British Academy Innovation Fellowship: Local Policy Innovation Partnerships and Cultural Infrastructure

Project team

Dr Victoria Barker

Collaborators

LPIP hub at City-REDI, University of Birmingham

Funder

British Academy

Value of project

£133,977

Duration of project

June 2024 - June 2025

Project overview

Centre for Creative Economies researcher Victoria Barker has been awarded a one-year Fellowship award, partnered with the Local Policy Innovation Partnership (LPIP) Strategic Coordination Hub. The LPIP Hub, based at the City-Region Economic Development Institute (City-REDI) at the University of Birmingham, is funded by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) as part of the Creating Opportunities, Improving Outcomes theme.

As a funded Innovation Fellow, Victoria will work alongside colleagues in the LPIP Hub at City-REDI, Birmingham, to support local and national policymakers in addressing key challenges, such as driving sustainable economic growth and reducing regional inequalities within the UK.

The LPIP Hub is particularly interested in the core theme of how to build confidence, capability and capacity in place; and how collaborative capability is valued and can be enabled in different places.

Project objectives

At the heart of the fellowship lies a fully funded research project, exploring the complex relationships between cultural and creative infrastructures and place-based policy.

The project hopes to explore how we can make places better by shaping policy around what is valuable to local communities. What are the most effective and engaging ways to do that and find levers for positive change in a context where budgets for this activity and infrastructure are severely challenged.

Impact statement

The research project will amplify the impact of cultural and creative research on policy development and contribute to the LPIP thematic areas of communities in their places, felt experiences and pride in place, and cultural recovery.

The work supports Coventry University strategic partnerships through research, as well as the creative cultures and responsible society research themes. This focus also supports the British Academy drive to demonstrate the impact of the SHAPE agenda (Social Sciences Humanities & the Arts for People and the Economy).

Outputs

• Policy briefs
• Literature and policy reviews
• Fellowship reports