Social and solidarity economy and shared knowledge: Facilitating and integrating the collaborative adoption of digital commons in Catalan coops

1. Introduction

The increasing dominance of large technology corporations such as GAFAM (Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon, and Microsoft) and other digital platform giants has raised critical concerns among researchers, policymakers, and civil society actors regarding digital control, data governance, and economic autonomy of public institutions, citizens, and smaller actors constrained by platform monopolies (Fontanel & Sushcheva, 2019). Regulatory responses have so far struggled to address the extractive practices characteristic of platform capitalism (Srnicek, 2017). Meanwhile, grassroots movements and cooperatives have been advancing alternative technological models grounded in the principles of the Social and Solidarity Economy (SSE) through the development and adoption of Free/Libre and Open Source Software (FLOSS) tools (Couture & Toupin, 2019; Haché, 2014), and in some contexts also inspired by alternative frameworks such as platform cooperativism (Scholz, 2016) or open cooperativism (Conaty & Bollier, 2015)

These initiatives are not regulatory responses at the policy level, but rather prefigurative practices for imagining, testing and advancing where possible SSE models and therefore society (Schiller-Merkens, 2024), in this case aimed at adopting open digital infrastructures for collective use and benefit. Within this landscape, we address the concept of digital solidarity economies (DSEs) (Rubim & Milanez, 2024) as an analytical perspective that bridges the intersection between SSE and digital commons-based initiatives. In particular, we emphasise the sharing of practical knowledge beyond organisational boundaries as a key feature of DSEs. Besides, we embrace Rubim and Milanez’s idea of “double movement”: DSE as a means of taking advantage of the opportunities that digitalisation offers to existing SSE initiatives and, at the same time, as a way of building technology solutions from the perspective of cooperation, consistent with the principles of the SSE.

Although DSEs remain under-theorised and require further conceptual development to distinguish them from similarly oriented concepts such as platform cooperativism (Scholz, 2016), alternative platforms (Sandoval, 2020), or worker-owned digital infrastructures (Grohmann, 2023; Hauben, 2020), we consider that DSEs should be understood as the intersection of SSE and FLOSS practices within specific sociotechnical contexts. This framing does not imply that all DSE initiatives must rely exclusively on FLOSS tools, but rather highlights a particularly rich area where commons-based infrastructure and solidarity-driven organisational models converge in different degrees and modes. In this paper, we aim to contribute to the theorisation of DSEs by exploring the collaborative facilitation and adoption of FLOSS tools by diverse SSE organisations. We draw upon a specific case and literature on the SSE, technological sovereignty, and open digital infrastructures to support this approach.

Our research is based on qualitative data from user-focused meetings and participant observation related to SSE-led technological initiatives in Catalonia, with a particular focus on the adoption of Dolibarr, a FLOSS tool designed for Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and Customer Relationship Management (CRM), combining modularity and simplicity to meet the operational and governance needs of diverse types of organisations. We examine how small and medium-sized cooperatives integrate FLOSS practices to enhance shared governance and mutualist economic models, both within their own organisational processes and in relation to the tools they adopt. This case study, centred on the facilitation work of femProcomuns (https://femprocomuns.coop/), serves as a practitioner-driven contribution to the collective exploration of governance, sustainability, and efficiency challenges faced by DSEs.

As an integral cooperative (a Catalan legal form that combines the roles of a worker cooperative and a consumer/user one), femProcomuns was founded in 2017 to strengthen the commons ecosystem in Catalonia. It operates as a multi-stakeholder platform where members co-develop projects, share resources, and provide services aligned with open knowledge and technological sovereignty. Its activities cover training, consultancy, and the facilitation of collaborative infrastructures such as the SomNúvol cloud service, always under free/libre licences and cooperative governance models. SomNúvol started in 2018 with just a handful of members. In 2022 and 2023, there was a significant increase. By the end of 2025, the network had about 203 members: 99 organisations and 104 individuals. More than half of the organisations are cooperatives (58), and 30% are associations (30), all part of the broader Catalan SSE ecosystem. Among the individual members, over 32% are women. Organisations and some free services bring in non-member users, currently around 2,000, 60% of whom are women, 37% men and 3% people who identified as non-binary.

Positioning DSEs within the broader literature on convivial technology development (Kostakis et al., 2023) and commons-based peer production (Benkler, 2006), we argue that DSEs represent a distinct departure from both neoliberal platformisation and state-centric digital governance (Couture & Toupin, 2019). They offer a plural, bottom-up approach to digital sovereignty anchored in the values and infrastructures of the SSE.

