THE DECLINE OF THE MONDRAGON COOPERATIVES

The Mondragon producers cooperatives in Basque Spain represent the cla ssic case of alternative industrial organisation. While the cooperativ es received a great deal of scholarly attention during the 1970s and 1 980s, relative little has been published on recent developments at Mon dragon. It is time to update the Mondragon story. In 1991, 100 coopera tives joined to become the Mondragon Cooperative Corporation. This sup er-structure has permitted an important degree of centralised control over member cooperatives. Yet it has also been the source of substanti al challenges, both structural and ideological, to this alternative fo rm of industrial organisation. We appear to be witnessing the cooperat ives' decline, the end of a great experiment in favour of just another capitalist enterprise. This story is important both for cooperativism in Mondragon itself and for scholars and practitioners worldwide who find in Mondragon proof than an alternative, less exploitative approac h to industrial organisation is possible.