Resilient alliances: Portuguese cooperative movement in the transition to modern times (1867-1933)

Abstract

This article analyses the cooperative movement emergency in Portugal on the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, focusing the pre-modern legacy revealed in their promoters' social origin, as well as in the moral values and purposed objectives. It is based on a comprehensive review of cooperative societies' foundation acts and statutes and in the comparison between these latter with the pre-modern institutions for collective action written norms - the craft guilds regimentos (regulations) and the rural communities posturas (municipal ordinances). The available data allows one to sustain that the earliest cooperatives, following mutual-aid societies, were mainly created by the craft community, which was making use of cooperation to assure the continuity of ancient practices. The functions fulfilled by the craft guilds, the brotherhoods, the commons and other pre-modern institutions were overtooked by their modern counterparts in a process of institutional adjustment to the new political and legal framework. In this way, is argued that, despite the different nature of nineteen century voluntary associations movement, the resilience of self-governance, mutuality and social control has to be related to the previous centuries of corporate collective action.