IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/trn/csnjrn/v8i1p65-83.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Structure and Performance of Italian Cooperatives: A Quantitative Analysis Based on Combined Use of Official Data

Author

Listed:
  • Carlo Borzaga

    (University of Trento; European Research Institute on Cooperative and Social Enterprises (Euricse), Trento, Italy)

  • Manlio Calzaroni

    (Expert in statistics; former Director at the Italian National Institute of Statistics (Istat), Rome, Italy)

  • Chiara Carini

    (European Research Institute on Cooperative and Social Enterprises (Euricse), Trento, Italy)

  • Massimo Lori

    (Italian National Institute of Statistics (Istat), Rome, Italy)

Abstract

Researchers and policymakers have identified the need to accurately and quantitatively evaluate cooperatives and their economic, social and employment effects, as well as their evolution over time, in a way that is as reliable as possible and not subject to interpretation. This need was also manifested in the adoption by the 20th International Conference of Labour Statisticians of the Guidelines Concerning Statistics of Cooperatives, which aim to facilitate the development of a set of statistics on cooperatives that can be compared at the international level. This study provides informative insights and analyses based on a unified statistical representation of the structure, economic performance and profiles of cooperatives—including cooperative groups— within the Italian economy. Through the integration of several official statistical data sources released by the Italian National Institute of Statistics with the Cooperative Register managed by the Ministry of Economic Development, on the one hand, the paper highlights the peculiarities of cooperatives compared to other companies; on the other, it deeply analyses the composition of the cooperative sector with respect to both economic and structural variables.

