File spoon-archives/marxism-international.archive/marxism-international_1997/marxism-international.9710, message 200


From: Michael Hoover <hoov-AT-freenet.tlh.fl.us>
Subject: M-I: A new book on Mondragon (fwd)
Date: Sat, 11 Oct 97 6:43:45 18000


Forwarded message:
> Date: Fri, 10 Oct 1997 10:29:04 +0100
> From: lerner-AT-watserv1.uwaterloo.ca (S. Lerner)
> To: PROGRESSIVE SOCIOLOGISTS NETWORK <psn-AT-csf.colorado.edu>
> Subject: A new book on Mondragon
> 
> FROM MONDRAGON  - TO AMERICA:
> EXPERIMENTS IN COMMUNITY ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
> 
> DATA AND REFLECTIONS FROM FORTHCOMING
>                  BOOK            by    Greg MacLeod
>                     tel   902-562-242
>                     Fax  567-0153
>                                                  gmacleod-AT-uccb.ns.ca
> 
> info contact
> UCCB Press
> Box 5300                         Tel  902-539-5300
> Sydney, N.S.                     Fax  902-562-0119
> Canada B1P 6L2
> 
> DRAFT ONLY                                        DRAFT ONLY
>                                         Contents
> 
> 1.  Inside Mondragon
>         A: Background
>         B: Mondragon: The Parts
>         C: Structures and Governance
>         1. Single Enterprise
>         2. The Zone Group
> 3 The General Congress
> 2. The Strength of Mondragon
>         A: Mission Statement
>         B: Ten Principles
>         C: Enterprise Creation And Development
>         D: Providing For Continuance
> 3.  New Vision
>         A: Sources
>                 1. The Church Tradition
>                 2. The Basque Social Tradition
>                 3. Socialism and Personalism
>         B: Don JosČ Maria's Synthesis.
> 4. A Critique of Private, Social and State Enterprise
>         A: Capitalist Corporation
>         B: Traditional Cooperatives
>         C: Soviet Model
>         D: Towards a New Model
> 5. A New Model
>         A: The Cooperative Corporation
>         B: A New Role for Management
>         C: Role of Workers
>         D: Evaluation and Replicability
> 
> 6.  The Valencia Experiment
>         A: Beginnings and Development
>         B: The Parts
>         C: Evolution to a New Phase
>         D: The Future
>         E: Basic Principles
> 
> 7. North American Glimmerings
>         A. Community Business Corporations
>         B. Alternative Financial Initiatives
>         C. Mexico: A Sustainable Development Project
> 
> 8. Practical Reflections for Community Economic Solutions
>         A: Community Economic Development
>         B: Getting Started
>         C: Person-Centered Economics
> 
> Appendix I:  Biographical Sketch of Don JosČ Maria
> 
> Appendix II: List of Mondragon Companies
> 
> Appendix III: Useful Addresses
> 
> 
> Abstract
> 
> CHAPTER ONE describes the facts about Mondragon, what the visitor will see
> on a visit there or what one will read in the annual business report of the
> Caja Laboral Popular (Credit Union or Cooperative Bank) which for many years
> served as the glue to hold the complex together. The description includes
> how the components function and relate to one another. Mondragon exists as a
> concrete, functioning and profitable enterprise.
> 
> CHAPTER TWO explains how the strength and success of Mondragon is rooted in
> the founders' vision of society and their guiding value system. Aggressive
> expansion in response to community needs is seen as a virtue. The complex
> techniques of enterprise creation are described in detail. Also analyzed is
> their freedom from bankruptcy.
> 
> CHAPTER THREE responds to interest in the original intentions and innovative
> ideas that gave rise to all this activity. The researcher will find that
> none of the components is original but that each was proposed by some
> earlier thinker.1 The genius of Don JosČ Maria was to construct out of these
> elements an original synthesis which proved to be applicable to the world in
> which he lived. Syntheses are extremely important for the advancement of
> knowledge. The synthesis of ideas behind Mondragon is important because it
> triggered a collaboration among a variety of institutions that are normally
> divided and in competition.
> 
> CHAPTER FOUR contains a critique of different models for a business
> enterprise: capitalist, communist or communitarian. With the fall of the
> communist systems in Eastern Europe these questions are important. An
> extremely simplistic attitude might assume that the capitalist model has
> 'won'. However, problems like chronic unemployment, pollution, and events
> such as the Los Angeles riots, indicate that traditional capitalist systems
> have not provided a formula for human wellbeing.
>
> CHAPTER FIVE presents the new model as envisaged by Don JosČ Maria, the
> communitarian model which has yet to be widely tried in the Western world.
> An examination of its success in the Mondragon complex reveals that it is
> neither simply cooperative nor simply capitalist. The chapter shows how
> Mondragon takes elements from several models and results in a community-
> based business system which is very flexible and adaptable to changing
> social needs and circumstances.
> 
> CHAPTER SIX describes the Valencia experiment as an example of the
> transferability of Don JosČ Maria's model. Founded by a group describing
> itself as followers of the Mondragon approach, the Valencian experiment
> consists of a community bank, a string of cooperative retail stores, an
> insurance company, employee-owned factories and a professional school.
> 
> CHAPTER SEVEN examines how the original motivation which inspired the
> Mondragon experiment is shared by many groups in North America, including
> one in Mexico, who are struggling to fight unemployment and economic decline
