Effective community development programmes:

A review of the international evidence base

Item Type Report

Authors Bamber, John;Owens, Stella;Schonfeld, Heino;Ghate,

Deborah;Fullerton, Deirdre

Publisher The Centre for Effective Services

Download date 24/01/2020 03:46:55

Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10147/298996

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cover-community2FINAL 13/09/2010 12:43 Page 1

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Effective community development programmes

The Centre for Effective Services is one This review was commissioned by the
of a new generation of organisations Effective community Department for Community, Equality
focusing on the emerging science of
implementation in human services. The
development programmes and Gaeltacht Affairs. Its purpose was
to seek important lessons from the
overarching mission of the Centre is to
connect the design and delivery of
A review of the international international evidence base about
effectiveness in community development
services with scientific and technical evidence base type programmes. It is aimed at those
knowledge of what works, in order to interested in and responsible for effective
improve outcomes for children and young John Bamber, Stella Owens, Heino Schonfeld performance in publicly funded
people and the families and communities Deborah Ghate and Deirdre Fullerton community development-type
in which they live. Our daily work is to programmes.
provide technical and organisational
expertise to support the design, John Bamber is Principal Fellow in
implementation and ongoing review Community Development at CES, Stella
and development of evidence-informed Owens is Senior Fellow in Practice
services for children, youth and families. Development, Heino Schonfeld is Deputy
Director and Deborah Ghate is Director.
Our aims are: Deirdre Fullerton was Senior Fellow in
• to promote and support the application Research and Evidence at CES between
of an evidence-informed approach to June and December 2009.
policy and practice in child, family and Centre for Effective Services The Centre for Effective Services is an
community services 9 Harcourt Street independent, not-for-profit company
• to promote the development of Dublin 2 limited by guarantee (Company Number
collaborative, joined up working that is Ireland 451580 in Ireland) and is governed by
outcomes-focused across research, tel: +353(0) 1 416 0500 an independent board. The work of the
policy and service providing email: [email protected] Centre is supported by the Atlantic
organisations www.effectiveservices.org Philanthropies, the Office of the Minster
• to build capacity within Ireland and and for Children and Youth Affairs, and the
Northern Ireland to take this work
65-67 Chichester Street Department for Community, Equality
forward in the longer term by
Belfast, BT1 4JD and Gaeltacht Affairs.
developing knowledge, skills and
competencies. Northern Ireland
tel: +44 (0) 2890 438 433
For more information about the work of email: [email protected]
CES, visit www.effectiveservices.org www.effectiveservices.org

CES Evidence Review

September 2010
community-FINAL3PROOF 13/09/2010 10:53 Page i

Effective community
development programmes
A review of the international
evidence base
John Bamber, Stella Owens, Heino Schonfeld
Deborah Ghate and Deirdre Fullerton

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community-FINAL3PROOF 13/09/2010 10:53 Page ii

Copyright © The Centre for Effective Services, 2010

The Centre for Effective Services

9 Harcourt Street
Dublin 2, Ireland
Tel: +353 (0)1 416 0500
Email: [email protected]
Web: www. effectiveservices.org

and

65-67 Chichester Street

Belfast, BT1 4JD
Northern Ireland
Tel: +44 (0) 2890 438 433
Email: [email protected]
Web: www. effectiveservices.org

Published by CES, Dublin

The views expressed in this report are those of the authors and do not
reflect the official policy of the Department of Community, Equality
and Gaeltacht Affairs.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,

stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means,
electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without
the prior permission in writing of the copyright holder.

For rights of translation or reproduction, applications should be made

to the Centre for Effective Services, 9 Harcourt Street, Dublin 2, Ireland.

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community-FINAL3PROOF 13/09/2010 10:53 Page iii

Contents

Foreword vii

Acknowledgements ix

Acronyms used x

Executive summary 1
Introduction 11
The aim of the review 11
Challenges in programme management 13
A note of caution about ‘effectiveness’ 15
Structure of the report 15
Part 1: Concepts and definitions 17
Defining ‘community development’ 19
Theoretical basis of community development 23
Defining a community development ‘programme’ 23
Outcomes in community development 25
Defining ‘what works’ in community development 26
What is ‘evidence’? 27
Part 2: Methodology 31
The purpose of the review 33
The research question 34
Types of sources included 34
Search strategy 36
Results of the search strategy 38

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Part 3: Lessons from the evidence base 39

Section 1: Programme structure and governance 41
The need for clarity of purpose from the top 42
Policy enactment through local interpretation 43
Partnership – a strategic engagement between
government and local entities 43
From government to governance 45
Positive engagement between levels of governance 47
Support for policy-makers 47
Summary of lessons 49
Section 2: Programme design and service content 51
The importance of needs analysis 52
Being clear about preferred outcomes 54
Realistic community development outcomes 55
The potential utility of logic modelling 59
Community strategic planning 62
Summary of lessons 65
Section 3: Programme implementation and delivery 68
Effective partnership working 70
Issues of recognition and authority 72
Support for collaborative work 72
Promoting active community engagement 74
Linking partnership and community engagement 80
Resourcing partnership and community engagement 81
The role of the workforce 83
Summary of lessons 85
Section 4: Monitoring and evaluation 87
A holistic approach to evaluation 90
Using outcomes and indicators 92
Issues in reporting 95
Combining internal and external evaluation 98
Capturing and disseminating learning 101
Standards and benchmarks 103
Summary of lessons 105

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Part 4: Conclusions 107

References 111
Appendices
Appendix 1: Elements in a logic model 118
Appendix 2: Generating evidence, evaluating and learning 119
Appendix 3: The Beacon Initiative: Standards for
Centers’ Providers 121
Appendix 4: Glossary of key terms 123

Tables, boxes and figures

Roles and outcomes in community development 22
A website for policy-makers 48
Determining the needs of older people in Galway City 53
Specifying outcomes in community development 56
Analysing systems 60
A logic model for community learning and development 61
Phases in the Communities That Care Programme 63
A typology of partnership working 71
The role of technical assistance 82
Delivery chain questions 91
Reporting layers 97
Assessing economic impact in the Community Futures Programme 99
Measuring performance in priority areas 101

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Foreword

V
ibrant communities are essential to the well-being of individuals
and society, but changing demographic and economic
conditions mean that effective support for communities in both
urban and rural settings has never been more needed.
That is why I warmly welcome this report from the Centre for
Effective Services (CES), arising from a wider review of the Local
Development Social Inclusion Programme and the Community
Development Programme. In 2008, the Department asked the Centre
– an independent centre established in a partnership between the
Government and Atlantic Philanthropies to promote evidence-informed
policy and practice – to review the design of the two programmes.
The lessons drawn from research and evaluations in countries with
jurisdictions similar to Ireland and with significant government
funding for community development, were used to benchmark the two
programmes against the principles of good practice found in the
international evidence base.
The report’s findings provide a valuable insight into the approaches
and practices that are likely to lead to improved outcomes for
individual beneficiaries and communities, and they have helped in the
design of the successor to the two former programmes, the new Local
and Community Development Programme.
As the Centre for Effective Services continues to advise and support
the Department in its improvement activities, the report’s findings will
also inform our innovative plans for the national evaluation of the
Local and Community Development Programme.

Pat Carey, T.D.

Minister for Community, Equality
and Gaeltacht Affairs
September 2010

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community-FINAL3PROOF 13/09/2010 10:53 Page ix

Acknowledgements
We would like to acknowledge the inputs to the production of
this report of various people in addition to the named authors.
Katherine Baxter, a policy expert in community development on
secondment to CES from the Ministry of Social Development in
New Zealand, contributed insights to the review in its early
stages. The review also gained from the contribution of Alison
Gilchrist, an independent consultant with expertise in
community development based in the UK. In the later stages,
the work benefited from the input of Claire Walsh, on release
to CES from the Irish Government’s Department of Community,
Equality and Gaeltacht Affairs. We are also grateful to two
independent peer reviewers who critiqued the earlier drafts
of the report. Any errors remain, of course, our own.

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community-FINAL3PROOF 13/09/2010 10:53 Page x

Acronyms used
ACOA Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency
CBDC Community Business Development Corporations
CDF Community Development Foundation
CDP Community Development Programme
CDB County or City Development Board
CDM Community Decision Making Entity
CED-Q Canada Economic Development for Quebec Regions
CENI Centre for Evaluation Northern Ireland
CES Centre for Effective Services
CF Community Futures Programme
CFO Community Futures Organization
CFP Community Facilitation Programme
CH/SFSC Columbia Heights/Shaw Family Support Collaborative
CLD Community Learning and Development
CSSP Centre for the Study of Social Policy (Washington)
CTC Communities That Care Programme
FedNor Federal Economic Development Initiative for Northern Ontario
HAZ Health Action Zone
HCN Higher and Complex Needs Unit (New Zealand)
HLC Healthy Living Centre
IC Industry Canada
IPH Institute of Public Health
JRF Joseph Rowntree Foundation
LDSIP Local Development and Social Inclusion Programme
LSP Local Strategic Partnership
MCCC Montgomery County Collaboration Council
NDC New Deal for Communities Programme
NDP National Development Plan
NIF Neighbourhood Initiative Foundation
NMP Neighbourhood Management Pathfinder Programme
RBA Results Based Accountability
RCT Randomised Control Trial
SAN Social Audit Network
SCP Single Community Programme
SIM Social Inclusion Measure
SIP Social Inclusion Partnership
SRB Single Regeneration Budget
SSLP Sure Start Local Programme
VCS Voluntary and Community Sector
WD Western Economic Diversification Canada

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Executive summary

T
he Centre for Effective Services (CES) is an independent, not-for-
profit organisation funded jointly by Atlantic Philanthropies, the
Office of the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, and the
Department for Community, Equality and Gaeltacht Affairs (formerly
the Department for Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs) in Ireland.
It is part of a new generation of intermediary organisations across the
world working to apply learning from the emerging science of imple-
mentation to real world policy and practice concerns. The overarching
mission of the Centre is to connect the design and delivery of services
with scientific and technical knowledge of ‘what works’ in order to
improve outcomes for children, young people, and the families and
communities in which they live.

Shortly after it was established in 2008, the Centre was asked by the
Department for Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs to review two
important community development programmes in Ireland: the Local
Development Social Inclusion Programme (LDSIP) and the Community
Development Programme (CDP). Between them the two programmes
accounted for €72.64 million funding directly from government in
2009. Both were run by locally based not-for-profit companies or
groups that work within their communities to identify needs and link
people to local services. The 2008 outturns estimated that in excess of
400,000 people were supported under the programmes. Beneficiaries
are located in urban and rural settings, and include those who have
been unemployed for long periods, lone parents, young people,
people with disabilities, people from the Traveller community, and

e xec utive sum ma ry 1

community-FINAL3PROOF 13/09/2010 10:53 Page 2

new migrants, as well as many other groups in local communities.

Because national priorities are addressed by the programmes, central
government involvement is required to ensure consistency and coordi-
nation.
Part of the review’s purpose was to seek important lessons from the
international evidence base about effectiveness in community devel-
opment type programmes funded by central and local government, or
other large-scale institutions such as major charitable foundations.
This led us to formulate the following research question:

What does the international evidence base tell us about key

principles of effective policy and practice in publicly funded
community development programmes?

The term ‘programme’ implies a degree of coherence and integration

around structure and governance, design and service content, imple-
mentation and delivery, and monitoring and evaluation. For this
reason, evidence was sought in relation to the issues, challenges and
promising responses associated with these four overarching aspects
of programme management.

Key findings
Regarding ‘structure’ and ‘governance’, for example, how should com-
missioners or others with overarching responsibility engage local
communities in devising  and implementing renewal, or work with
partner agencies in delivering change? A common challenge with
respect to programme ‘design’ is the tendency for commissioners and
practitioners to identify too many goals with ill-defined objectives that
are incapable of being monitored and evaluated. In terms of ‘imple-
mentation and delivery’, there is a reliance on structured collaborative
activity at local level to realise the intentions of policy, although the
degree of variability at local level can be counterproductive for
adherence to effective practice standards, and may also militate
against local accountability to national priorities. A pressing issue in
relation to the evaluation of publicly funded community development
programmes concerns how to assess at a national level the results of
work in different localities. Programmes that vary substantially at local
level also become very challenging (and sometimes impossible) to

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evaluate using orthodox scientific methods. This in turn renders them

non-accountable for outcomes and cost-effectiveness, eroding polit-
ical and public buy-in. More generally, monitoring and evaluation
processes will be counterproductive when the balance is wrong
between them and if they require disproportionate amounts of time.
There are, therefore, many challenges for public policy administrative
structures. It is a key message from the literature that complexity must
be managed, and to some extent constrained, if large-scale progr-
ammes are to be effective and be seen to be effective. Principles
underpinning effective programmes can be elaborated in relation to
the four overarching aspects of programme management.

Structure and governance of programmes

Structure refers to the way that commissioning bodies and local man-
agement and delivery bodies relate and are accountable to one
another nationally and locally. Governance refers to the principles and
processes by which programmes are overseen and regulated by
commissioners or others with overarching responsibility for their per-
formance. There is clear consensus across the literature that structure
and governance in community development type programmes have a
major determining role in whether local delivery results in desired out-
comes. Key points are:
• There needs to be a clear and consistent lead from government (or
the commissioning agency if this is not government). Frequent
changes of emphasis or direction from the top dislocate local
processes and undermine the potential for good outcomes.
• In spite of the importance of a strong lead from the top, ‘top-down’
approaches to management tend not to achieve good results in
this field. Better results are achieved when localities are able to
engage with the policy agenda and allowed latitude to interpret it
locally. However, to ensure congruence with public policy
objectives, good communications and dialogue between the centre
and the localities are needed throughout this process.
• There is overwhelming consensus across developed countries with
mature community development sectors that the Partnership
model favours good outcomes, whereby local groups of
stakeholders collaborate through more or less formal structures to

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agree and deliver community development inputs at the local level.

Partnerships would generally report to a wider national structure
that may provide support as well as governance functions.
• There is no evidence to suggest that micro-management of local
activity by funders produces good results. Whilst there needs to be
joint working between the centre and the locality in agreeing the
broad agenda for action, the details of how policy is interpreted at
local level are best delegated to local partners.
• Funding needs to be more than a ‘commissioning’ relationship and
should be seen as a negotiated, long-term investment in
community capability. It should allow for participation at the local
level with a reasonable degree of flexibility allowed to local
partners to determine allocations between constituent activities
and to vary between headings within overall budgets, and
reasonable stability of funding over time to allow longer term
priorities to be achieved.
• Good governance in this field requires careful attention to the
clarification of the specific roles and remits of partners and
funders. Different jurisdictions may manage this in different ways,
but early establishment of clear Terms of Reference for
partnerships and Service Level Agreements between funding
bodies and delivery agents is a common principle of strong
governance. Given the imperative to be responsive to local change
in this field, the facility to review and reformulate these from time
to time should be in-built.
• Regarding arrangements for governance, community engagement
is of central importance in addressing democratic deficit, in
modernising government, in building community cohesion and in
terms of plans to improve programme design and service content.

Programme design and service content

Programme design refers to the principles and processes by which the
overall shape of a programme, in terms of its constituent elements, is
determined, within an agreed framework. Service content here refers
to the specific nature of services provided at the point of delivery to
service beneficiaries – in other words, what local community develop-
ment entities actually provide to communities. Key points are:

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• A ‘systems’ (or ‘ecological’) approach to programme design

has proved helpful in many jurisdictions. It helps to elucidate
how the constituent elements (society, community/
neighbourhood, school, family, individual, etc) are related
within an integrated system within which there are many
interacting factors, and provides a framework for design by
focusing on the levels at which different activities can be
targeted and different outcomes might be envisaged.
• Programme design is most likely to be robust and effective
when it is underpinned by a clear theoretical framework,
which makes explicit the expectations around why providing
Input X should lead to change in Outcome Z. This should be
formulated with reference to existing theory about how
community needs arise and how change is achieved.
• Service content should be determined with reference to a
clearly articulated description of the expected mechanisms of
change, which makes explicit the expectations around how
Input X should lead to change in Outcome Z, perhaps by way
of Output Y.
• Combined, these two approaches are sometimes described
as a ‘theory of change’ and can be used to specify a ‘logic
model’ that sets out the various inputs, outputs/activities
and outcomes that the programme hopes to achieve and how
these are conceptually and practically linked. Providing this
logic model is agreed by all parties, it can then be a useful
tool for monitoring programme and/or service progress
over time.
• Programme design makes most sense when it is needs-
informed. This implies initial needs analysis, carried out at
local level, at the very least to confirm the local situation in
relation to nationally determined priorities for action. The
analysis helps to establish a baseline against which it is
possible to measure progress towards achieving goals.
• Needs analyses can be carried out utilising a combination of
existing administrative and demographic or epidemiological
data, new surveys of local residents or services, and public
and professional consultations, and need not be expensive or

e xec utive sum ma ry 5

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lengthy. In high-quality programmes, needs analyses are not used

simply as ‘gap-analyses’ or ways of identifying local or community
deficits; they are also used to identify strengths and clarify the
opportunities for building greater community resilience.
• It is a well-established principle in many fields of human services
that effective programme design is generally ‘outcomes-led’ or
results-driven. This implies that broad outcomes should be
identified before programme design begins and that specific
indicators of success that are measurable must be clarified as part
of the process of specifying service content.
• A focus on outcomes can help to avoid the situation where
performance is being measured in the abstract. In this approach,
required actions and activities can be projected backwards from
the desired results rather than forwards from a longer term or
aspirational goal.
• Some literature suggests it may be helpful to conceptualise
outcomes in the community development field as a sequence of
phases such as ‘preliminary’, ‘intermediate’ and ‘end’ outcomes,
and apply critical appraisal skills to the question of the level or
phase at which it is really feasible to expect community
development programmes to operate and deliver results.
• Given the wide potential scope of community development
activities, effective programmes generally have to restrict the
number of priorities for change that they address through their
programme design, focusing in on a carefully selected group of
feasible activities and bearing in mind local resources and other
capacity issues.
• Within this, the evidence from related community-based fields and
from successful community development programmes, such as
Communities That Care, is that multi-dimensional designs, with
service offers that draw on a menu of approaches to support
different learning styles, tend to be associated with the strongest
outcomes. The involvement of multi-disciplinary teams at both the
design and the implementation and delivery stages is a feature of
successful programmes internationally.

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Implementation and delivery of programmes

Implementation and delivery refer to the principles and processes by
which programmes and services are put into action ‘on the ground’.
Without effective implementation processes and high-quality front-
line delivery to service beneficiaries, even the best-designed and best
structured and governed programmes will fail. Key points are:
• A principle of effective implementation, flowing from the notion of
partnership working utilised by many effective community
development programmes around the world, is the involvement of
many partners in delivering the programme activities at the
neighbourhood level. Partly this serves to operationalise and
‘make real’ the concept of multi-agency partnership; partly this
ensures that the multi-dimensional ‘systems’ or ‘ecological’
approach required to deliver effective services to communities, as
noted above, is supported.
• The most promising approaches in this respect involve
collaboration between central or local government and the local
delivery agents in determining how the programme should operate
and how outcomes should be achieved by means of a negotiated
process.
• The evidence is clear that collaboration is not an end in itself.
Instead, collaborations can play an important role in building up
the local infrastructure, including support and umbrella bodies,
networks and forums, in order to develop long-term assets and
endowments and enable dialogue between communities and the
authorities.
• This work requires active community engagement at different
levels and in a variety of ways in policy-making and decision-
making processes.
• Enabling partnership activity and community engagement to fulfil
its potential, and facilitating active participation, requires
appropriate resources and skilled professional support.
• The critical role of the team/project leader or ‘champion’ at local
level has been documented as a major factor predicting success,
with the most effective leaders being skilled in a number of
different areas as well as in leadership, and having intimate local
knowledge and strong local credibility.

e xec utive sum ma ry 7

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• Close attention to training and development of front-line workers

and volunteers is a key feature of successful programmes, both to
build and retain a competent workforce to deliver complex work
with often high-need communities and to ensure that work is
delivered to a high standard.

Monitoring and evaluation

Monitoring and evaluation are terms that are often (counter-
productively) conflated in the literature and debates on community
development. Monitoring is a counting (or accounting) process
concerned with the assessment of whether agreed inputs have been
made as per Service Level Agreements and whether key targets for
service uptake have been achieved. On its own, monitoring does not
generally provide information on the impact or effectiveness of a pro-
gramme, only its throughput and resource utilisation. Evaluation is a
process that involves the systematic investigation of pre-determined
questions preferably using scientifically robust (transparent and
replicable) research methods, and assesses processes, outcomes and
impact of a programme or service. Key points are:
• Successful programmes generally find ways to collect robust
monitoring information that utilise data already collected routinely
by the programme, bearing in mind that the collection of accurate
data for monitoring processes should not require disproportionate
effort on the part of the service managers and front-line workers or
volunteers.
• It is widely accepted that a key requirement for robust evaluation
of both implementation and outcomes is that evaluators should be
intellectually and practically independent of those who deliver the
programme.
• There is evidence from the international literature that various
forms of self-evaluation (also sometimes called ‘action research’)
can be helpful in promoting learning and reflective practice at the
front line.
• However, local involvement and participatory research is not a
substitute for independent scientific evaluation and effective
programmes develop an appropriate combination of internal and
external processes, with the latter being an ethical imperative

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community-FINAL3PROOF 13/09/2010 10:53 Page 9

when significant public expenditure is involved and large numbers

of people are exposed to the untested effects of the programme.
• Evidence suggests that partners and communities can and should
be productively involved in all types of evaluation to ensure that
there is local ‘buy-in’ and that external researchers do not overlook
key issues that may affect the results or the interpretation of
results.
• An important message is that monitoring, evaluation and feedback
processes are of particular value when they contribute to learning
and development in programmes.
• Mechanisms and tools (including standards and benchmarks) for
‘quality control’ of front-line work are highly developed by
successful programmes to ensure that work stays close to the
agreed objectives of the programme or service and conforms to
principles of effective delivery (in as far as these are clear).
• Documentation or ‘manualisation’ of what, precisely, the
programme and its constituent services or activities consist of
is likely to be a key principle of effective practice since without it,
monitoring and evaluation cannot take place and replication of
successful approaches is thus prevented.

