Community Development Theory
Salman Wahid
SWK301Seminar42019.pptxPlanning
Seminar 4
Working with and developing communities (SWK301)
Overview of models…
Last seminar we looked at Rothman, Popple and Twelvetrees’ ideas for thinking about community work
In this seminar we will look at where ‘social’ or ‘community’
planning fits in terms of the various typologies we discussed last week.
| Rothmans typology | Community Development | Social Planning | Social Action |
| Goals | Capacity building, network building, self help, process orientated. | To solve a particular problem. Task orientated | Social change Institutional change Power shifts |
| Assumptions | People need community. The community holds the answers to it’s issues. | There are substantive problems that experts can fix | Society is unjust and unequal. Power must be challenged |
| Strategies for change | Involvement of broad range of people to determine and address their own issues | Gather data about issue and make decisions about most logical course of action | Consciousness raising and mobilizing of people to take action against the causes of oppression |
| Characteristics, tactics | Consensus, communication, discussion among diverse groups | Consensus or conflict | Conflict, direct action, confrontation, negotiation. |
| Practitioner roles | Facilitator, networker, event management, group worker, | Expert, researcher, analyst, social policy worker, project manager | Advocate, organiser, media liaison, event management |
Rothmans typology
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| Model | Strategy | Main role/title of worker | Examples of work/agencies | Key texts |
| Community Care | Cultivating social networks and voluntary services. Developing self-help concepts. | Organizer / Volunteer | Work with older people, persons with disabilities, children under 5 years old | Beresford & Croft (1986); Heginbotham (1990); Mayo (1994) |
| Community organisation | Improving co-ordination between different welfare agencies | Organizer / Catalyst / Manager | Councils for Voluntary Service, Racial Equality Councils, Settlements | Adamson et al. (1988); Dearlove (1974); Dominelli (1990) |
| Community development | Assisting groups to acquire the skills and confidence to improve quality of life. Active participation. | Enabler / Neighbourhood Worker / Facilitator | Community groups, Tenants groups, Settlements | Association of Metropolitan Authorities (1993); Barr (1991) |
| Social/community planning | Analysis of social conditions, setting of goals and priorities, implementing and evaluating services and programmes | Enabler / Facilitator | Localities undergoing redevelopment | Marris (1987); Twelvetrees (1991) |
| Community education | Attempts to bring education and community into a closer and more equal relationship | Educator / Facilitator | Community schools/colleges, 'compensatory education', Working class/feminist adult education | Allen et al. (1987); Allen & Martin (1992); Freire (1970, 1972, 1976, 1985); Lovett (1975); Lovett et al. (1983); Rogers (1994) |
| Community action | Usually class-based, conflict-focused direct action at local level | Activist | Squatting movement, welfare rights movement, resistance against planning and redevelopment, tenant's action | Craig et al. (1982); Jacobs & Popple (1994); Lees & Mayo (1984) |
| Feminist community work | Improvement of women's welfare, working collectively to challenge and eradicate inequalities suffered by women | Activist / Enabler / Facilitator | Women's refuges, Women's health groups, Women's therapy centres | Barker (1986); Dixon et al. (1982); Dominelli (1990, 1994); Flynn et al. (1986) |
| Black and anti-racist community work | Setting up and running groups that support the needs of Black people. Challenging racism. | Activist / Volunteer | Racial Equality Councils and Commission for Racial Equality funded projects | Ohri et al. (1982); Sivanandan (1976,1990); Sondhi (1982,1994) |
Popple’s Models of Community Work Practice
From: Popple (1995) Analysing Community Work - Its theory and practice, Buckingham: Open University Press
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Different dimensions of community work
Community development -----------
Self-help ---------
Generic community work -----------
Process focused -------------------
Enabling role of worker ---------------
Community work in its own right -----
Social Planning
Service and influence
Specialist community work
Product focused
Organising role of worker
Community work as an ‘attitude’
In Twelvetrees (2008) dimensions of community work, the community development worker works with people to assist them to realise their goals;
“The second main way in which the worker may operate is by initiating projects, liaising and working directly with service providers to sensitise them to the needs of specific communities, assisting them to improve services or alter policies…….I generally refer to this form of community work as the social planning approach.’
Some community work will involve more community development and some will involve more ‘social planning.’ Some community work will involve both.
