Community planning for whom? The role of third sector networks in marginal neighbourhoods

Since it has been imposed in the academic and public debate, social innovation constitutes an ambivalent concept. However, many interpretations agree on the positive relationship between bottom-up processes and institutional learning.In marginal contexts, practices of collective activation are often weak, evanescent and they remain into the informal domain due to the scarcity of cultural, political and economic resources of the agents, with very few possibilities of affecting the institutional level. Researching on social innovation and community-based planning in the perspective of marginal populations requires to not overestimate the capacity of the inhabitants to activate. On the contrary, intermediary actors and networks could carry out a strategic role in leading community-based planning processes.The paper aims at reflecting on the political and territorial implications of community planning processes in two public housing neighbourhoods in the city of Milan - San Siro and Giambellino - where the third sector organizations, promoting neighbourhood networks, started claiming for urban regeneration. Gathering together professionals, activists and inhabitants, they play a twofold role of service providers and representatives of the inhabitants.Analysing these processes in the framework of the transformation of welfare provision at the local level, what worth to notice is that community processes impact on the participant’s life and professional paths, more than on the neighbourhoods.Associating a policy analysis approach with the qualitative network analysis of social relations and biographic paths of some of the members of these networks, common patterns of activation and engagement seem to emerge.In conclusion, the paper reflects on communitybased planning and social innovation in marginal neighbourhoods starting from the recognition of new roles that are redefining the meaning of these processes and the perspectives of institutional change.