Journal of co-operative Studies, 58(3), 26-33

Abstract

In 2022, the US state of Rhode Island passed a landmark law that legalised the sale of cannabis and required that 25% of business licenses for cannabis stores go to verified worker-owned co‑operative businesses. The efforts to pass the law were led by organisations and activists dedicated to creating wealth-building opportunities for Black and Brown communities long targeted by the over-policing and racism that characterise the war on drugs. The emergent co-operative cannabis businesses that have emerged from these communities include the Roots of Hope Cannabis Cooperative, and this article analyses how the co-operative understands and envisions Principle 7 of the International Co‑operative Alliance co-operative principles. The article argues that the co‑operative’s vision of “concern for community” elaborates a vision of sustaining communities over the long term. Their vision of using worker ownership to create inter-generational wealth — wealth that has long been denied to Black and Brown communities — seeks to resolve presumptive tensions between co‑operative members and the broader community by noting how high labour standards and ownership for co-operative members will mean wealth for their families and communities. The vision draws on the Black co-operative traditions of community development and self-determination in the face of disenfranchisement.

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