vol. 24 núm. 109 (2016)

Purpose: To present a reflection and construct an interpretation from the perspective of the historical hermeneutic paradigm in order to generate processes of understanding about the social phenomenon of the commodification of education. Description: Education in Colombia has been recognized as a fundamental right since the constitutional reform of 1991. However, the recognition process has been accompanied by the advent of new information and communications technologies. E-learning, together with the franchise system, have formed a business model that is presented as an alternative and a strategy for economic development in the country’s education market. Viewpoint: This relationship has influenced the guarantee of the right to education by linking access and quality to economic opportunities. Conclusions: In Colombia, the education project of the country continues to depend on circumstances. Planning in the medium and long term is not part of a coherent public policy because there are always other priorities in budget allocation. In an unequal country like Colombia, this has meant turning education into a factor that increases inequality instead of what it should be: a factor of equality. 

Purpose: This article presents a systematic review of philosophical thought about the beginnings of the solidarity economy in the international and national context. Description: The development of the global economy requires new settings for thinking and the praxis of cooperativism or solidarity economies in the dif ferent activities that constitute the work of human beings, i.e., politics, society, economics, and culture, among others. This article describes the development of cooperativism and the solidarity economy from their conception to their contribution to the improvement of the quality of life of human beings, in addition to providing a suitable setting for the approaches generated by the peace agreements in Colombia. Viewpoint: The article attempts to consider theoretical development from the different schools of thought that have arisen over time, from the concept of the solidarity economy as a response to the social crises that have accompanied civilization. Conclusions: Solidarity has historically been based on social development that seeks equity, justice, and sustainability for individuals. The description provided in this article allows us to establish the characterization of thinking about solidarity as a basis for the progress of modern communities.

Purpose: This paper presents the experience of the Social, Solidarity, and Popular Economies Seminar at the Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos in Peru. Description: Taking up the challenge of reshaping universities and imagining new university programs of action demands that we question the imposition of the Eurocentric structure of knowledge. This is necessary in order to promote its decolonization and, therefore, encourage dialogue between scientific and humanistic knowledge, as well as with lay, popular, traditional, and urban knowl edge from non-Western cultures. Viewpoint: An attempt is made to overcome the academic division of disciplines in order to propose an inter- and transdisciplinary structuring. This structuring will then make professional training,research aimed at meeting the demands of capitalist society, and the necessary public administration give way to another one oriented toward good living,solidarity economies, and the socialization and decolonization of knowledge, in addition to the power relations that pose a great challenge. Conclusions:This review is in tended to develop a dialogue of knowledges about the social, solidarity, popular, and community economies, as well as experiences of intervention and advocacy processes at the university level.

Purpose: This article presents certain reflections resulting from an investigation into the dispute between Bahian Acarajé women and fifa, the governing body of world football. Description: With the hosting of the fifa World Cup in 2014, the “mega-event development model” was implemented in Brazil. This model resulted in the violation of the human rights of many Brazilians, including the Bahian Acarajé women. These women—street workers who were prevented from working in so-called “fifa exclusion zones”—resisted to have their centuries-old trade be respected as an autonomous economic activity. Viewpoint: In order to challenge the front of state-owned enterprises that was established in the country,the women engaged in various strategies of struggle spanning from negotiation to direct action. Conclusions: Based on the research findings in the field, I present some aspects of the dispute and the characteristics of the economic rationale of the Bahian Acarajé women from an intersectional and decolonial perspective.

Purpose: This article is written in the context of a regional struggle for the construction of autonomies, liberated spaces, and a defense of territory and our Mother Earth. The search for alternatives in these times of global crisis is urgent. However, we do not need alternatives but rather a new mode of knowledge production, i.e., an alternative way of thinking about alternatives. Description:In this article, we will discuss the case of Yomol A’tel (a group of solidarity economy cooperatives and enterprises in Chiapas, Mexico), which seeks to base itself on the Tzeltal indigenous worldview to find other ways of doing economics and of understanding work and production. Viewpoint:The economy, development, and all institutions of industrial society are daughters of the modern ego: it is this that is in crisis and in question. Conducting our analyses and research from different epistemic premises will lead us to distinct conclusions; reality shifts depending on the language used to inquire about it. Conclusions: Both epistemologies of the South and other new worldviews can enter into a dialogue of knowledges and be the basis for the construction of a new and relevant way of knowing.

