Scrap the deluded principles of economic regeneration
At a recent conference, I heard an otherwise sane academic tell us that the principles of regeneration – which were sound in the good times – will see us through the bad times.
What a delusion! Economic regeneration worked in part, but failed in some key areas. Let’s not forget, even when the economy was effervescent, poverty, low income and worklessness were never solved and in some cases actually became worse. The ‘good times’ were not that good for some. Also, in terms of the environment, economic regeneration policies have failed to deal with our overreliance on carbon for economic growth.
To solve the problems of inequality and environment, we need to start thinking differently about economic regeneration and economics. If we stumble on, in the belief that the principles were right, we will continue to get it fundamentally wrong. Let’s be clear – we need a rethink of these principles.
At the heart of this rethink is seeing poverty, low income and worklessness as well as climate change and pollution as issues with the same cause. They are both symptoms of economics and economic regeneration policy which failed to protect and nurture social and natural capital.
The old principles need some ‘creative destruction’. This will not just be a change in vocabulary where we just start refreshing our pre-existing plans with a dousing of worthy words such as ‘green’, ‘sustainable’ and ‘low carbon’. It does not just involve ‘taking the environment seriously’ and committing to media driven carbon reduction pledges, while following similar economic growth patterns. It is not just economic strategy adding a ‘green economy’ section. The environment is not an ‘issue’ to be lopped on like a brainstormed ‘post it’ note.
But there is a way forward. The driving principles were clearly faulty, but I believe that the people, disciplines and some practice surrounding regeneration were sound.
Practitioners in economic development and regeneration, planning and urban design, community development and all those other frontline ‘place making’ and so called ‘sustainable community’ workers, are imbued with values like fairness and liveability, instilled in practice. Arguably, these values were suppressed by overriding principles and an orthodoxy as regards land and property appreciation, financial services, trickle down economics and traditional economic growth models.
I believe this latent value driven process can forge new policy and practice, and develop a sophisticated appreciation of the relationship between economic development, growth, inequality and low carbon. This would mean, for example, that business support policy is also low carbon transition policy. It would mean that community development policy is environmental activism. It would mean that the young workless are trained as the carbon army.
I believe that with a mission to nurture and protect social and natural capital, these values can come to the fore. Indeed these practitioners can become the new environmentalists and forge a new wave of local economic activism and place making.
Posted on Thursday, 7th January 2010 | This entry has 16 comments
Leslie Watson | Thursday, 7th January 2010 | 04:52 PM
Indeed - that is why the concept of sustainable development was invented.
Consistently applying a full set of sustainability principles to policy and practice is the way ahead if regeneration is to be fit for the 21st century - as sustainable development finally comes of age.
Nick Bird | Thursday, 7th January 2010 | 05:42 PM
This is spot on. The tendency, though, will still be to dress up a ‘faulty’ (at it’s best) and destructive (at it’s worst) economic model with the ‘worthy words’. All like minded people need to be working together to ensure that the regeneration mindset based on the worship of economic growth really does get replaced.
Taking phrases from this article I think we need to prioritise the nurturing of social capital in as a way of nurturing and protecting natural capital. In other words local people developing environmentally sustainable and resilient local economic systems. It may not be the answer to everything but it’s a big part of the solution
Martin Yarnit | Thursday, 7th January 2010 | 06:07 PM
Neil
I like the drift but can I add: regeneration policy is skewed by the community deficit model. Communities have to be convinced that they have the capacity to lead their own renewal alongside helpful allies, so there’s a need for a balancing focus on assets based community economic development.
Bernie cullen | Friday, 8th January 2010 | 12:22 AM
I can get some of what you are saying, however I have one or two issues with the premise that any kind of regeneration will ultimately work if there is not a fundamental heart shift in the population from looking after me and my 2.2 or 4x4, to a greater community consciousness. I do not believe it can be imposed from on high. I work in the grass roots third sector regeneration industry…..... It’s tough and dirty, freezing cold and vastly underfunded, because all the money is swallowed by suppurating bodies of government funded outcome obsessed, grant munching, number crunching suits….. I must have had a hard day at the sharp end !!!
