Mondragón Corporación Cooperativa

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Mondragón Corporación Cooperativa

logo
legal form S. Coop. ( Cooperative )
founding 1956
Seat Mondragón , SpainSpainSpain 
management Javier Sotil (President)
Number of employees 74,335
sales 12.11 billion euros
Branch Conglomerate
Website www.mondragon-corporation.com
Status: 2015

The Mondragon Corporation ( MCC ) is the largest co-operative and the seventh largest company in Spain. It is based in Mondragón in the Spanish Basque Country and operates globally. The MCC includes more than 100 companies in various sectors such as mechanical engineering (including Orona ), the automotive industry, household appliances, construction, retail (including the supermarket chain Eroski ), banks and insurance companies. The network also includes 15 technology centers. According to its own statements, it is the largest productive cooperative in the world.

Foundation and history

The cooperative was founded in the small town of Mondragón in the Basque province of Gipuzkoa , where it is headquartered to this day. During the Spanish Civil War, the city suffered from mass unemployment. The young priest José María Arizmendiarrieta decided to alleviate the misery of the population with cooperative structures of self-help.

In 1943 Arizmendiarrieta built a democratically organized technical college, which played a key role in the later cooperative system in the Basque Country. Three years after the founding of the first cooperative by five graduates from the technical school founded by Arizmendiarrieta, the Caja Laboral was launched, a credit union that financed cooperatives and the start-up of cooperatives. The special aspect here is the role that serves the real cooperatives through the low interest rates for debt capital for start-ups.

At the beginning of the 1960s, more than twenty cooperatives had already emerged around Mondragón. The economic crisis in the mid-1970s hit Basque heavy industry hard, which also affected the Mondragón association. To alleviate the crisis, workers from a troubled Mondragón company were able to switch to one of the other cooperatives and the product range was broadened. It was thus possible to further enlarge the network in the following years.

In the wake of the European economic crisis that began in 2008 and the ensuing reluctance to consume, particularly in Spain and France, a subsidiary, the home appliance manufacturer Fagor , went bankrupt in October 2013. The other members of the entire cooperative had to hire further help after extensive help in the two or three-digit million range in order not to endanger themselves. On March 7, 2014, the successful German sales subsidiary, Fagor Hausgeräte GmbH, had to cease operations because no more devices could be delivered from Spain due to the cessation of operations in the Fagor factories there. Most of the employees were taken over by the other Mondragón cooperatives. Fagor was smashed in bankruptcy, parts of various companies were taken over and continued.

The cooperative idea

The employees of MCC participate in the share capital of the cooperative group of companies. You will be involved in the decisions of the management staff. The MCC's Basque cooperatives have a people-oriented character that seeks to put work, not capital, first. This should contribute to a positive climate, which increases the motivation and productivity of the companies. The employees share in the profits. If a company is in financial difficulties, they can be compensated for with the consent of the employees through reduced wages. In the event of major business problems or order peaks, employees work briefly in other cooperatives. Almost all of the income generated is reinvested. (Further) education is also very important. In doing so, the cooperative wants to meet not only business needs, but also its social responsibility.

On average, 81 percent of the employees (2016) at the cooperatives are also members of the company's cooperatives . The contribution that a member of the cooperative (so-called socio ) has to make is around 15,000 euros and can be paid over a longer period of time for low-wage earners. Part of this is used as investment capital. The rest is capital stock and is topped up with the profits of the companies. A retiree can withdraw his capital or continue to participate in the company's success. Unable to work receive full earnings up to retirement age, and in the case of need for care even 150% of the earnings. Managers earn a maximum of eight times as much as ordinary employees.

organization

The highest decision-making body is the cooperative congress with 650 members, which is composed of delegates from the individual cooperatives. The annual general meeting elects the “governing council” (board of directors), which is responsible for day-to-day business. Each individual cooperative has a works council that elects a chairman who advises the management of the company.

Tension relationship with traditional ideals

Size has created tensions between traditional values ​​and ideals and business realities. There have been allegations that factories have been relocated and workers are not given equal rights there. Nevertheless, at the end of 2005, 81% of the 78,455 employees were still full members of the cooperatives. Job creation still takes precedence over capital interests. Unlike other industrial companies, no job cuts have been carried out since the establishment of the cooperative.

The perceived increasing distance between management and employees also created unrest. It is true that the regulation still exists that management staff may earn a maximum of eight times the wages of the workers. Nevertheless, many employees no longer feel involved in the decision-making process and also state that the common cooperative idea and solidarity have waned in the last generation. Some cooperatives have already split off as they want to enforce more operational democracy in their cooperatives.

literature

  • Jörg Flecker , Luise Gubitzer , Franz Tödtling: Operational self-administration and independent regional development using the example of the Mondragon cooperative. Vienna 1985.
  • Sally Hacker: Women workers in the Mondragon system of industrial cooperatives. In: Gender & Society , Vol. 1, pp. 358–379.
  • JK Gibson-Graham: A Postcapitalist Politics. Minnesota 2006, ISBN 978-0-8166-4804-7
  • Sharryn Kasmir: The myth of Mondragón: cooperatives, politics, and working-class life in a Basque town. State Univ. of New York Press, Albany NY 1996

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Greetings from the President ( Memento of the original from October 25, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.mondragon-corporation.com
  2. ↑ a b Annual Report 2015 (PDF)
  3. ^ A b Yvonne Holl: Where everyone is boss . In: Vorwärts , 4/2011, p. 26
  4. ↑ Employment Distribution ( Memento of the original dated November 23, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.mondragon-corporation.com
  5. ^ Mondragon Corporation Homepage (German). In: mondragon-corporation.com. March 2, 2011, accessed March 2, 2017 .
  6. ↑ a b c Pit Wuhrer: Solidarity, rebellious, crisis-proof . In: kontextwochenzeitung.de. July 17, 2017, accessed March 2, 2017 .
  7. ↑ Ralf Streck: Spain: Even so far crisis-proof cooperatives are wavering. October 18, 2013, accessed November 24, 2015 .
  8. ↑ Mondragón: The most important dates ( Memento of July 7, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
  9. ^ Astrid Hafner: Cooperative reality in the Basque Mondragón. In: Auinger, Markus (ed.) Solidarity economy between market and state: social change or self-help? Mandelbaum, Vienna 2009.