Purpose: Looking at the experience of Argentina, this article intends to reflect on the ways in which the country’s social and solidarity economy has been conceptualized to date. Description: Based on the analysis of various foundational texts in this field and synthesis of part of my previous research, I would like to argue that the approaches to the study of these socioeconomic experiences represent a Eurocentrism in the knowledge. This is based on what I have called distance methodologies, i.e., ways of knowing that bypass power relations and decontextualize local knowledge in the interest of generating common criteria for general analysis. Viewpoint: These methods represent an exercise of epistemic violence and produce historical silences. Conclusions: Following Trouillot’s contention regarding the relationships between power and history production, that which hasbeen seen in this field of knowledge to date has closed off memories, histories, and knowledge located in economic/cultural difference. In order to recover these stories of other, I wish to share the contributions of the Andean Oral History Workshop to the creation of nearness methodologies, in a transition to knowledge characterized by cooperation and solidarity.

Purpose: This article seeks to present reflections on economic solidarity and good living based on findings in a small town near the country’s capital. Description: Villa del Carbón is a predominantly rural town, but, due to its location, it is a point of interconnection—a bridge between two important regions of the country—where the town brings together diverse times and spaces through a complexity that illustrates tensions between rationales. These rationales are, on the one hand, the processes of metropolization and development with their instrumental rationality and, on the other, the permanence and revision of ways of life based on reproductive, solidarity, and liberating rationales. Viewpoint: It is argued that there are examples of economic solidarity such as forestry, apiculture, agroecological, and ecotourism productive organizations. However, these are constantly threatened and strained by the demands of development and capitalism. Conclusions: The features of economic solidarity practices—which make tangible alternative rationales, other rationales—should be considered to design and implement public policies of promotion and strengthening.

I am very pleased to have been invited by the esteemed journal Cooperativism & Development to write the editorial for this interesting issue. As is well known, Cooperativism & Development forms part of a distinguished core of publications charged with discussing and disseminating diverse experiences and research on the solidarity economy, so-called sustainable development, and, increasingly, what have been called “other economies”: alternative modes of production, exchange, and consumption standing in contrast to those following the epistemic and operational logic of capitalism. In essence, these economies stand in contrast to modern-colonial rationales.

Purpose: This article is an introduction to the study of the social economy, providing a first approach to the main schools of thought, debates, and approaches found in various studies conducted in this area. Topics: It begins with a synthetic characterization of the schools of thought that gave rise to the social economy, the particularities of the social subjects that compose it, and the contrasts found in different territorial contexts. Moreover, its transformations are discussed in relation to the “social question” in order to arrive at its current situation. Development: In this article, the main discussions will be presented from the analytical category of field. This was constructed to refer to the social economy as a branch of specific knowledge that has its own object of study, theoretical corpus, and particular research methodology; however, it is also conceived as a complex social and political reality consisting of experiences, practices, and actors of different types (State, producers, organizations, cooperatives, etc.). Conclusions: The termfield is used and defined in this article to account for the complexity of the social economy based on the variety of forms it can take.

El libro es producto de un trabajo de recopilación y transcripción de archivos magnetofónicos y fue revisado por el profesor Darío Mesa Chica. Su contenido se desagrega en seis capítulos así: Contexto social y político colombiano del siglo XIX; El pensamiento de Caro sobre la moneda; Fuentes y rasgos característicos de la personalidad intelectual de Caro; Caro pensador y hombre de acción; Pensamiento político de Miguel Antonio Caro; Anotaciones complementarias a las exposiciones de varios participantes, bibliografía e índice de materias. Las seis lecciones que presenta el texto tienen, para los estudiosos de las ciencias sociales en América Latina, un conjunto de valores, que deben ser destacados. 

