AFRO-NETS> Towards a New Theory for Community Development (2)

[Claudio Schuftan <aviva@netnam.vn>]

Towards a New Theory for Community Development (2)
--------------------------------------------------
 
 
Dear Golden, 
 
my view is a bit different. What do you think?
 
Cordially,
Claudio Schuftan
mailto:aviva@netnam.vn
 
 
THE COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT DILEMMA: WHEN ARE SERVICE DELIVERY, 
CAPACITY BUILDING, ADVOCACY AND SOCIAL MOBILIZATION REALLY 
EMPOWERING?
 
* In community development, the empowerment of some entails the dis-
  empowerment of others -- usually the current holders of power.
 
* But beware, empowering people can well trigger repressive actions 
  by the authorities.
 
* Empowerment is a continuous process; it provides people with 
  choices and the ability to choose; it is the only (and necessary) way 
  to expand the 'political manoeuvring space' of a community seriously 
  trying 'to develop'.
 
IN THE DELIVERY OF SERVICES, EMPOWERING MEANS, OR IS, OR ARE ACTIONS 
THAT TEND TOWARDS:
 
* Providing services in a gender sensitive + culture sensitive way.
* Using existing local human resources.
* Community representatives participate in making decisions about the 
  services being delivered.
* Training of staff is mostly competence-based, in-service, aimed at 
  behavioral change and followed by regular support supervision.
* People cease to be passive recipients of services; they demand re-
  sponsibility for themselves; they take part in the decision making 
  process and in the delivery mechanisms.
 
IN CAPACITY BUILDING, EMPOWERING MEANS, OR IS, OR ARE ACTIONS THAT 
TEND TOWARDS:
 
* Enabling individuals/communities to continuously upgrade their 
  ability to analyze and understand their situation (people themselves 
  collecting, interpreting and using information for action). 
* Sharing a Conceptual Framework of the causes of their problems.
* Exposing people to relevant information, especially about the real 
  causes behind their problems. (Includes warning people about 'misin-
  formation' they are exposed to and replacing it).
* Raising people's consciousness to legitimize their claims.
* Changing people's perception of their potentials to forge a new re-
  ality.
* Increasing people's awareness of what is ?unfair? to them.
* Building growing constituencies for people's rights-based strate-
  gies.
* Emphasizing the provision of skills that lead to community owner-
  ship of the interventions undertaken.
* Giving high priority to literacy, especially for girls and women.
* Boosting women's negotiation capabilities, as well as their confi-
  dence.
* Raising consciousness about the natural environment.
* Emphasizing the training of local leaders, teaching them to carry 
  out social and political mappings that point to the current structure 
  of control of resources, as well as to carry out decision audits of 
  who currently makes what decisions about what
* Training community animators/validators as local strategic allies 
  to introduce new ideas.
* Creating new employment opportunities and democratizing access to 
  credit, as well as setting up income generation activities for women.
* Giving people a better income capacity and access to available sup-
  port systems.
* Building the mental preparedness for social mobilization.
* Preparing people to press-on with needed advocacy and effective 
  lobbying.
 
IN ADVOCACY, EMPOWERING MEANS, OR IS, OR ARE ACTIONS THAT TEND 
TOWARDS:
 
* Convincing and persuading decision-makers.
* Increasing people's demand for access to services.
* Emphasizing work towards the eradication of poverty. (Empowerment 
  implies a reduction of extreme poverty).
* Fostering actions that decrease the workload of women and give them 
  options for birth spacing.
* Promoting the shifting of the explicit control of resources more to 
  women.
* Promoting a more local control of resources.
* Striving for more economic justice and aiming at decreasing the 
  skewedness in the distribution of income and wealth.
* Addressing minority equity issues.
* Assuring active people's participation in informed decision-making.
* Raising people's consciousness about what their rights are and 
  translating them into specific claims.
 
IN SOCIAL MOBILIZATION, EMPOWERING MEANS, OR IS, OR ARE ACTIONS THAT 
TEND TOWARDS:
 
* Going from people's felt needs to concrete demands and from these 
  to making claims so they can better fight for their rights.(i.e., mo-
  bilization of their social power). 
* Mobilizing people's own resources as needed. 
* Organizing people to effectively use and progressively control ex-
  ternal resources. 
* Networking with others, to achieve a critical mass of concerned 
  people (locally and externally), and building coalitions. 
* Collectively identifying problems, searching for solutions and im-
  plementing them. 
* Giving people power over decisions thus increasing their self-
  esteem and self-confidence. 
* Increasing local democracy with people (especially women) partici-
  pating more actively in local government. 
* Decentralizing decision-making, including shifting control of fi-
  nances to the local sphere. (i.e., devolution of power). 
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