Tag Archives: cwop

CWOP, Home, Murphy News

Video: Reconstructing Economic Development for People and Planet: Stories of Just Economic Democracy

On Friday, May 11th,  in collaboration with Democracy @ Work New York, the Murphy Institute hosted a fascinating panel exploring how progressive local innovations stand to solve long-standing, seemingly intractable issues around poverty and inequality. Panelists included:

  • Michael Menser, Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Brooklyn College, Earth and Environmental Science and Environmental Psychology at the CUNY Graduate Center, Chair of the Board of The Participatory Budgeting Project, and author of We Decide! Theories and Cases in Participatory Democracy
  • Gabriela Alvarez, Chef and founder of Liberation Cuisine, a catering company dedicated to preparing meals collectively with sustainable ingredients and practices. Alvarez recently took her passion for healing and organizing with food to Puerto Rico to help with relief and rebuilding efforts
  • Kali Akuno, co-founder and co-director of Cooperation Jackson, a network of cooperatives and worker-owned enterprises and the author of Jackson Rising: The Struggle for Economic Democracy and Black Self-Determination in Jackson, Mississippi
  • Yorman Nunez, Program Manager at Community Innovators Lab MIT and coordinator of Bronx Cooperative Development Initiative

Miss the panel or want to experience it again? Watch it here:

In New York City worker cooperatives, participatory budgeting, and community land trusts are on the policy platform of the City Council’s progressive caucus and elected officials in the democratic party are pushing legislation for employee and worker ownership at the state and federal levels. With greater visibility and support from the public sector some believe that these pilots and experiments for neighborhoods to drive wealth creation and capture and create equitable economic opportunities can reach into broad-based and mainstream policy.

There is an opening here to expand the horizon of what is seen as possible for genuine equitable urban economic development, and its relationship to labor, communities and the political economy. In short, we can change the conversation from mostly pushing for greater accountability and transparency in the existing economic development order, to a conversation about what should come next and what policies and institutions would be a part of getting us there.

 

CWOP, Home

The Scarcity of Worker Cooperatives in the USA: Enquiring into Possible Causes

By Rebecca Lurie

Last year, the Community and Worker Ownership Project and John Mollenkopf at the Center for Urban Research at the CUNY Graduate Center were pleased to host Professor Sofia Arana Landin for research on cooperative economics in New York City. Her work was extensive in building foundational thought for a comparative study of cooperative enterprises’ success and challenges in the US as compared to other countries, especially in the European Union.

Professor Arana teaches taxation law and cooperatives at the public university in San Sebastian, Spain. Arriving to the states shortly after the inauguration of the 45th president for this research, the juxtaposition of opportunities and constraints was almost too much to bear. Nevertheless, she persisted.

Cooperative businesses, being a hybrid of “for profit” and “social” purposes, have a mission broader than that of a traditional business. Continue reading The Scarcity of Worker Cooperatives in the USA: Enquiring into Possible Causes →

CWOP, Home

Worker Cooperative Business Development Initiative Marks 3rd Anniversary

The Murphy Institute is proud to have been affiliated with the great work of the cooperative network of NYC. With the support of the NY City Council, the City’s Small Business Services and the Worker Cooperative Business Development Initiative (WCBDI) we celebrate over 180 business entities helped through this initiative. With 13 local community based or business development organizations giving services, the Murphy Institute has become a partner where training is hosted and meetings are held.

Read the third annual report here.

CWOP, Home

Photos: Cooperative Events at Murphy

By Rebecca Lurie

This Thursday, the worker-owned cooperative Action OSH hosted their Grand Opening at the Murphy Institute, celebrating the National Day of Workers’ Health and Safety. Along with allies from the Center for Family Life, United Steel Workers, NYC Network of Worker Cooperatives and the Murphy Institute Community and Worker Ownership Project and elsewhere, this group will bring knowledge and power to immigrant workers in our city.  We stand proudly in support of this team of educators and activists

Later in the day, the Murphy Institute Community and Worker Ownership Project joined with Green Worker Cooperatives to welcome Luis Alberto Duenas Casal from Cuba. He is a co-founder of the Cuban worker cooperative SCENIUS and a leader in the Cuban cooperative movement. Following Principles #5 and #7 of the international creed for coops, “Education, Training and Information” and “Concern for the Community,” we learned through conversation and presentation how the economic transformation in Cuba is supporting a redesign of their Social Economy.

Friends and comrades enjoyed a full day of learning and networking!

 

CWOP, Home, Labor Studies

Cooperative Business and the State of Higher Education

Cooperative business models are increasingly recognized as an essential element for transforming our economy. But where can you go to learn about them?

In a recent article in the Chronicle Review (Curricular Cop-out on Coops), Nathan Schneider offers a somewhat dispiriting picture of the higher education landscape for cooperative economics. He writes:

Education has been a basic feature of the modern cooperative movement since a group of textile workers established its now-canonical Rochdale Principles in 1844; promoting education is still part of how the International Co-operative Alliance defines cooperative identity.

And yet, MBA and other business-focused programs, while they appear to move increasingly away from profit-only models, mostly avoid mention of anything cooperative. For example, “At Harvard Business School […] Rebecca M. Henderson has written the latest in a decades-long series of Harvard case studies on Mondragon, and she teaches it in her “Reimagining Capitalism” course. As far as she knows, though, that’s the extent of exposure to co-ops available at the school.” Continue reading Cooperative Business and the State of Higher Education →

CWOP, Home, Labor Studies, Murphy News, Urban Studies

Announcing: the Murphy Institute Community and Worker Ownership Project

The Murphy Institute has a strong history of helping students and workers understand how to improve their lives at work and in their communities. To that end, we are pleased to announce the launch of a new project at CUNY at the Murphy Institute, Community and Worker Ownership Project (CWOP).

In this age of burgeoning inequality and pervasive challenges to political and workplace democracy, this project seeks to support undertakings in worker-owned cooperatives and worker participation and control, as well as grassroots leadership in community development.

Help us create a program that meets the needs of our community by participating in the CWOP Engagement Survey.

The CWOP intends to serve in these five areas:

Training and workshops

Bring non-credit courses and workshops to CUNY sites for existing and potential cooperative worker/owners

College degrees and certifications

Design credit courses, certificates and degree programs with scholars to expand education options for economic democracy and cooperative ownership

Business conversions and start-up

Support expansion of coop businesses with organized labor, worker centers, community based organizations and industry sectors

Public programming

Host and sponsor forums and conferences or serve as a speaker

Research

Initiate or share in research to evaluate economic and social justice impact of cooperative ownership and democratic engagement

Get involved!

You may be interested in learning more or participating in developing the work with us. You may have ideas or interests that can help grow the movement for economic democracy in your sphere of influence and impact and we can help. We want to hear from you!

Want to make the program as effective and useful as possible? Fill out our survey today to help shape the CWOP!

Email Rebecca Lurie at Rebecca<dot>Lurie<at>cuny<dot>edu to share your thoughts or ideas or to express your interest in this project.

Photo: Sergey Galyonkin CC-BY-SA