In Ireland, the government began supporting social enterprise in the 1980s as a way to combat unemployment. The national Community Enterprise Programme, established in 1983, “provided funded training programs, development grants and commercial aids to community-based groups” (O’Hara, 2001, p. 155). In Finland, the Ministry of Labour has worked with the Institute for Cooperative Studies at the University of Helsinki to develop materials and presentations on how to establish cooperatives (P¨attiniemi, 2001)