GERMANY - CO-OPERATIOK AND ASSOCIATION 



all in vSaxony. There on April ist., 1913, there were 13 central co-oper- 

 ative societies at work. 



As Dr. Rabe, the Managing Director of the Provincial Federation of the 

 Co-operative Societies of Saxony, was able to show at the International 

 Co-operative Congress held at Baden-Baden in May, 1912, neither in that 

 province were the objections against the legal form of the co-operative 

 society for such undertakings unheeded. But, since the communes and 

 districts held aloof, it did not seem fitting to call for the intervention of 

 private capitalists and so it was decided to have recourse to the co-operati\'e 

 form. It was thought also that, as this legal form, which is so widely 

 popular, had been adopted, the idea of the necessity and economic desir- 

 ability of using electric power would be more easily extended even to 

 the remotest agricultural centres. Besides, the federation was careful to 

 reduce the danger inherent in the democratic principle by wliich all the 

 members have equal right to vote in the general meeting, by entrusting the 

 board of management \\ ith a principal share in the work of the society. 

 And it endeavoured to correct the defects of the co-operative organ- 

 ization by inducing also the communes, districts and cities, to take part in 

 it. We shall have occasion later to speak of the results attained by these 

 large central co-operative societies. 



The number of small central societies of local character constituted 

 tinder the legal form of co-operative societies is greater. The statist- 

 ical return of the Prussian Central Co-operative Bank showed 66 of these 

 on January ist., 191T, and since then they must have considerably' in- 

 creased in number. 



But where the legal form of the co-operative society has found its 

 largest application is in the formation of societies for the distribution of 

 electric power from works already existing which limit themselves to 

 transmitting it to their own members by means of local and connecting 

 installations. However, in many cases, even the local and connecting in- 

 stallations are not established for their ov/n account by the large central 

 societies, and the local co-operative society for the distribution of elec- 

 tric power is only a society for the purchase of power and receives the cur- 

 rent in large quantity from the transformer, v/ hence it distributes it in 

 smaller quantity to its own members. 



Instead of forming special co-operative societies for the distribution 

 of power, it would be possible for the rural communes simpl3^ to associate as 

 such at the electric workshops. To arrange for so important and useful 

 a matter as the supply of electric power is without doubt amongst the duties 

 of the communal administrations and, in fact, rural and urban communes 

 have in various ways made provision in the matter. Their interven- 

 tion appears advisable also as guaranteeing a uniform and systematic 

 local installation, faciUtating the formation of the capital required, and 

 further assuring in advance a large number of consumers. It must, 

 therefore, in general, be affirmed, for the above economic and technical 

 reasons, that the direct adherence of the communes to the central societies 



