Commons-based Care: the Context
Testing a localised, commons-rooted model of care - and how to learn from it
This evaluation framework was developed during a 2023–2024 project piloting a commons-based home care model in Hackney, funded by the London Office of Technology and Innovation (LOTI).
LOTI’s innovation fund offered up to £200,000 for councils to collaborate with third- and private-sector partners on new approaches to social care. Our London Circle partnered with Hackney and Southwark Councils and secured £100,000 to develop the UK’s first care model built on commons principles, aiming to activate grassroots care networks at a hyper-local level.
The role of Our London Circle
Our London Circle, formed in 2020, works with community groups to build Community Care Circles that meet local care needs. These groups use Equal Care’s tech platform and support to develop cooperative care services rooted in the neighbourhoods they serve.
In early 2022, the team began organising with residents and groups in Clapton, Hackney. After a year of groundwork, the Clapton Care Circle of Equal Care was formed, co-producing a new vision for care and support in the area. Funding remained a barrier until LOTI’s opportunity gave the project momentum, supporting the transition from local organising to regulated service delivery.
What the pilot set out to do
The pilot, which ran from April 2023 to September 2024, involved members of the Clapton Circle and Equal Care’s operations and growth team in Calderdale, Yorkshire. Together, they worked to:
Build a hyper-local network that could support and resource five self-managing care teams
Co-produce an evaluation framework for commons-based care with people giving and receiving support, local authority partners and community members
Develop new features on our tech platform to empower other groups across the UK to create their own commons-based care services
Create a procurement-ready service specification for local authorities interested in funding commons-based models
Co-create this very playbook, offering a step-by-step guide for councils and community groups to establish cooperative care services
It also helped that the pilot took place in and around Clapton Common, supported by Clapton Commons, a place-based community development organisation. What better name for this new way of working than a commons-based model of care?
A framework for learning, not just proof
Given the short-term nature of the project, the goal of developing this evaluation framework was formative, not summative. The focus wasn’t on proving success but on learning in real time: trialling different tools, reflecting on what worked (and what didn’t), and adapting as we went.
The result is a framework designed to grow and evolve, shaped by the experience of building a new care model from the ground up - one that can now be used and adapted by other teams, services and communities exploring commons-based care.
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