Community Development in Practice

Community development is a way of strengthening civil society by prioritising the actions of communities, and their perspectives in the development of social, economic and environmental policy.

It seeks the empowerment of local communities, taken to mean both geographical communities, communities of interest or identity and communities organising around specific themes or policy initiatives.

It strengthens the capacity of people as active citizens through their community groups, organisations and networks; and the capacity of institutions and agencies (public, private and non-governmental) to work in dialogue with citizens to shape and determine change in their communities.

It plays a crucial role in supporting active democratic life by promoting the autonomous voice of disadvantaged and vulnerable communities.

It has a set of core values and principles covering human rights, social inclusion, equality and respect for diversity; and a specific skills and knowledge base.

In this Section

This section of the web site you will find:

• Documents
  Documents on this site and links to documents on external community development websites.
• Useful Links
  A digest of community development web sites.

Use the navigation links left to view the information.