Coparcenary

COPARCENARY, in law, the descent of lands of inheri tance from an ancestor to two or more persons possessing an equal title to them. It arose either by common law, as where an ancestor died intestate, leaving two or more females as his co-heir esses, who then took as coparceners or parceners; or, by particular custom, as in the case of gavelkind lands, which descend to all males in equal degrees, or in default of males, to all the daughters equally. All such special forms of descent were abolished by the Law of Property Act 1922 and the Administration of Estates Act 1925.

The term "coparcenary" is not in use in the United States, joint heirship being considered as tenancy in common.

CO-PARTNERSHIP, a term used (often with the prefix "Labour" or "Industrial" added) to denote (I) the ideal that workers should enjoy full participation in the profits and ad ministration of industry, and (2) a specialized type of business organization (more or less embodying this ideal) introduced into the fabric of the existing economic order.

As an ideal it has a history as old as that of the co-operative movement (see CO-OPERATION), and like the latter it drew its inspiration in the second quarter of the i9th century from a refusal to recognise that the divorce between productive labour and the ownership and control of capital was either just or in evitable. During the period of the Chartist movement, John Stuart Mill was not alone among economists in setting great store by co-partnership as a solvent of industrial discontent, and even as late as 1862 one finds him predicting that "the relationship of masters and workpeople will be gradually superseded by partner ship in one of two forms: in some cases association of the labourers with the capitalist, in others, and perhaps finally in all, association of labourers among themselves." Already in the 'forties efforts to achieve co-partnership in the forms to which Mill refers had met with wide support. The first form was held in view by the advocates of the limited partnership, legalisation of which would, it was hoped, put capital, protected by limited liability, at the disposal of the capital-less worker. The second form found expression in the starting of numerous societies for co-operative production. In neither of these direc tions can it be said that the course of economic development since 185o has confirmed the accuracy of Mill's prediction. The introduction (1855-62) of the registered limited liability com pany swamped the more modest proposal for the limited partner ship. And though the reorganization of industry and trade on joint-stock lines has steadily developed (quite overshadowing even the ordinary partnership) that event has not in itself con tributed much to bring about co-partnership between capital and labour. Only in one respect, and that indirectly, have the British Companies Acts favoured employee membership of companies. As the result of legislation, 1907-13, the restriction of the member ship of private companies to 5o has been waived in the case of employee or ex-employee shareholders.

Nor again were the high hopes placed by Robert Owen (q.v.), and later by the Christian Socialists, in the "self-governing work shop" form of co-partnership destined to be realised. The English co-operative movement, while always ready to encourage em ployee-membership, has won its main victories on the side of consumers' control rather than of producers' or of workers' con trol. The Scottish co-operative movement, however, has had notable success in giving the employee as such a joint share in control with the ordinary consumer-member.

Closely connected though it was in the 'eighties with the co operative movement and drawing part of its inspiration from the ideals of the Christian Socialists (see CHRISTIAN SOCIALISM), the organised movement has tended, especially in the present century, to develop on lines of its own and to put forward on behalf of labour claims more moderate than those advocated, for example, by the Guild Socialists (see GUILD SOCIALISM). These claims as formulated by the Industrial Co-partnership Association (the present title of the propagandist body founded in 1884) are that all workers "shall share to some extent in the profits, capital, and control of the business in which they are employed." By share in profits is meant an arrangement whereby as a matter of fixed rules the worker is entitled to receive, in addition to the standard wages of the trade, some share in the final profit (if any) of the business. By share in capital is meant the accumulation by the worker of his share of profit, or part thereof, in the capital of the business. Share in control is to be acquired in one or both of two ways: (a) by acquiring share capital, and thus gaining the ordinary rights and responsibilities of a shareholder.

(b) by the formation of a co-partnership committee of workers having a voice in the internal management.

It is obvious that even these fairly precise definitions leave considerable latitude in the planning of individual schemes, while the extent to which the ideal of co-partnership is in any case realizable depends not only on the amount of the share (in net profits, capital and control) to which the employees of an under taking are to become entitled but also on the kind of share con templated under each head.

Workers and Profit-Sharing.

On account of this element of uncertainty the annual statistics of the Ministry of Labour on "Profit-sharing and Labour Co-partnership" do not furnish a complete guide either to the success which co-partnership has already won or to the role which it is likely to play in the future. The latest official figures show that at the end of 1926 there were in Great Britain 28o schemes (the survivors of 554 launched during the past 5o years), one-half dating after the World War. These schemes were operated by 274 firms, employing 400,00o people of whom approximately one-half were eligible to participate in the benefits conferred. But at least 5o% of these existing schemes contemplate nothing more than a distribution of part of the net profits in cash (see PROFIT-SHARING). On the other hand, the official figures are far from being comprehensive (1) as regards capital ownership by employees, (2) as regards schemes which provide for their participation in internal manage ment. Under the former head the Committee on Industry and Trade had to record (in 1926) that "no information is available as to the extent to which employees own capital at the present time in the undertakings by which they are employed." But there is little doubt that the amount (e.g., in certain sections of the cotton industry) must be large. Under the latter head must be reckoned the extensive movement (stimulated by the Whitley Report) in favour of setting up joint works councils represent ing the management and the workpeople employed in a particular establishment. In some industries provision for joint consultation has been organised nationally as well as locally, and a tendency is observable—e.g., among railway companies—to use the ma chinery for administrative purposes. Whitleyism, though it does not approach co-partnership from the profit-sharing angle, has yet contributed much towards the rationalisation of industry on co-partnership lines by insisting that collective bargaining is not the only matter in which joint consultation between employer and employee is desirable.

Apart from these two developments there is little doubt that profit-sharing has up to the present been the basis of most of the experiments in co-partnership in Great Britain. Three types may be distinguished: (1) that in which either a specified proportion of the net profits or a bonus rising or falling with the rate of dividend is divisible among the employees ; (2) that in which the bonus or part of it must be left with the firm either on deposit or in the form of special "co-partnership shares" to earn interest varying with the rate of dividend; (3) that in which the profit is given indirectly through the offer of share or stock purchase facilities not available to the outside public or to non-employee shareholders. These facilities may take the form of opportunity to purchase by small instalments (a full dividend being payable before the last instalment is due) , opportunity to buy shares below the current price offered, or a right to receive an extra bonus on dividend. In any case the arrangement does not, like the second type, involve the creation of a special, new class of share.

Practical British Schemes.

This third type of scheme comes nearest to satisfying the three conditions laid down by the I.C.A. It is, however, a type better suited for adoption by the large public company than by the small concern whose shares do not command a ready market. In the gas industry, where in combina tion with direct profit-sharing it has stood the test of years, 44 English gas companies (6o% of the total number) have adopted with slight variations the scheme originally launched by the South Metropolitan Gas Company in 1889. This scheme, under which the employees have, since 1894, been given the opportunity of investing in the company's ordinary stock and, since 1896, of appointing their own directors to the board, was made statutory in 1920 on the basis of a division of profits (after payment of standard dividends) among consumers, shareholders, and em ployees in the proportions of three-fourths, one-eighth, and one eighth respectively.

Although the economic conditions in the gas industry (standard ized product, local monopoly, statutory limitation of dividend) are no doubt favourable to co-partnership, the fact remains that in Great Britain, as in America, employee stock or share owner ship has received recently marked encouragement by some of the larger British companies, more often than not in connection with schemes to give employees security of tenure and a direct voice in the control of the conditions under which they work. Viewed as an integral part of these larger administrative changes the co-partnership scheme of Imperial Chemical Industries Ltd., one of the largest British combines with a pay-roll of over 40,000, is of special interest. Under this scheme facilities are given to all employees to purchase ordinary shares in the company at 2s. 6d. below the mean market price, while employees earning less than L 200 p.a. are entitled to a bonus of one free share for every four shares purchased. It is also provided that the payment of all instalments outstanding on his shares are cancelled by the death of the employee-holder. The objection often urged against a scheme of this type, that it is unwise to encourage people of small means to invest their savings in the industry in which they are employed, can hardly be sustained in regard to a company con trolling the production of necessaries under conditions of virtual monopoly.

Another interesting variety of scheme (which avoids this par ticular objection without entailing the issue of shares carrying restricted rights of ownership) is that of the Brush Electrical Engineering Company Ltd. Under this scheme the employees collectively are entitled to take their share of the surplus profits either in cash or in shares in the company.

Of schemes in general it may be said that wherever the em ployers or directors show (as in the case of the two schemes just mentioned) a sincere desire to adopt co-partnership in a form and for objects which are acceptable to organized labour outside as well as inside their particular businesses the prospects of success ful working will be fair. Much, too, depends upon the possibility (of which there are many signs) that the traditionally lukewarm attitude of Labour towards co-partnership may change to one of acceptance when it is realized that co-partnership (in the broad sense of the term) is an essential ingredient in the scientific rationalisation of industry.

Movement outside Great Britain.

In the United States, as a recent investigation by Princeton university shows, the "ac quisition by employees of stock in the companies they work for has reached the proportions of a comprehensive movement." Though there is no doubt that this movement, fostered by instal ment-purchase arrangements, has stimulated a similar develop ment in other countries it is difficult to say whether co-partnership is likely to result from it as a permanent factor in the organization of American industries. It must be borne in mind that a large and increasing proportion of stock issued by American corporations is of the non-voting variety, that economic conditions have in themselves for many years past been favourable to investors, and that the investment capacity of the average American em ployee has been considerably greater than the employee in any other part of the world. He has had both the capacity and the opportunity to invest. Even then, of the total stock, the amount held by employee-investors is only something like 2 per cent.

In New Zealand an act known as the Companies Empowering act was passed in 1924 which enables any company registered under the general company laws to issue labour shares to its employees, these shares to be of no-par value and not to form part of the share capital. Voting rights, however, as well as rights to a share in the profits are to attach to these "shares" according to the regulations made by the company.

In France a somewhat similar arrangement was authorized by an act in 1917 for Societes Anonymes that choose to adopt it. Under this act, however, the "labour shares" (actions de travail) become the collective property of the employees organized in a "Societe commerciale co-operative de main d'oeuvre" with voting powers at the company's meetings. (See PROFIT-SHARING.) BIBLIOGRAPHY. Ministry of Labour Report on Profit Sharing and Bibliography. Ministry of Labour Report on Profit Sharing and Labour Co-partnership in the U.K. (Cmd. 544) (192o), also Annual Reports ditto in the Ministry of Labour Gazette; Report of Com mittee on Industry and Trade (Survey of Industrial Relations, 1926) ; quarterly journal of the Industrial Co-partnership Association ; Carpenter, Industrial Co-partnership (1921) ; E. Walls, Progressive Co-partnership (1921) ; Foerster and Dietel, "Employee Stock Ownership in the United States" (the Princeton University Report, 1927). (A. L. D.)