The urban collective

Collective ownership models offer the chance of genuine progress in areas where regeneration has ground to a halt. But local and central government must learn to embrace them – or risk repeating mistakes of the past, argue Tom Archer and Rob Rowlands

Picture the scene, a demolition site where grass now grows on the mounds where terraced housing once stood and street lamps denote the century old layout of an urban settlement. Pinned up on the notice board is a grand vision – a masterplan for redevelopment.

But years roll past as a series of reticent developers express an interest and then think better of it. Those who once lived in this area, which was far from perfect before demolition, have long since been displaced. Despite well-intentioned efforts development has not taken place, and probably won’t for some time.

We know this place because we have studied it for five years. We have watched interventions, tracked them, scrutinised them and predicted the outcome. There was a point of hope at which residents meaningfully engaged, proposing a collectively-owned vehicle for regeneration; a community land trust. Unfortunately, this opportunity was not seized. This was not due to incompetence or a lack of vision, but through necessity.

The government programme concerned, housing market renewal (HMR), could not support these collective ownership models. Our research has taught us about the mutual exclusivity between organic forms of collective ownership and strategic intervention planned at a sub-region. It has taught us how state-led regeneration programmes often prevent the dispersal of power and assets to communities. And it has taught us how there is perhaps hope in the aftermath of HMR.

This story is not unique to this location nor is it an isolated point in history, rather it is symptomatic of so many regeneration schemes over the last 50 years. Whether socially or market orientated, regeneration projects have, by-and-large, failed to give the local community sufficient ownership in the programme.

And while market-led regeneration has been widely critiqued for this failing, insufficient attention has been given to the weakness of the more socially-minded attempts in their promotion of community. Part of the problem is the use of the term community. It is too often used as a utopian catch all which is wholly inclusive and 100% democratic in its functioning.

As such it has become an empty, indiscriminate, almost lazy term when it is used by politicians and policymakers looking to do the right thing. In this usage, community is all encompassing, an unrealistic proposition and an unhelpful focus. For anyone who has worked with groups of people it is clear that there is no one community, no single shared vision and no stampede of people to get involved.

Like it or not, regeneration relies on a business approach and the ever inclusive, ever participatory model of community can hinder progress. It is easy to see why public bodies adopt this definition and approach. The public sector must protect its resources and at the same time be seen to be fair. But failing to capitalise on the enthusiasm of willing participants and the opportunities for progress that might be fleeting achieves neither. Delaying activity to ensure everyone is onboard is counter-productive. To be more effective, community ownership needs to adopt new models with different expectations of inclusion and participation.

‘The most significant obstacle remains the willingness of most local authorities and public bodies to support and work creatively
with such organisations. There is
a fear of such collective ownership among some public officials, and
a lingering desire to lead and control development.’ ‘Community ownership’ might better be termed collective ownership and it has worked with great success in other sectors. For example, the cooperative sector has always been based on different forms of collective ownership which have benefits for the local communities in which they operate. The origins in the UK owe nothing to the state, it came about through the collective action of a group of citizens and was focused around a business opportunity which would benefit its members.

Co-ops are an example of a business model which is ‘for the benefit of the community’, one where the direct beneficiaries are members but where membership is not unduly withheld. This model holds significant benefits for regeneration in both focusing activity and incentivising participation.

In a number of northern cities there are people trying to develop models of collective ownership, as a vehicle for regeneration. These models have emerged in the absence of HMR, and are an attempt to secure for existing residents an improvement that HMR failed to achieve. Such groups are trying to fill a void left by private sector developers, most of whom view these areas now as high risk or offering low returns investment. Ironically they are doing so with an entrepreneurial approach to problem solving which is lacking in either the public or private sectors.

This is clearly not a panacea, nor is it a costless alternative to HMR. Models such as community land trusts or cooperatives can be incredibly technical to set up, and accessing finance is still a battle. Challenges remain in terms of governance, and securing the buy-in from local residents to make the model work, especially if that model involves creative use of equity in people’s houses.

Yet the most significant obstacle remains the willingness of most local authorities and public bodies to support and work creatively with such organisations. There is a fear of such collective ownership among some public officials, and a lingering desire to lead and control development.

But if we are in any doubt about whether collective models of ownership can work in regeneration areas look no further than Dudley Street in Boston, Massachusetts. Long seen as a slum neighbourhood, in the late 1980s it was suffering from significant amounts of vacant land and abandoned buildings. Since then more than half of this abandoned land has been transformed, and human and social capital developed. The vehicle for this was a community land trust, in which residents work with local stakeholders to collectively own and manage land.

The lesson in this is that the state needs to be one stakeholder of many, providing effective and targeted investment where most appropriate to each project, but at the same time reducing unrealistic expectations of performance and relinquishing control after asset transfers/sales. Public investment need not always involve expensive capital costs. Providing the means to commission support through a development worker might be more critical, improving access to other resources while reducing the cost to the state. And this means loosening the grip on control, setting out realistic expectations on the funding support while leaving the project to get on with the job.

And what of the community? Any project needs focus and as the saying goes, too many cooks spoil the broth. To be successful there has to be unity and energy, qualities which emerge from shared problems and small bases. As the project develops so new members should be encouraged to draw in new and different resources. But too many too soon and the project will more than likely fail to get beyond the ideas stage. Nor should engagement be a process of unfettered interruption. Managing expectations and opportunities for engagement require a clear road map so that members are aware when and how their input can be made, balancing inclusion with the need to run an effective and efficient delivery on project outcomes. The challenge is achieving balance.

If we want to avoid our opening story from happening time and time again, we have to recognise the resources that exist in local communities, understand the vision that local people have for their futures and support them (financially and technically) to take ownership of that destiny.

• Tom Archer is a founding member of Locally Made, and has spent the last five years researching housing market renewal and its alternatives at the University of Birmingham. Rob Rowlands is a lecturer in urban and regional studies at the University of Birmingham.
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