organisation of, you know, the operations, because we started to do a bit of catering, having people taste the menu, and you know get some feedback. Do you like it or not? Bla-bla-bla. But then we realised that we were catering for between 15-20 to 70 people like every day for four days. And when I look at how it was going in the kitchen, so it is the beginning, so maybe a bit different, but still, I was seeing Karima and Alzira, they're already really busy. Even without loading and unloading the truck, driving the truck etc. So we started to discuss: "OK, do you think we need a third cook because it seems to me a bit tight in terms of, you know, responsibilities and timing and everything?" and we started to discuss: "who we will recruit?" And I had interviews with a couple of women, and I had someone in mind -a more different profile. And with Nadine we shared an idea that this woman happens to be an Eritrean. And you know this is when the social mission comes into the equation as well. This woman is Eritrean, and she has a refugee status. We were like: "this is a perfect candidate." At first, she openly expressed her willingness to work, to be a kitchen helper, because she said: "I'm not a cook. I have experience in helping in a kitchen, but I can't tell myself I'm a cook". So, she is interesting by this position and she has the right, you know, by any other characteristic we look at. You know, diversity of profiles and the social mission. This is where the social mission gets into discussion. We started business-wise, OK, operations, how we can make sure that we are able to do what we need to do.
And then when you choose a candidate, you don't only choose based on I want this profile, you also choose: "who do I want to empower?" When it comes to profits going to a charitable cause, Rita as well as Zoe claim they will use any surplus income of the food truck to finance the association -again we see that greed is not the motivating factor, instead it is their selfless will to empower the disadvantaged. However, they differ in their levels of optimism concerning how much extra cash the envisioned social business will actually generate.

ZOE
No, no. It was because of, because this is what we will end up doing -like having a separate commercial entity with a special agreement with the association that like 90% of the profit, no, let's put it, 100% of profit minus what's needed for investment will go to the association. The reason why we were a bit reserved when we met this guy was because he wanted to take some shares in the company. And we are not very comfortable with this.

RITA
But you're still pushing for a social business and if it doesn't happen, then you are setting up a private entity, company that will, if possible, also finance the association. Yeah?
Yeah, but I don't think that will finance the association. I think that's a really... (makes a gesture with her hand pointing upwards).
It would be a dreamer's dream, the biggest dream ever. No, it's just to make the ends meet. How do you say..?

Alright.
Because it definitely wouldn't finance the association. Also, the association runs only with projects at the moment, so then funding that is needed is only for specific projects. Like or no...

What brought you to Malta?
My husband was transferred here for work

How did you get involved with this association? Why particularly this association?
I got in contact with Nadine through my lecturer at university because I'm doing a master's in Gender

Studies
At the University of Malta?

50
Yeah! And at some point, I knew I had some more free time, so I decided to volunteer. I wanted to do something in relationship with the master's. So! And my lecturer, who knows Nadine very well, told me: "just go and see how you can help" This account of Zoe's about her presence in Malta confirms my Observation that the association consists of foreign nationals. Rita also confirms in her interview that she is not a Maltese national and that the association's goals chime well with those of her own -empowerment of foreign women in Malta -which is where I draw parallels with the values function discussed in the Volunteerism subchapter by Clary et al (1998) and Lavelle (2010) . Being an overseas citizen does not make them automatically humanitarian, philanthropic, or voluntary. However, it is one step closer to making them humanitarian as discussed in the Humanitarianism subchapter as they put alleviation of human suffering above international borders (Barnett, 2011) as becomes evident in the proceeding exchanges of questions and answers.

OK. I see. So, you're doing Gender Studies. Was your Bachelor's also regarding Gender Studies?
What is, sorry?
No, no, no, I already hold a Master's. Already in Business Administration with the specialisation in sustainability and consulting.

OK, OK, OK. And then you decided to get another Master's degree.
Exactly.

