UKSCS online lecture: 13 November 2026
Understanding the hidden giants: Implications for the co-operative movement and its future
UKSCS online lecture - 13 November, 09:30 (UK time)
Understanding the hidden giants: Implications for the co-operative movement and its future
Dr Garry Conan, Research Affiliate, Co-operatives Research Group, University of Sydney Business School.
Dr Garry Conan's wide ranging involvement in the co-operative sector, both nationally and internationally, spans over 40 years. It includes working for Australia’s largest membership based co-operative business; running co-operative development, legislative and policy programmes for government; establishing and jointly managing Australia’s first university based co-operative (social economy) research centre (ACCORD); and running global communications and business intelligence programmes for the International Co-operative Alliance where he conceived and launched the Global 300 research project, the predecessor to the World Co-operative Monitor.
Garry’s PhD, completed at the University of Sydney, was entitled Hidden Giants – 'a study of the world’s largest co-operative and mutual businesses'. His most recent research continues his focus on identifying the long-term drivers of co-operative and mutual global business success while positioning this experience within the context of the political economy of the national and global co-operative movements.
Read an overview of the lecture content and book your free place - see below.
Lecture abstract
Research into the world’s largest co-operative and mutual businesses provides an unusual lens through which to examine the development, strengths, limitations, and future possibilities of the wider co-operative movement. Drawing on his Hidden Giants research, Dr Conan's presentation asks a broader question: what does better understanding of the large co-operatives tell us about the co-operative movement itself?
The research identifies several striking patterns. The largest co-operatives and mutuals are disproportionately old, concentrated within a relatively small number of countries and industries, and commonly the product of long processes of merger, consolidation, and institutional adaptation. Collectively, they also represent a substantial share of the economic activity of the global co-operative and mutual movement.
These findings challenge assumptions that large size necessarily involves organisational degeneration or weakening of co-operative identity. Many large co-operatives have demonstrated considerable competitive resilience while retaining member ownership and purpose, and have often provided leadership, resources, and institutional support to the wider movement. Their longevity suggests that scale can represent accumulated institutional adaptation rather than simply departure from an earlier, supposedly more authentic, co-operative form.
At the same time, their success raises important movement-level questions. Consolidation can weaken intermediate federated structures and other parts of the institutional architecture, which helped earlier generations of co-operatives develop. Mature movements can therefore contain economically strong enterprises while experiencing declining organisational density, fewer new formations, and a thinning of the wider co-operative ecosystem. The largest trees may continue to flourish while the surrounding forest becomes less diverse and less capable of regeneration.
The presentation therefore extends organisational lifecycle thinking by considering a co-operative movement lifecycle. Co-operatives develop within historically formed ecosystems of legislation, finance, education, apex and federated structures, inter-co-operative networks, cultural legitimacy, and relationships with the state. National and sectoral movements themselves appear to pass through periods of formation, expansion, consolidation, institutionalisation, adaptation, stagnation, and possible renewal.
This perspective has implications for contemporary ambitions to expand the co-operative sector. Simply increasing the number of individual co-operative start-ups may not recreate the institutional conditions which generated earlier generations of successful co-operatives. Sustainable renewal may instead require rebuilding the wider movement “forest” and identifying sectors where supportive ecosystems can again be created.
The presentation concludes by considering whether contemporary economic and technological change — including housing, energy, social care, digital platforms, data and artificial intelligence — may provide new opportunities for co-operative development. Overall, the central question or tension explored is what the Hidden Giants analysis reveals about the future of the movement.
