Photo: MCC's worker-owned university

Education, Training

and Information: Looking

Deeper at Mondragon

By John McNamara

Feb. 8, 2010

“It is said that co-operation is an economic movement that utilizes educational activities, but it can also be said that co-operation is an educational movement that utilizes economic activities.“–Don José María Arizmendiarreta, founder of the Mondragon Cooperatives.

Here's a fun exercise, well maybe interesting more than “fun”, at co-operative gathering centers around the principles. Ask the co-operators present, “Which is the most important principle.” If there are more than seven people in the room, you will likely get about eight different answers.

People often focus on the user principles and democracy as being the principles that separate co-operatives from other businesses. Of course, in my opinion, the best answer is that they are all equally important and feed into each other. Case in point: how strong can democracy be if the electorate isn’t educated or informed?