Conclusion
The evidence from this review is clear that community development
programmes are not ‘quick fixes’ for entrenched social problems.
Effective programmes take time to mature. However, given strong and
not over-complicated structure, good governance, careful design,
high-quality delivery standards and proper monitoring, evaluation
and feedback, they can achieve important positive changes for local
communities. The particular nature of community development, how-
ever, requires close attention by funders and evaluators to capture the
wide range of potential benefits of work in this complex field. It means
recognising that a focus on ‘end outcomes’ alone (for example,
numbers of people removed from the unemployment register) may be
too simplistic as an indicator of effectiveness. The process by which
outcomes are achieved via preliminary and intermediate outcomes
(e.g. becoming better informed about employment opportunities, and

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community-FINAL3PROOF 13/09/2010 10:53 Page 10

acquiring skills that increase employability) may also be a key aspect

of effective work. If disadvantaged people are involved in decision-
making processes when previously they were not, their participation
is already a desired outcome.

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Introduction

The aim of the review

T
he Centre for Effective Services (CES) is an independent, not-for-
profit organisation funded jointly by Atlantic Philanthropies, the
Office of the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, and the
Department for Community, Equality and Gaeltacht Affairs (formerly
the Department for Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs) in
Ireland. It is part of a new generation of intermediary organisations
across the world working to apply learning from the emerging science
of implementation to real world policy and practice concerns. The
overarching mission of the Centre is to connect the design and delivery
of services with scientific and technical knowledge of ‘what works’ in
order to improve outcomes for children, young people, and the families
and communities in which they live. The Centre’s work is guided by
three aims:
• to promote and support the application of an evidence-informed
approach to policy and practice in child, family and community
services
• to promote the development of collaborative joined-up working
that is outcomes-focused across research, policy and service-
providing organisations
• to build capacity within Ireland and Northern Ireland to take this
work forward in the longer term by developing knowledge, skills
and competencies.

i ntrod u c tio n 11
community-FINAL3PROOF 13/09/2010 10:53 Page 12

Shortly after it was established in 2008, the Centre was asked by the
Department for Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs to review two
important community development programmes in Ireland: the Local
Development Social Inclusion Programme (LDSIP) and the Community
Development Programme (CDP). Between them the two programmes
accounted for €72.64 million funding directly from government in
2009. Both were run by locally based not-for-profit companies or
groups that work within their communities to identify needs and link
people to local services. The 2008 outturns estimated that in excess of
400,000 people were supported under the programmes. Beneficiaries
are located in urban and rural settings, and include those who have
been unemployed for long periods, lone parents, young people, people
with disabilities, people from the Traveller community, and new mig-
rants, as well as many other groups in local communities. Because
national priorities are addressed by the programmes, central govern-
ment involvement is required to ensure consistency and coordination.
Part of the review’s purpose was to seek important lessons from the
international evidence base about effectiveness in community devel-
opment type programmes funded by central and local government, or
other large-scale institutions such as major charitable foundations.
This led us to formulate the following research question:

What does the international evidence base tell us about key

principles of effective policy and practice in publicly funded
community development programmes?

The lessons were to be used to compare and contrast the LDSIP and
CDP with what is known about best practice. Both Irish programmes
had been reviewed and evaluated previously, especially the LDSIP, but
neither benchmarked in this way. The results of the evidence review
and the benchmarking exercise were to inform the development of a
new programme focused on improving outcomes for communities and
ensuring that the programme could be robustly evaluated in future
years. The overall review project was also intended to build experience
and capacity within the sponsoring government department to utilise
new kinds of evidence-informed approaches to programme review,
design, delivery and evaluation. The term ‘programme’ implies
a degree of coherence and integration around structure and gover-

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nance, design and service content, implementation and delivery, and

monitoring and evaluation. For this reason, evidence was sought in
relation to the issues, challenges and promising responses associated
with these four overarching aspects of programme management.

Challenges in programme management

Regarding ‘structure’ and ‘governance’, there are important issues
concerning the way that commissioning bodies and local management
and delivery bodies relate and are accountable to one another nation-
ally and locally, and there needs to be clarity about the procedures by
which programmes are overseen and regulated. How, for instance,
should commissioners or others with overarching responsibility
engage local communities in devising and implementing renewal, or
work with partner agencies in delivering change?
Programme ‘design’ refers to the principles and processes by which
the constituent elements of a programme are shaped and determined
within an agreed framework, and ‘service content’ refers to the specific
nature of services provided at the point of delivery to beneficiaries – in
other words, what local entities actually provide to communities.
Common challenges here revolve around commissioners and practition-
ers identifying too many outcomes, having inadequate data to inform a
thorough needs analysis, and setting ill-defined objectives that are inca-
pable of being monitored and evaluated. The consequence is that
resources can be spread too thinly to achieve transformational change.
‘Implementation and delivery’ refer to the principles and processes
by which programmes and services are put into action ‘on the ground’.
Often there is a reliance on structured collaborative activity at local
level to realise the intentions of policy, especially where these struc-
tures have the capacity to bring a range of statutory, voluntary and
private agencies together to focus on local needs and issues. According
to the Audit Commission (2009: 8), however, local partnerships:
• bring risks as well as opportunities, and governance can be a problem
• do not guarantee value for money, so local public bodies should
question whether and how they engage in partnerships
• need to be accountable to one another and to the public.

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Ensuring fidelity to the intentions of national policy is a key concern

for commissioners, while authority to tailor provision to local needs
and circumstances is crucial for local partnership entities.
‘Monitoring’ is a counting (or accounting) process concerned with
the assessment of whether agreed inputs have been made as per
Service Level Agreements and whether key targets for service uptake
have been achieved. It is distinct from ‘evaluation’, which is a process
that involves the systematic investigation of pre-determined questions
preferably using scientifically robust (transparent and replicable)
research methods, and assesses processes, outcomes and impact of a
programme or service. A pressing issue in relation to the evaluation of
publicly funded community development programmes concerns how
to assess at a national level the results of work in different localities.
More generally, monitoring and evaluation processes will be counter-
productive when the balance is wrong between them, if they require
disproportionate amounts of time and if accountability takes prece-
dence over the substantive work of the agency. In this case, monitoring
and evaluation may contribute little to learning and development.
To draw lessons from the evidence base in relation to these four
overarching aspects of programme management, the review analysed
literature from jurisdictions with political, social, economic and wel-
fare features similar to Ireland, where these types of programmes are
relatively well-established. As explained in Part 2 of this report, partic-
ular attention has been given to the findings from large-scale national
evaluations of publicly funded community development type pro-
grammes, especially where these have been conducted by researchers
using standard social scientific methods. In addition, lessons are also
drawn from relevant literature reviews and from practical-technical
reports from government or other reputable sources. Taken together,
these sources constitute the evidence base for this report.
A Technical Report (http://www.effectiveservices.org/projects.php)
accompanies this main report and details the data accessed during the
review process. It is intended that the information and resources con-
tained in both reports will be of use to a range of people involved in
publicly funded community development type programmes. This will
include policy-makers, decision-makers and senior officials, managers
and practitioners, as well as interested academics and people in com-

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munities. It is hoped that this main report will provide a foundation

for systematic reviews, involving more detailed studies concerning
effectiveness in publicly funded community development type pro-
grammes. Further research might usefully focus in more detail on each
of the four aspects of programme management. It may also, for
example, concentrate on areas such as: evidence of impact, finance
and funding, the place of volunteers, initial and continuing training
for the workforce, management in community development type
programmes, the nature and impact of the wider socio-economic and
political context, or interdepartmental coordination.

A note of caution about ‘effectiveness’

A note of caution is necessary given both the rapidity of the review and
the particular state and character of the available research evidence in
this field. In this report, the concept of ‘effective’ practice does not refer
to principles that have been established beyond doubt, by social scien-
tific methods, to cause specific outcomes. More often it refers to
practice that has been carefully inspected by authoritative commenta-
tors and has been adjudged to be plausibly related to particular results.
This process may or may not have involved extensive research and may
(or mostly may not) have involved testing the results against a ‘counter-
factual’ – that is, for instance, exploring whether the observed changes
in communities might have happened without the additional input
provided by the programme under consideration. Moreover, it is not
likely to have involved testing out different approaches to community
development to determine which are superior. For these reasons, we
use the term ‘effective’ in the sense that the term ‘promising’ is used in
other fields with a larger social science base.

Structure of the report

Part 1 of the report defines the key terms that informed the parameters
of the review: ‘community development’, ‘programme’, ‘outcomes’,
‘evidence’ and ‘what works’. The methodology for searching and
analysing data is outlined in Part 2. In Part 3 the results of the analysis
are elaborated in four sections corresponding to the overarching
aspects of programme management:

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1 Structure and governance

2 Design and service content

3 Implementation and delivery

4 Monitoring and evaluation

Each section begins with known challenges associated with this
aspect of programme activity. Promising responses to the challenges
are then discussed with particular reference to the primary evaluations
of programmes. Each section also contains additional material
from literature reviews and information and ideas from other credible
paper and web-based sources, including government departments,
academic centres or leading social policy ‘think tanks’ and institutes,
where these provide a useful insight into the issues or practices dis-
cussed. A summary of lessons from the evidence base is provided at the
end of each section.
The report concludes in Part 4 with some broad messages about
effective practice in publicly funded community development type
programmes.

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Part 1

Concepts and definitions

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Defining ‘community development’

D
efinitions of community development are many and various,
but in professional and academic literature common ground
can be detected around a set of core ideas (see, for example,
Towards Standards for Quality Community Work, an All-Ireland State-
ment of Values, Principles and Work Standards, Community Workers’
Co-operative, 2008; National Occupational Standards for Community
Development, Lifelong Learning UK, 2009; Community Development in
Europe, Hauteker, 2002). These ideas suggest that the practice of com-
munity development is concerned with promoting human rights,
democracy, equality and social justice. In essence, it is about tackling
poverty and disadvantage. This is often taken to mean:
• involving people in decision-making about what, and how, things
happen in their community
• fostering opportunities and processes for informal learning which
is directed by people according to immediate needs and interests
arising from their experiences
• working for progressive change through collective forms of action
• tackling barriers to democratic participation and social inclusion
by challenging discrimination in all its forms
• increasing people’s power to influence the decisions that affect
them, both individually and as a community
• ensuring that services and resources are available to communities
in ways that are accessible and appropriate to meeting their diverse
needs and aspirations

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• building on the inherent capacity and rights of communities to

take action to achieve shared goals or defend against a common
threat.

How the above are interpreted and applied in practice, however,

depends on circumstances in a given context, the nature of the
presenting issues and the desired outcomes. More recently, for
instance, there is increasing attention to environmental issues. Com-
munity development may also be different in rural and urban settings.
Similarly, the characteristics of target populations will also influence
practice in terms of its style and pace. This means that some ideas
would be privileged over others in any given context and by different
sets of actors.
Notwithstanding the above caveats, community development can
be understood as a broad approach to working in ways that are empow-
ering and participative. There is a focus on the most disadvantaged
sections of the population, who may be defined by age, gender, ethnic-
ity, disability, economic status or other such categories. Provision
might be universal or targeted, potentially working with the whole
community or a particular group such as young people. It may be
open-ended or prioritised to deliver given policy outcomes relating, for
example, to health, community safety, livelihoods or environmental
protection. It can take the form of unpaid active citizenship with com-
munity members organising themselves and taking on leadership
roles. Increasingly, it is a discrete practice undertaken by paid workers
in mainstream services such as education, health, housing or
specialist agencies located in the statutory or voluntary (third or inde-
pendent) sectors. Community development is frequently embedded in
large-scale publicly funded programmes, such as the aforementioned
government-sponsored LDSIP and CDP in Ireland. These types of
programmes have policy commitments to involving communities as
partners in the design and delivery of projects and services, to enhance
well-being or to improve local infrastructure.
In practice, an emphasis on empowerment and participation means
that community development is fundamentally concerned with deci-
sion-making processes affecting users, community-based agencies
and services. It is premised on a ‘bottom-up’ approach, which means
enhancing the capacity of communities to determine goals and to

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pursue issues of importance to them, and to make decisions affecting,

for example, the direction of services and the allocation of funds. In the
broadest sense, community includes members of particular communi-
ties of interest and place, as well as those statutory, voluntary
community-based agencies and entities with a remit to improve quality
of life and to address disadvantage in those areas. The essential com-
ponents of community development, in terms of its role and its
intended outcomes, have been usefully summarised in an English
context by the Community Development Challenge Group, as shown in
Table 1 (CDF, 2006: 17).
Community groups operating independently can agitate around
self-identified issues and work to achieve their own goals, which may
or may not coincide with the intentions of the central or local state.
An example here would be organised objections to the closure of a
local facility such as a school, or to plans to construct a motorway
through untouched countryside. Where the central or local state funds
community development, however, there can be tension between the
‘bottom-up’ processes of community development and the ‘top down’
intentions of policy decided through representative democratic
processes and implemented by public servants who are responsible for
disbursing public monies (Boydell, 2007: 10; Rugkasa, 2007: 11-14).
This means that professional community development practitioners
can find themselves occupying a middle ground between competing
forces.
Although there is inevitable tension in this position, the self-identi-
fied needs of communities can also coincide with and need to inform
policy-making, for example, with regard to increasing employment in
economically depressed areas or making neighbourhoods safer. In this
case, practitioners employed by the state may enable community
groups to develop their own ‘voice’ in order to put pressure on local
authorities or politicians to fulfil their responsibilities and commit-
ments. This is a form of advocacy that can be seen as complementary
to the local political structures that are fundamental to effective repre-
sentation because, as Chanan (1999: 4) puts it: ‘The overall democratic
framework needs to be supplemented by many informal or semi-
formal channels which give opportunities for various groups and
sections in the locality to extend communication and exercise
influence.’ In short, through such advocacy and a range of other means

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Table 1
Roles and outcomes in community development

roles outcomes
1 Help people see that they have • reduction of isolation and alienation
common concerns about local or • increase in social capital and
other public issues that they could cooperation
benefit from working on together
under their own control.

2 Help people to work together on • creation or improvement of bona fide

those issues, often by forming or community groups
developing an independent • increase in opportunities for activity
community group, supporting in the community
them to plan and take actions • more effective community activity
and encouraging evaluation
and reflection as a way of
improving effectiveness.

3 Support and develop independent Increase in:

groups across the community • community sector
sector, not directively but within • volunteering
an ethical framework, and increase • mutual aid and autonomous services
networking between groups. • learning between groups
• improvement in conditions in
the locality

4 Promote values of equity, Increase in:

inclusiveness, participation and • participation
cooperation throughout this work. • social capital
• cooperation
• community cohesion

5 Empower people and their • increase in community engagement

organisations to influence and and influence
transform public policies and • improvement in dialogue between
services and all factors affecting community and authorities
the conditions of their lives. • improvement in coherence and
effectiveness of public policies

6 Advise and inform public • increased capacity of agencies,

authorities on community authorities and professions to
perspectives and assist them engage with communities
to strengthen communities and • improvement in delivery of public
work in genuine partnership. services
• increased resources for the
community sector

Source: CDF (2006: 17)

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and methods, publicly funded community development seeks to

harness all the potential resources at the disposal of communities by
working with and bringing together the people, groups, agencies,
voluntary and statutory bodies to make a positive difference to
endemic or temporary social problems and issues.

Theoretical basis of community development

The theoretical basis of community development is eclectic. It is com-
monly based on social scientific understandings drawn from the
disciplines of sociology, economics and politics to explain that
complex problems, such as poverty, are interlocking and the result of
systemic inequalities. Key concepts include the state, class, racism,
sexism, power, injustice, inequality, rights, democracy, participation
and empowerment. There is a strong commitment to the notion that
injustice and inequality can be addressed by promoting human rights,
equality of opportunity, social justice and democracy in anti-discrimi-
natory, collective and collaborative ways. Along with this commitment,
there is a conviction that desired social change is more likely when
people are involved in decision-making about what and how things
happen in their community. In turn, learning to achieve such change is
seen as being more powerful when it connects with the needs and
interests that arise directly from people’s individual and collective
experiences. Finally, a cycle of development is seen as central to a
process in which practitioners work with people to analyse situations,
determine needs and draw up strategies for change, with results feed-
ing back into analysis to start a new cycle of action and reflection.

Defining a community development ‘programme’

The term ‘programme’ in this report refers mainly to community devel-
opment initiatives funded by central and local government, or other
large-scale institutions such as major charitable foundations. It is an
umbrella term, generally used to describe a collection of services, often
organised and delivered on an area basis, with local management and
delivery bodies that operate with varying degrees of autonomy from a
central structure such as a government department. The term implies
a degree of coherence and integration around structure and gover-
nance, design and content, implementation and delivery, and
monitoring, evaluation and feedback mechanisms and processes,

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although the extent to which integration and coherence is reflected in

reality varies.
In general parlance, the term also refers to a wide range of interven-
tions in particular communities or with predefined target groups. At
one end of the spectrum, such programmes focus on a particular
theme, such as parenting, and involve face-to-face interactions
between people with expertise and recipients. They can be highly pre-
scriptive and systematic in employing predetermined activities, or
curricula, in a certain sequence and within given timeframes. This is
not what is meant by ‘programme’ in this report and such examples are
not included. Large-scale and more complex interventions do feature,
however, because they exhibit many of the essential characteristics of
publicly funded community development programmes.
The programmes featured in this report are mostly promoted by cen-
tral or local government in jurisdictions similar if not identical to
Ireland, and result from representative democratic procedures that
provide a mandate for social and economic policy, a legislative frame-
work, fiscal measures and accountability mechanisms. Commonly,
responsibility for all aspects of programme delivery ultimately lies
with the sponsoring department or major funding body. Publicly
funded programmes, however, often involve a middle tier at a more
local or area level, which may be in the form of local government with
much the same features as central government. There may also be
alternative structures, such as regional consortia or local area-based
companies, set up for the purposes of the programme. Whatever form
the overall structure takes, across all the jurisdictions covered in this
report a prominent feature of such intermediary bodies is their dele-
gated powers to enact and interpret central or local government
policies within a given geographical area.
Intermediary entities may be responsible for development, facilita-
tion, coordination and/or direct service delivery, and they often
employ practitioners with a remit to develop and support work across
the whole area for which the entity is responsible. Within this area,
publicly funded programmes may also support local activity in specific
neighbourhoods where individual agencies or projects employ workers
to interface with community groups and individuals to assess needs
and to provide appropriate opportunities for development.

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Publicly funded programmes, therefore, typically operate on three

levels:
1 The first level involves a major funder that is interested in large-
scale social change. Examples here are central government seeking
to raise nation-wide academic achievements in the schooling
system or reducing the overall level of unemployment.
2 The second level involves an intermediary agency charged with
developing and delivering the overall policy objectives in a defined
area. There is usually a managing group, such as a Board, that
approves annual and longer term plans. Typically there are
working groups focusing on particular projects reporting to the
Board.
3 A third level is characterised by practitioners acting on behalf of
the intermediary organisation to define needs in the area, or to
support local agencies, or who provide development opportunities
for local people.
All programmes seek to achieve outcomes that may be centrally or
locally determined, or both.

Outcomes in community development

An outcome is generally understood as a change at the level of an indi-
vidual, a family, a neighbourhood or community or some other
structure or entity, such as a school or a service-providing agency, that
comes about as a result of something else. In this report, ‘outcome’
means change that occurs as a result of activities and opportunities
associated with a particular programme. Because it is often the case
that many small changes need to be achieved before large changes
occur, it helps to conceptualise outcomes in community-based
initiatives as both multi-level and staged, such as a sequence of phased
changes with ‘preliminary’ and ‘intermediate’ outcomes leading
towards ‘end’ outcomes (Learning Connections, 2007: 27). Sequencing
does not have to imply linearity in time. Multiple changes, at multiple
levels, may happen in parallel in the complex reality of community-
based initiatives.
Outcomes are the result of inputs involving materials, buildings,
money and staff time, and the informal and developmental learning
processes that such resources make possible. Inputs and processes

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lead to outputs in terms of a range of activities and opportunities for

adults, young people, children and families, and to support for net-
works and agencies. In turn, inputs, processes and outputs may result
in desired policy-related changes for individuals, for groups, for com-
munities and ultimately for society. Connell and Kubisch (1999: 20)
have categorised such outcomes broadly as referring to:
• The well-being of populations of children and families and of
neighbourhoods, including health, education, employment,
income, housing and neighbourhood safety.
• Elements of community efficacy, including civic and democratic
engagement, neighbourhood empowerment and policy/advocacy
successes.
According to Learning Connections (2007), in most cases it is not
reasonable for people working in community development to be
wholly responsible for outcomes at the level of societal change. It is
more appropriate to look for societal change as the overall result of
large-scale, interacting social and economic factors. Community part-
nership structures can realistically contribute to micro socio-economic
change in the areas for which they have some responsibility and in
relation to clearly defined targets that are particularly relevant in terms
of national priorities. These might concern, for example, unemploy-
ment, learning and education, promoting involvement in democratic
processes, or outcomes relating to health or community safety. Collec-
tively the work across a range of communities can contribute to change
at a societal level. Community development processes can be said to be
effective or ‘work’, therefore, when they lead to the sorts of outcomes
described above.

