Community building NATIONAL
NETWORk
A NATIONAL NETwork of community
builders
The Network connects community initiators and
leaders, support practitioners, researchers, policy makers, and others who are
interested in authentic community building work.
Ideas and experiences, papers, project reports, case studies of
local and overseas innovations, and progress reports in advocacy are posted online and shared.
There is no cost to join.
Register Here to Participate
in the Network
A National Co-ordinating Group for the Network
was established at the Street by Street, Suburb
by Suburb conference on April 21/22 in Melbourne.
If you would like to express your interest in
joining this National Co-ordinating Group, we would like to hear from you.
Express your
Interest in the National Co-ordinating Group
The
Natural
Neighbourhoods, Real Communities
Conference
on 22-23 June 2009 adopted a number of initiatives for national development and coordination,
including:
Click on each initiative for further information
and to register your interest.
BACKGROUND
Following the National Symposium on
Community
Building: Critical Voices, Alternative Strategies on 19 June 2007, a
national network of community builders was formed.
The five key recommendations of the 2007 Symposium were:
-
Community builders need to influence government policy and agendas in a
pro-active way, not wait for governments to lead. A network of community
builders
that is independent of government is needed for this task.
- Funding reform is critical - governments should overhaul their funding
methods to enable communities and projects to act with more autonomy and
flexibility, with longer time frames, and with access to pooled funds from
various programs and jurisdictions.
- Regulatory reform is urgent - governments should overhaul their regulatory
and reporting requirements for community building activities to ease the
regulatory burden.
-
Measuring community building is
important - community builders should develop appropriate ways of measuring
their achievements through effective evaluation methods, not wait for
governments to impose these from without.
- Empowerment and devolution are essential for community building -
governments should enable community strengthening and social capital
development, not control its form or dictate its direction.
The
network aims to influence the
policy agenda in these directions
and support good community building.
A subsequent
national conference on
Natural
Neighbourhoods, Real Communities
held on 22-23
June 2009 adopted a number of
initiatives for national development and coordination of key community building
strategies.
Several of these initiatives were further developed
at the Street by Street. Suburb by Suburb conference on 21-22 April 2010.
Details of the 2007 Community
Building: Critical Voices,
Alternative Strategies Symposium,
and the 2009
Natural
Neighbourhoods, Real Communities
conference are available.
Register
Here to Participate in the Network
Further information:
Vern Hughes
03 9824 4713
0425 722 890
network@civilsociety.org.au
