CFCFE is delighted to announce that the 2021 Credit Union Research Prize has been awarded to a team of leading academics who will be addressing the highly topical issue of social value, or impact, reporting for credit unions.
Dr Peter Cleary (Cork University Business School, University College Cork), Dr Martin Quinn (Queens University Belfast) and Dr Martijn van der Steen (University of Groningen) – pictured below – bring their accountancy and business expertise to the question of how social impact reporting can ensure credit unions retain their ‘moral legitimacy’, or understood social distinctiveness, in a highly competitive and regulated market which may disrupt the credit unions’ traditional ways of operating. The study will evaluate the usefulness of social value reporting in supporting credit unions’ delivery of their social role. The findings of the study will be relevant to the credit union sector in determining their true value to the communities in which they operate.
Several credit unions presented social impact reports in 2020, and CFCFE is currently finalising revisions to its credit union social reporting toolkit, so we are delighted to support this project to address the relevance and rigour of impact reporting.
CFCFE launched the Credit Union Research Prize in 2020, with the objective of bring new expert voices and ideas into the development of the movement. The 2020 Prize was awarded to a team from University College Cork, and the resulting paper will be published over the summer.
The 2021 Prize team
