UN-backed social and solidarity economy could reshape global health, researchers argue

Global health researchers are calling for the social and solidarity economy, an economic model formally recognized in a 2023 United Nations resolution, to be embedded within global health frameworks. Writing in the journal Globalization and Health, an international team led by Masami Fujita argues that the health sector alone cannot solve the complex, interdependent challenges now shaping population health across social, commercial, environmental, technological and political domains, and that the social and solidarity economy offers an institutional route to equity, resilience and sustainability that conventional approaches have largely overlooked.

The authors describe it not simply as a normative framework but as a practical institutional approach for realizing those norms. Their paper takes the form of a Debate article, and the version published online on 11 October 2026 is an early-release, peer-reviewed accepted manuscript that remains subject to further editorial edits before the final Version of Record appears.

To assess how the concept has been treated in the field, the team conducted a targeted literature review of global health scholarship, followed by an analytic mapping of social and solidarity economy contributions to the social, commercial and environmental determinants of health, as well as to cross-cutting areas of advocacy and reform. The review produced a striking finding: explicit engagement with the social and solidarity economy in global health literature remains scarce. Despite the model’s formal recognition at the United Nations, the authors found that global health scholarship has rarely addressed it directly, leaving a substantial gap between its potential and its uptake in health discourse.

That scarcity does not reflect a lack of relevant evidence. The authors identified illustrative examples showing that social and solidarity economy initiatives can reduce inequalities, create inclusive employment, strengthen community networks, counter harmful commercial practices and promote sustainable food, energy and housing systems. These examples, drawn from the literature the team reviewed, demonstrate the model’s capacity to address determinants of health in ways that conventional approaches often miss. Because the social and solidarity economy operates through inclusive, solidarity-based practices, the authors argue it can engage multiple determinants simultaneously rather than treating them as separate problems for separate sectors.

The paper uses migration health as its central illustration. Migration health, the authors note, is a key global health agenda that highlights how multiple determinants of health interact to influence the health of populations, making it a natural test case for an integrative economic model. The authors argue that social and solidarity economy practices can engage these interacting determinants while also promoting cross-border learning and advocacy for more equitable, resilient and sustainable systems, connecting local initiatives to broader structural reform.

Beyond migration health, the analytic mapping points to the commercial and environmental dimensions of health.

The authors are candid about the model’s current position: the social and solidarity economy remains marginal in global health discourse. Yet they argue it holds substantial and underrecognized potential as an integrative and community-driven approach for advancing equity, resilience and sustainability. Part of that argument rests on a diagnosis of failure elsewhere. The paper notes why previous equity-oriented health and economic frameworks have struggled to achieve structural change, and situates the social and solidarity economy within the broader question of accountability in global health governance. In other words, the concept is being proposed not as another parallel initiative but as a response to the lack of traction experienced by other transformative frameworks.

The distinction between a normative aspiration and an institutional mechanism runs through the paper. The authors frame the social and solidarity economy not simply as a normative framework but as an institutional approach to realize those norms, rather than merely restate them. Recognizing and embedding the model within global health frameworks is described as both timely and necessary for addressing the diverse determinants that shape population health.

Several caveats should frame how the findings are read. The paper is a Debate article, meaning it advances an argument rather than reporting a systematic review with quantified effect estimates. The literature review was targeted rather than exhaustive, and the examples of social and solidarity economy contributions are described as illustrative, not as a comprehensive evidence base of measured health outcomes. The authors themselves characterize the engagement of global health scholarship with the concept as scarce, which limits the strength of any conclusions about its real-world impact on population health. What the paper establishes is a case for attention: that a UN-recognized economic model, with documented examples across employment, community networks, commercial practice and sustainable systems, has been largely absent from a field whose stated goals it claims to serve. Whether embedding it in global health frameworks would deliver the structural transformation the authors envision remains, for now, an argument to be tested rather than a demonstrated result.

Subject of Research: The potential role of the social and solidarity economy in advancing equity, resilience and sustainability within global health

Article Title: Integrating the social and solidarity economy into global health: towards structural transformation for equity, resilience, and sustainability

Article References: Fujita, M., Loewenson, R., McCoy, D., Itami, K., Ong, L., Ueno, T., Murakami, H., Zugaj, M., & de Pas, R. V. (2026). Integrating the social and solidarity economy into global health: towards structural transformation for equity, resilience, and sustainability. Globalization and Health. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12992-026-01240-w

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1186/s12992-026-01240-w

Keywords: social and solidarity economy, global health, health equity, determinants of health, migration health, sustainability, community networks, global health governance, inclusive employment, United Nations resolution, structural transformation, Integrating