This timely Research Handbook offers new ways in which to navigate the diverse terrain of community development research. Chapters unpack the foundations and history of community development research and also look to its future, exploring innovative frameworks for conceptualizing community development. Comprehensive and unequivocally progressive, this is key reading for social and public policy researchers in need of an understanding of the current trends in community development research, as well as practitioners and policymakers working on urban, rural and regional development.
The Routledge Handbook of Community Development explores community development theory and practice across the world. The book provides perspectives about community development as an interactive, relevant and sometimes contradictory way to address issues impacting the human condition. It promotes better understanding of the complexities and challenges in identifying, designing, implementing and evaluating community development constructs, applications and interventions. This edited volume discusses how community development is conceptualized as an approach, method or profession. Themes provide the scope of the book, with projects, issues or perspectives presented in each of these areas. This handbook provides invaluable contextualized insights on the theory and practice of community development around core themes relevant in society. Each chapter explores and presents an issue, perspectives, project or case in the thematic areas, with regional and country context included. It is a must-read for students and researchers working in community development, planning and human geography and an essential reference for any professional engaged in community development.
Encompassing community development, organizing, planning, & social change, as well as globalisation, this book is grounded in participatory & empowerment practice. The 36 chapters assess practice, theory & research methods.
With eighty percent of the world's population professing religious faith, religious belief is a common human characteristic. This fascinating and highly unique Handbook brings together state-of-the-art research on incorporating religion into development studies literature and research. The expert contributors illustrate that as religious identity is integral to a community's culture, exclusion of religious consideration will limit successful development interventions; it is therefore necessary to conflate religion and development to enhance efforts to improve the lives of the poor. Issues addressed include: key tenets, beliefs and histories of religions; religious response to development concerns (gender, environment, education, microfinance, humanitarian assistance); and the role of faith based organisations and missionaries in the wider development context. Practical case studies of countries across Africa, Eastern Europe and the Pacific (including Australia) underpin the research, providing evidence that the intersection between religion and development is neither new nor static. By way of conclusion, suggestions are prescribed for extensive further research in order to advance understanding of this nascent field. This path-breaking Handbook will prove a thought-provoking and stimulating reference tool for academics, researchers and students in international development, international relations, comparative religion and theology.
Outreach and engagement initiatives are crucial in promoting community development. This can be achieved through a number of methods, including avenues in the fine arts. The Handbook of Research on the Facilitation of Civic Engagement through Community Art is a comprehensive reference source for emerging perspectives on the incorporation of artistic works to facilitate improved civic engagement and social justice. Featuring innovative coverage across relevant topics, such as art education, service learning, and student engagement, this handbook is ideally designed for practitioners, artists, professionals, academics, and students interested in active citizen participation via artistic channels.
The step-by-step guide to turning any neighborhood around A weak local economy can be strengthened. A run-down neighborhood of boarded-up storefronts, litter-strewn sidewalks, high unemployment, and poorly-maintained housing can be transformed. An entire community can be lifted up. Mihailo (Mike) Temali knows this first-hand. He has spent nearly twenty years working in community-based economic development, helping cities as diverse as St. Paul, Minnesota, and Santiago, Chile. In this concrete, practical, jargon-free handbook, he describes a proven way to make any community a better place to live. Comprehensive, realistic, and easy-to-use If you don't already have a community economic development (CED) organization in place, Temali tells you how to set one up. Then he defines four pivot points that are crucial to neighborhood economies: 1) Revitalizing your commercial district; 2) Developing microbusinesses; 3) Developing your community workforce; and 4) Growing good neighborhood jobs. He explains how to choose your first pivot point, then guides you through the process of tackling each one. True stories of successful CED provide inspiration. Sidebars explore related issues: dealing with gentrification, finding potential partners, supporting microentrepreneurs, and more. Other CED professionals share their insights in "From the Field" notes. Appendices point you toward useful resources, show you how to use the Internet to research your regional economy, and include dozens of worksheets that will help you move from reading about CED to doing it. The Community Economic Development Handbook is precisely what you need to turn your neighborhood around!
This book provides the conceptual, theoretical, and methodological foundation that teachers, principals, professors, and students preparing for teaching will need in order to be informed and effective planners and evaluators of character education programs and good character educators. Through its clear definition of terms, review of Constitutional and public support, comparative analysis of philosophical approaches, synthesis of many relevant theories of child development, K-12 core curriculum, description of many instructional strategies, and methodology for program evaluation, this handbook effectively prepares prospective program planners and character educators to create comprehensive programs that are developmentally appropriate, adapted to the unique needs and characteristics of school communities, and soundly evaluated. Dr. Vessels presents a wide range of options, developmental and practical guidelines for choosing from among these options, and a creative core curriculum and evaluation technology that he hopes school community members will find useful for their particular school or system.
Social and Community Development Practice makes a persuasive case for employing a social development approach to community development practice at local and village levels. Towards this end, the book offers a conceptual clarity of social and community development (SCD) by adding new dimensions. It also shows the significance of social policy education for social and community development workers and the need for expanding community development practice from local levels to international levels. The author argues that the social work profession itself needs to quickly reorganize and strengthen. It needs to consider alternative modes of preparing social workers and community organizers who can reach out at local levels. The profession also needs to develop indigenous ethical standards for SCD practice. The author’s deep reflections reveal the dire need to refocus on SCD practice to address major issues such as poverty and inequality plaguing vast populations around the world.
The second edition of Qualitative Research Methods for Community Development teaches the basic skills, tools, and methods of qualitative research with special attention to the needs of community practitioners. This book teaches students entering planning, community development, nonprofit management, social work, and similar applied fields the core skills necessary to conduct systematic research designed to empower communities and promote social change. Focusing on the basic elements of qualitative research, such as field observation, interviewing, focus groups, and content analysis, this second edition of this book provides an overview of core methods and theoretical underpinnings of successful research. It also includes two new chapters on qualitative data analysis software and techniques for conducting online qualitative interviews and focus groups. From housing, community organizing, neighborhood planning, and urban revitalization, this book gives students the skills they need to undertake their own projects and provides professionals a valuable reference for their future research. This book serves as a primary text for courses in applied qualitative research and as a reference book for professionals and community-based researchers.
The second and expanded edition of this award-winning book provides the most up-to-date and important efforts for improving the quality of life in communities around the world. It focuses on community improvements in relation to the interdisciplinary field of clinical sociology. The first part of the book includes updated analyses of important concepts and tools for community intervention. It discusses the importance of centrally involving community members in all phases of community development activities. Part II includes several completely new chapters and focuses on projects in a number of countries -- the United States, Brazil, South Africa, Canada, the Philippines and France. It covers topics such as establishing human rights cities; involving and empowering local communities; research in communities; the healthy cities movement; and climate change. This edition includes several new gender-focused chapters, addressing local level initiatives based on the recommendations of the Committee on the Elimination and Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), women in prison, and gender factors in climate risk. The appendices include profiles of outstanding practitioners and scholar-practitioners over the last 100 years. This edition includes contributions from well-known scholars and practitioners in clinical sociology and is of interest to sociologists, social policy makers, social workers, and sustainability researchers. The first edition of this book received the Distinguished Scholarly Book Award from the Clinical Sociology Division of the International Sociological Association.
