Community engagement in deprived neighbourhoods during the COVID-19 crisis: perspectives for more resilient and healthier communities

The current COVID-19 pandemic confines people to their homes, disrupting the fragile social fabric of deprived neighbourhoods and citizen's participation options. In deprived neighbourhoods, community engagement is central in building community resilience, an important resource for health and a prerequisite for effective health promotion programmes. It provides access to vulnerable groups and helps understand experiences, assets, needs and problems of citizens. Most importantly, community activities, including social support, primary care or improving urban space, enhance health through empowerment, strengthened social networks, mutual respect and providing a sense of purpose and meaning. In the context of inequalities associated with COVID-19, these aspects are crucial for citizens of deprived neighbourhoods who often feel their needs and priorities are ignored. In this perspectives paper, illustrated by a varied overview of community actions in the UK and The Netherlands, we demonstrate how citizens, communities and organizations may build resilience and community power. Based on in-depth discussion among the authors we distilled six features of community actions: increase in mutual aid and neighbourhood ties, the central role of community-based organizations (CBOs), changing patterns of volunteering, use of digital media and health promotion opportunities. We argue that in order to enable and sustain resilient and confident, 'disaster-proof', communities, areas which merit investment include supporting active citizens, new (digital) ways of community engagement, transforming formal organizations, alignment with the (local) context and applying knowledge in the field of health promotion in new ways, focussing on learning and co-creation with citizen initiatives. Lay Summary The COVID-19 pandemic is having a huge impact on community life and health, especially in poorer neighbourhoods. Many social problems have been made worse; e.g. poverty, difficulties getting food and social isolation. This has driven a huge effort from community-based organizations, national charities, volunteers and citizens who have worked hard to overcome these problems and help people in need. This paper shows examples of what has been happening in the UK and The Netherlands and how people quickly built on existing community work and made new projects in response to the pandemic. Activities ranged from local groups forming to help their neighbours through to national volunteer schemes. We argue that community action has been very important in meeting urgent needs, but also provides a base for future actions to make communities stronger and tackle underlying inequalities. Health promotion principles suggest that action is needed across society to give more power to communities and make sure that the priorities of disadvantaged communities are taken seriously in building a recovery. Practical actions include forming long-term partnerships between public services and community-based organizations, giving practical support to volunteers, making sure new digital-ways of connecting are open to everyone, and involving communities in doing research.