The unique historical, economic, and social features of the Canadian North pose special challenges for the social economy – a sector that includes nonprofits, co-operatives, social enterprises, and community economic development organizations. Northern Communities Working Together highlights the innovative ways in which Northerners are using the social economy to meet their economic, social, and cultural challenges while increasing local control and capabilities. The contributors focus on the special challenges of the North and their impact on the scope of the social economy, including analyses of land claim organizations, hunter support programs, and Indigenous conceptions of the social economy.

A welcome resource for scholars and policy-makers studying any aspect of the Canadian North, Northern Communities Working Together is a major contribution to the literature on the social economy in Canada.

Chris Southcott has been involved in community-based research in the circumpolar north for over 26 years. He has published over 100 scientific reports, books, chapters, and articles dealing with social and economic change in Northern Canada and the rest of the circumpolar world.

Chris Southcott's profile page

“Northern Communities is not an exposé; it’s an honest account of community life in a region governed by faraway federal regulators and mining corporations. Accounts are candid. The effect is unsettling. “

Blacklocks Reporter, December 19, 2015