This book explores Europe's third sector – the non-profit organisations and providers of social services such as mutuals, co-operatives, associations, voluntary organisations and charities: these elements of a civil society are important yet often overlooked features in contemporary...

In many European countries, the third sector is considered an actor able to improve both the efficiency and the efficacy of public healthcare systems afflicted by the crisis of the welfare state. Attributed to third-sector organizations is the role of a hybrid actor tasked with the professional...

The focus on achieving financial efficiency by microfinance institutions in recent years raises a natural concern on their social outcome, outreach to the poor. Using a stochastic frontier approach on sample microfinance providers in Ethiopia, this paper analysed the effect of an increasingly...