Shifting the balance: Local adaptation, innovation and collaboration during the pandemic and beyond

Community Power and Health Equity: Closing the Gap between Scholarship and Practice

Published: 2022

This discussion paper draws on learnings from Lead Local: Community-Driven Change and the Power of Collective Action, a collaborative effort funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. It shows how the power-building ecosystem works in practice, showcasing examples of state and local power-building organisations and campaigns nationwide and r…

Models of Value that Community Organising Generates for its Adopters

Published: 2022

Over recent years, the principles and practice of community organising have proliferated across a range of organisations and sectors. Keen to understand the impact of community organising and its potential as a tool for communities to tackle local issues, Power to Change commissioned a piece of research in 2020 looking in-depth at the experienc…

Understanding vaccine hesitancy through communities of place

Published: 2021

A new UK-US collaborative study examining vaccine engagement highlights the importance of tapping into local knowledge and leadership in efforts to improve Covid-19 vaccine take-up.

The research was funded by the British Academy, the Social Science Research Council, and the UK’s Science and Innovation Network in the&…

Rapid research COVID-19 Briefing #12: Community responses to COVID-19 – Potential and limits of community power in a pandemic

Published: 2021

New concepts of community power have risen up the policy agenda during COVID-19. Communities have widely been seen as integral to meeting local needs and as having the capacity to respond rapidly to the pandemic. The idea of community power is often assumed, in policy terms, to be a universally beneficial force. However, this fails to address i…

Power in Big Local partnerships

Published: 2021

This report is about the practice of decision making in a resident-led, place-based programme. It explores the operation of power within decision making, how decisions are made, by and with whom and in what contexts.

It considers how particular ideas gather appeal, how some voices are heard more than others, and how beliefs in ‘the right way…

Rapid research COVID-19 Briefing #11: Community responses to COVID 19 – Power and communities

Published: 2021

Community spirit has flourished and community power has been realised during the pandemic. But as thinking turns to recovery and ‘building back better’, it is timely to think critically about how power operates within and between communities, and to consider what this might mean for its potential for transformation. In this briefing we look…

Community Power: The Evidence

Published: 2021

The term community power captures a wide range of different practices, approaches and initiatives. Common to all of these is the principle that communities have knowledge, skills and assets which mean they themselves are well placed to identify and respond to any challenges that they face, and to thrive.

This report sets out the wealth of comm…

Rapid research COVID-19 Briefing #9: Community responses to COVID-19 – Communities and local authorities

Published: 2021

The varied ways in which local authorities have worked with communities in response to COVID-19 is of great interest for policymakers, researchers and practitioners at the local level. Earlier research on this topic can provide helpful frameworks and insights to inform current debates. This briefing looks at literature on the relationships betw…

Think Big, Act Small: Elinor Ostrom’s Radical Vision for Community Power

Published: 2020

Elinor Ostrom is the intellectual hero of the community power movement. She humanised the study of economics and politics and discovered what is possible, and the problems that can be solved, when we trust each other. In this new piece of work, New Local’s Dr Simon Kaye explores her ideas, and presents their lessons for the UK today.