Entrepreneurship development is a key factor for an economic and social development of a country. Estonia is a small country and in the context of big number of small-sized businesses and sole proprietors, it is also important to discuss about acting family firms as social entrepreneurs in transition society.

Our research will study:

• Historical development of social entrepreneurship,
• Modern definitions of social entrepreneurship,
• Historical background: how market economy was restored in Estonia,
• Different definitions of social and family entrepreneurship,
• Differences of traditional, family and social entrepreneur,
• Methodology and research questions,
• Estonian case of social entrepreneurship.

The concept of social entrepreneurship has been occurred in the scientific world since 1980s. Some researchers stress the importance of entrepreneurial environment and its process of becoming “social”. Others believe that the personal characteristics of particular entrepreneur are more important and only the presence of the unique individual traits will make social entrepreneur.
Estonian cases of social entrepreneurship have their specificities as examples from post-communist transitional country. The traditional market economy had to be introduced here about 15 years ago intensively both on theoretical basis and learning-by-doing.
As Estonian economy became very liberal, differences in between traditional and social entrepreneurship are more distinct. Traditional entrepreneurship considers itself as independent institution, apart from other social institutions. Its efficiency is considered in terms of profit.
Social entrepreneurship is rather symbiotic part of society, it shares interests with other institutions and its efficiency is measured by growth of social welfare and cohesion. Generation of money is just secondary and supportive objective.
The article will study social entrepreneur, Märt Vähi has very different background, having been 38 years active at Pentecostal Church in Canada and Estonia. Reverend Vähi has no business history but he has started several industries like saw mill supporting his foundation The Village of Hope. The Village of Hope is a ten month in residence Christian Drug and Alcohol regeneration program for men.
As well let us recall our research questions, we supposed that Estonian social entrepreneur (1) has been successful for-profit entrepreneur before and/or had reasonable social capital, including business connections, (2) had some strong personal motivation to turn sight beyond conventional business life and (3) had mastered to overcome compatibility problems in between conventional and social business logic.

Keywords: social entrepreneurship, family firms, post-communist transition society, case study