General co-op operations
Bryan Bishop
I was wondering what the thoughts are on how a co-op should run. In
particular, some co-ops have lots of resources, like store-fronts, and
in the case of agricultural cooperatives there's tractors, machinery,
farmland, etc. What types of policies are normally put in place to
guide the distribution of internal resources?
The reason I ask is because, while everyone in a co-op usually gets a
percentage of dividends or profit, and also gets a vote in decisions,
surely each and every issue of property owned by the co-op is not
voted on, is it? Instead, what is the alternative that is usually
implemented?
I am eager to hear what people have to say :-).
Jason Lau
co-op?
Seriously though, I think it'd be nice to see a charter of some
sort.
I assume there'd be some sort of operational committee to make day to
day decisions? Would the composition be voted on? I'm guessing big
decisions would be voted on, but operational things would be handled
by that committee. Kind of like shareholders and board/executives of
a company.
Jason
On Mar 28, 9:36 am, Bryan Bishop <kanz...@gmail.com> wrote:
Bryan Bishop
> I assumed there'd be a tribal council where people get voted off the
> co-op?
Only once a week, most likely on a Tuesday when the ratings will be
their highest.
> Seriously though, I think it'd be nice to see a charter of some
> sort.
>
> I assume there'd be some sort of operational committee to make day to
> day decisions? Would the composition be voted on? I'm guessing big
> decisions would be voted on, but operational things would be handled
> by that committee. Kind of like shareholders and board/executives of
> a company.
I have an alternative to suggest. While I agree that super big
decisions should be voted on by members (since it's a co-op after
all), committees don't sound like a good idea unless they are formed
in the sense of committees in the U.S. government (in which they
investigate and write up a report on something). What about appointing
individuals for different positions from within the co-op in general
elections?
I have become increasingly enamored by the structure of Debian:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debian
http://debian.org/
They are not a co-op, but their actual structure doesn't seem to be
that much different, except that it's non-profit and there's nothing
to distribute back to the members (other than the debian software
distribution itself, which is both libre software and free software
anyway).
--------------------------------
The Debian Project is governed by the Debian Constitution and the
Social Contract which set out the governance structure of the project
as well as explicitly stating that the goal of the project is the
development of a free operating system.[8][9] Debian is developed by
over one thousand volunteers from around the world and supported by
donations through several non-profit organizations around the world.
Most important of these is Software in the Public Interest,[10] the
owner of the Debian trademark and umbrella organization for various
other community free software projects.[11]
Thus, the Debian Project is an independent decentralized organization;
it is not backed by a company like some other GNU/Linux distributions
such as Ubuntu, openSUSE, Fedora, and Mandriva. The cost of developing
all the packages included in Debian 4.0 etch (283 million lines of
code), using the COCOMO model, has been estimated to be close to US$13
billion.[12] As of April 2, 2009, Ohloh estimates that the codebase of
the Debian GNU/Linux project (45 million lines of code), using the
COCOMO model, would cost about US$819 million to develop.[13]
....
The Debian Project is a volunteer organization with three foundational
documents:
* The Debian Social Contract defines a set of basic principles by
which the project and its developers conduct affairs.[9]
* The Debian Free Software Guidelines define the criteria for
"free software" and thus what software is permissible in the
distribution, as referenced in the Social Contract. These guidelines
have also been adopted as the basis of the Open Source Definition.
Although it can be considered a separate document for all practical
purposes, it formally is part of the Social Contract.[9]
* The Debian Constitution describes the organizational structure
for formal decision-making within the Project, and enumerates the
powers and responsibilities of the Debian Project Leader, the Debian
Project Secretary, and the Debian Developers generally.[8]
Currently, the project includes more than a thousand developers. Each
of them sustains some niche in the project, be it package maintenance,
software documentation, maintaining the project infrastructure,
quality assurance, or release coordination. Package maintainers have
jurisdiction over their own packages, although packages are
increasingly co-maintained. Other tasks are usually handled by the
domain of smaller, more collaborative groups of developers.
The project maintains official mailing lists and conferences for
communication and coordination between developers.[30] For issues with
single packages or domains, a public bug tracking system is used by
developers and end-users. Informally, Internet Relay Chat channels
(primarily on the OFTC and freenode networks) are used for
communication among developers and users as well.
Together, the Developers may make binding general decisions by way of
a General Resolution or election. All voting is conducted by
Cloneproof Schwartz Sequential Dropping, a Condorcet method of voting.
A Project Leader is elected once per year by a vote of the Developers;
in April 2008, Steve McIntyre was voted into this position, succeeding
Sam Hocevar. The Debian Project Leader has several special powers, but
this power is far from absolute and is rarely used. Under a General
Resolution, the Developers may, among other things, recall the leader,
reverse a decision by him or his delegates, and amend the constitution
and other foundational documents.
The Leader sometimes delegates authority to other developers in order
for them to perform specialized tasks. Generally this means that a
leader delegates someone to start a new group for a new task, and
gradually a team gets formed that carries on doing the work and
regularly expands or reduces their ranks as they think is best and as
the circumstances allow.
A role in Debian with a similar importance to the Project Leader's is
that of a Release Manager. Release Managers set goals for the next
release, supervise the processes, and make the final decision as to
when to release.[31][32]
--------------------------------
I also strongly suggest that we too come up with similar documents- a
constitution outlining how we're organizing and voting structure, and
perhaps an analogous "co-op social contract" that guides members and
serves as a guide towards excellence in our actions. Andrew has also
put in tremendous effort into the Pink Army business plan document.
The Debian Free Software Guidelines could also be used as a place to
start to help maintain Pink Army's overall integrity when it comes to
questions of whether or not something is open source.
Debian Social Contract: http://www.debian.org/social_contract
Debian Free Software Guidelines:
http://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines
or: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debian_Free_Software_Guidelines
FAQ for the community when those articles were being drafted:
http://people.debian.org/~bap/dfsg-faq.html
Jason Lau
of clinical, head of regulatory, head of communications, head of
whatjamajigers through elections. That's what I meant for an
executive committee. Of course that assumes the membership base has
people with the appropriate backgrounds. If not, outside expertise
would be needed. Personally, I'm not up to date in my whatjamajigers.