Cooperatives at a changing world

The ETH-project «Cooperatives at a changing World» is funded by Mobiliar and conected to the Chair of Technology and Innovation Management.

The project seeks to create research output on cooperatives and grand societal challenges and to promote the topic by the means of seminar, publications and public events.

Cooperatives have a long and rich historical tradition in Switzerland. While the world has changed, human-centered and participative organizations, such as cooperatives, continue representing a potential for local economies and improving people’s lives.

The project investigates the potential contribution of enterprises organized as cooperatives in the context of a changing economic and socio-political environment.

We define cooperatives as «an autonomous association of personsunited voluntarily to meet their common economic, social and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly owned and democraticallycontrolled enterprise.»

In our work we seek to provide a broad view of cooperatives by examining data and literature and by engaging with scholars and cooperatives, from a Swiss and an international perspective. Our work also includes other types of organizations that have a social and a business orientation. Our primary motivation is to understand how cooperatives provide answers to grand societal challenges.