Creating Opportunities through the Inclusion of Workers with Special Needs in Worker Cooperatives

Research on cooperativism is at the core of some of the most recent advancements in the analysis of alternative forms of organisation of the economy. This work presents the results of an in depth analysis of the features underpinning a concrete case study of a cooperative that provides employment opportunities to workers with special needs. The cooperative Mol Matric located in Spain was created in 1982 to dedicate their activity to the manufacture of dies and tools for the automobile industry. Taking into account the previous developments in qualitative research on coopeartivism, this work identifies the ways in which Mol Matric contributes to improve the inclusion of workers with special needs in the labour market. The qualitative fieldwork was developed on the basis of the communicative methodology, which has been published in two special issues of the ranked journal Qualitative Inquiry. As a result, this work provides evidence of the barriers faced by the cooperative in times of crisis and how to overcome such difficulties facilitating change and promoting the inclusion of workers with special needs. The investigation of this cooperative is framed in the line of research of competitive cooperativism and the study of successful cooperativist actions (Springer, 2017), which has achieved social impact in diverse contexts providing effective solutions to current societal challenges.

Soler, M. (2017). Achieving Social Impact. Sociology in the Public Sphere. Springer: Switzerland.