The concept of “community”, which seemed to be abandoned, is greatly reviving as regards the possibility to explain the transformations and the interventions in a territory. Nowadays we have to formulate a new concept of community, as collective intelligence, if we want to identify development models to realize the sustainability and the integration of individuals and territories. The collective intelligence has to be intended as a form of intelligence distributed everywhere, constantly improved and coordinated in real time, leading to a real mobilization of resources and competences of a specific context. It is based on people’s acknowledgment and mutual enrichment, not on the worship of “fetished” communities. The Policy makers who really aim to start a territorial sustainable development have to facilitate and enhance the creation of “communities”, as they are fundamental structures in which it’s important “to think about”: they represent the “factory” of a territorial human and social capital (territorial intelligence). The word “community” in a global society has not a negative sense, as the community considers individuals in their plenitude and not in one of the roles they have to play in the society. It is a whole of experiences and thoughts, tradition and engagement, participation and willingness, and at the same time it enhances the social dimension of the existence, the sense of belonging to a common destiny. The contemporary society has strong territorial and social differentiations to be decreased or totally removed. The cities (in many cases metropolis) are deeply fragmented, divided into neighbourhoods and suburbs, strongly differentiated per typology of inhabitants, presence of services and comfort of houses. These aspects of social differentiations cause a feeling of unequal and discriminated use of resources and services, increasing the perception of marginality. On the other hand, small rural or mountain villages continue depopulating, loosing the strong social and identity bonds which allowed them to survive to wars and catastrophes in the past: in this case the sense of marginality affects young people who don’t have certitudes to find a job and abandon their original territories, along with the adults who do not recognize themselves and do not feel to belong to the territories whose policies often imitate the urbanization processes, importing only the negative aspects. Due to these characteristics and conditions, the community is the more appropriate instrument to defend the territory from exclusion processes and to enhance the implementation of “communitarian” development models. It has to be considered as an open space in which environment and social networks find their best interrelation, in the way of sustainability of development and social protection activities, mixing environment, social and economic aspects. The territorial development projects do not have to improve the lifestyle of few people, but of the whole community. To do community means to valorise the differences to contribute to the construction of development models oriented to the preservation of a human dimension of life, starting from the feeling of identity and the embedding to the territory that each individual express when improving social forms of life. The community isn’t only a form of territorial expression revealing trough consolidated identity equipments and shared traditions. It’s the main resource, since is the unique form of social organisation focused on individuals capable to face and overcome “social pathologies” (overcrowding, depopulation, depression, identity crisis, etc.). Therefore, the community should start “promotion”, “participation” and “therapy” actions, leading to the assurance, especially for new generations, of life conditions enabling an itinerary of complete and integrated development.

The Community and Communitarian Development Models

MANGONE, Emiliana
2009-01-01

Abstract

The concept of “community”, which seemed to be abandoned, is greatly reviving as regards the possibility to explain the transformations and the interventions in a territory. Nowadays we have to formulate a new concept of community, as collective intelligence, if we want to identify development models to realize the sustainability and the integration of individuals and territories. The collective intelligence has to be intended as a form of intelligence distributed everywhere, constantly improved and coordinated in real time, leading to a real mobilization of resources and competences of a specific context. It is based on people’s acknowledgment and mutual enrichment, not on the worship of “fetished” communities. The Policy makers who really aim to start a territorial sustainable development have to facilitate and enhance the creation of “communities”, as they are fundamental structures in which it’s important “to think about”: they represent the “factory” of a territorial human and social capital (territorial intelligence). The word “community” in a global society has not a negative sense, as the community considers individuals in their plenitude and not in one of the roles they have to play in the society. It is a whole of experiences and thoughts, tradition and engagement, participation and willingness, and at the same time it enhances the social dimension of the existence, the sense of belonging to a common destiny. The contemporary society has strong territorial and social differentiations to be decreased or totally removed. The cities (in many cases metropolis) are deeply fragmented, divided into neighbourhoods and suburbs, strongly differentiated per typology of inhabitants, presence of services and comfort of houses. These aspects of social differentiations cause a feeling of unequal and discriminated use of resources and services, increasing the perception of marginality. On the other hand, small rural or mountain villages continue depopulating, loosing the strong social and identity bonds which allowed them to survive to wars and catastrophes in the past: in this case the sense of marginality affects young people who don’t have certitudes to find a job and abandon their original territories, along with the adults who do not recognize themselves and do not feel to belong to the territories whose policies often imitate the urbanization processes, importing only the negative aspects. Due to these characteristics and conditions, the community is the more appropriate instrument to defend the territory from exclusion processes and to enhance the implementation of “communitarian” development models. It has to be considered as an open space in which environment and social networks find their best interrelation, in the way of sustainability of development and social protection activities, mixing environment, social and economic aspects. The territorial development projects do not have to improve the lifestyle of few people, but of the whole community. To do community means to valorise the differences to contribute to the construction of development models oriented to the preservation of a human dimension of life, starting from the feeling of identity and the embedding to the territory that each individual express when improving social forms of life. The community isn’t only a form of territorial expression revealing trough consolidated identity equipments and shared traditions. It’s the main resource, since is the unique form of social organisation focused on individuals capable to face and overcome “social pathologies” (overcrowding, depopulation, depression, identity crisis, etc.). Therefore, the community should start “promotion”, “participation” and “therapy” actions, leading to the assurance, especially for new generations, of life conditions enabling an itinerary of complete and integrated development.
2009
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/11386/2296704
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