Humanity @ Work & Life

HUMANITY@WORK&LIFE is a collective labor of earned merit, vision and determination proving how solidarity, innovation, and conviction forge sustaining local and global social economy practice on behalf of the greater common good.

Editors: Christina A. Clamp & Michael A. Peck.

Contributors: Ana Aguirre, Kristen Barker, Charles Chawalko, Christina Clamp, Brian Corbin, April de Simone, Imanol Olaskoaga Fernandez, Damien Goodmon, Caitlin Gianniny, Roger Green, Rebecca Henderson, Jesus Maria Herrasti, John Holdsclaw, Mary Hoyer, Sara Horowitz, Esteben Kelly, Garam Lee, Sang-Youn Lee, Terry Lewis, Martin Lowery, Rebecca Lurie, Julian Manley, Sandra McCardell, Elroy Natuchu, Carmen Huertas Noble, Doug O’Brien, Kevin O’Brien, David O’Connell, Michael A. Peck, Kandis Quam, Jason Spicer, Dan Swinney, Oscar Muguerza Telleria, Jose Miguel Martinez Urquijo, Ellen Vera, Ibon Zugasti.

HUMANITY@WORK&LIFE is intended to provide hope and inspiration by serving as a resource for those interested in developing worker cooperatives, as well as an introduction for those interested in virtuous cycle, “Solidarity Dividend” alternatives to shareholder primacy capitalism practices. It is also intended to peer over incoming vision horizons and around strategy corners, “showing, not telling” how Mondragon-inspired virtuous cycles transform “humanity at work” globally and locally.  

The book was conceived in the middle of four lethal virus pandemics simultaneously threatening “humanity@work”: advancing extreme climate precarity, withering economic class inequalities including embedded racism, novel COVID-19 killing millions, and a global assault on democracy. Its twofold mission:  first, to be a resource for those developing hybrid model worker cooperatives and social enterprises as structural and cultural antidotes to a rising, inclusive, and climate-respecting Stakeholders-as-Shareholders global economy; and second, to uplift and amplify critical new voices of those doing the work. The four concurrent global pandemics have shone a harsher light on inequalities in society and offer opportunities to develop hybrid worker ownership models that seed virtuous cycles. 

This book’s core belief is that there is no sustaining worker voice without worker power communicated and demonstrated through solidarity, democracy, equality of opportunity and shared equity and wealth outcomes. Its premise is that an ineluctable foundational policy for a fair and aspirational economy working for all demands inclusive, broadened, and deepened, stakeholder worker ownership undergirded by workplace democracy practices. Like Mondragon, we believe single class equity governance is synonymous with solidarity.  Every equity share guarantees the equal right to vote for change and provides the basis for power-paradigm-changing culture combining stakeholder community and individual civic mutualism, stability, and self-reliance to innovate, defend and facilitate more fulfilled lives and dignified retirements.  

The core academic purpose of HUMANITY@WORK&LIFE is to make the case as to why Mondragon is a dynamic working and evolving model for those who see the need for replicable structural change in our economic institutions and in the proverbial “free market” economy across physical borders and cultural silos. The Mondragon case will be detailed and include both an overview of ecosystem cooperatives and discussion of global diffusion activities that the Mondragon cooperatives embrace locally and globally as well as those from other geographies inspired by close to 70+ years of Mondragon cooperative experiences. The book will include sections that examine how cooperatives inspired by the Mondragon cooperative ecosystem in the Basque region of Spain are emerging in different communities in the USA, Canada, Germany, the Republic of Korea, and the UK.  

The last section of the book is intended to provide grounded inspiration about how to develop worker cooperatives and ecosystems that scale and breathe freely in a world beset by culturally induced pandemics doing their utmost to subvert democracy, freedom, truth, and hope.

Chris and Michael have determined that the Editors’ royalties will go towards aligned social economy mission activists on a one contributor, one vote basis.

CONTENTS

Foreword: Rebecca Henderson

Introduction: An Overview of the Book, Audience & Intended Impact: Christina Clamp & Michael Peck

Part 1: Reimagining Capitalism

This section sets a theoretical framework for examining the problems of corporate capitalism, and how worker ownership and worker cooperatives address issues of equity and inequality in a free market system.

Chapter 1: Cooperative Capitalism at the Coalface - Michael Peck

Chapter 2: What’s In A Name? Conceptual Frameworks for a Cooperative World – Jason Spicer

Chapter 3: The Racial Equity Collaborative: "Undesigning" American Racism through Cooperative Community & Workplace Democracy at Work – Charles Chawalko, Sandra McCardell, Elroy Natuchu, Kandis Quam, April de Simone & Damien Goodmon

Part 2: Social Innovation in the Mondragon Cooperatives

This section provides an overview of the Mondragon cooperatives, the development of the networked group and the current involvement in the world.

