Start with people
by John Craig
As I sat down with a a government minister, a Guardian journalist and assorted policy super-brains, I really wished I was about to deliver some power-pointed statistics rather than tell a story. That was how we launched Start with People, based on case studies of five community organisations, and happily all at the event responded with generosity. David Lammy MP, Minister for Culture, described his new area of responsibility as 'pro-social behaviour', and spoke about the ongoing challenges of working with and learning from community organisations.
Start with People grows out of a project Paul Skidmore and I have been working on for some time about community organisations and their role in bringing the public realm to life. Across public services, formal politics and civil society, we argue that participation remains a vital missing link in public policy, and that community organisations have a special role in putting this right.
The launch was covered by the BBC online magazine, who focussed on community organisations' abilities to engage those other institutions struggle to reach. Allow me to introduce you to 'hoody two shoes'.