What Makes a ‘Just Neighbourhood’?: Looking at how communities plan for themselves – and who and what gets left out

Since 2023, I’ve been leading the Just Neighbourhoods? research project, funded by the Nuffield Foundation. It’s a three-year study looking at how community-led plans are created and used in places experiencing significant socio-economic disadvantage across the UK and Northern Ireland.

Working alongside colleagues from Cardiff and Hertfordshire universities, this project builds on years of research into community-led planning. Interest in the topic grew after the Localism Act was introduced in 2011, which gave neighbourhoods in England the legal power to create their own statutory plans – known as Neighbourhood Development Plans (NDPs).

Since then, around 3,000 communities in England have started developing one.

The problem with take-up

Most neighbourhood development activity in England has come predominantly from more affluent areas. Yet the potential benefits of such hyper-local planning may actually be greater in more deprived neighbourhoods.

This disparity – between who’s doing the planning and who can benefit most – raises important questions. It also reveals a clear research gap that hasn’t yet been explored in depth. Our project focuses on the neighbourhood scale and hyper-local planning – which has rarely been researched in the UK. Using a social justice lens, we’re particularly interested in how NDPs are developed, who is involved and the context in which they emerge.

Justice, equity and the planning gap

There’s been growing concern – in the UK and beyond – that community plans often fail to address social justice directly. For example, research in the US found that most local plans don’t even mention equity, let alone include goals to improve it.

There are several possible reasons for this. Some researchers point to outdated assumptions within the planning system or that policies aren’t designed to meet specific local needs and that there’s too little attention paid to the social impact of planning decisions. Some argue the problem runs even deeper – that economic structures actively work against justice-led planning.

Taken together, the findings suggest that many community plans fall short. They may be unrepresentative, overly cautious or simply not bold enough to bring about meaningful change.

Inside the project: What we’re doing

Our research focuses on content review work and ten case study areas across the UK and Northern Ireland. The aim is to better understand how hyperlocal planning is playing out in disadvantaged communities – and what can be done differently.

We’re tackling five key questions:

1. How do different communities understand social and environmental justice?

1. Who is and isn’t represented in community-led planning (CLP) spaces and how does that impact on outcomes?

1. How do the design, process and practice of CLP shape the forms and outcomes of activity?

1. What added value does CLP offer in relation to social and environmental justice outcomes?

1. How can we share lessons and best practice with others?

Looking ahead

The project is highly relevant to emerging approaches for addressing local disadvantage, guiding the allocation of resources, and informing government policy on regeneration, local governance and effective planning support.

We’re due to finish in spring 2026. So far, we’ve published four working papers – all available on our project website.

If communities are empowered to shape their own futures, the process needs to be fair, inclusive and just.

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