Other forms: cooperated, cooperating, cooperates
To cooperate is to work together willingly towards the same end. Cooperate with the police, refuse to cooperate, the two agencies cooperated.
The construction is cooperate with somebody on something. It carries a sense of choosing to help — you cannot be made to cooperate, only to comply, and that difference matters in reporting and in law. British English also writes it co-operate with a hyphen, and both are correct. Note cooperation, cooperative, and that a co-op is a business owned by its members or workers.
1verbcooperateTo work together willingly towards the same end.
“The two departments cooperated for exactly one project.”
synonyms: collaborate, work together
2verbasksTo do what somebody asks, helpfully.
“He cooperated fully and was released the same evening.”
Too few real examples of this word to estimate which sense is commonest.
cooperate is a working together.
Also accepted in games: collaborate
Latin cooperari is co-, together, plus operari, to work — from opus, a work. Opera, operate and cooperate all descend from the same noun, so cooperation is literally working together.
Latin
cooperātus
English, today
cooperate
Built from
Originated 1595–1605 from Latin cooperātus, perfect passive participle of cooperor (“to work with”), see -ate for more. Equivalent to co- + operate. Displaced native efnwyrċan.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA