Although Rochdale is normally credited as the “birthplace of cooperation” records show that in 1761, sixteen weavers in Ayrshire set up “The Society of Weavers in Finnick”, arguably the first co-operative organisation of the industrial age. It was some 83 years later, in 1844 that the infamous Rochdale Pioneers opened their store in Toad Lane, Rochdale and devised the principles which became the model for cooperatives worldwide.

Regardless of the dates, both groups had the same objectives, and the Fenwick charter required members to be “honest and faithful to one another … and to make good and sufficient work and exact neither higher nor lower prices than are accustomed in the towns and parishes of the neighbourhood”.

Fenwick survived on tweed and muslin weaving, shoemaking and farming and its tradesmen depended on patronage by the local elite. The late 1700s were a period of rapid change in the textile industry, with increasing pressure from agents and manufacturers to lower prices. Inspectors were employed to check the quality of work and prices, and it could be disastrous for a village to gain a bad reputation for quality, over-charging, or late delivery.

It does not take much imagination to see the parallels between the pressures placed on the Fenwick weavers and the perils of today’s “gig economy” workers whose livelihoods can be ruined by a few bad ratings and a damaged, digital, reputation.

The weavers’ society began by buying and sharing materials and looms in an effort to reduce operating costs for their members whilst still delivering a quality service. Together they were weaving threads into cloth, creating the materials the nation required for clothing and linen, quite literally weaving the ‘fabric of society’.

Today the term ‘thread’ has taken on another meaning and even the Oxford English Dictionary includes a second definition, after sewing and weaving, citing a thread as “a group of linked messages posted on an Internet forum that share a common subject or theme” and it is here, in this new digital domain, that a renewed essence of cooperation is emerging.

As the body of collective knowledge available via the internet, and technological developments, expand exponentially delivering unforeseen changes to the fabric of todays societies, the digital threads of collaboration are being teased out, untangled and woven into something better by a new type of co-operative weaver.

The internet has spawned a myriad of collaborative projects, the most notable of which are still Wikipedia, Firefox and Linux itself – the open source kernel which supports majority of the internet – but, in general, effective large-scale online collaboration has been extremely slow to evolve. Instead we are presented with a cacophony of voices all vying for our waning attention and, despite our best efforts, we naturally gravitate into internet silos which hamper the cross-pollination of ideas and opinions. Plus, now publishing one’s ideas has become so easy, there is often huge overlap between disparate groups who share exactly the same vision, purpose and objectives but remain ignorant of each others’ existence, or unsure how they could collaborate when they do discover each other.

This is the realm in which  The Collaborative Technology Alliance highlights the objective: “There are many groups around the world working to deliver a more open, more collaborative and inclusive society. These groups are intention-aligned but remain disparate initiatives, which means they fail to benefit from the network effect”.

Imagine how much more effective we could be if the members of the Transition Network, NEON, Occupy, The Solidarity Economy, The Internet of Ownership, The WWOOFers, The Eco village Network and all the other hundreds and thousands of like-minded networks were actively collaborating on creating the type of society to which they all aspire. The network effect would be unstoppable.

The good news is that there are people working on uniting these groups and they are the new co-op weavers: People like Nathan Schneider and Trebor Scholtz from the Platform Cooperativism movement, Michel Bauwens and all his excellent collaborators at the Peer to Peer Foundation, Fransesca Pick and her fellow connectors at OuiShare, Arthur Brock and the other boffins behind Holo (the new alternative to blockchain), and Pia Mancini and the other hackers and makers behind Democracy.earth. These are just some of the people that are using the warp and the weft of the world wide web to to weave a new fabric for our society; A fabric woven from the cooperative spirit which has been missing from our world for too long. We are extremely proud to be hosting most of the above names, as well as a hundreds of other would-be-weavers to the second Platform Co-op conference, OPEN 2018, which will take place in London in July.

Once the original Fenwick weavers got together in 1761 it was not long before they branched out into food and “victuals” by buying a sack of oatmeal at wholesale to sell to their members in smaller quantities at cut prices. Very soon they began lending money to needy members and their families making the Fenwick Society the first recorded credit union in the world. The story in Rochdale was very similar. The Pioneers decided it was time shoppers were treated with honesty, openness and respect, that they should be able to share in the profits that their custom contributed to and that they should have a democratic right to have a say in the business. Every customer of the shop became a member and so had a true stake in the business. When you think about it like that, and what transpired as a result of those pioneers, we would do well to recognise the new co-operative weavers of today and to assist them in every way we can.

Come to OPEN 2018 on the 26th & 27th of July to meet many of the people named above and help co-create a cooperative future.

