By Martine Theveniaut, General Manager of the Pactes Locaux

October 2009

- Up-front preparation, based on the conclusions of the approach, 20 summaries of actions and examples by people who had participated in the preparation. 21 people expressed their interest in a follow-up.

- 80 people signed up to the workshop, 40 people attended, representing Europe, Burkina Faso, Chile, Ivory Coast, Georgia, India, Madagascar, Malaysia, Mali, Quebec, The Philippines, and Senegal.

- The workshop had three sequences, based on illustrating and discussing viewed from the North and from the South; the third day was dedicated to a comparison. This enabled us to identify factors of convergence between participants of various levels of responsibility.

- The objective of the workshop was to “create a broad consensus to jointly put forward ideas on regulations, organisation and co-operation and decisions” This objective was met.

- The conclusions confirmed in the closing plenary session how important the territorial

approach is in building the future of solidarity economy in mainstream economy, and laid out the road for the next four years.

The main lessons learnt: How does the experience shape and take shape?

- Producing context-related knowledge that is useful on the ground causes things to happen and to move forward.

- Opening “in situ” dialogue between practitioners, theoreticians and regulators opens up perspectives.

- Deciding to hold an event within an up-front planned, methodological framework broadens the basis for consensus and consolidates energies.

- Stating from the outset that the final results would include the elements of the discussions, stimulates interest and creativity.

The outcome is… a new departure: on-going progress for the future

- Illustrate/discuss/propose, bringing together people of different nationalities, languages, cultures and themes is a method that provides a rich input for building policies based on things that are proven to work. It is less ideological than the World Social Forum and can be improved and used to write a road map for solidarity economy in Europe and at global level.

- The across-the-board approach is relevant (participation + territory); it stands back from the theoretical concepts, places the cursor on how and where things fall into the general economic framework and provide the levers for change.

- . How can we translate values into acts? A platform is a new collective form of organisation. It cuts across functions and is intercultural, is composed of multiple actors, who are involved at different levels of society. It aims to experiment on the basis of voluntary convergence, rather than to define a structure for its’ own sake.

Tasks and responsibilities exist, and are assumed on the basis of individual commitment to a collective approach, placing the common good at the centre.

2010-2013: From a collective of actors to a collective actor. Learning how to co-operate.

The starting points are the actors involved in hands-on concrete reality. This means declaring that solidarity economy is an economy of shared responsibilities.

- Solidarity is not something that can be decreed. It needs to be organised at different levels and between levels.

There are three main levels:

1- National and European levels:

« Communication Day » scheduled for December 1st in Poitier s: How to reinvest the lessons learnt in public discussion and action. The title will be “The role of civil society in territorial development: Imagining, organising and producing together”

2- Regional and local levels:

involving people and territor ies that volunteer to analyse and evaluate their practice? Staying the course and moving forward means letting time run its course and allowing things to fall into place.

- Twinning, formal and informal support. Specific partnerships in the framework of programmes.

- Identification and showcasing of progress by collecting stories

- In-depth work to help create new institutional structures, experimenting with branches/ territories…

- Tools to evaluate, and indicators to measure and report.

“Accompany an overall global policy of communication, vulgarisation, and pedagogy to create more accurate and representative information that is adapted and accessible to everyone”.

3 – Open up at international level. Intercultural relations are the levers of solidarity

- Follow-up actions to Workshop 7: Workshop 7 Task Force (W7TF) « Territorial Anchorage ‘: An Internet Forum: workshop7-w7tf@socioeco.org, this is an initiative of

- Asian Alliance for Solidarity Economy (AA4SE) (www.aa4se.org), leading partner in

the 5th Meeting of the Globalisation of Solidarity in Asia for 2013.

- The Pactes Locaux (www.pactes-locaux.org) accept the responsibility for implementing the consensus reached in workshop 7, with the support of the FPH.

- Hosted on the ALOE web site, and moderated in three languages by Yvon Poirier, Martine Theveniaut and Françoise Wauttiez.

“Territories are in the process of becoming an unavoidable aspect in the organisation of solidarity. The territorial approach to local or regional initiatives is of the highest

importance, in balancing or completing the approach to different sectors”.

Committing to working on this process is aimed at bringing experience together, and creating

an international non-academic think tank with a view to running a programme between 2010 and 2013.

Contacts for the Pactes Locaux: France Joubert, President: + 33 (0)6 70 00 14 67

francejoubert@wanadoo.fr

Martine Theveniaut, General Manager Telephone + 33 (0)4 68 69 92 88

martine.theveniaut4@orange.fr

Address: 5 rue de Cadène, F- 11580 Alet-les-Bains

English translation: Judith Hitchman.