ACTIVITY

The Institute of Cooperative Law and Social Economy is a University Institute of the UPV/EHU (University of the Basque Country) formed of researchers who work in different disciplines.

GEZKI’s activity is focused on four main areas: research, training, dissemination and intercooperation. 

In the field of research, GEZKI participates in research projects carried out with external funding, either in a leadership role or through cooperating with other organisations. These research projects include topics addressed by GEZKI in its five main lines of research: employee participation, social innovation, governance and law, public policy and internationalisation. In addition to working on these five research lines, GEZKI also leads the project of the Basque Observatory of the Social Economy (OVES/GEEB), which is mainly responsible for the exploitation of the socio-economic data of the social economy of the Basque Autonomous Community.

In the area of training, GEZKI runs the official university master’s course Social and Solidarity Economy. The master’s was organised by the Institute in collaboration with the following bodies of the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU): Hegoa Institute, University College of Labour Relations, University College of Business Studies of San Sebastian, Department of Applied Economics 1 and the Department of Business Law.

With regard to dissemination, the main tools are the meetings, seminars and conferences organised by GEZKI each year, together with the Basque Journal of Social Economics (GIZAEKOA- Revista Vasca de Economía Social). The journal includes, in one or two volumes a year, scientific articles written by professionals and researchers in the field of social economy. Moreover, the journal has already adopted 33 criteria from the Latindex database.

In terms of intercooperation, GEZKI participates in public, private and academic community and international networks. It has a close relationship with the social economy organisations of the Basque Country (Konfekoop, Asle, Ehlabe, Gizatea, Reas-Euskadi), various international research networks (Ciriec-International, Enuies, Rulescoop, EMES network, etc.) and public agencies and universities in the territory.