workers cooperatives and local economic development

Worker cooperatives are enterprises owned by employees who are sharing the decision taking. This form of enterprises is an old one in Europe but the recent crisis has underlined their capacity of resilience. Furthermore, worker cooperatives are non purchasable and non relocatable. So, it has given to this companies a new notoriety and created some interest from medias, politicians and researchers. This article will give an overview of the importance of workers cooperative in different regions in three countries of Europe: Emilia-Romagna (Italy), Basque region (Spain), West of France. The choice of these regions is based on the weight of worker cooperatives compared to other regions in their country. An analysis of the key success factors is tried in order to understand why worker cooperatives developed more in these regions.