Framework

Solidarity initiatives and enterprises are growing in number and innovating the ways of social and material organization of life, disseminating in a context of a deep job insecurity, other socioeconomic rationalities characterized by self-management, cooperation and solidarity. Their community dimension, based on a reciprocity logics, allows an equal and non-hierarchical coexistence of different sets of knowledge and the creation of practical alternatives based on them which resist and question the hegemony of global capitalism.

The Study Group on Solidarity Economy (ECOSOL/CES) of the Centre for Social Studies of the University of Coimbra is an academic space that gathers research initiatives about the courses, challenges and innovations in Solidarity Economy enterprises. It also organizes scientific events with the goal of promoting knowledge and experience exchange. The international colloquium "Solidarity Economy: a seed for the future" is one of those initiatives. In collaboration with the Centre of Cooperative Studies and Social Economy (CECES/FEUC) and the Master's Programme in Social and Solidarity Economy of ISCTE/IUL, the ECOSOL/CES group seeks to provide, with the international colloquium, a space for discussing the courses of Solidarity Economy in Portugal and the worlds.

Besides an opening lecture by Jean-Louis Laville, Professor at the Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers and European coordinator of the Karl Polanyi Institute of Political Economy, the Colloquium aims at providing to the academic community and enterprise activists, a broad reflection about the most significant dimensions of Solidarity Economy, with three thematic sessions on activism, market and State and one panel where scholars and activists will debate field experiences around solidarity economy.