Defining ‘what works’ in community development

One simple criterion for ‘what works’ is that desired outcomes are
achieved. Connell and Kubisch (1999: 16) note, however, that making
the case about what works in community-based initiatives is a multi-
stage process involving a combination of methods and data sources,
both qualitative and quantitative. The point, they assert, is not about
making incontrovertible cases, but making a credible claim that the
activity made a difference. Most of the featured publicly funded pro-
grammes aim for desired changes, with particular goals and objectives,

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where effectiveness is a function of the combined activities of

government departments (level 1), local area-based development
organisations (level 2) and agencies and practitioners operating in
particular neighbourhoods or with specific communities of interest
(level 3). This report refers to all three levels of activity in consider-
ing factors vertically in terms of the relationships between levels 1,
2 and 3 through management practices, as well as horizontally with
respect to performance within levels, for example, practitioner-led
activity at level 3. Particular sources cited in this report, however,
may only refer to evidence at one or other of these levels. But what
is meant by ‘evidence’?

What is ‘evidence’?
In general, the debate about what constitutes ‘evidence’ in social
science is a lively one and space precludes a detailed discussion of
the various positions that can be taken. Nutley et al (2003: 128),
after careful consideration of the attendant issues, suggest that
knowledge based on research can offer insights and ideas and new
understandings of practice, for example, by questioning premises
and the issues that are identified as problematic. According to these
authors, it works best when professionals ‘do not simply apply
abstract scientific research but collaborate in discussions and
engage in work practices that actively interpret its local validity and
value’ (ibid: 133). One of their key messages is that practitioners
need to be engaged, interested and involved in organisational
change.
In reviews and other distillations of information about what
works in areas where the evidence base is more substantial, it is
now common to rank evidence according to the quality and type of
methods used to generate the findings. There are now a number of
well-respected systems for this purpose, including the Scientific
Maryland Scale (SMS) (Farrington et al, 2002). These systems share
a common starting point, in that they regard evidence generated by
robust quantitative methods, particularly via randomised con-
trolled trials (RCTs), as superior to other forms of evidence for the
purpose of judging the impact of an intervention. In RCTs, people
are allocated at random (by chance alone) to receive one of several
interventions, with one of these being the standard of comparison

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or ‘control’. In the UK, information and support concerning systematic

reviews have been provided by the Evidence for Policy and Practice
Information and Co-ordinating Centre (EPPI-Centre) since its inception
in 1993 (http://eppi.ioe.ac.uk/cms/).
Moreover, within the health and education fields, programmes that
can be fully accredited as ‘effective’ must have evidence of their impact
drawn from a number of separate RCTs. This sets the bar very high, but
the key principle that underpins this position is that, providing they
are properly designed and properly implemented, RCT methods allow
for a high degree of confidence about not only what changes can be
observed in service recipients, but whether those changes can be
reliably attributed to the intervention under consideration. This involves
methods that can ‘control’ for the many other competing explanations
of what gives rise to change for individuals, families and communities,
and these are generally agreed to be the only methods that can confirm
a causal relationship between an intervention and an outcome.
Randomised controlled trials are, however, rare in the field of com-
munity development research, if they exist at all, and even the ‘next
best’ methodologies such as ‘quasi-experimental’ designs are
extremely uncommon. Furthermore, although robust quantitative
methods provide the most conclusive evidence in terms of whether
a programme or intervention ‘worked’ (i.e. its impact), they rarely
explain a great deal about how programmes or services work (i.e. about
their process and implementation – which can either promote or
inhibit positive impact). Other types of investigation are required,
especially those using qualitative, interpretive methods.
Even with respect to qualitative and interpretive methods, commu-
nity development in general is a relatively under-investigated field
compared to many others, which means that there is a considerably
smaller empirical evidence base from which to draw. Moreover, there is
a dearth of research focused specifically on publicly funded
community development programmes. Programme design and imple-
mentation in this field, therefore, has often been undertaken without
the benefit of a clear guide about what is likely to be most effective in
achieving positive change. Nevertheless, effective (or ineffective)
practice at the programme level has features in common with other
community-based services and initiatives, especially where these
operate through partnership structures and involve local people in

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determining needs and planning processes. Examples can be found in

the areas of child development and family support, housing, commu-
nity health promotion and work with young people. There is the
possibility, therefore, of a certain degree of ‘read across’ from other
fields with relatively more established evidence bases. In this case,
thinking about community development programmes can benefit from
a multi-disciplinary perspective on ‘what works’.
In this report, then, the terms ‘what works’, ‘evidence’ and ‘effective-
ness’ have been used with some latitude. Although the emphasis is on
the data generated by research studies carried out by professional
research practitioners, and within this on studies that use robust meth-
ods and have been published after peer review, other sources have
important things to say about publicly funded community develop-
ment programmes. Examples include government departments,
academic centres and leading social policy ‘think tanks’ and institutes,
the observations of authoritative observers and commentators, or
practitioners’ perspectives on their work (‘practice wisdom’). It is
important to distinguish these latter from rigorous research studies
since they are almost always conducted on a much lower scale, using
less systematic methods and for a different purpose. Accounts emanat-
ing from individual community development agencies, for example,
often seek to learn from doing for particular reasons and in a specific
context. They may also be caught up in the need retrospectively to jus-
tify funding or to make a case for future funding. For this reason they
are generally not intended for replication elsewhere. Nevertheless,
practice that is documented in a self-critical way can offer useful
insights into common issues and problems, and can be helpful in
building a realistic picture of what is possible in this field.

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Part 2

Methodology

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The purpose of the review

T
he purpose of this review was primarily to inform a larger
project to re-model two existing government-funded community
development programmes in Ireland. The aim was rapidly to
survey the international (Irish and other) literature on community
development programmes with a view to isolating commonly agreed
principles of effective practice and policy that would be relevant to the
Irish context. The principles identified were later used to ‘benchmark’
the existing programmes (i.e. to assess the extent to which they were
currently designed and implemented according to commonly accepted
principles of effective working) and to underpin thinking in relation to
the development of a design for a re-modelled integrated programme
in Ireland.
The review had to be conducted within particular policy timescales
and, in our view, needed to take a ‘broad brush’, but focused and prag-
matic approach to what should be included. We were not only
interested in what works (what leads to good outcomes), but also in
why and how it works. This approach is in contrast to other types of
reviews (for example, systematic reviews, where the review process
uses a standardised and prescriptive methodology and focuses exclu-
sively on particular types of research studies that use methods
considered to conform to the highest standards of scientific rigour).
As can be seen below, this review drew upon a far greater range of
sources than a systematic review would regard as appropriate. We
believe this eclecticism to be a strength given the purpose for which the
work was carried out, but it is also important to be aware of limitations
to the approach.

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The research question

The overarching research question we set out to answer was:
What does the international evidence base tell us about key
principles of effective policy and practice in publicly funded
community development programmes?
Within this, we aimed to explore the extent to which there were
commonly agreed key principles in four specific dimensions of pro-
gramme functioning: structure and governance; programme design
and service content; implementation and delivery; and monitoring
and evaluation.

Types of sources included

At the outset it was agreed that the review should take in a wide range
of potential sources, not limited to ‘research studies’ in the usual
sense. We therefore included some sources that would not generally be
considered in other types of review (for example, technical reports and
opinion pieces). Given the parameters of our task, and especially given
the ultimate intention to use the findings of the review to inform the
design of a new programme, we considered that these could be helpful
in informing our wider thinking around practice and policy. The types
of literature included can be divided into the following categories:
1 large-scale national evaluation studies of publicly funded
community development type programmes, conducted by
researchers using recognised social scientific methods
2 smaller scale local evaluation studies of individual or local projects
3 extensively researched literature reviews concerned with
community development issues, approaches, or aspects of
community development activity such as community engagement
4 practical-technical reports from government or other reputable
sources, including major charitable foundations and research
centres, providing resources, information or technical advice in
relation to particular areas of activity, for example, on the process
of evaluating community development
5 opinion pieces in journals and books, offering comment on issues
and developments.

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The following programmes and initiatives were the subject of the

literature review in the five categories listed above:
Australia
• Stronger Families and Communities
Canada
• Community Futures
• Vibrant Communities
Europe
• European Structural Funds
Ireland
• Local Development Social Inclusion Programme
• Community Development Programme
• Social Inclusion Coordination Mechanisms
United Kingdom
• Healthy Living Centres
• Sure Start
• Sure Start Plus
• Social Inclusion Partnerships
• Community Facilitation
• Children’s Fund
• Health Action Zones
• Local Strategic Partnerships
• New Deal for Communities
• Neighbourhood – JRF
• Pathfinders
• Guide Neighbourhood
• Single Community
• Single Regeneration Budget
USA
• Communities That Care

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The first two categories (and especially the first) – national and local
evaluation studies – constituted the core of the evidence base for this
review. Within these two categories, studies were further sorted into
groups reflecting the type of methodological approach taken. We
emphasize that this was not undertaken with the intention of
excluding studies because they did not meet key methodological crite-
ria (as would be done, for example, in the preparation of a systematic
review). Because of the relatively small number of evaluation studies in
the community development field that would meet the highest stan-
dards of methodological rigour, this would have left us with a very
restricted range of evidence for consideration and would not have been
helpful in meeting our aims. Rather, the sorting was undertaken to
allow the reviewers to take account of the relative weight that could be
attached to different conclusions and to ensure that emphasis was
placed primarily on higher quality studies, where they existed.
Studies in categories one and two were therefore sorted as follows:
• randomised controlled trial (RCT) whereby participants/
communities were systematically randomly assigned to either
intervention or control groups and followed up over time
(i.e. baseline and follow-up data are collected for both intervention
and comparison groups)
• quasi-experimental study where participants/communities were
assigned to intervention or comparison groups using other
methods and followed up over time (i.e. baseline and follow-up
data are collected for both intervention and comparison groups)
• ‘before’ and ‘after’ designs without a comparison group, where
baseline data were collected before the intervention and again at
different intervals after the intervention (i.e. baseline and follow-
up data are collected for both intervention groups only)
• retrospective design only – where  data are collected at one time
point only, after the participants or communities have been
exposed to the programme (i.e. no baseline data are collected).

Search strategy
As is usual in a review process, to make the search task feasible within
the study’s practical constraints, we set some conditions for what
could be included. These were that the literature should be:

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• reported in the English language

• conducted in an industrialised country, where community
development is a well-established field – specifically Ireland,
Northern Ireland, Britain, other European country, USA, Canada,
Australia and New Zealand
• published since 2000.
To locate published and unpublished literature relating to commu-
nity development programmes, three inter-related approaches were
adopted. The first involved searches of databases of published articles
including: Articles First, ASSIA (Applied Social Sciences Index
and Abstracts), British Education Index, ChildLink, Cochrane Library
(including DARE), Campbell Database, CINAHL, ERIC, IBSS,
Ingentaconnect, PsycInfo, PubMed/Medline, Sociological Abstracts,
Swetswise, and Web of Knowledge.
The second approach searched unpublished ‘grey literature’ data-
bases such as Intute and Canadian Evaluation Society. A number of
academic experts and practitioners were contacted and relevant
government and research centres’ websites searched. In addition,
Google and Google Scholar search engine searches were carried out
with a limited subset of the keywords. Citation searches were
conducted of relevant papers using Google Scholar and Web of
Science. Searches of all the reference sections of all relevant papers
were also carried out. Specific searches were undertaken to identify
evaluations of large-scale national programmes.
The third approach aimed to capture country-specific literature and
drew on our own professional knowledge networks. With the help of
various experts working in the field in Ireland, we identified relevant
Irish papers and reports, and copies of evaluations of local projects
and initiatives. The third approach also involved five meetings with
practitioner groups in Ireland. In addition, a draft version of the report
was presented to a cross-section of 60 practitioners from across Ireland
in a feedback event. Participants were asked to forward any relevant
reports to the authors and further sources of literature were identified
by means of this process.
Keywords and descriptors were adapted according to the conven-
tions of each specific database searched. The keywords used for the
database searches were:

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community development
Community AND (development OR initiative OR scheme OR project OR
programme OR activity OR partnership OR coalition)
OR
Local area AND (initiative OR scheme OR project OR programme OR
activity OR partnership)
AND
national programme
“Publicly funded” OR “Government” OR “National Programme” OR
Federal
AND
effectiveness
“What works” OR effective OR evaluation OR outcomes OR impact

Results of the search strategy

The search strategy described above identified 216 literary sources for
inclusion in the review. Titles and abstracts were imported from the
different searches and entered into Endnote bibliographic software,
and two reviewers grouped the papers as follows:
1 evaluations of national or local programmes (n=55, reporting on
23 programmes)
2 literature reviews on the topic of community development or social
inclusion (n=19)
3 discussion papers on issues in evaluation, or practical-technical
papers on evaluation designs for community development, or
papers reporting on individual projects (n=47)
4 practical-technical reports and papers on structures, methods of
working, standards or practice guidelines, measurement,
outcomes and indicators in community development (n=75)
5 discussion papers on the politics of community development or
theoretical debates (n=20).
The full text paper was obtained for each included source and the
content analysed in relation to the four dimensions of effective practice
detailed above. More information about the research methodology
involved in each of the featured evaluations, literature reviews and
other cited sources is included in Section 2 of the accompanying
Technical Report (http://www.effectiveservices.org/projects.php).

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Part 3

Lessons from the evidence base

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Section 1: Programme structure and governance

T
his section considers what the international evidence base
tells us about key principles of structure and governance in
publicly funded community development programmes. The term
‘structure’ refers to the way that commissioning bodies and local
management and delivery bodies relate and are accountable to one
another nationally and locally. ‘Governance’ expresses the principles
and processes by which programmes are overseen and regulated by
commissioners or others with overarching responsibility for their
performance.
It is a notable feature of the international evidence base relating
to effectiveness in publicly funded community development type
programmes that it has at least as much to say about what does
not work as it does about what works. For instance, the extensive
evaluation of the New Deal for Communities Programme (NDC), which
is a key component of the UK government’s National Strategy for
Neighbourhood Renewal, details the trenchant and multi-faceted
challenges and problems experienced by community development
programmes. According to Lawless (2005), the local NDC Partnerships
evidence a number of problems, including:
• difficulties in employing (and keeping) sufficiently skilled and
experienced staff
• perceived cliqueness of Boards
• history of resentment between residents and statutory agencies
• inter-community strife
• new or transient populations (lack of continuity)

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• being asked to do too much too soon (assess baselines, define

goals and strategies and select/design interventions)
• weaknesses in commissioning and learning from evaluation
programmes
• tensions between NDC and other ‘rival’ agencies – complex
organisational landscape.
The large-scale evaluations of the Sure Start programme launched
in 1998 in England show that many such problems relate directly to
questions of structure and governance.

The need for clarity of purpose from the top

Although Sure Start is not primarily a community development
programme, some elements of its structure and operation are relevant
in the context of this report. For example, Sure Start is area-based and
brings together statutory providers such as health, social services and
early education, as well as voluntary, private and community organisa-
tions and parents themselves, to provide integrated services for young
children and their families. A major lesson from the Sure Start evalua-
tions concerns activity at national, policy-making level where stable
and sustainable structures in governance and management/
leadership are required (Tunstill et al, 2002; Wiggins et al, 2005).
Programme effectiveness is limited when there are unexpected or fre-
quent changes in vision at national level and when there is a lack of
clear national guidance. A lack of clarity from the top makes it difficult
to establish a consistent and recognisable identity at the local area
level. In turn, credibility suffers, which makes it more difficult to build
relationships and to create a high profile in communities and with
other agencies. As a result, mainstream services might not be as
flexible or adaptable as needed in relation to initiatives.
Another lesson from Sure Start is about the need for good working
relationships between the constituent levels of a programme. This
depends in large part on all involved being clear about the purpose of
the programme and about their particular role in supporting it. These
types of issues were identified in the Irish Study of Community Partici-
pation in the RAPID Programme (Cosgrove, 2005: 16), which notes that:
‘In three of the four areas examined, there was a lack of clarity among
stakeholders … about responsibilities and roles of agencies in relation

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to targeting the estates and neighbourhoods where there was an

absence of community activities, for community development work.’
This message concerning the need for clarity resonates with findings
from the evaluation of the English Health Action Zones, which were
established in 26 areas in England to identify and address public
health needs of the area, to increase the effectiveness, efficiency and
responsiveness of services, and to develop synergetic partnerships for
improving people’s health and relevant services. The evaluation noted
that: ‘Throughout the lifetime of HAZs, beginning in the very early days
of the initiative, the issue of whether central government was
conveying clear and consistent messages to HAZs, and adequately
supporting local efforts, was raised time and time again by project
managers’ (Bauld et al, 2006: 433). Achieving such clarity is assisted
when policy-makers set out a small number of high priority goals and
a limited number of related objectives.

Policy enactment through local interpretation

Having clear programme goals expressed in terms of realistic objec-
tives, however, is only one part of the formula for success. Equally
important is the manner in which the goals are to be achieved.
In Finding out what works: Building knowledge about complex,
community-based initiatives, Coote et al (2004) warn that micro-manage-
ment from the top is not a characteristic of effective programmes. A
major conclusion is that policy enactment works best when the broad
intentions of the funding body are interpreted locally in particular
contexts and in line with perceived community needs. This is
supported by research into the workings of the major Single Regenera-
tion Budget Programme in England, which found that: ‘It is nearly
always the case that policies that evolve at one spatial level (national)
need to be customised in their delivery to reflect circumstances on the
ground’ (Rhodes et al, 2003: 1418).

Partnership – a strategic engagement between government

and local entities
In its study of relationships between government, the private sector
and civil society, the Centre for Evaluation Northern Ireland (CENI)
highlights the partnership mechanism as a means of delivering
modern integrated services in ways that reflect realities on the ground

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(Morrissey et al, 2002: 2-3). The authors (ibid: 7) argue that policy enact-
ment through local interpretation requires a particular kind of
relationship between the parties, stating that: ‘The rationale for fund-
ing the community and voluntary sector shifts in a diverse and
changeable environment in which partnership is a key component of
the governance system.’ In their view, providing an allocation to the
funded organisation is best understood as a transaction, whether in
the form of a contract or a grant allocation or core funding (ibid: 7).
Such allocations should be seen as negotiated, long-term investments
in community capability, which requires a transformation of the proto-
cols and models for evaluating those allocations. An effective
partnership, they argue, requires a strategic engagement between
government and projects about programme development, targets and
outcomes, and appropriate forms of monitoring and evaluation. The
thrust of their message is that partnership requires more than a
commissioning relationship between the central state and the local
area body. Instead, the relationship should be based on mutual respect
and reciprocity.
Even so, the relationship is conditioned by the fact that government
needs to be sure that once clarified, its intentions are realised through
the delivery mechanisms that it supports, while agencies and commu-
nities also want to make a difference to locally perceived problems and
issues. In the worst-case scenario neither party is satisfied, and in the
best case both see their priorities achieved. According to Turok (2001:
10), the local area-based partnership companies in Ireland provide a
necessary meeting ground between central and local governance
because: ‘The partnerships are ultimately concerned with informing,
influencing and reforming established government departments and
agencies. They want them to be more responsive to local needs and
better coordinated to provide enhanced services and facilities.’ These
kinds of entities are not simply one player amongst others with an
interest in interagency working. Their brief is to bring public, private
and voluntary sector agencies into play in pursuit of joint solutions to
common issues and problems in that area.
In managing themselves to achieve optimal performance, such part-
nerships need to extend beyond the relationship between
commissioning officials and practitioners to include local people. As
observed in the CD Challenge Group Report (CDF, 2006: 21), the distinc-

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tive character of community development is its commitment to

working with communities to determine their own agendas and to take
action to meet their own identified needs. One reason for this is that the
empowerment agenda in community development means that involve-
ment is a condition of the work itself and of intrinsic value. As a
corollary, when people are engaged in discussions with policy- and
decision-makers, community development has already fulfilled one of
its aims. This is one arena in which the process itself is also an impor-
tant outcome. A further reason for involvement, however, is to protect
the interests of local people in complex situations where there are
other and often more powerful contending interests. One illustration of
this in an American context is the case of private-sector leaders having
great influence in some collaborations and demanding massive local
public investments that are at odds with the wishes of local communi-
ties (Lowe, 2007: 39). Whatever the case, community involvement
carries significant implications for community involvement in policy
formation and decision-making processes.

