Transition Period Farmers' Professional Cooperatives Of Organizational Behavior Research

Membership homogeneity or heterogeneity is an important research field in the theory of cooperatives. Traditionally, cooperatives should be organized around common interests to achieve higher performance. However, as actors are different in endowment resources, their aims and roles, Chinese farmer specialized cooperatives are typical cooperative organizations based on heterogeneous members. Membership heterogeneity may certainly have an impact on farmer specialized cooperatives' organizational structure, governance mechanisms, organizational identity and member commitment. Therefore, it's necessary to analyze the above-mentioned organizational behaviors from a perspective on membership heterogeneity, which will be also beneficial to the efficient and sustainable development of farmer specialized cooperatives.As small farmers are usually less privileged groups, cooperation among each other should be a good way to protect their interests in market competition. However, most farmer specialized cooperatives are actually founded and controlled by some relative well priviliged groups who are big producers, market traders, traditional Rural Supply and Marketing Cooperatives, agricultural related process enterprises, or local government departments. This is the practical paradox for farmer specialized cooperatives in a transitional period. Trying to deal with this paradox, this dissertation begins with a systematic review of existing literature on cooperative studies, describes the formation process of farmer specialized cooperatives in a transitional peridod and then from membership heterogeneity perspective empirically analyses their organizational behavior based on primary data collected from field surveys, finally concludes by comments, implications for policy making, and recommendations for future research. The main contents of this dissertation are as follows:At first, from a historical point of view, the author analyzes the growth background, main actors and their behavior, organization maturation of fanner specialized cooperatives by using the method of normative analysis. The main purpose is to point out that "cooperation based on heterogeneous members" is the essential characteristic of farmer specialized cooperatives in a transitional period, which will serve as a basis to discuss their organizational behavior.Secondly, membership heterogeneity and organizational structure of farmer specialized cooperatives. This section attires to provide an understanding of the ownership structure, control structure and benefit allocation structure of farmer specialized cooperatives from a perspective on membership heterogeneity, and the author bases its research on the practice of 372 farmer specialized cooperatives in Zhejiang province. The main findings are: under heterogeneous membership, shareholding is popular among cooperatives, most of them are usually composed of a minority of big shareholders (core members) and a majority of small shareholders (common members); the board of directors are usually composed of core members who hold most of controlling rights on decision-making; the cooperative's surplus is usually divided into two parts: retention as public accumulation in cooperatives and distribution among members mainly according to members' shareholding rights.Thirdly, membership heterogeneity and governance mechanisms of farmer specialized cooperatives. Based on a brief review of the theory of cooperate governance, this section aims to analyze to the governance of farmer specialized cooperatives through a systematic empirical study with primary data of 168 cooperatives and Ordered Probit Model. In order to understand the current governance practices, the author identifies two sets of variables that capture farmer specialized cooperatives' performance and governance mechanisms, in light of literature review and China's practices. The empirical results indicate that performance is significantly correlated with governance mechanisms; cooperatives with better governance have higher growth ability, profitting ability and member satisfaction.Fourthly, membership heterogeneity and organizational identity of farmer specialized cooperatives. Organizational identities are the features of an organization that members and management perceive as ostensibly central, distinctive, and enduring in character and their identification with it. As it has functions of internal integration and external adaptation, organizational identity has grown over the past decade to be an important issue in analyzing many aspects of an organization. From an perspective on membership heterogeneity, this section describes an exploratory study into organizational identity of farmer specialized cooperatives in a transitional period. Data was collected by using questionnaires and semi-structured interviews with nine farmer specialized cooperatives in Zhejiang. The main findings are: farmer specialized cooperatives have a strong hybrid identity, deeply rooted in their pluralistic mission, normative and utilitarian value systems; under heterogeneous membership, the core members which play a larger role in the organization regard utilitarian identity as a salient one, and the common members' preferred identity is a normative one. During the development of farmer specialized cooperatives, the "normative and utilitarian hybrid identity" should be given enough attention to and effectively managed.Fifthly, membership heterogeneity and member commitment of farmer specialized cooperatives. As business organizations, cooperatives are highly complex. If they are to form and succeed, they must develop and nurture member commitment. This section describes an exploratory study into member commitment in farmer specialized cooperatives from an perspective on membership heterogeneity. Data was collected by using questionnaires and semi-structured interviews with nine farmer specialized cooperatives in Zhejiang. The author tries to identify the various kinds of commitment made by heterogeneous members and the characteristics of the various kinds of commitment of farmer specialized cooperatives, which possible can sever as references for the sustainable development of farmer specialized cooperatives.Basing his research on the summary of this study, the author makes some public and private policy recommendations for the development of farmer specialized cooperatives, and also gives some recommendations for further academic research.This study is unique in several dimensions. Most importantly, it is the first study to analyze farmer specialized cooperatives' organizational behavior from a perspective on membership heterogeneity which is a key issue for Chinese farmer cooperatives in a transitional period. It is also the first study to apply the theory of organizational identity and organizational commitment to farmer specialized cooperatives, making use of cooperative member-level data. In addition, the study is the first to summarize two sets of indicators to evaluate farmer specialized cooperatives' performance and governance mechanisms. Research results are expected to inform both private and public policy makers concerned with improving the efficiency and sustainability of farmer specialized cooperatives.