Social and Solidarity Economy (SSE) in the contribution will be placed in the wider conceptual framework of “diverse economy”. This implies, imagining economy differently, taking notice of everything we do to ensure the material and immaterial functioning and well-being of households, communities and nations. It means to find ways of framing an economy that can reflect this wider reality. In such a reframed economy we might imagine ourselves as economic actors on many different stages – as actors who can reshape economies so that environmental and social well-being, not just material output, are addressed (Gibson-Graham, Cameron and Healy 2013: 3). After a long time of indifference, within the last two decades, SSE is able to attract public attention, since it offers alternative and complementary structures to the current economic practice, which is increasingly subject to crises. Regardless of diverse forms and contexts from which they have emerged, they show distinct similarities, and the attempts to conceptualize them make clear that they constitute a civil society-based complementary structure to meet the needs of people and communi-ties. SSE puts some eco-social solutions at local level into action and is a forerunner of sustainable economies. Due to its integrative and transformative nature, it is also an instrument for implementing the 2030 agenda for sustainable development.

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