ABSTRACT
This chapter examines participatory and community-based research practice and fashion internationally for the promotion of collaborative and participatory practices within heritage thinking and practice, impact, participative approaches, co-creation, co-development and co-production of knowledge and of community-led and community-based activities. It explains the approaches to community engagement advocated by universities and heritage organisations alongside the autonomous, transformatory and counter-hegemonic motivations of some community-based activists. The chapter examines whether the interest in public engagement, impact and participation in the universities and the cultural heritage sector in the UK has really resulted in the promotion of more collaborative and equitable research relations with those outside those institutions. Since 2010 the UK Research Councils have been funding a large cross-council multidisciplinary programme entitled Connected Communities 'designed to understand the changing nature of communities in their historical and the role of communities in sustaining and enhancing the quality of life'.
