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Insights

In-house and independent research and essays sharing experience and knowledge of community-led change

In focus

A level playing field

In our latest essay, Ryan Herman visits five Big Local areas where sport is helping communities to transcend physical, social and political boundaries and tackle some of their biggest underlying challenges.

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Research

Find out what we're learning from Big Local

research
Developing potential

Bridging the gap between communities and developers

Housing
research
The halfway point

Reflections on Big Local: Sharing knowledge from the largest single-purpose, Lottery-funded endowment

Local economies Power and leadership
research
Achieving local economic change: what works?

What can be learnt from 40 years of local economic regeneration policy?

Local economies
research
Left behind? Understanding communities on the edge

New research identifies 206 ‘left behind’ areas in England

Health and wellbeing Spaces and services
research
Community hubs: Understanding survival and success

How can community hubs be financially viable?

Spaces and services
research
Community commissioning

Shaping public services through people power

Power and leadership
View all research

Essays

Read about how people and places are changing through Big Local in our essay series written by independent thinkers

| Big Local
Counterweight

How Big Local areas are levelling the scales of local power

David Boyle

| Big Local
A level playing field

How sport can unite and transform communities

Ryan Herman

| Big Local
Beyond age

Why communities are investing in young people’s futures

Antony Mason

| Big Local
Creating the future

Art, communities and change

Maddy Costa

| Big Local
Building wealth

How communities are reshaping the economy from the bottom up

Hazel Sheffield

| Big Local
Designs on the past

What can history do for hard-pressed communities?

Carey Newson

| Big Local
Community Spirits

The changing role
of faith in place

Stephen Bates

| Big Local
Skittled out?

The collapse and revival of England’s social infrastructure

Dan Gregory

| Big Local
New seeds beneath the snow?

Big Local neighbourhoods in action

Julian Dobson

| Big Local
The grammar of change

Big Local neighbourhoods in action

David Boyle

View all essays

Independent evaluation

Communities in Control

How health is affected by the power to make decisions

Our Bigger Story

An innovative longitudinal multimedia evaluation of Big Local