The article suggests that worker owned enterprises are the solution to life under capitalism, that we ordinary people can build micro-communities that are not only economically sustainable within a capitalist system, but can lead to building a larger system that can displace cut-throat capitalism.
...a growing number of Occupy activists are looking to worker-owned cooperatives as a way to self-fund the movement, displace corporate economic space, and develop an economic base that can support alternative economic and political formations. The path to building a truly democratic economy may be long, but the growing base of community wealth building institutions provide some building blocks that, over time, suggests the quiet development, potentially, of the basis for a community-sustaining economy that serves the interest of all Americans, rather than our current system which disproportionately benefits the wealthiest at the expense of the 99 percent.I think that this strategy is very misleading by encouraging activists that they can quietly build an alternative social-economic system within capitalism. Hence, they can forget about political activism, protests, and other militant actions to stop the capitalist assault on workers and the environment.
I think that worker owned enterprises can contribute much to building an alternative system, but it is by no means a sufficient means of change. Worker coops are at best a defensive action to save jobs and maintain worker skills. They can also act as laboratories for workers to learn how to manage their own enterprises democratically. However, even the best run such enterprises must function within an economic system that treats them with actions ranging from benign neglect to hostility. The laws governing enterprises are founded on private enterprise models that emphasize hierarchical systems of authority.
Coops will always find it difficult to compete with privately owned enterprises, especially those associated with large corporations. To succeed they would need a politically conscious local community that would be willing to support the coop even by paying higher prices. Private enterprises can always benefit by paying low wages and buying cheap products from foreign countries where environmental and labor laws are either non-existent or not enforced.
The ruling class of the One Percent can tolerate worker owned enterprises as long as they are limited to small niches in society and do not challenge the capitalist system or the enormous privileges of the One Percent.
A couple of good sources on establishing worker owned enterprises are here and here.
