RENEWING LOCAL DEMOCRACY THROUGH CIVIC ENGAGEMENT

Local Democracy in an Era of Governance and Change

Challenges for communities

Ann IrwinCommunity Workers’ Co-operative

Local Democracy in an Era of Governance and Change - Challenges for communities

Democracy – what is it anyway?Representative democracy and

‘Representation’The role of community developmentGovernance and participationSocial PartnershipConclusion

Democracy-what is it anyway?There are many who believe that exercising

their democratic responsibilities is about casting a vote every so often and electing a number of people to ‘represent’ them for a term in the Dáil, Seanad or local government structures but there are those of us who believe that

(a) the notion of representation needs to be deconstructed and examined and

(b) democracy could mean something else.

Representative democracy and ‘Representation’ In Ireland we have a particular, highly-

centralised notion of representative democracy.

Representative democracy and ‘Representation’ Approximately 10% of our

population were born outside of Ireland.

51% of the population are women. Approximately .5% of people are

members of the Traveller community.

Almost twice describe themselves as African.

Almost 10% of people have a disability.

16.6% of parents in this country are lone parents.

Approximately 14.1% of the populations were at risk of poverty and 5.5% live in consistent poverty.

The majority of people in poverty are lone parents and children.

This is no accident. Those already privileged in society are far more likely to have the education, the confidence, the networks, and the backgrounds that enable and facilitate them to become public ‘representatives’. The privilege that allowed many of our ‘representative’ to become that is highly likely to be protected and reinforced by those same ‘representatives’.

The role of community development

Community development in Ireland has provided opportunities for participation for those from the most disadvantaged communities for many years.

Community development or community work refers to a particular approach to addressing poverty, social exclusion and inequality that emphasises the need for social change in a way that is participative and collective.

Community development allows the notion of active citizenship to extend beyond the usually middle class nature of volunteering to the reach the excluded, in a cost-effective, autonomous, flexible and responsive way. Community work is near to communities and to where the ‘action’ is. An example of participatory democracy at work The type of voluntary activity that we in community development talk

about – activism for positive social change undertaken on a voluntary basis.

Local development/community development programmesProgrammes

Community Development ProgrammeLocal Development Social Inclusion ProgrammeBoth superseded by the Local and Community

Development ProgrammeFamily Resource Centre Programme

StructuresCommunity Development ProjectsLocal Development Companies (Partnerships)Family Resource Centres

Unfortunately, over the recent past the concepts of•community development,•the community sector and•the concept of ‘volunteering’ have been highjacked and co-opt to suit the agenda of others.

Changes in CD

An agenda that would like to see government policy implemented at local level by community-based organisations as opposed to community development organisations.

An agenda that defines community development as service delivery

An agenda that would like to see volunteering being defined as people giving their time on a voluntary basis to rather benign activities rather than action for social change that is motivated by a sense of injustice and undertaken on a voluntary basis.

An agenda that sees the balance between accountable governance and participation being swung in one direction only.

An agenda that doesn’t like dissent or the critical voice of communities being articulated.

At a practical level, there have been significant changes in the programmes that facilitate community development over the recent past, culminating in the introduction of the Local and Community Development Programme announced in September 2008, by the then Department of Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs to supersede the Local Development Social Inclusion Programme (LDSIP) and the Community Development Programme (CDP).

The LCDP is to ‘provide seamless social inclusion services to the most needy in Irish society’.

Designed by the Centre for Effective Services, the LCDP states that it seeks to tackle poverty and social exclusion through partnership and constructive engagement between Government and its agencies and people in disadvantaged communities.

The LCDP is underpinned by four high-level goals:To promote awareness, knowledge and uptake of a

wide range of statutory, voluntary and community services:

To increase access to formal and informal educational, recreational and cultural development activities and resources;

To increase peoples’ work readiness and employment prospects; and

To promote engagement with policy, practice and decision making processes on matters affecting local communities.

The implementation of the LCDP required that organizations funded under the Community Development Programme be ‘integrated’ into their Local Development (Partnership) Company, effectively forcing the winding-up of companies and the dissolution of management structures that had spent years building the skills required to fulfill the governance requirement designed by the very civil servants that were now forcing them to close.

National levelWe can evidence of the same trend at national level too. We have all heard about the forced closure, stringent and restrictive budget cuts and forced amalgamations of the likes of the NCCRI, the Combat Poverty Agency and the Equality Authority.

As recently as last week my own organisation, the Community Workers’ Co-operative, was among the few organisations that has had State support withdrawn

Social Partnership

Some might suggest that the social partnership arrangements are an attempt to broaden out the decision-making processes. However, others (including some of those involved) would suggest that Social Partnership is itself a State construct and is largely rhetorical. Certainly for those of marginally involved as part of the Community & Voluntary Pillar, a significant number believe that it is a façade.

Deepening Dialogue is another example of an initiative that clearly shows that the State is increasingly defining the Community Sector in a way that suits itself

Conclusion

To return to the starting point for this presentation – the challenges for communities in an era of governance and change, I believe that there has been no time of greater challenge to maintain that element of community that values constructive dissent; that is unafraid to speak out against social injustice; that is concerned with inequality and the prevalence of poverty.

The community sector, the critical voice, that dissenting element of civil society has been systematically eroded and dismantled and we have never seen such an erosion of that concept of the right of communities and of civil society to be a critical voice and to agitate for a better society.

There has been a significant shift in the role of the State. At one time it clearly saw itself as facilitating

and supporting the emergence of groups and organisations that emphasised the participation of disadvantage and marginalised individuals and communities in the decisions that affected them.

A clear attempt to tackle poverty, social exclusion and inequality, within what might be recognised as the framework of civil society and participatory democracy.

This has shifted to: An emphasis on the implementation of state

policy at local level and the local delivery of State services in what is presumably considered to be a cost effective way.

This cannot be seen in the framework of civil society and participatory democracy and indeed goes quite some way to undermine the role of civil society and to threaten the existence of any opportunities for participatory democracy.

For those of us who believe in democracy, in a particular form of democracy that emphasises the right to participate; a form of democracy that creates spaces for people, particularly people from marginalised communities, to participate, a renewal of local democracy is truly needed.

Community Workers’ Co-operativewww.cwc.ie