“Rethinking co-operatives: From local to global and from the past to the future”
8-10 July 2020, Athens Greece
Organizer and local partners
The ICA CCR European Research Conference 2020 will be held in Athens, from the 8th until the 10th of July at the Panteion University of Social and Political Sciences.
The conference is organized by the ICA CCR Europe Research Board and hosted with the support of five Universities, two National Research Centers and an educational cooperative, which bring together academics and researchers working on Co-operatives in Greece.
Main theme and suggested topics
The Blueprint for a Co-operative Decade of the ICA sets out a strategy plan with a number of ambitious goals to be achieved by 2020. The latter highlights -in many instances- the importance of safeguarding the cooperative identity, as well as encouraging the cooperation between cooperatives. Nevertheless, as we are approaching the end of the Co-operative Decade, how to maintain a common cooperative identity which is inclusive to both traditional and emerging cooperatives, while strengthening their network capacities in local, regional, and global level, still remains an open question. To address the aforementioned challenges, new strategic visions for cooperatives need to be explored and debated.
For this reason, following the main theme of the Berlin Conference in 2019 on cooperatives and the transformation of business and societies, the 2020 ICA CCR European Research Conference chose as its main theme: “Rethinking cooperatives: From local to global and from the past to the future” and invites scholars, practitioners and policy makers to reflect critically upon the evolution of the cooperative model over the years, the challenges that it has successfully addressed and those that remain unanswered, as well as the need to both evolve and adapt to new conditions, while maintaining a common cooperative identity.
Based on the above perspective, the conference aims to address a wide range of topics of the cooperative movement’s development through time and location from different scientific fields and traditions, including – among others:
Agricultural cooperatives
Consumer cooperatives
Cooperative governance
Cooperative law and public policies
Cooperative management
Cooperative networks and territorial and rural development
Cooperative resilience and sustainability
Cooperatives and climate change
Cooperatives and social and solidarity economy
Cooperatives and sustainable development goals
Cooperatives and the commons
Emerging types of cooperatives (e.g. cooperative platforms)
Financial and banking cooperatives
History of the cooperative movement.
Innovation in Cooperative education
Measuring the cooperative impact
Producer Cooperatives
Social Cooperatives
Statistics on cooperatives
Worker cooperatives
Thematic/topics are NOT exclusive and shall be re-defined based on the received submissions.
Details for individual presentations, self-organized sessions and workshops
1. Participants interested in presenting their work in the form of individual paper (or poster) are kindly invited to:
submit an abstract of a maximum of 300 words before the 31th of January 2020,
indicate whether the submitted abstract is related to a poster, paper or session
send the abstract at submissionsathens2020@gmail.com mentioning as the email’s subject “ICA ATHENS 2020 Abstract Submission”
2. Participants interested in organizing a parallel session are kindly invited to:
submit a proposal (max. 1000 words), in which the contributors, the contents, the number of presentations are mentioned and the abstracts are included.
send the proposal at submissionsathens2020@gmail.com mentioning as the email’s subject “ICA ATHENS 2020 Session proposal” before the 15th of January 2020
Young Scholars’ Event
At the first day of the conference a dedicated workshop will be organized for young scholars, in order to cultivate and enhance an interdisciplinary collaboration between projects. In case of available funding, the recipients shall be invited to contribute to the conference with a paper or poster presentation.
Important dates
Local Hosting Partners
The host organizer of the conference is the Panteion University of Social and Political Sciences with the support of the Post Graduate Programme (M.Sc.) of the Hellenic Open University on Social and Solidarity Economy, the National Centre for Social Research, the Institute for the Research and Study of Cooperatives, the Agricultural University of Athens, the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, the University of Western Macedonia and the educational non-profit cooperative “People’s University of Social and Solidarity Economy”.
Organizing Committee
Chair
Theodosia Anthopoulou, Panteion University and Hellenic Open University (President of the Academic Committee of the M.Sc on SSE)
Members (in alphabetical order):
Adam Sofia, Heinrich Böll Stiftung and Hellenic Open University
Alexopoulos Yiorgos, Agricultural University of Athens and Hellenic Open University
Birlarakis Vasilis, Federation of Cooperatives of Pharmacist of Greece
Douvitsa Ifigeneia, Democritus University of Thrace and Hellenic Open University
Giagnocavo, Cynthia, ICA CCR European Board, University of Almería, COEXPHAL-UAL Chair in Agricultural, Cooperative Studies and Sustainable Development.
Gritzas Giorgos, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and Hellenic Open University (Member of the Academic Committee of the M.Sc on SSE)
Iliopoulos Constantine, Agricultural Economics Research Institute (AGRERI), Greece & Leibniz Institute of Agricultural Development in Transition Economies (IAMO), Germany
Karafolas Symeon, University of Western Macedonia
Kassavetis Demosthenis, Democritus University of Thrace
Kavoulakos Κarolos, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and Hellenic Open University (Member of the Academic Committee of the M.Sc on SSE)
Klimi-Κaminari Οlia, Panteion University of Social and Political Sciences
Kouki Chara, Hellenic Open University
Mitropoulou Anna, Institute for the Research and Study of Cooperatives, ISEM
Nikolaidou Sofia, Hellenic Open University and Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
Nikolaou Kostas, UnivSSE Coop (President) and Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
Novkovic, Sonja, ICA CCR Global Chair, St. Mary´s University, Nova Scotia, Canada.
Ntrinias Theodoros, Hellenic Open University
Oikonomou, Andreas, UnivSSE Coop (Vice President of Research) and School of Pedagogical and Technological Education
Papafilippou Aspa, UnivSSE Coop (Vice President of Education)
Petas Dimitris, Panteion University and Hellenic Open University
Tournavitis Panagiotis, Cooperative Bank of Karditsa
Tzouvelekas Manolis, Panteion University of Social and Political Sciences
Vathi-Sarava Panagiota, Hellenic Open University and University of Patras
Vikas Ioannis, Institute for the Research and Study of Cooperatives
