Networking, Governance, and Stakeholder Engagement of Financial Cooperatives: Some National Case Studies

We illustrate network characteristics using formal networks orchestrated through a central bank with the aim of pooling resources, realizing economies of scale, introducing new centralized services, and improving the economic, environmental, and social sustain-ability of cooperative members’ activities. On the other hand, centraliza-tion is not a necessary solution, and different countries have followed different paths. For example, centralization and formalization have been achieved in both The Netherlands (Rabobank) and Italy (Cassa Centrale Banca Group and ICCREA), but at very different speeds. While Rabobank was already a centralized network with one central bank in the 1970s and this centralization and unification process was completed in 2015, in Italy, the same process only started in 2015 and was completed in 2020 (Groeneveld, 2015). Illustrating the examples, we consider the degree of inclusion in strategic planning to assess whether networks are coordinated in cooperation rather than by authority.