The International Co-operative Alliance is inviting co-operators from all over the world contribute ideas and help draft Guidance Notes for the 1995 Co-operative Principles.
The initiative was designed to strengthen the co-operative difference by shaping the pillar of Identity, one of the five themes of the Blueprint for a Co-operative Decade.
At the Alliance’s General Assembly in Manchester in October 2012, delegates agreed to award a mandate to the Principles Committee to put together contemporary interpretation aids for the 1995 Co-operative Principles.
By drafting the Guidance Notes the Principles Committee aims to provide guidance on the Co-operative Principles (as articulated in the Statement of the Co-operative Identity) and establish the irreducible core of each Principle and implicitly the co-operative identity.
The approach will consist in comparing the principles to historical doctrine and the realities encountered by co-operatives around the globe so that co-operative principles can be applied even more broadly.
Draft Guidance Notes for Principles 3 (Member Economic Participation), 5 (Education, Training and Information) and 7 (Concern for Community) are available online.
Co-operators are invited to send their comments on the substance of these draft Guidance Notes to Hanan El-youssef, Strategy Manager at elyoussef@ica.coop by 15 May 2014.
