I have been inspired to start this blog to try and provide a home for the practice of community development work in Leeds.<\/p>\n
It seems to me that much ‘community\u00a0development’\u00a0work in the city is actually the\u00a0delivery\u00a0of national and\u00a0local\u00a0government initiatives prepared in\u00a0response\u00a0to policies that may have had very little input from the communities that they are designed to help.<\/p>\n
Just\u00a0because\u00a0we call it community development work does not make it so!<\/p>\n
Good community development workers are increasingly\u00a0becoming\u00a0an extension of the state rather than a\u00a0catalyst\u00a0for genuine community development. \u00a0I am fed up of hearing people tell me that they take public money and then see how far they can go in subverting it to do ‘proper’ community development work. \u00a0Not only are the ethics of this questionable – but so too is the efficacy.<\/p>\n
If high quality community development processes work then we should ensure that they are properly resourced. \u00a0And if the public purse won’t pay for stuff that it can’t control then we must look elsewhere for investment.<\/p>\n
But this is not about turning our backs on public funding. \u00a0It is about developing a proper relationship with funders so that they recognise what underpins effective community development work (long term relationships and an adherence to a set of\u00a0values\u00a0and practices) and themselves managing to resist the temptation to buy pale imitations and short-cuts.<\/p>\n