Saturday, 12 January 2013

Mondragon Corporation

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Jump to: navigation, search

Megaphone icon.
This article reads like a news release, or is otherwise written in an overly promotional tone. Please help by either rewriting this article from a neutral point of view or by moving this article to Wikinews. When appropriate, blatant advertising may be marked for speedy deletion with {{db-spam}}. (July 2012)
MONDRAGON Corporation
TypeWorker cooperative federation
Founded1956
Founder(s)José María Arizmendiarrieta
HeadquartersMondragón, Basque Country, Spain
Area servedInternational
Key peopleJose María Aldecoa (Chairman)
Revenue14,832 million € (2011)[1]
Employees83,869 (2011)
DivisionsFinance, Industry, Retail, Knowledge
Websitemondragon-corporation.com
The MONDRAGON Corporation is a corporation and federation of worker cooperatives based in the Basque region of Spain. It was founded in the town of Mondragón in 1956 by graduates of a local technical college. Their first product was paraffin heaters. Currently it is the seventh largest Spanish company in terms of asset turnover and the leading business group in the Basque Country. At the end of 2011 it was providing employment for 83,869 people working in 256 companies in four areas of activity: Finance, Industry, Retail and Knowledge.
Mondragon cooperatives operate in accordance with Statement on the Co-operative Identity maintained by the International Co-operative Alliance. The standard Statement of Co-operative Identity largely eliminates perverse incentives that contribute to many problems of governance found in organizations with more traditional management structures.[2][3]

Contents

 [hide] 

[edit] History

The determining factor in the creation of the Mondragon system was the arrival in 1941 of a young Catholic priest José María Arizmendiarrieta in Mondragón, a town with a population of 7,000 that had not yet recovered from the Spanish Civil War: poverty, hunger, exile and tension.[4] In 1943 Arizmendiarrieta established a technical college that became a training ground for generations of managers, engineers and skilled labour for local companies, and primarily for the co-operatives.[5]
Before creating the first co-operative, Arizmendiarrieta spent a number of years educating young people about a form of humanism based on solidarity and participation, in harmony with Catholic Social Teaching, and the importance of acquiring the necessary technical knowledge. In 1955, he selected five of these young people who were working at the Unión Cerrajera company (Usatorre, Larrañaga, Gorroñogoitia, Ormaechea and Ortubay) to set up Talleres Ulgor (an acronym from their surnames), known today as Fagor Electrodomésticos, the first company of the co-operative and industrial beginning of the Mondragon Corporation.[6]
The first fifteen years were characterised by an enormous dynamism. It was a time when, taking advantage of the autarky of the market and the awakening of the Spanish economy, many co-operatives were established. During those years, also with the encouragement of Don José María, two bodies were set up that were to play a key role in the development of MONDRAGON -Caja Laboral (1959) and the Social Welfare Body Lagun Aro (1966)- and the first local group was created, Ularco, the embryo of the industrial co-operative associativism which has been so important in the Corporation’s history. In 1969 Eroski was set up, as a result of the merger of ten small local consumer co-operatives.[7]
Over the period from 1970 to 1990 the dynamism of previous years continued, with a strong increase in turnover, the launch of new Co-operatives promoted by Caja Laboral’s Business Division, the promotion of co-operative associativism with the forming of local groups, and the setting up of the Ikerlan Research Centre in 1974.[8]
With big changes on the horizon like Spain joining the European Economic Community, scheduled for 1986, it was decided to take an important step in the organisational area, by setting up the Mondragon Co-operative Group in 1984, the forerunner to the current Corporation. In-service training for managers was also strengthened with the creation of Otalora, which was to dedicate itself to training and co-operative dissemination. The Group had 23,130 workers at the end of 1990.[9]
On the international stage, the aim was to respond to the growing globalisation process, strongly promoting expansion abroad by setting up production plants in a number of countries. The first, the Copreci plant in Mexico in 1990 was followed by many others taking the total to 73 by the end of 2008. This was part of a strategy aimed at: increasing competitiveness and market share, bringing component supply closer to important customers’ plants, especially in the automotive and domestic appliance sectors; and strengthening employment in the Basque Country, by promoting the export of products manufactured by the Co-operatives by means of the new platforms.[10]
In October 2009, the United Steelworkers announced an agreement with Mondragon to create worker cooperatives in the United States.[11] On March 26, 2012, the USW, Mondragon, and the Ohio Employee Ownership Center (OEOC) announced its detailed union co-op model.[12]

