Performance management for community empowerment networks

Community participation is now highly valued in urban regeneration partnerships in Britain. The major current policy innovation is a National Strategy for Neighbourhood Renewal, which set up Community Empowerment Networks to engage communities. This article describes the Performance Management Framework produced for these networks, and examines themes from practitioners' responses to the draft framework, against a wider context of New Public Management and performance management. The article addresses the important question of whether the framework acts as a learning tool for those directly involved in organizing community participation or as a control mechanism applied to them by more powerful actors. © CIPFA, 2005