In Europe, the acknowlegement of the Human Rights provoked the old social order's instability without eliminating, however, diferences in social condition, inherited from traditional societies. With the 19th. century emerging social questions, compatibility between citzenship and economical development became an object of passionate debates assumed by newly coming associations. This article aims at underlining the significant amount of researches focusing on associations, which mark its difference from a patterned theoretical economical hypothesis and deductions, chosing, instead, comprehensive and historical methodologies. The main results lead to take the notions of non profit and third sector as relative. The concept of solidarity became the core of the explanation of many social practices which could be tied under the generic tittle of civic associations.