Against this backdrop, our research asks: How can commons-based, peer learning practices around FLOSS tools support organisational forms of technological sovereignty within DSEs? We address this question by tracing the adoption of a specific tool (Dolibarr) across diverse Catalan SSE organisations supported by a specific knowledge sharing and cooperative learning process.

2. Theoretical framework: Digital solidarity economies and technological sovereignty

The Social and Solidarity Economy (SSE) encompasses a wide range of economic practices oriented toward democratic governance, not-for-profit mission, collective ownership, and mutual aid (Miller, 2010). Rooted in Latin American and European traditions, SSE has long provided alternatives to both capitalist and statist models of economic organisation (Coraggio, 2021). In recent years, European policy frameworks have increasingly recognised the role of solidarity-based digital platforms. Initiatives such as the Social Economy Action Plan (European Commission, 2021) and the Plan for the Promotion of the Social and Solidarity Economy (Barcelona City Council, 2021) propose strategies to reinforce digital cooperation through ethical technology. However, gaps remain between institutional frameworks and the grassroots digital practices developed by SSE organisations.

In this context, DSEs can be understood as SSE-based alternatives to extractivist digital models, offering a critical response to the dominant logics of platform capitalism (Srnicek, 2016; Sandoval, 2017), that initially claimed social and solidarity ideals but later shifted toward profit-driven structures (Sadowski, 2020). Recent analyses underline how GAFAM corporations increasingly operate as “digital sovereigns”, concentrating power to the point of resembling quasi-nation-states that can regulate discourse, infrastructure, and even legal norms, thereby even fuelling concerns about techno-authoritarian or techno-fascist trajectories (Bollerman, 2025). Instead, DSEs are usually grounded in alternative economic traditions, emphasising equity, democratic governance, transparent infrastructure and collective ownership.

Technological sovereignty is a central concept in our understanding of DSEs, as the capacity to collectively own and/or control digital infrastructure, tools, and knowledge according to ethical, political, and socio-economic criteria (Couture & Toupin, 2019). We acknowledge certain terms’ polysemy at different levels, ranging from national/industrial “digital sovereignty” agendas in Europe to municipal and movement-based articulations -like economia solidária digital in Latin America (Rubim & Milanez, 2024). While companies such as Google and Amazon have in the past co-opted the term in order to expand, in line with other Big Tech actors, behind state-level digital protectionism and surveillance, and while some discourses reduce it to data localisation or security/industrial policy, grassroots interpretations of tech sovereignty emerge from FLOSS communities, cooperative movements, and digital commons initiatives (Haché, 2014). These grassroots approaches emphasise decentralised governance, autonomous development, ethical hosting, and participatory design as cores to sovereignty over digital tools and data. In our case technological sovereignty refers to these cooperative and commons-oriented capacities at the organisational and intercooperative scales (covering procurement, configuration, interoperability/federation, data governance, and the right to exit/migrate, among others), aligning with bottom-up approaches to digital sovereignty centred on community-controlled infrastructures (Couture & Toupin, 2019). Rather than protectionist controls at the level of nation-state, etc. It also refers to a pedagogical dimension: shared peer learning and participatory software adoption as prerequisites for exercising those capacities. This key aspect of peer learning connects with broader concepts of cooperatives as “learning spaces” (Vieta et al., 2024), as well as previous research on the importance of sharing tacit knowledge in communities of practice (Duguid, 2005). 

SomNúvol, the cooperative digital services ecosystem developed by femProcomuns, exemplifies in its core and collaboration network this grassroots version of technological sovereignty (Flanagan, 2022), distributing decision-making power between femProcomuns workers and user-members of the service, while collectively maintaining a shared suite of FLOSS tools for cloud services, videoconferencing, data storage, and -as we will see in detail- ERP-CRM functionalities. Through this structure, technical administration, documentation, and governance processes are shared across membership: experienced users demonstrate configurations, newer participants bring organisational questions, and knowledge flows in multiple directions, reinforcing both tool adaptation and community ties. This model fosters collaborative tool development and system administration, where users and workers co-create documentation, participate in feedback loops, and share responsibilities for governance and improvement. For us this invites reflection on how such mutualised modes of tool adoption can offer a replicable pathway for embedding digital sovereignty across diverse SSE contexts.

The concept of convivial technology (Kostakis et al., 2023) further complements our theoretical and practice-based approach. Convivial technologies are those that are accessible, adaptable, and oriented toward shared learning and repairability (Kostakis et al., 2023). They prioritise local capacity-building over dependency on proprietary systems. DSEs often embody convivial technology principles through collective tool development, modular design, and intercooperative uses. We argue that the emerging adoption of Dolibarr within SSE entities in Catalonia reflects this ethos, as these organisations adapt and share configurations, co-develop tutorials, and support each other through peer learning spaces.

