What are the learning and support resources available to community development so that it is equipped to respond effectively to the challenges faced by communities today and in the future? Do community development organisations give sufficient attention to this question or are they so taken up dealing with organisational and funding crises that the question is not addressed with sufficient rigour?

Overall, the picture is a mixed one. There are some examples of innovatory systems and opportunities but also evidence of worrying gaps and failures. In this chapter, we use Hungarian and UK experiences to explore this territory, finishing with a European perspective and some general comments. The word ‘resources’ is used deliberately; our focus in what follows is on training but it is important to remember that training is only one dimension of resources for learning and support.

Hungary

There are the two issues that Hungarian community development professionals have been tackling through adult training initiatives: one is the development of a democratic and collective attitude, civil courage, skills and democratic techniques among citizens; the other is sustaining a democratic attitude and the willingness to be active in local political decision making and the economic sphere.

Civil College Foundation

Its experiences of democratic deficit led the Hungarian Association for Community Development (HACD) to recognise that the informal learning that takes place in community development processes must be complemented with formal learning. The association has developed an adult training strategy, organised into activities that focus on community, democracy, civil society, local media and community-based economic development. Northern College, the adult education college in the UK, provided considerable assistance in developing this system. The resulting community development training organisation, the Civil College Foundation (CCF), has become a national adult education organisation. It is a social organisation for public benefit. In 2003, it was recognised by the state as an accredited adult education institution.

Participants on courses are civil and community activists (often members of Roma groups, unemployed people and members of community groups from disadvantaged areas). syllabus developed by CCF's 12 trainers and through participatory adult education methodology, they learn to think from their own community's point of view while at the same time acquiring civil action and other techniques.