usually three months, renewable for another three months, and
sometimes further than that. The committee of management are
elected by the general meetings; they decide on all loans, and
receive a salary, plus a commission on the business done. The
council of supervision are also paid, or at least entitled to pay.
The great objects which a bank keeps in view are security and a
good return on capital. It is not confined to a small area, but
works for as large and as varied a constituency as possible. With
such a constitution the Schulze-Delitzsch banks grow big and
accumulate a large capital of their own. On an average each
bank has nearly 600 members and lends about £150,000 per
annum, including loans renewed. Losses are sometimes made,
but they are not heavy on the whole. All the profits are divided
upon capital, or put to reserve, except some, usually small,
sums given to charitable or educational purposes. Dividends
average about 5%, but have been known to reach and even
exceed 30%.
It may therefore justly be said that for co-operative institutions these banks smack too much of joint-stockism: they are in fact co-operative not much more than in the same sense that the Oldham cotton mills, and other “working-class limiteds,” have sometimes been loosely called co-operative. They seem constituted to make the lender’s interest supreme, but they have, nevertheless, conferred enormous benefits on the handicraftsmen, small traders, small cultivators and others who borrow from them. They have put capital within their reach at reasonable rates.
These banks also have their central point. In 1864 the German Co-operative Societies’ Bank was founded to centralize the work of the local Schulze-Delitzsch banks and to bring the money market within their reach. It was not itself co-operative, and never confined its business to the co-operative banks. Beginning in a very small way, by 1903 it had attained a capital of a million and a half sterling and a yearly business of £154,000,000, of which £28,000,000 was specifically with co-operative credit societies. It was then amalgamated with another banking business, the Dresdner Bank, esteemed one of the most important and successful in Germany.
Thus these two types of credit co-operation agree in being founded on unlimited liability, but speaking broadly they are contrasted in that the Schulze-Delitzsch banks work primarily, though by no means solely, among townsmen, are based on share capital, work for profit, which they divide on shares, are conducted by paid directors, and confer their benefits not on the very poorest but rather, as their own friends say, on the middle classes: the Raiffeisen banks are designed for the peasantry, are not based upon share capital, neither divide, nor work for, profit, are conducted by unpaid directors, and confer their benefits especially on the very poor. The Schulze-Delitzsch type is strong in self-help, but tends to commercialism as it grows; the other needs the help of the well-to-do to back up the self-help of the poor, but it tends to altruism and the union of classes.
The world has 30,000 co-operative credit societies, not counting building societies; and though they are organized in many groups, especially in their native Germany, for local reasons, or because of some modification, or some compromise between the two systems, the two types really include them all. There is, however, a strong tendency to introduce limited liability into various offshoots of the one type and the other; even into the orthodox Schulze-Delitzsch banks themselves, when they grow big. From Germany co-operative banks have spread into almost all European countries—even at last to Ireland and England—and to America and Asia. In Germany there are some fifteen thousand local, and no less than sixty central, co-operative credit associations, which lend out £180,000,000 a year including renewals. In Italy, Austria and Hungary they are also strong. In 1896 it was estimated that £150,000,000 a year must be very well within the total amount lent by money co-operation on the continent of Europe; eight years later it could not well fall short of £250,000,000, and the amount keeps constantly increasing. Of this total only a small percentage represents loans by banks of the Raiffeisen type, which, though very numerous, often lend only a few hundred pounds each in the year.
Great controversy has prevailed as to the state subsidies given to co-operative credit. While governments are sometimes rather inclined to hinder co-operative distribution, they have shown a marked tendency to foster, whether for political or economic reasons, co-operative credit. The Prussian government in response to popular demand, vigorously supported by the agricultural interest, has founded and endowed with £2,500,000 of public money, the Central Co-operative Bank, whose object is to bring capital within the reach of the various groups of co-operative banks. The Schulze-Delitzsch Union was the only one to dispute the need of this, and though the bank has given a stimulus to the formation of co-operative societies, it still denies that this is a healthy propagation. Nevertheless, some even of the Schulze-Delitzsch societies resort to this state bank for money. It is under government administration and lends immense sums each year. In France the Bank of France has been compelled to lend £1,600,000 free of interest, and to give about £120,000 per annum out of its profits to assist agriculture; this money is being lent free to “regional” banks, and by them at about 3% to local societies. State help has also been given to the co-operative bank of the French workmen’s productive societies. In Austria and in many other countries a great deal of similar help has been given.
Closely connected with certain developments of credit, and deserving to rank as the third, if not the second, great subdivision of co-operation, is agricultural co-operation, a movement in the main of the last twenty years, but amounting now to a great force, almost everywhereDenmark and agricultural co-operation. except in Great Britain, and in some countries almost to a revolution. It is important to say agricultural co-operation and not co-operative agriculture, for in spite of some customary mutual help in farm work, in spite of several attempts, and some small successes, in co-operative farming, the actual cultivation is almost everywhere individualistic. The farmer or peasant cultivates alone, or with his family, or servants; when he co-operates with his fellows, it is to manufacture, or to market, the products of his farm, or more often to obtain the things he needs for his farming, to raise stock, to own expensive machinery in common, or insure against risks. By these means the small farmer, without sacrificing his own peculiar advantages, obtains most of the advantages of the big farmer, to the immense improvement of his position.
At almost every point agricultural and credit co-operation touch; yet the most perfect example of agricultural co-operation is not concerned with credit co-operation in any form. The farmers of Denmark practise co-operation in almost every variety, except for raising capital. The commercial banks have provided money to start dairies and other co-operative societies; so that, it would appear, the need of credit co-operation has not been felt.
The Danish farmer is almost always a freeholder: it is little more than a century since his ancestors were serfs. It is little more than a generation since a few men, turning to account the strong national feeling aroused by the defeat of 1864, started a great educational movement which has left its mark on all strata of Danish society. After the People’s High School, technical schools arose in various places; and to these, and to the excellent continuation schools in the country districts, the Danes are beholden for the regeneration of their agriculture. From 1867 co-operative distributive societies on the Rochdale plan had been spreading in Denmark; but it was not till 1882 that co-operation in agriculture began, and the first co-operative dairy was formed; ten years later there were about a thousand such, a number which has slightly increased since. These dairies are productive societies in which the cow-owners are the shareholders, and all shareholders have equal rights and equal voting power, whether they own one cow or one hundred. Almost every village has its co-operative dairy, fitted to deal with the milk of from 400 to 1400, or even 2000 cows. They far exceed all the other dairies of Denmark. More than four-fifths of all the milk of Denmark
