Linking Opposition & Alternatives

Cooperative development is the most important social change work that a person can do.

We have carried out an empirical study of WBOs in Italy since 1985, describing the role of two key institutions - the legal framework and the cooperative associations. WBO operations were officially recognized in 1985 by the Italian policy-maker. The research has led to establishing a sample, wider than any previously done in Italy, resulting from the analysis of data collected by the Legacoop’s Area Studi and provided by the main actors in the promotion and financing of WBOs (Cooperazione Finanza Impresa, COOPFOND, Federazione Trentina della Cooperazione) and the data published by Banca Etica and the Italian Network of Recovered Companies. This has led to being able to closely study the effectiveness and features of WBOs in Italy. We found that longer lifespans and higher rates of activity are associated with the membership of a cooperative association. The sectoral and geographic analysis confirms the conclusions of previous studies, highlighting a clear concentration of WBOs in the Central and North-Eastern regions of Italy and in the manufacturing sector. The average lifespan of the co-operatives, as well as the survival rate, proves the positive economic and social impact of WBOs in times of crisis. The findings have implications that go beyond Italy. We conclude discussing the importance of an appropriate legal framework supporting WBOs and the importance of cooperative associations, including their financial branches.

What follows is the midnight speech on 31 December 2023, by Dario Salvetti, an ex GKN worker and shop steward, and one of the spokespersons of Florence’s GKN Factory Collective.

Jay Geils talks about the multi-faceted Flora Cooperative and the co-op network Cooperation Milwaukee.

Resistance in the digital environment demands that we center our values, intentions, and dreams, focusing on other ways to live, be, and know. May First Movement Technology is a cooperative (primarily based in the United States and Mexico) that aims to put these values into practice: digital media that supports social struggles and grassroots movements working to create the world we know is possible.

Macro-transformation does not happen from individual initiatives acting alone: large shifts become possible when a critical mass of movements for radical resistance and constructive alternatives is able to coalesce through horizontal networks.

I delivered the following remarks last week at the Oxford Real Farming Conference, in Oxford, England, on January 5, 2024. It was part of a session in the Oxford Town Hall with the noted British activist-scholar-commoner Guy Standing, entitled, "Commons and Commoning: A Progressive Vision of a Good Society." 

In Thailand, several traditional cooperatives are offering products and services through digital platforms. While these may be considered Platform Co-ops, their primary revenue does not stem from the platform but from conventional business operations. This differs from the focus of this blog article, which refers to businesses that operate online through websites or mobile apps and are characterized by democratic decision-making and platform ownership by workers and users.

Stacco Troncoso gives an overview of the DisCO (Distributed Cooperative) model, which he alternately describes as a brand, an econoimc LARP, and an open source conspiracy to take over the world.

The Spanish Civil War and Revolution of 1936 was arguably the 20th century’s greatest experiment in economic democracy. Seizing the opportunity opened by the conflict between the Spanish Republic and right-wing Nationalists, Spain’s workers and peasants built a new economy in the midst of the chaos.