Social Economy Declaration

Our catalogue of demands to promote social, green and democratic economic activity.

The Social Economy Declaration has been signed by more than 60 institutions. The aim is to promote economic practices that prioritise the common good, solidarity, and democracy. Containing almost 100 demands for politicians, the declaration was presented to party representatives in parliament on 20 September 2023. The project was coordinated by RCE Graz-Styria.

In 2021, the European Commission presented an action plan to promote and strengthen the social economy, providing a framework for national action plans. 'The declaration is intended to support the development of an Austrian action plan and strategies to strengthen the social economy,' says Andreas Exner from RCE Graz-Styria.

The Social Economy Declaration calls for the following:

• Increased public procurement for social economy organisations and companies.
• Improvement of legal certainty, particularly with regard to non-profit status.
• Creating of a precise data basis for social economy in Austria.
• Including social economy in national development and resilience plans and collecting allready existing EU funds.
• Implementation of the Association Conversion Act to allow for straightforward changes to the legal form of a cooperative.
• Funding of social spaces for innovation to promote meaningful work and social security (including beyond wage labour).
• Providing of instruments for multi-year or permanent support of disadvantaged people in the labour market.
• Supporting the development of overarching cooperation structures in the social economy.
• Placing of “democracy and participation” as a criterium in the centre of funding measures of Social Economy.
• Supporting of organizations who wish to transform into social economy organisations or companies (e.g. in the event of generational change).
• Promoting skills development and awareness-raising at all levels: Universities, universities of applied sciences, vocational training and administration — creation of competence centres
• Encouraging of broad and inclusive co-determination of employees and users of the social economy in political initiatives on the social economy.

The idea for the declaration emerged in the context of the 1st Austrian Social Economy Conference in 2022. A draft was prepared with the involvement of the co-organising organisations. From mid-May to the end of June 2023, other organisations were invited to submit comments as part of a broad-based consultation process. Where possible, these were incorporated into the final version of the Social Economy Declaration by the editorial team. You can read the comments below.