Global Lead for Community Wealth Building

Neil McInroy is The Democracy Collaborative’s global lead for community wealth building. He has been involved in progressive economic and public policy for more than 25 years. Named as one of the most influential people in local government in the UK, Neil has collaborated with a range of local, regional, state and national governments across Europe, Asia, North America, and Australasia. He is presently a community wealth building adviser to the Scottish Government.

For the past two decades, Neil has served as the CEO of the progressive “think and do” tank Centre for Local Economic Strategies (CLES), based in Manchester, UK. Alongside a range of pioneering economic policy and practice work in UK and beyond, Neil was instrumental in leading the organizations activity on community wealth building (CWB). This included a critical role in the development of the “Preston model” and the subsequent advancement of a range of tools and expertise that has seen CWB grow in many locations across the UK.

Neil has been a friend and partner of TDC for many years and now works closely with the TDC team, helping to refine and develop technical delivery, including deep-dive partnerships with several local and state governments in the US. He also assists with the wider global rollout of CWB.