Publications

  • Key Publications that define and discuss FairShares

Where available, click the title of the publication to download, access a PDF version, or obtain further information to order a book.

  • Hilton, E. (2021) Exploring Organisational Ethics in Relation to the FairShares Model, FairShares Institute, Sheffield Hallam University.
    This document includes a fascinating essay by Eleanor Rose Hilton, a student at Sheffield Hallam University, about a role play designed and developed by the FairShares Institute in Sheffield Business School. The essay describes the development and resolution of tensions during the role play. Students role played co-operative members as they considered a proposal to share intellectual property with housing groups. Eleanor’s work shows how participation in decision-making improved her knowledge of FairShares, and how this knowledge countered selfish behaviour by, and anger towards, Founder members. She describes how worker, customer and investor members supported the proposal, and effectively countered both their own, and founder members’, egoism.

In this book, six partner organisations describe FairShares Labs for Social and Blue Innovation. They offer a vision of how to create social enterprise incubators that nurture inclusive multi-stakeholder co-operative enterprises. Building on the theory and practice of Living Labs, Social and Blue Economy and the FairShares Model the text of Creating Social Enterprises in FairShares Labs sets out the concepts, processes and methods for building a FairShares Lab.

Order from our FairShares Labs page.

  • O’Dor, J. (2019) What Influences Social Entrepreneurs to Adopt Particular Social Enterprise Structures and Why? DBA Doctoral Thesis, Sheffield Hallam University. [This thesis discusses the FairShares Model/Movement as an example of institutional entrepreneurship that creates an ecosystem for social enterprise outside (beyond) existing institutional norms].
  • McCulloch, M. and Ridley-Duff, R. (2019) ‘To profit or not to profit? That is the wrong question‘, in 7th EMES International Research Conference, EMES Selected Conference Papers 2019, EMES International Research Network. [This paper compares the ‘six capitals’ of the International Integrated Reporting Council to the ‘six forms of wealth’ in the FairShares Model].
  • Ridley-Duff, R. and Bull, M. (2019) Understanding Social Enterprise: Theory and Practice, 3rd Edition, London: Sage Publications. [See pages 280-2, 300-302, 387-389].
  • Nielsen, D., Grazzini, O., Lawson, Y. and Fuchs, E. (2019) The FairShares Model and Transformative Innovation: How Democratic Ownership Challenges Dominant Institutions, written in partial fulfilment of an MA Social Entrepreneurship, Roskilde University, Denmark.  Abstract: This project takes a critical look at the democratic ownership structures present in the FairShares Model and the model’s potential for generating transformative social innovation. The project originated as a student project at Roskilde University’s Masters’ program on Social Entrepreneurship and Management. The analysis of democratic ownership is based on a matrix, developed for this project, that situates the FairShares model according to the level of embeddedness of democratic ownership and the broadness of participation in the ownership. The FairShares Model’s potential to generate transformative social innovation is assessed by using TRANSIT’s 13 principles of transformative social innovation, presented in their Manifesto for Transformative Social Innovation, as a benchmark against which the FairShares Model is compared. Finally, the project speculates on a combination of the FairShares Model and the concept of a commons, and how such a structure could resolve many of the contradictions present in capitalism today. In both regards, the FairShares Model shows an impressive commitment and potential. It has a relatively embedded democratic ownership model, especially compared to conventional company structures. It also features broad participation. Regarding transformative social innovation the FairShares Company model shows strong potential for generating this, based on its democratic ownership model and its position as an alternative to traditional company models.
  • Ridley-Duff, R. (2019) “Co-operative social entrepreneurship: reflections on a decade of embedding co-operative studies in social enterprise courses”. In Woodin, T. and Shaw, L. (eds), Learning for a Co-operative World: Education, Social Change and the Co-operative College, London: Trentam Books (UCL IOE Press). [In this chapter, the FairShares Association is one of six cases deconstructed using Ostrom’s principles of collective action and the ICA’s Co-operative Values and Principles’].
  • Ridley-Duff, R. and Bull, M. (2019) “Solidarity cooperatives: the (hidden) origins of communitarian pluralism in the UK social enterprise movement“, Social Enterprise Journal, DOI:10.1108/SEJ-12-2018-0078. [This publication is the most thorough paper on the pre-history of the FairShares Model. It examines the convergence and transition of ideas created by past social enterprise consultants/researchers, and the way these came together as a viable multi-stakeholder (solidarity) model for co-operative development].
  • Ridley-Duff, R. and Wren, D. (2019) “Social Enterprise, Sustainable Development and the FairShares Model“, Japanese Journal of Human Welfare Studies, 11(1): 23-42.

