The article presents a model of the formation process of new cooperatives, primarily based on studies of the Swedish organizational population. The predominance of pragmatically oriented cooperatives provides an opportunity to study the process's organizational aspects, in relative isolation from ideological factors and the impact of movements. Cooperative formation is seen as an act of collective entrepreneurship, and a key event in the process is the emergence and crystallization of a social bearer for the cooperative project. A review of concrete cases of cooperative formation points to the importance of a prior history, and suggests four bases for the definition of a social bearer: community, need, idea and enterprise. The article closes with a review of the implications of the model for waves of cooperative formation, and for the cooperative's continued life path.
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