Building a solidarity economy in Jackson, Mississippi, anchored by a network of cooperatives and worker-owned, democratically self-managed enterprises.
News & Media
10 Year Anniversary Celebration Scenes
On Saturday, May 4, 2024 we celebrated 10 years of organizing for and building of the solidarity economy in Jackson, MS. Our 10th anniversary was on Wednesday, May 1, 2024, i.e. May Day or International Workers Day.
These pictures capture just snippets of the great day that we had that was filled with great food, great music, great company, and good politics.
Going forward, we need your support to ensure that the next decade is even more transformative and impactful than the first one. Please donate today and spread the word to your family, friends, comrades and cooperators!
Imagining Coop Universities with Columbia University Faculty and Staff
Kali Akuno of Cooperation Jackson and Bernard E. Harcourt reimagine the university as a multi-stakeholder cooperative of faculty, students, staff, and community on Wednesday, May 1, 2024.
Jackson Rising Redux Book NYC Book Launch at 1199 SEIU
The NYC book launch of PM Press' Jackson Rising Redux (2023), edited by Kali Akuno and Matt Meyer, was held at the main union hall of SEIU 1199 as a means of building new alliances across community-labor and geographic lines. Akuno and Meyer were joined by 1199 Vice President Shaywaal Amin, Cooperative Economics Alliance of NY co-director Maria Alex Garcia, 1199 senior advisor Bruce Richards, contributing author Sophie Gonick, and others.
Everything Co-Op Interview on Arts and Cooperatives within Cooperation Jackson
In honor of the 2024 Black History Month theme of African Americans and the Arts, Vernon interviews Kali Akuno, co-founder and Director and Cooperation Jackson. Vernon and Kali discuss new initiatives of Cooperation Jackson, and how the organization has used "the Arts" to inform and promote co-ops.
Conference on Worker Power and Economic Democracy: Keynote Address with Kali Akuno and Matt Meyer
Moderated by Benjamin Case, this Keynote Address from Kali Akuno and Matt Meyer-- editors of "Jackson Rising Redux: Lessons on Building the Future in the Present"-- was presented on Day One of the CWD Conference on Worker Power and Economic Democracy.
This event was held on Friday, February 23, 2024 at Arizona State University through the Center for Work and Democracy
Acting U.S. Labor Secretary pledges to enforce federal labor laws in Mississippi
Ed Inman, Special to the Mississippi Clarion Ledger
Article about the US Secretary of Labor, Julie Su, visit to Jackson, MS on Wednesday, February 14, 2021.
Cooperation Jackson played a critical role in helping to make this happen, via connections from the US Federation of Worker Cooperatives last Wednesday, February 14th. We thought it was critical to help advance our longstanding "union-cooperative" initiative, as part of our effort to unite and strengthen all of the tools in the toolkit of working class self-organization (respect to our comrade Tim Schermerhorn for this analysis and analogy, may he rest in power). It was a good time to reconnect with the various forces of the organized working class in Jackson, but we will see what the Labor Secretary can and will do in the days and months ahead to support the organizing efforts of workers in the state of Mississippi. Stay tuned.
Cooperation Jackson at 10: Lessons for Building a Solidarity Economy
Article written Steve Dubb for the Nonprofit Quarterly in January 2024. The story addresses some of the primary lessons learned by Cooperation Jackson in the decade it has been in existence from 2014 to the present.
Building the Future in the Present: Lessons from Cooperation Jackson.
Howard Zinn Book Fair
San Francisco, CA
Sunday, December 3, 2024
This stimulating panel discussion brings together three pioneering figures in grassroots activism and community-centered economics. The dialogue focuses on the insights and experiences derived from Cooperation Jackson, an innovative endeavor to establish a solidarity economy in Jackson, Mississippi. The panelists explore themes related to decentralized community organizing, ecological sustainability, educational outreach, and how to reimagine economic structures beyond the conventional capitalist framework.
Panelists: Kali Akuno, Sacajawea Hall, Matt Meyer
Communes or Nothing! Communes against Capitalism
Thursday, December 7, 2023
This virtual panel examined the commune and communal organizing as part of the project of revolutionary social transformation. The speakers address how socialist communes can be used to abolish capitalism’s logic, based on the exploitation of the human being and the expropriation of nature, along with the range of oppressions (including racial, gender, sexual, and colonial oppression) in capitalist society.
The speakers – Kali Akuno, John Bellamy Foster, Chris Gilbert, and M.E. O’Brien – draw from various theoretical perspectives and practical experiences. This panel is presented by Monthly Review and hosted by The People’s Forum, and was organized in the context of the recent launch of Chris Gilbert’s Commune or Nothing! Venezuela’s Communal Movement and Its Socialist Project from Monthly Review Press. The book looks at the theory, practice, and history of socialist commune building in Venezuela.
