Many months ago, over a coffee in Manchester, Steven Flower of Open Data Services Co-op told me about an idea he’d had to hold their AGM at Wortley Hall.

Wortley Hall is a stately home that was bought by a group of workers in the 1950s. They formed a co-op to purchase the hall and used their skills to restore to its former glory as it had begun to fall into disrepair. It remains co-operatively owned and hosts weddings, training days, and meetings etc. You should check it out if you’re looking for a venue for a wedding, training day, meeting etc. especially if you fancy Karl photobombing your wedding shots…

Portrait of Marx hanging in Wortley Hall. The corridors are lined with posters, portraits, banners, and badges from trades union and co-operative movements.

I’d been talking to a number of digital co-ops off the back of dotcomrades, an event to look at the future of large-scale membership organisations, particularly trade unions. I was also exploring options for what would become We Are Open Co-op.

Steven and I began talking about how we might foster co-operation among our co-ops and the other digital co-ops I’d been talking to and we started thinking about a larger gathering.

Once back in London I floated the idea with Outlandish who were in the process of formally becoming a co-op and despite the plan being little more than…

Step 1. Gather a bunch of tech co-ops.

Step 2. ?

Step 3. SURPLUS!!!

…their enthusiasm for the idea took it rapidly from chat over a coffee to deposit paid and dates in the diary.

40 something Co-operative Technologists gathered at Wortley Hall last week to bring together scattered conversations and to start to build relationships.

Ellie from Outlandish has written a summary post and we have a wiki, a slack channel (doesn’t everyone?), and a loomio group where a growing group of Co-operative Technologists are committed to exploring how we can support each other and meaningfully deliver on the seven principles of co-operation.

http://ica.coop/en/whats-co-op/co-operative-identity-values-principles

This hack of capitalism that those 28 Rochdale Pioneers formalised and gave away 172 years ago still works.

The turnover of the top 300 co-ops is $2.53 trillion. For a sense of scale, only the US, China, Japan, and Germany can boast a GDP that’s bigger. Add in the rest of the world’s 2.6 million co-operative businesses and the figure rises to $3 trillion in turnover.

Globally, there are approximately 1 billion members of co-operatives, roughly three times the population of the USA.

We have the economic power and we have the numbers but we seem to have lost our ambition. We need to look at the co-ops we are members of, and those which are supposed to stand in solidarity with us and ask at the very least:

Where’s the education about the benefits of co-operation?

Where’s the co-operation amongst co-ops to strengthen and grow the movement?

Where’s the belief that co-operation is the way we change systems and address causes rather than adopting corporate behaviours and outsourcing our concern for community to the charity sector?

The past year or so has revealed some green shoots to nurture…

We’ve seen a flurry of worker-owned tech/digital co-ops formed in the past year, many of whom were both at Wortley Hall and are active/visible in other ways inside the co-op movement.

There’s sustained activity and momentum gathering behind Platform Co-operativism, which replicates the technology of online platforms but puts them to work with a cooperative model to benefit members rather than venture capital. There was a second conference at The New School in New York earlier this month and we have Open 2017: Platform Co-operatives to look forward to in London in February.

There are encouraging signs that the Co-op Group, who can claim direct lineage back to Toad Lane, are trying to do the Pioneers proud with #backtobeingcoop and the rebuild.

The Co-op Digital team are hoovering up talent and, are throwing it at hard problems like member engagement, and looking for areas where there being no distinction between customers and owners gives the Co-op a competitive advantage.

However, we need to keep in mind that heritage for us is about radical action not sepia-toned, cosy, retro brand values. The Rochdale Pioneers were likely among the crowd charged by the cavalry at the Peterloo Massacre and were under no illusions that if they wanted to see change, they’d have to make it happen themselves.

Opening a shop is the first item on the list we inherited.

http://www.rochdalepioneersmuseum.coop/about-us/1844-rule-book/

This was never about just selling flour and candles.

We Are Open Co-op works to spread the culture, processes, and benefits of openness wherever we can.