The Italian cooperatives' dynamism during the pandemic. A regional analysis

Abstract

During the Covid-19 pandemic, cooperatives increased their business perfor-mance by supporting local communities and fostering collective well-being. This countercyclical feature is also present during other economic recessions and structural shocks, particularly in areas lagging in economic development, such as Southern Italy. The paper analyses the 2012-2019 data between the sovereign debt crisis and the beginning of the world health emergency. Author employs the technique of sec-toral-territorial decomposition (SSA) of the growth of regional economies, argu-ing for the relevance of considering cooperatives as the result of a specific milieu, institutional environment and distinct ‘social capital of opportunity'. The latter is the result of polanyan double movement, increases through the quality of antifragility, the weberian ethics of responsibility and social reflexivity and stimulates economic actors (entrepreneurs, consumers, institutions, etcetera) adaptation to the condition of lasting polycrisis.