From government to governance

Writing in an Irish context, O’Keefe (2008) notes in Local Governance:
The Case of Dún Laoghaire–Rathdown, successful community involve-
ment requires a change in the mindset of key players. O’Keefe
conceptualises the change in mindset as ‘a transition from government
to governance’, where governance ‘involves combining elements of the
top-down and the bottom-up where representatives of both can come
together to promote agreed strategies’ (ibid: 7). ‘Governance’, in
O’Keefe’s terms, necessitates building social capital so that members
of communities can move up from the basic ‘information’ level, which
means merely commenting on an agency’s intentions, through consul-
tative and representative stages, to the ‘participation’ level involving
continuous engagement in decision-making (ibid: 28). The author
acknowledges that achieving this highest level of activity, however, is
not without its difficulties.
Such difficulties are considered in a larger study in England: Public
Officials and Community Involvement in Local Services (Ray et al,
2008a). This qualitative case study of community engagement within
the London Borough of Haringey focused on the experiences of public
officials across three large public sector bodies: the local authority,

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police and a primary care trust (ibid: 66). In the Summary Report, the
authors concluded that (2008b: 3):
In forums where participants were seen as ‘stakeholders’ or
‘partners’ there were fewer tensions because participants were
valued for their skills or expertise rather than their
representativeness. Structures that were unclear about
community members’ roles – and their legitimacy – could
result in tensions between the expectations of different
parties. Better training could provide greater clarity for those
involved in designing community engagement processes.
However, these issues also need to be negotiated in a
collaborative way between different participants on the
ground.

The reference to negotiation in the above quote is important because

of a tendency for officials to view community engagement as ‘practices
that they initiated in order to listen to, debate with or work with the
community, rather than about devolving power or control’ (2008a: 19).
The evaluation report by McCabe et al (2007), Learning to Change
Neighbourhoods: Lessons from the Guide Neighbourhood Programme,
offers a much more constructive account of the potential contribution
of communities. The report portrays neighbourhoods as ‘important in
plans to improve service delivery and in addressing democratic deficit,
modernising government and building community cohesion in an
increasingly diverse society’ (ibid: 16). According to the authors, the
programme achieved the important outcome of helping the client
neighbourhoods to ‘move beyond their (justified) anger and opposi-
tional stance to recognize the value of building collaboration with
public sector partners and understand the place of local action within
wider policy contexts’ (ibid: 7). A major point made in the report is that
(ibid: 7):
The findings reinforce those of previous regeneration initiative
evaluations. Engaging and empowering residents is crucial
– but it takes time and adequate funding if local residents are
to participate in regeneration as equal partners. Equally, the
increasing pressure on community organizations to deliver
local services on behalf of statutory agencies alongside the
emphasis on local level democratic structures require longer

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term investment to build the skills and knowledge necessary

for good governance and accountability at the neighbourhood
level.

Positive engagement between levels of governance

Although top-level officials may be hesitant about embracing the full
potential of partnership structures in opening up to community
involvement, there are many examples from across the world of
positive engagement between programme levels. One such example
comes from the Vibrant Communities’ initiative in Canada, which is
concerned with building an enabling environment for comprehensive,
multi-sectoral approaches to poverty reduction (Leviten-Reid, 2007). In
this publicly funded programme, local communities and national
sponsors are directly involved in efforts to change the wider institu-
tional context in ways that better support ‘joined up’ strategies for
countering poverty. The ‘Policy Dialogue’ project, for example,
involved representatives from eleven federal government departments,
three provincial governments and the Federation of Canadian Munici-
palities and Communities, participating over 18 months in a series of
meetings. The dialogue served to orient policy-makers to the key ideas
associated with comprehensive community initiatives as well as the
opportunities and challenges related to government/community col-
laboration. As a follow-up to the Policy Dialogue, the Tamarack
Institute for Community Engagement, the Caledon Institute of Social
Policy, and Human Resources and Social Development Canada have
initiated a Government Learning Circle to explore more deeply how all
three orders of government can work together in support of compre-
hensive, multi-sectoral approaches to poverty reduction.

Support for policy-makers

If understanding, accepting and then enabling the involvement of
local people in policy and decision-making processes is a challenge for
practitioners, it would appear to be a particular challenge for policy-
makers at all levels. With regard to enabling different orders of
government to work together effectively, useful reference can be made
to the work of the Centre for the Study of Social Policy (CSSP) in
Washington, DC (www.cssp.org/). The CSSP addresses the need for
clarity and good working relationships between different programme

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levels, by producing a detailed and comprehensive series of Learning

Guides for local governance board members, their community partners
and staff. The guides are intended for a broad range of people, includ-
ing local elected officials, business people, staff of local service
organisations (both public and private), representatives of the faith
community, as well as parents and other lay citizens involved with
helping children and families. An equally important audience is state
officials who are supporting local governance partnerships from exec-
utive and legislative branches. The six guides cover the following areas:
• theory and purpose of local decision-making
• working with members
• setting a community agenda
• strategies to achieve results
• financing and budgeting strategies
• using data to ensure accountability.
Box 1 provides brief information about a web-based resource devel-
oped by CSSP to assist policy-makers.

Box 1
A website for policy-makers

PolicyForResults.org is a web-based initiative to help policy-makers

govern more effectively by providing the up-to-the-minute, high
quality research and evidence they need to enact policies that
measurably improve the lives of children and families. In the
American context, the website gives politicians, central and local
government officials and those who advise them clear examples of
why particular policy directions are important for children and
families based on evidence of effectiveness. It alerts people to what
policies are succeeding in other places and how to tailor policy to
their own particular conditions. The website provides:
• a step-by-step guide to making effective policy decisions
• data that show how a State’s children and families are doing
• examples of how other policy-makers make a difference in
children’s’ lives
• ways of learning about policy, financing and strategies that work.
Source: http://www.policyforresults.org

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Programme structure and governance

Summary of lessons
This section draws from the international literature to consider a
number of interconnecting issues concerned with structure and gover-
nance in publicly funded community development programmes. There
is consensus that structure and governance in community develop-
ment type programmes have a major determining role in whether local
delivery results in desired outcomes. Key points are:
• There needs to be a clear and consistent lead from government (or
the commissioning agency if this is not government). Frequent
changes of emphasis or direction from the top dislocate local
processes and undermine the potential for good outcomes.
• In spite of the importance of a strong lead from the top, ‘top-down’
approaches to management tend not to achieve good results in
this field. Better results are achieved when localities are able to
engage with the policy agenda and allowed latitude to interpret it
locally. However, to ensure congruence with public policy
objectives, good communications and dialogue between the centre
and the localities are needed throughout this process.
• There is overwhelming consensus across developed countries with
mature community development sectors that the Partnership
model favours good outcomes, whereby local groups of
stakeholders collaborate through more or less formal structures to
agree and deliver community development inputs at the local level.
Partnerships would generally report to a wider national structure
that may provide support as well as governance functions.
• There is no evidence to suggest that micro-management of local
activity by funders produces good results. Whilst there needs to be
joint working between the centre and the locality in agreeing the
broad agenda for action, the details of how policy is interpreted at
local level are best delegated to local partners.
• Funding needs to be more than a ‘commissioning’ relationship and
should be seen as negotiated, long-term investments in
community capability. It should allow for participation at the local
level, with a reasonable degree of flexibility allowed to local
partners to determine allocations between constituent activities

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and to vary between headings within overall budgets, and

reasonable stability of funding over time to allow longer term
priorities to be achieved.
• Good governance in this field requires careful attention to the
clarification of the specific roles and remits of partners and
funders. Different jurisdictions may manage this in different ways,
but early establishment of clear Terms of Reference for
partnerships and Service Level Agreements between funding
bodies and delivery agents is a common principle of strong
governance. Given the imperative to be responsive to local change
in this field, the facility to review and reformulate these from time
to time should be in-built.
• Regarding arrangements for governance, community engagement
is of central importance in addressing democratic deficit, in
modernising government, in building community cohesion and in
terms of plans to improve programme design and service content.
There is a widespread investment in publicly funded community
development type programmes in local partnership structures report-
ing to a wider national structure. Such entities require clearly defined
delegated powers to realise the intentions of government policy
in geographical or thematic areas. In large part, this authority is
exercised through decision-making about programme design and
service content in planning for a preferred future.

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Section 2: Programme design and service content

This section considers what the international evidence base tells us
about key principles of effective programme design and service content
in publicly funded community development programmes. ‘Programme
design’ refers to the principles and processes by which the overall
shape of a programme, in terms of its constituent elements, is deter-
mined, within an agreed framework. ‘Service content’ here refers to the
specific nature of services provided at the point of delivery – in other
words, what local community development entities actually provide to
communities in pursuit of a preferred future.
In planning for a preferred future, according to Connor and Kadel-
Taras (in Leviten-Reid, 2007: 15), it is often the case that: ‘Funders and
communities are weighed down by past ways of working – such as
fragmented problems, fragmented resources, uncoordinated public
policies and turf protection – that are no longer very helpful.’ Along
similar lines, the interim evaluation of the New Deal for Communities
Programme in England detects problems with partnership entities
typically identifying too many outcomes, with some ill defined, vague
and incapable of being monitored. Reporting on the English Health
Action Zones Programme, Judge and Bauld (2006: 341) also record ‘too
many hugely ambitious, aspirational targets were promulgated’
because they were ‘encouraged to set themselves impossibly ambitious
goals to transform the health of their communities’. A key lesson,
therefore, is that goals need to be realistic in the sense that they can be
achieved in a specified timeframe and within the resources available.
With respect to achieving such clarity, the Overview of the Social
Inclusion Partnership Programme in Scotland offers a number of useful
pointers (ODS Consulting, 2006). The overview found that there was a
general lack of meaningful local baseline data which SIPs or the
consultants carrying out the evaluations could use to measure per-
formance or the progress which had been made, and that apart from a
small number, SIPs were poor at determining whether the projects that
they funded were delivering the agreed outcomes (ibid: 9). The
overview notes that lessons have been learned from the SIP
experience: the outcome-based approach is more rigorous, there is a
clear flow from local activities to local indicators to local outcomes,
and the local outcomes are related to national priorities (ibid: 13).

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Although the SIP Programme was intended to encourage innovation

and to foster the development of new ideas and good practice, there
was no effective learning or knowledge transfer process established to
support the programme (ibid: 15). There was no systematic way of
measuring the impact that the SIP Programme had across Scotland,
while the information about projects was piecemeal and could not be
aggregated to a Scottish-wide level. A particular problem was the lack
of consistent information about a number of important issues
including the impact of partnership working, the development of
shared priorities and changes to the work practices and cultures of
service providers (ibid: 21-22). The authors concluded that there is a
need for a few outcomes that can be regularly measured and that fit
with the Scottish Executive’s overall priorities (ibid: 22).
The above points about the SIP Programme appear to confirm find-
ings from the evaluation of the Guide Neighbourhoods Programme in
England, in which McCabe et al (2007) comment on what they see as a
fundamental shift in funding regimes over recent years, with money
being increasingly tied to the achievement of ‘hard’ policy objectives,
such as crime reduction or educational attainment (ibid: 82). A conse-
quence is that: ‘Groups need to be better at relating their ideas and
objectives to key local and national targets – and being precise in how
their activities will help the funding body achieve their own
objectives.’ They conclude that: ‘New and emerging organisations
need to be clear about the consequences of accessing public funding in
terms of developing management systems which enable them to report
back regularly and accurately to sponsoring bodies’ (ibid: 82).

The importance of needs analysis

Given this need to focus, SQW (2008) recommend that a strategic deliv-
ery plan should be prepared each year, defining a limited set of
priorities and setting out key activities and milestones. Clearly identi-
fying and assessing needs is the first prerequisite to any such delivery
plan. This finding about needs assessment confirms earlier work in the
evaluation of the New Deal for Communities, which stated that: ‘It is
difficult to overestimate the importance of establishing an accurate
baseline at an early stage: unless Partnerships know the nature of the
problem they are facing it is hard to see how they can make reasoned
decisions regarding strategic priorities’ (Lawless, 2005: 268).

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One small-scale example of community profiling in an Irish context

confirms the value of data in relation to needs. In a Community Profile
of Supports and Services for Older People in Galway City, Lally and
Mortimer (2006) focus on the needs of 11,000 people older than 55. The
profile is drawn up by professional researchers who gathered and
analysed primary and secondary data, accessed detailed area socio-
economic indicators, population characteristics and information
about local services, and incorporated resident and practitioner views
about community needs. The result is a comprehensive picture of
priority issues and areas for development, as can be seen in Box 2.
This kind of profiling will be considerably assisted by recent
research in Ireland reported in New Ways of Mapping Social Inclusion
in Dublin City (Gleeson et al, 2009), which shows how statistical
profiles can be provided for areas as small as 65 households. This is
done by drawing information from existing national and local sources
in ways that can be analysed spatially and at scales that reveal the

Box 2
Determining the needs of older people in Galway City

• The stretched and under-resourced services, particularly some of

the health/social care services, are not supporting this stage of
life change in a positive, empowering manner.
• The lack of primary care teams in the community is seen by many
service providers as a problem, as is the lack of co-ordination and
liaison between services.
• Different parts of the city present different needs for older people.
• Loneliness and isolation are highlighted as key issues for older
people. Service providers feel that older people could be more
active, more involved in the community, more self-reliant, but the
‘for the elderly’ label stops people from getting involved.
• The lack of societal connections in the community, and the fact
that support structures are breaking down, were recurring themes.
• An increasing number of older people present with addiction
problems and associated conditions such as depression and other
mental health issues.
Source: Lally and Mortimer (2006: v)

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micro-geography of social inclusion and deprivation (ibid: 5). It holds

great potential for targeting resources and services on those ranking
highest in terms of social exclusion.

Being clear about preferred outcomes

One theoretical approach to targeting resources is Results Based
Accountability (RBA). According to Friedman (2005), RBA is about the
ways in which the results wanted for children and families, or other
defined groups and populations, can drive action planning (http://
www.raguide.org/). It involves identifying indicators in relation, for
example, to health and school readiness. Establishing baselines helps
practitioners to know whether conditions are getting better or worse,
and working out the ‘story’ behind the baseline helps to explain the
causes and forces at work. Success can be gauged by the amount of
progress when seen against these baselines. Crucially, in Friedman’s
schema, success depends on identifying and involving the partners
who can help to improve the situation, and best thinking about what
works (or could work), in terms of measurably improving the well-
being of groups, draws on the contributions of the partners, research,
experience in other communities and practitioners’ own experience. In
RBA, strategic planning takes from the most powerful of these ideas
and those with the greatest leverage, including no-cost and low cost
actions.
In the UK, the Improvement and Development Agency for Local Gov-
ernment commissioned a small study to examine the early impact of
RBA. The study looked at the extent to which it contributed to changes
in culture, planning and accountability which are likely to lead to more
effective services (McCauley and Cleaver, 2006). Two County Councils,
one City and one Borough Council, and one national children’s charity
were selected to participate on the basis that they were in the process
of applying the ideas of outcomes-based accountability and where
the adoption of the approach was known to be at varying stages of
implementation. The main conclusion was that although the organisa-
tions were at different rates of change, they were all developing more
systemic ways of working and establishing a more accurate picture of
how, why and in what ways they were making a difference with
people and in communities (ibid: 17).

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Realistic community development outcomes

Although being clear about intended outcomes is crucial for strategic
planning purposes, it is often considered to be difficult due to the mul-
tiple, multi-faceted and long-term aims that are a feature of this field.
That it is possible to clearly articulate outcomes can be seen from the
summary of the Evaluation of Healthy Living Centres (HLCs) in Northern
Ireland by the Institute of Public Health in Ireland (IPH, 2007). The
summary quotes from a manager of a HLC based in a rural area with
over 6,000 users, 60% of whom are regular users, who said that she
could provide (ibid: 5):
… endless examples of the impact the HLC has had on
individuals which can be backed up with statistics: breast
feeding rates have increased locally; home accident numbers
reduced following home safety checks campaign; more
families are supported; there is evidence from schools of
improved attendance; … fewer call outs to the area and social
services fewer referrals; there has been an increase in the
numbers nominated for Community Volunteer awards;
increase in numbers attending courses; individuals are said to
be more health aware with fewer pregnant women smoking
and a number of people who attended the centre with mental
health problems are now employed.
From this account of results, it would be a small step to furnish
indicators for each of these outcomes, assuming that the data were
available in such a form.
In a Northern Ireland context, Morrissey et al (2002: 13-14) also show
what is possible by developing a set of outcomes in relation to a range
of typical community development goals. Box 3 contains a slight adap-
tation of their work. The authors propose indicators and evidence of
achievement for each of the goals listed, such as the following case of
empowerment.
empowerment
Indicator: intended participants have increased confidence to
participate in community activity.
Evidence: numbers participating in personal development
courses; survey of participants to assess changes in attitudes
and behaviour.

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Box 3
Specifying outcomes in community development

goals outcomes
empowerment participants have confidence, skills and leadership
capacity

infrastructure participants engage in organisations and projects,

which are representative and inclusive.

connectedness participants are well connected with community –

trusting, sharing and working toward shared goals

engagement participants engage with other communities and

sectors through involvement in relationships and
networks

accessibility participants influence structures and processes to

make their community accessible to outside
communities and sectors

innovation participants are open to new ideas and solutions

facilitating their community to adapt to change

resources participants have access to people and institutions

outside the community with power and resources

influence participants have representation on local and

regional public fora at which their interests are
articulated

Source: Adapted from Morrissey et al (2002)

In a similar attempt to set out outcomes, a Scottish report entitled

Delivering Change, Understanding the Outcomes of Community Learning
and Development (Learning Connections, 2007) puts forward the view

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that it is not feasible for people working in community learning and

development (CLD) to be wholly responsible for wider societal level
changes, such as improved levels of health across the nation. It is more
reasonable to look for such ‘end’ outcomes as the product of macro
social, political and economic factors. In the Scottish case, the report
suggests that it is better to think of CLD as contributing to end
outcomes that are particularly important to the Scottish Government.
These might relate to the economy and unemployment, to learning and
education, to getting involved in democratic processes, to health, and
to wider outcomes such as community safety or celebrating people’s
identities and differences. The report proposes that it is more helpful to
concentrate on the ‘intermediate’ or micro socio-economic changes at
local levels that practitioners, managers and people taking part will be
most likely to achieve and be able to identify and record where this is
appropriate (ibid: 11).
The report also argues that CLD cannot be defined just in terms of
outcomes since crucially the work is about processes. The principles
underpinning such processes are set out in the report Working and
Learning Together (Scottish Executive, 2004) in terms of empow-
erment, participation, inclusion, equality of opportunity and
anti-discrimination, self-determination and partnership. The princi-
ples determine an approach to work in three national priority areas for
CLD. The following is a short example of how outputs, processes and
outcomes relate to these priorities (Learning Connections, 2007: 6):
Priority 1: achievement through learning for adults
Example: adult learners taking part in a numeracy group may
become more confident (and, hopefully, better at understanding
and using numbers).
Priority 2: achievement through learning for young people
Example: young people campaigning for a local skate park may
become better at working together.
Priority 3: achievement through building community capacity
Example: a network of community groups in a local area might
take action together on the issues that are important to them.
Identifying appropriate processes that are more likely to lead to such
outcomes, therefore, is a key aspect of programme design and service
content. It is in this connection that conceptual models (e.g. ‘systems’

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and ‘theory of change’ approaches to planning) and practical tools

(e.g. logic models) can be relevant and helpful. For instance, the
Vibrant Communities initiative in Canada is premised on the under-
standing that complex problems, such as poverty, are structural and
interlocking and that communities can only hope to make progress on
them by collaborating across organisations and sectors. Their response
is to adopt a systems level (or ‘ecological’) approach, which specifies
five key themes to be explored as an integrated set of actions for coun-
tering poverty. These five themes are (www.vibrantcommunities.ca):
1 Poverty reduction
to reduce poverty rather than simply alleviate its hardships
2 Comprehensive thinking and action
to address the interrelated root causes of poverty rather than its
various symptoms
3 Multisectoral collaboration
to engage a broad spectrum of sectors and organisations in a
collaborative effort rather than have each work in isolation
4 Community asset building
to emphasize the presence of community assets on which to build
rather than deficits to be overcome
5 Community learning and change
to embrace a process of continual community learning and change
rather than respond with relatively short-term, narrow
interventions.
Within the Vibrant Communities initiative, ‘Trail Builder’ communi-
ties put these themes into practice through multi-faceted, multi-year
poverty reduction projects undertaken in their local settings, and each
Trail Builder develops a ‘theory of change’ articulating the key ideas
guiding the initiative in its work. The theory sets out the project’s
understanding of poverty and poverty reduction, the goals it is seeking
with respect to community capacity building, household outcomes
and systemic changes, the specific strategies to be pursued and the role
that the collaboration will play in the poverty reduction process. This
‘theory of change’ constitutes a conceptual framework allowing local
and national partners to define the thinking behind the work.
An attempt to surface the thinking behind the work can be seen in
the 2004 report The Community Facilitation Programme (CFP),

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produced by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (ODPM). The CFP,
which ran between July 2001 and April 2004 in England, deployed
community facilitators to undertake conflict reduction and resolution
work in 34 areas that were identified as showing signs of high inter-
ethnic community conflict and tension. One of the objectives of the
evaluation was to enable stakeholders to surface and describe why and
how the programme worked (ibid: 5). The result was that the evaluators
were able to identify three linked theories of change (ibid: ix):
• Facilitation and mediation: the underlying idea behind these
projects was the belief that open, structured and honest discussion
is the basis of responding to conflict effectively.
• Structures and resources: the belief here was that infrastructures
and networks can ensure effective conflict resolution, reduction
and prevention.
• Community development and cohesion: the notion here was that a
broad base of public and community awareness is crucial.
One conclusion drawn by the evaluators was that the three theories
of change are essentially linked, overlapping and complementary, and
combine to constitute a process model underpinning the CFP projects.
Instead of there being one right approach, what matters depends on
what is most appropriate to a given situation and what the practitioners
or community groups want to achieve. The idea here is that several
theories of change can coexist simultaneously.
Foster-Fishman et al (2005) have considered the utility of change
theory in relation to a systems level approach. They suggest identifying
the layers involved in the system under consideration, after which it is
possible to then identify the particular intervention points for
proposed change (see Figure 1 overleaf). The idea is to examine how the
component parts of a system are linked together since root causes are
situated within these interactions and interdependencies, and to seek
a sustainable improvement or shift in the pattern of interrelationships.

