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Cooperatives are formed with the idea of cooperation. Due to their features, cooperatives have the potential to address the issue of poverty alleviation and improvement in income distribution, which currently is the central focus of governments' economic policy making. Currently, Islamic cooperatives or shari'ah-based cooperatives have also been developing well. Shari'ah-based cooperative is essentially the transformation of conventional cooperative through an approach in line with the Shari'ah principles. It could be one of the best solutions in supporting Islamic banking and finance for unbankable customers. This chapter describes the development of cooperatives in Malaysia and Indonesia. The chapter also discusses the need for cooperative governance and highlights the features of cooperatives that results to their governance is more complex that the governance of business organisations. This chapter also highlights laws, regulation and shari'ah governance measures taken by both jurisdictions to promote growth of shari'ah-based cooperatives.

Milkerie¹ worker cooperative was created after a yearlong labor fight against a factory closure announcement. By creating the coop, Milkerie’s workers set out to prove that if workers were given more decision-making power in the economy, it would be possible to create a more inclusive economy that values worker labor and provides them wage-based livelihoods. This chapter describes the historical conditions that the cooperative emerge, shaped its business model and governance structure. If cooperatives are believed to propose an alternative to capitalist enterprises, the case of Milkerie shows how the market pressure turns activism, that is, various types of unpaid voluntary labor, into simple jobs, that is, activities codified by task description and time frame, limiting the possibility to re-imagine the economy collectively.

Human evolution has witnessed the highest level of metamorphism overages. COVID-19 alarmed us when we were unceasingly running toward monetary benefits and money, the significance of health. That initiated the thought process of improvising the health and healthcare infrastructure, leading to the birth of the health cooperative as a reform. During the state of COVID services, operations of the hospital were unreachable due to the unavailability of doctors, facilities, hiked charges, and lack of insurance coverage made people disbelieve in the system. Many social activists propose the idea of healthcare cooperatives to foster healthcare needs. The study guides us to understand the roles of healthcare cooperatives like the establishment of service facilities, modernisation of existing facilities, expansion to various topographical locations, and healthcare education to the general public, repair, and renovate the instrumentation in the medical field. The study also finds the ways and means of self-sustainability of health cooperatives with dependency on government financial support during the initial take-off. The benefits of cooperatives contributing to the NDHM and supporting the development of healthcare infrastructure in rural areas. The study enables us to find the factors that healthcare cooperatives need to consider for providing the right benefit to the citizens and factors for the self-sustained and self-resilient mode of seamless operation. The study has two different data collecting instruments, one to collect the data from the public and other from healthcare professionals. The result of the study reveals the mechanisms through which healthcare cooperatives can provide well-structured healthcare support to the nation.

European performing arts companies, intrinsically fragile, have been severely hit by the economic crisis. Within the global search for new economic models in the sector, a growing number of initiatives have been taken in the form of establishing collective and participatory firms. Their forms vary from simple interorganization resource pooling to proper registration of a cooperative. Our research aims to understand the motivations of project initiators for collectively organizing their business. We test the influence of instrumental versus ideologically driven motives as well as the influence of the socio-economic context on the decisions of performing arts entrepreneurs (artists, producers, or directors) to establish participatory firms. We relate these results to the success or failure of collective firms and to the degree of cooperation. We use a qualitative method based on semi-directive interviews conducted in 21 performing arts collective organizations, over two years and in six European countries. Interviews were integrally transcripted and processed using qualitative data analysis software (QSR NVivo 10) in order to realize axial coding. We found that while the context, instrumental logic, and ideologically driven motives influence the decision to establish collective organizations in performing arts, it is the ideological dimensions that are predominant and constitute a necessary condition for the success of a participatory organization. We observe that the more collective organizations are ideologically motivated, the more they are likely to be successful in the long run (success being assimilated to economic sustainability). We also find that the greater the importance of the ideological motive, the more integrated the cooperation. Eventually, these results provide significant information regarding the form of collective firms in performing arts. We observe the emergence of new forms of cooperatives that comprise cooperatives of production and projects or companies, establishing participatory and democratic governance, and pooling resources and financial risk while preserving the artistic freedom of artists. We view these emerging types of cooperatives as a promising avenue both for the sector itself and for the development of the cooperative movement beyond its traditional sectors. The findings suggest that public incentives, as they are currently set up, may miss their objective of promoting shared practices in the arts or even be counterproductive; thus, it would be to their advantage to be modified in light of the above results. We also defend the interest of trans-border cooperative organizations inspired by the cooperatives of production and their governance models and organizations. Despite a number of studies highlighting cooperation in the cultural sector, research on cooperatives in this sector remains embryonic. This paper contributes to this literature. We argue that applied research in this sector can be of contributive value to the literature on cooperatives and participatory firms.

