Examples of ‘structured’ forms of participation that exist in Newham

In addition to the voluntary and community sector participatory initiatives, the Newham Civic Partnership, the West Ham Community Forum, The NDC Steering Committee, and the Mayor’s Question Time meetings have been more structured, Council led and financed participation initiatives. They were all different in their individual structure and purpose. The overarching purpose for all of them was to enhance the participation of Newham residents concerning issues affecting them through a council-led structure.

However, there are a number of problems when public participation takes place through such a rigidly structured top-to-bottom approach. The problems include meetings that reflect the overarching power structure; how some dominant figures influence the course of the decision making; how important decisions are made in a hasty manner;

and the lack of follow-up and feedback on joint decisions. These power dynamics were obviously reflected, for example, in the seating arrangements of all of the four groups.

The illustrations in this section show seating arrangements of the four different ‘struc-tured’ public participation initiatives (see Figure 2a – 2d below).

- The Newham Civic Partnership

The Newham Civic Partnership is one of the Partnership Committees of the Local Stra-tegic Partnership (LSP) of Newham. Purdue, (2005:123) summarised the role of LSPs as:

“Local Strategic Partnerships (LSPs) were introduced to develop Neighbour-hood Renewal strategies to cover the 88 most deprived areas in England. LSPs

bring together the major players in each locality. Community Empowerment Networks (CENs) have been funded to encourage and coordinate community representation in the LSPs and their families of partnerships.”

The Newham Civic Partnership as a body of the Local Strategic Partnership (LSP) was set up in 2000 to bring together at a local level the different parts of the public, private, community and voluntary sectors. The Newham Civic Partnership as part of the LSP was a multi-organisational partnership and its focus is ‘to operate at a level that enables strategic decisions to be taken, and is close to individual neighbourhoods in order to al-low actions to be exercised at community level’. (Apostolakis, 2004:106)

Figure 2a. Newham Civic Partnership – Seating Arrangement

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The attendees of the Civic Partnership meeting were representatives of each of the 10 Newham Community Forums, faith and voluntary groups, public sector organisations,

invited guest speakers and the Council officers. The meeting was chaired by the Mayor of Newham, or in his absence, by deputy chairs elected from the membership.

- Community Forums

Community Forums have different mechanisms by which to feed their issues to the higher authorities and decision makers – notably through their representation of the dif-ferent Committees of Local Strategic Partnership boards. In 2006 there were ten Com-munity Forums in Newham. ComCom-munity Forums convened by the Council are regular public meetings and events for people to discuss local issues. The issues could be any-thing that matters to local residents. However, each Forum set priorities through its Neighbourhood Action Plan, which focuses on the issues that local people wanted to tackle. Local councillors also played a leading role in the Forums and they were there to listen to residents’ concerns and help resolve problems.

Figure 2b. West Ham Community Forum – Seating Arrangement

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In contrast to the Civic Partnership meetings, the main attendees at the West Ham Community Forum are ordinary residents of that particular neighbourhood. In addition, elected Councillors from West Ham ward are regular members of the Forum. As an

open meeting to all interested residents from the West Ham area of Newham, there is no membership list. The chairperson is elected from among the residents.

Figure 2c. The NDC Steering Committee Meeting – Seating Arrangement

In the case of the NDC Steering Group, the attendees were a mix of elected resident rep-resentatives, representatives of stakeholders who are working in West Ham or who have an interest in working with the West Ham and Plaistow New Deal for Communities Projects.

Figure 2d.The Mayor’s Question Time – Seating Arrangement

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The illustrations above show how seats at the meetings were arranged. To some extent it hints at how power is distributed and shared. For example, The Mayor’s Question Time seating arrangement shows that people who have power are in a dominant position sit-ting in front of the audience to answer questions. On the other hand, the steering

com-mittee meeting seating arrangement shows that power is shared more equally without the dominance of one over the other. The Civic Partnership and the Community Forum arrangements suggest power is fairly distributed among attendees as there is no domi-nant sitting position that is able to control the activities of participants.

