Ciaran Lynch

Ciaran Lynch is the Managing Director of Community Engagement Partners Limited having retired as the Development Manager of LIT in 2016. He has a background in sociology, town planning, rural development and governance.

He worked as a local authority planner for over 20 years and was The Planning and Development Officer for County Clare for 13 years.

He was formerly the Head of the Sustainable Rural Development Department at Tipperary Institute and subsequently the Development Manager of LIT.  During this time he lectured on many topics including governance, strategic planning, land-use planning, sociology, politics rural development, community development and law. 

He is a former Director of the National Rural Network and was a member of the CEDRA Expert Advisory Group. He has also been Chair of the Tipperary Energy Agency, of the North Tipperary Sports Partnership and the LIT Research and Development Subcommittee, as well as a member of the County Tipperary Economic SPC and the Research Ethics Committee of LIT. He is still a member of the Tipperary LECP Steering Committee and of the Boards of the Tipperary Volunteer Centre, Kilkee Waterworld, the North Tipperary Green Enterprise Centre, Thurles Chamber Enterprise Centre, Thurles Community Projects and Communities Creating Jobs.

In addition to his work in Local Authorities he has led many development projects including local and regional social and economic strategies, community planning projects, EU-funded Interreg, Erasmus and Horizon 2020 projects. He has extensive experience in organisational development and governance both for national and community-based organisations and is a committee or Board member of many voluntary organisations.

He has presented papers and given presentations at many national and international conferences. He has both led and participated in research projects both qualitative and quantitative generally in the community and socio-economic areas and has edited and contributed to a number of publications relating to the general areas of rural and community development and participatory decision-making.