Build and Fight: Community Production, Community Control, and the Struggle for Self-Determination in Jackson, MS and across the Globe
Monday, December 4, 2023
Kali Akuno, Sacajawea Hall, and Matt Meyer discuss the strategies, successes, and lessons of Cooperation Jackson and how it became a center for national and international coalition efforts around the movement for grassroots-centered Black community control and self-determination, inspiring growing partnerships and emulation across the globe.
Imaginal Cells of the Solidarity Economy: Politics and Policy
This webinar series on The Imaginal Cells of the Solidarity Economy will showcase the myriad ways that solidarity economy practices are providing models and pathways to build a more cooperative, democratic, equitable, and sustainable world--one in which many worlds fit.
This video features David Cobb, Lydia Lopez, Jyoung Carolyn Park, Kali Akuno, and Petula Hanley discussing how to use/influence public policy advance individual policies as part of a coherent strategy to democratize the entire economy.
People’s Climate Week 2023 Launch Session - Monday, September 18, 2023
Video from the New School in New York City, kicking off the Peoples' Climate Week Launch: Day 1 on Monday, September 18, 2023! Listen in to Environmental Justice leaders holding the line against #FalseSolutions and demanding real climate action and #JustTransition! #PeoplesClimateWeekLaunch
Featuring video of Cooperation Jackson Executive Director, Kali Akuno.
Freedom is a Constant Meeting: An Interview with Kali Akuno
Facing South Interview with Kali Akuno, Executive Director of Cooperation Jackson, conducted by Frances Madeson.
Interview focused on how to deal with the organizing challenges in Jackson and the Deep South during an era of neo-confederate and neo-fascist ascendency.
Kali Akuno interview in Barcelona, Catalonia
Interview with Catalan Journal, Setembre. Conducted by Nuria Segura. The interview focused on how our organizing efforts are addressing the crisis in Jackson and beyond.
Please note the interview was printed in Catalan and translated into English via website tools. So, some things have been lost in translation.
Solidarity Economy in the Age of Global NeoColonialism
Lecture given at the Kenyan National Theater on Thursday, June 22, 2023.
It was hosted by Mwamko and Cooperation Jackson and featured a lecture by Kali Akuno. And discussion with Sacajawea Hall, Alieu Bah, and Ruzuna Akoth.
Coop News review of Jackson Rising Redux
Article written by Miles Hadfield for Coopnews.com that reviews Jackson Rising Redux and provides some updates on the development of the cooperatives developed by Cooperation Jackson.
Jackson Rising Redux interview on Hard Knock Radio, June 7, 2023
Cooperation Jackson Executive Director, Kali Akuno, interviewed by Davey D for KPFA’s Hard Knock Radio about the release of Jackson Rising Redux, which was published by PM Press.
Cooperation Jackson, Cooperative Economics, and Black Liberation
Kali Akuno in conversation with Dr. Jared Ball of I Mix What I Like on Black Power Media talking about Cooperation Jackson, Cooperative Economics, and Black Liberation. This conversation took place on Friday, May 26, 2023.
Eco-Justice Activist honored in Dixwell
Article from the New Haven Independent written by Allan Appel on May 15, 2023. The article is a report on the 2023 Gandhi Peace Award which was awarded to Kali Akuno from Cooperation Jackson.
Gandhi Peace Award 2023 - Kali Akuno Acceptance Speech
Video of Kali Akuno, Cooperation Jackson’s Executive Director, acceptance speech at the 2023 Gandhi Peace Awards given by Promoting Enduring Peace. The speech was given on Saturday, May 13, 2023 in New Haven, CT.
Organizers gather to advance solidarity economy organizing
The gathering was titled Building Worker Power through Solidarity, Cooperation and Care. Organized by the Labor Center at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and Wellspring Cooperative, a worker co-op network based in nearby Springfield, the conference set to develop deeper ties between unions and worker co-ops—and to advance organizing for a solidarity economy.
Cooperation Jackson, Political Struggle, and Organizing against neo-confederate fascists
Eric Draitser welcomes Kali Akuno back to CounterPunch to discuss the roots of Cooperation Jackson, the nature of political struggle in Mississippi, and the need to organize against the neo-confederate far right fascist movement. Kali Akuno is a co-founder and co-director of Cooperation Jackson and author of the new book "Jackson Rising Redux: Lessons on Building the Future in the Present."
