WANG Yuning, WANG Hualin
(Jingdezhen Ceramic University, Jingdezhen 333403, Jiangxi, China)

Extended Abstract: [Background and purpose] With the vigorous development of the cultural industry around the world, the economic value of intangible cultural heritage is increasingly being discovered and recognized. As a typical traditional craft with the nature of production, ceramic intangible cultural heritage has economic attributes from the date of birth and has broad prospects for industrialization. However, during the process of industrialization, it is very easy for enterprises to harm its artistic authenticity owing to the pursuit of maximizing profits. As a novel business model using market-based strategies to solve complex social issues, social entrepreneurship provides new ideas for the inheritance of intangible cultural heritage. Specifically, social entrepreneurship offers considerable benefits in the inheritance of ceramic intangible cultural heritage, such as achieving the integration of commercial and cultural value, engaging a diverse range of stakeholders, promoting ceramic cultural identity and dissemination, advancing the innovation and sustainable development and so on. However, in the process of fulfilling social mission, enterprises meet challenges in aggregating resources and creating value simply by its own strength, so that it is necessary to collaborate with stakeholders to allocate and integrate resources. Therefore, value co-creation represents the core logic embedded in the process of social entrepreneurship. This study is aimed to explore the realization path of social entrepreneurship to promote the inheritance of ceramic intangible cultural heritage under the participation of multiple stakeholders with case studies.[Methods] Huangyao Group and Chengdexuan Porcelain Co., Ltd. were selected as the samples for case study. The two companies have insisted on adopting traditional handmade porcelain techniques from the beginning of their founding, who have made outstanding contributions to the inheritance and development of the ceramic intangible cultural heritage. Their efforts also have received profound recognition. The grounded theory was used to analyze both primary and secondary data, totaling more than 160,000 words. The data set encompasses the following sources: (1) records of in-depth interviews, encompassing company executives, company staff, inheritors, and government personnel; (2) internal company documents; (3) information published on the company's official platforms; (4) relevant news reports; (5) government documents; (6) related papers from CNKI; (7) consumer feedback from various platforms. The data analysis process includes four parts: open coding, axial coding, selective coding and theoretical saturation test. Following systematic inductive analysis, the concepts and categories were progressively refined from the primary data, which was initially vague and cluttered. Ultimately, the realization path of social entrepreneurship to promote the inheritance of ceramic intangible cultural heritage was formulated.[Results] In the open coding session, 61 concepts were obtained through the initial refinement of the primary data. Subsequently, the related concepts were categorized into the same category and 19 categories were refined, such as profit-driven, social mission and personal experience. In the axial coding session, the 19 categories were integrated into 4 main categories through a process of further clustering and summarization: conceptual consensus, environmental co-construction, cooperation symbiosis and value win-win. In the selective coding session, through repeated analysis of the 19 categories and 4 main categories, the core category was finally summarized as "value co-creation of social entrepreneurship in ceramic intangible cultural heritage industry". The four main categories serve as the process of the core category, in which the conceptual consensus forms the foundation, the environment co-construction serves as the guarantee, cooperation symbiosis is the key and the value win-win is the goal. One-third of the original data were set aside as a saturation test sample. Following the coding process, no additional concepts or categories emerged. Consequently, the theoretical saturation test was passed and the model had reached saturation.[Conclusions] Social entrepreneurship is an effective way to promote the inheritance of ceramic intangible cultural heritage. Guided by the theory of value co-creation, the realization path of social entrepreneurship to promote the inheritance of ceramic intangible cultural heritage was thoroughly explored. Social entrepreneurship establishes a value co-creation network through four distinct processes, i.e., conceptual consensus, environmental co-construction, cooperation symbiosis and value win-win. This value co-creation network encompasses the involvement of various stakeholders, including government, enterprises, inheritors, local residents, universities, research institutes and consumers. In the collaborative creation of value by stakeholders, social entrepreneurship effectively activates the cultural value and economic potential of ceramic intangible cultural heritage, thus realizing its living heritage in the process of industrialization. Finally, the study was concluded with four implications to help optimizing the development of social entrepreneurship in ceramic intangible cultural heritage industry.
Key words: social entrepreneurship; ceramic intangible cultural heritage; value co-creation