Yesterday's
The prior distribution of this paper had a portion missing, probably from
a packet lost in transmission. I am resending the full text of the
article.
kelly
REGENERATING COMMUNITY
by John McKnight
Each of us has a map of the social world in our mind, and the way we
act, our plans and opinions are the result of that map.
The people who make social policy also have social maps in their
minds. They make plans and design programs based upon their map.
Indeed, if you carefully examine their programs, you can detect the
nature of their mental map.
Using this method, we have found that the most common social policy
map has two locations: institutions and individual people. By
institutions we mean large structures such as corporations,
universities, and government mental health systems. These structures
organize a large group of people so that a few of them will be able to
control the rest of them. In this structure, there is ultimately room
for one leader. It is a structure initially created to produce goods
such as steel and automobiles.
In the last few decades, the structure has also been used to design
human service systems. While these newly designed hierarchical,
managed service systems do not produce goods such as steel, they do
produce needs assessments, service plans, protocols, and procedures.
They are also thought, by some policymakers, to produce health,
education, security, or justice.
If it is correct that these systems can produce these service
commodities, then it is possible to imagine that there are consumers
of their products. For example, we have all heard that there are now
people called "health consumers." They are the individuals who are the
other part of the social map created by most social policymakers. They
make a complete economic world by acting as the users (consumers) of
the products of managed institutional producers of such commodities as
mental health, health, education, and justice. Thus, we can see that
it was necessary to create health consumers once we had systems that
could produce health. Otherwise, there would be no purpose for these
large hierarchical, managed systems.
Once we understand this social map of institutions and individuals we
can see why we have mental health providers and mental health
consumers. We can also see how our developing service economy works.
Because the gross national product is the sum of the goods and
services produced each year, many policy experts have come to believe
that the well-being of our society significantly depends upon the
amount of the commodities called services that are produced by
institutions and used by consumers. For example, a person with a
perilous and extended illness (a health consumer) contributes
significantly to our economic growth by using large amounts of the
commodities produced by the health system. Indeed, a very ill person
disabled for a considerable amount of time could cause production of
much more medical dollar value through their illness than the value of
their own production were they healthy.
This amazing development is possible, in part, because of the unusual
two-place map used by many social policymakers in designing social
service programs. Unfortunately, this map and the program designs that
flow from it have recently encountered three major problems.
The first problem is that in spite of ever-growing inputs into
institutionalized service systems, many individuals continue to reject
their roles as consumers. This is the problem of intractability that
has resulted in an increasing focus upon the "compliance" issue.
Especially in our big cities, many intractable young individuals
continue to refuse to learn in spite of heightened resources and
managerial inputs to school systems. This is commonly known as the
educational problem.
Similarly, there are many other intractable individuals who refuse to
behave in spite of our correctional institutions. This is the crime
problem.
There is also the nutrition problem created by intractable people who
refuse to eat the right food. And the chemical dependency problem
created by intractable people who insist on smoking and drinking
incorrectly. There is also the ever-growing number of intractable
people who refuse to flourish in institutions created for labeled
people, in spite of all the professional and managerial improvements
designed by the systems.
Indeed, there are so many intractable people refusing to consume
institutional services that we are now designing new systems that
surround these individuals with professionally administered services.
Thus, one can now see individuals whose lives are bounded by
institutions "targeting" their services at an intractable individual
through teachers, doctors, trainers, social workers, family planners,
psychologists, vocational counselors, security officers, and so forth.
This is usually called a "comprehensive, multidisciplinary,
coordinated, inter-agency service system." It is the equivalent of
institutionalization without walls or the design of an environment to
create a totally dependent service system consumer.
The second problem with programs based upon the typical social policy
map is that the sum of their costs can be greater than the wealth of
the nation. In a recent white paper entitled "A Time to Serve," a
group of Swedish government planners described the escalating costs of
their much-acclaimed social service system. They point out that at
present rates of growth, the system could consume the entire nation's
wealth within a few decades. Therefore, they propose that the
government begin to "tax" people's time by requiring the Swedish
people to contribute unpaid work to the maintenance and growth of
their social service system.
While it is clearly the case that the United States is not in
immediate danger of the Swedish economic dilemma, we are contributing
substantial amounts to social service systems. A recent study by the
Community Services Society of New York found that approximately $7,000
per capita of public and private money is specifically allocated to
the low-income population of that city. Thus, a family of four would
be eligible on a per capita basis for $28,000 that would place them in
the moderate-income category. However, only 37 percent of this money
actually reaches low-income people in income. Nearly two-thirds is
consumed by those who service the poor.
