VAWMA is a new workers organization in Owen Sound and Monday evening they're holding their first of four public meetings this month at the Community Incubator.
From their media release:
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VAWMA, a new workers organization launching in Owen Sound, is hosting their first of four public meetings and has invited John Restakis, author of Humanizing the Economy: Co-operatives in the Age of Capital as a keynote for the first event.
“For every dollar the boss makes, I make a dime” is a phrase we’ve all heard but there’s a new, local organization looking to change this dynamic and offer a different way of doing business – as a co-operative. The Voluntary Association for Work and Mutual Aid, or VAWMA for short, is a growing collective of local residents who have been focused on building tools and support for this different type of business model and they’re ready to host the first in a series of public meetings being held on Mondays in November.
“We’re so excited to bring this idea to the public,” shared James Harris who has been leading the group of volunteers who make up VAWMA. “As a society, we’ve proven that we can work together well-enough, we’re just proposing that we do the work now without a boss.” When asked about the inaugural event, James went on to say, “I’m excited that we’re having John Restakis to speak at our first event. He’s had a profound influence on our movement via his book, Humanizing the Economy.”
VAWMA, as an organization, has been growing over the years, gathering individuals interested in exploring the ideas of how they will organize their businesses, what they'll produce, and how the profits will be distributed amongst everyone who helped make them. VAWMA is a proposal for how working people can pool their resources to create businesses that will pay fair and living wages while giving workers control over things like their schedules, work environment, and organizational structure.
To this end, VAWMA is pleased to have invited John Restakis, author of Humanizing the Economy: Co-operatives in the Age of Capital, to share his expertise and understanding of the history of the Co-operative movement the world over. As noted on the publishers website, “Humanizing the Economy shows how cooperative models for economic and social development can create a more equitable, just, and humane future. With over 800 million members in 85 countries and a long history linking economic to social values, the co-operative movement is the most powerful grassroots movement in the world.”
The first in a series of four meetings being held on Monday evenings this November will be happening on the 7th, from 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m., at the Community Incubator located at 279 10th St. E., Owen Sound.
For more details and to learn more about VAMWA, visit their website or follow them on Facebook. You can RSVP to the meeting here.
The Voluntary Association for Work and Mutual Aid (VAWMA) is an organization focused on incubating cooperative owned businesses while creating a forum for Mutual Aid networking.
John Restakis is a program manager at Community Evolution and former executive director of the British Columbia Co-operative Association in Vancouver, a position he held for sixteen years. His experience also includes time as an adjunct professor at the Centre for Sustainable Community Development, Simon Fraser University, British Columbia. His professional background includes community organizing, adult and popular education, and co-op development. He does consulting work on international co-op and community economic development projects, researches and teaches on co-operative economies and the social economy, and lectures widely on the subject of globalization, regional development, and alternative economics.
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source: media release, VAMWA
