Community Development

Definition Community development is a log-term value based process which aims to address imbalances and bring about change founded on social justice, equality and inclusion.

 Community development (CD) is a broad term applied to the practices and academic disciplines of civic leaders, activists, involved citizens and professionals to improve various aspects of local communities.

Scope of Community Development

Community development is a very broad and wide term. It covers many issues including: Planning Services Servicing self help groups Running support and social action groups Building Community Networks Participating in inter-agency meeting Undertaking needs assessment

Increasing peoples skills Resourcing the community to meet needs Improving quality of life Defining priorities Working towards social justice Empowering individuals and communities

Principles of Community Development

Social Justice Citizenship and human rights Empowerment and Self-determination Collective action

 Tolerance of diversity Working for change and involvement in conflict Liberation and participating democracy Accessibility of human services

Values of Community Development

Equality and Anti-discrimination Collective Action Social Justice Working and Learning together

Rural and Urban Community Development

There are lots of differences in process of community development in rural and urban areas. In rural areas communities are closely net, whereas in urban area communities are sometime not very closely located.

In rural areas community sometimes people are not aware of several issue and additional efforts are required to motivate them.

 Sometimes issue of rural and urban communities have different types of issues, problems hence they address those proposal as per their social requirements. In rural areas population is sometime divided on the basis of biraderies, class, tribes and caste system, hence it requires different types of efforts to tackle those problems.

 In urban areas communities are divided on the basis of professions, ethnicities, religions. Hence problems are different. In rural areas sometimes societies are close but in urban centers societies become multiethnic and cosmopolitan.

Elements of Community Development

The idea of community development as a process is consisting following six inter-related elements or stages:
Element Characteristic Question

Information Theories Concepts Research reports Statistics surveys Budgets Peoples own experiences

What we know

Authenticity Peoples own knowledge and viewpoints What do the people think Pragmatism Existing structures, processes and practices What are the facilitating or constraining factors? What are our choices? What can we do

Vision

Alternative views of how things could be done

How could things be different? What would we like to happen? What is to be done and who will do it?

Strategy

Plans for getting to where we want to be

Transform Changes of existing structures, ation processes and practices

What changes have taken place?

Evaluation Evaluating the changes to existing What so we think of structures, processes and the changes that have practices taken place?

Role of Community Development Workers

Community workers play central pivotal role in the community development. Community workers have to keep following things in their mind:a) b) c) d) Tasks Abilities Knowledge Skills