Organizational Accumulation: Revisiting Capitalist Transitions and the Danish Farmer Cooperatives From the 19th to the 21st Centuries

When, how and why does farming become capitalist? This question has long shaped debates in agrarian studies and economic history. Although traditional analyses emphasize market dependency and competitive pressures, this paper argues for a shift in focus towards the diverse strategies of reproduction that farmers have employed in different historical contexts. Rather than searching for common capitalist behaviours, we should examine what made farmers different as they transitioned to capitalism. This approach is illustrated through the case of Denmark, where farmers from the late 19th century pioneered a unique strategy of cooperative organization to transition into capitalist agriculture. We introduce the concept of ‘organizational accumulation’ to describe this process, in which cooperative networks enabled farmers to strongly influence key aspects of production, processing and trade. By foregrounding organizational accumulation, this paper offers a new perspective on how capitalist farming emerges—and how its trajectories vary across time and place.