Centre for the Study of Co-operatives
University of Saskatchewan

Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada,
Strategic Themes Award - March 2002

Research Proposal

Summary of Proposed Research

This project will produce better understanding of how voluntary membership choices by Canadians can change their communities and contribute to social cohesion and economic development. Researchers and community partners will create and disseminate new knowledge about membership in one of Canada's largest groupings of associations, co-operatives, and how it contributes to communities. This research will demonstrate how globalization influences existing organizations and communities and creates opportunities for new connections and identities. It will document the experiences of members and the strategies and responses of organizations, in order to provide valuable information and public policy proposals for community leaders, concerned citizens, policy-makers, and those interested in understanding the relationships between social cohesion and economic development.

Recent research has demonstrated that while economic development changes and sometimes destabilizes communities, it also appears that community cohesion is a necessary prerequisite for effective economic development. In other words, markets and cohesive communities are co-dependent. Creating, sustaining, and reconstituting social cohesion alongside and through market relations is a key challenge for citizens and leaders.

Social cohesion is about membership: citizenship in a state, residency in a geographic community, participation in a network or a culture. Co-operatives are a microcosm of this phenomenon, containing many of the political, social, and economic elements that are found in the larger society. People who join co-operatives are assuming both obligations and rights, are entering a community of both owners and customers, a situation analogous to citizenship in a political community. Understanding the role, the tensions, and the successes of membership in co-operatives is significant for understanding the processes of social cohesion in a successful market society.

This project examines these questions by focusing on membership in co-operatives as a question of identities: the self-conceptions of the members and of the co-operative, the shared identities among members and sub-groups, the overlaps with wider and external community identities, and the relationships and communication processes within with identities are constructed. A shared sense of identity is a form of social capital that can enable group action on common needs and aspirations. For research purposes, we will investigate a series of propositions. First: co-operatives will experience changing patterns of cohesion, resulting from globalization, in the form of apparently increasing differentiation among their members and weakening member loyalty. Second, co-operatives will succeed economically to the extent that they can use and generate social cohesion. Third, pursuit of economic viability will push co-operatives to bridge the boundaries of tightly knit communities and articulate looser and wider community identities––another important form of social cohesion. Fourth, where there is a balance between intensive and extensive (bonding and bridging) membership functions, the results will be greater financial success for the co-operative as well as greater social cohesion and prosperity in the surrounding community.

These propositions will be tested in case studies that combine profiles of co-operatives and their communities with analysis of their culture and communications, and with direct study of the experience of members through surveys and focus groups. Researchers, research sites, and partner enterprises and federations from Halifax to Victoria to Nunavut will participate actively in collaborative interdisciplinary research. Studies will be integrated into four thematic clusters dealing with different types of communities: co-operative consumer identities in urban communities; co-operative membership and the changing boundaries of community, focusing on regionalization in rural areas; co-operatives and Aboriginal cultures, looking at barriers, success stories, and the ways in which co-operatives can contribute to Aboriginal economic development; and, finally, the co-operative use of information technologies, notably the Internet, to create new kinds of communities.

Detailed Description of Proposed Research

Objectives: This project will create and disseminate new knowledge about how membership contributes to social cohesion in Canadian communities in the present era of globalization, by examining one of the largest classes of membership-based organizations: co-operatives. Specific project objectives are to analyse the impact of globalization on membership identities and practices in selected communities; to document the challenges for and responses of existing community-based enterprises in maintaining relationships with their members and stakeholders; to assess the potential for new forms of member and community relations that increase community cohesion and social capital as well as reinforcing market success; and in light of these findings to formulate specific policies and recommendations relevant to the interests of communities, co-operatives, and governments.

Context: Globalization, Social Cohesion, and Co-operative Membership. The term globalization is highly contested and has multiple meanings. A serious academic definition involves "the growth of 'supraterritorial relations' among people" (Scholte 2000:46), creating a situation of "complex connectivity" where a set of linkages "now bind our practices, our experiences and our political, economic and environmental fates together across the modern world." (Tomlinson 1999:2).
Following Held et al. (1999), we can begin to assess the scope of these changes by observing shifts in extensity, the degree to which cultural, political and economic activities are "stretching" across new frontiers creating a global space; intensity, changes in the magnitude and regularity of interconnectedness; velocity, changes in the speed of global interactions and processes; and enmeshment, changes in the interdependence of the global and the local.

