Connection, Participation and Empowerment in Community-Based Research: the Case of the Transition MovementThis project was designed on the basis of conversations during and following meetings of Interest Groups on Researching Transition at the Transition Network conferences in Newton Abbot in 2010 and Liverpool in 2011. It explores patterns of engagement and knowledge exchange within the Transition movement in the UK, with particular attention to relationships between academic researchers, transition initiatives, and Transition Network, an international coordinating body dedicated to supporting Transition initiatives and enabling their work.
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(almost all of...) the Connection Participation and Empowerment project team.
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Funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council within the Connected Communities programme, it is a collaboration between Transition Network, the Centre for Social Justice and Community Action at Durham University, and further academic researchers at Bradford, Glamorgan and Manchester Universities. The project began in February 2012, and was completed in January 2013.
Research was structured as three work packages, each based on priorities identified by Transition Network and elaborated in dialogue with academic partners following the Liverpool conference in July 2011.
Work Package One documents experiences of previous collaborations between Transition initiatives and academic researchers, through interviews and focus group discussions involving both members of the Transition groups and the researchers. A summary report on this work is available here.
Work Package Two, on the basis of the findings of this research, ideas raised at Transition Research Network meetings and workshops, review of relevant Connected Communities Scoping Studies and the wider literature on participatory research, and a Pattern Language Development workshop held in Durham in January 2013, drafted an improved set of guidelines for Transition Research.
The third work package explored the challenges involved in developing evaluation methods for Transition groups, and included a workshop for a small group of invited participants that took place in Bristol in May 2012 . It led to the establishment of the project 'Monitoring and Evaluation for Sustainable Communities' in collaboration with researchers at Oxford University's Environmental Change Institute, and an application to the ESRC's Knowledge Exchange programme for further funding to continue this work. It also fed into the development of a proposal Transition: Reporting, Evaluation and Engagement, submitted to the EU's FP7 programme on February 28th 2013.
A follow-up grant awarded to Transition Network by AHRC in connection with its Connected Communities Showcase event in London in March 2013 supported development of the Transition Research Primer, a set of four posters (one on each of the three work packages in this project, and one on the Memories of Mr. Seel's Garden project), and three follow-up workshops on Theories of Change in Transition.
Research was structured as three work packages, each based on priorities identified by Transition Network and elaborated in dialogue with academic partners following the Liverpool conference in July 2011.
Work Package One documents experiences of previous collaborations between Transition initiatives and academic researchers, through interviews and focus group discussions involving both members of the Transition groups and the researchers. A summary report on this work is available here.
Work Package Two, on the basis of the findings of this research, ideas raised at Transition Research Network meetings and workshops, review of relevant Connected Communities Scoping Studies and the wider literature on participatory research, and a Pattern Language Development workshop held in Durham in January 2013, drafted an improved set of guidelines for Transition Research.
The third work package explored the challenges involved in developing evaluation methods for Transition groups, and included a workshop for a small group of invited participants that took place in Bristol in May 2012 . It led to the establishment of the project 'Monitoring and Evaluation for Sustainable Communities' in collaboration with researchers at Oxford University's Environmental Change Institute, and an application to the ESRC's Knowledge Exchange programme for further funding to continue this work. It also fed into the development of a proposal Transition: Reporting, Evaluation and Engagement, submitted to the EU's FP7 programme on February 28th 2013.
A follow-up grant awarded to Transition Network by AHRC in connection with its Connected Communities Showcase event in London in March 2013 supported development of the Transition Research Primer, a set of four posters (one on each of the three work packages in this project, and one on the Memories of Mr. Seel's Garden project), and three follow-up workshops on Theories of Change in Transition.
