Cooperative ownership

A business owned and democratically controlled by its members — workers, consumers or producers — on a one-member-one-vote basis.

The Rochdale Pioneers (1844) set out early principles; the International Co-operative Alliance restated them in 1995. The 'degeneration thesis' predicts that successful cooperatives drift toward conventional firms.

• Mondragon, a federation of Basque worker cooperatives founded in 1956.
• Consumer and agricultural cooperatives in many countries.

Cooperatives can struggle to raise capital and to make fast decisions; growth may lead to hiring non-member workers. The 2013 bankruptcy of Fagor Electrodomésticos within Mondragon is a frequently cited example.

Studies such as Burdín (2014) on Uruguay find worker cooperatives are not more likely to fail than conventional firms. They remain a minority form of enterprise.