Situating Community Wealth Building and Place Based Capital in the Australian context

Between 2004 and 2011 community members partnered with a wide variety of external actors to design their project, including the cooperative enterprise and mechanisms to share benefits amongst the local economy and communities. Through this grass-roots approach the cooperative raised over 9.9 million dollars in capital from community investors.

An early and prominent example is Hepburn Energy. In 2007 a locally owned cooperative was formed to develop a 4.1 megawatt wind (and soon to be 5MW solar and storage) energy park outside of Daylesford in Central Victoria.

A key focus within PBC approaches is the intentional design of diverse economic activities, so as to strengthen various forms of capital, including through generating funds for investment into local communities. Achieving this regenerative approach is supported by integrating the key principles of local ownership and democratic participation.

Prior to colonisation First Nations’ economies operated through complex webs of traditions and connections that gave groups rights to resources and responsibilities to sustain the socio-political and ecological relations within a place. This led to diverse forms of custodianship that linked people to place through intricate roles of stewardship and... See more

What does this mean for Places?

Place Based Capital (PBC) intentionally integrates the CWB principles into design and implementation of local investment and financing vehicles; with the aim of improving equity of access to opportunities and prosperity, and strengthening wellbeing and resilience outcomes in Places.

“Community ownership ... changes attitudes at the local level ... encourages greater diversity in the investor base and has tapped a latent, and lower-cost patient source of capital.” C4E, 2020

References

[1] For more historical background see: https://cles.org.uk/what-is-community-wealth-building/the-history-of-community-wealth-building/ and https://static1.squarespace.com/static/62f41050584b40607baef690/t/62fe8be83408b928b4756591/1660849128501/PUB_Community-Wealth-Building-Hanna-Kelly.pdf

[2] The Democracy Collaborative. (August 2023). A... See more

. . . a systematic approach to supporting and growing diverse forms of local capital (including financial), particularly through — increasing local control and ownership of those capitals; improving the alignment of external sources of finance with locally identified priorities; and locally reinvesting the value created by economic activity so as t

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