Patterns of Cooperative Management: Beyond the Degeneration Thesis

Abstract

This paper presents case studies of the development of four relatively long-standing and successful worker cooperatives in the UK. It focuses in particular on how, as a result of growth and pressure for greater efficiency, the cooperatives have developed new management structures and a more specialized division of labour, and how these changes have affected democratic control and accountability. The paper presents further evidence that degeneration is not inevitable as cooperatives age and grow, and details how processes of regeneration may occur. The paper concludes by highlighting some of the different conditions and strategies that support workplace democracy. In particular, as cooperatives grow their management structures and procedures will need to be regularly reviewed and changed, both to remain efficient and give renewed expression to democracy.

Managing and resisting ‘degeneration’ in employee-owned businesses: A comparative study of two large retailers in Spain and the United Kingdom

“…However, in line with authors who contend that degeneration is not inevitable and who argue that cooperative 'regeneration' can take place (Batstone, 1983;Estrin and Jones, 1992;Stryjan, 1994;Cornforth et al 1988;Cornforth, 1995;Hernandez, 2006), recent research on Mondragon highlights that a cooperative regeneration process could be slowly reversing the degeneration (Azkarraga et al 2012). While degeneration via reduction of membership rates has been more extreme in Eroski than in other cooperatives of Mondragon, Eroski has also played a leading role in the introduction of a number of innovative cooperative regeneration programs which will be described and explored below.…”

Challenging the Degeneration Thesis: the Role of Democracy in Worker Cooperatives?

“…Beyond these external sources of degeneration, Cornforth (1995) highlights the risk of "constitutional degeneration". Capturing this risk, Ng and Ng (2009) highlight the challenge of eliminating positions of power and control arising from personal attributes.…”

“…The centrality of democracy to degenerative resistance is further supported by the four approaches to regeneration, identified by Cornforth (1995). Cornforth (1995) highlights the importance of: maintaining values and culture through ongoing connections to social movements; reproducing active membership through "careful selection and socialization" (id.…”

“…Cornforth (1995) highlights the importance of: maintaining values and culture through ongoing connections to social movements; reproducing active membership through "careful selection and socialization" (id. : 30); reproducing values and democratic structure through everyday action; and maintaining an openness to opposition, criticism and difference supported through meaningful participation.…”

“…This poses risks of degeneration (Cornforth, 1995; see also Diamantopoulos, 2012;Chen, Lune and Queen, 2013;Doherty, Haugh and Lyon, 2014) that are heightened by an economic context which promotes managerialism and "market-based solutions to social problems" (Eikenberry, 2009: 585). The degeneration thesis claims that worker cooperatives will inevitably succumb to external forces and the impact of internal characteristics (such as the development of informal hierarchies based on personality traits or length of member involvement) "to adopt the same organisational forms and priorities as capitalist business in order to survive" (Cornforth, 1995: 1).…”