The potential utility of logic modelling

According to the Program Development and Evaluation Unit at the Uni-
versity of Wisconsin in the USA, the approaches to strategic planning
just described can find useful expression in a logic model (Taylor-
Powell and Henert, 2008). Logic models are most useful for graphically

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Figure 1
Analysing systems

system layers characteristic parts

first identify multiple layers, then identify which

levels and players within characteristics inside these
targeted system: system layers need to be
• children altered or added:
• families • policies and practices
• neighbourhoods • resources
• schools • opportunities
• school district • relationships
• broader community • power and decision-making
• state policy • values
• attitudes and skills

Source: Foster-Fishman et al (2005)

expressing the essential elements in any systematic attempt to

organise resources around achieving particular goals and objectives.
Logic models can provide a summary and overview of these elements
and capture the results of a rigorous strategic planning process in a
simplified way. Models can be used internally, for example, as a tool for
monitoring the work, and externally as a way of summarising the over-
all purpose and activities of an organisation to outsiders. They can also
be a useful document in discussions with funders and others
commissioning the work. To illustrate this point, work produced by
Learning Connections (2007: 27) in Scotland has been adapted in Box 4
to show the links between inputs, activities, outputs, intermediate and
end outcomes.
The English Neighbourhood Management Pathfinder Programme
evaluation also provides an example of a logic model of proposed
activities and what they are intended to lead to (SQW, 2008: 48). In this
case, the activities are about ‘bending’ service provision so that it is
more suited to the needs of local people:

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Box 4
A logic model for community learning and development

inputs
materials, buildings, money, staff time,
voluntary activity

outputs
opportunities for adults, young people,
and support for networks and agencies

CLD activities
learning for adults, young people and
capacity building in communities

preliminary outcomes
learning and development for
individuals and groups

intermediate outcomes
progressive change in local areas
and increased capacity

end outcomes
related to health, education, economic
activity and participation

Source: Learning Connections (2007: 27)

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Information and advice from residents enable service providers

to make changes, such as re-allocating, reshaping, joining-up
and improving access.
The changes lead to:
Improvement to services outcomes in terms of being more
accessible, targeted, responsive, better quality, sufficient in
quantity and efficient.
In turn, these improvements lead to:
Desired impacts on the neighbourhood in terms of: lower crime
and anti-social behaviour, cleaner streets, better housing,
higher educational attainment, healthier people, higher
household incomes and stronger community networks.

Being explicit about the ‘logic’ of interventions can help those

involved to maintain focus on the desired changes, concentrate efforts
on the agreed goals, avoid duplication of work across agencies and set
appropriate standards for the work. Adherence to a logic model is not
inconsistent with flexibility and responsiveness, since good planning
is more of a process than a one-off event. Good planning provides a
basis from which to react to unexpected events, take advantage of
emerging opportunities and be creative in meeting needs.

Community strategic planning

One systematic and tested evidence-informed programme that brings
together many of the elements considered in this section so far is the
Communities That Care (CTC) intervention, developed by Hawkins and
Catalano in the USA. This programme enables a community to plan
strategically to prevent common and often serious behavioural prob-
lems in youth, including violence, substance abuse, teenage
pregnancy, school drop-out and mental health difficulties, and to pro-
mote positive and healthy development. CTC is theoretically based on
the Social Development Model of the Social Development Research
Group at the University of Washington. Information about the research
group is available at http://depts.washington.edu/ssdp/. The
programme has been subject to a variety of evaluations, including ran-
domised control trials (Quinby et al, 2008). It has been implemented
extensively across the USA, as well as in the UK, the Netherlands,

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Box 5
Phases in the Communities That Care Programme

1 Community readiness – which involves a readiness

assessment to ensure that the community is ready to
start the CTC process.
2 Community mobilisation – organising, introducing,
involving – building the coalition of individuals and
organisations to involve.
3 Developing a community profile – collecting community-
specific data and constructing a profile from the data
which allows the community to analyse its own strengths
and challenges.
4 Creating a community action plan.
5 Implementing and evaluating the community action plan.

Source: http://ncadi.samhsa.gov/features/ctc/resources.aspx

Australia, Canada and Cyprus. As shown in Box 5, there are five linked
phases in the CTC process.
To evaluate the degree to which communities are true to the five
phases of CTC, the developers have devised a Milestones and Bench-
mark instrument. Milestones are the specific goals that the community
is to meet (e.g. developing an evaluation plan) and benchmarks are
actions that the community members take or conditions that have to be
met to achieve these goals (e.g. using a survey to measure progress).
Milestones and benchmarks can be used to decide what needs to
happen in the planning process, as a checklist to ensure that all neces-
sary steps are taken and as an assessment and evaluation tool to
identify changes or technical assistance needs.
A UK study by Crow et al (2004), however, sounds a more cautious
note about the efficacy of CTC, concluding that little impact has been
identifiable in the two and a half year period of the evaluation (ibid:
62), but acknowledge that the aims of CTC may only be realised over the

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period that it takes for a generation of young children to grow up (ibid:

62). In fact, the authors suggest that CTC may be better understood as
a process rather than a programme. Some important learning points
emerge from the evaluation (ibid: 66-72):
• CTC UK needs to recognise the diverse starting positions and
develop different implementation models for different types of
communities, which will create opportunities to build on
communities’ strengths while recognising their weaknesses.
• There is a need to ensure critical players are fully engaged in the
process throughout at strategic, management, operational and
local community level.
• Good communication and transparency over decision-making,
especially between local communities and senior politicians and
policy-makers, is critical.
• Consultation processes are essential to ensure that all parties are
fully informed, aware of decisions and able to avoid conflict. This
is fundamental for relationships between communities and
decision-makers.
• There is a need to develop guidance material on good practice in
designing and implementing an action plan.

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Programme design and service content

Summary of lessons
This section has discussed how programme design and service
content can come together in strategies that link overarching policy
goals to particular needs and specified actions by providers. Ideally
the connection between needs, processes and outcomes is very
clearly articulated in planning processes. Key points are:
• A ‘systems’ (or ‘ecological’) approach to programme design has
proved helpful in many jurisdictions. It helps to elucidate how the
constituent elements (society, community/neighbourhood, school,
family, individual, etc) are related within an integrated system
within which there are many interacting factors, and provides a
framework for design by focusing on the levels at which different
activities can be targeted and different outcomes might be
envisaged.
• Programme design is most likely to be robust and effective when it
is underpinned by a clear theoretical framework, which makes
explicit the expectations around why providing Input X should lead
to change in Outcome Z. This should be formulated with reference
to existing theory about how community needs arise and how
change is achieved.
• Service content should be determined with reference to a clearly
articulated description of the expected mechanisms of change,
which makes explicit the expectations around how Input X should
lead to change in Outcome Z, perhaps by way of Output Y.
• Combined, these two approaches are also sometimes described as
a ‘theory of change’ and can be used to specify a ‘logic model’ that
sets out the various inputs, outputs/activities and outcomes that
the programme hopes to achieve and how these are conceptually
and practically linked. Providing this logic model is agreed by all
parties, it can then be a useful tool for monitoring programme
and/or service progress over time.
• Programme design makes most sense when it is needs-informed.
This implies initial needs analysis, carried out at local level, at the
very least to confirm the local situation in relation to nationally
determined priorities for action. The analysis helps to establish a

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baseline against which it is possible to measure progress towards

achieving goals.
• Needs analyses can be carried out utilising a combination of
existing administrative and demographic or epidemiological data,
new surveys of local residents or services, and public and
professional consultations, and need not be expensive or lengthy.
In high-quality programmes, needs analyses are not used simply
as ‘gap-analyses’ or ways of identifying local or community
deficits; they are also used to identify strengths and clarify the
opportunities for building greater community resilience.
• It is a well-established principle in many fields of human services
that effective programme design is generally ‘outcomes-led’ or
results-driven. This implies that broad outcomes should be
identified before programme design begins and that specific
indicators of success that are measurable must be clarified as part
of the process of specifying service content.
• A focus on outcomes can help to avoid the situation where
performance is being measured in the abstract. In this approach,
required actions and activities can be projected backwards from
the desired results rather than forwards from a longer term or
aspirational goal.
• Some literature suggests it may be helpful to conceptualise
outcomes in the community development field as a sequence of
phases such as ‘preliminary’, ‘intermediate’ and ‘end’ outcomes,
and apply critical appraisal skills to the question of the level or
phase at which it is really feasible to expect community
development programmes to operate and deliver results.
• Given the wide potential scope of community development
activities, effective programmes generally have to restrict the
number of priorities for change that they address through their
programme design, focusing in on a carefully selected group of
feasible activities and bearing in mind local resources and other
capacity issues.
• Within this, the evidence from related community-based fields and
from successful community development programmes, such as
Communities That Care, is that multi-dimensional designs, with

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service offers that draw on a menu of approaches to support

different learning styles, tend to be associated with the strongest
outcomes. The involvement of multi-disciplinary teams at both the
design and the implementation and delivery stages is a feature of
successful programmes internationally.
Taken together the above elements constitute a rigorous approach
to programme design and content. A crucial determinant of impact,
however, is the ability of all partners to work together effectively in
implementing the delivery plan.

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Section 3: Programme implementation and delivery

This section considers what the international evidence base tells us
about key principles of effectiveness concerning implementation and
delivery in publicly funded community development programmes.
Because the focus in this part of the report is on implementation and
delivery, attention is more on ‘downstream’ activity at area and commu-
nity levels. The expression ‘implementation and delivery’ refers to the
principles and processes by which programmes and services are put
into action ‘on the ground’. Because publicly funded community devel-
opment type programmes commonly feature partnership entities as the
principal mechanism for delivery, the ability of such entities to function
effectively is central to implementation. In turn, engagement with
members of the community is a fundamental aspect of performance in
such entities.
The 2006 Community Development Foundation (CDF) report, Com-
munity Development Challenge, assessed strengths and weaknesses in
community development and proposed a range of actions to ensure
that it plays a more powerful role in meeting the needs of present-day
society. An important message from the report is that (ibid: 22-23):
Investment in CD (community development) has to work as
part of a network of investments by agencies across the board
… What are needed are neighbourhood-wide, area-wide or
locality-wide CD strategies. The aim would not be to regiment
the different types of CD input but recognising the necessary
diversity, to provide a framework to join up different pieces of
activity and allow the components to work together more
effectively.

The CDF report suggests that structured collaborative activity at

local level is fundamental to realising the intentions of policy where
these structures have the capacity to bring a range of statutory, volun-
tary and private agencies together to focus on local needs and issues.
Essentially, partnership is about sharing the vision at the core of pro-
grammes. It is a relational activity, in which the apparatus of the state
moves away from doing things ‘to’ communities, towards doing things
‘with’ them. This trend can be detected in the national evaluation of
the Neighbourhood Management Pathfinder Programme (NMP) in
England (SQW, 2008). The UK Government launched this programme

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in 2001 in 35 areas to test and develop how the neighbourhood man-

agement process could bring the community and local providers
together to address problems and improve services. The evaluation
concludes that: ‘The pathfinder model of neighbourhood management
has proved robust, flexible and appropriate. It represents a relatively
inexpensive model for in-depth local engagement and service improve-
ment’ (ibid: 9). It has led to a new national practice, with the model
now operating in over 27% of England’s unitary or district level
authorities, covering an estimated 4.2 million people (ibid: 10).
Based on their assessment of research into the extensive £26 billion
Single Regeneration Budget Programme in the UK, Rhodes et al (2003:
1414) also state that: ‘There is now a considerable body of evidence
that delivery mechanisms based on a partnership model offer real
advantages to the quality of the regeneration outputs and outcomes
achieved.’ Collaborative activity is often described as the ‘engine room’
of community development ‘providing the dynamism, project ideas
and links into wider networks that make things happen’ (Turok, 2001:
11). Making things happen in and through such entities, however, is
contingent on avoiding or dealing with a number of common
problems, pitfalls and issues.
The Audit Commission’s 2009 report Working Better Together
provides a detailed study of Local Strategic Partnership (LSP) activity
in the UK. LSPs exist in nearly all local authorities in England. The
study accepts that the state and its partners can deliver better
outcomes by working together than they can separately. They can do
this, for example, by setting a strategic vision or direction for an area,
discussing common concerns, agreeing shared goals and priorities,
and monitoring progress. The study also warns, however, that local
partnerships (Audit Commission, 2009: 8):
• bring risks as well as opportunities, and governance can be a
problem
• do not guarantee value for money, so local public bodies should
question whether and how they engage in partnerships.
• need to be accountable to one another and to the public.
The sorts of problems identified by the Audit Commission are
discussed in Partnerships: A Literature Review, commissioned by
the Research and Development Office for Health and Social Care in

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Northern Ireland (Boydell, 2007). In noting that the literature on both

governance and partnerships has burgeoned in the last decade,
Boydell offers the following blunt message regarding partnership
working (ibid: 3):
People often assume that collaboration will be more effective
than efforts planned and carried out by a single organisation,
yet there is little evidence that collaboration has improved
health status or impacted on health systems. Evaluating
partnerships is difficult for various reasons such as the long
timescales for achieving impact, different perspectives on
what success means, the complexity and variability of
partnership interventions, and the different contexts within
which partnerships work.

The message is reinforced by a key finding from Boydell’s review:

‘While there is acknowledgement in the literature that the purpose of
partnerships is to achieve important goals in the interest of the public
good, there is relatively little consideration of how that change may
be achieved’ (ibid: 12). Further research involving the same author,
however, concludes that with ‘effective processes and a favourable
context, partnership working can lead to a reduction in inequalities’
(Boydell et al, 2007: 4). A tool based on the model can be accessed at
www.partnershiptool.ie/. Although developed in a health context, the
tool applies to partnership working more generally.

Effective partnership working

One attempt to clarify what is meant by and involved in effective part-
nership working can be seen in the Irish report, Partnership Dynamics
– Key Lessons from Local Partnership in Practice (Pobal, 2006). The
report sets out indicators of good practice in local partnership compa-
nies and invites self-analysis in relation to a typology of activity
described as Progressive, Cooperative and Conciliatory (see Box 6).
A clear message from the Pobal study is that effectiveness is not
simply a matter of structure; it depends crucially on ethos, approach
and a sense of purpose, and requires a level of mutual support and
joint activity between members and the groups they represent.
Also drawing on learning about collaborative approaches in the
Irish partnership model, Turok (2001: 11) asserts that: ‘The nominated
officials cannot be mere delegates of their organisations, mandated to

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Box 6
A typology of partnership working

progressive
• high emphasis on developing proactive communication strategies
and decision-making is open and transparent
• imbalances of power between partners recognised and strategies
in place to deal with such imbalances
• partners open to various methods of working and collaborate
comfortably on the development and implementation of strategies
• skilled staff available to support the partnership process.

cooperative
• facilitates better planning and sharing of information and
resources between stakeholders
• moderate level of trust between partners, medium-level
participation of stakeholders and a limited communication
strategy
• flexibility, risk-taking and innovative methods of working
sometimes not encouraged.

conciliatory
• lack of strategic planning
• low levels of participation and trust between stakeholders
• poor linkages between agencies and stakeholders, weak decision-
making mechanisms and poor leadership
• minimal understanding and capacity for carrying out social
inclusion work
• lack of commitment locally to pursuing and supporting a social
inclusion agenda
• partners are not interested in challenging the status quo.

Source: Pobal (2006: 24-25)

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pursue particular policies or to implement national decisions. They

need discretion and some autonomy to participate meaningfully and
promptly in partnership forums, given the dialogue and negotiation
involved.’ Turok’s point is reinforced in the Report on the 2008 Survey
of all English Local Strategic Partnerships (Russell et al, 2009). When
partnerships mature, the members develop a degree of commitment to
one another and to collectively agreed goals and ways of operating
that is stronger than formal requirements to cooperate. As Russell et al
(2009: 73) state:
The message coming from the survey responses is that
accountability within the LSP is perceived to be increasing
and is stronger than external accountability. This applies both
between the constituent parts of the LSP and the
accountability to the LSP of its partners. More than four out of
five respondents also thought that the LSP’s partnership
working enhances the accountability of local agencies.

Issues of recognition and authority

But positive internal working is not enough by itself, as can be seen
from the evaluation in Ireland of the Social Inclusion Measure (SIM)
Working Groups (NDP/CSF, 2003). These groups were established
under the County and City Development Boards (CDBs) for the purpose
of coordinating, at a local level, the delivery of the social inclusion
measures contained in the National Development Plan (NDP). The
evaluation identified that as the partnership approach is grounded in
principles of participation, negotiation and consensus, a fundamental
constraint is the lack of authority underpinning the local coordination
function as none of the key local stakeholders can be obliged to partic-
ipate meaningfully in the process. In this case, what is required is a
higher level of priority being attached to the objectives and work of SIM
Groups by government departments and local delivery agencies,
resulting in incentives within the system to encourage and reward
organisations that pursue issues around coordination and who seek to
eliminate duplication (ibid: 62).

Support for collaborative work

Support for those engaged in collaborative working is provided by
Atkinson’s (2007a, 2007b and 2007c) three-part guide, Better at

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Working Together – Interagency Collaboration, to assist managers and

front-line workers with regard to partnership working. The guide was
created on behalf of the High and Complex Needs (HCN) Unit in New
Zealand, which coordinates a national strategy for dealing with
children and young people with high and complex needs. The unit
supports the development of intersectoral relationships and working
at all levels. A conclusion from Part 1 of the guide, a literature review,
is that the best predictor of effectiveness is the degree of consensus
about needs, problems, solutions and methods, and agreement or clar-
ity on aims, levels of involvement and commitment, and strategy
(Atkinson, 2007a: 7). A key message is that while collaborative pro-
cesses may be effective in the long term, they require a considerable
investment in time and resources and there are limits to the capacity of
agencies to participate in and sustain collaborative activity (ibid: 9).
The second part of the trilogy provides practical advice on inter-
agency working. It sets out HCN’s conditions for funding as a way of
defining what is meant by collaboration. For HCN funding it is
expected that agencies will (Atkinson, 2007b: 7):
• make a formal commitment to a joint process
• agree on a lead agency and accountability arrangements
• move beyond the agencies and professional paradigms involved
to form a shared view of the issues and the desired outcomes
• jointly develop and agree on a plan that focuses on the outcomes
for the child or young person and their family
• be willing to be flexible and to do things differently
• contribute resources (staff time, services, administrative support,
funding) to deliver the common plan
• ensure that the results are greater than the sum of the parts.
The final part provides a detailed self-assessment tool for managers
and front-line staff, with activities based on six mutually reinforcing
principles for collaboration (Atkinson, 2007c: 25-35):
• recognise and accept the need for collaboration
• be clear and realistic about the purpose
• ensure commitment and ownership
• develop and maintain trust

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• create clear and robust arrangements to support collaboration

• monitor, measure and learn.
For Atkinson’s work, see www.hcn.govt.nz/ publications.htm.
In community development type programmes, the purpose of
partnership stretches well beyond the idea of professionals and com-
munity-based agencies working collaboratively. On one level it includes
harnessing the contribution of community groups to achieving preferred
outcomes. On another level, it is about the involvement of community
representatives in planning and decisions about resource allocation in
their own communities. A fundamental aspect of the work of partner-
ship entities, therefore, is to promote active community engagement.

Promoting active community engagement

Wilson and Heeney’s (2006) report, Improving Neighbourhoods and
Supporting Active Communities, provides some useful indications of
what it means to involve the community as partners in the pursuit of
social change. In essence, it is about facilitating a movement from
engagement as a first step, through involvement in activities to full par-
ticipation. The authors assessed the role of the English Single
Community Programme (SCP) in Neighbourhood Renewal, which aims to
develop community participation through four strategic goals (ibid: 3):
• governance – developing a community ‘voice’ that enables
communities to participate in decision-making and increase the
accountability of service providers
• social capital – increasing the confidence and capacity of
individuals and small groups to get involved in activities and build
mutually supportive networks
• service delivery – ensuring that local communities are in a
position to influence service delivery and where appropriate,
participate in service delivery
• social inclusion and community cohesion – developing
empowered communities capable of building a common vision and
a positive identity where diversity is valued.
Their study was based in Hull, a major port on the east coast of Eng-
land, where they found that many voluntary and community sector
(VCS) organisations were small and community-led and very often

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operating through volunteers. As a result they were ‘below the radar’.

