Repository
A curated and searchable collection of community-related research reports, case studies and publications
Social infrastructure: international comparative review
Published: 2023
The British Academy report, ‘Shaping the COVID Decade’, included a call to “strengthen and expand [the] community-led social infrastructure that underpins the vital services and support structures needed to enhance local resilience, particularly in the most deprived areas” (the British Academy, 2021a, p. 34). In response, the British Academy fu…
Working with community groups: Why and how to do it
Published: 2022
Guidance for public agencies about working with community groups, based on research exploring relationships between Big Local areas and different public sector agencies.
You can find more reports written or commissioned by Local Trust here.
Supports and challenges for community businesses: Lessons learnt from Power to Change’s legacy programme evaluations
Published: 2022
This report summarises findings from a desk-based review of 17 publications commissioned by Power to Change, to share findings on the support and challenges that are faced by community businesses. Looking across Power to Change’s grant and support programmes such as the Bright Ideas, Trade Up and Community Business Fund programmes, the report…
Community Assets
Published: 2022
The Welsh Parliament (Senedd Cymru) Local Government and Housing Committee undertook an inquiry into community assets, with a specific focus on barriers and opportunities for communities to acquire built assets for community use. The Committee explored how the statutory and policy framework encourages and supports the development of c…
Community Pubs – A better form of business 2022
Published: 2022
This research used mixed methods to look at the size, characteristics and performance of the community pub sector in the UK. This is the eighth of such reports, building on what’s known about the sector as it becomes increasingly established. It can be used as an information resource and benchmarking tool for pubs, funders and support organis…
Community Shops – A better form of business 2022
Published: 2022
This comprehensive publication looks at the community shop sector in the UK. It was first published in 2011 and has grown with additional information year on year. The report can now be used as a startup guide for new groups, a benchmarking tool for existing community shops, and is used by funders and support organisations to futureproof servic…
Empowering Places: Impact on the community and wider place
Published: 2022
Empowering Places aims to build more resilient and prosperous communities by building the capacity of local organisations to catalyse and support the growth of new community businesses. It funds locally rooted ‘catalyst’ organisations in six areas of high deprivation. Each catalyst receives up to £1 million (July 2017–December 2022)…
Homes in Community Hands: Year Three Evaluation
Published: 2022
In 2017 Power to Change launched its Homes in Community Hands programme, which sought to boost the development of community led housing (CLH). This would focus primarily on five urban areas across the country. The programme has provided funding to help plan and develop affordable housing projects to meet community needs. It has also provided gr…
Volunteering Journeys
Published: 2022
A rapid evidence review from the Institute for Community Studies, commissioned by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) to explore young people’s experiences of, and attitudes to, volunteering.
Volunteering Journeys examines how young people perceive and experience the UK’s current volunteering ‘offer’, and how it cou…
The role of paid workers in supporting a community-led programme
Published: 2022
The Big Local programme aims to put more power, resource and decision-making in the hands of local communities. Most Big Local partnerships have chosen to hire paid staff, who support the delivery of Big Local in a huge variety of different ways.
This briefing is part of Local Trust’s research paper series, originally shared internally with st…
Valuing and enabling citizen science: Lessons from the Citizen Science Exploration Grant programme
Published: 2022
In 2019, UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) funded 28 Citizen Science Exploration Grant projects. This was part of its ongoing work to explore how researchers can work with diverse groups to participate with, and collaborate in, the research and innovation process – and to test opportunities for building citizen science methodologies into resear…
An equitable future for research and innovation: Building sustained community involvement in knowledge production
Published: 2022
This summary report shares the results of discussions with community representatives about how we can improve the ways in which knowledge is produced, used and communicated across the UK. These discussions focused on how formal institutions such as government, research funders and universities – which is typically called ‘the…