Mutual workers'insurance: A historical outline

This article focuses on the historical development of small workers'mutual insurance societies whose members manage the fund themselves. The article begins by describing the remarkable similarities in terms of characteristics and development of these societies in different places and periods. It then discusses various non-directly democratic competitors in the field of social insurance and forms of State intervention. Finally, the article attempts to explain why competition from the private sector and State interventions forced directly democratic societies to choose between bureaucratization, marginalization and disbandment.