Resilience

On the front line of social change – the importance of community businesses in community wealth building

If you want to see community wealth building in action, come to Liverpool 8.

There you will find The Florence Institute – known to all around as The Florrie – a vibrant community hub housed in an imposing Grade II listed Victorian building. Since being restored by local activists in 2012, The Florrie has been a space of empowerment for local residents – building wealth by offering jobs and projects to support those most in need.
“Community businesses play a crucial role in community wealth building by enabling a more plural ownership of the economy”
It was therefore a fitting venue for last week’s launch of CLES’ latest research on behalf of the Power to Change Research Institute – Building an inclusive economy: the role of social capital and agency in community business in deprived communities. The report looked at how community businesses can support the development of more inclusive economies in deprived areas. Using three case studies (north Hull, west Smethwick, and south Liverpool), CLES has spent the last year seeking to understand how varying forms of social capital are needed to help seed a vibrant local community business scene.

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Back to the future? Thoughts on the first UK2070 Commission report

The UK2070 Commission has released its first report: fairer and stronger: rebalancing the UK economy. The first of three reports, it represents the latest in a long line of policy efforts which have sought to tackle the deep spatial inequality which has plagued the UK as far back as the Barlow Commission of 1940. Does this report – or the Commission as a whole – offer a genuine, much-needed step change?

The starting point for UK2070 should be an acknowledgement that we live in unprecedented times: profound social, economic and democratic crises continue to unfold with a terrifying backdrop of ongoing climate emergency. Spatial imbalances are framed by this, as such  we need a fundamental redress to the UK social contract – this is not a 1979, 1997 or 2010 moment, this is more like 1945.

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Inclusive growth: Making an economy work for a few more?

The report from the RSA inclusive Growth Commission has now been launched – ‘Making our economy work for everyone’. Chaired by Stephanie Flanders, of JP Morgan Asset Management, this work sought to identify practical ways to make local economies across the UK more economically inclusive and prosperous. However, it is arguable that the ideas are limited in terms of wider social justice and economic resilience. Instead of making an economy work for everyone, it’s more likely that it will merely make our economy work for just a few more.

For many years, economic development has been a thin gruel for social inclusion; based overly on economic growth (sometimes at all costs), trickle down and spatial agglomeration. So, it is heartening that the commission seems to have partly picked up on the ideas of CLES and others (you can read our RSA submission here). This includes the understanding (if not a truism) that investment in social institutions and people is as important as investment in economic infrastructure; or, how the spheres of the economic and the social are not separate, but linked. They also highlight the excellent practical work CLES are engaged in: Community Wealth Building and Anchor Institutions.

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  • Five cities, five ‘good’ local economies

    14 Feb. 2017
  • RESEARCH

    Creating Good City Economies in the UK

    16th November 2016
    934.5kB     .pdf
    ...

  • What is a good city economy?

    28 Sep. 2016

    • Places have relationships

    CLES has been working as part of a consortium with Carnegie UK Trust, University of Stirling and the Scottish Towns Partnership. Commissioned and funded by Carnegie UK Trust and the Scottish Government, the consortium have now devised the UK’s first and unique online tool, which has facts and figures for all 479 towns and cities across Scotland.

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  • How independent is your town? New tool shines a light on place relationships

    30 Apr. 2015
  • RESEARCH

    CLES Manifesto for local economies

    17th March 2015
    215.5kB     .pdf
    This CLES Manifesto is underpinned by our values and principles and is based on the experience of our work in local economies over...

  • CLES Manifesto for Local Economies charts a more socially just future

    17 Mar. 2015
  • RESEARCH

    Developing Resilient Town Centres

    12th February 2015
    296.8kB     .pdf
    What makes a resilient town centre? This paper, aimed at people working to support their high street, town or city centre, provide...

  • Understanding Scottish Places

    09 Jul. 2014

    • Building a local civil economy

    The word ‘economy’ can be traced back to the Greek word oikonomos, – ‘one who manages a household’. However, the idea that the economy is intimate and social is often lost from modern day economic discussions. Indeed, all too often the social sphere, is seen as an assumed outcome of economic activity, rather than a planned for and locked-in necessity.

    This connectedness with the social sphere should be central to any local economic development. What is the point of local economic development if it does not deliver social outcomes or address poverty? In this we need to think about building a local civil economy – an economy which is decent, fair and works for people.

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  • RESEARCH

    Developing local economic resilience: The role of LEPs

    11th April 2014
    274.6kB     .pdf
    This CLES think-piece looks at Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) and the extent to which they are creating local economic resil...