Communities of Practice

CoPs are particularly valuable for cultural creatives, changemakers, and community leaders working on complex issues such as economic transformation, climate justice, and social regeneration—where no one has all the answers, and solutions must be grown together. These communities provide the scaffolding for shifting worldviews, embedding new narratives, and nurturing a sense of belonging and shared purpose.

The WEAll Cultural Creatives Community of Practice, hosted by the Wellbeing Economy Alliance Ireland Hub, is a vibrant example. It invites individuals and organisations to co-create and amplify new stories grounded in fairness, dignity, care for nature, participation, and connection. Focusing especially on the island of Ireland, this CoP works to challenge dominant economic narratives and cultivate liberating alternatives through dialogue, storytelling, and mutual support.

CoPs are not just learning spaces—they are essential infrastructure for systems change. They enable emergent leadership, encourage experimentation, and sustain energy over time by rooting change efforts in relationship and community.

Links: 

• Introduction to communities of practice

  • https://www.wenger-trayner.com/introduction-to-communities-of-practice/ 

‘Unless a social movement as a network develops into communities of practice it cannot become a system of influence. Communities of practice are of vital importance because, through them, people grow the necessary capabilities and structures that enable a new system to emerge – not as a social movement taking over institutions by force but by growing into a system of influence and thus becoming the new mainstream, making old structures obsolete.’ George Po