A Call to Come Together for Climate and Economic Justice
Photo exhibit and short report on a lecture given by our Executive Director, Kali Akuno, at the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs on Tuesday, April 11, 2023. The focus of the lecture was Shifting Focus: Building towards and EcoSocialist Future.
Organizers Are Resisting a 2-Tiered Legal System in Majority-Black Jackson, MS
Black Jacksonians plan to make this attempt at reinstating white supremacist rule “extremely difficult” to implement.
April 15, 2023
Shifting Focus Lecture at the University of Vermont
March 28, 2023
Capitalism is choking the life systems of our precious planet and threatening extinction of complex species including humanity. Kali Akuno explains how EcoSocialism offers transformation from below, employing the principles of decolonization, anti-imperialism, anti-capitalism, anti-racism, anti-heterosexism, and degrowth.
Shifting Focus Lecture at the Schumacher Center
March 26, 2023
Kali Akuno delivered the First Annual Robert Swann Lecture in Great Barrington, Massachusetts in March, 2023. in 2023, we introduced the Annual Robert Swann Lectures, featuring Kali Akuno of Cooperation Jackson as the inaugural speaker. The lecture took place in the Great Hall at Saint James Place in Great Barrington, MA.
Apartheid 2.0 in Mississippi
Davey speaks with Kali Akuno from Cooperation Jackson about new laws being passed in the state of Mississippi. On Feb. 7, the Mississippi State House approved House Bill 1020, a bill that would create a new, unelected court system in the state capital of Jackson.
CJ and the State of Jackson Short Take from Joshua Dedmond, Part 3
Check out Part 3 of Joshua Dedmond, our Program Director analyzing the impact of the reactionary legislation being proposed by the Republican majority of the Mississippi legislature that is attempting to construct apartheid 2.0 in Jackson, MS. He also highlights what Cooperation Jackson and the broader progressive social movement in Jackson are doing to combat the reactionary development.
CJ and the State of Jackson Short Take from Joshua Dedmond, Part 2
Check out Part 2 of Joshua Dedmond, our Program Director, breaking down highlights of the work of Cooperation Jackson and sharing updates on the social struggles taking place in Jackson in early 2023.
CJ and the State of Jackson Short Take from Joshua Dedmond, Part 1
Check out Joshua Dedmond, our Program Director, break down highlights from the work of Cooperation Jackson and provide updates on the social struggles taking place in Jackson in early 2023.
Jackson’s water system is broken by Design
By Hadas Their
February 23, 2023
Article published in the Nation Magazine that describes how declining federal funding has left Jackson’s water system at the mercy of the states conservative state legislature.
Making Reparations: Seeding a Just Future.
An event held in honor of the 50th anniversary of the book Small is Beautiful, 2023 as an opportunity to advance solutions to today’s social, economic, and environmental challenges that build on Schumacher’s original vision. re, organized around 12 key themes and fields of activism.
This event featured Winona LaDuke, Chief Kelly Larocca, Robin Rue Simmons, and Kali Akuno
Fight and Build: Envisioning Solidarity Economies as Transformative Politics
Written by Pen Loh and Boone Shear
December 12, 2022
This article was adapted from a more extensive journal article called, “Fight and Build: Solidarity Economy as Ontological Politics”, published in Sustainability Science, Volume 17, pp. 1207 - 1221.
We are republishing here to demonstrate Cooperation Jackson’s influence on the current solidarity economy movement.
From Crisis to Transformation: What is Just Transition? A Primer
This Primer has been the product of a collective process of thinking between the authors and their organisations, who have been working in different ways on the concept of Just Transition with social movements, organisations and communities around the world, and trying to understand how this simple but powerful idea can help people to mobilise for genuine and transformative change. This is not a final or exhaustive vision of Just Transition, as different regions, communities, movements and organisations are developing their own visions (see the final section). However it is hoped that these key ideas and questions will give all readers tools for thinking more deeply about what Just Transition might mean for them, their movements, and their communities.
Authors
Kali Akuno, Katie Sandwell, Lyda Fernanda Forero, Jaron Browne
In collaboration with
Mission & Purpose
The broad mission of Cooperation Jackson is to advance the development of economic democracy in Jackson, Mississippi, by building a solidarity economy anchored by a network of cooperatives and other types of worker owned and democratically self-managed enterprises.
Announcements
10th Anniversary Fundraising Appeal: Launching Development Phase Three
Capacity Building, Local Scaling, and Bioregional Development
Please support the Launch of our Third Phase of Development, focusing on Capacity Building, Local Scaling, and Bioregional Development.