> in their own communities. Also discussed are examples of other community
> businesses which contain, in various degrees, some of the values associated
> with the Mondragon experiment.
>
> CHAPTER EIGHT explains how technology is a way of thinking and a way of
> organizing. Based on his involvement in community economic development in
> Atlantic Canada during two decades, as well as his visits to the Spanish
> projects, the author proposes that basic guiding values and good technology
> are essential in making a new economy for a sustainable future.
> 
>         Appendix II is a useful list of the 96 member-enterprises of the
> Mondragon
> Cooperative Corporation, including product lines and addresses.
> 
>                         MONDRAGON DATA:  -
> The Mondragon Cooperative Corporation now functions as four groups or
> divisions:
> 1. Corporate, responsible for planning and development. This also includes
> the university. 15 enterprises
> 2. Finance including the Caja Laboral or Credit Union, along with insurance
> and social security. 6 enterprises
> 3. Industrial which includes the factories and agricultural units - 67
> enterprises (a sub-set of this group is subsidiary enterprises-13  total  of
> 80 enterprises
> 4. Distribution which includes the Eroski retail chain.
>   8 enterprises
>  These four divisions are united under the general coordinating role of THE
> CONGRESS which is comprised of delegates from all the divisions.
>                 MONDRAGON COOPERATIVE CORPORATION -Jan. 1997
> CONSOLIDATED FIGURES (Canadian Dollars)
> 
>                             1994                      1995               1996
> TOTAL ASSETS  $10.8 bill            $12.3 bill    $13.8 bill
> 
> I. PRODUCTION AND DISTRIBUTION
> SALES - GOODS   $4.9 bill          $  5.5 bill    $ 6.0 bill
> 
> EXPORTS      $    .8 bill            $  1.0 bill  $1.1  bill
> WORKER-MEMBERS   26 thou              28 thou       29 thou
> 
> II. CAJA LABORAL ( CREDIT UNION)
> 
> ASSETS       $ 4.6  bill           $ 5.8 bill    $ 6.06 bill
> INVESTMENT $  2.9 bill            $ 3.2 bill    $ 3.5   bill
> Equity    $    .6 bill            $  .7 bill    $  .8  bill
> WORKER-ACCTS$ 1.5 bill           $  1.7 bill    $1.9    bill
> The Caja ( co-operative bank) is still the key resource and instrument of
> growth.
> 
>                                 Internal Investments :  1995-96
>  Industrial group       $147 mill
>  Distribut.            $ 240 mill
> Finance                    9 mill
> Corporate                  5 mill
> total                  $ 401 million
>         Special Purpose Expenditures by the Caja:
> Education and Co-operative Development   -    6.7 mill
> Research                                       .3 mill
> Support  for Youth Entrepreneurship            .3 mill
> Promotion of Basque language                   .4 mill
> Institutional grants                           .4 mill
> Cultural Activities and other                  .7  mill
>                                                $8.8 mill
> CAJA LABORAL POPULAR     ANNUAL REPORT  1996
> 
> JOBS in Mondragon Cooperative Corporation:
>                                                 1995         1996
> 
> Industrial Group                    15,000        15,839          52,%
> Distribution group                  10,974        12,377          40.7%
> Finance                             1,777           1,830            6.0%
> Corporate activities                  387             400            1.3%
> Total                               28,228        30,446          100.0%
>     2, 218 added  in 1996 Most of these were from retail system . Still from
> non-retail we have a net gain of 905.
> 
>                                 STRATEGIC PLAN  1996 TO 2000
>                                         (cf. Lankide, April 1997)
> CREATE 8,800 NEW JOBS BY THE YEAR 2000
> ( From present 28,250 to 37,050)
> 
>                                 1996                    2000
> Industrial        16,040           20,000
> Distribution      10,030        -         14,530
> Finance            2,180            2,520
> total           28,250             37,050
> 
>         In this book we have looked at Mondragon, Valencia and a number of
> smaller
> examples of community initiative to set up businesses dedicated to the
> common good.  The ones that survive seem to be the ones that maintain a set
> of ideals and values but who admit that they cannot be all achieved.  Rather
> , they hold the ideals as a kind of horizon which we aim at.  Progress is
> judged not simply in attaining the ideal, but rather coming closer and
> closer to the ideal.   The danger is that the incomplete, compromise
> situation will be accepted as the ideal and that no effort will be made to
> change and improve what we have.
>         While almost every other corporation in the world is cutting back and
> reducing the number of employees, MCC has as part of its five year plan the
> goal of creating at least 8,800 new jobs  in Spain.  This is accepted as a
> duty to the general community which is suffering from unacceptably high
> levels of employment.  While for the Guiness Corporation, the priority is to
> increase profits, the priority for Mondragon is to increase jobs and
> preserve the community.  This manifests the over-riding fidelity of
> Mondragon to its most basic distinguishing characteristic: THE PRIORITY OF
> PEOPLE OVER CAPITAL.
> --
>                  Greg MacLeod
>                  University College of Cape Breton
>                  P.O. Box 5300
>                  Sydney, N.S.- B1P 6L2
>                  CANADA
> 
>                  FAX 902-567-0153
>                  Univ. tel  902-539-5300
>                  Res.  902-562-2420
-- 





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