You may not be in a cold place, but there is something about a pandemic and the winter months in the northern hemisphere that calls us to cozy up in our homes with something interesting to read. There are some fantastic co-op books out there from the past few years- from Jessica Gordon Nembhard’s Collective Courage to Everything for Everyone by Nathan Schneider or Daniel Cote’s Cooperative Management, full of case studies of co-ops from all industries around the globe taking their co-operative nature into action for collective benefit, for example. Or going back a few more years, you have Co-operatives in a Post-Growth Era by Novkovic and Webb or Humanizing the Economy by Restakis. You may have heard that Arizmendiarietta’s Reflections has a new translation. Jackson Rising: The Struggle for Economic Democracy and Black Self-Determination in Jackson, Mississippi by Akuno and Nangwaya is an uplifting narrative. This is all very exciting, informative and allows for people to understand the nature of co-operation via narratives and analysis by some leading thinkers. This list, of course, is not exhaustive – particularly thinking about publications from co-op practitioners and researchers from all continents, such a Waking the Asia Pacific Co-operative Potential by Altman et al. that came out in 2020.
For those who want to jump into journals, there are many journals that include co-operative research and content. In ed.coop’s classroom educator’s learning path, we include a list of journals. Some of these are only accessible via libraries, but many are open source. In particular, you can view:
-The International Journal of Co-operative Accounting and Management (hosted by the Centre of Excellence in Accounting and Reporting for Co-operatives, Saint Mary’s University, Canada)
–The UK Journal of Co-operative Studies
–Cooperative Business Journal (NCBA-CLUSA)
–Canadian journal of nonprofit and social economy research
We hope this inspired some learning and made your search for good reading a lot easier. Stay tuned for an upcoming blog on co-op podcasts.
-Erin Hancock