And you also saw this organisation and it kind of chimes together very well because this is an organization that is trying to empower women, correct?
That's the thing. When I was working as a sustainability consultant at some point [before moving to Malta], like when I was pregnant, I took a leave of course and I was thinking to focus more on empowering women and then I moved to Malta and I said: "OK, the two fields that interest me are migration and women". So, of course, you know, Expat Aid Association was a perfect fit. And at that moment, I applied actually to the association. I was starting a course on gender-based violence and this is why I started with Brighter Tomorrow because Brighter Tomorrow 19 is focused on gender-based violence survivors. Even though we do address women who are not openly gender-based violence survivors, but it was a conjunction of everything.

RITA
Why did we start providing English lessons to women? Because we realised that they were not going to the ones organised by the government. Why they don't go, because, for example, they don't have no one at home to leave their kids or maybe the classes would also have male participants and so on, so maybe their husbands would not allow in certain cases. They just can't afford to pay or that the courses are done during the working hours. Or yeah, there are a lot of… we took all this, and we tried to find a way to deliver English lessons only for women and we started providing childcare at the same time. So, we would invite them to lessons, and then in a different room in the same building there is a space where we have, can take care of the kids for one hour and a half. It's not really  (Fraisse et al., 2016) , (Corriveau, 2016) . And this is how Rita and Zoe confirm their needs-based approach. We start with the needs.

Is it easy to start with the needs?
No, because some are less sexy than others. Like SAHHA is very sexy. English classes very much less sexy.

Why? How come?
When I met this summer with the Malta Chess Community or whatever the name is, MCCF, they have a like a huge amount of money because they do big fundraising activities, and then they do a call for NGOs to get funded… and first we met them because of SAHHA. And when I met with them, it was like SAHHA -we get some money -but English classes -it's not nice. I mean, it's not nice, it's not…

Useful?
I don't know. It looks better if you do a report in your company, it looks better if you say: "well, I had to build a nice, trendy food truck for migrant women" than paying for English classes.

Did they explain why it looks better?
No. They didn't say. I told them: "it's much more difficult for us to fundraise for English classes than for a food truck." Individual people give for food truck, no one gives for English classes even though it was the original programme from the association. I got contacted by a friend, someone I know from somewhere, who is giving a theatre show and at the end they got donations from the audience because it is a free show. And he told me: "like last year gave the money to an organisation and this year we want to give it to you because we love the food truck." So, the food truck, it's appealing.

But will it last forever?
No. This is why we are building to make this work. (both laugh) because we need to be self-sustainable. So… Do you like the existing system of financing NGOs? The one that exists… No.

Shitty. What is it that you really don't like about it? That there are these sexy and non-sexy topics to finance?
First, it is about trends. Right. Of course, it's about who sets the… we don't set the priorities. We try to do advocacy that we do but you're dependent on the trends from the big donors. For example, the reason, like, we got the fund from the US embassy for Brighter Tomorrow is because they decided to focus on gender based violence and you know, there has been so many debates right now in society about violence that probably it should or shouldn't, I don't know, be easier to get funds for this. The two excerpts above confirm the humanistic needs-based principle which is driven by the willingness to see the world a better place as discussed by Walzer ability to address all needs which is a rather philanthropic mindset -the government is failing these individuals, thus, we need to step in and provide the necessary service rewardless-ly. However, there is another typical aspect of philanthropy noticeable -my participants intend to do a small scale activity in a narrow context (catering) which might overlook the greater problems pertaining the refugee women in Malta (Edwards, 2009) , (Frame, 2005) , (Blowfield & Frynas, 2005) .
Our conversation continues by revealing what rewardless-ly entails -they sacrifice their spare time to help others for free which puts the voluntary aspect into the picture (Clary et al., 1998) .

ZOE
OK. do we like money, do we do this for money? (I laugh) Is this the question?
Well, in a way yes. All of them are about money, these questions.
Do we personally or as an organisation?
As an organisation of course, as an organisation.
Well, we don't do it for money. I'm working on volunteer basis since four months. We don't do it for money. We do it because we want like… the money is a means. Like, if you want to be able to, you know, when they first wrote the business plan, they said: "our objective is to employ forty women. know. It's not only money. Like, when I see Alzira, she is so excited because they are two in the kitchen, both of them in the kitchen decide on the menu, they decide on everything. Basically, you know, they have power, the decision power which is greater than everything they had before in their work experiences. And, also, their culture is recognised and em… valued. Like, you know, past week we did some tasting for the menu and she… well I tried it before… she cooked one of the Syrian dishes and it's very good. And they never get to cook it before, not in their job in the kitchen, not even for an event, I think, because for an event we do more pastries and so on. And when they deliver the food to this company, you know, we have like a great feedback every day. And they were so excited because at the end of the day it is their culture that is valued.