In addition, commons-based digital infrastructures developed within DSEs draw on insights from governance and sustainability of digital commons (de Rosnay & Stalder, 2020). For instance, these initiatives aim to resist data extractivism, platform enclosures, and the commodification of digital labour (Esposito, 2021; Bühler et al., 2023), while prioritising collective ownership and decision-making. Technological infrastructures in DSEs are not only tools for operational efficiency, but are also embedded in broader political and collaborative frameworks that emphasise openness, shared governance, and replicability. As we have previously observed in the study of techno-social communities of practice around the commons in Catalonia, four transversal elements emerge across these contexts: a collective dimension, an experimental orientation, practices of sharing, and continuous processes of re-elaboration (Garriga et al., 2018).

In this sense, shared governance and sustainability in FLOSS ecosystems rely also on continued engagement from user communities, particularly when infrastructure is co-developed and co-maintained (Feller, 2005). This aligns closely with the SSE tradition of peer-supported learning and reciprocal contribution, enabling in many cases robust digital ecosystems – where robustness is understood not only in terms of technical reliability or security, but also in active contributor networks, transparent architecture, adaptability to complex needs, and collective stewardship – that are more than technical platforms. They are expressions of socio-political values. That is, DSEs embed technological sovereignty into SSE practice by building commons-based digital infrastructures aligned with mutualist principles. This needed theoretical but also political perspective foregrounds for us community-led digital transformation, convivial peer production, and shared governance as critical alternatives to both corporate and state-driven models of digital development and expansion.

3. ERP-CRM choices for DSEs: balancing functionality, openness, and collective governance

After three years providing digital tools for individuals and organisations, around 2021 femProcomuns realised several SSE organisations needed technological tools to improve their operational and financial workflows. Following those informal observations, in parallel to conversations with other organisations, SomNúvol’s team started to study the ERPs and CRMs available in the FLOSS movement with the idea of offering an easy yet powerful solution at a reasonable price. Within the FLOSS ecosystem, there are many ERP-CRM projects that cover all ERP-CRM features at different levels. Some of the most popular and broadly-used are, at the moment of writing: Odoo, ERPNext, Dolibarr, and Tryton.

• Odoo is a well-known ERP with extensive features and a modular approach. It has continued to grow and is known for extensive customisation and a user-friendly interface. It offers an integrated suite of apps and multiple modules. It operates under a dual licence: LGPL 3 for the Community Edition and a proprietary licence for the Enterprise version. It benefits from a large global community.
• ERPNext is known for its simple interface and in this case is provided under the GPLv3 licence. It allows unlimited users in its free tier and is suited for businesses needing advanced features in finance, inventory, and project management. Its community is growing, in parallel to expert technical support.
• Tryton is also a modular open-source ERP system, provided under the GPLv3 licence. It focuses on simplicity and flexibility, supporting a variety of business functions and serving as a lightweight ERP alternative.
• Finally, Dolibarr is a versatile open-source software, also under the GPLv3 licence, designed for business management and grassroot organisations. It offers a broad set of modules that can be activated or deactivated to meet the specific needs of different organisations. It was developed to ensure ease of use, adaptability, simplicity, support for multiple languages, multiple currencies, and multiple companies.

SomNúvol finally chose Dolibarr – even having more internal experience with Odoo – for its mentioned versatility, as well as for other technical and organisational reasons. It was launched in 2002 by French developer Rodolphe Quiédeville, and is currently led by Laurent Destailleur and Régis Houssin, both long-standing contributors to the FLOSS ecosystem. The name Dolibarr derives from "Dolores Ibárruri", also known as La Pasionaria, as a tribute to the figure and legacy of the Basque activist and intellectual. The not-for-profit Dolibarr Foundation was established in France in 2009 to promote and support the tool’s development. The tool is supported by a solid core team and an international community of volunteers, translated into more than 50 languages, with the core GitHub repository counting over 700 contributors since 2011, and where new versions are released every six months (Aversano et al., 2015).

Compared to other ERP-CRM projects, Dolibarr has an architecture based on PHP and MySQL, which makes it easy to install into a web server with other open-source PHP/MySQL-based tools (e.g., Wordpress, Drupal, Prestashop, Nextcloud, Mediawiki). In this sense, its adaptability to different contexts and scenarios, and the existence of a members module, makes it particularly suitable for most SSE cooperatives and companies (Limanto et al., 2021). The collaboration established with LliureTIC, specialising in the implementation and maintenance of FLOSS solutions, partners of femProcomuns, and their experience in the implementation of Dolibarr also weighed in on the decision. As a result, femProcomuns plays an active role in maintaining and updating Dolibarr instances, evaluating and selecting the most useful modules to meet the needs of different SSE organisations. Suitable and tested modules are acquired, installed and shared among instances at a shared cost, enhancing the overall functionality and user experience of the Dolibarr ERP-CRM software for all SomNúvol members.

