The NDC Project and Level of Community Participation in its Management - Essay Example

Describe the aims and objectives of a typical NDC project and level of community participation in its management and describe also how such a project was expected to bring economic prosperity and social cohesion in deprived communities. Introduction New Deal for Communities (NDC) is a chief programme in the strategy of the government of England in tackling different deprivations in the deprived neighbourhoods, in the nation. The program focused giving some of the poorest communities resources, which assisted them in tackling their problems in a co-ordinated and intensive way (Cullingworth & Nardin, 2001 Pp 305). The principal aim of the program was to link the gap between the deprived neighbourhoods and other social groups of England. The problems of each NDC neighbourhoods are particular; however, all the NDC partnerships tackle five chief themes. These themes include; poor job prospects, education underachievement, high crime levels, physical environment and housing, and poor health. The NDC partnerships seek to find outcomes that bring real benefit to individuals living in the most deprived neighbourhoods. NDC partnerships were launched in 1998 with the target of transforming the deprived neighbourhoods (Brown, 2001 pp 305). The program originated from the 1998 Comprehensive Spending Review that announced the New Deal for Regeneration. Seventeen partnerships were announced during the 1998 review and were followed by further announcement of 22 partnerships in 1999. The amount of money committed to the 39 partnerships totals to approximately £ 2 billion. The keys to transformations of the neighbourhoods include; improvement of local services, adoption of an evidence-based approach to deliverance of change, and increasing community capacity (Gilchrist, 2007 pp 40). The chief characteristics of NDC include; long term commitment to bringing real change and community involvement. For these programs to achieve success, it is essential for policy makers to stay focused to the challenges and realities, which communities go through in the grassroots level (Henderson, 2001). Overview This paper will concentrate on the aims and objective of the NDC project geared towards fighting joblessness and the level of community participation in the project. In addition, the paper will discuss how the labour project was expected to bring economic prosperity and social cohesion to the deprived communities. Aims and Objective The labour project was initiated with a chief objective of bridging the gap between the affluent, who had job opportunities and the deprived individuals, who did not have any employment opportunities. The project focused on attaining equality in the labour market. This was the principal goal for all the projects carried out in different areas focusing on joblessness. The aims of the labour project differed according to the target group and the problems facing the group. In business development area, the aims were to provide advice, support and financial assistance to deprived individuals desiring to start their own business ((Cullingworth & Nardin, 2001 pp 310). In this category, the target group was individuals without jobs, but preferred doing business in order to become self employed. For areas with high unemployment due to individuals possessing low skills and no local support for jobs, the aims were to offer employment support, business support, employability training and a social enterprise service. In local residential with socially excluded individual without employment, the aims of the labour project were to get local residents in to employment and create permanent jobs. Creation of permanent jobs was to be achieved through self employment and residents services organizations. In areas facing unemployment and having large proportions of youths, the aims of the labour projects were to provide quality job search facility, which could assist the population in searching for jobs. In addition, the project aimed at reducing levels of unemployment in such areas through the provision of advice to the population and training the population on job attainment. Level of Community Participation One of the unique features of New Deal for Communities (NDC) partnerships was that community engagement and participation was at the centre of the programme (Gilchrist, 2007 pp 53). The communities were at the heart of the programme since the local people were taken to be experts in understanding problems, in their communities; they also knew why attempted solutions to their problems did not succeed. There were different levels of community participation. One of the levels of community participations was giving information to individuals for the sake of communicating or enabling them in making more informed decisions. This could be through road shows, websites, and newsletters. This targeted certain groups. Another level of community participation was research, which was either structured or unstructured. Structured research involve the use of focus groups, interviews and surveys while unstructured research involve gathering of feedback from users of a service; for example, through the use of suggestion boxes (Denham, 2008). Communities also participated in consultation level, in which, consultation was through various techniques such as workshops, conferences, written responses and proposals. In addition, community participation level involved delegation of responsibilities, management, power and budget holding. Through these different participation levels, responses were gathered and helped in tackling problems of the deprived neighbourhoods. The labour project was targeted to achieve economic prosperity and bring social cohesion to the nation. Through the creation of employment opportunities to the unemployed deprived neighbourhoods, the individuals employed in the economy would increase, which helped to reduce the level of poverty