D. PARTICIPATORY STRUCTURE

IN' LAKESH, Mayan meaning 'I am another yourself'. How can representative structures, organisational, business or parliaments be structured so as to distinguish diverse stakeholders, valorise their ongoing contributions, recognise lifetimes of progressive ownership and acumen, facilitate election of representatives, integrate collective intelligence and be open to continual renewal? 

See also Section C. RELATIONAL ECONOMY 3) SHARING OUR LIVELIHOOD for accounting and structure

INDIGENE, Sharing our Livelihood with Community Ecological-Economic Participation (see attachment below)

Guidelines for incorporation and bylaws based in indigenous organisational and economic traditions.  Four accounting modules are described for contributions of 1. Founder (organisation & resouces), 2. Worker (labour & expertise), 3. Supplier (goods & services) and 4. Consumer (patronage & resources) members and organisation of their distinguished Associations.  Each of these gifts are complementary parts of a whole economy.  When planned together they create a gyroscope of secure economy.

ORIGINS

The participatory model was developed from 22 years of experience in Dukobour, Mennonite, Quaker and First Nation pacifist communities, reflections on the teachings of elders from these communities, the Natural Food Cooperative Networks of British Columbia BC (1969 - 80) and Quebec (1980 - 1991) and involvement in creating multi-stakeholder investment and management participation in a network of BC Pulp and Paper companies.  Participatory governance is as well used by some of the most productive Keiretsu (eg Toyota), Chaebol (Korea), Associative Economic (Europe) and Participatory (everywhere) companies in the world.

PACIFIST COMMUNITIES

A Dukobour contact George Podmorov originally born in Russia pointed out that the originators of the 3 pacifist communities were originally urban-based and organised in response to militarism in their societies.  This militarism had developed over thousands of years.  As the anabaptist pacifist communities formed and retreated to rural settings eventually across the oceans, they lost important cultural contexts and roles in their cities and societies.  The most pressing need for pacifist naturalism is in the urban society.  George pointed out their inabilities to continue working together over decades.  The Dukobours who came to Canada in 1899 for example by 1950 had built some one billion dollars worth of ecological  community homes, water systems, bridges, orchards, food production facilities, jam, brick and clothes factories, saw mills, transportation, education and health infrastructure and facilities.  Yet by that time with all that was needed to sustain rich lives, frustration with the one-member / one-vote co-ops which formed the community economies, led many then most to seek work outside in polluting resource exploitation 'English' economies of mines, refineries and pulp-mills such as Cominco and Canadian Cellulose CANCEL.

PARTICIPATORY INDUSTRY

Working at the local CANCEL pulp mill during the 1970s, Douglas Jack, a quality control technician, helped start a union-based Pollution Control committee and write about participatory methods of involvement.  Fellow Dukobour and Mennonite co-workers pointed to a successful Quebec mill called Tembec in Temiscaming from 1976, where workers, managers, townspeople, suppliers and governments bought the closing mill from Canadian International Paper CIP and turned it into a multi-stakeholder investment ownership participatory company (one-share / one-vote) with proportional limits to ownership.  Tembec grew across Canada and the USA as well as Central America and France to 55 forest product mills each with multiple stakeholder investment and participation on Company boards of directors.

COOPERATIVES

As Food Co-op working and supply members understood the failure of our mostly consumer (with some worker co-ops) co-ops to animate some 500,000 members, our resources, motivate participants, work collaboratively across multiple stakeholder groups (Founders, Workers, Suppliers and Consumers) and  employ the tens of thousands of suppliers, buying groups, stores and warehouses which formed these networks, a small number of activists formed study groups on Indigenous Economy considering the string-shell (Wampum and Quipu economic systems of First Nations in the Americas).  This study pointed to participatory multi-stakeholder systems with Time-Based Human Resource Accounting foundations.

