Building a Social Economy Research Platform: Towards a Strategic Decision-Making Approach within the BC-Alberta Social Economy Research Alliance (BALTA)

The BC-Alberta Social Economy Research Alliance (BALTA) is a coalition of community based and academic institutions formed to conduct research on the social economy and community economic development. This working paper was developed to guide decision making with regards to research priorities. It lays out a broad framework for BALTA's research program, then presents criteria to guide research decision making.BC-Alberta Social Economy Research Alliance (BALTA

Tracking Progress - Some Issues and Tools

Tracking progress is easy to say and hard to do. It becomes even harder in an era when tracking progress and accountability have often been morphed into rigid patterns of bean counting. People working in the trenches are increasingly frustrated with the lack of concern on the part of funding organizations, and in particular governments, with performanceoriented tracking. It often seems narrow concentration on financial details consumes far too much human energy compared to discussion focused on what is being learned and how results can be improved

Building Community Wealth

This book was developed and tested as a resource to accompany a full-day workshop on Social Enterprise: Assessing Readiness and Getting Started in SE, which is part of the Development Wheel project

Spinning the Web of Supports: Building the Infrastructure of the Social Economy

The idea of a web of supports being of central importance to the revitalization and renewal of a particular place, or to the development of social enterprises, has been amply illustrated in several of the contributions thus far. Early in Part One (Concepts and Context), the key economic and social functions relevant to community functioning were identified (4). How the various functions are organized and the extent to which they are linked together on a strategic basis (or not) constitutes key features of the web of supports. At the community or regional level, this web has been referred to in CED circles as the communitys or regions development system

Mapping the Social Economy in BC and Alberta: Towards a Strategic Approach

This paper sets out a general framework and taxonomy within which the BC-Alberta Social Economy Research Alliance could define a focus for its initial approach to mapping of the social economy in British Columbia and Alberta, Canada. This constitutes the initial part of the paper. The paper then explores and elaborates a definition of the social economy. What are the dimensions of the social economy that one might want to capture? What are the arenas of work that characterise the bulk of the work undertaken by social economy organisations? The approach to mapping advocated in the paper is intended to strategically facilitate a convergence of policy, practitioner and research interests consistent with the overall goal of BALTA: to strengthen the foundations of the social economy in BC and Alberta.BC-Alberta Social Economy Research Alliance (BALTA

Concepts and Context

This first section of the book introduces key concepts, assumptions and ways of understanding the context within which CED and the social economy have evolved. While making no claim this modest beginning represents some kind of definitive survey of concepts and contexts, the ideas probed in this section can be a useful source of clarification for practitioners and researchers alike. Its title - “Musings from the Trenches: Concepts, Strategies and Practices” - is deliberate

Constructing a Sustainable Future: Exploring the Strategic Relevance of Social and Solidarity Economy Frameworks

This paper was the result of BALTA Project C5 - From Social Economy to Solidarity Economy: Changing Perspectives in a Volatile World (Phase One).This working paper explores recent economic trends and thinking and the resulting conceptualizations of social and solidarity economy. The project focused on examining the definition of social economy being used by BALTA and critiquing its conceptual capacity to effectively guide policy and practice in a volatile and rapidly changing global context. Describing some key elements of the context from which CED and the Social Economy have emerged over the last 30-50 years as a point of departure, the paper examines the Pearce definition being used by BALTA to guide its mapping work and offers an alternative solidarity economy formulation that cuts the conceptual cloth very differently.BC-Alberta Social Economy Research Alliance (BALTA) ; Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC

Social Enterprise in Human Services and Affordable Housing

Human services and affordable housing are two constant themes in the history of CED and the social economy. This is not surprising. How we care for each other, or not, speaks centrally to the character of our social relations and what we value. If the big task is to promote the re-insertion of social and environmental goals into the heart of our economic life, as advanced in Part 1, then the smaller tasks associated with making such ideas real, enterprise by enterprise and project by project, are the crucial building blocks. Organizing services and housing in ways that empower us to better care for each other remain important arenas for expanding the social economy