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Self-initiated expatriates (SIE) women's career decisions are often based on the establishment of close personal relationships in various spheres of life. This paper aims to explore the effects of social isolation in times of crisis on SIE women's work, psychological and general adjustment.

The model of expatriate women's adjustment by Caligiuri and Lazarova (2002) is reviewed and adapted to account for the impact of social isolation and loneliness on SIE women's adjustment and professional development in a crisis context. The interplay between duration and intensity of crisis and acculturative stress over time is highlighted; danger zones for potential maladjustment are identified, and adjustment-as-a-crisis context are incorporated into the model.

The spillover effects between different life spaces in times of isolation have a negative impact on SIE women's ability to develop supportive relationships in different life spaces. The organization becomes the main point of contact with the host culture, but pressure to perform, uncertain contracts, gendered role division and the experience of a double crisis add to the existing acculturative stress which may lead to maladjustment or further fit-dependent crisis over time.

The authors contribute to the theoretical understanding of the impact of social isolation on a single, vulnerable acculturating group, by expanding on an existing static model of adjustment, to account for the temporal (time) and spatial (multi-dimensional crisis context) constraints faced by SIE women which has not been done before.

This research article addresses the role of processes of normative regulation, driven by distinct approaches to collective action and underlying narratives of social change, in the construction of “solidarity economy” initiatives as parallel spatialities to that of the mainstream economy.

This article is based on a comparative case study analysis, informed by aspects of the Grounded Theory and Extended Case Study methods, of an ecovillage, an alternative commercialization network and an “integral cooperative”. The analysis is illustrated with fieldwork data on food production, commercialization and consumption, given its centrality in the construction of human livelihoods and lifeworld.

The resulting conceptual framework identifies three methodologies of normative regulation: Prefigurative social technologies and capitalizing upon power and reputation to exert influence over other economic actors; being part of a wider class-based emancipatory political project; mobilizing online peer-to-peer platforms and community currencies to construct an alternative institutionality.

This article constitutes an exploratory analysis. Further research, based on the application of mixed methodologies to larger samples, will further expand the setup and applicability of these concepts.

This analysis will allow scholars and practitioners alike to gain a deeper understanding of how different approaches to collective action, based on distinct structural standpoints and narratives of change, constitute alternative economic spatialities to those of the mainstream economy.

The comparative approach used in this article, as well as the resulting concepts, have the potential of contributing to the convergence of “solidarity economy” strategies between initiatives and movements with different approaches to collective action, therefore contributing to improve their capacity to exercise influence upon incumbent institutional regimes, as well as promote socio-economic change.

This article aims to bridge a significant gap in the understanding of how “solidarity economy”-based parallel spatialities emerge and coexist with the mainstream economy: It analyses how processes of normative regulation result from narratives of change with distinct approaches to collective action, based on the standpoint of actors located differently within structural power relations.