The Mayor’s Question time meeting was meant for people who were living or working in the Stratford and West Ham areas. However, it was difficult to establish who was attending from which part of Newham. From the questions raised, it was apparent that most of the attendees were local people who took the opportunity to quiz the Mayor about issues affecting their particular community.

In the case of the Civic Partnership and the NDC Steering Committee meetings, the procedures were always standardised and formal; including asking for apologies, approval of minutes of the previous meeting, a brief discussion of matters arising and discussion of the agenda of the day. In the Civic Partnership the chair invited one or two guest speakers who spoke on a particular subject that concerns the whole of Newham, followed by two to three general questions from attendees. The attendees split into three small groups to discuss some of the issues raised by the guest speaker(s). The discussion points were provided by the guest speakers and involved looking at the general and spe-cific issues relating to the topic. The small groups were expected to feedback their thoughts to the whole group. If any attendee had a general point to make they could do so after the feedback from all the discussion groups was heard. The role of the partici-pants was to ask questions and respond on the themes that the speakers asked for com-ments on. The speakers’ presentations and points of the participants’ feedback were re-corded as a minute and appeared on the Council’s website as a public document.

The activities of the NDC Steering Group were similar to the Civic Partnership except that the discussions were about issues in West Ham neighbourhood only. At the

West Ham and Plaistow Community Forum most of the questions and discussion points were again about local issues raised directly by residents and shared with other resi-dents.

In the case of the Mayor’s Question Time, in addition to questions directed to the Mayor, a caseworker from the Mayor’s Office was on hand to take notes of the is-sues raised and help people with specific concerns. The meeting was composed of ques-tions and answers, between the Mayor and residents. Some of the quesques-tions were com-plaints and others were compliments relating to the performance of the council services in Stratford and West Ham neighbourhoods.

At the Civic Partnership meetings, the guest speakers were – in most cases – the ones who were in full charge of the meeting and were expected to make clarifications, give answers and take notes. Occasionally, senior council officers, and more rarely elected members responded to some specific questions. Certain individuals were more vocal and persuasive than others. During group round-table discussions some took more time to talk, hence others had little chance to participate. In most cases people wasted time on one question or an issue that was raised by the first commentator, and hence lost the main discussion points. Mostly, the discussions were in line with the points raised by the guest speaker to discuss. In some cases the main issues were rushed in the last five minutes as time was lost discussing unnecessary issues. It is clear that the level of understanding or the grasp of the issues varied from one individual to another.

In the case of the Community Forum meeting attendees were mainly listening to what the guest speakers were saying. Such guest speakers were invited from time to time. The small group discussion was to give residents a chance to raise questions and explanations. However, I observed that most of the issues came from the two elected Councillors who attended the meeting. Most of the forum members seemed passive

lis-teners rather than active participants. At the NDC Steering Committee meeting, given the small size of the group, everybody actively participated in a non-confrontational manner. Information and action points were shared accordingly among members of resident representatives and stakeholders. All seemed to have prior information on the topic that they were talking about.

I observed during the Mayor’s Question Time that some resident attendees were highly passionate about the topic or issue they raised. There were very few who com-plimented the work of the Council and the Mayor. Most of the questions were very local and specific and participants raised a wide range of issues. In the case of the Civic part-nership, there was no mechanism to follow-up what happened after the meeting closed, except as a ‘matter arising’ at the next meeting. As the next meeting dealt with an abso-lutely different topic and there was a three month gap in between, it was impossible for attendees to raise follow-up issues. Therefore, it is difficult to set out what goals the in-dividual participants wanted to accomplish. As all of the attendees were representing their respective group I observed no mechanism in place except to report back to their constituent groups.

The Steering Committee for West Ham and Plaistow New Deal for Communi-ties was a well organised group which they had specific agenda and action points for follow ups.

It was difficult to know the initial objective of the Community Forums and the Question Time Meetings. Therefore, it was difficult to assess what their specific goals were or whether they had been achieved or not.