[edit] Business culture

The ties that link the MONDRAGON Co-operatives are strong, as these bonds emanate from a humanist concept of business, interrelated by a philosophy of participation and solidarity and a shared business culture rooted in a number of Basic Principles, a shared Mission and the acceptance of a set of Corporate Values and General Policies of a business nature.[13]
Over the years these links have been embodied in a series of operating rules approved on a majority basis by the Co-operative Congresses, which regulate the activity of the Governing Bodies of the Corporation (Standing Committee, General Council), the Grassroots Co-operatives and the Divisions they belong to, from the organisational, institutional and economic points of view as well as in terms of assets.[14]
This entire framework of business culture has been structured on the basis of a common culture derived from the 10 Basic Co-operative Principles, in which MONDRAGON is deeply rooted: Open Admission, Democratic Organisation, the Sovereignty of Labour, Instrumental and Subordinate Nature of Capital, Participatory Management, Payment Solidarity, Inter-cooperation, Social Transformation, Universality and Education.[15]
This inspirational philosophy is complemented by the establishment of four Corporate Values: Co-operation, acting as owners and protagonists; Participation, which takes shape as a commitment to management; Social Responsibility, by means of the distribution of wealth based on solidarity; and Innovation, focusing on constant renewal in all areas.[16]
This business culture translates into compliance with a number of Basic Objectives (Customer Focus, Development, Innovation, Profitability, People in Co-operation and Involvement in the Community) and General Policies approved by the Co-operative Congress, which are taken on board at all the Corporation’s organisational levels and incorporated into the four-year strategic plans and the annual business plans of the individual co-operatives, the Divisions, and the Corporation as a whole.[17]

[edit] Wage regulation

At Mondragon, there are agreed-upon wage ratios between the worker-owners who do executive work and those who work in the field or factory and earn a minimum wage. These ratios range from 3:1 to 9:1 in different cooperatives and average 5:1. That is, the general manager of an average Mondragon cooperative earns 5 times as much as the theoretical minimum wage paid in his/her cooperative. This ratio is in reality smaller because there are few Mondragon worker-owners that earn minimum wages, their jobs being somewhat specialized and classified at higher wage levels.[18]
Although the ratio for each cooperative varies, it is worker-owners within that cooperative who decide through a democratic vote what these ratios should be. Thus, if a general manager of a cooperative has a ratio of 9:1, it is because its worker-owners decided it was a fair ratio to maintain.[18]
In general, wages at Mondragon, as compared to similar jobs in local industries, are 30% or less at the management levels and equivalent at the middle management, technical and professional levels. As a result, Mondragon worker-owners at the lower wage levels earn an average of 13% higher wages than workers in similar businesses. In addition, Spain uses a progressive tax rate, so those with higher wages pay higher taxes, further diminishing the disparity in terms of disposable income.[18]

[edit] Areas of activity

The Corporation’s companies operate in four different areas: Finance, Industry, Retail, and Knowledge, with the latter distinguishing Mondragon from other business groups. In 2010, the Corporation posted a Total Turnover (total revenue) of 14.8 billion euros,[19] roughly 20 billion USD, and employed 100,000 workers, making it Spain's fourth largest industrial and seventh largest financial group.[20]

[edit] Finance

This area includes the banking business of Caja Laboral, the insurance company Seguros Lagun Aro, and the Voluntary Social Welfare Body Lagun Aro, which had an asset fund totaling 4.2 billion euros at the end of 2009. The yield obtained from this fund is used to cover long-term retirement, widowhood, and invalidity benefits, complementary to those offered by the Spanish social security system.
Caja Laboral, for its part, ended 2009 with 18.6 million euros of deposits in a year in which it granted loans worth 16.4 billion, mainly to household economies and small and medium-sized enterprises. Its extensive experience with the Corporation’s Co-operatives enables it to offer SMEs services typical of large companies.[21]

[edit] Industry

The Corporation’s companies manufacture consumer goods, capital goods, industrial components, products and systems for construction, and services to business.
In the consumer goods sector, with sales totaling 1.5 billion euros, MONDRAGON produces white goods: refrigerators, washing machines, ovens, dishwashers, and boilers, under the brands Fagor, Brandt, and Mastercook, and maintains a leadership position in Spain and France and co-leadership in Poland and Morocco. It also produces office furniture and home furniture. In the leisure and sports area, it manufactures Orbea bicycles, exercise equipment and items for camping, the garden and the beach.[22]
In capital goods, MONDRAGON posted a turnover of 976 million euros in 2009, and is the leading Spanish manufacturer of chip removing (DANOBATGROUP) and sheet metal forming (Fagor Arrasate Group) machine tools. These machines are complemented by automation and control products for machine tools, packaging machinery, machinery for automating assembly processes and processing wood, forklift trucks, electric transformers, integrated equipment for the catering industry, cold stores, and refrigeration equipment. Specifically focusing on the automotive sector, the Corporation also manufactures a wide variety of dies, molds and tooling for casting iron and aluminium, and occupies a leading position in machinery for the casting sector.[23]
In Industrial Components, MONDRAGON posted a turnover of 1.5 billion euros in 2009, a sector in which it operates as an integrated supplier for the leading car manufacturers, offering from the design and development of a part to the industrialisation and supply of components and assemblies. It has different business units such as brakes, axles, suspension, transmission, engines, aluminium wheel rims, fluid conduction, and other internal and external vehicle components. It also produces components for the main domestic appliance manufacturers in three business areas: white goods, home comfort, and electronics. And it manufactures flanges and pipe accessories for processing oil-gas, petrochemical plants and power generation, copper and aluminium electrical conductors, and components for conveyors.[24]
In construction, sales totalled 974 million euros in 2009. This is a sector in which MONDRAGON has constructed emblematic buildings and important infrastructure projects. It designs and builds large metallic (URSSA), laminated wood and prefabricated concrete structures; supplies prefabricated parts in polymer concrete; offers solutions for formwork and structures (ULMA Group) as well as public works machinery and the industrialisation of the construction process, including engineering and assembly services. It also produces elevators (ORONA Group).
In services to business, sales totalled 248 million euros in 2008, including business consultancy services, architecture and engineering, property consulting, design and innovation (LKS Group), systems engineering for electromechanical installations, and integrated logistics engineering. It also offers a modern language service, manufactures educational equipment, and provides graphic arts services (MccGraphics).
In 2009 59.4% of total turnover came from international sales. Sales resulting from the export of products abroad and production generated in the 75 subsidiaries located in 17 different countries: China (13), France (9), Poland (8), Czech Republic (7), Mexico (7), Brazil (5), Germany (4), Italy (4), United Kingdom (3), Romania (3), United States (2), Turkey (2), Portugal (2), Slovakia (2), India (2), Thailand (1) and Morocco (1). Overall, in 2009 these 75 plants produced goods worth 3.1 billion euros and provided work for 14,506 people. The corporate industrial park in Kunshan, close to Shanghai currently houses seven subsidiaries.[25]

