Collaborative partnerships in community education

This paper reports on a study into collaborative partnerships between community educators and the variety of partners with whom they work. It suggests that, despite a policy imperative promoting partnership working, collaboration is only one of many solutions to the problem of delivering effective services and argues that there are a number of circumstances when it is best avoided. It contends that partnerships need to build a meta-strategy that is designed to allow all relevant interests to explore possible ways forward whilst, at the same time (a) advancing their own mission, and (b) building up the capacity (trust, understanding, synergy) to engage in effective and sustained collaborative working. Finally, it is concluded that the power relations in collaborative partnerships are critical and partners must take account of the exclusionary and inclusionary practices often built on deficit ideologies that these generate.