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“The law project Plx 335/2014 about the social economy in Romania is in its approval process at the Chamber of Deputies. We are aware that the actual law project is currently excluding of the sector the principals actors of the social economy recognized by all main European institutions: European Parliament, European Commission and the European Economic and Social Committee.

“Hereby, the European networks of social economy signatories of this letter including: ENSIE, Social Economy Europe, REVES, the French Chamber of the social and solidarity economy (ESS-France), SAW-B (representing of the social economy of Brussels and Wallonia), CIRIEC-International, the international Association of the Mutuality and the European Association of the Paritarian Institution of social protection (AEIP), will remind that the social economy includes the cooperatives, the mutual society, the associations, the foundations as well as new forms of enterprises sharing the values defined in Social Economy Europe’s Charter of Principles.

“These networks underline the importance of these essential values to the functioning of the social economy and stress to ensure that they are fully respected in the Romanian law project. The primacy of the person, the democratic governance, the collective ownership and the distribution or reinvestments of surpluses are the main core values shared by all actors of the social economy. The values have been recognized by the different economic European laws (Belgian, Spanish, French and Portuguese laws) and served as the basis for the definition of the sector and the elaboration of public policies.

“We ask you, following your possibilities, to help the Romanian social economy and above all the Coalition for the Social Economy[1], the Romanian representative platform of this sector, so these values can be included in the Romanian law project in order to establish a correct definition of the social economy. Thereby, we would like, if possible, your support in Romania in order to make this concept of social economy a reality and not just a manipulated concept to allow the absorption of European funds dedicated to this sector, creating the opportunity of misappropriation and distorting the functioning of the internal market.

“The structural funds are important tools for financing and developing the sector if they are implemented in tandem with a national and local strong political vision, with integrated support and promotion devices for the whole sector of social economy.”

For more information, please contact:
Patrizia Bussi, ENSIE
Víctor Meseguer, SOCIAL ECONOMY EUROPE
Raluca Ouriaghli, Coalition for the Social Economy in Romania