Help us raise $500,000 to provide our members with more skill development, inventory management, and value chain development training to successfully launch the People’s Grocery, a Trucking Cooperative, the Ewing Street Eco-village, and more.
People’s Assembly’s Popular Education Initiative
Checkout these dope slides about People's Assembly's that draws heavily on the work emerging from experiences in Jackson, MS and New Orleans over the last 20 years. This is from the Solidarity Economy Association out of the UK. Enjoy!
A Just Transition for Goddard College
Help Cooperation Vermont raise $5 million to purchase the Goddard College grounds and transform it into a Just Transition Center and future Cooperative College.
Cooperation Vermont is a sister organization of Cooperation Jackson, based in Marshfield, Vermont, and is the sponsor of the Marshfield Cooperative at the Marshfield Village Store. Cooperation Vermont is also one of the anchor organizations of the People’s Network for Land and Liberation, which consists of Cooperation Jackson, Community Movement Builders, and INCITE Focus.
Donate Now and Spread the Word! Please note “Goddard/CVT Land Trust” in your donation.
Seeking Experienced AgroEcologist to work with Freedom Farms Cooperative
Cooperation Jackson is seeking to hire two experienced Agroecologists to anchor our Freedom Farms Cooperative. We are looking to develop a team to farm our urban farming lands, our rural farming lands, and support the aquaponic and hydroponic operations that will be central to the People’s Grocery Cooperative. These anchors will need to help us revive our community supported agriculture program (CSA) and produce enough for steady market exchange to make the cooperative as self-sufficient as possible.
These positions will be vacant until filled.
Please send a resume and cover letter to cooperationjackson@gmail.com. Note: “Freedom Farms Position” in the title.
Congratulations to Vick L. Hudson on his appointment to the Jackson, MS Planning Board
Cooperation Jackson offers our heartfelt congratulations to Vick L. Hudson on his appointment to the Jackson, MS Planning Board. Vick was appointed to the Board on December 5, 2023 by Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba and the Jackson City Council.
Vick joined the staff of Cooperation Jackson in early 2023, to serve as our Community Land Trust Organizing Director.
Thank you for a dynamic 2023. Here’s to an amazing 2024!
To everyone who supported us, thank you. Your solidarity helped make our ongoing work possible. Love, Respect, and Solidarity.
Fannie Lou Hamer CLT Plaza Update
A short update on the development of the Fannie Lou Hamer Community Land Trust. Made in November 2023. Featuring, Sacajawea Hall, our Operations Manager, and Vick Hudson, our CTL Coordinator.
Help us start the new year off strong. We are in the process of completing Phase 2 of our CLT development work now, and getting in position to move to Phase 3 in 2024! Please donate now and spread the word to your family, friends, comrades and fellow cooperators.
Support the Eversville Design and Print Shop
Checkout this video of one of the Coop's co-owners Kwame Braxton describing some of the outlines of the business and its needs. We are looking to raise $80,000 to complete the build out of the Print Shop at the Ida B. Wells Plaza.
August 2023 Fundraising Appeal: Phase Two Development Completion
Completing Construction on the Ida B. Wells Plaza and other properties of the Fannie Lou Hamer Community Land Trust
Help Cooperation Jackson take the next step in our evolution. We are on the cusp of making a qualitative advance in our work, but we need your help to get there. Since our inception, we have tried our best to start our cooperatives as debt free as possible. To this point in our history, we have largely been able to acquire the property holdings of our community land trust and support our various cooperatives on a debt free basis by mobilizing resources drawn the various savings initiatives of our founders, dues from our members, ongoing support from our sustainers, strategic grants from progressive philanthropies, and the investment of major donors who share our vision.
We would like to see this trajectory through the completion of phase two of our development, which will enable our main hub and all of our cooperative units to remain debt free moving into the third phase of our collective development. This will enable us to further build and fortify a market protected ecosystem that will provide us with some competitive advantages in our quest to overcome the ruthlessness of the capitalist system, and replace it with a more cooperative and ecologically regenerative one. With your help, we will be in position to continue to serve as one of the largest and most strategic radical, Black led, land-based, solidarity economy initiatives in the United States.
So, what do we need help with? We need to raise $600,000 by October 31st to complete the foundational renovations at the Ida B. Wells Plaza, which is the largest holding in the Fannie Lou Hamer Community Land Trust, and several of our property holdings, including the Community Production Center.
