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Transition Towns and Community Capacity Building

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Challenging Capacity Building

Part of the book series: Rethinking International Development Series ((RID))

Abstract

The term capacity building has become part of the community development lexicon in a seemingly short space of time. From being virtually unheard of in the early 1990s it had become mainstream policy for many governments by the time of the New Labour victory in England in 1997 (Craig, 2007). As policy language it has permeated public and social policy discourses and become the preferred government language for community service delivery. Much of the capacity building discourse has been driven by governments that are keen to build active citizenship through participation and engagement and provide resources to this end but are reluctant to allow community ownership of those same resources (Craig, 2007).

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© 2010 Phil Connors

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Connors, P. (2010). Transition Towns and Community Capacity Building. In: Kenny, S., Clarke, M. (eds) Challenging Capacity Building. Rethinking International Development Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230298057_11

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