Matt Scott | Friday, 8th January 2010 | 11:29 AM
I think I agree with the conclusions and would be tempted to express things more starkly. If the logic and premise is that old style economic development is flawed what forces created that orthodoxy in the first place? The ideological obsession of both new public managerialism and market based fundamentalism has damaged our social bios. Too much focus on money and market; not enough on social justice and collective action. As martin says, we end up with only deficit models of community. Looking at the present time what is remarkable is that a market driven profligacy has now led us to the conventional wisdom that there must and can only be public sector cuts - i.e. that the public and community sectors must take the hit and There Is No Alternative. What we should be doing is challenging such unconscious positions of submission but instead the 3rd sector more often seeks to gently co-opt pseudo economic language in the hope of gaining a flawed credibility that puts greater distance between it and real communities.
Malcolm Cross | Friday, 8th January 2010 | 11:45 AM
I don’t know what’s worse - the claim that all regeneration approaches are still valid or a series of evangilistic slogans that are the proposed solution.
Fine words, yes, but how to implement them? To some extent, they are the most difficult aspects of regeneration and that’s why we’ve seen little progress. Even a whole European Commission funding bloc in the 1990s failed to make a decent impression. We end up initiatives that are stop start and with questionable financial sustainability.
Can we stop with the evangilism and get on with some practical solutions please?
Nick Bird | Friday, 8th January 2010 | 01:27 PM
I don’t want to be an evangelist but I feel some of the things that have been said need to be repeated over and over (and over) again:
Communities have to be (and can be) strengthened from within, not moulded from outside
But
Support is required from allies – responsive to need, not policy/programme driven
And
This support should enable communities to share and implement ‘practical solutions’
However
This all needs to work alongside a strong public service sector which (along with the voluntary community sector) shouldn’t have to pay for the mess created by the market
I watched the Age of Stupid last night and realise the least stupid thing to do is to bang our collective head against that big brick wall until…..
Malcolm Cross | Friday, 8th January 2010 | 03:11 PM
Markets - hey, they get a bad rap - but lets not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Some excellent, useful market based initiatives (microcredit, guaranteed job training schemes anyone?). Some really progressive company initiatives doing great community programmes - e.g. Bank of America.
When I read this blog - I just can’t understand what it all means in a practical sense. I am not being funny - I just can’t get to grips with the tangible and practice actions that community based approaches will take. What does social justice and collective action mean? to me its just a bunch of worthy words, like ‘progessive’.
Don’t get me wrong I am a left leaning person as fed up with the irresponsibility of certain businesses as much as anyone - but unless you folks can spell out in tangible terms what you mean, and how practically it will work and make a difference, then you’ll never get taken seriously by me anyway.
Neil McInroy | Friday, 8th January 2010 | 05:30 PM
Thanks for comments.
Leslie: I agree about applying sustainable development principles. Problem is..economic regenerators don’t really get sustainable development and I am not sure the concept helps itself actually. The challenge is about whether we place the change within an economic discourse/mindset and or reshape with a more social/community/environment activist based mindset.
Matt’s and Nick’s comments are very interesting and go to heart of the above challenge. I ultimately believe, like them, that we need to have both types of change and fight both battles That is, change the mindset of economics and continue with a clear alternative vision and mindset…building alliances and coalition as we go…but its a painful!
I think this is where Bernie’s comments are useful as they are articulating the pain of all this…we all get angry about the need for a fundamental shift to happen…which we are not yet seeing.
In Martin’s case he is focussing on the imbalance between community and equity and market driven approaches and indicates how we need to practically change the principles of economic development with an economic bend. i.e community asset models.
Malcolm: I agree we need action and practical solutions. There is a disconnect between warm words and real action from power wielders. However plugging our own work at CLES (http://www.cles.org.uk), we are working every day with partners to fight through these issues. We astride this tension. Especially through our work on local economic activism and place resilience.
Mary Mooney | Saturday, 9th January 2010 | 08:59 AM
Speaking as one who has had a little experience in the 3rd sector, I think the main problem is we are trying to “fix” economic deprivation and all that goes with it with the tools used by capital driven business.
Speak to anyone who has had to apply for a grant to run a project - from day one you are working out how it is going to work after the funding has melted away and a different focus is demanded by the grant givers. I agree that the most productive strategies come from communities and individuals who own them, see themselves in the driving seat, rather than being directed by anonymous suits in the town halls or EU.
Much was made of corporate social responsibility - I believe, like the carbon reducing issue, this should be our main tool to get the whole of society addressing the needs of our, and their, community.
Mike Chitty | Tuesday, 12th January 2010 | 10:43 AM
Perhaps ‘community’ is a red herring? And ‘green’ and ‘sustainable’.
