L’Université coopérative européenne (UCE)

Université coopératve européenne (UCE), which is a European network for cooperation, research and training in the social economy. “The UCE aims to mutualize, develop and promote cooperative practices through the production of knowledge that can be transmitted to social-economy volunteers, activists and professionals in order to improve individual and collective action.” (UCE Charter, www.universite-cooperative.coop). This special feature has three articles.

Jean-François Draperi, a former colleague of Henri Desroche at the Collège coopératif (Paris) and the Université coopérative internationale, participated in the first Leonardo program, which conducted a survey of social-economy courses and training programs in Europe. The study (“The Université coopérative européenne in perspective”) looked at the precursors to the UCE and, in particular, the similarities and differences with the projects developed by Henri Desroche. The issue raised in this article concerns designing a place for knowledge production and cooperative teaching methods specific to the social economy. There is clearly a wealth of resources that are underutilized.

Maurice Parodi, president of the Collège coopératif in the Provence-Alpes-Méditerranée (PACA) region and former president of the Réseau des hautes études des pratiques sociales (RHEPS), presents the UCE project and its accomplishments (“The UCE: Cooperative teaching methods in action”). One of the most important contributions has been designing teaching methods based upon cooperative principles. Pooling knowledge for sharing is central to the project, and the concrete manifestation of this has been the creation of a resource center on the UCE campus. The resource center is intended for trainers in social-economy entrepreneurship. The UCE has successfully combined its cooperative teaching methods with distance learning.

Alain Penven, director of the Collège coopératif in Brittany, discusses the UCE network (“A network of social-economy trainers”). This presentation of the UCE network shows the contribution of a growing group of cooperative trainers and mentors. One of the UCE’s effects has been to stimulate the cooperative training of the people involved in the project. It has often been noted that there is inadequate attention to the social economy in traditional university programs. Teaching about the social economy is patchy and often depends on the activist commitment of researcher-teachers in different university departments. An interdisciplinary and international network, which could reinforce these initiatives and raise the profile of cooperative education, was needed. For this reason, Recma is delighted to take this opportunity to promote a project that unites the places providing social-economy education.