Solidarity (concept)

See also: Solidarity

The solidarity binds the responsibility and the destiny of each one to those of all, so that each one must face the problems encountered (or caused) by only one member of the group.

Old concept, one finds of it the illustration within the legal framework : justice pronounces solidarity when it estimates that it is the coordinated action of the members of the group which caused an event, and which for this reason all of it are responsible as much the ones than the others. One usually says in France that, within the framework of the Civil law, “solidarity is not supposed”, i.e. it must result from an explicit mention of the Loi or of a Contrat.

See also: Right of the obligations (France)

One also finds the concept of solidarity in the military organizations ( For all, all for one. ) or in the populations in prey with a common problem (natural disaster, social struggle,…) : it is important to behave as if one were directly confronted with the problem of the others, if not the obstacle will not be crossed or the adversary will be able “us” to eliminate one by one. More largely, in its positive meaning, it is a humanistic step people being aware of a community of interest who choose (or feel morally obliged) to assist another person. Solidarity is distinguished from the Altruisme: the altruist can wish to help others without to feel concerned by what arrives to him, and conversely one can make oneself simply interdependent of others by interest included/understood well and not by altruism.

Very often, one presents in this positive form of the forms of more ambiguous solidarity:

  • a form of mutual exchange, where each member makes himself interdependent of the others because the others are made interdependent of him. It is thus a calculation (economic) and not a generous step (see Coopération);
  • a form of imposed solidarity, where each member is obliged to adhere to the group under penalty of losing certain benefit (case of the parents of a tenant, who must go interdependent guarantee to the risk to see their child excludes from the hiring; expenses of joint ownership…), even under the threat of sanction (left socialized wages, taxes, conscription).

Solidarity can be practiced at the individual level, but it is often expressed in a collective form (the French sociologist Emile Durkheim showed besides that it revêt of the different forms: based on the similarity of the individuals in the traditional companies with strong collective conscience, on the interdependences in the modern societies in which reign the Division of the labor and individualism). Indeed, it is often easier or more effective to adhere to a group, to even constitute it, to only act. It is also easier to approve an action of solidarity of a group to which one belongs in addition, by choice or for other reasons (in particular political structures), which to only launch out.

Various types of organizations claim positive value of solidarity, even are regarded as a fragment of the incarnation of solidarity:

  • the governmental organizations (term indicating an association completely independent of the governments) such as Doctors without borders, Oxfam or Greenpeace;
  • of very many associations having sometimes opposite objectives;
  • the wage earners associations.

Christian solidarity was the subject of the encyclicals Populorum progressio and Rerum Novarum.

See too

Internal bonds

solidarity|solidarity

External bonds

Random links:Economía de la Guinea Ecuatorial | Georges Valois | Laiwu | Antoine Odier | Daniel Fernandes | Pud Galvin | Disques_mystiques