Abstract
Traditional versions of workplace democracy imply that the decisions in which workers should have a say primarily concern governance issues. Worker cooperatives are, therefore, often cited as some of the most promising examples of workplace democracy. In this paper, I argue that a comprehensive and fully developed theory of workplace democracy should aim to democratize both spheres of power: governance and management. Indeed, there exists a broad spectrum of intermediate decision-making – carried out by middle and line management, such as team leaders, supervisors, superintendents, and foremen – that constitutes an often-overlooked site of power in worker cooperatives. The primary responsibilities of managers – which should remain subject to oversight by the workers – should therefore include facilitating and fostering democratic deliberation on work-related issues, supporting coordination efforts, and providing assistance to workers. This perspective also supports the view that managers themselves should be elected rather than appointed by the cooperative’s general manager or board of directors, as is usually the case.
Acknowledgements
I would first like to thank the members of the cooperative where I conducted my research. A previous version of this paper was presented at the MANCEPT Workshops 2024, in the “Workplace Democracy and Meaningful Work” panel organized by Matías Petersen and Joaquín Reyes, to whom I am grateful. I also thank the participants for their insightful questions. Special thanks go to Ada Reichhart, José Pereira, James Carey, and Marcus Carlsen Häggrot. I would also like to express my gratitude to Emmanuel Renault, Pierre-Yves Néron, and to the Centre de Recherche en Éthique at the Université de Montréal, as my post-doctoral stay there allowed me to refine the initial ideas developed in this article. Many thanks to Samuel Hayat and the Cevipof (Sciences Po Paris) for providing ideal conditions for my research. Finally, I thank the two reviewers of this article for their insightful revisions and comments.
References
Anderson, Elizabeth. 2008. “Expanding the Egalitarian Toolbox: Equality and Bureaucracy.” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes 82: 139–60. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8349.2008.00166.x.Search in Google Scholar
Anderson, Elizabeth. 2015. “Equality and Freedom in the Workplace: Recovering Republican Insights.” Social Philosophy and Policy 31 (2): 48–69. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0265052514000259.Search in Google Scholar
Anderson, Elizabeth. 2017. Private Government: How Employers Rule Our Lives. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.10.1515/9781400887781Search in Google Scholar
Anderson, Elizabeth. 2019. “Workplace Government and Republican Theory.” In Republicanism and the Future of Democracy, edited by Yiftah Elazar and Geneviève Rousselière, 189–206. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/9781108630153.011Search in Google Scholar
Bellas, Carl J. 1972. Industrial Democracy and the Worker Owned Firm: A Study of Twenty-One Plywood Companies in the Pacific Northwest. New York: Praeger Publishers Inc.Search in Google Scholar
Bernstein, Paul. 1976. Workplace Democratization: Its Internal Dynamics. Kent State University Press, Comparative Administration Research Institute.Search in Google Scholar
Blumberg, Paul. 1968. Industrial Democracy: The Sociology of Participation. New York: Schocken Books.Search in Google Scholar
Buchez, Philippe. 1832. L’Européen: Journal des sciences morales et économiques, June 30, 1832. Available online at http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k5860365z.Search in Google Scholar
Coase, Ronald H. 1937. “The Nature of the Firm.” Economica 4 (16): 386–405. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0335.1937.tb00002.x.Search in Google Scholar
Cole, G. D. H. (George Douglas Howard). 1920. Guild Socialism Re-Stated. London: Leonard Parsons. http://archive.org/details/guildsocialismre00coleuoft.Search in Google Scholar
Cornforth, Chris. 1995. “Patterns of Cooperative Management: Beyond the Degeneration Thesis.” Economic and Industrial Democracy 16 (4): 487–523. https://doi.org/10.1177/0143831X95164002.Search in Google Scholar