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These typologies tell us similar things about planning and social planning
Can involve ‘needs analysis’ or an enquiry into what a community wants, such as asset-mapping ( these are different)
Issues or concerns or hopes are identified, a logic-model approach is used to develop tasks and strategies to address them
a facilitator works with the community to follow up the tasks to resolve the issues
Evaluation takes place
Assumptions brought to any planning will shape how it is carried out, who is involved and where the outcomes will go and how effective the outcomes are.
A deficit approach to planning begins with what is missing or what’s not happening in the community, similar to focussing on the problems of an individual Whereas an asset based approach begins with what is working in the community.
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‘How do you know what you need, if you don’t know what you already have?’
Cormac Russell
What is the starting point for planning? This will influence the approach chosen.
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Strategic planning;
Develop a common VISION (how will the future look?)
Design an operational plan (what will we do to get there?)
Action plans –(how-tasks and steps to get there)
Evaluation- or review-(what will change? How will we know we are successful?)
Stringer. E.–e-readings for more exploration of using strategic thinking in community planning.
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Planning-the beginning of community work
A community profile creates a picture of the community;
information; data, ie ABS (census), reports (hard)
information; opinions and views about the area (soft)
information about organisations, structures, existing resources
What has already happened ?
Twelvetrees (2008), outlines a range of ways that community workers ‘do’ their planning even before formally engaging with the community (pre-start)
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What do we know about a place? A street? A group? A location?
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Asset –mapping considers the assets in a community
Individual assets-skills; ideas, talents of people
Institutional assets; organisations, clubs churches, schools
Social networks; informal and formal networks
Economic assets; business, markets, tool libraries
Physical assets; public spaces, playgrounds, parks, gardens
Stories, cultural and spiritual assets; museums, art galleries, traditions, values, belief systems
Exercise;
On a piece of paper write all the assets that you know of in a town ( or place you live or know well) on the other side of the paper list the issues or problems that you know about in the same place.
Both lists may be accurate, however starting from the assets energises and creates possibilities for change that a focus on the problems doesn’t allow. This planning tool then determines the next steps.
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Using asset -mapping
Define the purpose
Define the community project boundaries
Identify stakeholders
Identify the tools
Identify the assets
Apply and connect the knowledge
Tools for asset mapping
Street audits
Websites
Lists;10 best places to walk in our town
Events
Story telling
Public arts displays
Communi-tree
‘what people love about their community’
Source; Bank of Ideas
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No one person will know of all the assets in a community. Inviting people to contribute in different ways, recognises that most people have skills.
My big idea- one way to involve ideas from community members.
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Low –hanging fruit or short term and simple projects
What can be achieved easily or in the short term?
Train people to mentor new parents
A community festival
Training for association Leaders
-e reading; "We can't eat a road: Asset-based community development and the Gedam Sefer community partnership in Ethiopia" by Mulu Yeneabat & Alice K Butterfield
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Social Planning
An issue is in the public arena
Research and/or ‘needs assessment’ is commissioned (often by a local council, state or federal government)
A program is developed to address the needs
People are employed to deliver the project
Evaluation research is undertaken
Eg; Royal Commission into Institutional responses to child sexual Abuse (Australia Wide)
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Examples of social planning?
Northern Territory Emergency Response?
Large scale social planning exercise?
What might be the links to social policy?
The needs of young people ‘ leaving care’ in the care system. Children who grow up under the care of the government (wards of the state)- what happens to them when they leave care, turn 18? What do they need in terms of housing, education, education, employment?
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Indicators of good planning
What is happening in a good planning process?
What might be the barriers to good planning?
What might be the challenges for the worker in planning in the community work context?
Discuss these questions in groups.
For external students simply consider these questions.
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In the humanitarian context
Often outside humanitarian agencies come into a community to work
A community (or issue) is selected to ‘work with’
In some cases the location has been selected based on assessment of need in a particular location by a government or humanitarian agency.
Who decides on what the issue or problem is?
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Emergency Community Work
In many cases a location is selected because it has been the location of an emergency of some kind such; famine, war, environmental issue
Emergency or ‘disaster’ planning is required
Ideally there are plans in place PRIOR to an emergency (particularly in areas prone to environmental disasters)
This is a brief overview of planning and social planning; -in community development empowerment as a central value drives and shapes how planning occurs