As far as the meeting places are concerned, local community centres and schools are usually attractive meeting places to which different communities feel no difficulty in accessing. Such places are central to the community and can be perceived as neutral in

areas which are socially divided. The Town Hall is a bit intimidating for an ordinary person who has never previously attended a meeting in such a setting. For instance, the West Ham Town Hall is not like an ordinary community centre. The Hall is very clean, with big curtains, expensive lamps and the floor covered by comfortable carpets. The ceiling is high and well decorated. Unlike community centres one has to register a name, organisation and the time of arrival at the reception. During the four consecutive meetings I attended, I observed important issues to be noted. The good part of the Civic Partnership was two fold. On one hand, the group was composed of many sections of the community, thus revealing its representativeness. Moreover, the group was able to hear issues of community concern from people who have first hand information and ex-perience. The small group discussion was a good format to look at the issues more closely in a non-intimidating environment. The support given by the council officers was appreciable.

However, my observation and field notes from the Civic Partnership Meetings show weaknesses in areas of follow-up, accountability and feedback. Firstly, the pur-pose of the civic partnership in terms of linking the wider community with decision making is not clear, if not non-existent. It is more of an information exchange forum.

Exchanging information is obviously at the lower strand of Arnstein ladder of citizen participation. I have also observed that the discussions are mainly dominated by certain individuals. At one of the meetings, I noted that almost half of the discussion time was covered by an individual representative who was able to manipulate the course of dis-cussion in his own way. Such a dominant individual will overshadow the whole process of participation.

There were similarities between the meetings of the Community Forums and Question Time. There was a clear divide between the power holders and residents. Even

the seating arrangements reflect the divide in the distribution of power. The meetings were largely about information giving and receiving rather than genuine public partici-pation, which again indicate that these for a are placed at the lower rungs of the Arn-stein ladder.

The NDC Steering Committee meeting seemed more productive in terms of setting a system to follow up decisions and action points raised by resident representatives. The power seemed shared among resident representatives and stakeholders. There seemed to be checks and balances in terms of accountability. One could feel a level of partnership between residents (through their representatives) and stakeholders who were working for residents. The representation also covered a wide range of local interests including the voluntary sector, police, health and businesses. The numbers of participants gave a good indication how individuals are acting in such social gatherings. On the one hand, members of the small size groups like the NDC steering group knew and had confidence in each other. They respected each other and listened to the opinions of every member of the group. Their decision is based on consensus. On the other hand, if small groups are highly structured – for example in the case of the civic partnership – then it is likely to be elitist and decisions are dictated by those with political and informational power.

3.6. Conclusion

The aim of this chapter has been to demonstrate the ways in which public participation in urban regeneration schemes evolved from the early 1960s to the current time. The chapter discussed how public participation and partnership was conceived during differ-ent periods of regeneration in Britain. It also indicated how the power relationship be-tween the public and power holders changed during these periods. Public participation was at times placed at the ‘centre stage’ to contribute to the decision making process of

area-based initiatives and at other times completely marginalised. The government po-litical ideology of the time influenced how public participation should operate in the realm of regeneration. The chapter also discussed the most recent approaches of New Deal for Communities as an example of the New Labour ‘third way’ approach in which the public are expected to play an important role in local regeneration initiatives by sharing responsibilities and by being directly involved in the decision making process.

The final sections looked at different forms of participatory activity in practice.

The chapter has identified a) the intention of policies, as stated by government (to show that a varying degree of emphasis has been given to participation and aimed to achieve it using different mechanisms); and (b) the actual outcomes of the policies which, as reported by critical reviewers, have sometimes not been quite in line with the original aims, partly due to problems in using different definition of public participation.

It was also discussed how some features of urban policies have given attention to the need for social capital (social networks) to enhance the effective use of participation in each round of policy. The next chapter discusses the methodological frameworks that are applied to my research to conduct the gathering of field data and systematic analy-sis.