Definition of Purpose
People's Food Cooperative of Ann Arbor (PFC) is BROKEN. It is no longer what a cooperative is ideally and it is drifting farther and farther from those ideals. Perhaps that drift is not of its own making, since the organic food movement has been co-opted by Whole Foods, Arbor Farms and a slew of online commercial mail-order companies. So what the People's Food Cooperative used to be, an innovative alternative for a profit-driven, overly capitalist society, has fallen away as its product category has been snatched into the mainstream.
I contend that the creation of a natural food coop in the 1970s was more than just the creation of a way to get cheaper food by joining together to buy in bulk. The culture of the 1970s which was behind the cooperative drive, not just in creating food cooperatives but in creating living cooperatives as well, was countercultural and innovative in its visions. Given that, the PFC of 2005 is broken because it is no longer countercultural, it is no longer innovative, and it has succumbed to the very market forces it tried to speak out against with its very existence 30+ years ago.
This blog is to outline and explore both the particular ways PFC is broken in regard to that vision and to offer up solutions. This is a blog because I want to facilitate that conversation but I don't want to monopolize it. I want the community of PFC members, PFC employees, PFC Board of Directors members, and PFC management to be a part of this conversation: agreeing, disagreeing, adding suggestions.
I also invite the wider community of Ann Arbor and of those interested in cooperatives and the state of food in America and globally to comment on this, because the statements that PFC makes with its purchases, its vocal stands, and its community activism are directed at you. But I think its forgotten that.
I contend that the creation of a natural food coop in the 1970s was more than just the creation of a way to get cheaper food by joining together to buy in bulk. The culture of the 1970s which was behind the cooperative drive, not just in creating food cooperatives but in creating living cooperatives as well, was countercultural and innovative in its visions. Given that, the PFC of 2005 is broken because it is no longer countercultural, it is no longer innovative, and it has succumbed to the very market forces it tried to speak out against with its very existence 30+ years ago.
This blog is to outline and explore both the particular ways PFC is broken in regard to that vision and to offer up solutions. This is a blog because I want to facilitate that conversation but I don't want to monopolize it. I want the community of PFC members, PFC employees, PFC Board of Directors members, and PFC management to be a part of this conversation: agreeing, disagreeing, adding suggestions.
I also invite the wider community of Ann Arbor and of those interested in cooperatives and the state of food in America and globally to comment on this, because the statements that PFC makes with its purchases, its vocal stands, and its community activism are directed at you. But I think its forgotten that.
posted by Solomon at 9:40 PM
1 Comments:
Solomon,
As a PFC member and hard-core co-oper, I support any constructive discussion of flaws and potential solutions in our institutions, and look forward to seeing what you have to say. Looks like you're off to a good start.
Let me make two requests in the meantime:
1. The first person I mentioned the name of this blog to replied, "My god, do they have to dump all over everything?!" You're going to inevitably get the question, over and over, "Why do you hate PFC so much?" Be prepared to answer, over and over, "No, I _love_ PFC, which is why I care enough to do this!" and take pains to make that clear throughout. (So far, so good, imho.) There's a tragically fine line in the blogworld between critique hopefully leading to improvement and making people say, "Yeah! PFC suxorz! I'll never shop there again!"
2. Could you enable comments by people without blogger accounts? Is there an option to allow people to post a name and non-blogger url but not to allow totally anonymous comments? I understand the motivation behind not allowing anonymous comments, but a blogger account is hardly an accountable identity, and I think that forcing that step will discourage some readers from participating.
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