Our Story

At the end of 2024 Citizen Network had over 5,500 individual members and over 315 group members from over 50 countries. We work to help create a world where everyone matters and we share a rich library of free resources on this website. You can read more about our values and what we mean by citizenship here. Citizen Network began in 2009 and you can read our story below.

Origins and development

Simon Duffy and Nicola Protopapadakis created the Centre for Welfare Reform on the 1st October 2009. The Centre was a think-tank, based in the North of England, and its intended purpose was help us to help create a better world by sharing ideas, research and practice that would enable people to make improvements to how we live together. In practice, however, much of the early work of the Centre was focused on combating Austerity and resisting negative changes to UK public policy, such as the introduction of Universal Credit.

This work led to the development of Citizen Network for several reasons:

• We need an inspiring vision of a better future where we are all equal citizens
• We need information, and we also need connections, support and encouragement
• We need to carry forward the values of inclusion for future generations 

Planning for Citizen Network continued in partnership with people and organisations in Finland and Australia then on 17th November 2016, Citizen Network was officially launched at the Manawanui International Conference in Auckland, New Zealand by Simon Duffy and Kate Fulton. We encouraged people and individuals to join the network for free and we worked with organisations around the world to support people to take on coordination roles in order to advance Citizen Network's work. Early support came from: 

Avivo | Canadian Institute for Inclusion and Citizenship | CCS Disability Action | Centre for Welfare Reform | Choice Support | Community Connections | DD Network | Federation of Disability Resource Centers | ILS | Imagine Better | Inclusion North | In Control Scotland | Life Unlimited | Manavodaya | Manawanui | My Place | Puzzle | Quip | Ripple Trust | VID University | Western Australia Individualised Services (WAIS)

In 2019 at Citizen Network's first CitizenFest, in Glasgow we agreed that Citizen Network would required a distinct organisational to take forward its work. After discussions with allies in Finland it was decided to establish Citizen Network Osk as a non-profit global cooperative. Citizen Network Osk was officially registered as a coop on 26th October 2020. Between 2020 and 2024 many things were achieved:

• The Centre for Welfare Reform became Citizen Network Research and took on responsibility for hosting Citizen Network
• New partnerships were formed to strengthen work and develop projects, such as the SDS Network
• Emails and membership lists were transferred to the Action Network system and communications improved

However it was on 22nd November 2024 that the cooperative governance structure was not the best way forward for Citizen Network and the cooperative was closed. Citizen Network now continues under the guidance of Citizen Network Research and with ongoing support from several partners. We have exciting plans for the future and are particularly focused on the need to help create neighbourhoods of care. Below are some of our achievements so far.

Achievements so far

Citizen Network has an online library which at the end of 2024 had over 1600  articles and 12,500 visitors per month. It has published 6 books and over 100 major reports, including:

A Fair Start (2010) Personalisation in Mental Health (2010) Personalised Transition (2010) Positively Local(2011) Women at the Centre (2011) Dying with Dignity (2011) Peer Power (2012) Local Area Coordination (2013) Whose Community Is It Anyway? (2013) No Going Back (2013) The Unmaking of Man (2013) Counting the Cuts (2014) Who Cares? (2015) Citizenship and the Welfare State (2016) Love and Welfare (2016) Heading Upstream (2017) Cumulative Impact Assessment (2018) UBI and Health (2018) Second Class Citizens (2019) Know Your Place (2019) Stories of Our Lives (2019) Basic Income Plus (2020) Closer to Home (2020) Energy Impairment and Disability Inclusion (2020) Power and Connection (2021) Growing Peer Support (2021) A New Way Home (2021) Centralisation Meets Austerity (2022) Truth & Citizenship (2022) Global Standards for Self-Directed Support (2022) Redesigning the NDIS (2023) 

Members of Citizen Network lead national and global work on a range of social innovations:

Basic Income | Community Social Work | Constitutional Reform | Deinstitutionalisation | Family Leadership | Inclusive Education | Individual Service Funds | Local Area Coordination | Neighbourhood Democracy | 
Peer Support | People Based Development | Personalised Support | Person Centred Planning | Quality Checking | Self Advocacy | Self Directed Support | Support Brokerage | Supported Employment | Women-Centred Work

Citizen Network has inspired or supported the creation a range of new organisations including:

The Hub Yeovil (2010) People Focused Group Doncaster (2011) Campaign for a Fair Society (2011) iDirect (2014) Learning Disability Alliance (2014) Learning Disability England (2016) 
Chronic Illness Inclusion (2017) UBI Lab Sheffield (2018) We Are One: CitizenFest (2019) 
UBI Lab Disability (2020) Neighbourhood Democracy Movement (2020)

We are founding members of several networks including:

• Citizen Network (2016) - working to advance citizenship for all, present in 39 countries
• UBI Lab Network (2019) - working to advance basic income, with 35 labs now across the globe 
• Neighbourhood Democracy Movement (2020) - for communities wanting grassroots democracy

We hope to help all of us to become better citizens and to work together to create a world where everyone matters.