The third problem with the typical social policy map is that programs
based upon its suppositions are increasingly ineffective and even
counter-productive. For example, we now understand that our
"correctional systems" consistently train people in crime. Studies
demonstrate that a substantial number of people, while in hospitals,
become sick or injured with maladies worse than those for which they
were admitted. In many of our big city schools we see children whose
relative achievement levels fall further behind each year. Thus, we
have come to recognize the possibility that we can create crime-making
corrections systems, sickness-making health systems, and stupid-making
schools based upon a social model that conceives of society as a place
bounded by institutions and individuals.
It is obvious, upon the briefest reflection, that the typical social
policy map is inaccurate because it excludes a major social
domain--the community. By community, we mean the social place used by
family, friends, neighbors, neighborhood associations, clubs, civic
groups, local enterprises, churches, ethnic associations, temples,
local unions, local government, and local media. In addition to being
called the community, this social environment is also described as the
informal sector, the unmanaged environment, and the associational
sector.
The Struggle Between Community and Institution
These associations of community represent unique social tools that are
unlike the social tool represented by a managed institution. For
example, the structure of institutions is a design established to
create control of people. On the other hand, the structure of
associations is the result of people acting through consent. It is
critical that we distinguish between these two motive forces because
there are many goals that can only be fulfilled through consent, and
these are often goals that will be impossible to achieve through a
production system designed to control.
There are many other unique characteristics of the community of
associations:
* The associations in community are interdependent. To weaken one is
to weaken all. If the local newspaper closes, the garden club and
the township meeting will each diminish as they lose a voice. If
the American Legion disbands, several community fundraising events
and the maintenance of the ballpark will stop. If the Baptist
Church closes, several self-help groups that meet in the basement
will be without a home and folks in the old people's home will
lose their weekly visitors. The interdependence of associations
and the dependence of community upon their work is the vital
center of an effective society.
* The community environment is constructed around the recognition of
fallibility rather than the ideal. Most institutions, on the other
hand, are designed with a vision imagining a structure where
things can be done right, a kind of orderly perfection achieved,
and the ablest dominate.
In contrast, community structures tend to proliferate until they
create a place for everyone, no matter how fallible. They provide
vehicles that give voice to diversity and assume that consensual
contribution is the primary value.
In the proliferation of community associations, there is room for
many leaders and the development of leadership capacity among
many. This democratic opportunity structure assumes that the best
idea is the sum of the knowings of the collected fallible people
who are citizens. Indeed, it is the marvel of the democratic ideal
that people of every fallibility are citizens. Effective
associational life incorporates all of those fallibilities and
reveals the unique intelligence of community.
* Associations have the capacity to respond quickly. They do not
need to involve all of the institutional interests incorporated in
a planning committee, budget office, administrative staff, and so
forth.
A primary characteristic of people who need help is that their
problem is created by the unexpected tragedy, the surprise
development, the sudden change. While they will be able to
stabilize over the long run, what they often need is immediate
help. The rapid response capacity of associations, and their
interconnectedness, allows for the possibility of immediate and
comprehensive assistance without first initiating a person into a
system from which they may never leave.
* The proliferation and development of community associations allow
for the flowering of creative solutions. Institutions tend to
require creative ideas to follow channels. However, the
nonhierarchical nature of the field of associations allows us to
see all of the budding ideas and greatly increases our
opportunities for social innovation.
* Because community associations are small, face-to-face groups, the
relationship among members is very individualized. They also have
the tradition of dealing with non-members as individuals,
Institutions, on the other hand, have great difficulty developing
programs or activities that recognize the unique characteristics
of each individual. Therefore, associations represent unusual
tools for creating "hand-tailored" responses to those who may be
in special need or have unique fallibilities.
* Our institutions are constantly reforming and reorganizing
themselves in an effort to create or allow relationships that can
be characterized as "care." Nonetheless, their ministrations
consistently commodify themselves and become a service. For many
people with uncommon fallibilities, their need is for care rather
than service. While a managed system organized as a structure of
control can deliver a service, it cannot deliver care. Care is a
special relationship characterized by consent rather than control.
Therefore, its auspices are individual and associational. For
those who need care, we must recognize the community as the
appropriate social tool.
* Finally, associations and the community they create are the forum
within which citizenship can be expressed. Institutions by their
managed structure are definitionally unable to act as forums for
citizenship. Therefore, the vital center of democracy is the
community of associations. Any person without access to that forum
is effectively denied citizenship. For those people with unique
fallibilities who have been institutionalized, it isn't enough
that they be deinstitutionalized. In order to be a citizen, they
must also have the opportunity for recommunilization.