Communities often experience these changes as destabilizing. Livelihoods, ways of life, and shared identities may be undermined, particularly for remote rural, Northern, and Aboriginal communities as well as marginalized urban populations –– those isolated from beneficial changes. Although globalization has many aspects, the essential point is often perceived to be an increasing domination of market relations over other social relations. This has created an increased interest in alternative forms of economic development that are more consistent with community values; as well as increased attention to the nature and importance of social relationships in themselves and as preconditions for economic success. Among the responses to economic problems are community economic development (Douglas 1994) and the development of the social economy (Favreau and Lévesque c1996; Lévesque 1998, 1999; Quarter 1992). But recent discussions of social capital have stressed the importance of relationships and norms of trust for successful action by communities on economic and other issues. Economic success is not an alternative to but rather is co-dependent with successful social processes that build trust and cohesion (Putnam 1993a, 1993b; Fukuyama 1996; Gambetta 1988).

Social cohesion is about membership: citizenship in a state, residency in a geographic community, participation in a network or a culture. Membership-based associations appear to constitute important sites where social capital is created and renewed (Putnam 2000). Among associations, credit unions and co-operatives are of special interest because they straddle the boundary between market and community. The definition of a co-operative –– an association of people who operate an enterprise for their own use (MacPherson 1996: 1) –– makes their dual nature clear. Effectively co-operatives are microcosms of society, containing many of the political, social, and economic elements that are found in the larger milieu. Saul, in his Massey lecture "From Corporatism to Democracy," called for citizens to go beyond thinking like customers to think like owners (Saul 1995: 100). This same challenge is embodied in co-operatives where members must negotiate their roles as customers and as democratic participants in decisions. Co-operatives, like their communities, must reconcile the dynamics of markets and social cohesion, of financial capital and social capital. The co-operative structure internalizes stresses and issues of integration that are externalized by other forms of organization.

Co-operatives have developed widely in Canada in numerous kinds of communities (MacPherson 1979; Fulton 1990; Fairbairn, MacPherson, Russell 2000; Fairbairn 2001). While some kinds of co-operatives are under stress, notably in agricultural marketing (Fulton and Gibbings 2000), others such as credit unions and caisses populaires are thriving while attempting to create stronger central organizations (MacPherson 1995, Lévesque 1997). Credit unions have grown to have the largest membership of any type of co-operative: almost one in three Canadians is now a member. They are especially significant in light of the McKay task force report on the financial services sector: credit unions constitute an important community-based alternative in the event of increased concentration in the banking industry. Consumer co-operatives are regionally strong in Atlantic and Western Canada (Fairbairn 1989, Brown 1995, Hammond Ketilson 1995), while co-operatives play an exceptional role in Northern, Inuit communities (Hammond Ketilson and MacPherson, 2001). Newer types of co-operatives such as those involved in health, housing, childcare, and neighborhood development address economic needs of low-income and other urban groups. Altogether, Canadian non-financial co-operatives had 5.1 million members in 1999 and over $17.4 billion in assets.

The distribution of co-operatives –– their historical strength in rural communities and their new role in some Indigenous and marginalized urban populations is not accidental. It reflects the degree to which they developed by making use of social cohesion, both exploiting it and fostering it, in order to thrive in settings where other forms of enterprise could not succeed so well. Co-operatives depend for their success on member loyalty and participation, usually developed through attachment to shared local or group identities. As relationships and identities within communities change under the influence of globalization, co-operatives experience this as change in the cohesiveness, connectedness, and loyalty of their membership. As primarily local organizations, rooted in communities, co-operatives are among the first organizations to feel the effects of globalization. They can also be on the front lines of community response, of community survival, and of the re-invention of community itself. This is more than a side-effect: in general, co-operatives cannot succeed as businesses unless they find, augment, or create social cohesion among their members.
Co-operatives, in pursuing business success, are compelled to address issues of community cohesion. They are, therefore, an ideal site to study the connections between well-functioning markets and effective social processes.

