Solidarity economics is an alternative economic framework that prioritizes mutual support, democratic participation, and collective wellbeing over profit maximization, creating economic relationships based on cooperation, shared responsibility, and community control rather than individual competition and accumulation.
Solidarity economics emerged from social movements in Latin America and the Global South as a transformative approach to economic organization that explicitly challenges capitalist principles of individualism, profit, and private property. Unlike reforms that attempt to make capitalism more humane, solidarity economics seeks to create entirely different economic relationships based on values of cooperation, equity, and ecological sustainability. This framework recognizes existing practices of mutual aid, cooperatives, and community self-reliance as the foundation for building economic systems that serve human and ecological wellbeing rather than capital accumulation.
In practice, solidarity economics operates through interconnected networks of cooperatives, mutual aid organizations, community land trusts, local currencies, and other democratic economic institutions that distribute both ownership and control across participants. These structures create what solidarity economics advocates call “real alternatives to capitalism”—economic relationships that embody values of justice, sustainability, and collective care through their daily operations. Solidarity economics emphasizes that economic transformation must be both practical (meeting immediate material needs) and visionary (building toward systemic change), creating “the new world in the shell of the old.”
Uses of “Solidarity Economics”
Solidarity Economics in Community Resilience
Solidarity economics provides frameworks for communities to develop economic self-determination through locally-controlled alternatives to corporate and state services. These include community-owned enterprises, local exchange systems, and mutual aid networks that keep resources circulating within communities while building collective assets and capacity.
Examples include community land trusts that remove land from speculation, worker cooperatives that distribute ownership and decision-making among employees, and mutual credit systems that create local currencies without interest. These institutions demonstrate how communities can “redistribute power and resources to those who have been most harmed by white supremacy, settler colonialism, patriarchy, ableism, and capitalism” while meeting immediate material needs for housing, food, healthcare, and education.
Solidarity Economics and Web3 Systems
In Web3 and blockchain contexts, solidarity economics principles align with decentralized technologies that enable cooperative ownership and democratic governance without traditional intermediaries. DAOs, platform cooperatives, and mutual credit systems can embody solidarity economics values by distributing both economic benefits and decision-making power across participant communities.
Blockchain technologies can support solidarity economics by reducing coordination costs, increasing transparency in resource flows, and enabling global cooperation while maintaining local autonomy. These systems can create “mechanisms for resource pooling, risk distribution, and collective governance without requiring centralized control,” demonstrating how technology can serve solidarity economics rather than capital accumulation.
Solidarity Economics in Movement Building
Solidarity economics recognizes that individual organizations cannot create systemic change alone—transformation requires building “networks, federations, and coalitions that align with solidarity economics principles and practices.” This approach emphasizes connecting local initiatives across geographic and organizational boundaries while maintaining autonomy and community control.
Movement building through solidarity economics involves creating shared infrastructure for democratic decision-making, resource distribution, and mutual support that can sustain communities through both immediate crises and long-term transformation. This creates resilient social coordination that operates independently of dominant systems while building collective power for broader change.
Solidarity Economics as Values Framework
Beyond specific institutions, solidarity economics provides a values framework for evaluating and transforming economic relationships. The six principles from the REAS Charter for Solidarity Economy include equity (recognizing equal dignity), work (recovering human dimensions of labor), environmental sustainability, non-profit orientation (reinvesting benefits), and territorial responsibility (supporting local development).
These principles guide the transformation of “social, economic, and political relationships and institutions” by creating standards for authentic solidarity economics practices versus those that merely adopt cooperative forms while maintaining exploitative relationships. This framework helps practitioners “maintain the balance between what’s realistic vs. what’s too idealistic” while stretching toward liberation.
Solidarity Economics and Contemporary Transformation
Solidarity economics offers concrete pathways for addressing interconnected crises of inequality, ecological destruction, and political authoritarianism through economic relationships that embody alternative values. By creating economies oriented toward collective wellbeing rather than private profit, solidarity economics demonstrates that “another world is possible” through practical organizing and institution-building.
Contemporary applications span from local cooperatives and community currencies to global networks coordinating resources and knowledge across movements. These efforts show how solidarity economics can operate at multiple scales simultaneously, creating both immediate alternatives for survival and foundations for broader transformation beyond capitalism.
Related Concepts
- Solidarity: Solidarity economics operationalizes solidarity principles through economic institutions and relationships
- Cooperative: Cooperatives represent key organizational forms within solidarity economics frameworks
- Mutual Aid: Mutual aid networks embody solidarity economics principles of reciprocity and community care
- Mutualism: Mutualism provides philosophical foundations for solidarity economics emphasis on reciprocal exchange
- Mutual Credit: Mutual credit systems exemplify solidarity economics alternatives to interest-bearing debt
- Decentralization: Solidarity economics distributes economic power across communities rather than concentrating it in capitalist or state institutions
References and Resources
- REAS Network. “Charter for Solidarity Economy” - Foundational document outlining principles and practices of solidarity economics
- Solidarity Economy Association. “What is the solidarity economy?” - Comprehensive overview of global solidarity economics movement
- New Economy Coalition. “The Solidarity Economy” - Framework for building just and sustainable economy prioritizing people and planet
- Razeto, Luis. “What is Solidarity Economics?” - Theoretical foundation for solidarity economics as alternative development model
- U.S. Solidarity Economy Network - Resources for building solidarity economy in North America
- RIPESS (Intercontinental Network for the Promotion of Social Solidarity Economy) - Global network promoting social solidarity economy across continents