ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the need for alternative paradigms, outlines an alternative framework for analyzing inner-city development, and provides cooperative enterprise development as a viable economic strategy for inner-city redevelopment. It also provides political economy as an appropriate tool in understanding socio-economic conditions in US cities, and explains its effectiveness in describing the relationship between corporate forms of business and the cooperative enterprises advocated for in the industrial policy of cooperative economics. Throughout the US and the world, thousands of cooperative firms produce goods and services for the market and provide social conditions and work opportunities capable of responding to human needs and developing human potential. The cooperative enterprise can be the cornerstone of a progressive urban revitalization strategy, but to date this model has been left out of the debate. The chapter reviews the ways in which conditions in industry can be enhanced with democratic ownership and governance.