[edit] Retail

Led by Eroski, Mondragon runs one of the leading retail groups in Spain, posting a turnover of 8.3 billion euros in 2010. It operates all over Spain and in the south of France, and maintains close contacts with the French group Les Mousquetaires and the leading German retailer Edeka, with whom it set up the Alidis international partnership in 2002. The worker-owners and consumer-members are involved in the management of Eroski, with both groups participating in the Co-operative’s decision-making bodies.
At the end of 2009, Eroski was operating an extensive chain of almost 2,400 stores made up of 113 EROSKI hypermarkets, 1,063 EROSKI/center, Caprabo and EROSKI/city supermarkets, 224 branches of the EROSKI/viajes travel agency, 58 petrol stations, 40 Forum Sport stores, 289 IF perfume stores, 7 Abac leisure and culture outlets and 40 goods depots. In addition to this chain, there are 481 self-service franchise outlets. Moreover, in the south of France it has 4 hypermarkets, 16 supermarkets and 17 petrol stations, and it has 4 perfume stores in Andorra.[26]
At an Assembly held In 2008, its worker-members approved by a majority vote the process to expand the transformation into co-operatively run businesses to the Group as a whole. So work started on turning the Group’s subsidiaries into co-operatives, as well as on making their salaried workers worker-members. This process will be carried out gradually over the next few years.
The retail area is also home to the food group Erkop, which operates in the catering, cleaning, stock-breeding, and horticulture sectors and has as its leading name Auzo Lagun, a co-operative engaged in group catering and the cleaning of buildings and premises, and also offers an integrated service in the health sector.[27]

[edit] Knowledge

This area has a dual focus: education-training and innovation, which have both been key elements in the development of the Corporation. Training-education is mainly linked to the dynamism of the University of Mondragón, the significant role that Politeknika Ikastegia Txorierri, Arizmendi Ikastola and Lea Artibai Ikastetxea play in their respective areas and the activity of the Management and Co-operative Development Centre Otalora.
The University of Mondragon is a university of a co-operative nature, which combines the development of knowledge, skills, and values, and maintains close relations with business, especially the Co-operatives. Technological innovation is generated by through the Co-operatives’ own R&D departments, the Corporate Science and Technology Plan, the work of the Corporation’s 12 technology centres and the Garaia Innovation Park.[28]
For their part, the 12 technology centres, with a workforce totalling 742 people and an overall budget of 53.7 million euros in 2009, continue to play a fundamental role in the development of the sectors in which they focus their activity.[29]

[edit] Reactions

Scholars such as Richard D. Wolff, American professor of economics, have hailed the Mondragon set of enterprises, including the good wages it provides for employees, the empowerment of ordinary workers in decision making, and the measure of equality for female workers, as a major success and have cited it as a working model of an alternative to the capitalist mode of production.[30]
Linguist and activist Noam Chomsky has said that while it offers an alternative to capitalism, it is still embedded in a capitalist system which limits Mondragon's decisions:[31]
“Take the most advanced case: Mondragon. It’s worker owned, it’s not worker managed, although the management does come from the workforce often, but it’s in a market system and they still exploit workers in South America, and they do things that are harmful to the society as a whole and they have no choice. If you’re in a system where you must make profit in order to survive, you're compelled to ignore negative externalities fixed on others.”
The Mondragon system is one of four case studies analyzed in Capital and the Debt Trap, which summarized evidence claiming that cooperatives tend to last longer and are less susceptible to perverse incentives and other problems of organizational governance than more traditionally managed organization.

[edit] See also

Portal iconSpain portal
Portal iconBasque portal
Portal iconOrganized labour portal

