Summary Backlight is staying in the Basque village of Mondragón, where the majority of the population works in cooperatives. All employees are also co-owners and together they decide on the company policy. Even in today's harsh economic climate, this approach is successful. Mondragón manufactures high-grade technological products and is now the seventh largest company in Spain, a multinational with branches all over the world. While the global crisis grimly continues to wreak havoc all around us and criticisms are heaped on the neoliberal model, the UN declared 2012 the International Year of Cooperatives. Boards, authorities and economists are keen to establish a model that functions properly and is above all internationally competitive. Mondragón is always used as an example and is flooded with visitors from all over the world. The American government is currently facing the choice whether to privatise General Motors again after salvaging it in 2008. Its future is causing heated debate. One idea is not to float the company but convert it into a cooperative. Backlight investigates the cooperative model in times of crisis. How firmly is this model anchored in society? Are notions like solidarity, participation and self-support generally accepted? Backlight follows some of the key people.

• Documentary