Community Development Theories

Community Practice

Encompasses a number of different methods, all of which are focused on creating change in the social environment

Community organizing

Focused on harnessing the collective power of communities to tackle issues of shared concern. Challenges government, corporations, and other power-holding institutions in an effort to tip power balance in favor of communities. Enhances participatory skills of local citizens by working with and not for them, thus developing leadership with particular emphasis on the ability to conceptualize and act on problems. Community members can develop the capacity to resolve problems.

Person in Environment

Individuals' problems are addressed in combination with social context; Work to change the environment so that it functions more effectively for individuals, families, and communities

Community Planning

Involves collecting data, analyzing a situation, and developing strategies to move from a problem to a solution; defined as the process by which a group or community decides its goals and strategies relating to societal issues. Rather than planning "for" communities, social workers as planners engage "with" community members

Stages of Community-Based Decision Making

Orientation, Conflict, Emergence, Reinforcement

Community Change

The desired outcome, whether it means adding needed services, shifting the balance of power from the haves to the have-nots, reducing isolation, or developing and implementing more effective policies.

Social Planning Model of Community Practice

a) A rational problem-solving process in which planners look at communities and available resources and create plans to develop, expand, coordinate, and implement services. b) Takes place at local and regional levels c) Social worker roles include planner, researcher, manager, proposal writer, and negotiator.

Reasons for Social Work Involvement in Community Practice

a) Improving the quality of life for community residents b) Advocating for a community of interest, for a specific issue, for the establishment of political and social rights, and for additional resources c) Increasing participation, building grassroots leadership, and strengthening communities socially and economically d) Establishing or improving needed services e) Developing better integrated and coordinated services locally, nationally, and internationally f) Building political power, improving access and opportunity for marginalized people, and increasing their participation g) Fighting for social justice to increase equality and opportunity across race, class, gender, and other lines

Community Social and Economic Development Model of Community Practice

a) Strives to empower and improve the lives of low-income, marginalized, and oppressed people by bringing residents together to become more involved in the social and economic lives of their community b) The goals include improving education, leadership, and political skills within the community and improving the economic health of a community. c) Community members are involved in each step of the process. d) Social worker roles include planner, teacher, manager, promoter, and negotiator

Functional Organizing Model of Community Practice

a) The focus is on recruiting people with similar interests or concerns rather than on recruiting people in the same geographic location b) The aim is on creating external change and building internal capacity c) Organizing efforts focus on advocating for a specific issue or population and are often aimed at policy change, service development, and community education d) Social worker roles include organizer, teacher, advocate, and facilitator

Political and Social Action Model of Community Practice

a) The model focuses on helping citizens gain political power and a voice in the decision-making process. b) The aim of the model is to increase social justice by pressuring political and corporate leaders to replace harmful policies or practices with ones that benefit disadvantaged and low-income groups. c) Public and elected officials and corporate leaders are often the targets of such campaigns. d) Social worker roles include advocate, organizer, educator, and researcher.

Neighborhood and Community Organizing Model of Community Practice

a) The process of bringing members of a geographic community together to create power in numbers b) Practitioners organize residents to act on their own behalf, developing local control and empowerment c) Has an external focus on accomplishing specific tasks and an internal focus on helping members build their capacity for future organizing efforts d) Social worker roles in this model include organizer, teacher, facilitator, and coach.

Program Development and Community Liaison Model of Community Practice

a) The purpose is the creation of a new service or expansion of an existing service or program to meet community needs. b) The process involves conducting a needs assessment, planning new services specifically designed to meet community needs, and implementing and evaluating those services. c) To be effective, the process should include input from all those who will be affected by the new program: current clients, potential clients, agency staff, community leaders, and community residents. d) Social worker roles include planner, proposal writer, mediator, facilitator, and liaison with the community.

Coalition Building Model of Community Practice

a) formed when separate groups come together to work collectively on an issue of concern. b) joining allows groups to increase their power base and available resources while at the same time maintaining their autonomy. c) usually focus on a single issue and are often time limited d) present a number of interesting challenges to community practitioners. Groups that join together may agree on one issue, yet disagree on many others. There may be tensions over who gets to make decisions, who speaks for the group, how resources are divided, and what direction the coalition should take. e) Social worker roles include mediator, negotiator, spokesperson, and teacher.

