Sunderland's Community Leadership Programme report

In this report we evaluate Sunderland City Council's Community Leadership Programme, which is a key strand of the city's 'Sunderland Way of Working'.

2020 Public Services Hub at the RSA has long argued for a new social settlement based on the idea of social productivity. In our view, the objective of public services and state action should be to foster social and economic resilience by enabling people and communities to lead the lives they choose. This is not just about meeting need – it is also about running with the grain of communities to identify and build on social assets, unlock social resource and enhance autonomy. This imperative is even more pressing as Britain faces a decade of austerity and low-to-no growth.

There is also a growing danger that the challenges we face as citizens, families and communities seem beyond politics. And yet democratic politics is the best way in which communities can promote their interests. The task is to realign local democratic politics to the circumstances, needs and aspirations of today's communities. This is not a separate and unrelated process from the imperative of promoting social productivity in public services. They are two sides of the same coin.

This is why Sunderland City Council asked us to evaluate its Community Leadership Programme (CLP). The Council has decided that it wants to simultaneously turn itself into a platform for local social and economic productivity and at the same time reinvigorate the role of local councillors as community leaders. In this report we provide a social productivity analysis of the Council's CLP, highlighting the lessons it can teach localities across the UK and how the Council could further strengthen the CLP through a socially productive approach to local democratic politics and public services.

Download the Sunderland's Community Leadership Programme: a social productivity analysis report (PDF, 1MB)

Find out more about the report on the 2020PSH website.