4. Methodology

Our methodological approach combines participatory action research with ethnography, guided by our positionality as practitioners embedded in the Catalan SSE and FLOSS commons ecosystem since the Free Culture Forum in Barcelona in 2009. Some of the authors were subsequently involved in diverse FLOSS and digital activism initiatives, participating in the interconnection of social movements and civic technology projects that emerged with the 15M movement in 2011 (Gómez Fontanills et al., 2018; Senabre Hidalgo, 2015). For our qualitative analysis approach in this study, more concretely, we employed a combination of three complementary methods:

Collaborative authorship: The different phases for co-writing this article, from the theoretical framework to the discussion section, served as a method of reflexive inquiry, aligning with our participatory action research practices of knowledge sharing facilitation and open documentation (Garriga et al., 2018), also for mirroring the co-creation processes central to femProcomuns digital infrastructure work.

Facilitated sessions: We organised and documented two main Dolibarr user meetings (an online session in February 2025 and an in-person session in March 2025), which functioned as spaces of tacit knowledge exchange, feedback collection, and community building, allowing participant observation from our side.

Autoethnographic reflection: Drawing from our own roles within femProcomuns and media coverage of the project, we integrate in the analysis our narratives with those of other peer organisations to address how technological sovereignty is framed and enacted.

The combination of these three qualitative methods proved effective for capturing and describing the multi-layered nature of digital commons adoption processes, where technical, organisational, and cultural dimensions are deeply interconnected. By integrating collaborative documentation, facilitated peer exchanges, and reflexive ethnography, we were able to trace forms of knowledge interchange within DSE initiatives. This aligns with Kelty’s (2008) early ethnographic work on the free software movement, where being embedded as both participant and observer can reveal how communities shape and reshape the very infrastructures on which they depend. In our case, this hybrid perspective – bridging implementation and inquiry – enabled us to make sense of emerging practices within DSEs through both analytical and experiential lenses, showing how commons-based tools like Dolibarr and infrastructures like SomNúvol can become sites of mutual learning, governance experimentation, and socio-technical transformation.

About the Dolibarr sessions

We organised two Dolibarr peer learning sessions with SomNúvol during the study period: a first online meeting in February 2025 and a second face-to-face session in March 2025. Together they gathered around 15 and 40 participants respectively, representing cooperatives, associations, consumer groups and freelance projects using or exploring the ERP–CRM tool. The online session focused on enabling organisations to present how they currently use Dolibarr and which modules they rely on, while the face-to-face Dolibarr Day, held in Barcelona within the Mobile Social Congress 2025, facilitated practical demonstrations, peer-to-peer exploration and mutual support among users. Across both sessions we observed shared learning dynamics, screen-sharing practices, and cross-organisational problem-solving, which provided rich qualitative material for our analysis of collaborative adoption patterns in the SSE. Previous needs and operational patterns that we had identified in the process of supporting organisations to adopt Dolibarr, as described in the next section, were taken into account in the design of these sessions.

5. Results: use cases, community practices, and field insights

This section addresses our research question by tracing how commons-based, peer-learning practices around FLOSS tools – in this case Dolibarr – can contribute to organisational forms of technological sovereignty within DSEs. Drawing from our facilitation within SomNúvol, we examine four interconnected dimensions: the identification of typified adoption profiles to guide tailored, collaborative support; the cultivation of trust and transparency through online exchanges; the creation of in-person, hackathon-style spaces for horizontal learning; and the systematisation of knowledge into open resources that feed back into future adoption cycles. Together, these practices illustrate a cyclical process in which technical onboarding becomes an opportunity for community care and cooperative governance, as well as shared experimentation.

Dolibarr sessions function as spaces for collaborative learning, where SSE groups exchange best practices. Some cooperatives leverage existing communities of practice to support Dolibarr adoption, while others face difficulties aligning their internal Dolibarr systems with external financial and legal requirements. During the period of this research we have organised two meetings, a first meeting online and a second face-to-face.

