ABSTRACT
The Co-operative Stores, in the form that may be said to have started some sixty years ago, now represent, so far as Great Britain is concerned, the most flourishing side of the co-operative movement. The Rochdale Pioneers furnish the historic instance of expansion, because the circumstances of their humble origin are so well known, and because the part that their constitution and success have played in the subsequent development of the movement. The Royal Arsenal Society, at Woolwich, for instance, now the largest society in the south of England, and one of the largest in the country, began in 1868 on even a smaller scale, with twenty members and a trading capital of £7. The importances of a co-operative tradition and of local solidarity as aids, and of outside competition as a hindrance, are probably reflected in the differences in the average rates of dividends that are earned by the societies in the various geographical sections of the Co-operative Union.