Abstract: This paper explores how the fields of social enterprise and sustainable development can be aligned by applying the FairShares Model to co-operative development. The adoption of public policies on sustainable development goals (SDGs) challenges our current conceptions of wealth. Using materials published by the FairShares Association and International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC), we advance a theoretical framework based on six forms of wealth creation (natural, human, intellectual, social, manufactured and financial). We deploy this to explore inter-relationships between social enterprise and sustainable development then use a FairShares case study to show how applying the FairShares Model enfranchises stakeholders, alters the distribution of wealth and power, and helps to realise SDGs. Recognising and rewarding each form of wealth makes the connections between them more visible. The FairShares Model offers a coherent philosophy for co?operative development that acts as a bridge between the fields of social enterprise and sustainable development.

  • Ridley-Duff, R., Schm?dtchen, R., Arnold-Schaarschmidt, M., Vukov??, S., Klercq, J., Southcombe, C. Trzec?nsk?, S. Oparaocha, K., Pataki, V., Wren, D. Bed?né Károly, J. (2018). Methodology for Creating a FairShares Lab, IO1 for Erasmus+ Project (European FairShares Labs for Social and Blue Innovation, project number 2016-1-DE02-KA204-003397) (Final).

Abstract: Welcome to the full version of the first intellectual output (IO1) of the Erasmus+ project FairShares Labs for Social and Blue Innovation Project (Project 2016-1-DE02-KA204-003397). IO1 has been prepared by project partners to describe their methodology for creating FairShares Labs. Work started in Erfurt, Germany (7-9 December 2016) and has been discussed in three further transnational meetings in Sheffield (26-28 June 2017), Berlin (27-28 August 2017) and Osijek (20-22 Feb 2018). In this document, we set out the purpose of IO1. This document provides any person involved in the creation and development of a FairShares Lab (partners, coordinators, trainers and advisers) with an overview of the methodology for creating their lab. This includes an account of the FairShares Model itself as well as processes for setting up, recruiting people to and marketing a FairShares Lab, and supporting lab participants as they incubate new FairShares enterprises and contribute to building an ecosystem for FairShares.

  • Levillain, K., Parker, S., Ridley-Duff, R., Segrestin, B., Veldman, J. and Willmott, H. (2018). “Protecting Long-Term Commitment: Legal and Organizational Means“, in Driver, C. and Thompson, G. (eds.), Corporate Governance in Contention, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 42-65.
  • Boeger, N. (2017). ‘The New Corporate Movement‘ in Nina Boeger and Charlotte Villiers (eds) Shaping the Corporate Language: Towards Corporate Reform and Enterprise Diversity, Oxford: Hart Publishing, pp. 189-212.
  • Ridley-Duff, R. (2017). “The internationalisation of FairShares: where agency meets structure in US and UK company law”, in Boeger, N. and Villiers, C. (eds), Shaping the Corporate Landscape, Oxford: Hart Publishing.

Abstract: This chapter is a reflexive analysis of factors that are affecting the internationalisation of the FairShares Model (FSM) in the US and UK. The goal of the paper, however, is to explore how Giddens’ (1984) structuration theory offers insights into the formation of social enterprises that deploy alternative approaches to incorporation. Between September 2015 and January 2016, three social entrepreneurs used the FSM to constitute two new companies in the UK and US. A study of FSM early adopters provides an opportunity to explore how agents (social entrepreneurs) rewrite structures (Articles of Association) when they form a new social enterprise. By examining how the Articles of Dojo4Life Ltd (UK) and AnyShare Society (US) changed during debates about incorporation, the dialectical relationship between social entrepreneurial agency and institutional structures can be theorised.

