Neighbourhoods

Civic journalism, no messing

'Back in those days,' croaked Grandpa Harris, 'there was tales about something called multimedia, we'd never heard of the internet but people in huddled meetings would whisper about the political potential of 'self-publishing' and whatnot...'

In parallel gatherings, no doubt some educational and psychological theorists were muttering about the general contraction of attention spans.

Now try Alan Stanton's latest 14 second civic-epic on an all-too-familiar neighbourhood blight. And if you can take it, Disgusting II: the close up.

 

Social justice is no longer available

‘People come together through day-to-day activities, not 'integration projects' which too often feel irrelevant and prove unsustainable… Central to this will be ensuring that the integration benefits of programmes and projects are recognised and supported.’

These sentences come from a paper on Creating the conditions for integration published yesterday by DCLG. They suggest, first, that the government recognises the value of interactions in everyday life, so it must place value on a public realm where such integration can be stimulated and take place. That's a relief, the sceptic might have been wondering.

Secondly it suggests that the government values the evaluation and demonstration of 'integration benefits' where they can be shown to have occurred. That's good too ain't it?

The paper raises a few other points. First – I don’t think I have a problem with using the word integration rather than, say, cohesion (which is what we’d have expected in the past): but it might be interesting to ask why, why the change in vocabulary? At the Institute of Community Cohesion, they know about some of this stuff: do they feel snubbed, I wonder?

Second – is there an understanding that social injustice, poverty and unequal access to power and influence might be critical barriers to integration and should be part of the equation? (Answer, no).

Third – at least three times in the paper the following phrase is used: ‘We want to hear further ideas for action…’ but there is no channnel offered, no named author with contact details on the document, only the switchboard number for the entire department. Somebody’s not being sincere.

And on the question of social justice, here’s some curious news. A week ago the DWP set up a survey to help define social justice (be quick if you want to catch that link):

'The government will shortly publish a social justice strategy paper, detailing a new approach to it. This will define what social justice means to the government, and principles and current practice underlying activity in this area. The government would like to know what social justice means to different stakeholder organisations, so would like organisations to complete a short survey.'

If you follow the link now, this (at the moment) is what you see:

This survey is no longer available.

Please contact ( ) for further assistance..

 

 

Housing and social media

Yesterday I took part in a live panel discussion on social media in housing, for the Guardian’s housing network, and blogged a note about it here.

 

Co-op capitalism

I'm not an economist and I've been puzzled at how little open practical debate there has been over alternative forms of capitalism during the recession.

Now here's Noreena Hertz in a Co-Op think piece outlining the potential of a capitalism associated with collaboration, loyalty and trust, interaction, social connectedness, and respect for process not just outputs.

Here are four of the features of co-op capitalism that she offers:

• The collective has value
• How we interact matters
• The network has worth
• Collaboration can trump competition.

It's a list that you might readily find on a flip chart after a workshop on community development.

I've often noted that there is a fresh receptivity to social values, albeit sometimes in a shallow way; and the evidence of their widespread application in local entrepreneurship is plentiful. As so often, we are waiting for our leaders, so-called, to catch up.

 

How we treat kids

Two contrasting posts about how we treat young people, from two wise minds of the blogosphere today.

Tim Gill has this story of school children being banned from playing hide and seek, from writing notes to each other, and banned from having best friends. I'm sure in time this story will reveal a dreadful poverty of understanding of childhood among those who we expect to appreciate it.

After which, I hope this might cheer you up: David Barrie has this post, with videos, about the great treehouse challenge.

 

Over the garden wall

Here's an example of an informal but sanctioned short-cut for the kids to play with the kids next door. From a section of the BBC's feature on neighbouring which I mentioned yesterday.

 

 

97 per cent of neighbouring surveys say neighbouring ain’t what it used to be

The chorus of popular survey reports lamenting the decline of neighbouring continues to swell and boom. I don’t scour for them systematically, but I have at least half a dozen per year from the last few years. What I most long for is the moment when one of my neighbours rushes in to tell me about new survey results they've just found, showing that X per cent of neighbours share information with each other.

