A Prescriptive Model

This paper describes the findings of an action research project based in a community setting. A key focus of the paper is a discussion on how workers in community agencies can become partners in research projects. Given their positions within agencies, community and social service workers can assist in ensuring that research findings will make a contribution to the development of more effective social and community work practice. The paper also discusses research principles that can guide action research projects in communities and in social service agencies. These principles are derived from action research methodologies and from community development practice. The researchers argue that approaches such as strength-based practice can also guide research processes. The authors also encourage researchers to critically evaluate the purposes of research: will it generate useful knowledge and make a difference in the lives of those being researched, or does it merely serve the purposes of the researchers?

The increase in personal and mobile technologies as well as increasing access to organisational media suggests new ways in which community development can be supported. In this paper, we describe the differences between text messaging and email as ways of supporting community activities. A case study of a group of University students is presented. A framework for characterising and comparing communities is described. This is used to analyse the role of the technologies in the development of a sense of community amongst the students. The students completed communication diaries. Differences in the use of the technologies are identified and described. These are explained in terms of a claims analysis in which literature claims are compared with the collected data. The discussion focuses on the social use of technology and the integration of media within the community setting.

Intersectoral collaborations are recommended as effective strategies to reduce health inequalities. People most affected by health inequalities, as are people living in poverty, remain generally absent from such intersectoral collaborations. Community-based participatory research (CBPR) projects can be leveraged to better understand how to involve people with lived experience to support both individual and community empowerment. In this paper, we offer a critical reflection on a CBPR project conducted in public housing in Québec, Canada, that aimed to develop intersectoral collaboration between tenants and senior executives from four sectors (housing, health, city and community organizations). This single qualitative case study design consisted of fieldwork documents, observations and semi-structured interviews. Using the Emancipatory Power Framework (EPF) and the Limiting Power Framework (LPF), we describe examples of types of power and resistance shown by the tenants, the intersectoral partners and the research team. The discussion presents lessons learned through the study, including the importance for research teams to reflect on their own power, especially when aiming to reduce health inequalities. The paper concludes by describing the limitations of the analyses conducted through the EPF–LPF frameworks and suggestions to increase the transformative power of future studies.

The “Males’ Sexual Health Society” (MSHS, pseudonym) has been implementing HIV-prevention programmes for males-who-have-sex-with-males (MSM) in Bangladesh since the 1990s, aiming to employ a community development (CD) approach. MSM refers here to a diversity of homosexually-active biological males with differing gender and sexual identities, so that the focus for ‘community development’ is not straightforward. This doctoral research aimed to examine how ‘community’ and ‘identity’ are constructed by MSHS while using CD as an approach, who holds the dominant power in constructing these concepts, and whether and how participation of different gender and sexual identity groups are ensured by the MSHS. Case-study research focused on MSHS’s operations in a city in Bangladesh. Interviews were conducted with beneficiaries, staff and board-members, as well as donors. Documentary analysis and non-participant observations were also employed. The data analysis adopted a social constructionist perspective and used techniques associated with grounded theory. The findings suggest that the agency has focused on constructing a community of ‘Kothi’, who are feminized males and commonly engaged in sex work. The agency is wielding power to assert the Kothi identity as the pre-eminent basis for community development but some MSM are working within the agency’s structure not directly to challenge this dominant discourse but to work with it to broaden it out and reintroduce diverse legitimated identities. The agency founders regarded community development as a means of reducing vulnerability to HIV infection but also as a means of funding and legitimating political organising among local MSM. The agency has enabled the participation of MSM already identifying as Kothi and encouraging some MSM to embrace this identity for the first time. Some beneficiaries reported empowerment for example through vocational education and sexual negotiation skills. Though rhetorically emphasising bottom-up decision-making, in practice power is largely held by the agency’s board, top management and increasingly donors. But it is also clear that beneficiaries have not merely been the ‘objects’ of community development, with some constructing nuanced and contingent identities, for example embracing mixed identities or inviting non-Kothi-identified partners to agency activities. More recently there are concerns that donors’ increasing power is hampering the more intangible but perhaps crucial aspects of community development most valued by beneficiaries. In conclusion community development has proceeded in complex ways, enabling as well as directing, and producing diversity as well as cohesion.

The first International edition of this textbook provides students with an introduction to the basic concepts and principles of social psychology from an interactionist perspective. The presentation of classic studies and theories are balanced with insights from cutting-edge, contemporary research. An emphasis on real world examples and applications is intended to guide students to critically analyze their situations and social interactions in order to put their knowledge to effective use.