Worker roles in social action model

advocate, activist, negotiator

Socio-psychological area of community

belief that people of community are bound together by existing area of interest and connected based on goals they share, needs, values, and activities; there is personal-psychological community within each individual; as a form of social living that is defined by attitudes, norms, customs, and behaviors of those living in community

Tasks/goals of community organizing

change public/private priorities to give attention to inequality and social injustice; promote legislative change; influence public opinions; improve community agencies/institutions to better satisfy needs of community; develop new ways/services; improve access to service; set up new programs; develop capacity of grassroots citizen groups to resolve problems; seek justice for oppressed minorities

Social reform model of community organization practice

collaborates with other organizations to develop coalitions of various groups to pressure for change; mixture of social action and social planning; strategies include fact gathering, publicity, lobbying, and political pressure; typically pursued by elites on behalf of disadvantaged groups

Tactics of social action model

conflict, confrontation, contest, and direct action

Tactics of locality development model

consensus and capacity building

Tactics of social planning model

consensus and conflict

Goal of SW involved in community organization efforts

education in democratic decision-making and promoting skills for democratic participation

Worker roles in locality development model

enabler, coordinator, educator, broker

Organizer

enables members to address community problems independently, in part through their learning analytic, strategic, and interpersonal skills

Campaign tactics in community organizing

hard persuasion, political maneuvering, bargaining/negotiation, and mild coercion; requires perceived differences in goals, inequality in power, and intermediate relationships

How does community organization practice (COP) differ from other forms of practice?

highlights knowledge about social power, social structure, social change, and social environments; acknowledges the reciprocal process between individual and social environment; seeks to influence and change the social environment as it is seen as the source and likely solution for many problems; social problems arise from structural arrangements rather than personal inadequacies

Social planning model of community development practice

involves careful, rational study of community's social, political, economic, and population characteristics to provide basis for identifying agreed-upon problems and deciding range of solutions; government orgs can be sponsor, participants, and recipients of info from social planners; focus on problem solving through fact gathering, rational action, and needs assessment

Models of community organization

locality development; social planning; social action; social reform

Key concepts in community development

long-term commitment; addresses imbalances in power; justice, equality, inclusion, mutual respect; working together in collective action

Assumptions that underlie community organization practice

members of community WANT to improve situation; members are ABLE to develop ability to resolve communal/social problems; members must participate in change; systems approach that considers total community

Coercive power

power from control of punishment

Referent power

power from having charisma or identification with other who have power

Expert power

power from superior ability or knowledge

Collaborative tactics in community organizing

problem solving, joint action, education, mild persuasion; requires a perceived consensus of goals, power equality, relatively close relationships, and cooperation

Contest tactics in community organization practice

public conflict and pressure; requires pubic conflict, disagreement concerning goals, uncertain power, distant or hostile relationships

Social action model of community organization practice

requires easily identifiable target and relatively clear, explainable goals; typically target is a community institution that controls and allocates funds, community resources, and power and clients are those who lack social and economic power; assumption is that different groups have interests that are conflicting and irreconcilable; direct action is only way to convince those w/ power to relinquish resources/power

Worker roles in social planning model

researcher, reporter, data analyst, program planner, program implementer, facilitator

What determines which tactic will be used in community organizing?

the degree of difference or commonality in goals between the community group and the target system; the relative power of the target system and the community group; the relationship of the community group to the target system

What is community development?

the process of helping individuals improve the conditions of their lives by increased involvement in the social and economic conditions of their communities

Values of community organization practice

working WITH, not for clients to enhance participatory skills; developing leadership; strengthening communities; redistributing resources; planning changes in systematic and scientific ways; rational problem-solving process; advancing the interest of the disadvantaged in order for them to have a voice in the process

Locality development model of community organization practice

working in a neighborhood w/ the goal of improving the quality of community life through broad-spectrum participation at local level; process-oriented with purpose of helping diverse elements of community come together to resolve common problems and improve community