Purpose: To examine the refugee women's empowerment and integration component of the pilot program of a Turkish social entrepreneurial organization (SEO) specialized in supporting disadvantaged women's empowerment. Methodology/Approach: The chapter utilizes a comparative qualitative case study approach to investigate the interplay between the dimensions of: business model, knowledge acquisition, and learning experiences, the achievement of goals, and scalability in determining social innovations. Findings: Despite the widespread belief that women's cooperative is an ideal business model for inclusivity, the chapter presents a variance in achieving this goal. The results propose that a strong business model, enhanced with knowledge acquisition and learning, and an inclusive approach to innovation, enable a women's cooperative to offer desirable solutions to community needs, improving its chances for higher impact. Research Limitations/Implications: The chapter adds to social entrepreneurship literature by offering multilevel analysis in examining social innovation, which has been often neglected as a research approach in the field. It asserts that an investigation into the community as a unit of analysis promises to be viable research in social innovation studies. Practical Implications: An inclusive approach that develops relations with the broader community and networking with other cooperatives and social actors is essential for women's cooperatives. Social Implications: The SEO's increasing local reach and impact have made it a strong actor in women's empowerment on the ground and force for institutional change. In the long term, SEOs' actions targeting multiple actors of influence will increase the chances of suggested framework changes accepted by policymakers.

The closure of Fagor Electrodomésticos in October 2013, the most iconic cooperative in the Mondragon Group, not only cast doubt on the economic and social management of the cooperative itself but also called into question the very viability of the overall cooperative model. In addition to describing the evolution of this cooperative in its last years in business, this chapter offers a comprehensive review of the mechanisms of inter-cooperation in the Mondragon Group and the way in which they were applied in the crisis at Fagor Electrodomésticos.

The methodology applied is a qualitative research methodology mainly based on semi-structured interviews.

The main conclusion of the chapter is that the closure of the cooperative was largely caused by market conditions. The chapter also highlights the validity of the mechanisms of inter-cooperation applied in managing employment which contributed to a rapid resumption of the employment situation of surplus personnel from Fagor Electrodomésticos.

The main contribution of this chapter comprises a detailed description of the methods used by the Mondragon Group to manage employment adjustment at the time of closure of its largest industrial cooperative during the recent general economic crisis (2008–2014), and thus avoid large-scale unemployment, its concommitant problems, and deeper deterioration of social capital in the Mondragon area. Further research is needed to compare this process with other international experiences based on cooperation.

Existing theoretical and empirical evidence is inconclusive concerning the comparative performance of labor-managed firms (LMFs) and conventional firms. By assembling and analyzing new data for a sample of 51 conventional firms and 26 producer cooperatives in the Italian construction industry during the period 1981–1989 we provide additional evidence. Except for organizational form, the cooperatives in our sample are fairly comparable to our conventional firms. Based on our production function estimates, and unlike some previous econometric studies, we find no significant productivity advantage of cooperatives over conventional firms. Our ordinary least squares (OLS) point estimates generally indicated that output would be lower in a cooperative than in an otherwise identical conventional firm. The only statistically significant measure of financial and decision-making participation is collective reserves. We conclude by offering some possible explanations for why our results may differ from some previous findings, especially those for Italian producer cooperatives. In particular we suggest that research methods that are new to the study of cooperatives are needed to help to resolve these questions.

There is still no universal definition of the third sector in Europe, but it can be seen as including all types of non-governmental not-for-profit entities such as non-profit organizations, mutuals, cooperatives, social enterprises and foundations. This article attempts to make sense of the current shifting conceptualization of the third sector in Europe. It is based on short country summaries of the images and concepts of the third sector in 13 European countries by EMES Network’s members, first presented in 2008 (Defourny and Pestoff, 2008; nine of them were recently revised and are found in the appendix to this article.). The perception and development of the third sector in Europe is closely related to the other major social governance institutions/mechanisms, like the market, state and community and through the third sector’s interaction with them. Moreover, many third sector organizations (TSOs) overlap with these other social institutions, resulting in varying degrees of hybridity and internal tensions experienced by them. TSOs can generate resources from their activities on the market, by providing services in partnership with the state and/or by promoting the interests of a given community or group. The country overviews document a growing professionalization of TSOs in most countries and a growing dependency of public funds to provide services. This has important theoretical and practical implications for orienting the articles included in this book. Thus, it can provide a key for better understanding the discussion and analysis in the remainder of this volume.

From a perspective of ‘critical performativity’, John Lewis is of special interest since it is celebrated as a successful organization and heralded as an alternative to more typical forms of capitalist enterprise.

Our analysis uses secondary empirical material (e.g. JLP documents in the public domain, histories of John Lewis and recent empirical research). Our assumption is that engagement and interrogation of existing empirical work can be at least as illuminating and challenging as undertaking new studies. In addition to generating fresh insights, stimulating reflection and fostering debate, our analysis is intended to contribute to an appreciation of how structures of ownership and governance are significant in enabling and constraining practices of organizing and managing.

The structures of ownership and governance at John Lewis, a major UK employee-owned retailer, have been commended by those who wish to recuperate capitalism and by those who seek to transform it.

JLP can be read as a ‘subversive intervention’ insofar as it denies absentee investors access to, and control of, its assets. Currently, however, even the critical performative potential of the Partnership model is impeded by its paternalist structures. Exclusion of Partners’ participation in the market for corporate control is reflected in, and compounded by, a weak form of ‘democratic’ governance, where managers are accountable to Partners but not controlled by them.

Our contention is that JLP’s ownership and governance structures offer a practical demonstration, albeit flawed, of how an alternative form of organization is sufficiently ‘efficient’ and durable to be able to ‘compete’ against joint-stock companies.

By examining the cooperative elements of the John Lewis structures of ownership and governance, we illuminate a number of issues faced in realizing the principles ascribed to employee-owned cooperatives – notably, with regard to ‘democratic member control’, ‘member economic participation’ and ‘autonomy and independence’.