[edit] References

  1. ^ "Cifras más reseñables, Corporación MONDRAGON" (in Spanish). Mondragon Corporation. http://www.mondragon-corporation.com/CAS/Magnitudes-Econ%C3%B3micas/Cifras-m%C3%A1s-rese%C3%B1ables.aspx. Retrieved 3 December 2011.
  2. ^ Capital and the Debt Trap
  3. ^ "In 2008, MONDRAGON provided 3.6 % of the Basque Autonomous Community’s total GDP and 6.6% of its Industrial GDP". http://www.mondragon-corporation.com/ENG/Press-room/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/1377.aspx. Retrieved 4 december 2010.
  4. ^ The Mondragon Experiment - Corporate Cooperativism (1980) FULL
  5. ^ Molina, Fernando (2005). Jose Maria Arizmendiarreta. Caja Laboral. ISBN 84-920246-2-3.
  6. ^ Foote, William (1991). Making Mondragon. IRL Press. ISBN O-87546-182-4.
  7. ^ http://www.eroski.es/es/conoce-eroski/una-empresa-diferente/historia
  8. ^ http://www.euskomedia.org/aunamendi/76338
  9. ^ http://www.mondragon-corporation.com/ENG/Co-operativism/Co-operative-Experience/Year-on-year-Development/agentType/ViewSearch/CustomFieldIDs/16/SearchValues/1999.aspx
  10. ^ Ormaetxe, Jose Maria (2003). Medio siglo de la experiencia cooperativa de Mondragon. Azatza. ISBN SS-1433/2003.
  11. ^ Wilson, Amanda. Bendable Business: Cooperatives less likely to break in economic crises. The Dominion. 4 December 2009.
  12. ^ http://assets.usw.org/our-union/coops/The-Union-Co-op-Model-March-26-2012.pdf
  13. ^ Larrañaga, Jesus (1998). El cooperativismo en Mondragon. Azatza. ISBN 84-88125-12-7.
  14. ^ Mondragon Corporation
  15. ^ Mondragon Corporation. Co-operative Culture
  16. ^ Foote, William (1991). Making Mondragon. ILR. ISBN 0-87546-182-4.
  17. ^ Mondragon Corporation. Co-operatives bodies and terminology
  18. ^ a b c Herrera, David (2004). "Mondragon: a for-profit organization that embodies Catholic social thought.". Review of Business (The Peter J. Tobin College of Business, St. John's University) 25 (1): 56-68. http://www.stjohns.edu/media/3/998412b80a354217a89c869400427929.pdf. Retrieved October 21, 2012.
  19. ^ "MONDRAGON ends the financial year 2010 with a profit of 178 million euros, tripling the previous year’s figures". 2010-06-01. http://www.mondragon-corporation.com/ENG/Press-room/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/1584.aspx. Retrieved 8 June 2010.
  20. ^ Jeffrey Hollender (June 27, 2011). "The Rise Of Shared Ownership And The Fall Of Business As Usual". Fast Company. http://www.fastcompany.com/1762938/the-rise-of-shared-ownership-and-the-fall-of-business-as-usual. Retrieved 2011-06-28.
  21. ^ / Caja Laboral annual report 2009
  22. ^ / Organisational Estructure in Mondragon, consumer goods
  23. ^ / Organisational estructure in Mondragon, capital goods
  24. ^ / Organisational Estructure in Mondragon, industrial components
  25. ^ / Corporative Profile 2010
  26. ^ / Magnitudes económicas de Eroski
  27. ^ / Erkop
  28. ^ Mondragon Annual Corporate Profile for 2010
  29. ^ / Mondragon Yearly Report 2010
  30. ^ The Guardian, 24 June 2012, "Yes, There Is an Alternative to Capitalism: Mondragon Shows the Way: Why Are We Told a Broken System that Creates Vast Inequality Is the Only Choice? Spain's Amazing Co-op Is Living Proof Otherwise," http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jun/24/alternative-capitalism-mondragon
  31. ^ Talking With Chomsky, Laura Flanders, CounterPunch.

[edit] Further reading

[edit] External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Mondragon Corporation

[edit] Multimedia



Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mondragon_Corporation&oldid=527935920"

View page ratings
Rate this page
What's this?
Trustworthy

Objective

Complete

Well-written



We will send you a confirmation e-mail. We will not share your e-mail address with outside parties as per our feedback privacy statement.

Saved successfully
Your ratings have not been submitted yet

Your ratings have expired
Please reevaluate this page and submit new ratings.
An error has occurred. Please try again later.
Thanks! Your ratings have been saved.
Do you want to create an account?
An account will help you track your edits, get involved in discussions, and be a part of the community.
or
Thanks! Your ratings have been saved.
Did you know that you can edit this page?
on
Labels: , , ,

2 comments:

  1. Autolinkqatar15 January 2019 at 19:36

    NICE BLOG!!! Your blog is very informative. Thanks for sharing a nice information.
    click here

    ReplyDelete
  2. Alex ken23 April 2020 at 06:12

    This type of tax has no correlation with an individual's earnings or income level.

    inheritance tax planning in the UK

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)