How Luxembourg’s social and solidarity economy loses their roots

In the early 2000s, Luxembourg’s solidarity was characterized by a radical idea: social justice through collective action, democratic self-organization and local responsibility. Projects such as Objectif Plein Emploi (open), founded in cooperation with the OGBL, embodied this emancipatory model. The goal was not only the reintegration of the unemployed, but the development of an alternative economy that explicitly opposed market twigs and growth logic.

Today, two decades later, there is little left of this original claim. There are still social initiatives, funded by the Ministry of Social and Solidar Economics or represented by networks such as Uless. But the mission statement has changed fundamentally: where solidarity and participation were used, terms such as « social entrepreneurship », « effect » and « social innovation » dominate today.

This change is not only semantic. It reflects a profound change in the political and economic orientation – with serious consequences for social cohesion and democratic culture. In many cases, the new generation of social projects no longer pursues the goal of changing social power relationships, but is limited to the management of social symptoms.

Social grievances are no longer understood as a result of an unjust system, but as a challenges that need to be solved innovatively – efficiently, scalable and ideally with market potential.

Instead of long -term construction work, there is « projectitis »

A central problem of this development is depoliticization. What once started as a collective project against structural inequality is presented today as a functional service. Social questions are treated technocratically – their causes are from sight.

Poverty, precarity or social exclusion no longer appear as political scandals, but as market segments for creative solutions. The original emancipatory impulse, which aimed at self -empowerment, justice and common good, becomes a tool in the toolbox of neoliberal control.

In addition, there is increasing project logic: Many initiatives are now dependent on temporary support programs, competitions or EU financing. The compulsion to constant innovation leads to fragmentation, short -term thinking and resource wear. Instead of long -term construction work and relationship care, there is « projectitis » – a state of permanent renewal without structural depth. The risk is that social work has more to do with PR and funding logic than with sustainable change.

This logic primarily favors those actors who can offer marketable, scalable and quantitatively measurable solutions. On the other hand, if you deal with difficult to quantify goals such as empowerment, community formation or collective self -government, you fall through the grid. The original vision of a solidarity economy – supported by local needs, democratic participation and critical reflection – is marginalized or dismissed as out of date.

The fetishization of effect

Another critical point is the democratic deficit that goes hand in hand with this development. While the early initiatives of the solidarity economy relied on participation and self -government, the influence of those affected is often low today. Participation usually means « stakeholder consultation » instead of real co-decision. Decisions are made externally, the role of those affected is limited to feedback – if at all.

The social effect is measured from the outside, not lived from the inside. The principle of self -authorization gives way to the model of the socially accompanied consumer.

In addition, the fetishization of effect (impact) has led to further narrowing. Only what can be expressed in numbers is considered successful. However, many central elements of solidarity – trust, relationship work, political education, collective experience – avoid this logic. What is not countable becomes invisible. This also has consequences for funding policy, which is increasingly controlled by KPI: Those who have no « measurable effect » are left behind.

The language of the innovation increases the language of solidarity more and more. It sounds modern, solution -oriented, dynamic – but is not neutral. It shifts the focus from structural change towards efficiency increase in the existing. Social innovation becomes the optimization of social administration, not to question social conditions.

A solidarity without solidarity

All of this does not happen by chance. The crisis of open and similar projects in the early 2010s-including financial turbulence, political friction and public criticism-served as a welcome pretext to delegitimize the model of the grassroots democratic solidarity. In their place, there were supposedly « more professional » players, new funding structures, an innovation -driven vocabulary. The paradigm shift was sold as progress, but was actually a disempowerment of the original idea.

In total there is a sobering picture: the social and solidarity economy of Luxembourg is on the way to losing its critical substance. Instead of promoting social transformation, it increasingly integrates into a system that she once wanted to question. The logic of the innovation replaces the logic of solidarity – and with it the possibilities for real social change also disappear.

It is time to critically question this development. Not to basically condemn innovation – but to ask the question of who it serves, who can have a say and what falls by the wayside. Because a social and solidarity economy without solidarity, without democracy and without system criticism, is ultimately only a socially decorated market. And it cannot produce a fairer society.