Social economy, solidary economy, third sector: what do they refer to?

Abstract

From the mid 90s on, the Brazilian academic literature starts to bring a series of new categories that could be grouped into the denominations of third sector and social economy. This research work concentrates on the latter category and aims to identify its origin and the reality it intends to comprise. This text exposes some of the definitions that can be found in the international literature concerning terms such as social economy, solidary economy, third sector and others. From this confronta-tion it seems that the concepts used in Brazil to study the field of solidary economy tend to be somewhat narrow due to the little emphasis given to issues such as the historical background earlier to the 80s, the ideological plurality and the economic hybridism, although they seem to be sensible to the construction of another eco-nomic and managerial culture and are attentive to the tensions existing among mar-ket economy, state economy and reciprocity economy, an attention that the category of the third sector tends to veil. Having this in mind, it can be observed that there is a need to rethink this category and question the great expectations that rely upon the formation of a solidary economy to transform society. Key words: Social economy; solidary economy; third sector.