WP 61 | 13 Social entrepreneurship in Croatia: a framework for development

Social entrepreneurship in Croatia is a rather new phenomenon and is still poorly developed. The paper continues on from the findings of the author’s PhD research and its intention is to provide an understanding of the socio-economic, political and cultural context in which social entrepreneurship emerges, as well as an overview of the current stage of its development in Croatia. Read More

WP 60 | 13 The degree of awareness of the Small Business Act and industrial policy measures and the recent economic performance of Italian cooperative enterprises: key findings from a qualitative survey

This work, based on a qualitative survey regarding a representative sample of 1,000 micro, small and medium-sized enterprises, sought to identify the degree of entrepreneurs' knowledge about the Small Business Act (SBA) and recent industrial policy measures, as well as to analyze their most recent economic performance and the main competitiveness factors, both internal and external. Read More

WP 59 | 13 Exploring the performance of social cooperatives during the economic crisis: the italian case

By developing a multiple factor analysis (MFA), this paper aims at deepening the understanding of the economic performance and the employment features of social cooperatives in 2008 (before the crisis) and 2011 (after the beginning of the crisis) in order to better understand how the employment and economic performances of such organisations have changed during the years of the economic crisis. Read More

WP 53 | 13 Worldwide regulation of co-operative societies – an Overview

The main part of this paper is concerned with describing the legal models of cooperative societies from different perspectives: (a) by origin, (b) by type of cooperative, and (c) by continent. Conclusions are drawn on international guidelines for good cooperative law around a common core-the International Cooperative Alliance (ICA) Declaration of Cooperative Identity. Read More

WP 52 | 13 Collective institutions towards habitability: roles, strategies and forms of governance

The goal of this paper is to apply the theory of commons to residential contexts and verify if and how collective institutions can be used to produce habitability, i.e. a set of particular socio-environmental conditions conducive to inhabiting a particular area. While most literature on the study of the commons has a specific focus on the management of natural resources, this paper argues that collective institutions can work also in urban contexts. Read More

WP 51 | 13 The performance of service cooperatives during the crisis: an analysis during 2009-2011

This research, conducted using the traditional method of financial statement indices, concerns the economic and financial performance achieved in the years 2009-2011 by 30 worker cooperatives in the service sector. The cooperatives investigated are medium-sized (turnover 30-50 million euros) and large (turnover over 50 million euros). The results obtained support the thesis that cooperatives exhibit strong resilience in the face of the economic crisis. Read More

WP 50 | 13 Impact of agricultural cooperatives on smallholders’ technical efficiency: evidence from Ethiopia

Using household survey data from Ethiopia, this paper evaluates the impact of agricultural cooperatives on smallholders’ technical efficiency. We utilize propensity score matching to compare the average difference in technical efficiency between cooperative farmers and similar independent farmers. The approach assumes exogenous cooperative formation and similar farm technology across households. Read More