Today’s survey results come from the Ordnance Survey, although since there’s nothing about it on their website thus far, I can’t tell you what they think it shows, nor why they had it carried out.

Here are the headlines:

• 35% of those surveyed do not know their neighbours’ names
• 29% said lack of community spirit and anti-behaviour (sic) were the two biggest problems in their neighbourhood
• 17% of parents in the study stated they never let their children play outside
• 11% said they rarely or never visit their high street
• 25% said a community forum where they could air their concerns would help tackle community issues, whilst 29% claimed that a source of local information would help tackle community issues.

As always, it’s hard to comment without seeing the questions, especially on the first two of these points (all neighbours’ names? Any neighbours’ names? Some neighbours’ names?). Perhaps they will be made available in due course.

I promise to do an extended update of my previous review of popular surveys, because I do think there are things we might learn from them.

A related but separate phenomenon to examine is the media-political obsession with telling us how we are no longer neighbourly, and we all were, unfailingly, in the past of course. They chant the mantras, hoping to light upon some magic combination that will cure all social ills.

My thanks to the dependable Chris Gittins of Streets Alive who offered some commonsense observations when interviewed about the issues on BBC Breakfast this morning.

 

New data on neighbourliness

Rightmove’s ‘Happy at Home Index’ for UK towns has received quite a bit of publicity, mostly pointing gleefully or disparagingly at towns regarded among the ‘happiest’ or ‘unhappiest’. It illustrates how competition between localities for contented residents has become a theme of policy and media attention.

The company has generated an index using 12 measures to assess how people feel about where they live, covering aspects of their property, subjective feelings about their home, and sense of community.

The four questions used for the ‘community’ category seem pretty good to me and are worth reproducing here.

Apparently Dorchester scored highest for neighbourliness and Ilford scored lowest, but I’m not sure it’s helpful to dwell on these rankings.

One might have wanted to see something in there about the local economy and transport: and there’s nothing anywhere in the index to allow for people’s feelings about the value of their council tax and services.

But the survey had a whopping 25,340 respondents and a ten-point scale for each question, so there could be some interesting work to be done on the relations between some of the measures, if the data can be made available.

Pubs and taverns

According to the Lost Pubs Project, in the UK pubs are currently closing at an accelerating rate of 50 each week. While there's been a fair amount of froth around parliament (eg), acknowledging the implications and condemning the tied pub model, there doesn't seem to have been much to challenge the trend.

Apparently something similar has been happening in Chicago. This article suggests the problem is mainly down to the sheer bureaucratic awkwardness of getting a license. One commentator complains:

"Getting a new tavern license issued in a residential neighborhood is brutal. It's virtually impossible."

The problem sweetly illustrates the extent to which social value, publicness and local economies are intertwined. Perhaps policy makers everywhere could appreciate and value the role of pubs in stimulating local social capital, as well as their role in the local economy. Here's a start: Scott Martin who owns Simon's Tavern in Andersonville, Chicago, says that when he bought the place 17 years ago, he found a shoebox containing $80,000 in IOUs.

Previously:
More on local pubs
Why pubs need the CIA

High street blues

The government-led approach to regeneration through competitions and 'challenges' is becoming a flood-threatening piss-take. When I heard about the 'Portas pilots' - a scheme for twelve towns to bid to become 'areas with the vision and enthusiasm to breathe new life into what should be the beating heart of their communities' according to Grant Shapps - forget the dreadful rhetoric, I must have misread the amount available.

Not unreasonably, I feel. One million pounds each might have been meaningful, but not between the lot. If politicians and central government officials want to complain about the use local government officers make of their time, it's worth asking them (a) why they spend their own time coming up with incontestably crap schemes like this, and (b) do they or do they not expect a lot of officials to spend time developing bids that ultimately will not be successful?

Once upon a time we had policy and strategy on social issues, now we have 'innovation', 'challenges' and 'pilots'. Here's David Marlow's take on the government approach, from Regen & Renewal:

'the pattern of their approach to economic development has now been clear for some time. In default of a coherent strategy, they come up with an ad hoc announcement, with derisory funding, to give the appearance of leadership.'