They also found that because much community-based activity comes
from perceived need, it rarely fits into neat thematic boxes. Yet their
mapping of the VCS activity shows the significant scale of the contribu-
tion that such organisations make to major areas of social policy,
including health, crime and learning (ibid: 15-20). The study shows the
various ways in which the Hull Community Network and Hull Commu-
nity Investment Fund (CIF) supported such work by having contact
with around 860 VCS organisations across the city. The network con-
tributed to the development of social capital by (ibid: 21-22):
• acting as a focal point and first point of contact, and signposting
for both VCS and statutory organisations
• raising awareness through network forums and publications,
i.e. VCS organisations are made aware of funding streams,
practice from other groups, at the same time as sharing their
own learning and practice
• enabling members to be both givers and receivers of information
• holding network meetings to allow groups to gain a lot of
information in a small amount of time
• providing Community Chest grants to ‘kick start’ purposeful
community development
• helping members with funding applications.
Wilson and Heeney’s 2006 report contains many examples of good
practice and evidence of what works in promoting a truly joint and
joined-up approach to tackling endemic social problems.
In considering the support mechanisms involved in enabling the
active participation of people from disadvantaged neighbourhoods,
Taylor et al’s (2007) evaluation of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation’s
(JRF) work with 20 neighbourhoods in the UK relates directly to Wilson
and Heeney’s categories of ‘governance’ and ‘social capital’. The pro-
gramme aimed to test out the value of different kinds of ‘light touch’
support to organisations at different stages of development. Examples
of the light touch that were deemed to be effective included (ibid: 14):
• development support: in the form of a facilitator to plant seeds,
share information, ask interesting questions or to remind people to
keep things on the agenda

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• credit: small amounts of unrestricted money provided to

community groups; for instance, to purchase regeneration
magazines and newsletters, marketing/publicity, or to buy
equipment such as a laptop, projector, digital camera
• networking opportunities: such as joint events between
community groups from different neighbourhoods, to share
experiences about common themes such as community
engagement, funding, diversity, and working with power-holders
• action planning: providing a planning framework and evaluation
guidelines to help organisations to review local needs and
opportunities, map out their future and reflect on past
achievements and difficulties
• brokerage: mediation with other organisations and power-holders
such as the local authority
• dissemination: providing a UK-wide platform for groups to discuss
the challenges of neighbourhood working with policy-makers from
local and central government
• kite marking: with groups being able to use the JRF name to
promote their profile locally.
According to Taylor et al (2007), these measures made a positive
difference in terms of assisting a more coherent analysis of local prob-
lems, engaging more people in tackling local problems, developing
leadership capacity at local level, increasing access to information and
ability, and generating knowledge through research.
The Guide Neighbourhoods Programme in England, which ran from
January 2005 to March 2007, sought to create synergies between indi-
vidual ‘guide’ neighbourhoods by connecting residents seeking to
regenerate their neighbourhoods with experienced residents from
strong, successful ones (ibid: 10). Notwithstanding a number of diffi-
culties and problems with the scheme, centering on the failure to
establish a truly national identity, the authors point to a range of
achievements. These include (ibid: 5-6):
• motivating residents to become active in their communities and to
have the confidence to persist with their ideas, by seeing the
example of successful resident-led regeneration
• building wider organisational capacity by supporting, often quite

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fragile, community groups to create a physical presence and

change on their own estates
• playing a role in developing greater professionalism and
effectiveness within client organisations.
• acting as positive role models and encouraging client
organisations to engage in strategic partnership through effecting
introductions or brokering positive relationships with public
agencies in cases where this has been difficult in the past
• achieving community empowerment outcomes through a focus on
improvements in the quality of community life, such as
environmental changes, community safety and neighbourhood
management initiatives
• reaching hidden communities on ‘forgotten estates’ where little or
no funding had previously been received.
The fact that there are considerable difficulties and barriers associ-
ated with community engagement, however, is recognised in Bartley’s
(2004) Review of Public Participation in Dún Laoghaire–Rathdown
County Development Plan. The review finds that communities, and in
particular disenfranchised communities, can be better enabled to
develop a proactive role in the planning process through ‘incentivised
capacity building’ (ibid: 40). However, people should not be coerced or
otherwise compelled to engage with the planning apparatus at a level
which is not appropriate and not in their own interests (ibid: 38).
Instead, engagement is more likely when issues have a clear or imme-
diate relevance to people’s lives, and the type and level of involvement
has to be agreed and should be appropriate to the circumstances of
prospective participants. According to the author, involvement options
range from ‘informing and consultation’, which are suitable for large
audiences because they are less demanding in terms of time, effort and
other resources, to ‘negotiation and delegation’, which are more suited
to small numbers who are able and willing to commit the time to
engage in the process (ibid: 38).
Issues that resonate with Wilson and Heeney’s category of ‘gover-
nance’ are also considered in the UK report Empowering Communities
to Influence Local Decision Making – A systematic review of the evidence
(Pratchet et al, 2009). The literature review aimed to ‘identify, quality
assess and subsequently synthesise existing domestic and (where

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appropriate) international evidence with a view to drawing out useful

policy implications, by attempting to make sense of variable and often
competing or contrasting evidence in order to identify which mecha-
nisms empower, in what ways, and in what contexts’ (ibid: 10). The
research team selected six specific mechanisms for more detailed
analysis (ibid: 10-11):
• asset transfer and other facilitative mechanisms for community
management and/or ownership of assets and social enterprise
• citizen governance, covering the role of citizen or community
representatives on partnerships, boards and forums charged with
decision-making about public services and public policy
• electronic participation, for example, e-forums and e-petitions as a
means of offering substantively different forms of engagement and
alternative or complementary channels for participation
• participatory budgeting as a form of deliberative participation in
communities facilitating decision-making on devolved budgets
• petitions as a mechanism for citizens and groups to raise issues of
concern
• redress as a mechanism for citizens to register complaints, have
them investigated and receive feedback and response.
According to the authors, identifying criteria to define empowerment
and systematically to draw out cause-and-effect relationships allows
qualitative researchers to go beyond the usual claims of ‘suggest’,
‘indicate’ and ‘appear’ to identify the conditions for ‘empowerment
success’ (ibid: 11). The conditions are said to include (ibid: 59):
• the initiative is open to all
• support is provided to participants
• there is a formal link to decision-making
• political and bureaucratic buy-in is present.
Where these conditions apply, the chances of successfully realising
the intentions of policy are maximised. The main findings are (ibid: 21):
• The community empowerment agenda is still in a nascent stage.
Local practitioners are a crucially important resource in developing
this agenda and bringing it towards fruition.

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• It is important that government clarifies the objectives of

empowerment and gives a sustained commitment to an agenda
that may take a while to deliver notable successes.
• These simple messages imply the need for developing accessible,
inclusive and facilitated strategies for empowerment. The
community and voluntary sector, and specifically community
development techniques, have an important role to play here.
• It is also important, however, to pay attention to the perspectives of
public sector organisations, their staff and elected members. The
need for ongoing learning, training and capacity building is clear.
• This research has also shown the importance of integrating
mechanisms into an overarching strategy for empowerment that is
set within a mainstreamed agenda of building trust with the public
at every opportunity.
The findings of Pratchet et al (2009) resonate with those expressed
by Chanan (1999) in Local Community Involvement – A Handbook For
Good Practice, which is based on a pan-European survey of work in
relation to community engagement. In response to a widespread
impression that the lack of investment in local involvement has weak-
ened local development as a whole, Chanan’s study set out to show
that this ‘sector’ is objective, measurable and amenable to planned
improvement. It argues that as the underlying strength of the commu-
nity affects outcomes in all aspects of development, policies should
intend to build up the infrastructure of the sector, including local
support and umbrella bodies, networks and forums, in order to build
up long-term assets and endowments and enable dialogue between
communities and the authorities (ibid: 11). Chanan shares the view
taken by Bartley (see above) that capacity building should take a
holistic approach, recognising a ‘pyramid’ of participation, with a
point of entry for everyone depending on their interests and abilities
(ibid: 37). The pyramid has five levels:
1 representing a network or forum in an official scheme
2 helping groups and organisations to form a network
3 helping a group/organisation to cooperate with others
4 taking a developmental role in a group or organisation

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5 being a member or user of a community group or voluntary

organisation.
Each level feeds into the one above and is affected by the one below,
so that capacity at the top depends on the vibrancy of the lower levels.
Chanan’s main point is about the need to promote participation at
every level. The author concludes that building the infrastructure can
lead to a number of desirable outcomes, such as (ibid: 26):
• community organisations are strengthened
• more people participate at various levels in community
organisations
• excluded people have more footholds in local society
• the local community sector has more influence on public affairs
• public authorities take more account of community needs
• innovative local economic initiatives are flourishing
• community representatives on official schemes have clearer
legitimacy and lines of communication with local people.

Linking partnership and community engagement

The work of the Montgomery Collaboration Council (MCC) in the USA
exemplifies the ideas discussed in this Section and also in Section 2.
The MCC’s work is an example of a joined-up, needs-led and results-
focused approach to community development. Twenty-one board
members represent public agencies, families, elected officials, busi-
nesses and community advocates. Five committees relating to
Executive, Child Well-being, Legislative, Fiscal and Membership func-
tions support this governance and policy-making body. The Child
Well-being Committee is at the centre of the collaboration’s work. It has
three workgroups that focus on three priority areas: early childhood,
youth development and children with intensive needs. Board
members, service providers, parents and community advocates serve
on these committees and workgroups. Members do not simply make
recommendations or contribute information. They ensure that their
own organisation or agency actively and simultaneously addresses the
agreed goals, such as work on reducing truancy levels. In doing so,
they may also undertake joint projects with other members. They are
also fully involved in planning and evaluating the results of the work.

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In 1998 the MCC undertook a wide-ranging consultation exercise,

involving service providers, user groups, residents and politicians, to
establish The Children’s Agenda as the vision for the well-being of chil-
dren and families in Montgomery County (MCC, 2007). This document
provides extensive demographic data that is regularly updated in line
with the Council’s planning periods. Since 1998 MCC understands
needs as the gaps between what is currently happening with children,
youth and families and the desired outcomes set out in The Children’s
Agenda.
In the planning period 2007 to 2012, MCC has identified 38 commu-
nity needs organised into its three focus areas: early childhood, youth
development and children with intensive needs (MCC, 2007: 15). These
have been compiled into A Community Needs Assessment Workbook.
Extensive outreach with a wide variety of community groups and
citizen advisory commissions was conducted to elicit their input
regarding the identified needs. Over 425 surveys were completed,
mostly online, by a breadth of community members, including parents,
youth and service providers with culturally diverse backgrounds. Using
a set of criteria that assessed (1) the importance of each need and
(2) the feasibility of making significant progress in meeting the need
within the next five years, the Child Well-being Committee then
selected those needs in each focus area that the MCC would
proactively address. The resulting 22 priority identified needs are
found within each focus area section of the plan. The planning process
then establishes the links between the identified needs and related
strategies and activities, responsibilities, resources and timescales for
meeting the needs.

Resourcing partnership and community engagement

The importance and centrality of partnership working and community
engagement means that time and resources need to be invested in sup-
porting the work and in resolving the attendant difficulties. This will
often mean professional staff acting as brokers and intermediaries
between groups and organisations. Their role is to help establish clear
and agreed protocols setting out the conditions for membership, to help
to build trust, understanding and common purpose. They will also be
important in maintaining linkages with other local development initia-
tives and with strategic bodies at ‘higher’ levels of decision-making.

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Staff employed, for example, by local partnership entities can be

expected to provide a wide range of technical assistance to partners in
a number of ways, including:
• funding applications
• finance and probity
• advice about employment practice
• planning and evaluation
• governance
• building board capacity.
Box 7 provides an example of technical assistance from the
Columbia Heights/Shaw Family Support Collaborative (CH/SFSC) in
Washington, DC.
It is clear from this discussion of the need for and nature of tech-
nical assistance that much is required in terms of knowledge, skills
and commitments from practitioners in community development
programmes. Pope (2007: 12), in her study of the Caroline Springs

Box 7
The role of technical assistance

CH/SFSC is an association of more than 40 community organisations,

resident groups and neighbourhood leaders working in partnership
to build a neighbourhood-based network to promote positive family
and community development. The organisation provides a number
of community-based services in two divisions: family services and
community capacity building. The Collaborative provides a regular
programme of training available to member organisations, and
others, on such topics as organisational development or more
professionally focused issues. The following are examples:
• supervisory solution-focused training – managers
• organisational solution-focused training – directors
• Family Group Conference facilitator training
• Effective Youth Violence Intervention.

Source: http://www.chsfsc.org/index.php?id=1

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Partnership in Australia, also refers to the crucial role of the lead

worker, in this case called a director, in effective partnerships. She
argues that success is highly dependent on the person having:
• high levels of communication, networking, facilitation and
negotiation skills
• detailed knowledge and understanding of the workings of state
and local government
• high levels of community involvement at the leadership level.
Also in the Australian context, in the National Evaluation (2004–
2008) of the Stronger Families and Communities Strategy 2004–2009,
Muir et al (2009: xi) observe that partnership arrangements in this
government initiative were effective when ‘facilitating Partner project
managers had the necessary communication, organisational, facilita-
tion, contract management and conflict resolution skills, because the
success of the CfC model was highly dependent on the qualifications,
skills, experience and personalities of project manager, staff and
volunteers’.
The fundamental contribution of leaders and practitioners to
community involvement is also captured in the Sure Start Plus National
Evaluation: Final Report, where Wiggins et al (2005) highlight the
significance of such factors as one-to-one individual holistic support
involving friendliness, informality, accessibility, proactiveness and
persistence in support. They also state that it required dedicated staff
and community support to reach specific ethnic communities. In some
cases, the presence of a dynamic paid coordinator from the outset
minimised problems in planning and implementation and inspired
respect and loyalty from colleagues and partner organisations (ibid: 77).

The role of the workforce

This latter set of observations highlights the central role of the work-
force in community development programmes. The range and
complexity of functions is captured well in the Irish Combat Poverty
Agency’s report Communities, Voices and Change (Airey, 2006), which
examined the policy work of community development agencies in
three government-funded programmes. The report found that (ibid: 52) :

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Staying abreast of changing policy developments, engaging

effectively in policy arenas, offering well-presented, sound
arguments for change based on evidence and analysis within
these arenas, while networking and building alliances as part
of one’s strategy in influencing positive change demand a
range of competencies and skills in addition to the
‘traditional’ skills required for community development.

Clearly, a well-trained, well-paid, properly utilised and supported

workforce is crucial to effective programme implementation and
delivery. This raises questions about the extent and quality of initial
and post-qualifying training, as well as continuing professional devel-
opment support for the workforce. The need for training and support,
however, goes beyond the professional cadre of community develop-
ment workers. In this connection, the previously mentioned Centre for
the Study of Social Policy has developed a range of guides to human
resource management tailored specifically for welfare organisations.
A practical and informative self-assessment tool – Building a Stable
and Quality Child Welfare Workforce – has wider relevance than the
title suggests (www.cssp.org/). It covers ‘Promising Strategies’ for
organisational culture and employee relations, professional develop-
ment and employee retention, and recruitment.

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Programme implementation and delivery

Summary of lessons
The discussion in this section supports the view that the impact
of publicly funded community development type programmes is likely
to be greater when a range of partners overcome inherent problems
and issues in working together, and collectively bring to bear the
resources of their own agencies and ways of working. Key points are:
• A principle of effective implementation, flowing from the notion of
partnership working utilised by many effective community
development programmes around the world, is the involvement of
many partners in delivering the programme activities at the
neighbourhood level. Partly this serves to operationalise and
‘make real’ the concept of multi-agency partnership; partly this
ensures that the multi-dimensional ‘systems’ or ‘ecological’
approach required to deliver effective services to communities, as
noted above, is supported
• The most promising approaches in this respect involve
collaboration between central or local government and the local
delivery agents in determining how the programme should operate
and how outcomes should be achieved by means of a negotiated
process.
• The evidence is clear that collaboration is not an end in itself.
Instead, collaborations can play an important role in building up
the local infrastructure, including support and umbrella bodies,
networks and forums, in order to develop long-term assets and
endowments and enable dialogue between communities and the
authorities.
• This work requires active community engagement at different
levels and in a variety of ways in policy-making and decision-
making processes.
• Enabling partnership activity and community engagement to fulfil
its potential, and facilitating active participation, requires
appropriate resources and skilled professional support.
• The critical role of the team/project leader or ‘champion’ at local
level has been documented as a major factor predicting success,
with the most effective leaders being skilled in a number of

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different areas as well as in leadership, and having intimate local

knowledge and strong local credibility.
• Close attention to training and development of front-line workers
and volunteers is a key feature of successful programmes, both to
build and retain a competent workforce to deliver complex work
with often high-need communities and to ensure that work is
delivered to a high standard.
Learning from experience is crucial in terms of reaching the high
standards referred to in the last bullet point, and this requires appro-
priate mechanisms and procedures for monitoring and evaluation.

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Section 4: Monitoring and evaluation

This section considers what the international evidence tells us about
key principles concerning monitoring and evaluation of publicly
funded community development programmes. The importance of
appropriate monitoring and evaluation today is universally recognised
and cannot be overestimated. In this report, ‘monitoring’ is used to
describe a counting (or accounting) process, concerned with the
assessment of whether agreed inputs have been made as per Service
Level Agreements and whether key targets for service uptake have been
achieved. Of itself, monitoring does not reveal if a programme has been
successful, only how it used the resources provided. Clearly, robust
monitoring processes are a key component of ensuring accountability
for public funds, but are not in themselves a sufficient indicator of
effectiveness. ‘Evaluation’ is a process that involves the systematic
investigation of pre-determined questions preferably using scientifi-
cally robust (transparent and replicable) research methods.
Evaluations can describe and assess the quality of implementation
(process, or formative evaluations) or assess the relationship between
outcomes for service recipients and the inputs made by the service
(outcome or impact, or summative evaluation).
According to Spicer and Smith (2008), however, evaluation is prob-
lematic in complex community-based initiatives, especially in contexts
of rapid changes in national and local policy. Their analysis draws
extensively on the evaluations of the Children’s Fund, a £960 million
UK Government initiative between 2001 and 2008 that established
local partnerships in each of the 150 English local authorities to
promote children’s social inclusion. The authors state that (ibid: 79):

It is increasingly recognised by policy-makers that social

problems such as social exclusion and health inequalities
have multiple facets relating to poverty, unemployment,
family, education, neighbourhood, opportunity and lifestyle.
Hence, there can be no simple, causal association between a
policy intervention and its potential impacts.

A specific and pressing issue in relation to the evaluation of publicly

funded community development programmes concerns how to assess
at a national level the results of work in different localities. In their

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review of evaluation practices in the voluntary and community sectors

in Northern Ireland, McDonnell et al (2010: 14) observed:
It is acknowledged that the absence of defined programme
level outcomes makes it difficult to connect project activities
and outcomes to overall programme objectives. It also makes
it difficult to aggregate monitoring and evaluation data
generated from individual projects in order to provide an
overview of programme achievements.

At the same time, monitoring and evaluation processes will be

counterproductive when the balance is wrong between them, if they
require disproportionate amounts of time and if accountability takes
precedence over the substantive work of the agency. In this case,
monitoring and evaluation may contribute little to learning and devel-
opment. These sorts of issues are confirmed by Ellis and Gregory’s
(2008) research over a period of two years into how third sector organ-
isations approach evaluation. The research found that all too often
performance measurement is used internally by organis-ations them-
selves purely as a compliance mechanism. Respondents from different
stakeholder groups reported that organisations were often doing eval-
uation ‘just because they have to report to funders showing what they
have got for their money’ (ibid: 88). For such reasons it is used less
often to check and challenge the direction of the organisation.
The problems identified by Ellis and Gregory are compounded by
the difficulties inherent in attempts to measure outcomes in
community development. On the basis of his literature review of over
130 texts relating to evaluations of community development approa-
ches to tackling poverty in Ireland, Motherway (2006: 62) came to the
following conclusion:
Setting out to measure the poverty impacts of a community
development initiative is always extremely difficult. Impacts
are often more related to ‘process’ themes such as
empowerment and activation. Direct impacts on poverty are
difficult to measure from a programme perspective, and if
measured more globally are then difficult to ascribe to specific
policies or interventions. Many impacts are qualitative in
nature and an excessive emphasis on quantitative

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measurement risks the underestimation of the full positive

impacts of community development.

One illustration of this problem comes from a value-for-money

review of the Irish Local Development and Social Inclusion
Programme, which stated that (Fitzpatrick Associates, 2007: 24):

As articulated by evaluators to date, the greatest weakness of

the Partnership experiment is lack of ability to state
definitively in an evidence-based manner, after 15 years of
implementation, what impact they have had as a programme
on the communities in which they are established. Evaluators
have generally concluded that, while there is no doubt that
the areas have developed over time, it is more difficult to
demonstrate what the Partnership’s distinct contribution has
been over and above what might have occurred anyway
because of economic growth or other interventions.

There is a parallel set of issues for academic research in this area.

