Conceptual Expansion and Approaches to the Concept of Alternative Economy Dev Narayan Sarkar 1 and Kaushik Kundu 2 Abstract Researchers have emphasized upon the significance of alternative economy. Inferences from past stud- ies, and the suggestions on the characteristics of alternative economic networks, are manifested in studies concerning multiple disciplines. The present study explores the definitional aspects and the fac- ets of alternative economic networks. The analysis of a wide range of literature, sampled in the present study, employed a disciplined literature discovery process with Max Qualitative Data Analysis software to produce a tabulation of characteristics of “alternative economy”/“community economy”/“social economy.” Furthermore, these characteristics were studied through a statistical content analysis of rel- evant literature, and an importance-based classification of the characteristics was developed. Principal components analysis was used to distinguish thematic clusters within extant literature. These principal components were used to construct a definition of alternative economy. The present study subse- quently analyzed the temporal evolution of the possible characteristics of alternative economy as pro- posed by scholars. The facets of alternative economy, thus identified, may be utilized for supplementary empirical studies in the context of alternative economic networks. Keywords Alternative economy, community economy, social economy, household economy, dual economy Introduction In Good Food Network, a farmers’ market in Ireland, denizens of the farming community trade and exchange their produce with the local inhabitants and purchase their requirements from the same market, without any significant associations to the outside world (Sage, 2003). An analogous propensity to barter and exchange goods locally has been witnessed in Indian villages (Deshpande, 2017; Sarkar & Kundu, 2016). Traditional societies produce and use food and other wares in local economic networks (Chandrasekhar, 2004; Golan & Kohli, 2013; Sonnino & Marsden, 2005). The producers and consumers Article Global Journal of Emerging Market Economies 12(3) 257–282, 2020 © 2020 Emerging Markets Institute, Beijing Normal University Reprints and permissions: in.sagepub.com/journals-permissions-india DOI: 10.1177/0974910120967567 journals.sagepub.com/home/eme 1 PepsiCo India, Kolkata, West Bengal, India. 2 Department of Management and Business Administration, Aliah University, Kolkata, West Bengal, India. Corresponding author: Kaushik Kundu, Department of Management and Business Administration,Aliah University, 11-A/27,Action Area II, Newtown, Kolkata, West Bengal 700160, India. E-mail: kau_kun@rediffmail.com