Ten Concluding reflections: philosophical perspectives on community and community development
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Peter Westoby
Abstract
This chapter concludes the book with philosophical reflections on the nature of ‘community’ as an ethical space and ‘community development’ as an ethical practice. While it may be more usual to begin a text with an abstract philosophical framework within which subsequent practice-oriented chapters are placed or judged, in this book we develop a vision of community and community development at the end. This chapter builds on the diverse narratives of the many ethical challenges relating to policies, organisations and practices recounted by the authors in this volume. They are rooted in the daily doubts and dilemmas faced by people working for transformative change – often in challenging circumstances in the context of a profoundly inequitable world. By turning an ethical lens on this practice, we have focused attention both underneath the macro political and institutional structures and beyond the merely technical and practical toolkits for work on the ground. We have been given accounts of the complexities, uncertainties and contradictions of community development work and the fine textures, including the knots and broken links, that make up the fabric of the ethical spaces in which it is located. What does this mean for our conceptions and theoretical understandings of community and for how we characterise the work that creates, maintains, develops, unsettles and even destroys the ethical space of community?
Community economists Katherine Gibson and Julie Graham (2006) (writing as J.K. Gibson-Graham), drawn on by Gradon Diprose and Ann Hill’s Chapter Nine in this book, use the work of French philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy (1991) and North American feminist Iris Marian Young (1990) to argue that ‘we need to liberate community from its traditional recourse to common being … a commonality of being, an idea of sameness’ (Gibson-Graham, 2006: 85–6).
Abstract
This chapter concludes the book with philosophical reflections on the nature of ‘community’ as an ethical space and ‘community development’ as an ethical practice. While it may be more usual to begin a text with an abstract philosophical framework within which subsequent practice-oriented chapters are placed or judged, in this book we develop a vision of community and community development at the end. This chapter builds on the diverse narratives of the many ethical challenges relating to policies, organisations and practices recounted by the authors in this volume. They are rooted in the daily doubts and dilemmas faced by people working for transformative change – often in challenging circumstances in the context of a profoundly inequitable world. By turning an ethical lens on this practice, we have focused attention both underneath the macro political and institutional structures and beyond the merely technical and practical toolkits for work on the ground. We have been given accounts of the complexities, uncertainties and contradictions of community development work and the fine textures, including the knots and broken links, that make up the fabric of the ethical spaces in which it is located. What does this mean for our conceptions and theoretical understandings of community and for how we characterise the work that creates, maintains, develops, unsettles and even destroys the ethical space of community?
Community economists Katherine Gibson and Julie Graham (2006) (writing as J.K. Gibson-Graham), drawn on by Gradon Diprose and Ann Hill’s Chapter Nine in this book, use the work of French philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy (1991) and North American feminist Iris Marian Young (1990) to argue that ‘we need to liberate community from its traditional recourse to common being … a commonality of being, an idea of sameness’ (Gibson-Graham, 2006: 85–6).
Chapters in this book
- Front Matter i
- Contents v
- List of figures and tables vii
- Rethinking Community Development ix
- Acknowledgements xi
- Notes on contributors xiii
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The ethico-political context
- Ethics, equity and community development: mapping the terrain 3
- Community development in an unequal world: challenging neo-liberal values 37
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Everyday ethics in community development practice
- Negotiating roles and boundaries: ethical challenges in community work 59
- Negotiating consent in neighbourhood-based community development work 83
- Whose ethics counts? Ethical issues in community development and action research with communities facing stigmatisation 103
- Koorliny birniny, ni, quoppa katatjin respect and ethics in working with Indigenous Australian communities 123
- Corporate social responsibility and community development in a mining region in India: issues of power, control and co-option 143
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Envisioning an ethical space for community development
- Relational ethics and transformative community organising in the neo-liberal US context 167
- A Community Economies perspective for ethical community development 189
- Concluding reflections: philosophical perspectives on community and community development 209
- Index 221
Chapters in this book
- Front Matter i
- Contents v
- List of figures and tables vii
- Rethinking Community Development ix
- Acknowledgements xi
- Notes on contributors xiii
-
The ethico-political context
- Ethics, equity and community development: mapping the terrain 3
- Community development in an unequal world: challenging neo-liberal values 37
-
Everyday ethics in community development practice
- Negotiating roles and boundaries: ethical challenges in community work 59
- Negotiating consent in neighbourhood-based community development work 83
- Whose ethics counts? Ethical issues in community development and action research with communities facing stigmatisation 103
- Koorliny birniny, ni, quoppa katatjin respect and ethics in working with Indigenous Australian communities 123
- Corporate social responsibility and community development in a mining region in India: issues of power, control and co-option 143
-
Envisioning an ethical space for community development
- Relational ethics and transformative community organising in the neo-liberal US context 167
- A Community Economies perspective for ethical community development 189
- Concluding reflections: philosophical perspectives on community and community development 209
- Index 221
