Outra economia acontece: o caso do Projeto Esperança/Cooesperança na geração de trabalho e renda em Santa Maria-RS de 1987 a 2023

Abstract

Project Esperança represents an important episode in the History of the Brazilian Popular Solidarity Economy. In 2023, it completes 35 years of activity. This research is focused on analyzing the importance of the Popular Solidarity Economy on the generation of work and income for small farmers associated to COOESPERANÇA. Concerning the general objective, it is expected to broaden the historiographical understanding of the impact of Project Esperança in confronting the economic and social effects resulting from the Brazilian economic situation of the 1980s and 1990s. Namely, effects such as unemployment, rural exodus, and social exclusion, despite being permanent elements in capitalism, were intensified in the aforementioned time period. This study intends to identify and highlight elements that demonstrate the relevance of the project for the generation of work and income of the workers on the fair, with focus on farmers; as for the impacts on production, to emphasize the introduction of agroecology and direct trade. Income generation is directly related to workers' quality of life, and since it is a dynamic of non-capitalist production and commercialization, it is also the objective of this study to investigate the increase in the quality of life of the people involved in the Solidarity Economy. To obtain more comprehensive results, methodologically, it was chosen to investigate the documents present in the collection of the project, oral reports and bibliography about Project Esperança/COOESPERANÇA, in order to achieve, through this variety of sources consulted, a result that allows a broader perspective of the impacts of the Solidarity Economy. The possibility of historical research in this theme is really vast and unexplored; the origins of the Solidarity Economy must be investigated so as to better understand these dynamics. It is up to the historian to explore the conditions that favored the working class to fight for an economy based on self-management, solidarity, and quality of life, which promote collective organization to resist capitalism as autonomous workers and subjects of their own history.