Improving public spaces is a strategy of great importance for the successful future of our cities and their communities. The potential of places for citizen communication is often underestimated as stimulus for growth and development of urban communities and therefore public spaces are underused. The article analyses socioeconomic and psychological effects of architectural arrangement of traditional public spaces in modern perspective as areas for social interaction between different neighbourhood and citizen groups in an urban community, based on case examples of two cities: Vilnius in Lithuania and Weimar in Germany. Analysis of changing spatial composition and principles of social functioning are directly dependent on socio-political system of each different historical period and represent the chronological evolution of the present architectural appearance of the presented urban squares. The importance of local urban territorial communities is underlined in the article as they are the most important social entities for identifying the needs of local residents and in many cases are ready to take over the responsibility for rearrangement of the public spaces adjacent to their areas of residence. Based on a careful observation of public activities on going in the analysed urban squares in Vilnius and in Weimar, the principles of planning, functionality and spatial arrangement are analysed in the aspect of facilitation of social interactions on going or potentially possible in these spaces. The research identifies planning and spatial arrangement models that could facilitate the preferred ways of social interactions and generate the better overall aesthetical and functional quality of those places. Santrauka Viešųjų erdvių kokybės gerinimas yra svarbus miesto socialinės raidos uždavinys. Neįvertinus didelio viešųjų erdvių potencialo miesto bendruomenėms augti ir plėtotis, dažnai viešosios erdvės miestuose yra apleistos ir neišnaudotos, kartais jos užstatomos pastatais ir išnyksta. Pasiremiant dviejų miestų – Vilniaus Lietuvoje ir Veimaro Vokietijoje – pavyzdžiais, straipsnyje analizuojami socialiniai, ekonominiai ir psichologiniai miesto viešųjų erdvių architektūrinės struktūros efektai jų poveikio įvairių mieto gyventojų grupių bendravimui aspektu. Tiriamų miestų skverų ir aikščių erdvinė kompozicija ir jų socialinis reikšmingumas kito pagal besikeičiančius istorinių laikotarpių socialinius, politinius principus: tą parodo šių viešųjų erdvių architektūrinės planinės struktūros evoliucijos tyrimas. Straipsnyje iškeliamas vietos teritorinių bendruomenių kaip subjektų, tiesiogiai suinteresuotų greta jų gyvenamųjų vietų esančių viešųjų erdvių pertvarkymu, naudojimu ir priežiūra, vaidmuo. Remdamiesi atidžiu tiriamuose Veimaro ir Vilniaus skveruose ir aikštėse vykstančių viešojo bendravimo procesų stebėjimu, straipsnio autoriai pateikia rekomendacijas, kaip įvertinant miestiečių bendravimo specifiką reiktų tobulinti miestų viešųjų erdvių suplanavimą, erdvinę struktūrą, funkcionalumą ir kitus svarbius jų įrengimo aspektus.

Consultation research to date has largely concentrated on how consultation practices generally serve only the purpose of procedural compliance. This article identifies and explores the gap in existing research on the impact of law on consultation practices and purposes. To explore current practices and the potential contribution of law to the nature of consultation practices, the article focuses on the NSW duty to consult Aboriginal people before permitting harm to Aboriginal cultural heritage. Conventional regulatory approaches to consultation assume that Aboriginal interests are accommodated by the same consultation strategies applied to other stakeholders in rural law and policy. This article uses an administrative law doctrinal research approach to identify the specific issues and requirements for Aboriginal consultation relating to cultural heritage. Consideration is given to the effectiveness of the case study consultation requirements, the duty design, and the recent Land and Environment Court judgment of Ashton Coal Operations Pty Limited v Director-General, Department of Environment, Climate Change and Water. The article argues that statutory consultation requirements and purposes can, and should, be taken more seriously. The law reform discussion highlighted in the paper considers how identified consultation requirements can be incorporated into Australian Cultural Heritage legislation, and the possible impact of such incorporation on the purpose of the consultation. More broadly, the law reform discussion indicates that when consultation requirements are tailored to suit the purpose of the consultation and the consultation parties, the law can play a positive role in consultation, engagement and capacity building.

Local governments play pivotal role in fostering and facilitating community development, a vital aspect of societal progress. This research aims to explore and analyze the multifaceted role of local governments in community development initiatives. Through an extensive literature review and case studies, this study investigates the key responsibilities, challenges, and best practices employed by local governments to ameliorate conditions of their communities. The research delves into the various aspects of community development, including social, economic, and environmental dimensions. It examines how local governments engage with stakeholders—residents, community organizations, and businesses—to identify needs, set priorities, and implement strategies tailored to the unique characteristics of their regions. Furthermore, the study investigates the policy frameworks, funding mechanisms, and resources that local governments utilize to support community development projects. The research relies upon qualitative methods and data collection mainly from official documents and research. Findings from this research helps not only understanding challenges and means employed to address them by local governments in community development.

Public participation is increasingly becoming a necessary content in community regeneration in China, though there is a lack of evaluation of the public participation process. This study explores a method for evaluating the public participation process, with the aim of improving the effectiveness of public participation. Based on the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) and using the analysis method of structural equation modeling, this study has preliminarily established the evaluation model of public participation processes represented by “Expectation–Perception–Satisfaction–Trust (EPST)”, while taking a case study in Nanjing for empirical study. The results show that to improve general satisfaction and public trust in those activities participated in, it is necessary to upgrade public expectation and the public perceived quality at the same time. This study believes that the entire investigation and understanding of public demands before regeneration is the premise to improving the regeneration effect. For community regeneration in Chinese cities, the key is to mobilize public participation, while a detailed understanding of residents’ needs for community environment and community services is an important part of enhancing the effectiveness of regeneration. This study believes that in community regeneration, actively organizing various participation activities and giving full play to the role of local government and third-party organizations are conducive to enhancing the public’s satisfaction with regeneration.

Using Monticello, Utah, as our case study, we apply interactional field theory to an understudied area – the impact of extralocal institutions on community development related to environmental health issues. While the role of external forces in community development efforts is acknowledged in the interactional field theory literature (e.g. Brennan, M., & Luloff, A., (2007). Exploring rural community agency differences in Ireland and Pennsylvania. Journal of Rural Studies, 23(1), 52–61; Korsching, P., Sapp, S., & El-Ghamrini, S. (2003). Rural telephone company adoption of service innovations: A community field theory approach. Rural Sociology, 68(3), 387–409), there is minimal analysis of what happens to community development when encountering these forces. Therefore, we explore what can occur when collective community action related to local toxics and community-wide illness collides with an extralocal federal agency. To accomplish this, we analyze both in-depth interview data and archival data sources. Doing so begins to address the assertion in this journal that “theories of community, including but not limited to interaction theory, must better account for the existence of structural level constraints and the various ways in which such constraints are manifested and experienced at the local level” (Theodori, G. (2008). Constraints to the development of community. Community Development.: Journal of the Community Development Society, 39, 106).

There are many constraints to community development. In this paper some of the constraints to the design of a feasible integrated, rural community development project in an isolated third world setting are considered. Constraints to data gathering are considered in terms of reliability, validity, and multi-disciplinary team work. Constraints to the project design process are discussed with respect to attitudes of officials, the use of the report, and development. Three factors which community development specialists might want to pay particular attention to are: interpersonal relations, qualitative contextual factors and community goals. This case study will help to clarify some of the similarities and differences between Indonesia and other third world settings on the one hand and North America on the other. While social organization and welfare may be quite different in some respects, some of the constraints to data gathering and project design may be analogous to problems frequently encountered in community development efforts in the U.S. or Canada.

Conflict is a major facet of many environmental challenges of our time. However, growing conflict complexity makes it more difficult to identify win-win strategies for sustainable conflict resolution. Innovative methods are needed to help predict, understand, and resolve conflicts in cooperative ways. Agent-Based Modeling of Environmental Conflict and Cooperation examines computer modeling techniques as an important set of tools for assessing environmental and resource-based conflicts and, ultimately, for finding pathways to conflict resolution and cooperation. This book has two major goals. First, it argues that complexity science can be a unifying framework for professions engaged in conflict studies and resolution, including anthropology, law, management, peace studies, urban planning, and geography. Second, this book presents an innovative framework for approaching conflicts as complex adaptive systems by using many forms of environmental analysis, including system dynamics modeling, agent-based modeling, evolutionary game theory, viability theory, and network analysis. Known as VIABLE (Values and Investments from Agent-Based interaction and Learning in Environmental systems), this framework allows users to model advanced facets of conflicts—including institution building, coalition formation, adaptive learning, and the potential for future conflict—and conflict resolution based on the long-term viability of the actors' strategies. Written for scholars, students, practitioners, and policy makers alike, this book offers readers an extensive introduction to environmental conflict research and resolution techniques. As the result of decades of research, the text presents a strong argument for conflict modeling and reviews the most popular and advanced techniques, including system dynamics modeling, agent-based modeling, and participatory modeling methods. This indispensable guide uses NetLogo, a widely used and free modeling software package, to implement the VIABLE modeling approach in three case study applications around the world. Readers are invited to explore, adapt, modify, and expand these models to conflicts they hope to better understand and resolve.

Team Teaching “Conflict Resolution in Educational and Community Settings”: An Experiment in Collaboration and Conflict Resolution

Political groups are often seen as polarized communities. Research suggests social capital predicts intergroup attitudes; those who perceive higher social capital tend to have more positive attitudes about racial outgroups. Do the positive associations between social capital and racial attitudes extend to attitudes about political outgroups? If so, could social capital help reduce political animosities? Lessons are found in the fields of community development and psychology. We conducted a survey (n = 338) of college students regarding their perceptions of social capital in their university community, as well as their political ideology and attitudes about liberals and conservatives. After controlling for personality and pre-political predispositions, regression analyses indicate asymmetrical effects. Among liberals, social capital positively predicts attitudes about the liberal ingroup and the conservative outgroup. Among conservatives, social capital has no significant effects on attitudes about either political group. Thus, liberals and conservatives respond differently to their beliefs about their communities, potentially impacting the effectiveness of interventions.

(1997). In Search of Basic Principles in Social Psychology (Book) Psychological Inquiry: Vol. 8, No. 4, pp. 355-359.