Repository
A curated and searchable collection of community-related research reports, case studies and publications
Volunteering in community business: a digest of recent research
Published: 2021
Volunteers are critical to how community businesses help to make places better. They help root community businesses in their local communities, and their time is central to community businesses’ financial viability. In fact, some community businesses would not exist at all were it not for volunteers.
This digest summarises three re…
Empowering Places – Change Framework
Published: 2021
This is a working ‘change framework’ for the Empowering Places programme – a five-year programme designed to empower communities to build community businesses. The framework sets out the desired vision and outcomes of the programme, as well as pointing to the elements of the programme that enable progress towards the vision and outcomes. …
How to enable Community-Led Housing: Learning Brief 1 – Enabling and catalysing community-led housing
Published: 2021
As part of the ongoing evaluation of Power to Change’s Homes in Community Hands programme, this learning brief shares key insights on how to enable community-led housing. It draws on evidence from five enabler hubs funded through the programme in 2020-21, revealing how hubs are building an environment in which community-led can grow. This bri…
How to enable Community-Led Housing: Learning Brief 2 – Building Positive Relationships with Hub Stakeholders
Published: 2021
As part of the ongoing evaluation of Power to Change’s Homes in Community Hands programme, this learning brief shares key insights on how to enable community-led housing. It draws on evidence from five enabler hubs funded through the programme in 2020-21, revealing how hubs are building an environment in which community-led can grow. This bri…
Leading to Net Zero – Evidence review of communities pioneering low carbon standards
Published: 2021
The consultancy firm Hoyle and Dean was commissioned by the Community Land Trust Network to undertake a “soft touch” review of the approach various community-led housing development teams take towards sustainability and carbon reduction for housing developments within their operating areas. The purpose of the review was to find the overall …
Levelling the land: Social investment and ‘left behind’ places
Published: 2021
Local Trust commissioned independent advisor and researcher Dan Gregory to explore whether social investment in its current forms could support the regeneration of the most deprived or ‘left behind’ neighbourhoods across the country or, as our experience with the Big Local programme was suggesting, new models were needed, and if so, what th…
Rapid research COVID-19 Briefing #15: Community responses to COVID-19 – Changing community needs and looking to the future
Published: 2021
The pandemic has been accompanied by a searching analysis of its multi-faceted challenges, uneven consequences and intensifying social needs. Looking ahead, it is thought that a ‘long shadow’ of impact will be cast over the coming ‘COVID decade’. But how are needs experienced at community level identified and understood? This briefing a…
Routes into community influence
Published: 2021
This project was carried out by a team of Community Researchers in Lawrence Hill, Bristol between May-August 2021, with support from Wellspring Settlement’s Economic Resilience and Community Inclusion teams and researchers from the University of Bristol. The project was funded by the UKRI QR Strategic Priorities Fund, administered by the Univ…
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&…
A Civic Strength Index for London
Published: 2021
The London Civic Strength Index and its underlying framework have been co-designed and co-created by Londoners to understand where civic strength exists; to make that strength visible; and to capture what makes it unique in communities across London. This first report sets out a clear framework for civic strength in London, aims …
Community Pubs – A better form of business 2021
Published: 2021
This research used mixed methods to look at the size, characteristics and performance of the community pub sector in the UK. This is the seventh of such reports, building on what’s known about the sector as it becomes increasingly established. It can be used as an information resource and benchmarking tool for pubs, funders and support organi…
Community Shops – A better form of business 2021
Published: 2021
This comprehensive publication looks at the community shop sector in the UK. It was first published in 2011 and has grown with additional information year on year. The report can now be used as a startup guide for new groups, a benchmarking tool for existing community shops, and is used by funders and support organisations to futureproof servic…