Methodology: This research is designed to answer two fundamental questions. How is globalization affecting the economies and social capital of co-operatives, their members, and their communities? How can co-operatives respond or innovate in connection with membership to ensure their own economic success and to promote social cohesion? To problematize these questions for research, we focus on membership as a question of identities: the self-conceptions of members and of the organization, the shared identities among members and sub-groups, the overlaps with wider and external community identities, and the relationships and communication processes within which identities are constructed. It is important in this connection to investigate different types of identities and relationships. Putnam's distinction between "bonding" and "bridging" social capital (2000: 22) is relevant: the former cements group identities for mutual support while excluding other people; the latter crosses group boundaries to lubricate processes of diffusion and innovation. Co-operatives can and do perform both functions at the same time. Their practical effect and success within particular communities will depend on the balance and complementarity between creating tight intra-group identities among the members or within a smaller community, and promoting looser and broader inter-group identities. This issue will arise, for example, when rural co-operatives undergo amalgamation or other forms of regionalization, attempting to maintain their role in specific historical membership communities while also necessarily embodying a newer, wider, and partly ahistorical regional identity. Similarly Aboriginal co-operatives face the challenge of linking to and mobilizing Aboriginal cultural solidarity, while also functioning in ethnically diverse communities and wider networks. These are difficult issues for co-operatives, just as they are as for communities and societies. What underlies them is the question of articulating bonding and bridging identities that create the right kinds of cohesion to ensure business success.

Identity in co-operatives is expressed through membership: shared membership confirms and sometimes creates a shared identity. Such an identity may be of greater or lesser intensity, with more or less frequent or numerous connections between members. A shared sense of membership is a form of social capital that can enable group action on common needs and aspirations. In some cases this will be relatively one-dimensional (reflected in a concern simply with low price); in others it will be more far-seeing while still pragmatic and at root individualist (concern with good "quality" and "service" –– terms that require experience over time, greater trust, and multiple dimensions of comparison); and in still other cases there will be additional, less economic or less individual aspects (supporting local jobs, keeping wealth in the community, participating in good causes). Importantly, membership is not simply binary –– member/nonmember –– but rather comes in degrees, kinds, and combinations of interests. Whatever the goals or causes with which members are associating themselves, all are assuming similar rights and obligations of membership (loosely analogous to citizenship rights and duties in a polity), and are entering into a series of exchanges and interactions with other members and with the co-operative, a process or discourse that will mutually modify their perceptions of membership. Membership is both a choice and a process. Its meaning is constructed within a field of communication among and between members, their organization, and surrounding influences.

Co-operatives need to know who their members are in order to serve them. Social or demographic changes in a community, or changes in attitudes and perceptions, are not just abstract concerns for them but necessarily business concerns. Equally, members need a sense of the co-operative in order to feel connected –– a clear identity is essential to marketing and economic success. Where co-ops and members understand each other well, this should be apparent in the degree of member loyalty, expressed in the willingness to patronize and to participate. Loyalty is a mechanism linking cohesion and business success. The implications of this linkage go beyond co-operatives and are apparent in membership-like practices that have become common in retailing: frequent-buyer plans, point and discount cards, and other loyalty rewards. Only in co-operatives is membership further articulated into a potential for participation, ownership, and control. What it means to members to have this potential, and whether they take advantage of it, is a significant topic for research.

For research purposes, we will frame our investigation of identity, membership, community cohesion, and co-operative success in a series of propositions. First: co-operatives will experience changing patterns of cohesion, resulting from globalization, in the form of apparently increasing differentiation among their members and weakening member loyalty. (It is important to say "apparently" because members may in fact have been diverse before, but united in some one dimension that facilitated co-operative loyalty.) Second, co-operatives will generate member loyalty to the extent they can foster shared identities that are intense, frequently reinforced, or multi-dimensional. This is to say that co-operatives will succeed to the extent that they can use and generate social cohesion. Third, pursuit of economic viability under globalizing conditions will push co-operatives to perform bridging functions in creating larger and wider communities. Co-operatives that respond to economic forces by helping to expand and redefine community beyond tightly-knit groups will be contributing to new networks for information diffusion and innovation. Fourth, where there is a balance between intensive and extensive (bonding and bridging) membership functions, the results will be both greater financial success for the co-operative and greater social cohesion and prosperity in the members' community. These propositions will be tested by investigating the connections between, on one hand, members' practices and attitudes toward their co-operative and their community, and, on the other, the practices and success of the co-operative. Such a study of complex interconnections is best conducted using a rich, contextual case-study methodology.

Context for member studies will be provided by profiling the co-operative and its community in each case, its formal and informal communications with its and identity: its corporate culture. Historical profiles of co-operatives and key-informant interviews within co-operatives, community organizations, and public agencies will supply basic information. Economic and organizational challenges facing the co-operative and its community will be analysed in terms of their connections to globalization –– the extensity, intensity, and velocity of local social-economic changes and their enmeshment in global processes (such as international trade, capital, competitive restructuring, advertising, immigration); and the new opportunities or requirements for innovation that these entail. Communication with members is particularly relevant to member perceptions and will be analysed using a combination of interdisciplinary tools. Borrowing from the linguistic turn in the humanities and from cultural studies, we will make selective use of critical techniques for analysis of texts, language, and discourse. These methods will be combined with more conventional social-scientific content-analysis procedures. The intent is to isolate the key messages in co-operative communications, but also ambiguities and omissions, and to place these within the context of the wider field of market and social relations surrounding the members' lives. Questions of gender, ethnicity, age, and income are particularly important categories of research and analysis, as these can be expected to influence greatly members' experiences and attachment to the co-operative. Both the contextual studies of the organizations, and the direct research on their members, will highlight these factors.

A key part of the research in every case will be the most direct possible study of membership itself. This will be done, first, by cross-sectional surveys of co-operative members and of control groups of non-members in the same communities. These surveys will ask about member choices and motives in joining and patronizing the co-operative, about perceptions of the co-operative and of alternative businesses, and about perceptions of how the co-operative relates to the surrounding community. Among other techniques we intend to use conjoint analysis (asking members about preferences among combinations of different services or attributes) in order to document how they evaluate trade-offs among possible choices, for example price versus ethical or social practices of the enterprise. The surveys will be self-administered (mail, Internet) or administered by trained researchers, research assistants, staff, or volunteers of partner organizations, according to the needs of the particular member group concerned. (Our past experience indicates, for example, that reliable results are not obtained from Aboriginal groups using self-administered methods.) Surveys will be complemented by selective focus groups using a collaborative methodology appropriate to co-operatives. Where
possible and with the assistance of the organization, members will be brought into focused discussion groups that will meet multiple times, working through a process to investigate an issue and make recommendations to their co-operative and to the project. This turns the focus-group method into a kind of fully collaborative participatory action research involving the co-operative and its members in study, feedback, and reflection on the research design and results as it is conducted. For all aspects of research, standard ethics approval will be obtained beforehand. In addition, research design and conduct will be negotiated with and approved by partners before research is conducted with their members.

This combination of approaches will produce multidimensional and interdisciplinary case-studies of membership in defined contexts. We will aim to examine sets of interconnected co-operatives that have overlapping memberships in the same communities; and to investigate comparisons between communities, particularly of similar organizations or similar subgroups or milieux. Such interconnections and comparisons will facilitate analysis across and between cases. To promote integration we will cluster case studies throughout the project according to community types and issues. Researchers and partners involved in each cluster will discuss research and results on an ongoing basis.

First, we wish to spotlight membership in urban areas. Given trends towards urbanization, as well as the high velocity of change in and enmeshment of urban communities in global processes, it is important to understand the meanings and modes of social cohesion in urban communities. In Canada co-operatives have been primarily associated with rural places, yet certain urban centres exhibit high levels of co-operative membership. It is necessary to examine what kind of social cohesion is fostered by co-operatives under such circumstances in order to assess the potential of co-operatives as responses to globalization. We intend to focus a cluster of research on the city of Calgary for this purpose, examining the members in that city of Calgary Co-operative Association, Mountain Equipment Co-op, and of credit unions and other co-operatives. Calgary Co-op, the largest local consumer co-operative in North America, has 355,000 members in the Calgary area. Mountain Equipment Co-op (MEC) is a centralized, coast-to-coast consumer co-operative, headquartered in Vancouver, with over 1.3 million members. Both are successful retail organizations organizing urban consumers. We will complement the Calgary study with a similar study in Halifax in order to study the extent to which members in two different cities share a similar identity through membership in the same co-operative.

The traditional strength of co-operatives in certain communities exposes them to pressures as globalization, demographics, and other factors change those communities. The issue on which we aim to focus in this connection is the redefinition of membership, and of the identity it represents, to bridge former community divisions and to encompass wider populations. Our second cluster of study will examine how historical community identities are changing under current stresses, for example through processes of regionalization in rural areas. Sites for this research will include the Prince Albert region in north-central Saskatchewan, and the Interlake district north of Winnipeg; in both cases our partners will be a comprehensive range of local credit unions and co-operatives as well as their central organizations. For comparative purposes we will also examine how regionalization is affecting member identities in Eastern Canada in conjunction with our partner federation there, Co-op Atlantic, which represents 226,000 Atlantic Canadian consumer-members; and how co-operative membership fosters social cohesion in Québec forestry communities. Finally, an important study will be conducted in conjunction with the CRISES research network concerning the new forms and meanings of membership in Québec's unique model of solidarity co-operatives. These bridge conventional boundaries of membership to integrate more dependent persons such as those with disabilities alongside other citizens. The unifying theme of this research cluster is the evaluation of organizational innovations by which co-operatives are responding to the redefinition of community.

We have mentioned that co-operatives have, historically, emerged in disadvantaged communities. There is an important gap in this pattern. Aboriginal communities, though heavily disadvantaged, have not (generally speaking) produced many co-operatives. Aboriginal self-governance and social-economic development are critical issues in Canada and pose special opportunities and challenges for social cohesion. Given the importance of these questions and of recent research highlighting the uneven development of Aboriginal co-operatives (Hammond Ketilson and MacPherson 2001), an independent research cluster is needed to examine the connections between membership-based voluntary co-operation and Aboriginal cultures. We will consider both barriers where co-operative enterprises have not developed, as well as the reasons for successes. Our key partner for this research is Arctic Co-operatives Limited (ACL), the central federation for co-operatives in the North. Working with ACL we aim to identify a set of four large and small, Inuit and Dene communities in which to study the meanings of membership, the roles of co-operatives with respect to social cohesion, and the connections between co-operative development and the processes of cultural revival and political self-government. Other parallel case studies will be conducted, in partnership with Aboriginal organizations, on selected Southern co-operatives.

The above three clusters focus on geographic and historic communities: urban, rural, or Aboriginal. But an aspect of globalization is the–in some ways–decreased importance of place, and the possibilities for the creation of virtual communities. There is a special opportunity to examine how co-operative ideas, networks, institutions, and members interact with the new technologies. Co-operatives around the world have recently created a new Internet domain, dotCoop (.coop), which will be a web space where co-operatives can redefine and reposition themselves, brand themselves, reach members in new ways, and effectively create new kinds of co-operative community. Our partners to research this initiative include the US-based National Cooperative Business Association, a large trade organization that is spearheading the development of dotCoop; the Canadian Co-operative Association (CCA), its Canadian counterpart; PopTel, a UK-based high-technology worker co-operative that is developing the technical support services; and ACCORD, an Australian co-operative research-and-development centre. We aim to concentrate on the first wave of Canadian adopters of the dotCoop innovation, and compare them with adopters in other countries. It is too early to identify which co-operatives this will be, but our first interest will be in the financial-services sector and the ways in which Canadian credit unions will use information technologies for member relations and services. Because of the timing and speed of change in this sector, we plan tocapture change over time, during the life of the project, by conducting a two-wave panel study with participants early and late in the adoption process.

Each cluster will nominate a co-ordinator from among the research team and will have its own entitlement to resources, including one to two graduate student researchers per cluster. Cluster teams will conduct workshops and planning meetings in or near the research sites to facilitate greater input by local partners into research design and direction. All participants in all aspects of the research (co-investigators, collaborators, and partners) will be invited to symposia and workshops to share ideas. In the first year (2002-3), a conference of the full team and partners will decide the research propositions, concepts, questions, methodologies, and research tools that will be employed commonly across all cases and clusters. In the second year, workshops within each cluster will discuss preliminary research results. The final year's common symposium (2004-5) will include the full presentation of the research outcomes from the whole project. Between meetings, a project newsletter and web pages as well as Internet or telephone conferences and discussions will maintain communication among all participants.

A project co-ordination group will advise the project manager and facilitate the intellectual integration of the different components. This group will be composed of representatives from key institutes (Fairbairn, Coleman, Lévesque, MacPherson) and partners (Canadian Co-operative Association, Co-operatives Secretariat), plus the cluster co-ordinators.

Dissemination of Results: There are three basic components to the plan for the dissemination of research results: conferences and workshops, print publications, and web site/electronic publications. These complementary forms of communication will allow dissemination to wide and varied audiences.

Research within the various clusters will be produced in the form of reports and conference papers. Team members will be asked to present their findings at external academic conferences in their disciplines. Researchers will also be asked to submit their research to peer-reviewed journals in their respective disciplines.

