The Social Economy as the Economics of Liberation
The four oppressions!
Capitalism—source of oppression: overwhelming rights of capital
Colonialism—source of oppression: global extension of capitalism
Communism—source of oppression: excessive power of the state
Patriarchy—source of oppression: unequal relationships between sexes
World Social Forum, Porto Alegre
Liberation from capitalism
This is where co-operation started The Webbs and the Miners’ next step Reclaiming surplus value Challenging the power of capital to buy
labour Robert Owen, William Morris and the utopian
community Guild socialism
Liberation from colonialism
Imperialism as a global extension of capitalism
Colonialism as the institutionalisation of global capitalism
Challenge engendered inferiority Ghandi’s ideas of Swaraj Vandana Shiva and the subsistence
perspective
From Medellin to Porto Alegre Latin bishops’ conference, Medellin, 1968, created
the term ‘institutionalised violence’ Comunidades eclesiales de base (CEBs: local
church communities) Gustavo Gutierrez Merino (born 1928, Lima, Peru),
A Theology of Liberation (1972) Leonardo Boff (born 1938, Concórdia, Brazil),
Church: Charism and Power: Liberation Theology and the Institutional Church
Eliminated by JPII and Cardinal Ratzinger
The concept of ‘emancipatory praxis’ Everyday experience of poverty: mutualism as a
practical rather than ideologically driven response Uses a radical reintepretation of the Bible. Jesus as
revolutionary. Marxist ideas of class struggle Deeply rooted in the local Church: importance of
mutualism as local solutions Change grows out of meetings to discuss scripture:
community involvement Realisation of the Kingdom of God on earth:
importance of utopian project: coops as real change agents rather than the ‘lottery mentality’, living on dreams, encouraged by the conventional economy
Social economy in the poor countries Social economy grew under the Pinochet dictatorship in
Chile, as a source of resistance and mutual support: from 15% of the workforce in Santiago in 1970 to some 20% by 1982. Provides around a third of jobs in the poorer quarters of Santiago.
MST in Brazil and the peasant challenge to state support for neoliberal, neocolonial land ownership patterns
Case-study from Argentina: The Take, taking over factories left idle because of financial collapse
Côte d'Ivoire: 827,000 small farmers are co-operative members
Nicaragua: 78 per cent of maize and 59 per cent of beans are cooperatively marketed
Liberation from communism
Concentration of state power: loss of initiative Issue of scale: one bicycle factory Party replaces community Bureaucracy creates inefficiency
Co-operatives in Central and Eastern Europe Gorbachev hoped to liberalise via co-ops Lost history of co-operation in Czech
Republic: in 1994 new agricultural coops operated on 47 per cent of cultivated land and controlled 67 per cent of production
Cooperative is frequently co-opted by the state and now not trusted
Liberation from patriarchy
‘Sisterhood is powerful’ Women’s strength in community Reproductive labour A different attitude to resources: ecofeminism
The Holy Family
Extended by Engels in his The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (1942)
In communal economies women are equal or more powerful (matrilineality)
The growth in private property undermines the role of women
Men's ability to generate a surplus creates patriarchy where women (and slaves) become themselves the property of father and husband.
Feminist views of patriarchy
Feminists focus on women's work as reproductive rather than productive labour
The invisible nature of women's work The iceberg model (Maria Mies) Ecofeminists argue that loss of
embeddedness is source of spiritual and environmental alienation
Are women natural co-operators? Ease of access to finance Sharing of skills and building of confidence Micro-finance developed in women’s co-ops
and businesses Could this idea be based on stereotyping?
What do the four have in common? Concentration of power [democratisation] Inequality of access to resources [equality] Alienation [empowerment] Self-delusion [self-realisation] Isolation [mutuality, reciprocity, sharing]
Assess the four concepts in terms of the three organisational forms
Democratisation Equality Empowerment Self-realisation Mutuality
Social firm
Social enterprise
Co-operative