ABSTRACT
This chapter demonstrates the importance of the social economy as an element of community regeneration. Community needed to be ‘restored’ in the more disadvantaged areas from which it had been lost, either because housing programmes had displaced community ties or because of moral breakdown. The Community Development Projects focused on 12 areas across the country, and combined action with research teams in each locality, which was another idea borrowed from the United States War on Poverty. The policies and language in the area of community and local government constantly changed under New Labour making it a dynamic and confusing policy landscape. Localism was an important dimension of the Coalition Government's attempts to transfer power from central government and to community groups. ‘Community’ is a complex and contested term with a plethora of different meanings used in an array of contexts.