Yeah.
And as I remember, it was you and Agatha, you had a bit of reservations about that because of taxes.
No, no. It was because of, because this is what we will end up doing -like having a separate commercial entity with a special agreement with the association that like 90% of the profit, no, let's put it, 100% of profit minus what's needed for investment will go to the association. The reason why we were a bit reserved when we met this guy was because he wanted to take some shares in the company. And we are not very comfortable with this.

You want to be independent, right?
Yeah, and you see I think you asked before about a good offer and this is the second person who offered to take shares in the company. So somewhere it does validate the fact that is gonna work.
And there's like a market segment for what we want to do.
You are prepared to do this thing to have two separate entities.
We have to.
The association and the business and then funnel the money.  Engel's (1987) iteration and non-iteration of time flow and Walzer's (2011) advocacy of justice as humanitarians' main ambition are two parts of one process.
Iteration in the given context is perceived as injustice toward refugee women in Malta by my participants, whereas their envisioned non-iteration via the food truck business is perceived as an embodiment of justice toward refugee women in Malta.
Time is a tool of change too -a vehicle of power described by Lucht (2012)  I don't know if they use the word 'service'.

Ah, they don't use the word 'service'?
They might be using the word 'service'. You can check if you want.

OK.
There was a change in the legislation this past month.

Alright, I'm just wondering what's the point then of having a social enterprise business if you can just sit on this system of kind of giving food away for free but then…
The problem is of having them regularly, on a very regular basis.
The regularity is the problem.
Whereas, we don't, we did not have them regularly. While law is an external obstacle which affects time too (iteration and non-iteration and search for solutions to establish a social business -search for justice), time as a factor can also be found within the association. My Observation suggests that the participants are required to live up to other obligations, e.g. family, education, work, which at times is in conflict with their obligations as members of the association in question. This is where Daniel Golden's (Benedek & Veszelszki, 2016, pp. 51-56) revelation that each individual is given a limited fraction of time while there is an infinite supply of it in general comes into play -moreover, this is also where Herring's (2009)  Yeah, Brighter Tomorrow.
The excerpt above from Zoe's interview and the one below from Rita's expose three phenomena: intensification of time usage, prioritisation of out-of-association activities, and the lack of division of labour. The first (intensification) is a product of the willingness to achieve more while the second just like the third is a typical characteristic of volunteer-based organisations. The intensive versus extensive time usage is what Daniel Golden (Benedek & Veszelszki, 2016) points out: every human being, having acknowledged that insufficient work has been done, is facing a dilemma: either to work more hours or to work more intensively. My interviewees work more intensively -they perform numerous tasks simultaneously which is also a lack of clear division of labour so typical of volunteer organisations as discussed by Farmer and Fedor (2001). Zoe actually opts for working less hours for the association and more on her master thesis instead and this is where Farmer and Fedor (2001) can explain why -volunteers' priorities with regard to time management are dictated by other obligations, e.g. education, family, and so on.
They note that unpaid staff (volunteers) are more likely than paid professionals to prioritise out-of-voluntary-organisation obligations at the expense of their voluntary duties once a time management conflict arises which results in a significant hindrance for a voluntary organisation's ability to perform its tasks.
However, Zoe and Rita do not quit the association altogether. As discussed in the Philanthropy, Volunteerism and Humanitarianism subchapter, my participants as predominantly value motivated volunteers (Clary et al., 1998) are prepared to go above and beyond to see the association's goals achieved (Farmer & Fedor, 2001) while at the same time trying to preserve their other roles outside the association.
Rita also struggles with time management and, also, opts for spending less time on the association, and she also wears many hats at a time in the association.