The first meeting took place using the BigBlueButton videoconference FLOSS tool. We invited member organisations of SomNúvol, as well as other organisations that self-provide Dolibarr, whether by installing it themselves or through other suppliers. The main purpose of this meeting was for those organisations that use Dolibarr to get to know each other, to be able to briefly explain which modules they use and for what purpose. An environment of trust was generated where some organisations shared computer screens to show each other how they use their ERP-CRM. Four worker cooperatives, one consumer cooperative, two associations and two freelance professional projects participated in the event. Most organisations were made up of teams of between three and ten people and, in two cases (the coordinator of Lleialtat Santsenca and the consumer cooperative Gafarrons) with a broader social base that makes direct or indirect use of Dolibarr itself.

The second meeting was held as a “Dolibarr Day” with SomNúvol “FreeI/Libre software for the management of organisations and companies” to present how SomNúvol works (pooling our tools among our members) and how we share our tools and our knowledge. The venue was in Barcelona at the Ateneum of democratic innovation Canòdrom, a City Council space that hosts FLOSS and citizen participation projects. The chosen date was important. It was the same week in which the big telecommunications companies met in Barcelona at the Mobile World Congress (MWC). Two days before, the Sobtec (Technological Sovereignty Congress) was held, in which another way of making non-business-oriented technology was discussed and reflected on. It was also the same week the Mobile Social Congress took place, which denounces the crimes and injustices derived from the MWC guest industry. The Dolibarr Day with SomNúvol was held within the framework of the Mobile Social Congress 2025 in collaboration with Setem, its driving organisation. Setem is a Catalan NGO and federation that promotes global justice and SSE through awareness-raising, education, and campaigns against exploitative economic practices – one of its commitments is to denounce the ecological impact and working conditions in the technology production and distribution chain.

Typified use cases: profiles and adoption practices

The process of supporting new organisations in adopting Dolibarr has been cautious. We started with two projects in 2022, and by 2024, ten organisations were using it. Unlike simpler tools like email or video conferencing, we progressively realised an ERP-CRM requires in-depth knowledge of an organisation’s operations: who is involved, their roles, workflows, products, services, accounting, HR, inventory, and more.

By measuring our dedication to this line of activity, among other femProcomuns projects and activities, we found that each organisation required at least 20 hours of personalised support regarding Dolibarr: mainly for understanding their needs, then configuring the system, and finally training teams. On the other hand, we needed to systematise the knowledge and affordance needs of the projects we were supporting, in order to be able to typify the solutions and continue to help SSE organisations in their stability or scaling up. This led us to identify three main typologies of Dolibarr potential users: service-oriented, production-oriented, and commerce-oriented.

Service-oriented: Represented by Vira Cooperativa (https://vira.coop/), which offers feminist consulting to educational institutions and public/private bodies. With four partners and two employees, Vira has used Dolibarr for two years to replace disconnected Google spreadsheets here and there. They track contacts, projects, workload, and expenses, though not invoicing yet. Each year, they tackle a new area of internal management with FLOSS, planning to integrate invoicing and bank reconciliation next.

Production-oriented: Represented by L’Escamot (https://escamot.cat/), which promotes active mobility and offers consultancy and training. Based in Camp de Tarragona, the four-member cooperative currently uses Dolibarr to track cash and tickets from its bicycle workshop, manage billing and projects, and monitor time allocations. Using bank reconciliation features is planned too.

Commerce-oriented: Represented by Gafarrons (https://gafarrons.coop/), a 15-year-old consumer cooperative in Premià de Mar with sixteen consumer units. Previously reliant on complex systems of proprietary spreadsheet software, Gafarrons now uses Dolibarr to manage weekly orders, supplier coordination, invoicing, stock, and even a webshop. Orders are placed weekly; goods received and updated in the system; invoices generated by rotating “basket-pickers.”

These three typologies helped us develop pre-configured SomNúvol demo instances for onboarding new users. We tested our categorisations in meetings with users and Dolibarr developers, and recognised the need to promote peer learning and community support through meetings and the SomNúvol Àgora forum. The Dolibarr community user sessions are also derived from that process.

Peer learning in practice: the online user session

The online user meeting revealed a wide range of day-to-day uses of Dolibarr across participating organisations. Gafarrons, for example, showed their order workflow and webshop integration. Others shared how they transitioned from spreadsheets or use Dolibarr for invoicing and project management. Menjamiques, which sells carob-based products to a community of co-responsible consumers, plans to connect a webshop to Dolibarr like Gafarrons. Like L’Escamot, the cooperative Insta (dedicated to environmental legal services) and Nus (dedicated to the facilitation of groups with creative and participatory methodologies), as well as the Econau association (vegetable and carob mill shared workshop), use Dolibarr for billing. L’Escamot, Vira, Insta, Econau and Nus also use the platform for project management, agenda or time dedication. Lleialtat Santsenca is a building owned by the Barcelona City Council, self-managed by the neighborhood through an association of more than 60 organisations. In addition to the agenda and budgets, they use Dolibarr for contact management, room booking and shared resource bank (tables, kitchen utensils, etc).

