The Alinsky Model

Definition: The Alinsky Model is a conflict-oriented form of community organizing developed by Saul Alinsky in Chicago in the 1930s. "Alinsky's type of organizing is based on building political power and using it to confront authority - generally through employing social action - and, if necessary, force those in power to negotiate. This kind of organizing is still widely used and still effective, especially in situations where power has long been in the same hands." Source: Section 4. Social Action. (n.d.). Community Tool Box. Retrieved from http://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/assessment/promotion-strategies/systems-advocacy-and-community-organizing/main

Application: The Alinksy Model is an important tool for community developers, especially when working with communities who have historically and continue to hold little power. A great example of applying the Alinsky Model that is extremely relevant right now in community development efforts is organizing large numbers of parents and other community stakeholders in a low-income community to show up at their community's school board meeting to put pressure on the board to concretely address the presence of police officers in schools.    

Adaptation: The Alinsky Model can be easily applied to the context of education, specifically in terms of making student voice heard. For example, many student groups at universities across the country have used the Alinsky model to demand lower tuition and greater university transparency. Because of the power imbalance between the administration and the students, conflict-oriented tactics are often the only way to get the administration to really listen. 

Theory of Democracy

Definition: "Democracy, or 'rule by the people,' is an egalitarian form of government in which all citizens of a nation determine public policy, the laws, and the actions of their state together, requiring that all citizens have an equal opportunity to express their opinion." Source: Boundless. "Theories of Democracy." Boundless Sociology. Boundless, 21 Jul. 2015. Retrieved from https://www.boundless.com/sociology/textbooks/boundless-sociology-textbook/government-15/democracy-115/theories-of-democracy-642-10474/ 

Application: Democratic theory is imperative to community development work - most often, underserved and oppressed communities that developers primarily work in have been robbed of their right to fully participate in the American democratic system on a number of levels. This has two implications for community developers: 1) to ensure that they do replicate systemic oppressions in their work with communities and to approach community work from democratic philosophy that allows all community members to fully engage in the community development work, and 2) to use community development as a tool to push for making democratic theory a reality in the United States. 

Adaptation: I think it would be interesting to apply the theory of democracy to the medical field. Because doctors are portrayed as all-knowing experts, many patients hesitate to question their doctor's recommendations or diagnoses - some doctors, even, do not openly welcome patient input or opinions. If the medical field took a more democratic approach to their medical practice with patients, I think that patient-doctor relationships could improve and become more of a partnership, giving patients a stronger sense of control and empowerment over their health.  

Intersectionality

Definition: "Intersectionality is a framework that must be applied to all social justice work, a frame that recognizes the multiple aspects of identity that enrich our lives and experiences and that compound and complicate oppressions and marginalizations." Source: Uwujaren, J., & Utt, J. (2015). "Why Our Feminism Must Be Intersectional (And Three Ways to Practice It." Everyday Feminism. Retrieved from http://everydayfeminism.com/2015/01/why-our-feminism-must-be-intersectional/. 

Application: Intersectional theory is critical to community development work - as community developers, we have to work to understand experiences and identities that are often not our own. Without understanding our own identities and the identities of the communities we work with, we run the risk of replicating structural oppressions within our social justice communities. Beyond seeking to understand different experiences, community developers need to be aware of how multiple identities intersect to create different experiences - racism and sexism manifest in completely different ways for black women than for black men or white women.

Adaptation: Intersectional theory is equally important in the context of public policy. To use the example of black women, public policies that attempt to address racism or sexism often do not account for the experiences of black women who do not experience these oppressions separately, compared to black men (who have male privilege) and white women (who have white privilege) - black women are oppressed on both fronts. Without taking intersectionality into account, black women are often further marginalized and silenced by these policies.

Team Development Theory

Definition: Tuckman's model of small group development consists of 5 stages: forming, norming, storming, performing, and adjourning. He "theorizes that these phases are all necessary and inevitable in order for the team to grow, to face up to challenges, to tackle problems, to find solutions, to plan work, and to deliver results." Source: Four (Five) Stages of Team Development - Bruce Tuckman. (n.d.) Retrieved from http://www.washington.edu/research/rapid/resources/changeModels/mc_team_development.pdf

Application: As a community developer, knowing Tuckman's model of small group development would be helpful when organizing community members. Knowing what is likely to happen in each stage as the group forms, a community developer can be better prepared to deal with group conflict and other issues that may arise while working with small groups. 

Adaptation: Tuckman's model of small group development is very applicable to, and is often consulted, in the business world. When thinking about small group work in the context of a group of employees working together to deliver a final product at a certain deadline, the project manager can be better prepared to facilitate the group with an understanding of the general trajectory that small groups follow.  

Social Penetration Theory

Definition: Social penetration theory contends that "as relationships develop, communication moves from relatively shallow, non-intimate levels to deeper, more personal ones." Source: Altman, I., & Taylor, D.A. (1973). Social penetration: The development of interpersonal relatioships. New York: Holt, Rinehard, and Winston.

Application: Social penetration theory is important for community developers in terms of forming relationships and building trust with community members. For example, rather than entering a community and immediately sharing intimate, personal details about yourself might be uncomfortable for community members who are meeting you for the first time. Instead, a community developer should begin to communicate and build relationships around less personal topics and gradually build up to both sharing and seeking more personal information after trust has been built.  

Adaptation: Social penetration theory could also be applied to the education field in terms of student-teacher relationships. For example, students may not feel comfortable sharing intimate details about their lives with a teacher they have just met (i.e. if they are having problems at home and that is why they are never on time to class). After having built some level of trust with the teacher, however, a student might feel that they can go to their teacher, share what is going on with them, and maybe ask them for help. 

Cognitive Dissonance Theory

Definition: Cognitive dissonance theory "refers to a situation involving conflicting attitudes, beliefs or behaviors. This produces a feeling of discomfort leading to an alteration in one of the attitudes, beliefs or behaviors to reduce the discomfort and restore balance." Source: McLeod, S. (2008). Cognitive Dissonance. Retrieved from http://www.simplypsychology.org/cognitive-dissonance.html

Application: Cognitive dissonance theory is important in the context of community development, both for the community developer and for the community they are working with so that they can recognize when they themselves or community members are struggling with conflicting attitudes, beliefs or behaviors and can address them accordingly. For example, a community member might refer to themselves as a social justice advocate but later make a racist remark to another community member, an issue that the community developer would want to address before moving forward. 

Adaptation: Cognitive dissonance theory could also be applied to political science. For example, a politician might have some political issues that are very important to them as they enter office but may be forced to act differently based on the political climate of the legislature, forcing them to find a way to reduce the discomfort of taking actions that are not truly in line with their beliefs. 

Social Exchange Theory

Definition: "Social exchange theory is based on a central premise that the exchange of social and material resources in a fundamental form of human interaction...interaction patterns are shaped by power relationships between individuals, and the resulting efforts to achieve balance in exchange relations." Source: Social exchange theory. (1996). Pathbreakers. Retrieved from http://www.washington.edu/research/pathbreakers/index.html#1978

Application: Social exchange theory is important to think about in the context of community development when it comes to organizing the community. When reaching out to community members to encourage their participation in the development process, their participation can hinge on what benefits they see it bringing them versus what costs might be accrued if they were to participate. For example, a resident might want to become involved in an organizing campaign, but doing so might cause them to have less time to spend with their family on the weekends. That resident may think through a small cost-benefit analysis to see if they would get as much out of the organizing process as they would have to put in, and if the benefits of the organizing outweigh the costs of spending less time with family.

Adaptation: Social exchange theory can be easily applied to the business world and economics . For example, a business that has the option to merge with another similar business will weigh the costs and benefits of agreeing to the merger versus continuing as a single, stand alone business before making a decision.  

Standpoint Theory

Definition: Standpoint theory operates under the assumption that one’s experience of the world is contingent on their material reality. Consequently, different material realities produce different ways of being and knowing. Emerging out of these distinct epistemologies is the idea, “the oppressed are seen as having an ‘epistemic advantage’ because they can operate within two sets of practices and in two different contexts,” which dominant groups lack the ability to do (Narayan, pp. 338-339). Source: Narayan, U. (1989). The Project of Feminist Epistemology: Perspectives from a Nonwestern Feminist. In C. R. McCann and S. Kim (Eds.), Feminist Theory Reader, Local and Global Perspectives (pp. 332-340). New York, NY: Routledge. 

Application: Standpoint theory is critical to community development work. When entering a community, it is important to defer to the community members and respect them as experts on their own community. Rather than coming into a community with a grand masterplan to fix it, community developers should seek out the beliefs, values, and ideas of the people who actually live in the community and are privy to community knowledge that outsiders are not. 

Adaptation: I think standpoint theory could also be adapted to various business disciplines. Without consulting the people they are hoping to sell products to, or selling products/starting a a new business in a neighborhood without any understanding of the community, businesses could make less of a profit than they could have making a product or starting a business in a community where they knew their products or business were both need and wanted by consumers. 

Liberalism

Definition: At the core of liberal philosophy is the idea that "All systems either of preference or of restraint, therefore, being thus completely taken away, the obvious and simple system of natural liberty establishes itself of its own accord. Every man, as long as he does not violate the laws of justice, is left perfectly free to pursue his own interest his own way, and to bring both his industry and capital into competition with those of any other man, or order of men." Source: Klein, D. (2014, February 13). The Origin of 'Liberalism.' The Atlantic. Retrieved from http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/02/the-origin-of-liberalism/283780/


Application: In community development work, it is important to identify the degree to which the community you are working with operates under liberal theory. Because our history is entrenched in liberal theory, many Americans adhere to the notion of individualism, rather than a collectivist approach that is more conducive to community building. This could be an important component of a community assessment as far as determining what types of strategies or projects would be most feasible in the community based on how strongly they adhere to liberal ideals.

Adaptation: Outside of community development work, I think that liberal theory is important to understand within the context of education. Because our education system is similarly influenced by liberal individualism, many of our classrooms foster individual competition rather than co-learning. Educators should be aware of how this theory can impact students in the classroom and take care to create classroom environments that encourage students to work together rather than against each other.

Critical Theory

Definition: Critical theory "attributes social problems to social structures that favor certain groups in society and oppress others along lines of class, race, gender...The solution is to transform society into one in which social equality replaces dominant-subordinate relationships," (Mullaly, 2010, p. 5). Source: Mullaly, B. (2010). Challenging oppression and confronting privilege: A critical social work approach. Don Mills, Ont: Oxford University Press.  

Application: Critical theory can be applied to community development work as a way of starting the process of conscientization, or consciousness raising. While organizing a community and developing its collective power to rally against some kind of social injustice, critical theory can provide a lens for diverse community members to view and identify the common structural forces that oppress and marginalize them and potentially unite them. Furthermore, critical theory can become an important part of the community visioning process for communities that place a high value on social equality.  

Adaptation: Critical theory could easily be utilized in disciplines like political science or public policy. For example, policy analysts and politicians could use critical theory to identify and call attention to legislation that may appear neutral on the surface but might allow for more subtle oppressive and discriminatory practices to take place on the ground.