RITA
How is the time management? Do you find enough time to dedicate to the organisation, to the women's organisation and then some other things that you have to do like studying? Some hobbies or whatever you have?
No, not really.

Not really, busy?
I just went on part-time work because of that.

So, you say it's hard, right?
Mhm.
OK. So, I remember that you're a board member. Besides that, anything else?
So, I used to be a volunteer before that. Then I became a board member. This is also voluntary. Then yeah, but I'm still involved in the running of the organisation, not only board duties.

What other duties? Administrative stuff?
Administrative stuff. Like helping with applications. Em… keeping in touch with other organisations by email.
Later, I discuss diversity issues with my interviewees which also affects their time management. Diversity of opinion is what Herring (2009)  If you look at what the Grassy Hopper is doing right now, the vegan, vegetarian restaurant, in Gzira, they stop operating during the day, they just do special evenings. So of course, their consistency is about bringing vegetarian and vegan food but then their special evenings, special nights -you have one Japanese night, one pizza night, one Indonesia food. So, it is about bringing a whole diversity of food and twisting recipes to make them vegan and vegetarian. And I guess that the mission of the food truck is also to bring this diversity with people coming from different backgrounds. So, for me it is not a problem if we have a specific menu. And you know like if you look at numbers, well I'm not 100% sure of this, but if you just look at the women who we are in contact with, the vast majority are women from Syria or Libya or, you know, North Africa. So, I think it's kind of realistic to say that on the menu we will have always dishes from these countries and these cultures. And then, I would very much like to have someone from Eritrea or Somalia or West Africa to bring other things. But even Filipinos, Colombian people. And we will find a way. There's always a way to market things. We can say: "Oh, we have a new cook, or a new cook visiting for one month". And you get a limited time contract for this person, for one month, we advertise a lot, we say: "hey, let's discover together food from Columbia". And you keep part of your regular items on the menu, but you know change half of the menu to cater for these specific things. I think there's always a way to… what we bring is like home-made food from different countries. So, no matter what the countries are.

Conclusion
How does the absence of pro-social business legislation in Malta affect the endeavours of a philanthropic NGO to pursue the aim of empowering migrant women via social business? The short answer: the absence of pro-social business legislation in Malta affects my participants negatively. However, there is a broader picture.
The EU's 2015 report on social entrepreneurship superficially touches upon the barriers faced by social entrepreneurs in Europe -lack of pro-social business legislation causes legal uncertainty and in general NGOs striving to establish a social enterprise lack good organisation. My work has managed to see behind these vaguely described obstacles and see what distinguishes social entrepreneurs from ordinary entrepreneurs. Firstly, as evident from the Law and Society chapter, law is just one element embedded in a larger narrative -any story touching upon legal matters starts before law is invoked and usually surpasses the legal stage and continues to exist at later stages. My participants as defined in the Analysis part exhibit traits attributable to humanitarians, volunteers and philanthropists supporting their social mission as future entrepreneurs, that is social entrepreneurs, and as such they face the legal uncertainty when it comes to establishing a social enterprise which they see as a mechanism of delivering justice to those (refugee women) whom they perceive as suffering from injustice -the lack of integration and employment opportunities in the Maltese society.
Secondly, apart from the external legal obstacle which incites them to resort to creating a vehicle as described by Zoe to realise their plan, there are a myriad of internal factors causing delays in the establishment of the food truck social business.
They lack the organisational skills and time resources necessary to reach their goals at the desired pace. Zoe's envisioned vehicle is a product of deliberations and planning caused by the lack of appropriate laws which has consumed much time.
Time occupies a special place in the lives of my participants. It is the only true resource at their disposal to further their goals but as volunteers they devote it free of charge and only as much as is permitted by other obligations, i.e. family, education, work. And time is also a measuring tape of their perception of injustice and justicesimilar to Engel's (1987) iterating and non-iterating time flow -the current situation 73 with the refugee women is perceived as an iteration of injustice and the envisioned future social business is perceived as a non-iteration of injustice and, hence, progression toward justice. question is addressed to you as an individual working for the association and as the organisation as a whole, as a collective of people.