An important aspect of this first online meeting was that organisations that were considering using a new Dolibarr module could meet other organisations that were already using it. This is an aspect in which we wanted to deepen in the second meeting. Field notes captured quotes such as: “We use it like this...”, “Could we adapt that to our group?”, or “I hadn’t thought of that – brilliant.” In this respect, we observed trust and transparency facilitated the session’s success.

From a learning perspective, this first online meeting already illustrated how knowledge around open digital tools can circulate through situated, practice-based exchanges rather than formal instruction. Organisations could understand important features and advantages of Dolibarr by observing others’ configurations, comparing workflows, and collectively interrogating the limits of their own routines, in line with what Duguid (2005) describes as the tacit, lived dimensions of organisational knowledge. What emerged in terms of peer learning outcomes was not only a transfer of technical skills, but a form of legitimate sharing ethos facilitated by proximity, interest and trust. This suggests that Dolibarr adoption within the SSE relies on forms of peer learning closer to communities of practice and commons-based peer production (Benkler, 2006) than to proprietary digital or tool-centered training, reinforcing the pedagogical potential of open DSE infrastructures.

Dolibarr Day: horizontal mentoring and 'learning forks'

The following session, the “Dolibarr Day”, included existing users, curious newcomers, tech freelancers, and academics. Vira, L’Escamot, and Gafarrons shared their experiences alongside groups like Tocaterra, El Rodal, Dropcampers, and others.

Attendees used a grid on arrival to mark which modules they used. This visualised the community’s collective expertise. There was a combination of organisations that already use Dolibarr and others interested in getting to know the tool. The event had two parts: peer group exchanges and a plenary with tool presentations and live demos. Groups were organised around three themes: project management, consumer cooperatives, and onboarding for beginners.

Each group was co-facilitated by experienced users following a show-and-tell model. Questions flowed freely, interruptions were welcome, and participants split into what we considered spontaneous “learning forks”: small explorations to answer practical questions. People switched screens, collaborated in pairs, and documented insights. Gender balance was notable: women were well-represented, especially among those responsible for coordination, admin, or shared services. The conversational tone revealed insights such as: “How do you track supplier payments?” or “That same thing, but applied to our organisation, how would it be?”. Participants openly shared knowledge - even developers from other ERP systems based on FLOSS participated without competition. Again, the session embodied a commons-based, horizontal peer learning, typical in open learning spaces of early hacklabs and hackmeetings (Maxigas, 2012).

This sort of horizontal mentoring observed during the discussions further developed a collaborative learning ethos, with spontaneous “learning forks” that developed brief, self-organised side explorations to answer concrete questions. Rather than following a main facilitation or eliciting process, like a typical linear instructional path, groups once in front of a shared computer screen started to co-develop understanding through specific tasks and actions of experimentation, troubleshooting and reciprocal demonstration. This mode of learning resonates with convivial technology perspectives (Kostakis et al., 2023), where tool adoption usually develops better from collective capacity-building. Dolibarr, in this sense, functioned as a shared learning object around which a temporary, cross-organisational community of practice took shape, contributing to strengthen the intercooperative community of the SSE in a specific local and economic context.

Mutual support, systematisation and replication

What began as a community session user training turned into a live, mutual support process. First-time users met experienced ones. Some had participated in the online session; others were new. There were informal clusters of people comparing the use of tools, reflecting on organisational structures, and sharing what worked or failed. Field note excerpts capture this atmosphere: “I don’t know for sure, but I think we could use that module for tracking hours” (an organisation recognising that a module demonstrated by another could help structure task-based time recording); “We do this in a totally home-made way” (after noticing that others used a clearer, more organised way to manage some financial records); “In our case, issuing an invoice is always tricky” (a participant raising a concrete administrative pain point when comparing solutions with other SSE organisations); “I know another group doing this differently” (a user informing practices from another organisation not present in the session, reinforcing cross-organisational knowledge circulation within the SSE).

These excerpts from statements and conversations represent trust-based disclosure and organisational vulnerability, in an atmosphere supporting digital sovereignty not just in theory but in practice.

These sessions ultimately confirmed to us that Dolibarr could support three distinct organisational models. Based on this, we have developed three shared tutorial instances for the tool’s online training content, also known as “Pepa Demo” stories:

Model femFeina (service-oriented, based on Vira)

Model XoRutlla (production-oriented, based on L’Escamot)

Model Pardalets (commerce-oriented, based on Gafarrons)

Each video-tutorial is pre-configured to reflect sector-specific workflows with SomNúvol, and also Dolibarr. They serve as both onboarding tools and material for peer learning platforms, shared under copyleft licenses. We continue to document our experience to share with new trainers and reinforce the commons logic that underpins SSE and DSE practices around Dolibarr.

