We will also need to create a world that gives voice to the kind of cultural specificity relating to academics supporting citizens – a federalism of collaborative interests that permit a necessary subsidiarity of its participants. In universities, as clearly revealed in Professor Nigel Lockett’s view of James changes at Salford University (2011), “there has always been a heroic ‘resistance movement’ to change of the kind envisaged he tried to enact in Salford University – many of his colleagues, tried to retain their existing academic status quo, with ‘partisan change enterprise groups in support of citizens’, battling with an ‘entrenched academic ‘culture’. So, embedding change for Citizens Enablement at Salford was not  easy”, and will not be in most universities; rather it is a confrontation in the form of a ‘real world versus ivory tower’ discourse, or as one member of staff put it ‘we are academics, we sit in our ivory tower, do stuff and, as such you don’t understand what it’s like in the real world’. And within academe the cultural battle derives from opposing needs of scarce resources. And, while Salford’s appraisal and reward system  ostensibly covered research, teaching, innovation and administration, it is still the research that is considered vital to ensure promotion.

As Prof. John Dewar, Vice-Chancellor and President, La Trobe University, a university trying to make the sort of changes suggested here said recently (2020), “universities serve many diverse functions and communities but first and foremost they are concerned with optimising their self-interest…. which leads to his case for a new approach University 4.0 – the ‘university for others’ – one outward looking, deeply connected to industry and the communities around it, and also committed to serving the needs of its students. In simple terms the reasons why we need to rethink the role of the university is firstly that the world of work, for which we are preparing students, is changing very quickly. We know that automation will make many current occupations obsolete; we also know that pathways into and through a working life are changing dramatically, with many of the traditional ladders into the workforce disappearing; and we know that the shelf life of skills and qualifications acquired through formal education at school and university is reducing very quickly. In short, the rapid change we see with digital technologies is rendering obsolete traditional approaches to qualifications and pedagogy. 

The second reason for rethinking the role of a university lies in expectations concerning universities and economic development and growth. Research in universities has been an important source of innovation ever since they began but simply assuming that university research will somehow find its way into useful hands is no longer enough. More generally, a university’s social license to operate is increasingly dependent on its ability to demonstrate that it gives back to the community around it more directly than through the production of graduates. The result will be a much more active pursuit of applied university research, through deep industry partnerships, accelerator programs, incubators, and the like. This is reinforced by the fact that technological innovation now happens much faster and at a smaller scale that in the past the old methods of translating university research into commercial outcomes just take too long. This creates a need, and a space, for the rapid stimulation of ideas and their translation to commercial outcomes.

Universities are uniquely well placed to play this role their combination of smart people, sophisticated research infrastructure and, often, extensive real estate, position them well to act as the centre of precincts or innovation hubs involving physical co-location of the industry as well as fostering start-up businesses. The final reason is digital technology itself, which is actually a significant driver in the developments I have already stated. It also increases expectations about the availability and flexibility of the learning experience, while creating opportunities to respond to these challenges in new ways, and opens up other opportunities previously undreamt of”. And Universities must be seen more than as places of teaching where students re prepared for particular end goes in business or in civic life. After Covid-19 many Universities will strive simply to get more students to balance their books and to fill their halls of residence and try to develop new ways of teaching that are more cost effective to cut down costs. However, Universities are organisations of Higher Education, not Higher Teaching, and the word Education has its route in Latin, meaning ‘to draw out or lead out’ from within. We take this to mean, like in our proposal that Academics and others wishing to help citizens should try to draw out from them the undoubted skills each one has. So rather than just teach things more efficiently, they should seek ways to enable improved personal and self-learning for all – the essence of the proposal mentioned here

So Universities need to look at changing academic expectations to truly reflect the type of activities involved in enabling citizens; and fortunately for James, at least for his time in office he felt able to do that at Salford and hence the powerful cases showing success revealed in Part II. Unfortunately, the problem of trying to bring about change in a hierarchical organisation like a university or a local authority is,  that those at the top can always take back any change they have allowed, especially if that leadership itself changes. This is why such change is so problematic and as champions of it come and go. New leaders are often unwilling to continue initiative started by their predecessors, as Nigel Lockett predicted in what happened at Salford.

