Towards a Social Economy

Can anything really link building societies, marriage guidance centres, co-operatives, pension companies, private health providers and the Fabian Society? In Britain, we have no conception of the social economy. Yet the European Commission has a Directorate to oversee it and the French a Delegation at ministerial level. So what is it, and how can we use it? The authors, who both specialise in the subject, define the social economy as bodies which trade for a social purpose. Organisations, that is, which are neither in the public nor private sectors but which have more in common than their being neither one nor the other. They argue that not only is it an area deserving of study in itself, but that it is also a useful too for the Left in escaping from the sterile public/private debate. -- Page 4 of cover.