A outra racionalidade da economia solidária. Conclusões do primeiro Mapeamento Nacional no Brasil

• Main Author: Luiz Inácio Gaiger
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Centro de Estudos Sociais da Universidade de Coimbra 2007-12-01
• Series: Revista Crítica de Ciências Sociais
• Subjects: solidary economy; association; self-management; democratic participation; Brazil
• Online Access: http://journals.openedition.org/rccs/725

This paper examines the empirical results of the first national survey on the solidary economy in Brazil, which collected data on nearly 22,000 experiments. Since these relate to organizations based on the free association of workers, cooperative production, and principles of self-management, the author’s goal is to see to what extent they adopt a different rationale, opposed in certain aspects to the economic logic that underlies the continuous accumulation of capital. The analysis focuses on relations between indicators of the internal and external solidarity of enterprises and indicators of efficiency and economic viability. Although weaknesses and limitations are pointed out, these enterprises show a general tendency to accomplish their goals of preserving life with dignity, through democratic participation and reciprocity.