Ensuring Children and Young People Have a Voice in Neighbourhood Community Development

Abstract

Encouraging participation and agency are fundamental elements of social work practice using a community development approach that emphasises community identification of needs and strengths, and community involvement in social change. Ensuring children have a voice is also a cornerstone of social work practice. This paper reports on a project being undertaken in two social housing neighbourhoods in Sydney that began with an exploration of community members' perceptions of community and priorities for change. Initial engagement undertaken with adults living in the two estates indicated that lack of support for children and the behaviour of young people were pressing community concerns. This prompted researchers to revisit the community development research design in order to actively seek out the perspectives of children and young people. Unsurprisingly, the children and young people provided a layer of additional and alternative knowledge about community life and a raft of suggested strategies to improve community wellbeing. We argue that the position of children and young people as community members in community development discourse and practice requires further attention. If community development is posed as an alternative to “top down” approaches to work in communities, then including children and young people (and other marginalised age groups) in “bottom up” initiatives is crucial.