Cornforth, Chris, Alan Thomas, Roger Spear, and Jenny Lewis. 1988. Developing Successful Worker Co-Operatives. London; Newbury Park: SAGE Publications Ltd.Search in Google Scholar
DeHart-Davis, Leisha. 2009. “Can Bureaucracy Benefit Organizational Women? An Exploratory Study.” Administration & Society 41 (3): 340–63. https://doi.org/10.1177/0095399709334643.Search in Google Scholar
Dejours, Christophe. 2006. L’évaluation du travail à l’épreuve du réel: Critique des fondements de l’évaluation. Paris: Quae.Search in Google Scholar
Dejours, Christophe. 2013a. Travail Vivant. Tome 1 Sexualité et travail. Paris: Payot.Search in Google Scholar
Dejours, Christophe. 2013b. Travail Vivant. Tome 2 travail et émancipation. Paris: Payot.Search in Google Scholar
Dejours, Christophe, Jean-Philippe Deranty, Emmanuel Renault, and Nicholas H. Smith. 2018. The Return of Work in Critical Theory: Self, Society, Politics. New York: Columbia University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Deranty, Jean-Philippe, and Emmanuel Renault. 2020. “Democratizing Workplaces from Below: Beyond Workplace Republicanism.” In Whither Work? The Politics and Ethics of Contemporary Work, edited by Jean-Philippe Deranty, and Keith Breen. Routledge, 2021.10.4324/9780429243394-11Search in Google Scholar
Dow, Gregory K. 2003. Governing the Firm: Workers’ Control in Theory and Practice. Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511615849Search in Google Scholar
Dow, Gregory K. 2018. The Labor-Managed Firm: Theoretical Foundations. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/9781316459423Search in Google Scholar
Ferreras, Isabelle. 2017. Firms as Political Entities: Saving Democracy Through Economic Bicameralism. New York: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/9781108235495Search in Google Scholar
Ferreras, Isabelle. 2007. Critique politique du travail: Travailler à l’heure de la société des services. Paris: Presses de Sciences Po.10.3917/scpo.ferre.2007.01Search in Google Scholar
Frega, Roberto, Lisa Herzog, and Christian Neuhäuser. 2019. “Workplace Democracy – The Recent Debate.” Philosophy Compass 14 (4): e12574, https://doi.org/10.1111/phc3.12574.Search in Google Scholar
Gay, Paul du. 2000. In Praise of Bureaucracy: Weber – Organization – Ethics. London Thousand Oaks New Delhi: SAGE Publications Ltd.Search in Google Scholar
Graeber, David. 2018. Bullshit Jobs: A Theory. London: Allen Lane.Search in Google Scholar
Greenberg, Edward. 1986. Workplace Democracy: The Political Effects of Participation. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Honneth, Axel. 2024. Le souverain laborieux: Une théorie normative du travail. Paris: Gallimard.Search in Google Scholar
Hsieh, Nien-hê. 2005. “Rawlsian Justice and Workplace Republicanism.” Social Theory and Practice 31 (1): 115–42. https://doi.org/10.5840/soctheorpract20053116.Search in Google Scholar
Kasmir, Sharryn. 1996. The Myth of Mondragon: Cooperatives, Politics, and Working-Class Life in a Basque Town. Albany: State University of New York Press.Search in Google Scholar
Mansbridge, Jane J. 1983. Beyond Adversary Democracy. Édition: New edition. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Search in Google Scholar
Marx, Karl. 2004. Capital: A Critique of Political Economy, Vol. 1. London: Penguin.Search in Google Scholar
Meister, Albert. 1964. Socialisme et Autogestion : L’expérience Yougoslave. Paris: Le Seuil.Search in Google Scholar
Néron, Pierre-Yves. 2015a. “Rethinking the Very Idea of Egalitarian Markets and Corporations: Why Relationships Might Matter More Than Distribution.” Business Ethics Quarterly 25 (1): 93–124. https://doi.org/10.1017/beq.2015.7.Search in Google Scholar
Néron, Pierre-Yves. 2015b. “Social Equality and Economic Institutions: Arguing for Workplace Democracy.” In The Equal Society, edited by George Hull. London: Lexington Books.10.5040/9781978736887.ch-014Search in Google Scholar
Néron, Pierre-Yves. 2024. Seeing Like a Firm: Social Justice, Corporations, and the Conservative Order. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.10.1093/9780197774151.001.0001Search in Google Scholar
Pérotin, Virginie. 2016. “What Do We Really Know about Workers’ Cooperatives?” In Mainstreaming Co-Operation: An Alternative for the Twenty-First Century?, edited by Anthony Webster, 239–60. Manchester: Manchester University Press.10.7765/9781526100993.00019Search in Google Scholar