The current development of the typified tutorial instances of “Pepa Demo”, in line with the project’s ethos, builds on the described dynamics of peer learning by systematising shared knowledge without detaching it from its "communal" origins. In this sense, replication does not imply standardisation from above, but a commons-oriented process of refining and circulating modular know-how across organisational boundaries. These learning dynamics prefigure for us governance logics central to DSEs, where technological sovereignty is achieved not only through tool choice but through the collective pedagogies and derived learning materials that sustain their adoption and regular use.

6. Discussion

Our analysis responds to how commons-based, peer-learning practices around FLOSS tools support organisational forms of technological sovereignty within DSEs. By adopting a very specific DSE conceptual lens, we distinguish our perspective from adjacent frameworks such as platform cooperativism or open cooperativism. While these approaches also seek to align digital infrastructures with cooperative values, they have often focused on platform-based market models, individual user needs and centralised service provision. In contrast, our theorisation and community-based experience of DSEs emphasises decentralised governance, transparency, intercooperative resource mutualisation, and key peer-learning processes as infrastructural components. This positioning builds on the convivial technology perspective (Kostakis et al., 2023) and commons-based peer production (Benkler, 2006), while situating them firmly within SSE principles of mutual aid, democratic control, and collective ownership.

From community infrastructure to typified solutions

When SomNúvol was launched in 2018, our initial goal was to offer collectively governed alternatives to GAFAM tools, focusing on cloud-based services that were easy to deploy and use – such as email, office software, and videoconferencing. This accessibility allowed SomNuvol to grow its user base and reach a critical mass of members between 2019 and 2021. However, by 2022 it became clear that many SSE organisations also needed more sophisticated digital tools to support their operational and financial workflows. ERP-CRM systems, and in particular Dolibarr, emerged as central to this effort.

Unlike simpler tools, ERP-CRM implementation requires a high level of engagement with the inner workings of each organisation. Rather than just “installing” software, we found ourselves co-designing workflows and reflecting with each participant on how they budget, plan, track, and report. This was not just technical onboarding, but a space for collective self-understanding. The process echoed earlier experiences in the same local context from projects like La Comunificadora – a digital entrepreneurship programme for commons-oriented projects – where femProcomuns facilitated and encouraged peer learning and collaborative self-assessment (Vidal, 2022).

By identifying three dominant adoption profiles and facilitating horizontal exchanges, we were able to validate the idea of typified Dolibarr instances. These became an effective starting point for new organisations and reinforced our belief that digital infrastructures can (and should) be commonised. Crucially, the collaborative work we undertook was in tension with prevailing narratives of platform cooperativism, which often replicate platform logic without challenging its competitive and individualised characteristics (Sandoval, 2020).

Dolibarr as a tool for mutual learning

What emerged through these sessions was not only technical know-how but a shared pedagogical space. Every organisation came with a different learning curve, internal logic, and external constraints. Sharing these specificities – in detail, with transparency – created an atmosphere of mutual empowerment. Dolibarr functioned not just as a management tool, but as a sort of medium for shared experimentation.

Through the open exchange of missteps, adaptations, and hacks, the meetings fostered a culture of learning that extended well beyond the platform itself. Several participants noted that their realisation of Dolibarr’s potential only came after seeing others “show and tell” in a live context. This reciprocal learning suggests that beyond user manuals and training videos, live situated learning spaces are essential for tool uptake in the DSE.

In line with Duguid’s (2005), our experience shows that much of the most valuable Dolibarr-related knowledge is tacit, embedded in the lived work of configuring, adapting, and integrating the tool into specific organisational routines. This knowledge cannot be fully codified, and is better acquired instead through legitimate interest, observation, and iterative engagement. More specifically, the type of peer learning we have been referring to in this case is shaped by boundaries and capacities within the group, meaning that opening up this tacit layer of know-how requires deliberate facilitation, organisational openness and trust-building.

Moreover, this pedagogical approach represented for us the political dimension of digital sovereignty. The embodied experiences of configuring Dolibarr, negotiating its integration with other parts of organisational life, made visible the compromises and decisions inherent in technological autonomy. Mutual learning, rather than simply an outcome, preconfigures mechanisms of commons-oriented governance. This aligns with Vieta’s et al. (2024) insights on “learning in struggle” and “workplace learning” within worker-recuperated enterprises, where collective problem-solving and situated learning processes become both a means of organisational resilience and a vehicle for reinforcing cooperative values.

