Community empowerment in Practice March 13, 2008
Posted by western4uk in Change, Corporate Governance, Decision Making, Equity, Governance, Grey Literature, Interagency Relations, Management, Public Health, Social Capital.Tags: Empowerment, Governance, Grey Literature, Interagency Relations, Social Capital
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Community empowerment in practice: lessons from Communities First looks at community empowerment in local governance and service delivery which has become a key component of government policy in the UK. However, there are critical challenges to achieving this in practice. This research sees the Joseph Rowntree Foundation use 9 case studies to consider:
It considers:
- how far partnerships have developed and evolved to empower communities;
- the relationships communities have with other representative channels;
- the extent to which communities have influenced other agendas;
- the overall impact of regeneration partnerships.
It finds that:
- Community members responded positively to the opportunities for participation provided by Communities First and, as they began to recognise their own role in promoting positive change in their community, their confidence in their abilities increased.
- Community members brought varied skills and knowledge to the partnership process but required support to develop the skills required for effective partnership working.
- Levels of community engagement were improved by providing multiple routes to participation. Highly localised forums that fed into the partnership widened community empowerment and helped to support community members of the partnerships.
- Little evidence of community influence over statutory members of Communities First partnerships and no evidence of significant mainstream ‘programme bending’ where statutory agencies prioritised actions and expenditure in the Communities First partnership area.
- Clearer links are needed between strategic partnerships at ward level and those at the local authority level. Local Strategic Partnerships or Local Service Boards are not sufficiently local or connected to the community to facilitate effective community empowerment.
- Concludes that government will need to provide incentives and sanctions to promote a greater statutory sector response to processes of community empowerment. Consideration should be given to allocating specific functions and resources to local partnerships which they can deploy. The continued commitment of community members will be conditional on ‘purposeful’ community involvement.
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