The project includes two large conferences or symposia, one in the first year to provide a forum for the discussion of theoretical and methodological approaches to the study of membership and social cohesion; and a capstone conference in the final year which will showcase research findings, analysis, and policy implications. All partner organizations, as well as the wider academic and co-operative sectors, community representatives, and policy-makers will be invited to attend these conferences. There will also be a number of smaller workshops. Year one will include a workshop on Aboriginal awareness and cultural issues, open to all researchers and partner organizations and particularly important for those working with First Nations communities in any of the clusters. All cluster research team members and partners will be invited to attend workshops in the second year of the project where interim results will be discussed. The cluster meetings in year three will also enable researchers to disseminate their findings to partner and community organizations.

The major project conferences will both result in publication of edited volumes growing out of conference presentations. Four booklets will be produced based on research and discussion from each cluster workshop in year two; these will be suited to informed non-academic audiences. The Centre for the Study of Co-operatives, as part of the project, will design additional print and web-based publications aimed at partner organizations, the co-operative sector, public-sector
agencies and policy makers, students and libraries, and the general public. Translation of key documents into the languages of partner organizations and communities (French, English, or Aboriginal languages as needed on a case basis) is provided for in the budget. This includes French translations of the large edited volumes. In addition to these communication activities, many of our partner organizations will publish research results and make them widely available among their
members.

Description of Team

The team includes two historians, two political scientists, three sociologists, two management and marketing specialists, two Aboriginal scholars, two specialists in communications and culture, and two economists. A majority have done previous interdisciplinary work concerning co-operatives and several have previously collaborated with other members of this team. All will participate in common annual symposia and workshops, in network discussions and decisions concerning the project, and in meetings and research within their clusters.

Brett Fairbairn, University of Saskatchewan, principal investigator, is historian of co-operatives, co-operative thought, and democratic politics, and director of the Centre for the Study of Co-operatives, a university-industry joint venture. (Project Manager; Clusters 2 and 4; lesser role in Clusters 1 and 3).

Morris Altman, University of Saskatchewan, co-investigator, studies behavioural economics with a focus on co-operation among economic agents and economic and social justice. He is editor of the Journal of Socio-Economics and associate editor of the Journal of Economic Psychology. (Cluster 1)

Leslie Brown, Mount Saint Vincent University, co-investigator, is a sociologist specializing in co-operative democracy and participation, social auditing, and the practice of social responsibility in co-operatives. (Clusters 1 and 2)

Mario Carrier, Université du Québec en Abitibi-Témiscamingue, co-investigator, is holder of the Chaire Desjardins en développement des petites collectivités and a member of the department of management sciences. (Cluster 2)

Cristine de Clercy, University of Saskatchewan, co-investigator, studies leadership, democracy, and federated organizations and is a political scientist. (Clusters 1 and 2)

William Coleman, McMaster University, co-investigator, directs the Institute on Globalization and the Human Condition and holds a Canada Research Chair in Global Governance and Public Policy. He is a political scientist with an interest in business policy. (Project Co-ordination Group; Cluster 3)

Isobel Findlay, University of Saskatchewan, co-investigator, is a humanist trained in language and literary study, now working in a department of management on Aboriginal business and postcolonial models of the firm. (Clusters 3 and 4)

Murray Fulton, University of Saskatchewan, co-investigator, is an agricultural economist and a leading authority on current changes in agricultural co-operatives. (Clusters 1 and 4)

Michael Gertler, University of Saskatchewan, co-investigator, studies the sociology of co-operation and rural development. (Clusters 1 and 2)

Lou Hammond Ketilson, University of Saskatchewan, co-investigator, is one of Canada's leading specialists in co-operative management and marketing. (Clusters 3 and 4)

Benoît Lévesque, Université du Québec à Montréal, co-investigator, is a historical sociologist and co-ordinator of CRISES (Collectif de Recherche sur les Innovations Sociales dans les Entreprises et les Syndicats ), a large inter-university research network. (Project Co-ordination Group; Cluster 2)

Ian MacPherson, University of Victoria, co-investigator, is a world authority on co-operatives, a historian of Canada, and director of the B.C. Institute of Co-operative Studies. (Project Co-ordination Group; Clusters 3 and 4)

George Melnyk, University of Calgary, co-investigator, is a writer known for his books on co-operatives, community, and Western Canadian regional identity. (Cluster 1)

David Newhouse, Trent University, co-investigator, is a specialist in Aboriginal economic development. (Cluster 3)

Wanda Wuttunee, University of Manitoba, co-investigator, brings research expertise in Aboriginal culture and business management. (Cluster 3)

Mark Lyons, is a collaborator representing the Australian Centre for Co-operative Research and Development, an industry-academic partnership. (Cluster 4)