Tactic 16: Community-led Neighbourhoods

Community-led NeighbourhoodsNeighborhoods focus on resident-driven development to create integrated and inclusive infrastructure in informal settlements. Housing, habitats, and neighbourhoods are collaboratively designed, with an emphasis on preserving culture through locally sourced building materials. Enumeration and decanting should be approached flexibly and based on community preference, ensuring minimal disruption. The 15-minute neighbourhood concept is key in providing essential social services within walking distance. Homes should be designed to meet basic health and safety standards, ensuring a healthy living environment. The tactic also addresses the community's "life and soul" requirements, fostering sustainable livelihoods and enhancing overall well-being.

This tactic addresses critical issues in informal settlements, which are often characterisedcharacterized by inadequate housing, overcrowding, and poor access to essential services. These settlements face significant challenges including:

Overcrowded and Hazardous Living Conditions: Housing in informal settlements is typically makeshift, with limited space and no adherence to safety standards. Their overcrowded state exacerbates risks such as fires and disease outbreaks.
Lack of Basic Infrastructure and Services: Many informal settlements lack access to clean water, sanitation, healthcare, and education. This deficiency severely affects residents' quality of life and perpetuates cycles of poverty.
Vulnerable Social and Economic Structures: Informal settlements often lack formal governance, making residents vulnerable to exploitation and eviction. Economic opportunities are limited, and livelihoods are often precarious.
Cultural Erosion: Development projects in these areas often fail to respect or incorporate local culture and practices, leading to a loss of community identity.

The Community-led Neighbourhoods approach seeks to counter these issues by involving residents in every step of the development process. This ensures that housing, neighbourhoods, and infrastructure are not only functional but also reflective of the community's cultural and social values. The use of locally available building materials and adherence to the 15-minute neighbourhood concept (where residents have access to essential services within walking distance) helps create sustainable and resilient communities.

Showing overcrowded and hazardous living conditions. Source: ResearchGate

Showing lack of basic infrastructure and services such as roads and drainage facilities.Source: AFD

The Challenge

Encourages continuous community engagement in scrutinizing, testing, and refining infrastructure projects, ensuring adaptability and responsiveness to evolving challenges and lessons learned.

Enhances safety and resilience by empowering communities to collaboratively design infrastructure that addresses local vulnerabilities, ensuring they can effectively respond to and recover from disruptions and shocks.

Supports the maintenance of social and ecological balance by integrating community knowledge into planning, ensuring development respects local values, and protecting ecosystems and biodiversity in the process.

Embodies collaboration and co-design by treating residents as equal partners, leveraging their firsthand knowledge of local challenges to create more effective, context-sensitive infrastructure solutions.

Empower residents to actively participate in every project phase, fostering inclusive decision-making and ensuring that community needs and rights are prioritized in urban development.

Broad Participation: Ensuring that all community members, regardless of age, gender, socioeconomic status, or ethnicity, have a voice in the decision-making process.
Equity: Addressing disparities by prioritising marginalised or underrepresented groups to ensure that their needs are met.
Inclusivity: Aligning with the principle that every resident has the right to participate in the development process without discrimination.

Cross-sector Collaboration: Involving various stakeholders, including government, NGOs, and private sector actors, to ensure a multi-faceted approach that integrates diverse expertise.
Equal Partnership: Residents work alongside planners and designers as equals, contributing their local knowledge and experience.
Context-sensitivity: Solutions are tailored to the specific needs and challenges of the community, making them more effective and sustainable.

Key concepts

Community-led Neighbourhoods refer to an approach in which residents of informal settlements play a central role in planning, designing, and implementing infrastructure projects within their communities. This approach emphasises inclusivity, integration, and collaboration, ensuring that the outcomes reflect the needs, values, and knowledge of the locals.

Main Themes

Holistic Planning: Combining social, economic, and environmental considerations to create cohesive and sustainable infrastructure solutions.
Ecological Balance: Preserving natural ecosystems and biodiversity by incorporating environmental considerations into planning and design.

Adaptive Design: Infrastructure is designed to be resilient to shocks and stressors, such as natural disasters, by incorporating community input on local vulnerabilities.
Community Empowerment: Residents are empowered to take ownership of their environment, enhancing their ability to respond to and recover from challenges and disruptions.

Iterative Process: Constant feedback loops allow for refining and adaptation based on new challenges, ensuring long-term relevance and effectiveness.
Prototyping and Testing: Small-scale pilots are tested and tweaked before full implementation to mitigate risks and improve outcomes.