When I am working with people who are struggling to provide breakfast for the kids, these things are a million miles from the top of their agenda. This is not their starting point - and it should not be ours - however attractive and compelling they might be.
We have to engage people, individuals, where they are - not where we would wish (or need) them to be. If they want to change stuff then we might (emphasise MIGHT) be able to help.
Community emerges when people recognise that in pursuing their own self interest they have to help others in pursuit of theirs. What results is an understanding of the power of association, collaboration and organisation. And ‘community’ emerges as a result.
As immediate economic, social and psychological wants are met new wants begin to emerge - including the (very human) want to do no harm. At this point an interest in sustainability may develop.
So here is my first offer a principle for regeneration - ‘Start where people are at - not where we (or our funders) want them to be’.
Martin Yarnit | Tuesday, 12th January 2010 | 11:42 AM
Start where people are at - with one eye also on the opportunities arising from government and the local economy - makes sense. It’s what unites Participle’s work with the elderly in South London and Hamas’ recognition that it needed to develop useful services if it was going to make political headway against Al Fateh. It’s what the trade union/labour movement used to do - read Paul Mason’s account, Live Working or Die Fighting.
Working with people to identify what they need and working with them to develop solutions: in a way it’s too simple but that’s the foundation. A large part of the solution is about changing services to make them more useful and useable. Another large part is about generating income and jobs. If we could do those two things better…
What strikes me increasingly is how often the problems/solutions centre on better services/support for children and their parents, and better provision/activities/jobs for young people. Ageing and its social and economic consequences is the third big issue.
Matt Scott | Tuesday, 12th January 2010 | 03:29 PM
Community as red herring - not sure I like the sound of that. Government might agree with you though; hence the individual behaviour change model that treats people like consumer units who need to change more light bulbs etc. For me the reason why commuity is not a red herring is because social problems are created by inequality and only solvable by collective action i.e. “common-unity”; the clue is in the name. Agree that we should start where people are at - a key community development principle - but need to quickly break the isolation doesn’t win out
Mike Chitty | Tuesday, 12th January 2010 | 05:06 PM
Firstly - treating people as individuals means the opposite of treating them as consumer units. It means treating them as unique beings capable of transformation and change.
Secondly individual, personal action is at the root of true collectivism. Much of what passes for ‘community’ is a warm glow that surrounds a common activity, frequently of little or no transformational relevance (going on a protest march). It is not community but its counterfeit. The world is full of people trying to help others, when really they should be figuring out how to help themselves.
Rob Billson | Friday, 15th January 2010 | 09:39 AM
In reply to Bernie Cullens’ response and speaking as a manager in one of those “suppurating bodies of government funded outcome obsessed, grant munching, number crunching suits” I would ask what’s wrong with being obsessed or as we prefer to call it “focussed” on outcomes- surely we need to be aware of what we want to see in the end? is it not better than being focussed just on outputs and indicators?
I have worked in the “grass roots third sector regeneration industry” before and have seen plenty of expense deployed on talented committed peoples time, training, community capacity building etc, I spent a fair bit of it myself, and there is an issue of how accountable those spending the money etc are to the wider community. There is an issue about communication here, its very easy to carp on about how the suits are making life difficult for those who work in and with communities, perhaps a better approach might be to see if you can develop a more positive relationship with them, which might lead to better outcomes?
Hilary Burrage | Sunday, 17th January 2010 | 11:01 PM
I’d agree with what Rob says here.
It’s easy to feel the ‘them’ and ‘us’ when it comes to the decision-makers and the like; but someone has to do it, so why not see whether the people who are actually in these roles are willing to support and link things up and help in whatever ways they can?
And, to share a bit of experience informally (unless it’s a formal bid where you can’t, which is another story for another time) it’s best to work (tactfully) ‘top down’ for a decision or change of direction, once of course you’ve also conversed positively with those on the ground in an organisation.
Some decision-makers and leaders have it in them to listen, and even perhaps learn, and then if possible join the dots. These people will appreciate openness and the sharing of perspectives to see things more holistically and from others’ points of view.
And sadly a few won’t.
So at least trying to communicate lets us know who at the top, as Neil says, cares about fairness and so forth, and who doesn’t. That’s surely better than making assumptions about anyone without having tested their response.
Why, after all, would anyone actually want to go into regeneration etc., if they don’t care about these things?
And who knows? One day it might be you making those decent and fair and connected decisions, in the newly established way of doing things.