Themes, lessons and further research

This chapter summarizes the principal themes arising from the case studies, deriving lessons from the varied experiences, analysing both the extent to which consumer co-operatives in differing contexts have been successful in implementing strategic renewal, and why this was the case. In addition, it provides directions for further research into this complex area, seeking fresh opportunities to extend our study and integrate it with the strategic renewal literature. The central point arising from this discussion is that the relationship between membership motivation and consumer co-operative efforts at strategic renewal is by no means clear. Indeed, there is an urgent need to conduct much more research into the issue of member motivations, as well as the most appropriate structures to adopt in order to incentivize membership. It is interesting that in the South Korean, Japanese and Italian cases, at least some of the strategic renewal initiatives display a membership activism dimension, suggesting that members are not entirely passive.