The Solidarity Economy: A Way Forward for Our De-Futured World

As society contends with the ongoing economic, environmental and political crises perpetuated by racist patriarchal ecologically-destructive capitalism, there is a need to look beyond forms of inequality to the opportunity of solidarity. While histories of mutuality and reciprocity have long been present in economies around the world, it is in the last thirty years that global movements have begun to coalesce under the framework of the solidarity economy. This framework asserts a path forward towards a just and sustainable post-capitalist future, based in cooperation and care.. We begin by exploring how the solidarity economy framework and movement have been making already-existing alternatives to capitalism visible. Then we consider the values, practices and institutions that have come to define the solidarity economy, and the vital role social movements have played in creating a politics and culture of solidarity. We then look at how the solidarity economy movement is growing and solidifying the solidarity economy through education, incubation, and establishing networks at multiple scales. The article concludes with a consideration of present challenges, including capitalist competition, dealing with competing frameworks, inclusion/exclusion, and overcoming conflict

Adam Smith’s Green Thumb and Malthus’ Three Horsemen: Cautionary tales from classical political economy

This essay identifies a contradiction between the flourishing interest in the environmental economics of the classical period and a lack of critical parsing of the works of its leading representatives. Its focus is the work of Adam Smith and Thomas Malthus. It offers a critical analysis of their contribution to environmental thought and surveys the work of their contemporary devotees. It scrutinizes Smith's contribution to what Karl Polanyi termed the "economistic fallacy," as well as his defenses of class hierarchy, the "growth imperative" and consumerism. It subjects to critical appraisal Malthus's enthusiasm for private property and the market system, and his opposition to market regulation. While Malthus's principal attraction to ecological economists lies in his having allegedly broadened the scope of economics, and in his narrative of scarcity, this article shows that he, in fact, narrowed the scope of the discipline and conceptualized scarcity in a reified and pseudo-scientific way

Corporate Governance for Sustainability

The current model of corporate governance needs reform. There is mounting evidence that the practices of shareholder primacy drive company directors and executives to adopt the same short time horizon as financial markets. Pressure to meet the demands of the financial markets drives stock buybacks, excessive dividends and a failure to invest in productive capabilities. The result is a ‘tragedy of the horizon’, with corporations and their shareholders failing to consider environmental, social or even their own, long-term, economic sustainability. With less than a decade left to address the threat of climate change, and with consensus emerging that businesses need to be held accountable for their contribution, it is time to act and reform corporate governance in the EU. The statement puts forward specific recommendations to clarify the obligations of company boards and directors and make corporate governance practice significantly more sustainable and focused on the long term

Social surplus approach and heterodox economics

Given the emphasis on social provisioning in heterodox economics, two of its central theoretical organizing principles are the concepts of the total social product and the social surplus. This appears to link heterodox economics to the social surplus approach associated with the classical economists and currently with Sraffian economists. However, heterodox economics connects agency with the social surplus and the social product, which the Sraffians reject as they take the level and composition of the social product as given. Therefore the different theoretical approach regarding the social surplus taken in heterodox economics may generate a different but similar way of theorizing about a capitalist economy. To explore this difference is the aim of the paper. Thus the paper is divided into four parts and a conclusion. In the first section social provisioning and the social surplus is introduced. In the second section, the Sraffian social surplus approach is delineated while in the third section the heterodox social surplus approach is delineated. In the fourth section of the paper, some of the implications emerging from the differences between the two approaches are discussed. The paper is concluded in the final section

Beyond economic man: economic crisis, feminist economics, and the solidarity economy

Este trabajo hace una revisión de la evolución histórica del feminismo así como de los cambios y retos en las demandas sociales con enfoque de género en el contexto de los países desarrollados. Esas reflexiones se relacionan con los cambios en el pensamiento socialista y las luchas sociales en el capitalismo avanzando hacia la economía solidaria y feminista como alternativa ante la crisis capitalista [email protected] paper reviews the historic evolution of the feminist movement as well as the changes and challenges on social demands with a gender perspective in the context of developed countries. Such reflections are related to changes in the socialist thought and social struggles in the capitalism leading to feminist solidarity economy as an alternative in the capitalist crisis

Some Comments on the Role of Lesbianism in Feminist Economic Transformation

This paper explores the relationship between feminism and lesbianism, arguing both that feminism has encouraged and supported lesbianism, and that the existence of lesbian feminism supports both feminist goals in general and heterosexual feminists in particular.Lesbian, Lesbianism, Feminist, Feminism, Economics, Sexuality,