Fira FESC: the trade fair organized by XES in Barcelona

In addition to networking, the activities of XES are centered on lobbying Catalan municipalities for the adoption of an appropriate legal and regulatory framework for the social and solidarity economy. In parallel, XES is involved in several projects, which include the organization of training courses (such as the summer school it launched this summer and a new educational program starting in September), the creation of an interest-free mutual credit market based on a local social currency (called “ecosol”), the publishing of books and the InfoXES journal, the development of an indicator (called “Balanç Social”) for measuring the social and environmental contribution of social economy organizations and the collaboratively-developed map “Pam a Pam” for the Catalan social economy.

Pam a Pam: mapping the Catalan social economy

Internally, the organization of XES’ activities is based on a dozen autonomous committees made up of about 60 volunteers, whose work is coordinated by the so-called “permanent committee”. Aside from the committees, for the purpose of strategy formulation and decision-making XES holds three assemblies per year, in which all members of its network can participate.

The governance model of XES

For its economic sustainability, XES depends on the fees paid by its members and on public funding it receives for specific projects (e.g. the Catalan government provides funding for the creation of local networks and the Municipality of Barcelona for the development of “Balanç Social”), while the costs of the trade fair it organizes every year in Barcelona are covered by the rent (of 100-150 euros) paid by the participating producers for their stands.

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Alberto Manchado, coodinator, EBC Girona

Yesterday myself and Kevin Flanagan of the P2P Foundation had the pleasure of attending a presentation on the Economy For the Common Good at an open day hosted by XES, the Xarxa d’Economia Solidària, a Catalan organisation linked with the Catalan Integral Cooperative (CIC).

A standout item in this presentation by Alberto Manchado of the Girona branch of ‘Economia del Bé Comù‘ was the concept of the Common Good Balance Sheet, a matrix which allows organisations to be evaluated not according to economic criteria but by how much they give to and preserve the commons by what they do.

The Financial Times’ Chris Bryant has produced an article (pdf version) about the Common Good Balance Sheet:

“This reporting innovation is perhaps better described as a scorecard. It awards participating companies points based on the extent to which they have acted in a humane, co-operative, sustainable, just and democratic manner. There are minus points for violating labour standards, pollution, unequal pay for women and using tax havens. An external auditor assesses the company’s dealings with suppliers, investors, staff, customers and the community according to a prescribed matrix of criteria, then awards an overall score – the maximum is 1,000 points.”

We feel this way of rating organisations, based on the work of Christian Felber could become very influential for organisations seeking to show their ethical credentials; for example the German enterprise Fairmondo, seeking to build an ethical version of an online marketplace similar to eBay has already produced their own Common Good Balance Sheet.

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