Solidarity Economy in Brazil: Towards Institutionalization of Sharing and Agroecological Practices

Abstract

Solidarity economy is often focused on autonomous initiatives outside the regular market system. In Brazil, the leftist national government during the 2000s has supported a number of solidarity economy initiatives by institutionalizing the ideal and practices of sharing and sustainable production and consumption within the regular market system. New actors, policies, and procedures have been instrumental in this institutionalization. However, the questions of how the actors, policies, and procedures interact and how the interaction becomes socially and politically relevant remain largely unaddressed. In this chapter we will explore implications of the interactions for the establishment of solidarity economy based on agroecological practices carried out by small family farmers in Brazil. We firstly give an overview of the national context in which the agroecological practices were linked to the practice and economy of sharing. We then analyze cases of the Program of Food Acquisition in the south of Brazil and agroforestry systems in the Amazon region in order to highlight different patterns of the involved actors’ interaction and eventual articulation of solidarity economy in relation to the promotion of sustainability. The chapter concludes by discussing the linkage between actors at different levels, new institutional arrangements, and monetary and nonmonetary values added to the solidarity economy.