{"id":5297,"date":"2017-07-12T10:33:03","date_gmt":"2017-07-12T08:33:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.polyas.de\/blog\/?p=5297"},"modified":"2017-07-12T10:33:03","modified_gmt":"2017-07-12T08:33:03","slug":"history-credit-unions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.polyas.de\/blog\/en\/electoral-research\/history-credit-unions","title":{"rendered":"History of Credit Unions in North America"},"content":{"rendered":"

The history of credit unions depicts an important change in financial and cooperative services. In the 19th century, credit unions started to offer affordable banking and loan services to customers\u00a0and paved the way for a\u00a0fairer financial market. Read more about the history of credit unions in our second blog article.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

“Co-operatives are based on the values of self-help<\/strong>, self-responsibility<\/strong>, democracy<\/strong>, equality<\/strong>, equity<\/strong> and solidarity<\/strong>. In the tradition of their founders, co-operative members believe in the ethical values of honesty, openness, social responsibility and caring for others.” (International Co-operative Alliance<\/a>)<\/em><\/p>\n

Credit unions are financial cooperatives which are owned and run by their members. They still adhere to the above-mentioned values. Even though credit unions now exist all over the world, the cooperative banking movement started\u00a0in Europe with the German cooperative innovator\u00a0Hermann Schulze-Delitzsch. He established the first credit unions in mostly urban areas in the 1850s. A decade later,\u00a0Friedrich Wilhelm Raiffeisen brought the cooperative banking concept to rural parts of Germany. From there, the credit union movement spread across the globe.<\/p>\n

Beginning of\u00a0credit union history in Canada<\/h3>\n

Alphonse Desjardins, a Canadian parliamentary reporter founded the first successful credit union in Canada in 1900. It was\u00a0known as caisse populaire (people’s bank) and situated in L\u00e9vis in the province of Qu\u00e9bec. Then, the caisse populaire began with an initial total membership deposit of $26. A\u00a0dime was the first individual savings deposit. After the favorable example in the French-speaking part of Canada, attempts in the English-speaking areas were made. However, most of them were not widespread or at all successful until the early 1940s. From then on, credit unions spread and were established all over Canada. These credit unions and caisses populaires now serve over 10 million customers.<\/p>\n

Next stop: credit unions in the United States<\/h3>\n

The Canadian Alphonse Desjardins devoted his remaining life to the credit union development in North America. In 1908, he also founded the first American credit union, St. Mary’s Bank in\u00a0Manchester, New Hampshire. Furthermore, two Americans became the key figures of the American cooperative banking movement:\u00a0Pierre Jay, the Massachusetts banking commissioner and Edward A. Filene, a Boston merchant. They\u00a0studied credit unions in Europe and corresponded with Desjardins, resulting in the first state credit union act in the United States. Today, there around 6,000 credit unions in America with more than 100 million members.<\/p>\n

Read more about credit unions’ elections<\/a><\/p>\n

Up next: successful election organization in credit unions<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The history of credit unions depicts an important change in financial and cooperative services. In the 19th century, credit unions started to offer affordable banking and loan services to customers\u00a0and paved the way for a\u00a0fairer financial market. Read more about the history of credit unions in our second blog article.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":268,"featured_media":5288,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_eb_attr":"","ub_ctt_via":"","spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[893],"tags":[860,1126,975],"featured_image_src":"https:\/\/www.polyas.de\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/Credit-Unions.jpg","author_info":{"display_name":"Jaqueline Bargmann","author_link":"https:\/\/www.polyas.de\/blog\/author\/j-bargmann"},"yoast_head":"\nHistory and Development of Credit Unions in North America<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The history of credit unions gives you the important facts. Credit unions today are still an essential element of the financial market. 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As cooperatives are owned by their members, members are responsible for electing the board of directors. The board, in turn, manage the credit to handle the management of the credit union. While legislation regarding credit unions varies internationally, it\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Electoral research"","img":{"alt_text":"Essentials about credit union elections","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.polyas.de\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/Credit-Unions.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5259,"url":"https:\/\/www.polyas.de\/blog\/en\/electoral-research\/credit-unions-general-information","url_meta":{"origin":5297,"position":1},"title":"Credit Unions: What You Need to Know","date":"05\/07\/2017","format":false,"excerpt":"In the first blog of our new series about credit unions, we take a look at their key features and how they contribute to the financial services market. 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These members can be normal people, other\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Electoral research"","img":{"alt_text":"Winning Candidates in Cooperatives' Election organization","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.polyas.de\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/10\/genossenschaften_digitale_Mitbestimmung-1.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":4352,"url":"https:\/\/www.polyas.de\/blog\/en\/electoral-research\/cooperatives-history","url_meta":{"origin":5297,"position":3},"title":"History of Cooperatives","date":"23\/02\/2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Here you can read all about the history of cooperatives, why they became a common business practice and some of the interesting stories behind their development in the 19th and 20th centuries. Read on to learn more! 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