Results/Outcomes

Social Cohesion: Strengthened community ties as residents work together toward common goals.
Sustainable Development: Infrastructure that is better suited to local conditions and needs, reducing waste and increasing longevity.
Empowered Communities: Residents gain skills, confidence, and a sense of ownership, leading to more active and engaged communities.

Thematic Sub-Areas

Participatory Governance - Locals actively engage in and influence policy and governance outcomes.
Social Equity and Justice - Ensuring fair access to resources, opportunities, and decision-making processes, empowering all community members—especially marginalized groups—to actively participate and benefit equally in the development and management of their neighbourhoods.
Sustainable Urbanism - Creating and managing urban spaces that prioritize environmental sustainability, social equity, and economic viability, driven by the active participation and decision-making of community members.
Disaster Risk Reduction - Strategies and actions aimed at minimizing the damage and loss caused by natural and man-made hazards by reducing vulnerabilities, enhancing preparedness, and promoting resilience within communities and societies.
Environmental Stewardship - Management and protection of natural resources and ecosystems through mindful practices and conservation efforts.

How To

Planning &
Design

Participatory Workshops: Residents participate in workshops where they can voice their concerns, share ideas, and contribute to the design process. This ensures that the infrastructure reflects local knowledge and priorities.
Collaborative Decision-Making: Rather than being passive recipients and being sidelined in the process, community members work alongside urban planners and designers as equal partners. This collaborative approach leads to more context-sensitive solutions that are better suited to the community’s specific challenges.
Integration of Local Knowledge: The tactic ensures that the residents’ understanding of their local environment, social dynamics, and daily challenges is integrated into the planning and design process, leading to more effective and sustainable outcomes.
Design for Inclusivity: The design process explicitly considers the needs of all community members, including marginalized groups, ensuring that the resulting infrastructure is accessible, equitable, and beneficial to everyone.

The result is a more cohesive, resilient, and inclusive neighbourhood that truly reflects the needs and aspirations of the local community.

Implementation & Use

Community-Driven Implementation: Locals are not just involved in the planning stages but are also active participants in the implementation process. This includes roles in decision-making, monitoring, and even hands-on involvement in construction or landscaping tasks.
Collaborative Oversight: The community works alongside project managers and contractors to oversee the implementation, ensuring that the design is faithfully executed and any emerging issues are promptly addressed. This partnership ensures accountability and responsiveness.
Capacity Building: Training and workshops are provided to community members, equipping them with the skills needed to maintain and use the infrastructure effectively. This approach empowers residents to take ownership of the project, fostering long-term sustainability.
Feedback Loops: The tactic incorporates continuous feedback from users, allowing for real-time adjustments and ensuring the infrastructure remains relevant and functional over time.

The result is a well-integrated, community-centered infrastructure that is not only functional but also deeply rooted in the social fabric of the neighbourhood, ensuring lasting impact and adaptability.

Governance & Policy

Inclusive Decision-Making: Governance structures actively involve community members in policy formulation and decision-making processes. This is achieved through public consultations, advisory committees, and participatory planning sessions. By integrating diverse voices, especially those from marginalized or underrepresented groups, policies are more reflective of the community's needs and perspectives.
Collaborative Policy Oversight: The tactic ensures that policies are not only created but also implemented with ongoing community involvement. This might involve community representatives working alongside policymakers to monitor policy execution, address challenges, and make necessary adjustments. Such collaboration helps in maintaining transparency and accountability.
Capacity Building for Policy Participation: Workshops, training sessions, and educational programs are designed to empower community members with the knowledge and skills needed to engage effectively in governance processes. This might include understanding how to navigate policy frameworks, engage with local government, and advocate for community needs.
Continuous Feedback Mechanisms: To ensure that policies remain relevant and effective, regular feedback loops are established. These can include surveys, town hall meetings, and feedback forms that allow residents to voice their experiences and suggestions. This ongoing dialogue helps refine policies and ensure they address current issues and community needs.
Integration with Existing Structures: The tactic integrates with existing governance structures by embedding community involvement into the fabric of policy processes. This includes aligning community input with policy goals and ensuring that community-driven initiatives are supported by formal governance frameworks.

By incorporating these practices, the tactic ensures that governance and policy are not only inclusive and representative but also adaptable and responsive to the evolving needs of the community.