Ethical values in Social Economy, Human Resource Management Practices and Sustainability

The purpose of this study was to analyse the positive relationship between social economy entities and their sustainability. We aimed to determine whether the ethical principles and values that mark the creation or foundation of this type of entities are the ones that make them more sustainable, or if this relationship is rather governed by the different human resource management (HRM) practices carried out by each social entity. Firstly, we conducted a literature review to contextualise the current framework of social economy, determining its most significant ethical principles and values, as well as their impact on the design of HRM practices. Then, we analysed a sample of the most representative Spanish social entities, of which we highlighted the three most present ethical values in them: commitment, responsibility and respect. The analysis suggests that these three ethical values are important for planning and implementing certain HRM practices, such as: selection, training and development, and diversity management. The present work concludes with the proposal of a theoretical model and some proposals among the considered variables.