 

Abstract: Imagine a society in which every adult is entitled to co-own the organisations on which they, their family and their community depend… The FairShares Model is an approach to creating networks of solidarity enterprises. Every adult can become a member-owner, whether a founding entrepreneur, supplier, employee, customer, user or social investor. This book clearly sets out why we need FairShares, how to provide FairShares education and the legal templates for a new generation of social enterprises that apply FairShares values and principles.

Important Conference Papers on FairShares

Underpinning Research

  • Atherton, J., Birchall, J., Mayo, E. and Simon, G. (2012) Practical Tools for Defining Co-operative and Mutual Enterprises, Manchester: Co-operatives UK, accessed 1st October 2012.
  • Birchall, J. (2012) “A member-owned business approach to the classification of co-operatives and mutuals”, in McDonnell, D. and Macknight, E. (eds) (2012), The Co-operative Model in Practice, Glasgow: Co-operative Education Trust, pp. 67-82.
  • Brown, J. (2006) “Equity finance for social enterprises”, Social Enterprise Journal, 2(1): 73-81.
  • Ellerman, D. (1984) “Entrepreneurship in the Mondragon Co-operatives”, Review of Social Economy, 42(3): 272-294.
  • Ellerman, D. (1990) The Democratic Worker-Owned Firm: A New Model for East and West, Boston: Unwin Hyman.
  • Ellerman, D. (2005) Helping People Help Themselves: From the World Bank to an Alternative Philosophy of Development Assistance, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
  • Erdal, D. (2000) The Psychology of Sharing: An Evolutionary Approach, unpublished PhD Thesis, University of St Andrews.
  • Erdal, D. (2009) Local Heroes: How Loch Fyne Oysters Embraced Employee Ownership and Business Success, London: Penguin.
  • Erdal, D. (2011) Beyond the Corporation: Humanity Working: London: The Bodley Head.
  • McDonnell, D., MacKnight, E. and Donnelly, H. (2012) Democratic Enterprise: Ethical Business for the 21st Century, Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=2041159 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2041159.
  • Major, G. (1996) “Solving the under-investment and degeneration problems of worker co-ops”, Annals of Public and Co?operative Economics, 67: 545-601.
  • Major, G. (1998) “The Need for NOVARS (Non-Voting Value Added Sharing Renewable Shares)”, Journal of Co?operative Studies, 31(2): 57-72.
  • Major, G., Boby, G. (2000) Equity Devaluation, The Rarity of Democratic Firms, and “Profit Shares”, originally accessed from www.democraticbusiness.co.uk/vanekps.html (no longer in print).
  • Le Grand, J. and Roberts, J. (2017) “The public service mutual: theories of motivational advantage”, Public Administration Review, 78(1): 82-91.
  • Ridley-Duff, R. J. and Bull, M. (2011) Understanding Social Enterprise: Theory and Practice, London: Sage Publications.
  • Ridley-Duff, R. J. (2012b) Creative Commons, discussion paper for the School for Democratic Socialism and Co-operative Party.
  • Ridley-Duff, R. J. (2010) “Communitarian governance in social enterprises: case evidence from the Mondragon Co-operative Corporation and School Trends Ltd”, Social Enterprise Journal, 6(2): 125-145.
  • Ridley-Duff, R. and Bull, M. (2014a) ‘Entrepreneurship: value-added ventures’, in O. Laasch and R. Conway (eds), Principles of Responsible Management. New York: Cengage Learning, pp. 186–219.
  • Turnbull, S. (1994), “Stakeholder democracy: redesigning the governance of firms and bureaucracies”, Journal of Socio-Economics, 23(3): 321-360.
  • Turnbull, S. (1995) “Innovations in corporate governance: The Mondragon Experience”, Corporate Governance: An International Review, 3(3): 167-180.
  • Turnbull, S. (2002) A New Way to Govern: Organisations and Society after Enron, London: New Economics Foundation.
  • Vanek, J. (1970) The General Theory of Labor-Managed Market Economies, Ithaca: Cornell University.
  • Whyte, W. and Whyte, K. (1990) Making Mondragon: The growth and dynamics of the worker co-operative complex, Cornell University Press.

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