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No. 1 The APJ Magazine February 2007 |
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In
This Issue: ‘Is There Such a Thing as Community?’ – Kevin Loughran APJ Publications Email: Tel / Fax: + 44 (0)28 9072 9353 APJ Publications: |
Is
There Such a Thing as Community? Kevin Loughran * *Kevin Loughran has worked for many years in the fields of community
development and social policy. He is
the author of The Idea of Community,
Social Policy and Self published by APJ Publications in 2003. Few of us do not
acknowledge the idea of community in some way or another. For example, we attach the word community
to many titles of jobs or activities or institutions: community nurse,
community social worker, community pharmacy, community policing, community
workshop, community enterprises, community health centres; and so on. Community is more than a commonly used
word. It has become a habit of
expression. Does it matter? After all (it can be argued) the world
doesn’t come to an end because many common words or phrases are used
loosely. But when a word is used not
only loosely but habitually – when it has become a habit of expression – then
we have ceased to think about what we mean by it. We have ceased to consider that we may not
be conveying any information or adding any meaning to what we say or write when
we use the word. What do we mean by community when
we use the word? Often when we talk
about community we are referring to a group of people who happen to have
something in common: they live in the same place, or come from a similar
background, or face the same changes – or threats – to their
environment. By using the word
community we imply that we are saying something about the situation of this
group of people and their relationships with each other. In fact we may be failing to explain why we
are picking them out. We may be
failing to examine what they have in common and what makes them a
group. We may be failing to examine
their relationships with each other. If the idea of community is to be
of value, it will be as a means of understanding and describing something of
what is common between people. If the
idea of community is to be of use it will be by providing insights into the
networks to which people are connected and the forms of association in which
they participate. By providing such
insights the idea of community can suggest frameworks for offering support
and organising services. It can point
to ways of reaching people. But if the idea of community is
of some use, how far does its usefulness go?
Most often the idea of community is acknowledged without any sense of
the limits of the idea. But all ideas
have limits to their usefulness. There
is much that the idea of community does not explain, to which it is not
relevant. Community is but one among
a number of dimensions of our social existence. Take the application of the idea
of community in the health and social services, especially the services
grouped together under the heading of community care. How does the community part relate to the
care part? Perhaps the community in
community care means that some idea of community is essential to the services
and activities under the heading of community care. But many helping relationships within
health and social services do not involve any process which might be
described as a process of community.
Most services under the heading of community care involve, as part of
the service, individualised helping relationships which are on too small and
personal a scale to justify the application of the word community to them. And if we are prepared to
question what we mean by the word community, and probe the limits of the idea
of community, we should be prepared to ask the fundamental question: is there
such a thing as community? Or are
there, as Robert Nozick in Anarchy,
State and Utopia (1974) asserted, only individual people with their own
individual lives? For many people the question ‘Is
there such a thing as community?’ may seem superfluous. They can point to the prevalence of group
life and learning in human social existence.
They can point out that co-operation, when individuals act together
for the benefit of each other, is common in nature and even more common among
human beings. They can argue that
co-operation is natural. But co-operation may not be all
that it seems. Co-operation may have
evolved as a sensible way of protecting individual self-interest; and now may
represent a recognition that, as often as not,
individual self-interests belong together.
Perhaps all human behaviour, whether individual acts of acquisition or
individual acts of giving or co-operative acts in groups, is motivated
ultimately by individual self-interest.
Perhaps we value the outcomes of our actions more by possible individual
advantage to ourselves than by any other outcome. If we do, can the word community be a
useful way of describing our relationships with each other? Straightforward words such as ‘association’
or ‘group’ or ‘grouping’ would be preferable: words which refer simply to
people coming together for some common purpose but do not in themselves imply
any quality of relationship. Some who take an essentially
individualist view will argue that some degree of association for the purpose
of mutual support is prudent and necessary, and that there is a necessary
role for the state: to prescribe certain goals, to provide certain benefits
and to regulate certain activities.
But others will carry the argument further and be sceptical about
imposing any social obligations on individuals. For example, Robert Nozick in Anarchy, State and Utopia (1974)
argued for a minimal state which would be limited to the function of
protecting its citizens against force, theft and fraud and of enforcing
contracts. On this basis he argued
that it was as illegitimate for the state to take a man’s goods through taxes
to pay for services for needy people as it would be to direct him into forced
labour to provide services for needy people. What answers do we give to the
question ‘Is there such a thing as community?’ may influence how we define
problems and where we seek solutions.
If human nature is essentially individualist, if strategies of
self-interest are at the heart of social existence, then collective action
will be for individual ends. Social
policy – if there is to be social policy – will be about facilitating
individual choices. Community may be a
misleading term. But if the groups and
associations in which we are involved with other people are part of what and
who we are, if co-operation is a fundamental fact of our existence and our
being, and not simply collective means to individual ends, then it will not
be sufficient to interpret our social existence in terms of the arrangements
which individual people make with each other.
It will be necessary to consider the quality of our
relationships. It will be necessary to
acknowledge that being with other people and acting together with them are
not simply means to individual ends but can be ends in themselves. If relationships with other people are ends
in themselves then the idea of community can have some validity as a means of
describing what is common between people. A strong idea of community may
imply state action. Michael Walzer (in
Liberalism and its Critics, edited
by Michael T Sandel, 1984) advocated the idea of political community, and a
general obligation for the mutual provision of security and welfare. Within such a philosophy, state action
would seem a natural and logical consequence of there being a political
community. A strong idea of community within
a conservative philosophy would lead to a different view of social relations
and obligations and the role of the state.
Roger Scruton (in Conservative Texts,
1991) emphasised association between people outside of government. Mutual support could be provided by direct
association and a multiplicity of associations. This conservative idea of community could
be taken to call into question the very idea of an active social policy by
the state. What answers we give to the
question ‘Is there such a thing as community?’ may reflect how we see social
existence: how we view obligations and responsibilities and what we should do
about them; how we associate; and how we see the role of the state. In questioning the idea of
community I am not arguing against it.
If an idea is worth thinking about, it is worth questioning. I believe that community is a reasonable
idea to apply to our social existence, but I am asking 'How far does it
go?' And what does each one of us mean
by it when we use the word? When we
use the word community we should mean something and convey that meaning, and
so help each other to choose common actions more sensibly |
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2007 |
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