THE DYNAMICS OF PLURAL 'WORTH' AS A CHALLENGE TO THE GOVERNANCE OF SOCIAL AND SOLIDARITY-BASED ECONOMY ORGANIZATIONS

This article resorts to Boltanski and Thevenot's Economies of Worth model (1987, 1991) to examine from a theoretical stance the various institutional logics competing in social and solidarity-based economy organizations (SSEOs). The originality of our approach does not lie so much in the identification of the main conventions shaping the governance of SSEOs, but rather in the analysis of the conflicts and achievable compromises among each of these polities. Our contribution is threefold. We first show that the competition among several conventions generates organizational conflicts that are difficult to solve. We then reveal that achieving an (ephemeral) compromise entails a risk of excluding a 'polity', which may in turn weaken the governance of SSEOs. We finally sketch out some perspectives allowing to mitigate this risk. In particular, we outline organizational strategies likely to frame the governance of SSEOs without impairing their identities and plural forms of 'worth'.