Play Sufficiency as an Organising Principle of Community Development

Abstract

Play matters to children yet has received little attention from adults in respect of community development, doing so would presents an opportunity to do things differently. By prioritising play alongside other adult agendas and positioning play as central to our thinking, we can ensure children and their way of engaging with the world has much greater influence over how we govern and the design of environments we create for people. In 2012, the Welsh Government introduced the Play Sufficiency Duty. This duty places a responsibility on all local authority’s in Wales to carry out an assessment of children’s opportunities for play every three years and in between times to take action to secure sufficient opportunities for play based on their findings. This case study presents our experiences of 'doing' play sufficiency over the last 8 year. Working with children, parents and professionals as well as other associated adult community memembers we have endeavoured to understand how play might matter in communities and we might maintain it, where it is experienced positively or develop it where it is lacking.