Join the Campaign to Rebuild the Fight Back Center
This video features Endesha Juakali, one of the founders of the New Day Collective, and one of the principal organizers of the movement to save public housing in New Orleans over the last 40 years. The New Day Collective started in the St. Bernard neighborhood, located in the historic 7th Ward, in the 1970's. In this video Endesha shares some of the history of the struggle to save public housing housing since Hurricane Katrina, what the economic and political elite of New Orleans did to undermine this struggle to ensure that nearly 100,000 Black working class and poor folks could not make it back to New Orleans to ensure that the city would become "whiter, smaller, and more affluent".
Please donate as generously as you can to the Fight Back Center Campaign by donating to Cooperation Jackson at www.cooperationjackson.org/donate.
The Principles of Building Class Conscious Cooperatives
These graphics distill the core principles outlining what we believe it takes to build class conscious cooperatives. We believe the adoption of these principles help enable organizers, cooperators, and communities from building “cooperatives for cooperatives sake”, which are often ungrounded politically and can be and are used against working class communities as enablers of gentrification and displacement.
These principles are some of the emerging cornerstones of our Build and Fight Formula. Be on the lookout for more details on elements of how we think this formula can and should be operationalized to make some critical contributions to advance the struggle to socialize production and democratize society.
Building Class Conscious Cooperatives
An article written by our Executive Director, Kali Akuno, on occasion of International Workers Day 2023 and the 9th anniversary of Cooperation Jackson. The article focuses on the need to build class conscious cooperatives as a core tool in the toolkit of the working class to socialize production and democratically transform society.
Realizing the Durban Declaration and Program of Action is at the Heart of Our Pan-African Global Reparations Movement
An open letter to the Permanent Forum for People of African Descent will be issued before the next Session at the end of May. Support the demand for its work to be grounded in the Durban Declaration and Program of Action (DDPA) and the full and complete repair & justice it calls for. Provide your info and we will keep in touch around the Open Letter and other ways to engage.
Waste Management Support
Monday, April 17 - Friday, April 21, 2023
Ida B. Wells Plaza
1128 W. Capitol Street, Jackson, MS
Join us in the effort to serve the people and keep our community clean. Dump your trash and recycle your plastics with us as we work together to overcome this crisis.
Jackson Rising Redux
Out Now! Get your copy today.
Edited by Kali Akuno and Matt Meyer
Jackson Rising Redux is an updated and expanded version of Jackson Rising. It chronicles and growth and struggles of Cooperation Jackson in the ongoing struggle to socialize production and democratize democracy on a municipal scale.
Stop HB 1020
Fight Apartheid 2.0
House Bill 1020 is nothing but the promotion of a new and improved version of Jim Crow apartheid. HB1020 is intended to be an expansion of the Capitol Corridor Improvement District (CCID), which came into effect in 2018. This Bill will expand the district to include all of the majority white districts in the city of Jackson, and enable them to exercise a degree of self rule, that would include creating as separate police force in this district, a separate court system, the elimination of voting and political rights for Black people in this district, and will divert critical tax dollars away from the Black controlled municipality and communities in need.
This Bill poses a critical threat to the Jackson-Kush Plan and Cooperation Jackson opposes it unequivocally. We encourage everyone, in Mississippi and beyond, to do the same.
#StopCopCity
Cop City is a portent of the future. It represents the fact that both mainstream political parties, the Democrats and the Republicans, are running out of viable options for a better, brighter, equitable and regenerative future. The investment of the Atlanta police, the City of Atlanta, the Federal government, and both political parties in making sure this project comes to fruition demonstrates that they all clearly envision and plan on delivering a more repressive future.
We have to Stop Cop City. We have to preserve what remains of our natural environments, particularly in urban spaces, where the vast majority of humanity now resides. Stay tuned to our sister organization Community Movement Builders (CMB) for updates on the struggle to stop Cop City and how you can get involved.
#Justice4Jackson Demands and Action Items
There are two components to Phase 2 of our Water Crisis Recovery, One dimension is Building Community Resilience and the Second dimension is Political Resistance. We need your help with both.
Water Catchment Demonstration Video
A short explanation about one of the methods of water catchment and filtration that we will be employing at community centers and homes throughout Jackson as part of Phase 2 of our response to Jackson's ongoing water crisis.
Jackson, MS Water Crisis - Building Community Resiliency, Water Crisis Relief Phase 2
What's happening is that we are moving on to Phase 2. This is the first community based water catchment system we are installing. More are on the way with your help & donations to build some resiliency in our community.
Special thanks to our comrades from Just Construction for coming down and lending us some knowledge, skill, education, training, and labor.
We need your support for Phase 2 of this struggle. Please donate generously.
Justice 4 Jackson. Help us fix Jackson’s water system and build more autonomy and people power in the city.
Call to Action from Cooperation Jackson.