Tensions and hybrid dependencies

Despite the enthusiasm and creativity of the groups involved, it is important to recognise several ongoing challenges. Many organisations, for example, still rely on external accountants or legal frameworks that favour proprietary software. In these cases, Dolibarr exists in a hybrid stack, side by side with tools like Excel, Sage, Contasol or Quipu.

There is also the challenge of time and capacity. Organisations operating within SSE often do so with limited administrative resources, so even a reasonable investment of time in understanding and configuring a tool like Dolibarr can become difficult to sustain. While our role as facilitators helped mitigate some of this burden, it also underscored the need for public support mechanisms and institutional recognition of the value of self-managed digital infrastructures.

Finally, there is the issue of narrative. Media accounts and even some policy discourses tend to frame technological sovereignty as a discrete choice or success story. Our ethnographic and practitioner experience reveals instead a layered, ongoing negotiation - between ideals and limitations, between FLOSS values and interdependencies with the broader digital and legal ecosystem. These tensions, far from being signs of failure, are probably constitutive of what it means to build economic alternatives from within,as has been observed in diverse challenges encountered by prefigurative social practices (Schiller-Merkens, 2024).

Reflections on the ethics of intercooperation

Across all of these insights, one transversal theme is the ethics of intercooperation. Our work on Dolibarr adoption was never about creating a turnkey product or a marketable service. It was, and remains, a collective experiment in applied commons logic. By pooling maintenance, investing in shared knowledge, and resisting extractivist dynamics, we try to demonstrate how SSE principles can be embedded in digital infrastructures.

The project also offered a mirror for our own practices. What does it mean to facilitate without having all the answers to participants' potential needs? To support standardisation without flattening diversity? These questions remain open, but they spark our continued commitment to a cooperative DSE possible scenario grounded in care, mutualism, and autonomy.

In this light, Dolibarr can be seen as not just an ERP-CRM system, but as a shared space of struggle and invention, where digital sovereignty is continually and strategically made and remade in common. As emphasised throughout this study, our experience aligns with grassroots interpretations of technological sovereignty (Haché, 2014; Couture & Toupin, 2019). These practices reflect not only a rejection of the excesses and inequalities driven by platform capitalism (Srnicek, 2016; Sandoval, 2020; Renau-Cano et al., 2021) but a positive affirmation of how solidarity-based digital infrastructures can be built and learnt collectively. Our observations resonate with other calls to rethink digital infrastructure as a form of community care and governance (Esposito, 2021; Bühler et al., 2023), and reaffirm the importance of cultivating spaces where socio-technical experimentation is not only permitted, but structurally supported.

Our experimental and experience-based approach – from an action research perspective – set out to explore how SEE organisations in Catalonia adopt and adapt FLOSS-based ERP-CRM tools through commons-based, peer learning practices. It examined how this adoption aligned with digital sovereignty and mutualist governance principles. Drawing on qualitative data from user-focused meetings, media interviews, and participant observation in the adoption of Dolibarr within the SomNúvol service by femProcomuns, we have also examined the interplay between technological choices, cooperative governance, and collaborative learning. Our findings can contribute to the theorisation of digital solidarity economies (DSEs) in three main ways. First, the Dolibarr adoption case demonstrates how intercooperative learning can function as a form of infrastructure, embedding knowledge exchange into the socio-technical context of digital-mediated services and contexts. Second, it shows how distributed models in ERP-CRM adaptation can mirror cooperative decision-making principles, ensuring that tool evolution reflects the collective needs of diverse member organisations. Third, it highlights a commons-based approach to scalability, where functionality grows through mutualisation of resources and collaborative feedback for development, rather than driven by competitive expansion. For practitioners, these findings suggest that ERP-CRM adoption in SSE contexts can be not merely a technical upgrade but a strategic opportunity to embed technological sovereignty principles into everyday organisational practices. For policymakers, the case should contribute to illustrate how support for FLOSS infrastructures within SSE networks strengthen prefigurative alternatives for economic democracy and resilience.

While this study focuses on a single regional case, its insights can be relevant for broader debates on how grassroots, commons-oriented infrastructures can operationalise digital sovereignty. By explicitly framing these practices through the DSE concept, we also point to the value of naming and analysing this intersectional field in its own right, as a way to sharpen both theory and practice in the convergence of SSE and digital commons. Future research could extend the analysis to other FLOSS tools and SSE contexts, compare different governance and peer learning models for shared digital infrastructure, and explore the long-term sustainability of DSEs in changing public policy and economic environments.