.right-column[Specific policy interventions can be helped by a "proof of concept"
Smaller community groups can help to form a "niche" which can serve as laboratories for testing out new ideas.red[*]]
.footnote[.red[*] For more on this, check out: René Kemp, Johan Schot & Remco Hoogma, 1998. "[Regime shifts to sustainability through processes of niche formation: the approach of strategic niche management](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/09537329808524310)." Technology Analysis & Strategic Management, vol. 10, iss. 2, pp. 175–198. For an overview of research into sustainability transitions see: Jochen Markard, Rob Raven & Bernhard Truffer, 2012. ["Sustainability transitions: an emerging field of research and its prospects"](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S004873331200056X). Res. Policy 41 (6), 955–967.]
Environmental values are often cultivated and deployed through practices on a local level.
Community groups enable persons to express environmental work and advocacy through (and not in spite of) their personal values.
Similarly, community groups can often form the context where environmental transitions are "materialised," that is, embedded in concrete changes to local infrastructure.
More than serving as the sum of the individuals who are involved, community groups can provide a safe supportive space where convictions can be transformed into action.
In some cases, a group will connect with a range of different networks, setting up a Development Trust for the sake of a funding application and a transition group for another project.
Similarly, individual members of these groups may participate in a whole range of activities, performing different eco-identities in each context.
Whereas for national networks and campaigning organisations, "action" and "issues" can often serve as the main driver.
In contrast, with community groups, the opposite is often the case.
Groups are driven by community formation and support, and issues come afterwards..red[*]
.footnote[.red[*] For more on this form my research, check out the forthcoming article: "Christian climate care: Slow change, modesty, and eco-theo-citizenship", coming out later in 2018.
In workshops we've conducted, we have found that these groups can often contain a wide mix: including people who have resided for multiple generations in a community to foreign nationals who have been resident in Britain for only a few years.
Resourcing is extremely scarce. Though some groups are successful at securing lottery funding or a climate challenge fund grant, far more often groups work with minimal resourcing. This means there isn't any formal staff, and their activities are outside working hours, and activities will rely on volunteered expertise.
Many of the volunteers involved in these groups are tremendously hard working people, putting in hundreds of pro bon hours each year. Small successes and public attention can provide a major boost. Similarly, setbacks can often dampen work for long durations.
We conducted a study of five Scottish community group networks (633 total). Based on this research, these groups use the following social media platforms:
- Groups which have a .blue[website]: **87%**
- Groups with a .blue[facebook page/group]: **70%**
- Groups with a .blue[twitter feed]: **26%** (ranging from 16% to 35%)
- Groups with .blue[no social media] (including website): **9%** (ranging from 3% to 18%)
## Idea 2: Targetted communications make a difference
Each network has a range of different forms of work: food growing, infrastructure. Similarly, groups have different approaches to policy engagement - some are direct others are indirect.
.left-column[
I'm working with several of these networks to survey their membership to identify these patterns and enable more bespoke outreach, e.g. identifying "high stakes" groups near licensed fracking wells and "politically active" groups with identified experience hosting hustings and local MPs.]
**The potential impact of policy co-creation and co-research could be very significant, especially given the uneven distribution of population across representative democracy.**
