Page:Emile Vandervelde - Three Aspects of the Russian Revolution - tr. Jean Elmslie Henderson Findlay (1918).djvu/99



Co-operative organizations have not had to suffer in the same degree as the Trade Unions from administrative and police interference. Thus their development has been more rapid and more intense. From 1896 associations of this sort were sufficiently numerous for the "general assembly of commerce and industry" of all Russia, which was held at Nijni-Novgorod, to be charged especially with examining the questions raised by their existence. After the Revolution of 1905 their growth was prodigious. They have to-day acquired a development which equals in many respects their development in some Western countries. The latest statistics that we have been able to obtain, that of January 1, 1913, said:

"About 7,500 co-operative stores are scattered throughout the Empire, forming a certain number of federations, dealing principally with the organization of wholesale purchase. The most important of these federations is that of Moscow, which has about six hundred societies.