Coopetition – Cooperation among competitors during competition.
Collaboration among competitors, as in the New Economy. Social capital (networks, shared norms, and trust), as fostered in collaboration and alliances, may be as important as physical capital (plant, equipment, and technology), and human capital (intellect, character, education, and training) in driving innovation and growth.
Competitors cooperate in order to gain advantage over other competitors, as in a NASCAR race, when competing drivers team up temporarily by staying in a single line to combine their horsepower and speed during a draft. (as inferred from various comments over the years by Darrell Waltrip, NASCAR Champion Driver and Fox Sports NASCAR Racing Commentator)
Implication for schooling: Competition among students that may include temporary, strategic sharing, teamwork, collaboration, cooperation, and other forms of working together while recognizing that one will likely gain more advantage through that effort than others in the same operation.
Key ideas for teachers and students:
1. Competition dominates while individuals use alliances to gain more personal benefits, that is, more advantages, profits, and greater gains than others receive.
2. Temporary strategic alliances during competition for a limited reward.
3. Coopetition contrasts with cooperation, collaboration, sharing, etc. as ends in themselves.
That is, students may work together in a project (as on an athletic team or in an orchestra), but will not all receive the same recognition or other reward for the complete project. Someone will compete for team captain or concertmaster/concertmistress, others will follow these leaders.
Some teachers see coopetition as disruptive and threatening to their pedagogical and political beliefs .
Others celebrate coopetition uncritically, ignoring the professional judgments that create uneven distribution of cost and benefits to students and schools.
I urge teachers to consider new possibilities coopetition offers for technological and pedagogical progress while preparing all students with information and skills they need to succeed in what appears as an emerging global economy.