Using a jointly owned and democratically run business, a cooperative is “an autonomous association of citizens linked voluntarily to achieve their common economic, social, and cultural needs and objectives.” Each member of a cooperative has one vote, and the board of directors is elected democratically by the members.
A housing cooperative, also known as a “co-op,” is a type of residential housing option where the owners do not possess their apartments outright. Instead, based in part on the relative size of the unit they reside in, each resident is a shareholder in the corporation. Here, we examine co-op living in more detail.
Cooperatives may be:
- enterprises run and controlled by consumers of their products or services.
- enterprises where producers combine their output for the benefit of all.
- groups run by the staff members there.
- enterprises where customers share their money.
- hybrid cooperatives with multiple stakeholders that distribute ownership among them. As an illustration, consider care cooperatives where ownership is shared by both caretakers and recipients. Nonprofit organizations or investors may also be considered stakeholders.
- Cooperatives in the second and third tiers whose members are also cooperatives
- platform cooperatives that enable the purchase of products and services through the use of a website, a mobile application, or a protocol that is jointly owned and regulated.
According to research from the Worldwatch Institute, in 2012, at least one billion people across 96 countries joined a cooperative. The largest 300 cooperatives in the world generated $2.2 trillion in revenue.
According to research from the United Kingdom, twice as many co-operatives (80%) survive their first five years compared to other business ownership models (41%) making cooperative enterprises often more productive and economically resilient than many other kinds of enterprise. The Mondragon Corporation, created by Catholic priest José Mara Arizmendiarrieta, is the largest worker-owned cooperative in the world. It has been in operation continuously since 1956.
Cooperatives usually have social objectives, which they try to achieve by giving back to their local communities a share of the trading profits. Retail co-ops in the UK, for instance, invested 6.9% of their pre-tax profits in the areas where they operate, compared to 2.4% for other competitive supermarkets, as an illustration of this.
The usage of a.coop domain has made cooperatives recognizable on the Internet since 2002. The International Co-operative Alliance (ICA) introduced the Cooperative Marque in 2014, making it possible to distinguish ICA cooperatives from WOCCU credit unions using a mark that promotes ethical consumption.