We are demanding the State and Federal Government completely overhaul Jackson’s water treatment and delivery systems. And asking our allies to help us build autonomous infrastructure to help us end various dependencies on the racist state apparatus.
We Need Your Support. Please Donate Today.
Water Crisis Fundraising Appeal - 8.30.22
Support Jackson in our critical time of need. Due to climate change & decades of neglect of our cities infrastructure the entire city is without drinking water and it is not clear when water access will be restored. Donate today at https://cooperationjackson.org/donate. #Solidarity #MutualAid
Show some love for Cooperation Jackson!
Support Our Capital Campaign for the Fannie Lou Hamer Community Land Trust
After two years of adjusted development due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Cooperation Jackson is poised to take the next major step in our development. We aim to raise $2,500,000 that will strengthen our efforts to decommodify land and housing, collectively steward our resources, and expand the opportunity we have for democratic community control. Help us take the leap needed to consolidate the development of our Community Land Trust.
Cooperation Jackson developed the Fannie Lou Hamer Community Land Trust as a division of our non-profit operations in 2015. We established the land trust to protect and preserve Black land stewardship in West Jackson. By purchasing as many of the vacant lands and facilities as our limited resources would allow, over the past seven years, we have successfully acquired over forty properties in West Jackson, including a shopping mall, and three commercial facilities.
In our fight to defend our neighborhood in West Jackson from the rising tide of gentrification and displacement, our approach continues to be multifaceted; remove land and housing from the speculative market; build the affordable housing and commercial space needed to support families and businesses; create community space where we can be in relationship with each other; and build the democratic practices necessary to sustain and defend our alternative model. The money raised will enable us to finish developing the land and facilities we currently steward, and purchase a few remaining strategic assets in the neighborhood.
In many ways, it is now “the best of times, and the worst of times'' in Jackson. The housing market is increasingly rapacious, while speculation runs even more rampant than when we launched Cooperation Jackson. While it is true that these multinational corporations like Amazon will help address the need for jobs in Jackson, their arrival comes at a cost. In addition to the impact on land and housing, most of these jobs will deepen the exploitation of the working class in Jackson, the state of Mississippi, and the southern region in overall, as they are premised on exploiting the political conditions that exist in the state and region that intentionally impoverish labor and deprive workers of their fundamental rights, particularly the right to organize themselves into collective bargaining units.
In order to play our part in countering these developments, we are focusing and prioritizing the following:
Completing the renovation of the Ida B. Wells Plaza, to enable the opening of the People’s Grocery Cooperative, and to provide affordable commercial space for local businesses and community organizations
Fully renovating the Dambala House, one of the commercial facilities we own to turn it into a Maker Space with a training center in the arts of digital fabrication
Acquiring the commercial lot behind the Ida B. Wells Plaza to turn it into a food hub and recycling center
Acquiring a new home on one of our newest properties for Ms. Rose Brown, that will enable her to receive the critical live in home care that is required to manage her chronic medical condition
Completing renovations on the three existing cooperative housing units
Completing renovations on three additional housing units that can enable the development of more affordable housing in our community.
Clearing the dilapidated structures on Ewing Street, commencing soil remediation, continuing the community envisioning and planning workshops that will go hand in hand with the experimental housing development led by our Community Production Cooperative for the Eco-Village Pilot
The $2,500,000 we are seeking to raise will enable us to complete these fundamental projects that ultimately position our community and Cooperation Jackson to weather the storm of capital accumulation presently confronting us. So, we ask everyone who despises gentrification, displacement, the exploitation of labor, and the extraction of resources to show us some love today and the remainder of February.
We look forward to building a groundswell of support for our vision of a regenerative economy and a self-determined community. Donate and spread the word to family, friends, co-workers, comrades, and fellow cooperators.
We appreciate the love and support!
Our Story
Cooperation Jackson is the realization of a vision decades in the making. Our roots lay deep within the struggle for democratic rights, economic justice, and self-determination, particularly for Afrikan people in the Deep South, and for dignity and equality for all workers.
Events
May 2024 Movie Night - An Upright Man
Balagoon Center
939 W. Capitol Street, Jackson, MS
6 pm
Thomas Sankara: The Upright Man is a 2006 documentary film about Thomas Sankara, former president of Burkina Faso. Sankara was known as "the African Che", and became famous in Africa due to his innovative ideas, his devastating humor, his spirit and his altruism.
May Day: 10 Year Celebration
Saturday, May 4, 2024
Balagoon Center
939 W. Capitol Street, Jackson, MS
1 - 6 pm
Join Cooperation Jackson on Saturday, May 4th at the Kuwasi Balagoon Center from 1 to 6 pm to honor International Workers Day or May Day and the 10th Anniversary celebration of the launch of Cooperation Jackson.
