Communities: the way we could be

Some people idealise past communities as what must have been the embodiment of a wonderful time – stable, calm, guided by reassuring traditions. Others dread the talk of ‘community’ because they find in so many communal/neighbourhood settings signs of prejudice, discrimination, and oppressive hierarchies. 

The truth is that communities have the potential for mutually supportive relationships and a positive sense of belonging which embraces diversity. However, that potential can only be realised if inclusive and cooperative relations are backed by the prevailing culture, rules and institutional practices. Otherwise, there is always a danger that marginalisation and exploitation could become the norm in a closed-off structure.

When politicians sing the praises of communities, we should go beyond the rhetoric to see if they are championing communities that are realising their social potential through collaborative working, or they are actually promoting the idea that communities riven by divisions should be left alone to deal with their own problems.

The latter type of politician, out of cynicism or naivety, will tell us that the more is left to communities to sort out for themselves, the better it would be for all concerned.  Public expenditure can be reduced, taxes cut, and people will learn to rely on themselves.  In practice, the more communities are deprived of wider political and economic support, the less likely they can ever escape from poverty, poor health, and their generally unenviable quality of life.  The mantra of pulling oneself by one’s bootstraps rings hollow to those who are having to walk barefoot down a stony path.

No one wishes to deny that communities can do a lot for themselves, but ultimately whether that is enough to lift them towards a better future is connected to the type of partnership arrangements they enter into with public bodies as well as among themselves.  This does not mean that there should be large-scale programmes set up in communities with centrally directed funding, targets, and intensive monitoring.  Instead, what the accumulating evidence of successful community-based transformation around the world tells us is that real partnership has to be built on the sharing of trust, information, and power.

With public investment and the proper statutory framework, community organisations have been able to develop community land trusts to provide genuinely affordable housing, set up anchor facilities to meet local needs, and run community enterprises that generate income to help pursue neighbourhoods’ priorities.  Mutual support schemes such as time banking thrive when they are financially backed rather than left to their own devices with no public funding.  Regeneration programmes deliver more cost-effective outcomes and higher satisfaction when public agencies ensure they are shaped by the informed input and continuous feedback from the communities concerned.

It is now widely known that suspicion and misunderstanding that so often undermine partnership working between government bodies and community groups can be significantly reduced through the use of inclusive dialogue techniques, responsive engagement processes, and shared objective-setting.  Community learning, backed by trained facilitators, can help people explore the real causes of the problems they face, and work together in formulating viable solutions. And trust can be built by replacing rigid target-setting and inflexible monitoring with adaptive planning processes and responsive evaluation.

Whatever the sceptics out there may think, the facts speak for themselves.  State-community co-production, guided by the aforementioned collaborative approaches, has led to a wide range of improvements such as: higher levels of both actual and perceived community safety; the development of multi-stakeholder cooperative models in the health and social care sector that result in better care and greater affordability; more effective outcomes and enhanced dignity in tackling food insecurity; and sustained progress in dealing with environmental challenges relating to energy, transport and air quality.

Communities should be encouraged to do what they can to improve their quality of life.  But how much they can actually do is inseparable from the political choices that are made.  Political leaders who want to work with communities as partners and are prepared to listen as well as propose when it comes to solving problems, will find that their joint endeavours have a much better chance of bringing about the kind of transformative changes informed citizens seek.  

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Find out more from: 

Tomorrow’s Communities: lessons for community-based transformation in the age of global crises (Policy Press, 2021)

Con Politics & the Hate Parade

Con politics is a mutated form of conservatism.  Conservative thinking is generally cautious about big societal changes, and tends to oppose them unless most people have in time come to see that the changes are actually quite harmless, or indeed beneficial for society. Con politics, on the other hand, pushes without hesitation for big societal changes whenever these are likely to strengthen further the self-centred clique of powerful people who steer it – even if that would be harmful for others in society. 

The changes Con politics implacably opposes are those that could diminish its proponents’ wealth, status, or ability to keep taking unfair advantage of others – in such cases, it does not matter if most people are persuaded that the changes are necessary to reduce the suffering of those who have endured much pain and mistreatment, or there is mounting evidence that they will help improve life in general, Con politics would vilify such changes as utterly unacceptable. 

To win votes, and avoid being exposed as callously self-serving, Con politics rallies support by weaponising hate against two types of target: the vulnerable scapegoats and the ‘do-gooder’ enemies.

Top of the list for scapegoats are immigrants and refugees, who will be routinely mentioned with the prefix ‘illegal’. The substantial contributions they can make to the economy must be ignored, instead they should be prevented from getting any paid work, and then blamed for being a drain on public resources. Resentment against ‘foreigners’ (even if their families have lived here for generations) and their ‘alien’ customs is to be stoked. Absurd schemes to deter people coming from abroad (except for the wealthy ones who are likely to donate to Con politics) should be concocted to keep them out, lock them up, or fly them away to far off land.

Next on the scapegoats list are people on low pay or unable to get a job, and have to resort to claiming benefits to make ends meet. They are to be indignantly denounced as ‘cheats’ and ‘scroungers’. Anyone denied decent pay is to be branded as ‘lazy’, the homeless are to be told they have only themselves to blame, and those who cannot work because of their illness or disability are to be slammed for lying about their condition and have all support withdrawn if they do not get out of their sick bed or wheelchair and start looking for work.

More scapegoats are to be found amongst those who live a ‘non-traditional’ way of life – women who want to have opportunities truly equal to those available to men, homosexual couples who want to get married, anyone not conforming to ‘conventional’ notions of gender and sexuality, etc – they are all reviled for violating precious principles and long revered customs.

Along with the scapegoats, Con politics targets the ‘do-gooders’ who dare to press for changes that will help the disadvantaged, and promote reforms that will alter power structures and prevailing practices to improve life for people in general. Trade unions that champion the workers’ cause, politicians who seek to bring in progressive policies, campaigners for the rights of those who are discriminated against, advocates for curbing corporate greed to protect the planet, lawyers who challenge oppressive measures, international organisations that uphold standards of fairness and decency – they are all presented as despicable enemies who should be loathed as dangerous radicals and shut out with perpetual disdain.

Why so much hate? Well, since sympathy with the plight of those who have the toughest struggle might lead to support for giving them help, Con politics wants to turn them into hated scapegoats that few will want to assist with public resources. As for the ‘do-gooders’, if people would listen calmly to their reasons and evidence, they might end up siding with them and their reform ideas. But manipulate people into hating them, that would ensure the case they make – however sound – would be rejected without even getting a hearing.

No wonder the rallying of Con politics is basically one long hate parade.