Pat Conaty is a Fellow of New Economics Foundation (NEF) and has worked with NEF since 1987. He is also a research associate of Co-operatives UK. He specialises in action research, education and development that focuses on successful methods of social economic innovation. During the 1990s he led work at NEF to introduce to the UK Community Development Finance and other forms of co-operative and mutual banking. From 2000 to 2010 as a research associate of Community Finance Solutions at the University of Salford, he played a leading role in researching and developing Community Land Trusts nationally. This led to the successful development of the Community Land Trust Fund and the National CLT Network trade body.
In recent years he has been working similarly on introducing other innovative forms of co-operative economic democracy, social co-operatives for care services and co-operative solutions for self-employed workers. Since 2005 he has also worked internationally as one of several UK members of BALTA – a Canadian research, education and development network involving practically oriented academics from ten universities plus other social economy and co-operative sector network practitioners. Inspired by the work of the late Elinor Ostrom, Pat has specialized in innovative work on Commons solutions since 1999. Many of these solutions are covered in his 2012 book with Mike Lewis The Resilience Imperative: Co-operative Transitions to a Steady-state Economy. The below is a profile of recent research and publications from Pat Conaty.
- Conaty, P. (2011) A Co-operative Green Economy – New Solutions for Energy and Sustainable Social Justice, Co-operatives UK, October 2011.
- Beardmore, P., Ross, S., Conaty P. and Cobbing, P. (2012) West Midlands Local Authority Low Carbon Economy Programme – Community Strand Final Report, February 2012.
- Conaty, P. (2012) Community Development Finance and Home Improvement Partnerships, Housing Associations Charitable Trust, August 2012.
- King, M. with a contribution from Conaty, P. (2013) Heat Services – Towards a Mutual Future in Haringey, January 2013.
- Conaty P, Riseborough, M. and Kersley, H. (2013) Evaluation report for London Rebuilding Society as a Home Improvement Lending CDFI, new economics foundation, January 2013.
- Conaty, P and Large, M. (2013) editors of Commons Sense – Co-operative Place Making and Capturing Land Value for 21st Century Garden Cities, Co-operatives UK, December, 2013 and also to be published as an e-book in 2014 by Hawthorn Press.
- Conaty, P. (2013) Sharing Prosperity: Enabling co-operative enterprises to grow the green economy, The Co-operative Cyrmu/Wales, November 2013.
- Conaty, P. (2014) Social Co-operatives – Democratic Co-production for Care Services in the UK, Co-operatives UK, July 2014..
- Conaty, P. (2014) ‘Co-operative Commonwealth: De-commodifying Land and Money’, a paper on co-operative city investment strategies presented to the 13th International Karl Polanyi Conference at Concordia University in Montreal, Canada on 8 November 2014.
- Conaty, P. and Bollier D. (2015) Towards an Open Co-operativism, Commons Strategies Group report on a convergence between Co-op and Commons movement best practices, January 2015.
- Bollier, D. and Conaty, P. (2015) A New Alignment of Movements?, Commons Strategies report on the scope for convergence between a number of social movements including the Co-op, Commons, Sustainability and Solidarity Economy, February 2015.
- Conaty, P. (2015) A Collaborative Economy for the Common Good, Wales Co-operative Centre report on the potential for an alignment between the community economic development and co-operative economy best practices in Wales, November 2015
- Bollier D. and Conaty, P. (2016) Democratic Money and Capital for Commons, Commons Strategies Group report on co-operative money and capital, January 2016.
- Conaty P., Bird, A. and Ross, P. (2016) Not Alone – Trade Union and Co-operative solutions for self-employed workers, Co-operatives UK, Wales Co-operative Centre and Unity Trust Bank, April 2016.