 

Dickens 200: that quote again

"My faith in the people governing is, on the whole, infinitesimal; my faith in the people governed is, on the whole, illimitable."

Charles Dickens, born 7 February 1812.

 

Neighbourhood care groups

Neighbourhood care groups and organisations provide an astonishing social resource which seldom penetrates the policy-media consciousness. Some I know a little about, such as Brighton and Hove Neighbourhood Care Scheme, and Tower Hamlets Friends and Neighbours (where I was a trustee for a while). Now, thanks to Bernard Leach, erstwhile head of sociology at Manchester Metropolitan University, I’ve been learning a little about a group which has been active in Chorlton, Manchester for 44 years.

Chorlton Good Neighbours (CGN) was established in 1967 by local people and has evolved to become a well-established charity offering a range of services to local older people. It currently has over 250 users and 70 volunteers. The group offers a range of practical support including transport and odd jobs for example; and various activities such as exercise classes, cooking sessions, and trips out.

CGN recently carried out their own research with a view to capturing the benefits that are generated by organising care collectively and providing a context for volunteers. The research was based on a survey which asked about levels of confidence to meet and socialise; health, well-being, independence and self-worth; sources of information and advice; sense of safety; and feelings of involvement. This exercise illustrates the great value in having high quality informal local arrangements for people in need of help and support. Take this quote for instance:

‘there is also a policy of ringing up people if for example, they don’t turn up for sessions they normally come to, or if a volunteer notices when delivering a newsletter that there is a lot of mail uncollected... We go the extra step, not just because it is the correct professional thing to do, but because volunteers and users know each other and care for each other.’

Or consider the chart below, which hints at the benefits felt from the range of activities run by the group:

The report suggests that:

‘Overall, the evidence base points to the conclusion that CGN’s activities do change users’ attitudes, lifestyles and their mental and physical wellbeing. It is reasonable to go on to conclude that such care services can lead to significant savings for both the NHS and the Local Authority’s Social Services…

Core activities such as home visits, wheelchair support, coffee morning, Sunday teas and day trips will remain at the heart of what we deliver as they provide a haven of friendship and support – neighbourliness – which enrich the lives of all those involved with Chorlton Good Neighbours.’

 For more details about the report, contact Bernard Leach – btleach { at } gmail.com.

Is inequality the new exclusion?

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, ‘social exclusion’ was, rightly in my view, a major political issue in the UK and the theme under which a good deal of positive social change came about. But I sense that the concept is being replaced in our vocabulary by increasingly assertive discussion about ‘social inequality’.

Two recent examples may in time come to illustrate this. Yesterday we had the director general of the Institute of Directors, Simon Walker, unhappy that Sir Fred Goodwin, former boss of RBS, had been stripped of his knighthood:

“To do it because … you don’t approve of someone, you think they have done things that are wrong but actually there is no criminality … is inappropriate."

So he still doesn’t get it, and shouldn’t be surprised if he is stripped of any credibility he may have had.

My dad was a bank manager. He would have been appalled at the crass contortions being attempted by financial services cronies trying to justify their greed at the expense of several million other people. The ramifications of the behaviour of people like Goodwin, who arrogantly remoulded their roles in crude attempts to exclude social responsibility from banking when, as my dad would have observed, it is fundamental and ineluctable, are causing widespread poverty, stress and grief.

But today we heard from someone who sounds a little more grown up, the chief executive of Deutsche Bank, who warned of a 'social time-bomb' from wealth and income inequality. Let’s be thankful that this man has shown awareness and a willingness to speak out. Who knows, he could start a trend.

And maybe the money from the RBS chairman's declined bonus could go towards copies of The spirit level given to people like Goodwin and Walker and thousands like them, as part of mandatory workshops run by the Equality Trust? It would be good to see them shamed into learning something.

Social exclusion as a principle theme of policy emerged from long-standing debates in Europe about poverty in the 1980s, which mattered because they expanded to include other forms of exclusion. Will something similar happen with ‘social inequality’, which is emerging in the context of 'public concern' about relative wealth? Social inequality is not just about wealth, is it? When do we get to the bit about power?