World Co-operative Monitor: Explorative report 2012

The International Co-operative Alliance (ICA) - with the scientific and technical support of Euricse - launched a new project: The World Co-operative Monitor. Thanks to the support of Crédit Coopératif, the Desjardins Group, the Indian Fertiliser Cooperative Limited (IFFCO), Organização das Cooperativas Brasileiras (OCB), and The Co-operative Group, this project aims to monitor and demonstrate the economic and social impact of the largest cooperative and mutual organizations worldwide. Read More

Efficient inclusion

Is it possible to get disadvantaged people back to work? And does it make sense to do so today, in the years of job insecurity, when the phenomenon of unemployment and exclusion from the labor market is affecting increasingly large groups of individuals? These questions were attempted to be answered by a recent research paper published in the volume "Efficient Inclusion: the Experience of Social Cooperatives for Job Placement". Read More

European Commissioner Barnier responds to Euricse’s appeal for greater attention toward cooperative banks

PRESS RELEASE Trento, Sepember 26 2012 Good news for European cooperative banking. After the European Banking Authority, now the European Commission, represented by the Commissioner responsible for internal market and services, Michel Barnier, has also responded positively to the appeal launched by Euricse in March, demanding that EU institutions pay more attention to local and cooperative banks. Read More

Cooperatives and s.p.a. corporations in Trentino compared: value added and income generated from 2006-2010

In recent years various scholars and representatives of important institutions have sustained that cooperatives have responded better to the crisis than other forms of enterprises. The resiliency of the cooperative model has been interpreted as the consequence of their different nature, in particular their orientation towards the satisfaction of a need rather than the distribution of profits. This particularity, it is suggested, pushes cooperatives to maintain production levels even under conditions of reduced or negative revenue. Read More

WP 45 | 12 Cooperative finance and cooperative identity

The question addressed in this paper is whether the financial structure of cooperatives constitutes a badge of identity that differentiates cooperatives from other corporate legal forms such as capital-based companies. To this end, it examines features of their financial structure that are considered typical of cooperatives in a number of documents published by international organizations. Read More

WP 43 | 12 Do cooperative enterprises create social trust?

This paper contributes to the literature by carrying out the first empirical investigation into the role of different types of enterprises in the creation of social trust. Drawing on a unique dataset collected through the administration of a questionnaire to a representative sample of the population of the Italian Province of Trento in March 2011, we find that cooperatives are the only type of enterprise where the work environment fosters the social trust of workers. Read More

WP 41 | 12 Co-operation as a remedy in times of crisis: agricultural co-operatives in the world

Changing framework conditions and the changing environment bring challenges that more affluent people can face more easily than poorer ones. At these stages, cooperation with others facing similar problems may prove to be a remedy. However, pooling resources presupposes that individuals who decide to cooperate have at least small potentials and means that they can pool to build a common force. Read More