Faces of Governance of Production Cooperatives: An Exploratory Study of Ten French Cooperatives

One of the main characteristics of French worker cooperatives is the principle of collective entrepreneurship. The aim of this article is to understand how it is applied, and in particular how the board of directors and the managing director work together. To answer this question, an exploratory study focused on ten French worker cooperatives in 1998 and 1999, during which we conducted interviews with their managing directors. The results show that three forms of collective entrepreneurship can be distinguished and that these forms depend on the context and the management of these worker cooperatives. Copyright CIRIEC, 2004.