Abstract
Workers’ buyout (WBOs) are emerging during the present economic crisis as an alternative tool to maintain employment and production. In Italy, in the last thirty years, 258 cases have been recorded. What are their general characteristics? Why do WBOs develop and who are the main sponsors and financing tools? The present analysis aims at defining the phenomenon and the enabling environment. Moreover, primary sources collected from different actors will explain how WBOs have developed and thrived across Italy saving jobs and productive capacity.
Highlights
The literature on the history of the cooperative movement refers to 1844 as the year when the first basic commodities consumer cooperative in Rochdale started near Manchester (Bernardi, 2007; Solera, 2012)
Between 2010 and 2011, as showed in the data, the process started to accelerate thanks to the bigger role played by Cooperazione Finanza Impresa (CFI) and the mutualistic funds that, in a difficult socio-economic moment, financed an increasing number of viable workers’ buyout (WBO) projects
In the last years, taking into account CFI estimation, only 5% of the production value, 7% of the investment and job places were lost on the overall total of WBOs approved (CFI, 2016)
Summary
The literature on the history of the cooperative movement refers to 1844 as the year when the first basic commodities consumer cooperative in Rochdale started near Manchester (Bernardi, 2007; Solera, 2012). The Rochdale Society of Equitable Pioneers, unlike the previous experiences, owes its success to the idea of securing members’ loyalty through the mechanism of profit allocation proportionally to purchases, namely to the number of operations carried out with the cooperative (Bernardi, 2005; Memorie Cooperative, 2014). In Italy, the acquisition of a business by the employees can be traced back to 1874 when workers of a crockery and majolica factory created the Cooperativa Ceramica d’Imola, which is the oldest Italian production and worker cooperative (Brignanti, 1976; Reggi 1974). The article shows up-to-date facts and data on the Italian WBOs from 1986 to 2016
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