Photo by cobalt123

The post Who are the new Co-op weavers? appeared first on P2P Foundation.

Bec Sanderson: Today PIRC, the New Economics Foundation, NEON and the FrameWorks Institute are launching two story strategies that progressives can use to shift thinking on the economy. They’re built on values and metaphors that encourage the hope that change is possible and increase people’s support for progressive policies.

Download the report

Why we need new stories

Dominant economic narratives have gripped the public imagination and paved the way for regressive economic, social and environmental policies. Without the framing resources and co-ordination to challenge these narratives, campaigners often score own-goals when they talk about the economy.

The austerity story, based on the belief that Labour’s overspending ‘maxed out’ the nation’s credit card and left Britain in a mess, has been used to justify a regime of cuts to public spending that persisted in spite of the horrific social consequences and sluggish economic performance. More recently, the Brexit story has harnessed an unholy alliance between anti-immigrant sentiment and an aspiration for national self-reliance in order to ‘take back control’ from distant Brussels elites.

In the face of these stories, campaigners have often been on the back foot, using language that they haven’t shaped (like ‘Labour’s mess’), relying on oppositional politics (e.g. anti-cuts) and experimenting with frames(e.g. the ‘game is rigged’) without knowing how to use them most strategically –  rather than asserting their own vision of the economy.

How research can help us frame more effectively

Framing research projects can help campaigners be on the front foot, figuring out exactly what they want to say and how. In Framing the Economy, movement-building was an explicit aim alongside the empirical research: seeking to build up much needed coordination, resilience and support between movement spokespeople.

Working with the FrameWorks Institute, NEF, NEON and a large network of campaigners, journalists and press officers, we went through the key stages of framing research (more detail here).

First, we figured out our ‘untranslated story’: what we wanted to say, positively, about the values, principles and policies that a new economy should be based on. Next, we carried out extensive research into how people across the UK were thinking about the economy. We found that people thought of the economy a bit like a bucket—some people fill it up and others drain it out—a metaphor that lends itself to an simplistic understanding that the ‘economically unproductive’ (i.e. anyone not working right now) are the problem. However, people also had a strong belief that the economy is rigged to serve the interests of a nefarious and coordinated elite, and that this is dangerous and wrong. Coming away from this research, the biggest barrier to change didn’t seem to us to be people’s analysis of the problem. Fatalism— the attitude of ‘yes, we know that there are problems, but there’s nothing we can do’—seemed to pose a bigger barrier.

We looked for areas of alignment and divergence between these themes and our ‘untranslated story’ in order to identify the key framing challenge: to communicate that the economy is a product of design, and can therefore be redesigned.  We used this to develop a series of values, metaphors and policies, testing them with interviews and national surveys to see whether or not they worked.

The two stories we recommend

The following two approaches differ in tone and emphasis, but both work towards the same goals, complementing each other in a wider framing strategy.

 1: Resisting Corporate Power

“Over the last forty years, our government has become a tool of corporations and banks, prioritising the interests of the wealthy rather than giving equal weight to the needs of everyone. We need to reprogramme our economy so that it works in the interests of society rather than just in the interest of corporate elites.”

This story centres on how the economy is both unfair and broken and lays blame squarely on corporate power and wealthy elites. It argues that the economic system has been unfairly influenced by a powerful few for their own benefit, and that this manipulation is the source of the economy’s problems. This story draws either on the value of Economic Strength or the value of Equality as the rationale for supporting progressive policies and uses a reprogramming metaphor to show how the economy has been intentionally designed—and can be redesigned— through policy decisions.

 2: Meeting our Needs

A good society makes it possible for everyone to lead a meaningful and fulfilling life. Yet, our society is currently focused solely on profit, and people are forced to chase money rather than happiness. The laws and policies that we make lay down tracks that determine where the economy takes people. Right now, our economy is built around profit rather than being built to get people to their true needs.”

This story brings into focus the priorities of individuals and society. By drawing on the value of Fulfillment, this story identifies deeper needs—beyond the need to make money—and makes the case for an economy that prioritises happiness and fulfillment over profit. It utilises a metaphor of Economic Tracks to illustrate the significant role the economy plays in structuring opportunities, making it clear that society’s current priorities result from the way the economy has been designed.

Next steps

We hope, in using these stories, that campaigners and progressive spokespeople can build greater support for an economy based on equality, community, and stewardship of the environment.

Download our report to read our findings and recommendations in full!

Contact Bec to talk about PIRC’s ongoing research on framing strategies for a new economy.

The post Change is possible! How to frame the economy to support progressive politics. appeared first on P2P Foundation.