Conference 2025

The 2025 theme for United Nations International Year of Co-operatives theme  ‘Co-operatives Build a Better World’ puts a spotlight on how the co-operative model 'is an essential solution to overcome many global challenges and continues to play an important role in accelerating efforts to implement the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030'. Consequently, the joint conference between the UK Society for Co-operative Studies and the Society for Co-operative Studies in Ireland held in Belfast offered an excellent opportunity to bring co-operative knowledge and insights from across Ireland and Britain to understand how our movement plays a prominent role in this work, at an important moment in the development of the movement across these islands. 

The conference brought together a wide range of academics, policymakers, and practitioners to address a number of key issues from co-operative histories, worker co-operatives and workplace democracy, international co-operation, social economy enterprises and organisations, housing, education, sustainable development, agriculture, community-led models, and the importance of place.

Keynote speakers included:

• Dr Caoimhe Archibald, MLA - Northern Ireland Economy Minister
• Paul Gerrard, Campaigns, Public Affairs/Board Secretariat Director at the Co-op Group
• Linda Ervine, MBE, founder and manager of Turas, a cross-community language project based in East Belfast
• Cliff Mills, consultant working with Anthony Collins, a specialist law firm based in England

Patrick Doyle, Chair of SCSI: "The conference showcased the vibrancy and diversity of the co-operative movement across Ireland and Britain. There is much we can learn from each other. At a time of multiple overlapping crises around housing, climate, and the future of democracy, it is vital that we advocate for co-operative solutions to these challenges."