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Catalyzing worker co-ops & the solidarity economy

Support Organizations

Organizations that provide services, resources or any form of support to cooperative/solidarity economy initiatives or enterprises.

February 29, 2024

‘New Economies’ and the Rebuilding of Democratic Power

We need to look more directly at how we can stimulate a new structural transformation of civil society. It will be a broad process that explores how we can rebuild democratic power to facilitate mass involvement in civil society and, by extension, our political system. Though there seems to be an instinctual knowledge of this problem, many are unaware of this prehistory of civil society, and understandably find it difficult to see an alternative to the memberless NGO, whose unelected governance, unreliable funding streams, and informal support base is inadequate to the challenges of the present, let alone the disruptions of the future.

January 4, 2024

Stitching a Co-operative Future in Victoria, BC

In the heart of Victoria, British Columbia, a remarkable transformation story has been threaded by The Make House. What started as a 10-year-old sole proprietorship blossomed into a worker co-operative in December 2022.

November 2, 2023

Field Notes from the Radical I.T. Department

Years of being one of the "technical people" in activist circles resulted in my being continually called on to help community groups and fellow organizers understand and more correctly wield technology in service of their mission. Using my blogpost "Three Tips for Providing Tech Help to Non-Profits and Other Such Organizations" as a point of departure, I will share my experience and derived best practices.

Citations

John McNamara (2023).  The Masters in Management: Co-operatives and Credit Unions Program Turns 20.  Grassroots Economic Organizing (GEO).  https://geo.coop/articles/masters-management-co-operatives-and-credit-unions-program-turns-20

October 16, 2023

The Masters in Management: Co-operatives and Credit Unions Program Turns 20

The International Centre for Co-operative Management offers management education in a multi-sectoral format that brings managers from producer, worker, and consumer co-ops and credit unions. The students learn together and share their models of co-operation. The result is a dynamic and engaging educational program that creates a unique management paradigm for the co-operative enterprise model.

September 25, 2023

Mapping a Local Landscape of Care and Belonging

Equal Care Coop and Clapton Commons are mapping a local landscape of care and support in Clapton Common, Upper Clapton. Using KUMU, a powerful system mapping platform, we are creating an interactive map that makes the often invisible grassroots networks of care and support more visible and accessible to people giving and receiving care.

March 1, 2023

Opportunities for Innovation: Home Care Worker Cooperatives

We are in the midst of a labor force crisis in the supply of direct service workers. The home care industry experiences a 67% average annual turnover in workers. The number of workers needed to provide home care and respite is going to escalate over the next 2 decades, exacerbating the crisis. The shortage is already acute in rural areas, and worsening in urban and suburban areas as well. An emerging solution is developing across the country through Home Care worker cooperatives.

January 5, 2023

Worker Cooperatives: Building a Better Workplace

Laura Flanders speaks to founder of the Community and Worker Ownership Project Rebecca Lurie, CEO of One Brooklyn Health LaRay Brown, and New York City Council Member Sandy Nurse about the recent enthusiasm surrounding worker cooperatives throughout the country, and what they can offer workers that traditional employment cannot.

October 24, 2022

Teaching Solidarity: Popular Education in Grassroots U.S. Social Movements

How one program tried and failed to carve out autonomous "free space" within a large affordable housing non-profit.

August 15, 2022

Like Compost, But For Work

Today on the Tuesday 8:00 Buzz with Dr. Damita Brown, Charity Schmidt from University of Wisconsin Center for Cooperatives and Madison Cooperative Development Coalition joins us to talk about cooperatives and her work helping cooperatives develop!