L’économie sociale au Bas-Saint-Laurent : son impact à l’émergence d’un modèle de développement territorial progressiste

The Bas-Saint-Laurent is one of the six major outlying regions of Quebec. Although the restructuring of its economy has facilitated its repositioning on the provincial scene in recent years, this region is still characterized by the persistence of socio-economic disparities aggravated by population decline in many localities. Just as can be seen across the province, many regional players turned to the social economy in order to give a boost to the economy of this region. Do these social economy enterprises of the Bas-Saint-Laurent set the conditions for progressive territorial development? The aim of this paper is to assess the social and economic contributions of social economy enterprises to development in the Bas-Saint-Laurent. This is done in terms of the social representations of the managers of 129 companies: the analysis is performed by distinguishing certain geographic and socio-economic differences between rural and urban areas. The result is a cartographic typology of the localities in the Bas-Saint-Laurent based on the contribution of social economy enterprises to social and economic development.