According to Berkowitz (2001), there are multiple methodological
problems associated with external evaluations of community-based
coalitions. These are said to include (ibid: 215-217):
• extraneous variables potentially bearing on outcomes may be
both very large in number, difficult to fully specify, and also
non-uniform across communities and cannot be controlled
• interactions among extraneous variables may also occur, and
may be complex, multiple and frequent, but these will be hard to
determine if such variables are insufficiently identified or
controlled
• the choice of which particular measures to use (e.g. process and
product measures or both, and also specific choices within these
categories) is often not obvious; multiple measures may be called
for, but their specific selection as well as their potential weighting
may not be clear.
Given the potential for flawed approaches, it is important to be as
clear as possible about the intended purposes of monitoring and
evaluation, and to clarify the mechanisms and processes for internal
and external measurement.

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A holistic approach to evaluation

The 2009 report by the Audit Commission, Working Better Together,
stresses the need for a holistic approach to monitoring and evaluation
focusing on the parts played by the various actors in delivery. As Box 8
shows, a number of related questions can help those responsible to
focus attention on key aspects of the ‘chain of delivery’ that makes up
the overall system.
One example of a concise framework that is helpful in holding
together the related elements in monitoring and evaluation is outlined
in the Neighbourhood Management Pathfinder Programme report (SQW,
2008). In relation to the core activities of improving local services, learn-
ing and development, community engagement and delivering quick
wins, the report proffers a number of key evaluative questions (ibid: 96):
1 What are the resource inputs?
2 What activities is the Pathfinder pursuing?
How do these fit into the categories?
What is the sequence of events for each stream of activity?
3 What are the barriers, helping factors and issues that influence
success in securing changes?
4 What improvements are being made to services?
How can these be measured?
5 What changes are occurring in the area?
6 To what extent are changes in area conditions traceable to the
Pathfinder, compared with other external influences?
A consistent message from the evidence base is that there are many
different ways of answering such questions and care should be taken
to access appropriate methods. Working with lay people and commu-
nity groups, for example, will require a more engaging and lively
approach to secure full participation in the process. One instance of
this can be seen in the methodology adopted by the Neighbourhood
Initiative Foundation in England (NIF, 2009). Its work on ‘Planning For
Real’ helps residents throughout the UK to play an active part in the
regeneration of their neighbourhoods and the development of their
communities. NIF has developed a systematic approach to work that
uses interactive techniques and tools incorporating helpful visual

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Box 8
Delivery chain questions

• Is the outcome clearly defined?

• Is the evidence base robust?
• Is there enough capacity, including available resources, to
deliver?
• Is there a shared (cross-agency) operational plan describing
how services/interventions will be provided?
• Are the objectives supported by a funding strategy?
• Do the different agencies communicate regularly, using
reliable information, and at the right levels?
• Are levers and incentives fit for purpose?
• Are the risks to the delivery chain well managed?
• Do performance management systems enable tracking of
delivery?
• Is there strong leadership, accountable through clear
governance structures, at all levels of the delivery chain?
• Are mechanisms in place for regular feedback and review,
supporting continuous learning?
• Have systems to achieve efficiency been built into the
delivery chain?

Source: Working Better Together (Audit Commission, 2009: 43)

aids, or models of neighbourhoods, to stimulate debate and contribu-

tions from participants.
Another comprehensive approach to internal evaluation has been
developed by the Social Audit Network (SAN) in England. According to
SAN (2009), the aim is to enable ‘a social enterprise to build on its
existing monitoring, documentation and reporting systems to develop
a process whereby it can account fully for its social, environmental and
economic impacts, report on its performance and draw up an action
plan to improve on that performance’. Emphasis is on self-evaluation

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in a process that involves a systematic and easily understood series of

steps using charts, diagrams and grids to focus attention on all aspects
of performance and on impacts. A significant aspect of the process
involves setting up a panel of impartial people to authenticate the
report. It is based on six underpinning principles:
1 Social accounting should engage with and reflect the opinions of a
wide variety of people (key stakeholders) affected by (and able to
affect) the organisation (multi-perspective)
2 Social accounting should cover all the activities of the social
enterprise or organisation (comprehensive)
3 The organisation should be able to compare its performance over
time and also against similar organisations (comparative)
4 It should be undertaken regularly rather than be a one-off exercise
and become embedded in the running of the social enterprise or
organisation (regular)
5 The Social Accounts should be checked (audited) by an
independent social audit panel, chaired by an approved Social
Auditor (verified)
6 The findings of the audited Social Accounts should be widely
circulated and discussed (disclosed).

Using outcomes and indicators

The evidence suggests that using outcomes and indicators appropri-
ately is central to effective monitoring and evaluation. Outcomes are
the results of programme activity such as changes in knowledge,
behaviour, practice, decision-making, policies, social action,
condition or status. Outcomes may be intended or unintended, and
positive and negative, and may fall along a continuum from immediate
(initial; short-term) to intermediate (medium-term) to final outcomes
(long-term), which are often synonymous with impact. An indicator is
an expression of impact in the form of evidence that the impact has or
is being achieved. According to the Nexus (2001) evaluation of the
Community Development Programme in Ireland, the capacity to focus
on outcomes is important because it is necessary to evaluate the extent
to which actions are consistent with the environment in which a
project operates. Is the project ignoring education in an area of high

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early school leaving and where no other response is evident, for exam-
ple, or targeting unemployment when others are already doing so?
Translating the intent to become more outcomes-focused, however,
presents significant challenges. As McDonnell et al (2010: 7) observe in
a Northern Ireland context: ‘The methods and skills to understand,
develop and implement outcomes approaches remain largely under-
developed at both programme and project levels, with the focus
continuing to be on outputs, involving quantitative monitoring data,
as opposed to outcome measurement.’ In their 2008 report Delivering
Outcomes in Community Learning and Development: Current issues for
outcome-focused practice in youth work, Learning Connections
consider the issues involved in reporting outcomes in the context of the
Scottish National Youth Work Strategy. Although focusing on youth
work, the content of this report applies equally to other aspects of work
in communities. In February 2008 the Scottish Government
established a concordat setting out the terms of the new relationship
between local authorities and Scottish Government. A central proposal
was the creation of a single outcome agreement between each council
and the Scottish Government, based on 15 national outcomes agreed in
the concordat. One of the 15 national outcomes is:
Our young people are successful learners, confident
individuals, effective contributors and responsible citizens.

Cross-cutting issues regarding evaluation in relation to the national

outcomes are identified in the report as confusion about terminology
and ability to measure outcomes, working within an output culture,
capacity to undertake evaluations and working with new national and
local outcomes frameworks. In addition, because of the voluntary
nature of participation and the sometimes unpredictable pattern of
contact with young people, there is difficulty in establishing accurate
baseline information on individuals in youth work. For these and other
reasons, the report suggests that there is a need to introduce a more
streamlined tool for recording how outcomes are being met. The make-
up of the youth work profession, being mostly volunteers and sessional
staff at delivery level, also makes outcomes-focused practice a
particular challenge. The suggestion is for a simple booklet with a rec-
ommended system to use that can be accessible to all staff members,
sessional and part-time workers, and more training on the system so

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that everyone understands the terminology and the purpose. Two

strong recommendations emerge from the Learning Connections
report:
• There should be longer-term sustainable funding packages, which
help projects to plan for long-term outcomes that meet the needs of
communities not determined by short-term funding priorities.
• At the same time, investors, inspectors and decision-makers
should work collaboratively to reduce duplication of effort for
practitioners, streamlining systems for measuring recording and
reporting on outcomes.
The Learning Connections report acknowledges that impact can
be long term in community development and therefore difficult to
measure. With regard to such difficulties, a report from the Centre for
Evaluation Northern Ireland, Proving and Improving: A quality and
impact toolkit for charities, voluntary organisations and social
enterprise (www.proveandimprove.org/new/about.php), states that it
is important to choose indicators of performance, quality or outcomes
that are within the organisation’s scope to measure and use. The
toolkit states that indicators need to be:
1 action focused. Does knowing about this issue help your
organisation or its key stakeholders to do things better or more
effectively? Is it within your organisation’s power to influence it?
2 important. Is it relevant to your organisation? Is it a priority for a
core stakeholder or group of stakeholders?
3 measurable. Can you get information that tells you something
about the effects you’ve had?
4 simple. Is it clear and direct enough to be understood by all
stakeholders? Is it easy enough to get information without expert
assistance if none is available?
According to the Community Development Foundation (2006), the
difficulties of measurement can be addressed by taking a strategic view
of a whole neighbourhood or locality, and of all community develop-
ment inputs from all sources into that locality. On this basis it should
be possible over a period of time to show measurable indicators of
improvement on such things as (ibid: 23):

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• whether people feel they can influence what goes on around them
• whether people feel their locality is one in which people from
different backgrounds can get on well together
• amounts of voluntary activity
• numbers of community groups and numbers of people involved in
them
• range of public issues tackled by community groups
• numbers of people benefiting from the activities of community
groups
• numbers of people who become skilled in local organising and
representing community interests.
The Centre for Evaluation Northern Ireland (CENI) has also devel-
oped a set of 24 generic indicators that have possible utility across a
range of community development projects, although they have to be
tailored to individual organisations and agencies (Morrissey et al,
2002). The indicators are based on a social capital framework involving
transactions with funders (linking capital), connecting members of
communities with other communities (bridging capital) and engaging
people with each other in their own communities (bonding capital).
The indicators need to be prioritised, which means variation across
agencies, and some could be selected for particular attention in any
one timeframe.

Issues in reporting
Reporting in a timely and accurate fashion on performance and
progress is a major aspect of effective monitoring and evaluation
processes. There are particular issues in organisations involving many
partners while drawing from a number of funding streams, and then
having to collect data and provide separate reports for the various par-
ties, as well as to different funders. Increasingly, however, there are
software systems available to enable data collection and analysis, and
use the information for reporting purposes. Recent work by FSG Social
Impact Advisors indicates progress in developing shared systems
(Kramer et al, 2009: 7):
Concerns about duplication and the lack of collaboration
within the non-profit sector are nothing new. What has been
missing, however, is the availability of inexpensive

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performance reporting and outcome measurement systems

facilitated by independent staff. When organisations
dedicated to similar objectives have voluntary access to
comparative data and the opportunity to meet regularly with
the support of trained facilitators, our research suggests that
they gravitate over time toward more coordinated and aligned
strategies, without the drawbacks of artificially forced
partnerships.

Another issue is the cost of such software systems, but there are
now examples of tools being made available to local groups by larger
bodies, such as local authorities, that could be emulated elsewhere.
One such tool is the Boston Indicators Project which aims to ‘democra-
tize access to information, foster informed public discourse, track
progress on shared civic goals, and report on change in 10 sectors:
Civic Vitality, Cultural Life and the Arts, the Economy, Education,
the Environment, Health, Housing, Public Safety, Technology,
and Transportation’ (www.bostonindicators.org). Through The Metro-
Boston DataCommon, the project provides access to an online
mapping tool providing data about the region and each of its cities
and towns. It is an open resource for anyone wishing to better under-
stand how the region and its communities are changing, and is
designed to help residents, planners, educators, city and town
officials, amongst others, to explore options and make informed
decisions (http://metrobostondatacommon.org/html/about.htm).
The 2009 Audit Commission’s report concerning local strategic part-
nerships (LSPs) presents a useful case study in England about one
LSP that commissioned the county council to develop area profiles
based on the Audit Commission’s quality of life themes. These themes
include factors such as community cohesion and involvement,
community safety, and education and lifelong learning (ibid: 71-73).
The county council produces a summary profile called the ‘Quilt’, with
33 key statistics for each community. Colour-coding of performance
and outcomes gives LSP members and local managers an at-a-glance
comparison of all the areas and performance issues, supported by
underlying statistics and more detailed analysis.
A related issue in terms of reporting concerns levels and frequency.
In England, the Audit Commission sets out a clear rationale for
different layers of reporting (see Table 2).

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Table 2
Reporting layers
Governance Frequency Type of data Purpose
layer
strategic 3-4 a year key changes, reportable • challenge performance:
performance indicators examine and respond
(outputs and to trends, steer partner
outcomes), LAA activity
indicators and other • give an account to
LSP-related data partners

executive 6-12 a year management data • monitor performance;

(input and process) adjust activity to bring
it back on track
• report exceptions to
plan
• give an account to
strategic level

operational 12-52 a year performance data • take immediate action

(input and process) • report exceptions
to plan
• give an account to
executive level
Source: Audit Commission (2009: 65)

The range, complexity and severity of issues, problems and chal-

lenges associated with monitoring and evaluation in relation to
publicly funded community development programmes raises signifi-
cant questions about organisational capacity and support. Optimally,
robust internal systems would dovetail, with appropriate independent
and external evaluation processes, to provide accurate and timely data
as a basis for assessing effectiveness and learning from experience. In
this connection, a useful information guide to the associated issues
that is likely to be of value to local and external evaluators, and for
those with key responsibilities in this area, can be found in a recent UK
report Supporting local information and research: Understanding
demand and improving capacity (Smith et al, 2009).
Reporting levels and arrangements for accountability will vary
depending on the size of the agency and the terms of the financial
transaction. Example options are: a site visit, a one-page quick report,

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an agency’s own annual report and occasional full-scale inspections.

CENI have produced a resource entitled Prove and Improve – A Self-
Evaluation Resource for Voluntary and Community Organisations,
which provides a coherent, systematic step-by-step approach to evalua-
tion, with a particular focus on outcomes given the increasing emphasis
on this aspect of evaluation today (Swanton and McIldoon, 2008).

Combining internal and external evaluation

There is consensus in the literature that evaluation processes in
publicly funded community development type programmes need to
combine internal and external approaches requiring interactions
between researchers and practitioners. In this regard, it is interesting
to note Ellis and Gregory’s (2008: vi) point that: ‘The previously
predominant model of an expert carrying out evaluation at project
completion is giving way to increased self-reliance and also to partner-
ship between external evaluators and internal staff, with work carried
out at the project start, and a combination of internal and external
methods.’
To illustrate the benefits of combining internal and external
processes at the level of a local partnership entity, useful reference can
also be made to Partnership in Action, which is an impact analysis of
the work of the PAUL Partnership in Limerick, Ireland (O’Brien, 2006).
This analysis, covering the period 2000-2006, exemplifies in a number
of ways how organisations stand to benefit from rigorous monitoring
and evaluation. The Partnership availed itself of independent research
expertise to include quantitative and qualitative methods to assess the
impact of the work regarding services for the unemployed, community
development and community-based youth initiatives, all three reflect-
ing government priorities in a particular programme funding stream.
Significantly, the Partnership added a further area to take into account
generic and cross-cutting activities. The analysis provides the Partner-
ship with feedback about the impact of its work and concludes with over
30 recommendations for developments spread across six key areas:
• communications/public relations
• economic/financial/employment issues
• education and training
• community development

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• research and evaluation

• equality.
Clearly, investment is needed in order to develop a wider range of
evaluation techniques and to effectively combine multiple methods.
To this end, Coote et al (2004) argue that extensive dialogue is needed
about the challenges of evaluating complex, community-based initia-
tives, the different functions of evaluation and the range of methods
needed to fulfil them. The authors set out a number of key questions
with regard to generating evidence, evaluating information and
learning for development (see Appendix 2).
Another example of the benefits of combining internal and external
processes at the level of a whole programme comes from the Evaluation
of the Community Futures Program in Atlantic Canada – Final Report
(ACOA, 2009), which focuses on four areas: programme relevance,
design and delivery, success, cost-effectiveness and alternatives. The
report notes the national programme’s limited degree of influence on
indicators measuring the achievement of long-term goals (e.g. change

Box 9
Assessing economic impact in the Community Futures Program

The results are obtained through investment expenditures from

commercial projects as well as the direct creation of jobs from
these projects. These are called the direct impacts, as they can be
attributed to specific projects. Through the CBDCs’ direct support
to business, the direct creation of jobs can be utilised to estimate
the indirect and induced impact on the economy of the four
Atlantic provinces. In the analysis, the jobs are translated into a
measure of value-added output by economic sector. From the
value-added output, the economic impact is estimated using
econometric models developed by the Conference Board of Canada
for each Atlantic province. In this manner, direct, indirect and
induced macro-economic effects, in particular the impact on gross
domestic product (GDP), employment, wages and tax revenues, are
estimated.
Source: ACOA (2009: 73)

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in employment rate, change in employment distribution and change in

annual average household income), as well as difficulties with attribu-
tion (ibid: 69). As shown in Box 9, however, ACOA have developed a
means of analysing and estimating the economic impact and benefits
of the Community Futures Program in Atlantic Canada.
The final evaluation report shows how the performance of
individual CBDCs can be calculated and then aggregated to provide
figures at province level. The evaluation report contains a technical
appendix describing the method for calculating economic impact. The
Community Futures approach is interesting because of its attempt to
measure impact at a programme-wide level, which (as noted at the
beginning of this Section 4) has been an area of difficulty for publicly
funded community development programmes.
One informative example of evaluation at programme level comes
from the work of Gore and Wells (2009) in the UK, who draw from the
mid-term evaluation of the 2000–2006 South Yorkshire Objective 1
Programme (one of the European Union’s main funding streams to
support regional and employment policy) to reflect on the role of
governance in shaping and framing the specification and implementa-
tion of ‘horizontal priorities’ in European regional policy. As Gore and
Wells explain (2009: 158), the term ‘horizontal priorities’ is used by the
European Commission to denote issues that have relevance across its
principal policy domains and refers to priority areas such as opportu-
nities between men and women, environmental sustainability and
employment. Their focus is on the implications for evaluation in a pro-
gramme where more traditional notions of policy implementation
through top-down management processes give way to conceptions of
governance in which those responsible for implementation exercise
considerable discretion in interpreting policy and over activities.
In this scenario, programmes develop through networks that are char-
acterised by multi-level governance that cut across management tiers.
The argument is that a more complex system of policy enactment
requires a more sophisticated approach to evaluation. Nine criteria for-
mulated for the assessment reflected the main issues set out in the EU
specification for the evaluation. This gives rise to a matrix with the six
horizontal priorities as axis y, and the criteria as axis z. A scoring
system of 0 (no evidence of activity) to 3 (activity fully embedded) was
agreed against the criteria, which gave the possibility of comparing

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Table 3
Measuring performance in priority areas
criteria
priorities 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 score 0-3
1
2
3
4
5
6

total scores under each criterion total

Source: Adapted from Gore and Wells (2009)

and ranking progress with regard to the different priorities. Table 3

provides a summary of the main elements of Gore and Wells’s matrix.
In drawing from agreed and publicly available criteria, this type of
matrix scoring system offers a degree of rigour in a qualitative process,
although quantitative measures could also apply by informing judge-
ments about performance with respect to any given criteria, or forming
all or part of individual criteria. The schema could be applied and used
for self-evaluation purposes at local level, for example, concerning the
performance of local entities in working to national programme goals.
Assuming a degree of standardisation in its use, it could also be
applied and used for external evaluation purposes by comparing and
contrasting performance between different parts of a programme, for
example, between local entities engaged in similar work and working
to the same national goals. Finally, it could also provide an overall
composite picture of programme performance by aggregating the
scores from the different parts into a collective whole.

Capturing and disseminating learning

Monitoring and evaluation can lend itself to documenting the work,
which in turn enables learning. This point about capture is important

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in terms of using the learning that comes from performance and out-
come evaluation to inform programme development. In her analysis of
policy work in community development programmes in Ireland, Airey
(2006: 62) argues for a reciprocal relationship between projects and
lead agencies or departments, in which projects analyse their experi-
ences and translate these into policy messages, and lead agencies and
departments refine these policy messages and deliver these to appro-
priate departmental and other policy arenas on poverty. In Airey’s
view: ‘Doing this effectively necessitates analyzing what works and
recording reasons why and the existence of some mechanism for the
subsequent transfer of that learning to others’ (ibid: 62).
The Vibrant Communities Initiative in Canada illustrates many of
the points about monitoring and evaluation made in this discussion. In
return for receiving extra financial and technical support from the
national initiative, ‘Trail Builders’ agree to closely track their lessons
and outcomes, and share them with members of the initiative and
national sponsors. A learning and evaluation process has been devel-
oped to follow the work of each project as it evolves, track the
outcomes achieved and identify the lessons learned. This process
consists of three main streams. In order to capture the results from
their poverty reduction strategies, they have developed two-page
descriptions of the specific strategies being pursued. These descrip-
tions briefly indicate the challenge being addressed, the strategy being
employed and the results anticipated or achieved. To date, 21 such
stories have been documented. These narrative descriptions are also
intended to help Trail Builders develop evaluation plans for tracking
the results achieved by each initiative, including logic models and
research strategies.
Trail Builders provide regular reports that summarise the work
being done and the results achieved, and allow for dissemination
of findings among Vibrant Communities participants and other inter-
ested groups. They also prepare brief mid-year updates and more
extensive end-of-year reports identifying key developments in their
initiatives, challenges encountered and lessons learned. Included are
statistical reports concerning the two main quantitative targets being
tracked by the initiative: the number of partners engaged in the local
initiative and the number of low-income households benefiting from
the work and in what ways.

