Les rapports de coordination entre banques coopératives et entreprises sociales en France

Our contribution is on the coordination relationships, established and territorially delimited, between two types of the social economy structures in France : the banks with cooperative status and the social enterprises with community status (and in a more marginal way with cooperative and mutual status). The choice of using the conventions theory, in its socioeconomic meaning, is because it first supplies a pertinent framework in the sight of the following problematics questions : what proximity links are made between actors connected by above all economic needs or necessities ? Are the coordination relationships just a matter of commercial operations or is it possible to bring other actions, and in consequence interaction, principles out ? Is it possible to find relational features specific to the social economy ? The second reason that lead us to opt for this framework is connected to the accepted methodological approach. The meanings on which we base our analysis on are the results of actors/individual subjects representations, who have an autonomous judgment in the scope of their collective structure. In other words, we constructed an analytical model – the principles of the action legitimacy – adapted to the individual opinion and not to institutional speeches. The purpose of this approach is to wonder about the existence of compromises, real or potential, within the coordination relationships between cooperative banks and social enterprises, as well as about the nature of these compromises. From the compromises built up by the actors/subjects, what conventions can be contemplated ?