Belong – The Cohesion & Integration Network
Belong – the Cohesion and Integration Network work with local government, private sector and civil society organisations to develop, implement and evaluate work that brings people together across difference and builds stronger communities.
We partnered with Belong to understand how events can bring people together across divides, and to develop tools to help event organisers craft events that matter for social cohesion.
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The Power of Events: evidence from our archive
Belong looked at evidence from over a decade of supporting events to find out how community events – festivals, parades, ceremonies and fun-runs – can strengthen social cohesion.
Their review asked the question: ‘What makes an event that results in people feeling more connected to their communities and that builds social cohesion?’ To answer this, Belong looked at reports and evaluations from our archive.
They recommended that:
- Understanding local places, people and contexts is essential. Local groups need to be part of the design of events, and funders should invest in local skills and networks.
- Accessible and meaningful evaluation approaches is needed to understand ‘what works’. All events should use appropriate techniques, and evaluations should look at the process as well as the wider system events sit in. Funders should support a wide range of robust evaluation approaches.
- Cohesion requires participation, so organisers and funders need to consider the barriers of participants, volunteers and the wider community. Events should build in spaces where different people can come together easily and safely.
Events can leave a legacy of cohesion, but only if they are designed well. Organisers should focus on building and supporting cultural memory that is relevant to all communities in a place. The partnerships developed for an event should be embedded in local places so they can continue to make a difference. Funders should support peer learning so organisers can share and test their ideas and should open their own archives for learning.
Power of Events Learning Resource
To help event organisers design events that support social cohesion, we worked with Belong to develop a set of online tools:
They consist of:
- a step-by-step guide to planning events which build social cohesion and creating a Theory of Change for your event which you can use to maximise your impact and build social cohesion, and
- a Social Value Estimator which calculates the potential social value of your event, including how much wellbeing it could generate through social cohesion. This includes a step-by-step guide on including costs and activities, video explainers, and a bespoke report on your event’s social value.