Chapter 4: The Power of Social Innovation in the Mondragon Experience: Setting the Stage – Christina Clamp

Chapter 5: An Interview with Julio Gallastegui - Christina Clamp

Chapter 6: The "Own The Metrics” Campaign: ESGs & SDGs Meet Their Port Alegre Moment – Ibon Zugasti & Michael Peck

Chapter 6: Footprints of the Catholic Church’s Social Doctrine in Mondragón’s Experience: Future Projection – Jesus Maria Herrasti, former (and first) Mondragón International President

Chapter 7: The Foot prints of the Catholic Church's Social Doctrine in Mondragon's Experience: Future Projection - Jesus Maria Herrasti

Chapter 8: Mentoring Best Practices from Spain’s Basque Region: The Gaztenpresa Case Study - Christina Clamp & Michael Peck

Chapter 9: Mentoring Best Practices from Spain’s Basque Region: The Ahalbidetu Case Study - Jose Arturo Villanueva Barriocanal,  Jose Miguel Martinez Urquijo & Jose Antonio Lopez Egana 

Chapter 10: The Mondragón Team Academy & TAZEBAEZ – Ana Aguirre

Chapter 11: The Erreka Co-op Reimagined: The Industrial Screw Case Study – Imanol Olaskoaga

Chapter 12: Ten Reasons for Mondragon - Agustin Markaide Soraluce

Part 3: Mondragon’s Global Influence

Mondragon has earned an outsized mission and values-based influence far beyond its regional home in Spain. Today, the group annually hosts between three and four million industrial tourism visitors (returning to pre-Covid levels) from all parts of the world through Otalora, Mondragon’s Center for Management & Cooperative Development, housed in a rural mid-14th century manor. This section examines how Mondragon continues to inspire and catalyze local stakeholder ownership, creating and preserving good worker cooperative and union jobs in Preston, UK, Germany and in South Korea.

Chapter 13: The Role of Faith & Civic Action: Pope Francis, Catholic Social Justice & Mondragon – Brian Corbin & Michael Peck

Chapter 14: From Mondragón to Preston: How the Basque Experience has Influenced the Preston Model – Julian Manley

Chapter 15: As German Unions Struggle to Save Jobs, Worker Buyouts Are on the Rise – David O’Connell

Chapter 16: Mondragon’s Influence in Korea – Sang-Youn Lee & Garam Lee

Part 4: Worker Ownership in America

The focus in this section is telling the stories of efforts around the USA generating new worker cooperative development, influenced by global models for which Mondragon is baseline.

Chapter 17: Mondragon: A Model for a New Paradigm of Development – Dan Swinney

Chapter 18: Platforms Co-ops & Emerging Possibilities: An Interview with Doug O’Brien - Christina Clamp & Michael Peck

Chapter 19: “Co-op Cincy”: A Living Lab for the 1worker1vote movement – Kristen Barker & Ellen Vera

Chapter 20: Citizen Share Brooklyn: Addressing Structural Racial and Economic Inequality via Economic Democracy – Roger Green

Chapter 21: Building Mondragon In Detroit: An Interesting Context for an Interesting Translation – Terry Lewis

Chapter 22: Reflection: What Then Shall We Do? - Chris Cooper

Chapter 23: Structuring Worker Ownership in America: Coming Clean & going Long - Michael Peck

Part 5: Resource Challenges for New Worker Cooperative Development

In the United States, the infrastructure for developing new worker cooperatives has lagged behind large scale European Union social economy (reaching 10% of GNP in some countries) and solidarity taxonomy progress.  Here, we have asked leaders in the US cooperative movement to reflect on what it will take to grow similar movement scale throughout the US.

Chapter 24: Our Humble Harvest: Gathering the Right Lessons from Mondragon to Build a North American Cooperative Ecosystem – Esteban Kelly

Chapter 25: Labour Unions and Worker Co-Ops: Democratizing The Economy – Mary Hoyer & Rebecca Lurie

Chapter 26: Worx Printing Cooperative, A Union Worker Co-Op Case Example - Kevin O’Brien

Chapter 27: Placing Where We Place Value: Cooperatives, Cultural Norms, and Challenges Co-Ops Face in the US – Caitlin Gianniny

Chapter 28: Worker-owned and Unionized Worker-owned Cooperatives: Two Tools to Address Income Inequality – Carmen Huerta Noble

Chapter 29: Financing Worker Cooperatives: Challenges & Opportunities – John Holdsclaw IV 

Chapter 30: Reflections: Building the New Mutualism – Sara Horowitz

Conclusions: Virtually Convening the Contributors: A Round Table Discussion - Christina Clamp & Michael Peck, with reflections from Martin Lowery