The article considers a such type of socio-economic activity as social entrepreneurship in the context of ensuring the financial capacity of local communities, as well as in the plane of solving current social problems. Four main approaches to the interpretation of social entrepreneurship are developed. The basic features and differences in comparison with other forms of economic activity are revealed. It was found that unites all these approaches-priority of the social purpose of economic activity and they differ in the breadth of the scope. The paper outlines the manifestations of socio-economic effects of social enterprises. The importance and urgency of starting social enterprises for territorial communities in the conditions of decentralization are substantiated. Three tendencies of the process of formation and development of social enterprises in the regions of Ukraine are indicated, as well as the main directions of support of social business by local self - government bodies. The official statistical information on the social and business sector is analyzed. The decisive feature of social business is the official declaration of its own social mission in regulations. The main barriers and problems of social enterprise development in the regional socio-economic processes of Ukraine are identified and directions for their elimination are proposed. The study concluded that the practical activities of socio-entrepreneurial initiatives often outpace the state response to current challenges, create jobs, generate significant financial capital and investment in state and local budgets. Thus for the successful functioning of social entrepreneurship in regional socio-economic processes, rationally built economic and management mechanisms are needed, and appropriate strategies (ways) to support the development of social enterprises are outlined. However, each community is unique in its geographical, spatial, socio-demographic, natural and resource characteristics, therefore the activities of local governments will largely determine the specific directions of such strategies.