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The work of the Trail Builder communities also highlights the

importance of ‘manualising’ experiences in community development,
so that learning can be captured and shared with colleagues in similar
situations. An exemplar of this, also from Canada, is the Community-
Government Collaboration on Policy, which has developed an
extensive manual that contains many practical tools and lessons for
creating effective government–community collaborations. One
example of such a tool is a web-based index of policy measures that
is hosted on the Caledon Institute of Social Policy website where
it can be accessed by community members and user groups
(www.caledoninst.org/).

Standards and benchmarks

The results of learning in this way also make it possible to distil key
messages, principles and practices that can enable setting standards
for the work, which is another approach to ensuring quality. One exam-
ple of the use of benchmark standards for design and content purposes
comes from the San Francisco Beacon Initiative, which is a public-
private partnership that promotes youth and family centres in state
schools. The goal of the initiative is to offer opportunities, services and
activities that promote the healthy development of children, youth,
families and communities. The initiative has developed an assessment
tool specifying the required standards for their youth and adult devel-
opment programmes. The outline of the tool is provided in Appendix 3.
It covers compliance, early, intermediate and long-term standards. One
interesting aspect of the Beacon standards is the inclusion of research
as an outcome area. This is about the organisation’s commitment to
using the findings from the evaluations based on the standards to
improve overall performance. This signals the importance of documen-
tation in recording findings and learning for wider consumption, and
also to spread good practice.
The Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency has encouraged the
Community Business Development Corporations to establish stan-
dards, for example, in the areas of hours of service, minimal
counselling time, minimal number of meetings with clients and turn-
around time for information requests and applications (ACOA, 2009:
68). Setting such standards enables network members to make
meaningful comparisons between their activities. The importance of

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reporting publicly on activities goes beyond marketing to include

venues for communicating their activities or results, for example, by
making annual reports available on their websites (ibid: 67). The ACOA
evaluation suggests the need for a consistent format for annual reports.

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Monitoring and evaluation

Summary of lessons
The discussion in this section underlines the importance of monitoring
and evaluation mechanisms in publicly funded community develop-
ment type programmes. There is no doubt that evaluation is complex in
this field and monitoring, evaluation and feedback processes are of
particular value when they contribute to learning and development.
Key points are:
• Successful programmes generally find ways to collect robust
monitoring information that utilise data already collected routinely
by the programme, bearing in mind that the collection of accurate
data for monitoring processes should not require disproportionate
effort on the part of the service managers and front-line workers or
volunteers.
• It is widely accepted that a key requirement for robust evaluation
of both implementation and outcomes is that evaluators should be
intellectually and practically independent of those who deliver the
programme.
• There is evidence from the international literature that various
forms of self-evaluation (also sometimes called ‘action research’)
can be helpful in promoting learning and reflective practice at the
front line.
• However, local involvement and participatory research is not a
substitute for independent scientific evaluation and effective
programmes develop an appropriate combination of internal and
external processes, with the latter being an ethical imperative
when significant public expenditure is involved and large numbers
of people are exposed to the untested effects of the programme.
• Evidence suggests that partners and communities can and should
be productively involved in all types of evaluation to ensure that
there is local ‘buy-in’ and that external researchers do not overlook
key issues that may affect the results or the interpretation of
results.
• An important message is that monitoring, evaluation and feedback
processes are of particular value when they contribute to learning
and development in programmes.

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• Mechanisms and tools (including standards and benchmarks) for

‘quality control’ of front-line work are highly developed by
successful programmes to ensure that work stays close to the
agreed objectives of the programme or service and conforms to
principles of effective delivery (in as far as these are clear).
• Documentation or ‘manualisation’ of what, precisely, the
programme and its constituent services or activities consist of
is likely to be a key principle of effective practice since without it,
monitoring and evaluation cannot take place and replication of
successful approaches is thus prevented.
It must be remembered that the process of community development
is of itself an outcome, which makes it different from other fields. For
example, empowerment is both a process and an outcome. If disadvan-
taged people are involved in decision-making processes when
previously they have been outside of such processes, their participa-
tion is already an outcome regardless of the results of such
engagement, although any such results may well be significant. At the
same time, approaches to measuring outcomes that target past
performance may well underplay the more intangible assets that are
generated by partnership working (Boydell et al, 2007: 19). Examples
identified by Boydell et al include development of relationships and
networks, reputation or credibility, and improvements in competence
arising from acquisition of information, skills and experience and
exploration of shared values that comes through involvement in
partnership working. The importance of this enhanced competence is
the capacity to act in a variety of situations to add value (ibid: 21).
If the main benefit of evaluation is ensuring good performance and
learning from any successes and failures, there is also a need to justify
activity to commissioners and beyond this to account to policy-makers
and the general public for what organisations do. A major challenge
emerging from the evidence base is for monitoring systems to produce
the type of data that helps practitioners to have oversight of what they
are doing and achieving, while also providing accurate and meaningful
information for evaluation and reporting purposes. A connected
challenge is to achieve a proportionate combination of internal and
external evaluation methods and procedures that enables organisa-
tions to relate activities to results and to satisfy objective scrutiny.

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Part 4

Conclusions

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This report has addressed the following question:

What does the international evidence base tell us about key
principles of effective policy and practice in publicly funded
community development programmes?
In answering this question, the report began with an explanation of
the key terms that informed the parameters of the review: ‘community
development’, ‘programme’, ‘outcomes’, ‘evidence’ and ‘what works’.
The methodology for searching and analysing data was outlined in
Part 2. At the outset it was agreed that the review should take in a wide
range of potential sources, without being limited to ‘research studies’
in the usual sense. Sources were therefore included that would not
generally be considered in other types of review (for example,
technical reports and opinion pieces). The results of the analysis
were elaborated in Part 3 in four sections corresponding to the four
overarching aspects of programme management:
1 structure and governance
2 programme design and service content
3 implementation and delivery
4 monitoring and evaluation
Known challenges associated with aspects of programme activity
were considered in terms of promising responses and discussed with
particular reference to the primary evaluations of programmes from
jurisdictions with political, social, economic and welfare features
similar to Ireland, where these types of programmes are relatively well-
established. The report now concludes with a summary of the broad
messages about key principles underpinning effective practice in
publicly funded community development type programmes.

Structure and governance

Programmes are more likely to be effective if:
• decision-making from the top is transparent and informed by the
views of stakeholders
• there is a clear aim and a limited set of goals from the main funders
• micro-management is not attempted; instead, the aims and goals
are interpreted and enacted locally in line with community needs
and issues

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• there is a strategic engagement between the centre and localities,

and communication goes in both directions.

Programme design and service content

Programmes are more likely to be effective if:
• notwithstanding appropriate local variation, there is a degree of
consistency across the programme in standards and service
delivery
• interventions are focused on achieving realistic outcomes in
communities with appropriate milestones and indicators of
progress
• timely and accurate data are available and usable for needs
analysis and planning purposes
• there is a coherent theory of change articulating the link between
desired changes and inputs, outputs and activities, indicators and
outcomes.

Implementation and delivery

Programmes are more likely to be effective if:
• partners share the vision and partnership structures are at the
heart of complex community-based initiatives
• vertical and horizontal collaboration is a high priority for all
partners with a stake in agreed outcomes
• communities are integral to policy and decision-making processes
designed to tackle social issues and problems, as appropriate at
different levels.

Monitoring and evaluation

Programmes are more likely to be effective if:
• monitoring systems are fit for purpose, light touch and user-
friendly in helping end users to improve their work while meeting
reporting requirements
• rigorous internal and external evaluation processes dovetail to
provide credible accounts of performance
• there is a commitment to capturing and disseminating learning
and development throughout the programme and beyond.

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Final remarks
The single most significant finding from the international evidence
base about ‘what works’ in community development programmes
is the ubiquity of partnership models in addressing social
problems and issues. There is widespread belief in the potential
of such collaborative structures to deliver significant results in
terms of realising the intentions of social policy. Where this
potential is realised there are reports of success in tackling
otherwise intractable social problems and issues. There are
significant obstacles to success, however, and the constituent
elements of the programmes need to be managed so that
maximum effort is systematically focused on achieving results.
There is no evidence that any of these actions automatically
result in progressive social change since there are too many
variables at play in societies and communities to guarantee the
effects of any intervention. Not least, these variables include the
intentions, character, knowledge and circumstances of the
individual people and groups of professionals at the intersection
of policy and practice. Taken as a whole, however, when actions
are properly coordinated, appropriately resourced and are, above
all, realistic in their aims, there is promising evidence that they
are more rather than less likely to support coherent decision-
making processes that in turn can lead to effective and
sustainable strategies for local development. The key to success,
however, is in managing the constituent elements of the
programmes so that maximum effort is systematically focused on
achieving results. In contexts where there can be a tendency
towards over-diversification and over-complexity, it is important to
appreciate that effectiveness in an individual programme is a
function of coherence across the whole range of actions related to
that programme. Change in any one area will have consequences
for others, which means that all elements of activity must be
coordinated and kept in view simultaneously. Clearly, this is no
easy task, but the results of this review show that with careful
attention to the multiple moving parts of complex community
initiatives, effective programmes can be designed and delivered.

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Appendix 1
Typical elements in a logic model
Assumptions describe the suppositions made about a range of
contingent factors (likelihood of success, stability of the situation,
possibility of support, theory of change) influencing planning.
Baseline statements refer to information about the trend, situation or
condition prior to a programme or intervention.
Inputs are the resources that go into a programme of work, including
staff time, materials, money, equipment, facilities, volunteer time.
Outputs are the activities, products and participation generated
through the work in terms of goods, services, activities and
opportunities made available.
Outcomes describe the results or changes from the programme, such
as changes in knowledge, behaviour, practice, decision-making,
policies, social action, condition or status. Outcomes may be intended
or unintended, and positive and negative. Outcomes fall along a
continuum from immediate (initial; short-term) to intermediate
(medium-term) to final outcomes (long-term), often synonymous with
impact.
Impact refers to the long-term social, economic, civic and/or
environmental consequences associated with the goals of the
programme. Impacts may be positive, negative, or neutral, intended or
unintended.
Indicator is an expression of impact in the form of evidence that the
impact has or is being achieved.
Measure refers to quantitative (data in numerical format) or to
qualitative (data in a narrative or text format) information that
expresses the phenomenon under study.
Evaluation describes the systematic collection of information about
activities, characteristics and outcomes of programmes used to make
judgements, improve effectiveness, add to knowledge, and/or inform
decisions about the work, and be accountable for positive and
equitable results and resources invested.
Monitoring is a counting (or accounting) process concerned with the
assessment of whether agreed inputs have been made as per Service
Level Agreements and whether key targets for service uptake have
been achieved.

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Appendix 2
Generating evidence, evaluating and learning
Source: Coote, A., Allan, J. and Woodhead, D. (2004) Finding out what works: Building
knowledge about complex, community-based initiatives. London: King’s Fund Publications.

generating evidence
• Is there sufficient investment in building the evidence base?
• To what extent is the turn to evidence-based practice encouraged
within the context of broad-based critical appraisal?
• How is discussion being promoted at all levels about the complex
and varied roles that different kinds of evidence can play in
helping to plan and implement social programmes?
• How widely is evidence disseminated?
• Is evidence disseminated in accessible, but not oversimplified,
forms?
• In what ways are people helped at all levels to acquire skills and
techniques for using the evidence base effectively?

evaluating information
• What is the commitment to developing a wider range of evaluation
techniques and working out the best ways of effectively combining
multiple methods?
• How is the programme meeting the need for dialogue about the
challenges of evaluating complex, community-based initiatives,
the different functions of evaluation and the range of methods
needed to fulfill them?
• What is the extent of practitioner involvement in evaluation and
learning from their experience, and what recognition is given to
this?
• How are the skills and techniques involved in evaluation processes
being developed?

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learning for development

• To what extent is the need for a stronger learning culture within
government openly acknowledged and addressed?
• What is being done to promote widespread discussion about
conflicting interests and competing philosophies, and how these
influence the knowledge-building process?
• What efforts are being made to promote shared learning and
organisational change at national and local levels?
• What is the commitment to sustained investment in facilitating
peer-to-peer and organisational learning, and to bring this learning
into the mainstream?

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Appendix 3
The Beacon Initiative: Standards for Centers’ Providers
Source: http://www.sfbeacon.org/

compliance standards
• Safety-Accessibility-Engagement and Collaboration-Participation

early outcome standards

• safety
• accessibility
• visibility
• welcoming
• diverse and well-trained staff
• engagement and collaboration
• comprehensive programming
• participation

intermediate outcome standards

• supportive relationships
• meaningful participation and sense of belonging
• user involvement with the community
• challenging and engaging skilled building opportunities

long-term outcome standards

• increased user competencies in core areas:
leadership increased youth well-being
educational support increased positive connections to school
career development increased school performance
health increased family support for education
arts and recreation research outcomes

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The standards provide a basis for self-assessment among the

Beacon Centers’ providers, as well as a shared tool for quality assur-
ance. Levels of compliance to the standard are on a three-point scale:
fully met, partially or being met, and not being met. There is also a
waiver option for particular cases. The standards cover staff perform-
ance and give guidance as to intended outcomes. They also refer to
organisational commitments such as the required level of resources.
The following is one example under the heading of Safety (San
Francisco Beacon Initiative, 2003: 10):

Beacon Center ensures staff-child/youth ratios and group sizes

permit the staff to meet the needs of youth participants.
a Staff-child ratios vary according to the ages and abilities of
children. The ratio is no greater than 1:15-20 for groups of children
age six and older.
b Staff plan for different levels of supervision according to the
particular activity and the needs and ages of youth participants.
c Substitute staff or volunteers are used to maintain ratios when
regular staff are absent.

The assessment tool can be accessed on the Beacon Initiative’s

website (www.sfbeacon.org/For-The-Field-Practitioner-Resources/).sp

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Appendix 4
Glossary of key terms
Accountability denotes responsibility to provide evidence to
stakeholders and funders about the effectiveness and efficiency of
programmes.
Baseline refers to information about the situation or condition prior
to a programme or intervention.
Benchmarks refers to performance data that are used for
comparative purposes.
Collaboration is the process by which individual agencies and
organisations come together to achieve a common end, for example,
by joint working or pooling resources.
Evidence base in this report refers to the totality of the texts that met
the criteria for inclusion, comprising primary evaluations of
programmes, literature reviews and other documents from reputable
sources.
Evaluation is a process that involves the systematic investigation of
pre-determined questions preferably using scientifically robust
(transparent and replicable) research methods. Evaluations can
describe and assess the quality of implementation (process, or
formative evaluations) or assess the relationship between outcomes
for service recipients and the inputs made by the service (outcome or
impact, or summative evaluation).
Feedback is the process by which the results of monitoring and
evaluation are validated and fed back into the programme
management, design and delivery to achieve programme
improvements.
Governance refers to the principles and processes by which
programmes are overseen and regulated by commissioners or others
with overarching responsibility for their performance.
Grey literature refers to materials issued outside the formal channels
of publication and distribution, such as scientific and technical
reports, government documents and theses.

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Impact indicates the social, economic, civic and/or environmental

consequences of the programme. Impacts tend to be longer term and
so may be equated with goals. Impacts may be positive, negative,
and/or neutral, intended or unintended.
Indicator refers to the expression of impact in the form of evidence
that the impact has or is being achieved.
Implementation and delivery refer to the principles and processes
by which programmes and services are put into action ‘on the
ground’. Put simply, it is about the why, what, when, where, who and
how of programme activity.
Inputs are resources that go into a programme, including staff time,
materials, money, equipment, facilities and volunteer time.
Logic model is the graphic representation of a programme or project,
showing the intended relationships between investments, outputs
and results.
Manualisation refers to the documentation of what, precisely, the
programme and its constituent services or activities consist of. It
enables monitoring and evaluation, and replication of successful
approaches. The process of documentation may involve the
development of standards and benchmarks.
Measure refers to the quantitative or qualitative information that
expresses the phenomenon under study. In the past, the term
‘measure’ or ‘measurement’ carried a quantitative implication of
precision and, in the field of education, was synonymous with testing
and instrumentation. Today, the term ‘measure’ is used broadly to
include both quantitative and qualitative information.
Monitoring is a counting (or accounting) process concerned with the
assessment of whether agreed inputs have been made as per Service
Level Agreements and whether key targets for service uptake have
been achieved.

Outcomes are the results or changes from the programme, such as

changes in knowledge, awareness, skills, attitudes, opinions,
aspirations, motivation, behaviour, practice, decision-making,

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policies, social action, condition or status. Outcomes may be

intended and/or unintended, positive and negative. Outcomes fall
along a continuum from immediate (initial/short-term) including
improvements in community, group and individual conditions and
circumstances; to intermediate (medium-term) including
improvements in micro social and economic conditions and
circumstances; to final or ‘end’ outcomes (long-term), often
synonymous with ‘impact’ in terms of macro social and economic
conditions and circumstances.
Outputs are the activities, products and participation generated
through the investment of resources. Goods and services delivered.
Partnership usually refers to formal arrangements and structures
whereby individual agencies and services work collectively towards a
common end.
Programme describes a series of organised learning activities and
resources aimed to help people make improvements in their lives.
Publicly funded programme is an umbrella term, generally used to
describe a collectivity of services, often organised and delivered on an
area basis, with local management structures and delivery bodies
that operate with varying degrees of autonomy from a central
governance structure. The term ‘programme’ tends to imply a degree
of coherence and integration around funding, structure, design,
delivery mechanisms and evaluation processes, although the extent
to which integration and coherence is reflected in the actual situation
on the ground varies.
Performance measurement denotes enactment of objectives,
exercise of responsibility. The ongoing monitoring and reporting of
accomplishments, particularly progress towards pre-established goals.
Qualitative data are data in a narrative or text format.
Quantitative data are data in numerical format.
Randomised control trial describes an experiment in which people
are allocated at random (by chance alone) to receive one of several
interventions, one being the standard of comparison or ‘control’.

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Rapid reviews aim to use systematic methods to search and critically

appraise existing research, but make pragmatic concessions to the
breadth or depth of the process by limiting particular aspects as
necessary.

Results-based accountability is a system of planning that starts

from desired results and works back to the activities needed to
achieve these results, which may be contrasted with starting from
aspirations or ideals or vague general goals.
Service design and content refer to the principles and processes by
which all the constituent elements of a programme can be shaped
and made coherent to achieve the intentions of policy. Content refers
to community development processes and activities that seek to
promote desired outcomes in response to identified needs and in line
with the underpinning practice principles and value base.
Structure refers to the way that commissioning bodies and local
management and delivery bodies are related and are accountable to
one another nationally and locally.
Systems (or ‘ecological’) approach indicates an approach to
practice premised on the view that all elements (society, community/
neighbourhood, school, family, individual, etc) are related within an
integrated system within which there are many interacting factors.
The approach provides a framework for design by focusing on the
levels at which different activities can be targeted and different
outcomes might be envisaged.
Theory of change articulates the key ideas guiding the initiative in its
work, including understanding of the issue or problem (e.g. for
poverty and poverty reduction), the goals it is seeking (e.g. comm-
unity capacity-building, or improved household outcomes), the
specific strategies to be pursued (e.g. the role that the collaboration
will play in the poverty reduction process) and associated activities.
This ‘theory of change’ constitutes a conceptual baseline allowing
partners to refine the thinking behind the work.

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photo Getty Images

Effective community development programmes

The Centre for Effective Services is one This review was commissioned by the
of a new generation of organisations Effective community Department for Community, Equality
focusing on the emerging science of
implementation in human services. The
development programmes and Gaeltacht Affairs. Its purpose was
to seek important lessons from the
overarching mission of the Centre is to
connect the design and delivery of
A review of the international international evidence base about
effectiveness in community development
services with scientific and technical evidence base type programmes. It is aimed at those
knowledge of what works, in order to interested in and responsible for effective
improve outcomes for children and young John Bamber, Stella Owens, Heino Schonfeld performance in publicly funded
people and the families and communities Deborah Ghate and Deirdre Fullerton community development-type
in which they live. Our daily work is to programmes.
provide technical and organisational
expertise to support the design, John Bamber is Principal Fellow in
implementation and ongoing review Community Development at CES, Stella
and development of evidence-informed Owens is Senior Fellow in Practice
services for children, youth and families. Development, Heino Schonfeld is Deputy
Director and Deborah Ghate is Director.
Our aims are: Deirdre Fullerton was Senior Fellow in
• to promote and support the application Research and Evidence at CES between
of an evidence-informed approach to June and December 2009.
policy and practice in child, family and Centre for Effective Services The Centre for Effective Services is an
community services 9 Harcourt Street independent, not-for-profit company
• to promote the development of Dublin 2 limited by guarantee (Company Number
collaborative, joined up working that is Ireland 451580 in Ireland) and is governed by
outcomes-focused across research, tel: +353(0) 1 416 0500 an independent board. The work of the
policy and service providing email: [email protected] Centre is supported by the Atlantic
organisations www.effectiveservices.org Philanthropies, the Office of the Minster
• to build capacity within Ireland and and for Children and Youth Affairs, and the
Northern Ireland to take this work
65-67 Chichester Street Department for Community, Equality
forward in the longer term by
Belfast, BT1 4JD and Gaeltacht Affairs.
developing knowledge, skills and
competencies. Northern Ireland
tel: +44 (0) 2890 438 433
For more information about the work of email: [email protected]
CES, visit www.effectiveservices.org www.effectiveservices.org

CES Evidence Review

September 2010