INDIGENE SHARING LIVELIHOOD, ELECTION OVERVIEW PDF on Four Stakeholder, 1. Founder, 2. Worker, 3. Supplier, 4. Consumer  Person Hour Share PHS Voting Affiliation / Delegation process to Director Representatives.  Each share is represented by specific Directors answerable to members and their stakeholder Associations and Caucuses.  Standard corporate governance is based on majority voting and elections where 'Winner Takes-All' rules.  However through indigenous practices of 'caucusing' (Iroquois = 'grouping of like-interests') and prioritised voting, shareholding stakeholders can all find representatives and ongoing dialogues with them for their specific complementary interests.  In this Participatory model below, stakeholders each contribute their own unique gifts economically and earn Person Hour Shares, which they use to vote for specific representatives, who carry these voices at the board level of each association.  There are proportional limitations on how many shares each member may hold (minimum and maximum) in each Association.  Senior shares in Worker, Supplier and Consumer Associations are given options to transfer to the Founder / Fund Association.  Some representatives carry more shares and thus more votes than others.  Please read the Indigene Sharing our Livelihood with Community Ecological-Economic Participation corporate and association bylaws for specific structures as well as member rights and responsibilities.

La Formule coopératif renouvellée résumé en française.

The following is an example of a collaborative structure,

INDIGENE, SHARING OUR LIVELIHOOD WITH COMMUNITY ECOLOGICAL-ECONOMIC PARTICIPATION

AFFILIATIVE VOTING by PERSON HOUR SHARE

12.0 GENERAL ELECTIONS     Page 50.

An OVERVIEW of ELECTION Process

INDIGENE COMMUNITY Corporation.

CONSUMER

I = Household VOTING MEMBER. Consumer Caucus member have varying PHS.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII      /     IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII     /     IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

DIRECTOR                                                                 DIRECTOR                                                    DIRECTOR

CONSUMER CAUCUSES

I = WORKER

Caucus members have varying PHS

IIIIIIII   IIIIIIII   IIIIIIIIII

DIRECTOR     DIRECTOR     DIRECTOR

WORKER CAUCUSES

I = SUPPLIER

Caucus members have varying PHS

IIIIIIII   IIIIIIIIIIIIIIII   IIIIIIIIII

DIRECTOR     DIRECTOR                       DIRECTOR

SUPPLIER CAUCUSES

I = FUNDMEMBER

Caucus members have varying PHS

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII   IIIIIIIIIIIIIII   IIIIIII 

DIRECTOR                         DIRECTOR                    DIRECTOR

FUND CAUCUSES

PHS represent diverse stakeholder contributions accounted for in member accounts.

Experience, expertise & decision-making acumen affiliate to specific directors.

Members delegate Person Hour Shares PHS votes to three 3 Directors from each Association who carry the voting weight of affiliated votes.

CONSUMER:   DIRECTOR,  DIRECTOR,  DIRECTOR 

WORKER:        DIRECTOR,  DIRECTOR,  DIRECTOR

SUPPLIER:      DIRECTOR,  DIRECTOR,  DIRECTOR

FOUNDER:      DIRECTOR,  DIRECTOR,  DIRECTOR

Three Directors vote/choose with their affiliated / delegated PHS for Association President, Secretary, Treasurer Executive Posts in each:

Association Executive

CONSUMER:    PRESIDENT  SECRETARY  TREASURER

WORKER:         PRESIDENT  SECRETARY  TREASURER

SUPPLIER:       PRESIDENT  SECRETARY  TREASURER

FOUNDER:        PRESIDENT SECRETARY  TREASURER

Association Directors convene as a

CORPORATE BOARD of twelve 12 DIRECTORS

DIRECTOR  DIRECTOR  DIRECTOR

DIRECTOR  DIRECTOR  DIRECTOR

DIRECTOR  DIRECTOR  DIRECTOR

DIRECTOR  DIRECTOR  DIRECTOR

Corporate Directors vote with affiliated / delegated PHS for

                              CORPORATE EXECUTIVE of three 3: 

                            PRESIDENT  SECRETARY  TREASURER