Monday, 04 February 2008

Public libraries and multicultural relationships

Helen Carpenter, who managed the Welcome to Your Library project, has just published a very readable report about her international study tour on the role of public libraries in multicultural relationships.

She considers the relationships in terms of:

  • how public libraries connect as institutions with all relevant stakeholders
  • how they plan and deliver services that reflect, support and promote diversity
  • how they enable inter-cultural dialogue and encourage active citizenship in a rapidly changing environment.

Helen visisted Canada, the USA, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands and Belgium, and the report offers numerous little snapshots of good practice with professional reflections. More insights on her travel blog.

4 Feb 2008 12:58:37 | Citizenship and democracy, Cohesion and diversity, Information and communication

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Community cohesion: stimulating more interaction The government's response to the Commission on Integration and Cohesion, published today, anounces new actions including guidance for local authorities to consider how funding can better be used to support greater interaction between people from different backgrounds. The proposed actions are: * Specialist cohesion teams to be established by central government to provide advice on conflict resolution, mediation, leadership and on the steps that local leaders might take when new people arrive in their area. * Local authority twinning - between areas of the country experiencing similar issues in order to share ideas and solutions to inspire innovation to respond to these challenges. * New guidance for local authorities on developing Information Packs for migrants. * Consultation on cohesion guidance for funders - to encourage local authorities to consider how funding can better be used to support greater interaction, and reducing funding for single groups. * All local authorities will have access to an impact assessment tool to assess whether the activities they are planning will have a positive impact on cohesion in their neighbourhoods. Press release.
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Pssst, heard what they're saying about rumour? Word of mouth doesn't have to take months. I was talking to a couple of residents a while ago about rumour and misinformation in an area of intense regeneration activity, and we touched on the value as well as the problematic nature of rumour. The following anecdote was offered with the conviction of truth of someone reading a log book. A community activist was busy organising a meeting about an issue they perceived to be important, but too few people promised to come. Tactics adopted included getting on a local bus with a colleague, and using a loud whisper, convincingly foretelling a negative development which would have an unhappy effect on everyone locally. According to the story, this did the trick: the meeting was very well attended.

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