Decolonizing Economics 2024: Earth Day to May Day
Wednesday, May 1 - Friday, May 3, 2024
This 3-day virtual conference serves as a space to exchange experiences and information, strengthen alliances and networks, and to devise strategies to decenter colonial systems and implement concrete solutions to heal the land and people.
April 2024 Movie Night: Stamped from the Beginning
A film by Ibram X. Kendi
Balagoon Center for Economic Democracy and Sustainable Development
939 W. Capital Street, Jackson, MS
6 pm
Dismantling Green Colonialism: New Orleans
Discussion with author and editor, Hamza Hamouchene
John Thompson Legacy Center
Tuesday, April 23, 2024
6 pm
1212 St. Bernard Ave, New Orleans
Co-Sponsored by the Transnational Institute
Dismantling Green Colonialisim: Jackson
Discussion with author and editor, Hamza Hamouchene
Balagoon Center for Economic Democracy and Sustainable Development
Monday, April 22, 2024
6 pm
939 W. Capitol Street, Jackson, MS
Co-Sponsored by the Transnational Institute
Organizing for Change: Fighting Poverty and Inequality in the US
Human Rights Center at the Columbia School of Law
Jerome Green Hall, Room 107
Thursday, April 11, 2024
12 - 1 pm
Featuring Kali Akuno of Cooperation Jackson, Ashely Hufnagel of United Workes, and Anthony Prince of the California Homeless Union
The Build and Fight Formula: A Lunch and Learn at the New School
Tuesday, April 9th, 10:30-Noon EST
Where: In Person, The New School, Room TBD.
Presented by the Tishman Environment and Design Center.
Build and Fight: And Encounter in Brooklyn
Sunday, April 7, 2024
4:00 PM
At Woodbine
585 Woodward Ave, Queens, NY 11385
4 pm
Jackson Rising Redux NYC Book Launch and Discussion
Join Cooperation Jackson in NYC at 1199 SEIU
498 7th Avenue, NY, NY
Join Kali Akuno, Sacajawea “Saki” Hall, Matt Meyer (co-editor), with Maria Alex Garcia, the Coordinator of the Cooperative Economics Alliance of NYC, and Bruce Edwards and Shaywall Amin of SEIU 1199.
March 2024 Film Night - Fannie Lou Hamer’s America
Friday, March 29, 2024
Balagoon Center 939 W. Capitol Street, Jackson, MS
6 - 8 pm
A new documentary about Mississippi legend, Fannie Lou Hamer, in her own words.
Really, Really Free Market
Join Cooperation Jackson and local allies and partners on Saturday, March 23, 2024 for this mutual aid exchange to meet the material needs of our families and community.
Ida B. Wells Plaza
1128 W. Capitol Street, Jackson, MS
Saturday, March 23, 2024
9 am - 2 pm
Worker Power and Economic Democracy
Old Main ASU, Tempe Campus
February 23 and 24, 2024
Worker Power and Economic Democracy, the ASU Center for Work and Democracy’s Annual Conference with Kim Kelly, Kali Akuno, and Matt Meyer in-person in Tempe, AZ and online.
Learn more, join via Zoom, and get their books at blog.pmpress.org/event-directory/
Land Back and Liberated Zones
Tuesday, February 20, 2024
Old Chapel, UMass Amherst
Featuring Kali Akuno of Cooperation Jackson and Ethan Miller of Land in Common
Organized by Building Solidarity Economies at UMass Amherst
February 2024 Movie Night - “Life and Debt”
Friday, February 23
6 pm
Balagoon Center
939 W. Capitol Street, Jackson, MS
"Life and Debt" is a searing documentary from director Stephanie Black that examines the ways that policies of the International Monetary Fund (I.M.F.), the World Bank, and other aid organizations changed the Jamaican economy in the late 20th century.
January Movie Night - Stonewall Uprising
Friday, January 12, 2024
Kuwasi Balagoon Center
939 W. Capitol Street, Jackson, MS
6 pm
Stonewall Uprising tells the story of the massive police raid of Stonewall in June 1969.
Commune or Nothing! Communes against Capitalism
Thursday, December 7
6:30 pm est
This virtual panel will examine the commune and communal organizing as part of the project of revolutionary social transformation. The speakers address how socialist communes can be used to abolish capitalism’s logic, based on the exploitation of the human being and the expropriation of nature, along with the range of oppressions (including racial, gender, sexual, and colonial oppression) in capitalist society.