in the entire economy. Reduction of poverty in the economy would promote economic prosperity of the nation (Downer, 2008 pp 55). Also, through the project, the level of GDP would increase with the increase in the number of employed individuals, which will in turn enhance economic prosperity. The economy would also prosper with the promotion of equality. Through offering employment to the excluded groups, there would be equality in employment services, which would promote economic prosperity. Economy would prosper with the improvement of the life standards of the nation. By the offering of employment services to the deprived neighbourhoods, the number of individuals employed in the nation would increase, thus reducing the levels of poverty, which would in turn improve the living standards in the nation leading to prospering of the economy. Through creating job opportunities to the deprived neighbourhoods, there will be promotion of equality in the nation, which would enhance social cohesion amongst individuals ((Cullingworth & Nardin, 2001 pp 318). Although the New Deal for Communities (NDC) was geared towards fighting for inclusion of the deprived neighbourhoods to the economy of the nation, the programme was not successful in its endeavours (Gilchrist, 2007). The programme emphasized on greater community participation and tackling of exclusion. However, it was remarkably difficult to make individuals from the deprived communities participate in the programme since they felt excluded from the rest of the citizens. The excluded individuals felt alienated and powerless, which made them not become active citizens. According to these individuals, they viewed active participation in the programme meaningless. The success of this programme relied on the policy makers in remaining alive to the challenges and realities faced by the deprived groups. It is these challenges that contributed to little achievements by the program. One of the challenges that hindered success of the programme was that most neighbourhoods faced complex and varied make up of the local communities. This made concentration of each community’s problems difficult. Because of the complexity of the local communities, understanding and dealing with the problems facing the communities was not feasible. In most cases, communities felt alienated and ignored, and without a voice ((Cullingworth & Nardin, 2001 pp 312). This made the communities not participate fully in the programme. Lack of participation of such communities made it difficult for the policy makers to make effective decisions; since they could not have proper responses from the community. The communities that felt alienated and ignored could not air their views regarding a certain project or a problem, which the programme researched about. In such a scenario, the policy makers could not fully understand the problems facing the community and the effective solutions to the problems. Another challenge influencing the success of the programme was the danger that certain initiatives could reinforce the labelling of a deprived community as dependant or lack in the sense of self-help and initiatives ((Cullingworth & Nardin, 2001 pp 322). This made communities not participate fully in the program, which made policy makers not have the true picture of the communities. Ensuring that the community development was sustainable in the long term posed a challenge to the programme since different projects required close monitoring at all times. In addition, the program faced challenges since despite offering financial support to the communities, it was necessary to empower the communities in order to make them have the capacity of managing their own resources and affairs. This posed a challenge to the success of the programme. Conclusion New Deal for Communities (NDC) was formed by the government of England; with the main view of bringing the excluded groups in the nation to participation in the national economy. It was to be involved in tackling of multiple deprivations in the most deprived neighbourhoods, in the nation (Marquand, 2008 pp 67). The deprivations included; poor job prospects, education underachievement, high crime levels, physical environment and housing, and poor health. In dealing with these problems in the excluded communities, the NDC partnerships that took part in the initiative summed up to 39 in total (Cantle, 2002 pp 305). Community participation was the central theme of the program. However, most communities did not participate in the program since they felt alienated and powerless. This led to the programme not achieving its main goal. This revealed that; although the programme was bold and ambitious, it may not bridge the gap between the poor and the affluent in Britain. The chief characteristics of NDC include; long term commitment to bringing real change and community involvement. For these programs to achieve success, it is essential for policy makers to stay focused to the challenges and realities, which communities go through in the grassroots level and all other areas facing deprivation. References Cullingworth, B.J. & Nadin, V 2001, Town and Country Planning in the UK, Routledge, London. Brown, G. 2000. Lecture delivered by Gordon Brown at the 17th Arnold Goodman Charity on the ‘Civic Society in Modern Britain’. Available at:[Accessed 15 April 2012]. Henderson, P. and Salmon, H. 2001. Social Exclusion and Community Development: Community development Foundation. London. Gilchrist, A. 2007. The well- Connected Community: A Net-Work approach to Community development. Community Development foundation. London Downer, S. 2008. Empowerment white paper announced: New Start Online . Available at: [Accessed 15 April 2012]. Marquand, D. 2008. Article on Social democracy and Labour/liberals common roots. New Statesman. 25 Feb. p33/34. Cantle, T. 2002. Community Cohesion. London: The Cantle Report. Denham , J. 2002. Building Cohesive Communities.London: The Denham Report. Read More