I’ve started two co-ops. I left both after a couple years. One was for early child-care and parental support. The other was a food co-op that leveraged wholesale and direct trade purchasing to bring down costs and create new food-systems.
The child-care one turned into a MAHA hub making others (including myself) very unwelcome/uncomfortable. The other one was leveraged by home baking businesses and made smaller purchasers unable to have a voice.
I do a good job of bringing people together and a bad job of helping them remember the spirit of the original union. I also do a bad job of creating and enforcing rules. Lots to learn for me lol
I’ve come to think the evolution of a co-op might require some more rigid early structure before becoming genuinely co-operative. Or at least there needs to be some power structure that keeps it equitable and confront the people in the group who seek Power Over.
I’m sure such a structure exists and is well-defined.
I definitely need to learn more before starting my next… which I still intend to do.. probably around shared cooking and gardening spaces (shared juicers, cob ovens, ice cream makers and other things that can be unreachable, as well as land for gardening and regen farming)
While this series on prefigurative community building isn't going into immense detail on structuring our projects in ways that will ensure their effectiveness at dismantling systems of Power Over, the goal is to at least get the ball rolling.
I wish there was a way for me to embed the deeper understanding of Power in all my posts, but alas, I must settle for people going on their own journeys of discover throughout this series.
Also reminds me that while I love the spirit of matriarchy, so many of the women i’ve met use that word to utterly dominate cooperative spaces for power, security (in a social sense), and attention.
Sadly, the logic of Patriarchy doesn't magically disappear when the label of Matriarchy is applied.
In their work Capital As Power, Bichler & Nitzan coined the term "Creorder" to mean the creation and constant recreation of order. In their work it refers to the social order of capitalism being constantly recreated through the daily application of the logic of capital.
But the term can just as easily be applied in this context. Matriarchy cannot be just a lip-service label. Its logic, and ethics of care, must be creordered, just as patriarchy is currently creordered.
Yes!!!!
I’ve started two co-ops. I left both after a couple years. One was for early child-care and parental support. The other was a food co-op that leveraged wholesale and direct trade purchasing to bring down costs and create new food-systems.
The child-care one turned into a MAHA hub making others (including myself) very unwelcome/uncomfortable. The other one was leveraged by home baking businesses and made smaller purchasers unable to have a voice.
I do a good job of bringing people together and a bad job of helping them remember the spirit of the original union. I also do a bad job of creating and enforcing rules. Lots to learn for me lol
I’ve come to think the evolution of a co-op might require some more rigid early structure before becoming genuinely co-operative. Or at least there needs to be some power structure that keeps it equitable and confront the people in the group who seek Power Over.
I’m sure such a structure exists and is well-defined.
I definitely need to learn more before starting my next… which I still intend to do.. probably around shared cooking and gardening spaces (shared juicers, cob ovens, ice cream makers and other things that can be unreachable, as well as land for gardening and regen farming)
While this series on prefigurative community building isn't going into immense detail on structuring our projects in ways that will ensure their effectiveness at dismantling systems of Power Over, the goal is to at least get the ball rolling.
I wish there was a way for me to embed the deeper understanding of Power in all my posts, but alas, I must settle for people going on their own journeys of discover throughout this series.
Also reminds me that while I love the spirit of matriarchy, so many of the women i’ve met use that word to utterly dominate cooperative spaces for power, security (in a social sense), and attention.
Sadly, the logic of Patriarchy doesn't magically disappear when the label of Matriarchy is applied.
In their work Capital As Power, Bichler & Nitzan coined the term "Creorder" to mean the creation and constant recreation of order. In their work it refers to the social order of capitalism being constantly recreated through the daily application of the logic of capital.
But the term can just as easily be applied in this context. Matriarchy cannot be just a lip-service label. Its logic, and ethics of care, must be creordered, just as patriarchy is currently creordered.