Future Consultations

In partnership with Local Trust

This consultation will focus on the future for communities and place, exploring the importance of community as a key issue for policy makers and practitioners. In doing so it will draw on current research conducted by the Institute for Voluntary Action Research (IVAR) and Local Trust on the necessary conditions for creating empowered communities in the 2020s which is due to report in the summer.

It will also consider the emerging findings of the Inquiry into the Future of Civil Society due to report in autumn 2018. The consultation takes place at a critical time in this policy space, as the Government considers the content of its own Civil Society Strategy (on which it launched its own consultation in March).

Key issues of focus for the event will be:

The importance of place: What does place mean, how does it contribute to individual and community identity and why does this matter?
Power and influence: Who holds power as we enter a new decade? How can power be meaningfully transferred to communities? What does this mean in the context of reduced resources and capacity amongst those who have traditionally held and brokered power at a local level?
Transience: What happens when many people no longer stay in communities for long enough to feel part of them? What does community mean for people living in insecure housing tenure and their neighbours?
Spaces: What does the disappearance of shared space means for civil society? What does it mean in particular for disadvantaged communities, where both public and private sector spaces are in retreat?  Where can communities find common interests or meet with people with different views or backgrounds?

In partnership with Future iQ

The future of urban living is an increasingly critical issue given population trends which show more and more people becoming urban dwellers. Cities and their inhabitants are becoming one of the most influential factors shaping the future of the planet.

On the current trajectory, by 2050 the urban population is estimated to be 6.3 billion (66% of the world’s projected population). Currently 54% of the global population already live in cities. With a further three million people per week moving to urban centres, the future of urban living is an issue we need to explore in depth and prepare for creatively and pragmatically.

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In partnership with the Jane Goodall Institute

This week-long Consultation will bring together young people from across the world who are involved in the Roots and Shoots Programme devised by the Jane Goodall Institute. The focus of the week is for the professional development of each participant.

There will be a series of high-level presentations on topics of relevance to the Institute as a way of engendering debate and discussion.

While training for faith leaders is wide-ranging and varied, nowhere in the UK are mid- to senior religious decision makers trained in leadership skills side by side. 

The Senior Faith Leadership Programme is intended  to deepen encounters between those who are serving the Abrahamic communities in Britain, whether in a lay or clerical capacity. Its focus is on developing leadership – which by its nature is an inter-disciplinary phenomenon. Leadership of communities affects people from all walks of life and concerns the diversity of human experience.