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What is the worth of the social economy? What worth does the social economy produce?
Co-operatives, not-for-profit and mutual benefits organizations as well as foundations share common values that colour the way they perform and how they manage to do so. Yet, little is known about how the social economy is actually being evaluated, and how evaluation may reinforce or weaken this specificity.
This book fills a gap in the literature about the social economy. It seeks to make a critical assessment of the interests to which the social economy of today must cater and for which questions of evaluation appear to be the most telling.
A first set of contributions is made up of four theoretical papers inspired by various disciplinary fields: management, economy, sociology, philosophy. A second set of contributions is composed of seven national analyses of how the social economy is evaluated in different institutional contexts: France, Québec (Canada), United Kingdom, United States, Brazil, Portugal and Japan. The conclusion of the book summarizes the findings of this study and formulates some questions addressed to policy designers, evaluation specialists and social economy actors.

The Worth of the Social Economy: An International Perspective

Contents: Marie J. Bouchard: Introduction. The Worth of the Social Economy - Marie J. Bouchard: Methods and Indicators for Evaluating the Social Economy - Bernard Perret: Evaluating the Social Economy. Clarifying Complex Rationality - Bernard Enjolras: The Public Policy Paradox. Normative Foundations of Social Economy and Public Policies. Which Consequences for Evaluation Strategies? - Bernard Eme: Miseries and Worth of the Evaluation of the Social and Solidarity-based Economy. For a Paradigm of Communicational Evaluation - Nadine Richez-Battesti/Hélene Trouvé/François Rousseau/Bernard Eme/Laurent Fraisse: Evaluating the Social and Solidarity-Based Economy in France. Societal Balance Sheet-Social Utility and Identity Trial - Marie J. Bouchard: The Evaluation of the Social Economy in Quebec, with regard to Stakeholders, Mission and Organizational Identity - Roger Spear: Social Accounting and Social Audit in the UK - Charles Patrick Rock: Evaluating Nonprofit Organizations in the United States Welfare System - Maurício Serva/Carolina Andion/Lucila Campos/Erika Onozato: Evaluation of the Social Economy in Brazil. An Analysis of the Practices in some NGOs - Isabel Nicolau/Ana Simaens: The Evaluation of Social Solidarity Organizations in the Portuguese Context - Akira Kurimoto: Evaluation of Co-operative Performances and Specificities in Japan - Marie J. Bouchard/Nadine Richez-Battesti: Conclusions.