January 20, 2025

Alternative voice: inclusive decision-making empowering Dundee’s community

By Annie McKenzie, Partnership and Projects Lead (Scotland) at the Joseph Rowntree Foundation

Poverty can be seen as an imbalance of income, wealth and power. We undertook a piece of work recently to shine a light on an area that is trying to redress that balance of power.

Dundee Fighting for Fairness (DFFF) are a group of Dundonians with lived experience of poverty who work to ensure the voices of people who often go unheard are instead at the centre of local decision making. DFFF work in partnership with Dundee City Council to influence anti-poverty policy design, through the initiative of the Dundee Fairness Leadership Panel (DFLP). The aim of our work was to identify and understand the key success factors of their participatory model.

The DFLP brings together equal numbers of people with lived experience of poverty and people with the power to make change. Together, they provide insight and challenge to the issues of poverty and inequality experienced by citizens.

The DFLP has become embedded in the Council’s efforts to tackle’s poverty and inequality. The panel has a range of players including members of DFFF, the Chief Executive and Leader of the Council, service delivery mangers and officers and wider public sector professionals.

Conversations with those involved emphasised how the structure and principles of the DFLP have supported the panel’s integrity and sustainability, leading to meaningful action and policy change.

“Councils need to do this sort of work…you are there to make things better for your city or town and the only way you can make things better is by listening to people who have the most difficult experiences to understand and try and make it better.” – Member of DFFF

The Council’s publication of the Fairness Action Plan places a city-wide emphasis on fairness. This lays the foundation for the anti-poverty agenda in Dundee, recognising that to truly achieve fairness, power imbalances must be disrupted and the voices of people with experience of poverty must be at the heart of policy design.

A tension that is often discussed but not necessarily resolved, is that embedding lived experience in policy-making creates a challenge to reconcile deeply personal evidence with tackling structural issues. There is a danger that the people who share their experiences are left feeling used or retraumatised, especially if there is no resulting action.

Our research shows that DFFF and the DFLP have carefully and skilfully navigated this tension. Focusing on the system, instead of people’s individual stories has meant they have managed to advocate for structural policy change on a wider scale, while importantly prioritising people’s dignity. The systems focused approach strengthens the integrity of evidence, pushing decision makers to justify making the change people want to see.

Undoubtedly, the DFLP has succeeded because of the involvement and commitment from key organisations and skilled individuals across a well-connected third and public sector.

The relationship DFFF have built with the Council has been made possible due to the support of charity Faith in Community Dundee (FiCD). FiCD have played a critical role both in establishing DFFF and the DFLP and facilitating the connection with key actors in the Council. FiCD support members of DFFF to participate in the panel, providing wrap-around trauma-informed support to those who share their lived experiences – critically lowering the risk that comes with centring lived experience in policy-making.

Each of these organisations, FiCD, DFFF and Dundee City Council, are the pillars which have structurally supported the development of the DFLP. Each plays a distinct role, ensuring the DFLP is impactful, meaningful and places values of equity and dignity at its core.

A participatory approach like this requires investment in a belief that creating a fairer society is possible and the best way to achieve this is to work together as a community, amplifying the voices of people who most often not heard. We can and should learn to shift the balance of who makes decisions about poverty more widely. You can read more about this research.

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This article is featured in our 22 January newsletter.

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