Community Development is a big concept! Few things can bring together the cornerstones of principles of society and humanity quite like it. It is both a principle and a call to action, where sustainability is a destination and its practitioners effectively work in a trajectory where success for a practitioner equates to working themselves out of their work role in a host community. When community development is applied to a community, as opposed to rolling out a community program it is felt by community members as empowerment, ownership, shared responsibility and cooperative action..,. active citizenship.
I have over time had the good fortune to have been employed in roles where community development was an underpinning principle and practice. These roles has often been simple and effective asset based projects like a Bike Library where I could encourage and build capacity for others to maintain and repair bicycles, share the sense of freedom riding a bike brings and the sustainability of repairing and re-birthing old bikes into another person’s new form of transportation and wellbeing. Community development has taken me to some amazing places in northern Australia as well as urban community settings, sometimes paid and sometimes as a volunteer. It would be fair to say that volunteering is another activity that is important to Community Development, because at it’s heart is the question “What is something you care enough too act on?”
In 2007-2008 I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity as a master’s student and VET teacher to work and live in Wugularr, in west Arnhem Land and design a Youth Work curriculum tailored to work with community strengths, community work roles, Capacity Building and work within the cultural context built on rights, tradition, kinship and custodianship of traditional lands.
I have selected excerpts in this vault from my thesis to republish where they offer points of reflection and understanding. This passage explores the relationship between community development, Social Capital, capacity building and Social Justice:
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Community development can broadly be defined as an active and emancipatory process where positive and sustainable change is facilitated in a community that is based on principles of equity, social justice and mutual respect. At its core is the removal of barriers that prevent people within communities from participating in developing solutions to problems and issues that exist within their own communities.
Muirhead (2002) places a more personal definition on the term by emphasising the word development as a way of “unwrapping” potential by aligning the development of a community as network of people in relationship as being akin to “personal development” only on a larger scale. Community Development to Muirhead, therefore represents a process of “unwrapping the potential of communities”, where community is defined as “people in relationships”.
This notion of relationships between people forming the basis of communities is very important consideration as it places a value on the nature and quality of these relationships whether they be past, present or future as a shared and accessible community resource. This value, is “social capital”. The idea of Social Capital is one that has significantly highlighted the positive role of community development in society. The term itself does not apply to all relationships within a community but is limited to those based on mutual trust and respect that are beneficial to the social cohesion and operation of the community itself (Kenny, 2007). Facilitating the development of social capital in communities is a key aspect to the process of community development.
In community development, the process of how a community achieves its goals is often more important than the actual outcomes themselves. When a community becomes empowered to address it’s own issues skills an ability or capacity is developed amongst it’s members to respond to the community’s own problems (Muirhead, 2002). The development of this ability in communities or Capacity Building sits alongside social capital as a second integral element in Community Development.
A third essential concept in community development is “Social Justice” which like social capital is also difficult to define and the frequent topic of extensive philosophical and political discourse. For the purposes of this dissertation it can be taken to encompass the principle that “all human beings are of equal worth, deserve to be treated decently and to have a fair share of the community’s wealth” (Lawrence, 2002).
“Social justice is what faces you in the morning. It is awakening in a house with adequate water supply, cooking facilities and sanitation. It is the ability to nourish your children and send them to school where their education not only equips them for employment but reinforces their knowledge and understanding of their cultural inheritance. It is the prospect of genuine employment and good health: a life of choices and opportunity, free from discrimination.” (Dodson, 1993 as cited by Lawrence, 2002)
Community development is therefore a means of empowering people within communities to strive for equality and justice (social justice) by building mutually beneficial relationships (social capital) to and allow the community to develop its own solutions to it is own issues (capacity building).
- Kenny, S (2007) “Developing Communities for the Future, Community Development in Australia” Second Edition, Thomson Publishing, Victoria, Australia. ISBN: 0 17 010205
- Lawrence, C. (2002). “Dr Carmen Lawrence: What is social justice?” Website: http://www.safecom.org.au/social-justice.htm
- Muirhead, T. (2002) “Weaving tapestries : a handbook for building communities” Mount Hawthorn, W.A. : Local Government Community Services Association (WA)
- Dodson, M. (1993) “Annual Report of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner.” Commonwealth of Australia.
- Anderson, S.C (2008) Linking Flexible VET Delivery to Community Development in the Context of an Indigenous Community A Dissertation for the Award of Masters in Education Charles Darwin University