Similarly, those from the community, citizens and small businesses, also feel themselves to be constrained by their existing culture, by their existing social, economic and political circumstances, by their world view and actions, or by their ways of seeing and acting in the world as learned responses to the complex nature of their lives, and by their existing expectations. In the face of an educated academic, even one wishing to help them, most citizens typically feel powerless and believe they are unable to compete creatively, innovatively or even to get the just desserts they think the deserve; they might say of what James is trying to achieve, ‘it’s not for the likes of us’. This was revealed in the Charleston and Lower Kersal project (Case Study 12, page  68) led by Tim Field, a citizen sensitive senior professional officer who was ready, willing and able to balance the creative, but often opposing views of the team of people managing it. In this case Tim’s leadership made all the difference and the local residents started to gain the confidence to try to develop better ways of working and better solutions to cope with what they knew to be their local problems and issues; this led to many things including a transformation of the environment in which they all lived for the good.

To some extent these two cultures of citizen and academe are also creating a pressure point between each other, seemingly blocking each other’s wants and ways of being. What we need to do is a sort of ‘cross infection’ of each other views and values so they each start respecting each other. This starts with caring and active listening by all parties in any collaboration

Peter believes the above are most useful passages in the paper showing typical constraints for both (academic) enablers and citizens. It portrays how cultures create blockers to change for improvement, which for parallel reasons become locked-into their existing ways by those wishing to remain part of their existing, but quite different, cultures. This is explained in the work of Mary Douglas, see earlier comments about her studies on page 1, at least to James, and shows how it also provides an excuse for inaction because of the fear of change

So creating learning change on both sides of this equation requires huge and sustained effort and a real desire for change. James was able to use his strong leadership, backed by his VC and Chair of Council, who he convinced that his proposed way, ‘was the only act in town’ for their university, especially with its particular staff’s capabilities. However, for James, and any other leaders trying to Enable Citizen to grow and develop, an approach is needed for academics to learn better how to motivate and reward staff to believe in a more meaningful way to do this; they also need to provide a structure and appropriate evaluatory mechanism which motivates and rewards those willing to try. It is also important to produce motivators and rewards to encourage citizens/communities to become stakeholders in their own future developments; during Covid 19 many have begun to recognise what may well be ‘at stake’ for them in a very different kind of future which they must learn must be more under their control – itself a wonderful motivator. To Peter, these are yet other key learning points: firstly to be vulnerable, and listening, as a leader and secondly build meaningful ways of providing rewards that truly encourage academics to actually try and thirdly to begin to be supportive of each other’s ways of trying.                                           

Leadership for Enabling Citizens requires the leader’s own views, values and aspirations of need, and the developing learning processes, to be clear, consistent and repeated, especially in the way they are expressed so they respect the real constraints citizens have when they define their own problems they are willing to share in any development process. Such leaders need to provide a clear philosophical position statement for the change, which engenders a real commitment to an alternative kind of engagement. They must develop ways their colleagues can appropriately reflect on necessary new kinds of engagement, feeding back their reflections into their own developing processes. This becomes a virtuous circle, cycle or upward spiral for all academic staff. Again this demands active listening, and a caring response, to the citizens they are trying to support. And, to repeat, because it is so important, this in turn should drive the leaders to create structures which helps motivate and reward those staff who agree to follow the improved way – otherwise the existing culture will soon turn the process back to the old ways. So, we must establish the desire to apply Socratic principles of a genuine desire to understand the others’ position, articulate it to their satisfaction and take part in ‘co-operative argumentative dialogue’ between all the individuals in the development team so they recognise what precisely is at stake for all and what each individual is expected to engage in.

Similarly, we need to create an upward spiral of encouragement for citizens so they believe in themselves, and try the new and innovative for their own personal gain, as well as other colleague citizens or their local communities – circles of influence and circles of concern They need to believe they can move from a situation where they feel ‘there is one way for the ruling elite, and quite another for themselves’, to a culture of Enablement, where they are capable of securing the future they actually want. This is where sensitive and caring academic partners come into play, as they give confidence of what can be  truly possible and work hard to avoid being limited by their own focused perspective; this may firstly be with their support and finally by achieving improved ways of citizen working by, and for, themselves. Such citizens need to learn how to believe in themselves, then to listen to other citizens in order to work out their needs as well, and try to lead a new change process themselves. This is not a trivial process without development teams being able to change the social, economic and political circumstances surrounding how they define the problem they are tackling, how they are seeking to address it and their ambitions/aspirations of all their efforts. Their reward will hopefully be the success they can achieve when they actually deliver improvements for themselves and other citizens. In effect, such citizens learn to become social entrepreneurs, citizen  entrepreneurs or citizen innovators, adopting a new culture or cultural context where the challenge is to identify a truly objective ‘truth’. 

