New Approaches to Social Economy

Social economy is a relatively new phenomenon, having started just a few decades ago, and due to this reason it has yet to reach great scale. Due to the phenomenon of global crisis propagation, the economies of all countries have been affected and have gone into an economical cycle recession phase, some economical agents hitting the climax of the crisis, practically shutting down their activities. Starting from this, some social problems started to accentuate: the number of unemployed people has risen, the poverty rate went up, the marginalization and social exclusion rates went up, the aging of the population has increased, the discrepancy between the rich and poor has widened and so on, and in this context social economy has gained a greater importance not only at an European level but also at an international level. As such, social economy may become one of the innovative and creative solutions which can contribute to a more human approach to economical problems, combining freedom of market with social responsibility to the benefit of the whole community.