Citizen Participation & Empowerment Chapter 12 Fall 20101.
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Transcript of Citizen Participation & Empowerment Chapter 12 Fall 20101.
Citizen Participation & Empowerment
Chapter 12
Fall 20101
Fall 20102
Why have you gotten involved in the past?
3 Citizen Participation Themes
Fall 20103
1. Participation in community decision-making
2. Citizen Empowerment
3. Participation & empowerment are related to Sense of Community
Citizen Participation
Fall 20104
“A process in which individuals take part in decision-making in the institutions, programs, & environments that affect them” (text, p. 402)
Participation/Efficiency Balance
Participation: The Means-Ends Distinction
Fall 20105
Means: way of improving community conditions
Commitment to a decision/outcome is greater if you have participated in it
Ends: essential quality of democracy
Its own reward
Empowerment
Fall 20106
“An intentional, ongoing process centered in the local community, involving mutual respect, caring, & group participation, through which people lacking an equal share of resources gain greater access to & control over those resources.”
Accomplished with others, not alone
Qualities of Empowerment
Fall 20107
1. Multilevel Ecological Construct Individuals: personal sense of efficacy Organizations
Empowered Orgs: know how to create changes in community Empowering Orgs: know how to empower people in org
Communities: competent community
2. Levels are Independent feeling empowered ≠ being empowered
3. Bottom Up Approach
Contrasting Empowerment & Prevention
Fall 20108
Rappaport’s (1981) Distinction:
Needs Perspective (prevention)
vs. Rights Perspective (empowerment)
Different Origins Needs perspective from helping professionals Rights perspective from activists, perspective
from activists, community organizers
Characteristics of Needs Perspective
Fall 20109
1. Professional as expert
2. Clients lack competence which they need
3. Risk factors are in the individual
4. Programs developed in one context can be transported across contexts
5. Organizations & communities are sites where intervention occurs, not objects of intervention
Characteristics of Rights Perspective
Fall 201010
Focus on what rights people have to control their lives
Collaborating with people rather than being expert
Assuming people have competencies but lack environmental opportunities to develop them
Risk factors are in environment
Programs need to be developed locally to be responsive to local situation
Organizations & communities are object of intervention
Power: Brief Review
Fall 201011
Involves ability to affect external events/ forces/ decisions
Best understood as aspect of relationships or interrelationships (can be resisted as well as acquiesced to)
Contextual: may have power in some situations/ roles & not others
Power’s Multiple Forms
Fall 201012
1. Types of Power Power Over - capacity to dominate others Power To - ability for self-direction to pursue
goals Power From - ability to resist power exerted by
others
2. Integrative Power: capacity to build groups, bind people together, & inspire loyalty (“people power”) (e.g., Ghandi)
Power
Fall 201013
Reward Power —controlling valued rewards that can be used to shape others’ behavior
Coercive Power —capacity to punish
Legitimate Power —based on role/position of one over another
Expert Power —based on knowledge/skill
Referent Power —based on interpersonal connection or a shared social identity
Participation in Neighborhood Orgs & Sense of Community
Fall 201014
Neighborhood organizations as mediators between citizens & higher-ups Mediators are go-betweens/ liaisons
Citizen participation ranges from attending meetings to holding leadership positions
How Community Orgs Empower Members
Fall 201015
Empowering (member influence)
vs.
Empowered Orgs (community influence)
Qualities of Empowering Orgs
Fall 201016
1. Solidarity Group-based, strengths-based belief system Social Support Shared, Inspiring Leadership
2. Member Participation Participatory Niches, Opportunity Role Structures Task Focus Participatory rewards for volunteers who make the
org possible Promoting diversity Fostering intergroup collaboration
Dilemmas in Creating Empowering Orgs
Fall 201017
Challenge of success Growth/Resources affect initial sense of
mission/solidarity
Paradox of empowerment Can one group empower another? Can old social regularities be overcome? HSC experience
Fall 201018