In A Fix? Welfare Cuts and Consumer Society »

In A Fix? Welfare Cuts and Consumer Society

Designer dresses; watching the football; or pizza, potato wedges and a litre of Coke – a treat can come in many forms, but the underlying value is the same.   The secret of success in a consumer society is that there’s a price and a product for whatever you can afford: a £1000 Vivienne Westwood creation [...]

March 6, 2013 | Posted in Pictures,Policy | Read More »

The Drugs Don’t Work »

The Drugs Don’t Work

The drugs don’t work.  No painkiller beats dealing with the source of the pain.  No opiate can deliver a high as sustainably as our own bodies can.  This would be a matter for each of us to work out for ourselves, except that the full cost of drug abuse is not just paid by the [...]

June 25, 2012 | Posted in Pictures,Policy | Read More »

Community Resilience and Self Help »

Community Resilience and Self Help

Chamberlain Forum’s 2011-12 programme focuses on Community Resilience and Self-Help.

March 19, 2012 | Posted in Policy | Read More »

The Future of Health and Social Care »

The Future of Health and Social Care

Reforms in health and social care services are needed to enable: decision making to take place at the best level – too much is too centralised and based on data extracted from an area, rather than real information about life in it public services to support and enable self-help – not enough emphasis is put [...]

March 9, 2012 | Posted in Policy | Read More »

Macnamara, Social Capital and The Missing Measure »

Macnamara, Social Capital and The Missing Measure

Charles Handy’s explanation of Macnamara’s Fallacy comes to mind in looking at the way the government’s Community First fund, details of which have been published this week, has been allocated between neighbourhoods in England…

October 6, 2011 | Posted in Policy | Read More »

What We Do

Chamberlain Forum helps civil society and local authorities to coproduce better places to live. We are non-profit, politically independent and proudly based in Birmingham.
We organise Chamberlain Lectures featuring speakers including Prime Minister David Cameron. We also organise Resident University - a peer and shared learning programme for people who live and work in neighbourhoods.
We promote and develop community networks as social capital builders, including by supporting Community Network 4 Birmingham
We support action to strengthen local civil society including through: community asset transfers; neighbourhood websites; mediation and facilitation; training and business planning.
We organise action research into aspects of coproduction and are delivering an 18 month programme, Communities Managing Change, funded by Barrow Cadbury Trust.
Chamberlain Forum Limited acts as a consultancy delivering a wide range of 'thinking and doing' services for clients including local authorities, housing associations, development trusts, health and social care bodies, local strategic partnerships and voluntary and community groups.

Big Ideas

3rd Sector Asset Transfer Big Society Birmingham Citizenship Citizenship Model Disability civil society co-production Cohesion Community Community Anchor Community Assets Community Dialogue Community Empowerment community first community networks Connecting Communities Culture Democracy faith future cities Health Local Government Localism Neighbourhood Forums neighbourhood management ni4 Participatory Budgeting Regeneration research Resident University riots Sandwell Self-help Social Enterprise Social Media Story Telling Sustainable Communities Timebanking Transforming Local Infrastructure unemployment Volunteering welfare West Bromwich Youth Empowerment

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