Embedding Society in the Firm — The Role of Social and Cooperative Enterprise in Shaping Capitalism

Abstract

This article considers social and cooperative enterprises whose governance differs categorically from the shareholder corporation, and asks what scope there is for these alternative formats of the firm to transform what has become a “market society” into a more social market economy, in which society and its interests and ordering are embedded into the way markets function. In this way, the article asks whether we can embed society within the firm itself by structuring firms in ways that are more open to societal interests beyond those that are mediated through market incentives. These possibilities also force us to reconsider whether certain forms of social and cooperative enterprises that have traditionally been celebrated as achieving wider political concerns, do in fact enable this embedding of society in the firm.