Suggested Citation

  • Carlo Borzaga & Manlio Calzaroni & Chiara Carini & Massimo Lori, 2019. "Structure and Performance of Italian Cooperatives: A Quantitative Analysis Based on Combined Use of Official Data," Journal of Entrepreneurial and Organizational Diversity, European Research Institute on Cooperative and Social Enterprises, vol. 8(1), pages 65-83.
    • Handle: RePEc:trn:csnjrn:v:8:i:1:p:65-83
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://jeodonline.com/jeod_articles/structure-and-performance-of-italian-cooperatives-a-quantitative-analysis-based-on-combined-use-of-official-data/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Cecilia NAVARRA & Elena VALLINO, 2015. "Who Had the Idea to Build Up a Village Organization? Some Evidence from Senegal and Burkina Faso," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 86(1), pages 33-72, March.
    2. Chiara Bentivogli & Eliana Viviano, 2012. "Changes in the Italian Economy: The Cooperatives," L'industria, Società editrice il Mulino, issue 3, pages 497-528.
    3. D. Joseph Stiglitz, 2009. "Moving Beyond Market Fundamentalism To A More Balanced Economy," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 80(3), pages 345-360, September.
    4. Federica VIGANO & Andrea SALUSTRI, 2015. "Matching profit and Non-profit Needs: How NPOs and Cooperative Contribute to Growth in Time of Crisis. A Quantitative Approach," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 86(1), pages 157-178, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Guido Caselli & Michele Costa & Flavio Delbono, 2022. "What do cooperative firms maximize, if at all? Evidence from Emilia‐Romagna in the pre‐Covid decade," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 93(4), pages 821-847, December.
    2. Michele Costa & Flavio Delbono, 2021. "The Italian Geography of Regional Resilience: The Role of Cooperative Firms," Working Papers wp1166, Dipartimento Scienze Economiche, Universita' di Bologna.
    3. Calabrese, Giuseppe Giulio & Falavigna, Greta, 2024. "Do social cooperatives stimulate social change? An investigation on Italian firms based on DEA-Malmquist approach," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 199(C).
    4. Flavio Delbono & Carlo Reggiani, 2024. "The Degeneration of Workers' Cooperatives under Endogenous Membership in Mixed Oligopoly," Working Papers wp1194, Dipartimento Scienze Economiche, Universita' di Bologna.
    5. Michele Costa & Flavio Delbono & Francesco Linguiti, 2023. "The performance of cooperative Vs capitalistic micro firms in the pandemic," Working Papers wp1187, Dipartimento Scienze Economiche, Universita' di Bologna.
    6. Carlo Borzaga & Chiara Carini & Ermanno Celeste Tortia, 2022. "Co‐operative enterprise anti‐cyclicality and the economic crisis: A comparative analysis of employment dynamics in Italy," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 93(3), pages 551-577, September.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Giuseppe Terzo, 2021. "Social capital, social economy and economic resilience of Italian provinces," Papers in Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 100(5), pages 1113-1135, October.
    2. Giuseppe Terzo, 2022. "Investigating the link between social cooperation sector and economic well‐being of Italian provinces through the lens of social capital," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 93(4), pages 1041-1062, December.
    3. Anne Musson & Damien Rousselière, 2020. "Exploring the effect of crisis on cooperatives: a Bayesian performance analysis of French craftsmen cooperatives," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 52(25), pages 2657-2678, May.
    4. Burger Ronelle & Owens Trudy & Prakash Aseem, 2018. "Global Non-Profit Chains and the Challenges of Development Aid Contracting," Nonprofit Policy Forum, De Gruyter, vol. 9(4), pages 1-12, December.
    5. Niels Hermes & Marek Hudon, 2018. "Determinants Of The Performance Of Microfinance Institutions: A Systematic Review," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 32(5), pages 1483-1513, December.
    6. Marcos Carchano & Inmaculada Carrasco & Ángela González, 2024. "Eco‐innovation and environmental performance: Insights from Spanish wine companies," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 95(2), pages 595-623, June.
    7. Fałkowski, Jan & Kurek, Przemysław J., 2024. "Religious symbols in the public sphere and development of the third sector: Some evidence from rural Poland," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(2), pages 495-508.
    8. Giuseppe Terzo & Giuseppe Notarstefano & Umberto Di Maggio, 2024. "Strengthening local economies through social capital: The role of cooperative firms in driving economic growth in Italy," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 95(3), pages 863-882, September.
    9. repec:ehu:cuader:69659 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. Ronelle Burger & Indraneel Dasgupta & Trudy Owens, 2015. "A Model of Nongovernmental Organization Regulation with an Application to Uganda," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 64(1), pages 71-111.
    11. Kibrom A. ABAY & Bethelhem KORU & Gashaw Tadesse ABATE & Guush BERHANE, 2019. "How Should Rural Financial Cooperatives Be Best Organized? Evidence From Ethiopia," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 90(1), pages 187-215, March.
    12. Perez, Marybel & von Schnurbein, Georg & Gehringer, Theresa, 2022. "Mitigating health policy fragmentation through interlocks. The networks between American and Swiss public-private partnerships," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 126(11), pages 1163-1172.
    13. Firas Farhan Jedi & Sabri Nayan, 2018. "An empirical evidence on the effect of women board representation on firm performance of companies listed in Iraq Stock Exchange," Business and Economic Horizons (BEH), Prague Development Center, vol. 14(1), pages 117-131, January.
    14. Gani ALDASHEV & Cecilia NAVARRA, 2018. "Development Ngos: Basic Facts," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 89(1), pages 125-155, March.
    15. Xiao-Min Yu & Ke Chen & Jin-Tong Liu, 2022. "Exploring How Organizational Capabilities Contribute to the Performance of Social Enterprises: Insights from China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(7), pages 1-20, April.
    16. Hermes, Cornelis & Hudon, M., 2018. "Determinants of the Performance of Microfinance Institutions: A Systematic Review," Research Report 2018008, University of Groningen, Research Institute SOM (Systems, Organisations and Management).
    17. Muhammad Mansoor Baig & Qaisar Ali Malik & Nazima Ellahi, 2024. "Corporate Governance and Credit Rating of Islamic Banks: Moderating Role of Shariah Governance Attributes," SAGE Open, , vol. 14(2), pages 21582440241, May.
    18. Md. Ali Rasel & Sandar Win, 2020. "Microfinance governance: a systematic review and future research directions," Journal of Economic Studies, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 47(7), pages 1811-1847, April.
    19. Gupta, Aparna & Owusu, Abena & Zou, Lei, 2021. "Identifying board of director network influence for firm characteristics," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 581(C).
    20. Federica VIGANÒ & Andrea SALUSTRI, 2019. "Partnering with Civil Society Organizations. The role of volunteers and not for profit organizations in the provision of welfare services," CIRIEC Working Papers 1910, CIRIEC - Université de Liège.
    21. Müller, Malte, 2020. "Leadership in agricultural machinery circles: experimental evidence from Tajikistan," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 64(2), April.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Italy; Cooperatives; Statistics; Economic and employment size; Innovation and digitalization;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C81 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Data Collection and Data Estimation Methodology; Computer Programs - - - Methodology for Collecting, Estimating, and Organizing Microeconomic Data; Data Access
    • J21 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Labor Force and Employment, Size, and Structure
    • P13 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Capitalist Economies - - - Cooperative Enterprises
    • J54 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor-Management Relations, Trade Unions, and Collective Bargaining - - - Producer Cooperatives; Labor Managed Firms

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:trn:csnjrn:v:8:i:1:p:65-83. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Barbara Franchini (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/euricit.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.