Purpose: This article aims to share the progress of community work in the field of solid waste management in the rural district of Pueblo Viejo in the town of Moniquirá, Boyacá, Colombia. Topics: The increasing environmental damage caused by improper disposal of solid waste results in the degradation of resources and landscapes in rural areas. It is therefore necessary to provide accompaniment and interact with the residents of the district in a way that responds to the need for community and inter-institutional action in the face of environmental problems caused by waste. Development: The project was developed with a mixed approach in which the constructivist descriptive method was used to guide the exercise. Conclusions: The results reflect the way in which the residents of the district of Pueblo Viejo perceive their territory and the impact of solid waste on that territory, as well as the impact of entities that in one way or another have had an influence with regard to this topic in the region. An awareness campaign on the care of natural resources in the region was carried out, beginning at rural schools with the residents of the district.

Purpose: This article seeks to give an account of an observatory as a tool for the social, cooperative, and solidarity sector in the department of Tolima, Colombia. Description: The observatory was created as a tool for the social, cooperative, and solidarity sector, taking into account that in the region of Tolima there are organizations that develop activities for collective or social benefit and whose sole purpose is to improve the living conditions of the collaborators or communities. These organizations and their activities led to the creation of the observatory, which advocates for continuous processes of education, training, technical as- sistance, and research. This is so that higher standards of cohesion, integration, coordination, visibility, productivity, competitiveness, innovation, and entrepreneurship may be attained. Viewpoint: The lack of information to make decisions and generate collective action is one of the factors preventing the work of organizations within and around particular environments from being recognized. Conclusions: While it is true that an observatory has many features, one must think of it in the context of a network where collaborative work is the cornerstone of construction based on aspects such as multiculturalism and a multidisciplinary approach.

Introduction: Competitiveness has become an element that characterizes the dynamics of a sector or organization, and its search has led to the construction and implementation of tools to improve the conditions in which organizations compete in the market. Methodology: Our methodological development was based on the consultation and analysis of documentary sources that allowed the state of research on the sector to be established. This review showed that traditionally there has not been a research interest in the sector, save in its purely technical aspects (on which research has been carried out by institutions of higher education). The field of its management, however, has not been studied. Results: This research presents the results of a theoretical review of the competitiveness of intercity land transport in Boyacá (Colombia), with the aim of encouraging further research to contribute to the development of this sector in the region. Conclusions: It was concluded that further research is needed on the elements that promote the competitiveness of the sector.

Purpose: This article aims to explain the actions of the Social Innovation Observatory (ois by its Spanish initials) that are aligned with the strategic focus of the Social Innovation Science Park (pcis), which are related to transforming communities and tracking the management of knowledge and ois processes, methods, and tools. Topics: The pcis has a particular model of management, complex for its combination of the obscure term “science park” that is derived, on the one hand, from the market economy and, on the other, the polyvalent and polysemic concept of social innovation that is still under construction and is associated with the problems and challenges of society. Development: In this context we find the ois, a management unit of the pcis that is dedicated to monitoring the environment in search of opportunities and challenges in communities. It also searches for means to address these challenges such as knowledge and technologies. Its operations have closely adhered to the model shown here since 2013. Conclusions:The ois fulfills an important role in the observation of the processes of community transformation, both outcomes and impacts, as well as those processes related to environmental monitoring. It additionally observes traditional knowledge, opportunities, challenges, and technologies.

Purpose: This article seeks to guide solidarity thinking and practices from a perspective that transcends economic and ethical concerns. Description: Included are not only the power relations that sustain life in capitalist society, but also the need for awareness that we are facing a dramatic epoch shift. Both the progress/development and modernity projects are undergoing irreversible crises, and we must prioritize taking care of life. Viewpoint: To this end, the concept of economic solidarity is put forward, which allows—assuming economic and cultural diversity—the linking of all practices inspired by liberating and solidarity rationales. Going beyond their possible assignment to certain ethical, political, and cultural schools of thought or to specific institutional forms, these rationales are based on reciprocity, decommodification, and self-government. They are also as sociated with a new horizon: good living, or, good livings oriented toward de coloniality. Conclusions: It should be noted that the struggle for an alternative society is not only an economic and ethical struggle; the current structural crisis encompasses an entire historical form of human coexistence and the whole pattern of colonial-modern and capitalist power.