Journal of Co-operative Studies, 50(3), 29-34

Abstract

W. P. Watkins — a life-long co-operator — focuses on workers’ participation, which he sees as “increasingly effective” (p. 29), albeit “down to zero” in some types of co-operative enterprise. He bases his essay on the premise that worker participation is “grounded in the co-operative principle”.  Watkins advocates for worker co-operatives as part of the wider international alliance of co-operatives rather than segmentation of different organisational forms and concludes that they have a vital and contemporary role both in promotion of democratic and participatory management, and also in “progressively reinforcing the superiority of Co-operation to private and capitalistic competition… as a system of supplying society’s wants” (p. 34).