CALL FOR PAPERS
13th Conference of the
International Association for the Economics of Participation (IAFEP)
Mondragon University
(Basque Country, Spain)
13 – 15 July 2006*
Expanding Democratic Firms,
Broadening Economic Democracy


*Study tour of Mondragon cooperatives, July 12

 

(CONFERENCE WEBSITE)


The International Association for the Economics of Participation (IAFEP) is dedicated to exploring the economics of democratic and participatory economic organizations, such as labour-managed firms, cooperatives and firms with broad-based employee share-ownership, profit-sharing and worker participation schemes, as well as democratic nonprofit, community and social enterprises. The IAFEP Conferences, which take place every two years, provide an international forum for the presentation and debate of current research and scholarship on the economics of participation.


The major themes of the 2006 conference will be:
The incidence of democratic economic organizations in industrialised, transition and developing economies
The creation, growth and survival of employee-owned firms
Strategies for supporting the expansion of economic democracy
Issues facing expanding and transnational employee-owned firms
Participation and discriminated or marginalised groups
The evolution of employee ownership in transition economies
The development and (in)stability of employee share ownership in conventional firms
Financial instruments for cooperatives and employee-owned firms
The potential benefits of applied research for cooperative and employee-owned firms.


As in past IAFEP conferences, presentations in the following areas are welcome:
Worker participation
Self-management, labour-managed firms
Employee ownership
Co-determination
Cooperatives
Economic and industrial democracy
Profit sharing and stock options
Community and social enterprises.


Call for Papers
Submissions are invited from all relevant fields of study including comparative economic systems, industrial and labour economics, organisational studies, management studies, economic sociology, institutional economics, evolutionary economics, development economics and studies of economies in transition.


Abstracts (max. 400 words) in English should be sent by e-mail to iafep@leeds.ac.uk or by post to Virginie Pérotin, IAFEP, Leeds University Business School, Leeds LS2 9JT, UK, before 15 May 2006. Abstracts should include full details of institutional affiliation and e-mail and postal addresses.


Papers Complete drafts should reach us by 30 June 2006 in order to be included in the CD that will be handed out to Conference participants. Authors of research papers will have the option of submitting them for publication in Advances in the Economic Analysis of Participatory and Labor-Managed Firms after the conference.

 

Horvat-Vanek Prize
The Horvat-Vanek prize is awarded every two years for a research paper of exceptional quality written by a young scholar in one of the areas of interest to IAFEP. The prize, of a value of US$ 1,000, will be awarded during the conference.
In order to be considered for the prize, researchers and doctoral students aged 35 or under should submit one research paper in English (maximum length 10,000 words) by 15 May 2006 to iafep@leeds.ac.uk. Please include your institutional affiliation and an abstract, and indicate clearly on the paper that you wish it to be considered for the Horvat-Vanek prize (the recipient will be requested to provide a passport or other official evidence of their date of birth in order to receive the prize).


Practical Information
The conference will be taking place in Oñate (Basque Country, Spain), at a new conference facility next to the Arantzazu Basilica in an outlying neighbourhood in the mountains. There are 30 or 40 hotel rooms within 5 minutes of the conference centre. Other accommodation will be available in Oñate hotels and student residences, and a bus service will be to the conference centre.
The nearest sizeable airport is Bilbao, with connections to Madrid, Barcelona and the main European cities including London and Brussels. Flights are also available from certain places in Europe to smaller nearby cities such as Vitoria (Foronda airport), San Sebastian (Hondarribia airport), Santander and Biarritz, on the French side of the Basque Country. A bus will be organised on 11 and 12 July to take Conference participants from Bilbao airport to Oñate and Arantzazu, which is pretty complicated for visitors to find on their own.
Further information as well as registration for the conference, buses and accommodation is now available on the Conference website: http://www.eteo.mondragon.edu/IAFEP/IAFEP_en.php.


Conference fees:

• Academics and professionals from high income countries with institutional funding 300 euros
• Other academics and professionals 150 euros
• Students 50 euros

A small amount of funding is available for participants from developing and transition economies and students.

If you require funding to take part in the conference, please send a letter as soon as you can to iafep@leeds.ac.uk , along with your abstract, explaining what you require.

Abstracts: iafep@leeds.ac.uk (Virginie Pérotin, Leeds University Business School)
Conference organization: iafep2006-plan@eteo.mondragon.edu (Fred Freundlich, Mondragon University)

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