The speakers – Kali Akuno, John Bellamy Foster, Chris Gilbert, and M.E. O’Brien – will draw from various theoretical perspectives and practical experiences.
This panel is presented by Monthly Review and hosted by The People’s Forum, and is organized in the context of the recent launch of Chris Gilbert’s Commune or Nothing! Venezuela’s Communal Movement and Its Socialist Project from Monthly Review Press. The book looks at the theory, practice, and history of socialist commune building in Venezuela.
PLEASE NOTE this is a virtual panel and there will be no in-person component of the event.
Climate Strategies in the Solidarity Economy
Tuesday, December 5, 2023
Eastside Arts Alliance Cultural Center Gallery
2285 International Blvd, Oakland, CA
Join Kali Akuno and Sacajawea “Saki” Hall in Redding, CA for this book tour event about our struggle to construct economic democracy and ecological regeneration from below in Jackson, MS.
Hosted by Communities United for Restorative Youth Justice (CURYJ), the Anti-Police Terror Project (APTP), and the California Arts Council.
Howard Zinn Book Fair
Sunday, December 3, 2023
10 am - 6 pm
CCSF Mission Center
1125 Valencia Street, San Francisco
Kali Akuno and Sacajawea Hall will be speaking about “Jackson Rising Redux” and the ongoing work of Cooperation Jackson.
Climate Strategies in the Solidarity Economy
Saturday, December 2nd
3 pm
First United Methodist Church
1825 East Street, Redding, CA
Join Kali Akuno and Sacajawea “Saki” Hall in Redding, CA for this book tour event about our struggle to construct economic democracy and ecological regeneration from below in Jackson, MS.
Dope is Death. Film Night.
Friday, December 1
6:30 pm
Kuwasi Balagoon Center for Economic Democracy and Sustainable Development
939 W. Capitol Street, Jackson, MS 39203
The story of how Dr. Mutulu Shakur, stepfather of Tupac Shakur, along with fellow Black Panthers and the Young Lords, combined community health with radical politics to create the first acupuncture detoxification program in America in 1973 - a visionary project eventually deemed too dangerous to exist.
Building Relationships for Climate Justice
Tuesday, November 14, 2023
8:00 AM 8:00 AM
939 W Capitol St.
Join these esteemed thinkers, strategists, and climate justice activists in roundtable discussions and an opportunity to break bread. We will explore big questions like: What role can higher education play in climate justice? How can we create transformative climate justice strategy and networks?
Imaginal Cells: Politics and Policy
Tuesday, September 19, 2023
1 - 2:30 pm cst
The Imaginal Cells of the Solidarity Economy is an ongoing webinar series that showcases the myriad ways that solidarity economy practices are providing models and pathways to build a more cooperative, democratic, equitable, and sustainable world--one in which many worlds fit.
People’s Climate Week Launch
Monday, September 18, 2023
3 pm - 8 pm cst
Join us Monday (9/18) for a Plenary & Movement Social as the launch of Peoples' Climate Week. On Tuesday (9/19), we will host a teach-in led by EJ/CJ frontline and BIPOC organizers on real versus false climate solutions.
Reparations and the Construction of a New International Order : Addressing the crimes of Enslavement, Colonialism and Climate Change
Thursday, September 14
6 pm
Balagoon Center
939 W. Capitol Street, Jackson, MS
This event is sponsored by Cooperation Jackson and the Global Working Group Beyond Development of the Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung.
The event will be translated from English to Spanish and Spanish to English online and in person.
Friday Films in Jackson - Summer of Soul
Friday, June 30, 2023
6:30 pm
Balagoon Center 939 W. Capitol Street, Jackson, MS
Join us Friday, June 30 at 6:30 pm at the Balagoon Center located at 939 W. Capitol Street, Jackson, MS.
We will be showing the Summer of Soul about the Harlem Music Festival that was long forgotten by many.
Food and snacks will be served.
Solidarity Economy in the Age of Globalized Neo-Colonialism
Thursday, June 22, 2023
Mwamko and Cooperation Jackson invite you to this timely lecture and conversation on the alternatives to Capitalism and the many ways to build a new world. Join us at the Kenya National Theatre on Thursday, 22nd June 2023, at 4.00pm Kenya time 9 am est/8 am cst/7 pm mst/6 am pst. The event will be livestreamed on Cooperation Jackson’s Facebook page.
Our Principles
Cooperation Jackson has 13 Core Principles, which were crafted by adapting aspects from the basic principles of the Mondragón Cooperative Corporation in the Basque country of Spain, and the International Cooperative Alliance’s cooperative identity, values and principles.