Community-based sustainability initiatives: the quality of relationships matter?

This study examines the role of the qualities of social relationships within 22 different community-based sustainability initiatives each framed round different types of sustainability challenges, from flooding and climate change to community development and youth engagement. Research involved 37 semi structured interviews, combined with visual techniques, to explore the qualities of different relationship from the perspective of actors actively engaged in developing and progressing initiatives with different communities across Scotland. A typology of relationship qualities (tense, pragmatic and supportive qualities) is presented and applied to examine the ways in which relationships shape the benefits that participants identify for these community-based initiatives. The findings show supportive relationship qualities, involving a sense of respect, integrity, honesty and opportunities to test out new ideas, are particularly important in sustainability initiatives, providing a diverse range of benefits. Relationship qualities can also shift over time, either relatively suddenly or incrementally. Some groups of initiative actors worked strategically with relationships, underpinning their relationship-based strategies with relationships with different actors dominated by supportive qualities to actively harness the benefits these types of relationships provide and strengthen the sense of community and shared interest surrounding initiatives. A focus on relationship qualities can...
Source: Sustainability Science - Category: Science Source Type: research