Co-operatives: ‘Blueprint For Black Power’

Co-operatives: Blueprint for Black Power

Co-operatives or co-ops are business enterprises owned, controlled and patronized by a group of people referred to as its members (and often by non-members). They are established by voluntarily pooling together the capital investments of their member’s, purchasing wholesale lots of products and distributing them proportionately among members or by selling them and distributing the return among members. Co-operatives concept has different types of co-ops which serve different purposes and the type we are interested within context of this discussion may be referred as Retail Co-operative or Co-operative Corporation.

Many co-ops by legal definition do not make a profit even when the make one. They have a ‘surplus’ or a ‘net margin’ or a ‘savings’. Distribution of the savings is also referred as ‘patronage refunds’. How Co-operatives ‘profit’ or surplus is distributed depends on the form of the corporation as state or country governments licensing differ in definition, organization, function and other legal parameters accordingly.

Purposes

-providing members and/ customers with needed goods and services costs in the form and quality they desire at the lowest possible prices.

-Provision of employment and decent living wages to community workers.

Principles

-Open membership.

-Democratic control- one vote for each member regardless of number of shares held.

-Limited return on invested capital.

-All net savings distributed in proportion to patronage (or shares).

Practices

-Sales at going market prices.

-Constant expansion

-Continuous education.

Co-ops in their many varieties and their democratic, communal, organization, management and control, like rotating credit association are very compatible with the current economic status of the Black Community. They should be supported with the spirit of traditional communal orientation of African culture. Their organization and management generate:

i) A sense of social solidarity and co-operativeness within the community.

ii) Valuable social attitudes necessary for community survival, advancement and empowerment.

iii) Small food or consumer co-ops whether sponsored by collectives individuals or organizational associations such as churches or secular organizations may enable Pan African community to establish viable Black-owned business and thereby penetrate the monopolization of their community market by ‘aliens’.

iv) Sense of competitively driving out discourteous, price gouging, exploitative merchants and vendors who are only interested in the community to the extent to which they may rob it of vital resources and suck its economic blood.

Co-operatives are 1st and last people- people who can work together, who can understand and respect one another, who can agree on common needs and goals and how they are to be accomplished. It is the people will make or break any business and it is this ‘working together’ which will require the most of work of all.

“So our people not only have to be reeducated to the importance of supporting black business, but the black man himself has to be made aware of the importance of going into business. And once you and I go into business, we own and operate at least the businesses in our community. What we will be doing is developing a situation wherein we will actually be able to create employment for the people in the community. And once you can create some employment in the community where you live it will eliminate the necessity of you and me having to act ignorantly and disgracefully, boycotting and picketing some practice some place else trying to beg him for a job.” Malcolm X

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Adapted from the book:Blue Print For Black Power by Amos N Wilson