Project Members: Chelsea Halliwell, Lillian Luu, Cecilia Macedo, Shammah Martin, Jamieson Mockel, Sophie Powers

Funding Support: Laura Good Undergraduate Research Grants ($ 1,223.78)

Description:

During the Fall 2012 semester, 32 SJSU students enrolled in a new anthropology course called “The Great Recession.” Assignments and discussions revealed that the financial crisis has affected students’ lives profoundly. Youth unemployment in California is nearly 35 percent, and even higher for minority youth. At SJSU, Latinos, Asian Americans, and African Americans together constitute a majority of the student population. Nearly all students were dealing with at least one of a series of distressing situations: layoffs or reduced work hours, failed family businesses, overcrowded living arrangements, strained or broken relationships, home foreclosures, and stress-induced illnesses. Many shared personal accounts of how their lives have been turned upside down over the past five years.Students began investigating strategies for surviving the Great Recession–or at least minimizing its impact. What captured students’ imaginations more than anything else was the possibility of a business model slowly gaining momentum worldwide: the worker-owned cooperative. These businesses differ from conventional enterprises because they are owned collectively–typically by employees or “worker-owners” who make decisions democratically. Profits are not distributed to shareholders, but instead are divided between workers, a capital fund, and the broader community. Perhaps the most famous example is the Mondragón Cooperatives in northern Spain, which began as a small enterprise in the 1950s but now includes more than 80,000 worker-owners. In Cleveland, Ohio a similar experiment is underway: Evergreen Cooperatives provide products and services to institutions such as hospitals and universities. Evergreen is succeeding in the heart of the Rust Belt and may serve as a model for viable futures beyond corporate capitalism. Such initiatives also provide opportunities for new directions in applied anthropology.

As the course came to an end, several students began developing an idea inspired by these examples. They decided to explore the possibility of creating their own worker cooperative. They identified a service that is in great demand in downtown San Jose–educational enrichment programs–and have committed themselves to conduct more research, establish strategic relationships, create a business plan, and secure small grants for launching their enterprise. Though the Creative Learning Center project is still in its preliminary stages, the participants have made a great deal of progress.  The project team has conducted more than 80 hours of participant-observation and interviews with members of worker-owned cooperatives and educational centers.  In April 2013, they presented the preliminary results of their research at the Southwestern Anthropological Association conference in San Jose.