People can organize co-operatives for any of hundred of purposes, from child care to burial co-operatives. In northern Europe and many of the countries which they particularly influenced (for, example, through their empires) the best known co-operative sectors have been the following: consumer, worker, agricultural, financial and housing. Within those countries, however, and to a far greater extent in many southern Europe countries, particularly Italy (and, in the North, France), other kinds of co-operatives have also emerged. These include, for example, co-operatives for people with disabilities or chronic illnesses, those requiring home support or home care, and senior citizens for any of many purposes.

These kind of co-operatives can be loosely grouped together under the heading of "social co-operatives"; in fact, one could also include health and housing co-operative under the same heading since they arguably have been organized primarily to meet social needs.

Within the BCICS web site we have followed the common practice of segregating housing and health co-operatives in our classification because they are well established co-operatives in our part of the world: hence they have their own web pages. We have grouped the other "social" co-operatives together on this web page. So far, we have started to develop a selection of papers, an information base and a set of links to useful sites on the following subjects: co-operatives for people with disabilities, etc.

You may find further information on social co-operatives on the following web pages on this site.

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