For as Kevin McCloud – the architect, designer and tv pundit – recently pointed out, “we all like the same”, by which he meant the same things as those who inhabit our own culture or ‘sub-culture’ – some would say there is only one culture in society, but a series of differentiated sub-cultures which embody and embed quite different world views and social practices – in each sub-culture we want the same things, the same cars, the same houses etc reflecting our own same values. To McCloud, and us as authors, members of the same sub-culture typically want ‘the same’ as others in our own sub-culture; we are sustained by this while by the culture and this also guides our values and behaviour. These, in turn, affect what members of each sub-culture values and one of the difficulties is that (academic) enablers do recognise that they might not share the same values as their citizen partners or even approve of those they are working with. Indeed their own values may be in conflict with those they are trying to work with. We have found that a great deal when we act as facilitators/enablers ourselves, and it is difficult to work through. But we have to cope with this situation if as Enablers we are to help Citizens achieve in their own terms. And we do this by building up our understandings of each other’s culture, begin to determine shared desires, but they are as powerful and strong as any that are self-generated. Sometimes you may have to negotiate a temporarily agreed position even when people don’t have shared desires, interest and values; hopefully a temporary strategic alliance will eventually lead to a more specific change.

These lessons of trying to change a sub-culture, or more precisely trying to enable the sub-culture to truly adopt new ways of working, in order to achieve what their ‘culture’ tells them that they want, are the ones most difficult to develop, enact and embed. In the present context, they normally start from small, and fairly focused approaches, using the powerful language of the citizens themselves portraying a self-evident need that the rest of us clearly recognise; that is why Marcus Rashford’s call for the government to change its policy of providing food vouchers for poor children, has been so effective at creating change. It is also why we need to use the experiences, knowledge and skills of the Leonardo Ambassadors, and others in the know, to create similar successful ways of sustainable change.

James in fact developed an approach in his university, when a PVC, which he ‘defined as developing academic opportunities beyond means currently employed to the highest values’; this had a clear focus on Citizen Enablement and clearly worked for many of his staff, as can be seen in the next section. As one of his staff once said regarding the embedding of change he sought, ”the PVC is a fantastic advocate for the new enterprising way, but the problem is there is only one of him and he can’t be everywhere at the same time. The university’s next challenge is to ensure an adequate embedding at the grass-roots’. And this is the same challenge for all striving to develop cultural change within a university, a community or elsewhere. Another member of academic staff said, ‘my feeling is that because he (the PVC) is very enthusiastic, that drive is coming from there and that the Schools and Faculties, in which we all work, aren’t following with the same enthusiasm. The university needs to create a drive from the grass-root, as well as the top’, by understanding the WIFM (What’s in it for Me’ components of living). The review of James Powell’s Academic Developments by Professor Nigel Lockett  and best portrayed by Case Studies – Generic Process A and B and other Case Studies, namely 6, 9,10,11,13 and 14 (pages,              respectively) showed the effectiveness and appropriateness of his leadership with respect of Citizens Enablement.

Finally, Case Study 1 (page 34) on Community Banking, not only presents a study of the development but a fuller analysis in the use of the step-by-step approach Bob Paterson used to help citizens design, build and manage such Banks. So change of the kind suggested here in undoubtedly possible, but it requires a new kind of leadership which will try for such a  change and be prepared to undertake the ‘heavy lifting’ that will be necessary to enact relevant change and to empower citizens.

The questioning framework shown below and the end of Generic Process A (page 26), is taken from the UPBEAT introductory manual, and shows a fairly complete representation of the fine sequencing of the approach we are proposing for those who truly wish to become Citizen Enablers and Empowerers; for we have found that asking the right questions, in the right sequence is the easiest way to achieve success. You start by asking the questions posed at the lower levels of the diagram and then work up step-by-step until you reach the highest honour of becoming a Global Steward. However, it must be stressed that you begin at the bottom in any new collaboration by tackling issues open to early consideration: