Member commitment in olive oil co-operatives: cause and consequences

Commitment has an important place in organisational behaviour literature due to the consequences for business efficiency. In this paper we study co-operatives that produce olive oil and the commitment characteristics of their members. Based on the Meyer and Allen (1991) and Sharma and Irving (2005) models, our objective is to analyse the commitment shown by members of olive oil co-operatives, the attitudes behind each type of commitment, and the consequences of the behaviour shown by members. Our work is motivated by the lack of studies on these types of democratically governed organisations. We use a qualitative methodology to make an empirical study through interviews with members of olive oil co-operatives. In the study we show the differing perspectives of members in relation to their continuance in the co-operative, and we analyse the commitment displayed by these members. We present a commitment model for co-operatives that could be a guide for future research on co-operatives. These results are an initial effort to understand the consequences of the commitment shown by co-operative members. Reprinted by permission of the Society for Co-operative Studies