Co-delivery sir? Certainly, which kind would you like?

The other day I posted a note about co-delivery, making an aside about policing. Soon afterwards, looking for something else of course, I came across this short 2009 paper by Tony Bovaird and Elke Loeffler, on 'user and community co-production of public services', published by the Third Sector Research Centre.

 
They report survey and focus group research in five European countries, looking at the (co-)production of community safety, the local environment, and public health. The ranking is revealing: crime reporting, and most aspects of crime prevention, clearly rank lowest, even though the top indicator is 'take care to lock doors and windows'.

Bovaird and Loeffler conclude that people are most willing to make a contribution to public services 'when it involves them in relatively little effort and when they do not have to work closely with other citizens or staff or professionals in the government.'

Reassuringly, the researchers do not see this as beyond the influence of policy:

'the behaviour of citizens is more likely to give rise to individual co-production, unless encouragement is given to mechanisms which lead to more collective co-production. The research has suggested the possibility that third sector intermediaries and that internet-enabled technologies are likely to fulfil the requirements which make collective co-production easier and more likely.' (Emphasis added)

That last sentence combines two long-held concerns of mine - the first (third sector intermediaries) being a community development credo and obviously encompassing street reps, for example; the second being precisely the argument that Hugh Flouch and I have been making about neighbourhood online networks. We're hoping that we can confirm it convincingly in our current research.

 

 

 

Comments

[Tony Bovaird]

Hi Kevin

Glad you found our work interesting - and especially glad that Razia Shariff's sharp eyes found your blog and told us!

We're especially interested in the idea of street reps and ways in which they might link, both formally and informally, with public services. After all, self-organising and self-help communities are NOT an example of 'co-production' in such activities, where there is no public sector input by definition. So we think that these people who can provide the right interface to enable genuine 'CO-production' are likely to be far more important in the future than they were in the past. Would be keen to hear more about your work in this area and the examples that you regard as especially successful.

[ian]

On the subject of crime, I have always thought that if anyone was to try to set out Peel's Principles of Policing these days they would be denounced as a dangerous radical.

http://ibanda.blogs.com/panchromatica/2006/12/sir_robert_peel.html

I particularly like:

Principle #2: The ability of the police to perform their duties is dependent upon the public approval of police actions.

Principle #3: Police must secure the willing co-operation of the public in voluntary observation of the law to be able to secure and maintain the respect of the public.

Number 7 though is the one likely to cause a sharp intake of breath amongst Chief Constables and Home Secretaries across the land:

Principle #7: Police, at all times, should maintain a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and the public are the police; the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent upon every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.

[Ben Lee]

I also see Tony Bovaird and Elke Leoffler's excellent work on co-delivery as exposing a real point of leverage over public service reform. It is very similar to what we have found in our action learning around Community Contracts with neighbourhood managers which Liz Richardson at Manchester evaluated independently http://www.communities.gov.uk/publications/communities/evaluationcommunitycontracts . Many contracts are monitored by street reps, and despite the concerns Kevin raises, I am generally quite optimistic about them provided they have good buy-in and support from within the council.
To me there are three connected issues which could be investigated together (ideally through action research with local public officials and citizens). The question to test would be:
Can we take the co-delivery idea further if we look jointly and connect the findings from (1) the very positive experience of citizens taking a monitoring role under community contracts (2) TSRC's evidence around older people being more likely to give time and effort to co-delivery, and (3) match this against the need for major change in the way we provide older poeple's services locally in the coming decades?

I for one would be very keen to take this a bit further - with TSRC, Kevin (and perhaps Manchester Uni) if they are up for it!