Las Santas Casas de Misericórdias (The Holy Houses of Mercy) are institutions of Portuguese origin that emerged in the late fifteenth century and that, over time, have expanded beyond the territories of the Portuguese Empire, including to Spain, where various Casas de Misericordia were created in their image and with similar purposes to the original. The Misericórdias continue to be relevant and present throughout Portugal, in various decolonized countries of the former Portuguese Empire, and in other territories that have been influenced by Portuguese emigration, and have always played an important role in the social care of citizens. In Spain, the Santas Casas de Misericordia do not have the same long history, nor the same social relevance as their Portuguese counterparts. However, even today, there are some Casas de Misericordia in Spain that provide social care services, having adopted various legal structures such as foundations, associations, and public entities.

The aim of this article is to assess the use of the term Social Economy, while being aware of its lack of concreteness, and to analyze the level of scientific production by means of a bibliometric analysis using WoS (JCR) and Scopus (SJR) as sources. Starting in 2004 and related to the Charter of Principles of the Social Economy, the material development of articles began. The most receptive countries are Spain, the USA, China, the UK and Canada. In terms of the most productive journals, Voluntas in JCR and CIRIEC-Spain and REVESCO in SJR stand out. Scientific production on this issue is linked to university institutions, namely the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the University of Valencia and the University of Quebec. The most prevalent subject are Economics and Business in the case of JCR and Social Sciences in SJR. The most recognized term is that of cooperatives and the most prevalent keyword trends being related to sustainable development, climate change, urbanization, management and China.

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