Self-management and Globality

Situating economic self-management in today’s world

What do the co-operatives provide today? To what extent are they instruments of the system in force and to what extent do they really bring about change? What is the point of the co-operative movement today, and to a wider extent self-management? Are they going anywhere? Or can they?

We have asked these questions in our minds and in our co-operative and social environment. The fact is that today’s globality has brought these questions to the fore once again. These are important questions, as they question the extent of our motives. We think that answers can start to be given on an intuitive basis, and in line with this we have published an initial reflection in this booklet.

To start, we have established a concept of self-management. We have then come up with four ideas to situate economic self-management in today’s world. To finish, we have tried to describe the potential and the limits offered by economic self-management. We recognise that there is a level of abstraction in the text and that it is quite dense, as we wanted to express these ideas in a concise, compact way. We hope that it will encourage reflection and debate.

Authors: Jon Sarasua and Ainara Udaondo

1. Concept of self-management
   • Conceptual approach
   • Condition of continuum and its ranges
   • Economic self-management
   • Our focus
2. Situating economic self-management in today’s globality
   • Situating it in the diversity of responses to standardisation
   • Situating in the broad democratic paradigm
   • Situating it in the field of paradox
   • Towards a self-managed social project
3. Potential and limits of economic self-management
   • Potential for articulating the balance between the individual and the community
   • Potential for development
   • Potential for deep-seatedness
   • Potential for creating and maintaining jobs
   • Potential for integrated participation
   • Potential for establishing limits to economic activity through social commitment
   • Potential for intercooperation
   • Potential for global solidarity
4. Some of the risks and limits of economic self-management

Self-management and globality in pdf format