But are they microcosms of the democratic society that we crave? Or do they hinder political change by taking people away from social movements and trade unions and into self-contained, competing and self-exploitative economic units? Workers’ co-ops clearly have massive advantages over authoritarian systems of workplace organisation – but do they have the potential to change the world?Read the rest of the article to find his answers to these questions. IMO worker cooperatives are not in themselves a way to change society. Yugoslavia used them extensively and found that they took on many characteristics of private enterprises because they competed against each other.
Still when societies have to increasingly localize to cope with diminishing fossil fuels, they can then serve a critical function if they are organized to serve, and answerable to, the wider community.