Principles & Lessons from the Land+ Work
Photos – Big Fit Walk 2018 – by Marion Milligan
A Community-Led Approach
These Principles, which emerged during the Land+ work, represent our approach: they are our ‘Regional Land Use Framework’. The Principles acknowledge and respect that communities in this area have experienced multiple short-term, externally-imposed projects which have relied on volunteer input from a small, over-stretched group of people, and have often ended without achieving long-term, transformational change. In this work we are striving for something radically different, and aspire to support a genuine collaboration and respectful dialogue that empowers the community of place to achieve the change they define as necessary. Therefore we will continue this work ensuring:, |
The Ten Principles
1. The NW2045 RLUP will respect the knowledge, experience and expertise of people within the community of place.
2. People within the community – those who have a long-term commitment to the well-being of the place – will be at the heart of the work, and are supported by a wider team who are also ‘of’ the area, who understand the full reality of life in the North West.
3. Provision should be made within the budget to pay for the time of these ‘Community Co-Leads’, rather than relying on voluntary input, in order to:
a. Ensure that different demographics within the community are represented.
b. Mitigate volunteer fatigue and elite capture (ie only those who can afford, in terms of finances or time, to volunteer get involved).
c. Underline / emphasise that people’s time and input is valued: they are experts of their place.
4. The voices of the children and young people will be integral to conversations about long-term changes in land use. The approach will also respect the ‘carrying stream’ of knowledge from older generations, and seeks to strengthen intergenerational and cross-community links.
5. The team will find ways to encourage ‘hidden voices’ – those within the community who may not normally express their opinions publicly – to be heard.
6. The Community Council should be the node of democracy from whom the project seeks the mandate to proceed; who hold us to account, and who are consulted and involved as appropriate.
7. The approach will strive to be grounded, practical and useful, and make all communications accessible and jargon-free.
8. The project will strive to flex and adapt to changing circumstances, and work with other local initiatives for maximum efficiency and effectiveness, and to avoid duplication of effort.
9. Whilst being embedded in ‘the place’, the approach will integrate knowledge and expertise from the wider national, UK and international conversations, to ensure that the community benefits from any appropriate opportunities.
10. The approach will strive for reciprocity and exchange: to optimise and build on the capacity and skills that already exist within the place, the ‘local asset base’ in the widest, most holistic sense.
Lessons learned from the NW2045 RLUP approach
Our methodology is unconventional; it takes time, and is therefore expensive, but when done well it can deliver genuine and lasting results through the new connections and collaborations that are created. Some essential factors for success:
• Time, patience, persistence and energy are required to deal with multi-faceted, complex reality.
• It is beneficial to work directly with people who are of / from the community, who have energy, enthusiasm, bandwidth, tenacity and investment in the future of the place, and people who are respected within the community.
• Diversity within the team, intergenerational and cross-sectoral, is important.
• Remunerating people for their time, wherever possible, is important to avoid volunteer fatigue and elite capture.
• Ensure children and young people are involved; they are the future.
• Foster genuine, mutual trust and respect within and beyond the project team.
• Ensure people know they are listened to, have a voice and agency, and are connected. This engenders a sense of empowerment, which can catalyse change.
• Being present in the community and able to attend meetings of the Community Council and other bodies fosters connections more organically.
• This “soft presence” helps build trusting relationships, reaching beyond the usual suspects to lesser-heard voices and building a holistic picture of the community’s views and concerns.
• Personal connections help people to share knowledge. Often this knowledge is all that is needed to stimulate and enable change to happen.
• Technical vocabulary does not enthuse people. It is important to use accessible language and focus on clear, practical concepts.
• External experts must communicate clearly and be careful to involve people meaningfully and respectfully.
• These external advisors and experts must learn from working within a community.
• Abstract concepts such as climate and nature crises, and natural capital, often do not resonate with people, especially when they are facing more urgent, tangible challenges.
• These issues are often less abstract when framed in terms of more relatable impacts on daily life, such as saving money through increased energy efficiency or the benefits to children of connecting with nature.
• The groundwork of creating connections builds resilience and equips the community of place for future challenges.
• There is no quick win when it comes to natural capital projects, but an RLUP can help make concepts more accessible and support communities of place to understand the opportunities and potential trade-offs.
• For all partners to have the confidence to commit to a long-term project requires certainty and stability in many variables, both external factors (including agricultural subsidies) and all relationships pertaining to the land.
• We continue to participate in wider knowledge-sharing initiatives across Scotland.
