Global Youth Network* (2020)
Of considerable note among the reviewed coopyouth research initiatives is the Mapping Project, completed in late 2020 by the Global Youth Network of International Cooperative Alliance (*now referred to as the “Youth Committee”). The data from the mapping initiative, collected between 2018 and 2020, helped to identify the cooperatives interviewed for this current research endeavor. It also marked a first step in building a quantitative representation of the global Coopyouth Movement. The initiative delineated between coopyouth "cooperatives" and coopyouth "support initiatives," the latter of which were then further subdivided into seven categories. This categorization is unique to the Mapping Project and does not align with either of the typologies developed by the International Cooperative Alliance or the International Labor Organization.
This toolkit initially endeavored to maintain a distinction between "cooperative" and "support inititiative;" however, during the course of interviews for this toolkit, the stratification between a “cooperative” and a “support initiative” became extremely blurred. As a result, the cooperatives interviewed not delineated into those categories and all qualify as cooperatives, as they seek to adhere to the Cooperative Identity no matter their activities. The method of data collection and type of data collected via the Mapping Project was via radio buttons and dropdown menus via a survey greatly shaped the classification of the data. The project’s researcher warned of potential errors in how some cooperatives self-describe, meaning that respondents may have either selected an incorrect type or were only able to select one type when they actually fulfilled the requirements for multiple types. Cooperatives’ near-universal adaptability to any need and context, as well as their ability to meet various needs at once in ways not reflected in conventional business and organizational frameworks further complicates their taxonimization.
The Mapping Project connected with 178 respondents in total, accounting for 55 enterprises from 27 countries and 107 support initiatives from 51 countries. Most of the individuals respondents were paid workers within their respective organizations, though not necessarily members or owners. Less than one fifth of the respondents were volunteers. All respondents were 36 years old or younger. Questions covered the following topics: past participation or interest in future participation in international coopyouth events, financial status, perception of other cooperatives in their service areas, tools used and desired for communication and decision-making, as well as role of the international Coopyouth Movement in their local work. Respondents were also encouraged to offer general feedback.
Some of the key statistics and reflections generated by the study include:
ENTERPRISES
REGIONS:
- Africa: 35
- Americas: 9
- Asia-Pacific: 7
- Europe: 4
TYPE:
- Worker: 17%
- Consumer: 18%
- Producer: 28%; 87% of which in Africa
- Multi-Stakeholder: 37%
FUNDING:
- Autonomous: 64%
- Individual Donors: 18%
- Non-Governmental Organizations: 16%
- Government Funding: 13%
- Other Cooperatives: 11%
- Private Enterprise: 5%
SUPPORTS
REGION:
- Africa: 29
- Americas: 42
- Asia-Pacific: 17
- Europe: 19
TYPE:
- Cooperative Federation: 34
- CoopYouth Networks: 16
- Youth networks: 14
- Universities/Colleges: 9
- Cooperatives: 9
- Foundations: 4
- Developers: 4
FUNDING:
- Self-Funded: 65%
- Cooperatives: 38%
- Non-Governmental Organizations: 25%
- Government Funding: 22%
- Individual Donors: 21%
- Private Enterprise: 6%
- Service Users: 3%
- Foundations: 1%
REFLECTIONS
AWARENESS:
- 1 - Completely Unaware: 23%
- 2: 25%
- 3: 21%
- 4: 14%
- 5: 8%
- 6 - Highly Aware: 9%
WHAT RESPONDENTS WANT:
- Platform for sharing best practices and experiences
- Plan to promote cooperatives within educational institutions
- Unifying CoopYouth Manifesto
There are distinct differences in response rates between the Mapping Project and the toolkit interviews, which can be accounted for by a number of factors identified in the “How We Did It” methodology section. One unique to the Mapping Project that likely accounts for some of this higher response rate is the project’s solicitation of responses from organizations that are both not exclusively engaged in cooperative work (e.g. general youth empowerment non-profits, educational institutions), as well as other organizations that are run by elders for youth. Anecdotally - due to a lack of formal data, such elder-led and conventional youth organizations typically have more staff/resources than youth-run cooperative enterprises, enabling them with more capacity to respond to calls for their participation in research projects than coopyouth enterprises.