Pettit, Philip. 2012. On the People’s Terms: A Republican Theory and Model of Democracy. The Seeley Lectures. Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Potvin, Raymond H. 1958. An Analysis of Labor Management Satisfaction Within the Enterprise Councils of Belgian Industry. Washington, DC: Catholic University of American Press.Search in Google Scholar
Rajan, Soumya G., and Paul Bino. 2021. “Searching for Answers on Dignity, Knowledge and Engagement in a Worker Cooperative Society.” IIMB Management Review 33 (2): 166–76. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.iimb.2021.03.008.Search in Google Scholar
Renault, Emmanuel. 2022. “Démocratiser le travail.” In Travail e(s)t liberté?, edited by Enrico Donaggio, José Rose, and Mariagrazia Cairo, 69–94. Toulouse: ERES.Search in Google Scholar
Rothschild, Joyce. 2000. “Creating a Just and Democratic Workplace: More Engagement, Less Hierarchy.” Contemporary Sociology 29 (1): 195–213. https://doi.org/10.2307/2654944.Search in Google Scholar
Rothschild, Joyce, and Raymond Russell. 1986. “Alternatives to Bureaucracy: Democratic Participation in the Economy.” Annual Review of Sociology 12 (January): 307–28. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.soc.12.1.307.Search in Google Scholar
Rothschild, Joyce, and J. Allen Whitt. 1986. The Cooperative Workplace: Potentials and Dilemmas of Organisational Democracy and Participation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Schuppert, Fabian. 2015. “Being Equals. Analyzing the Nature of Social Egalitarian Relationships.” In Social Equality: On What It Means to be Equals, edited by Carina Fourie, Fabian Schuppert, and Ivo Wallimann-Helmer, 107–26. Oxford; New York: OUP.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199331109.003.0006Search in Google Scholar
Sobering, Katherine. 2019. “The Relational Production of Workplace Equality: The Case of Worker-Recuperated Businesses in Argentina.” Qualitative Sociology 41 (4): 543–65. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11133-019-09434-y.Search in Google Scholar
Sobering, Katherine. 2022. The People’s Hotel: Working for Justice in Argentina. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.10.1515/9781478022862Search in Google Scholar
Ternier, Camille. 2021. Être Des Travailleurs Libres. Le Modèle Des Coopératives de Production Comme Forme Institutionnelle d’une Économie Démocratique. Paris: Mare&Martin. Bibliothèque Des Thèses.Search in Google Scholar
Wagner, Anne-Catherine. 2022. Coopérer - Les Scop et la fabrique de l’intérêt collectif. Paris: Cnrs.Search in Google Scholar
Whyte, William Foote, and Kathleen King Whyte. 1991. Making Mondragón: The Growth and Dynamics of the Worker Cooperative Complex. Ithaca: ILR Press.Search in Google Scholar
Wright, Erik Olin. 2019. How to Be an Anticapitalist in the Twenty-First Century. London, Brooklyn, NY: Verso.Search in Google Scholar
© 2025 the author(s), published by De Gruyter, Berlin/Boston
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Editorial
- Editorial: Work and Democracy in Conflict
- Focus:Work and Democracy in Conflict
- 10.1515/auk-2025-2004
- 10.1515/auk-2025-2007
- Challenging Democratic Deficit at Work Through Humoristic Criticism: Perspectives from Turkey’s Highly Qualified Employees
- 10.1515/auk-2025-2003
- 10.1515/auk-2025-2001
- Plural Cooperativism. The Material Basis of Democratic Corporate Governance
- General Part
- Between Hermeneutics and Systematicity: The Habermasian Method of Theorizing
- Discussion
- McMahan on the War Against Hamas
- A Reply to Statman’s Defense of Israel’s War in Gaza
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Editorial
- Editorial: Work and Democracy in Conflict
- Focus:Work and Democracy in Conflict
- 10.1515/auk-2025-2004
- 10.1515/auk-2025-2007
- Challenging Democratic Deficit at Work Through Humoristic Criticism: Perspectives from Turkey’s Highly Qualified Employees
- 10.1515/auk-2025-2003
- 10.1515/auk-2025-2001
- Plural Cooperativism. The Material Basis of Democratic Corporate Governance
- General Part
- Between Hermeneutics and Systematicity: The Habermasian Method of Theorizing
- Discussion
- McMahan on the War Against Hamas
- A Reply to Statman’s Defense of Israel’s War in Gaza