In summary, the community of associations provides a social tool where
consent is the primary motivation, interdependence creates holistic
environments, people of all capacities and fallibilities are
incorporated, quick responses are possible, creativity is multiplied
rather than channeled, individualized responses are characteristic,
care is able to replace service, and citizenship is possible. When all
of these unique capacities of community are recognized, it is obvious
why the social policy map that excludes community life has resulted in
increasing failures. To exclude from our problem-solving capacities
the social tool of community is to have taken the heart out of
America.
Why is it, then, that social policy maps so often ignore community?
One reason is that there are many institutional leaders who simply do
not believe in the capacities of communities. They often see
communities as collections of parochial, inexpert, uninformed, and
biased people. Indeed, there are many leaders of service systems who
believe that they are in direct competition with communities for the
power to correctly define problems, provide scientific solutions and
professional services.
In this competitive understanding, the institutional leaders are
correct. Whenever hierarchical systems become more powerful than the
community, we see the flow of authority, resources, skills, dollars,
legitimacy, and capacities away from communities to service systems.
In fact, institutionalized systems grow at the expense of communities.
As institutions gain power, communities lose their potency and the
consent of community is replaced by the control of systems; the care
of community is replaced by the service of systems; the citizens of
community are replaced by the clients and consumer of institutional
products.
Visions of Society
Today, our society is the site of the struggle between community and
institution for the capacities and loyalties of our people. This
struggle is never carried out in the abstract. Instead, it occurs each
day in the relations of people, the budget decisions of systems, and
the public portraits of the media. As one observes this struggle,
there appear to be three visions of society that dominate the
discourse.
The first is the therapeutic vision. This prospect sees the well-being
of individual as growing from an environment composed of professionals
and their services. It envisions a world where there is a professional
to meet every need, and the fee to secure each professional service is
a right. This vision is epigrammatically expressed by those who see
the ultimate liberty as "the right to treatment."
The second prospect is the advocacy vision. This approach foresees a
world in which labeled people will be in an environment protected by
advocates and advocacy groups. It conceives an individual whose world
is guarded by legal advocates, support people, self-help groups, job
developers, and housing locaters. Unlike the therapeutic vision, the
advocacy approach conceives a defensive wall of helpers to protect an
individual against an alien community.. It seeks to insure a person's
right to be a functioning individual.
The third approach is the community vision. It sees the goal as
"recommunilization" of exiled and labeled individuals. It understands
the community as the basic context for enabling people to contribute
their gifts. It sees community associations as contexts to create and
locate jobs, provide opportunities for recreation and multiple
friendships, and to become the political defender of the right of
labeled people to be free from exile.
Those who seek to institute the community vision believe that beyond
therapy and advocacy is the constellation of community associations.
They see a society where those who were once labeled, exiled, treated,
counseled, advised, and protected are, instead, incorporated in
community where their contributions, capacities, gifts, and
fallibilities will allow a network of relationships involving work,
recreation, friendship, support, and the political power of being a
citizen.
Because so many labeled people have been exiled to a world expressing
the professional and advocacy vision of an appropriate life, the
community vision has frequently been forgotten. How will people know
when they are in community? Our studies suggest that this universe is
distinctive and distinguished from the environment of systems and
institutions. The community experience incorporates a number of
strands.
Capacity. We all remember the childhood question regarding how to
describe a glass with water to its mid-point. Is it half full or half
empty? Community associations are built upon the recognition of the
fullness of each member because it is the sum of their capacities that
represents the power of the group. The social policy map makers, on
the other hand, build a world based upon the emptiness of each of
us--a model based upon deficiency. Communities depend upon capacities.
Systems commodify deficiencies.
Collective Effort. It is obvious that the essence of community is
people working together. One of the characteristics of this community
work is shared responsibility that requires many talents. Thus, a
person who has been labeled deficient can find a "hammock" of support
in the collective capacities of a community that can shape itself to
the unique character of each person. This collective process contrasts
with the individualistic approach of the therapeutic professional and
the rigidity of institutions that demand that people shape themselves
to the needs of the system.
Informality.. Associational life in the community is a critical
element of the informal economy. Here transactions of value take place
without money, advertising, or hype. Authentic relationships are
possible and care emerges in place of its packaged imitation: service.
The informality of community is also expressed through relationships
that are not managed. Communities viewed by those who only understand
managed experiences and relationship appear to be disordered, messy,
and inefficient. What these people fail to understand is that there is
a hidden order to community groups that is determined by the need to
incorporate capacity and fallibility.
While institutions and professionals war against human fallibility by
trying to replace it, cure it, or disregard it, communities are
proliferations of associations that multiply until they incorporate
both the capacities and the fallibilities of citizens. It is for this
reason that labeled people are not out of place in community because
they all have capacities and only their fallibilities are unusual.
However, because there are so many community associations, there are
always some sets of associational relationships that can incorporate
their fallibilities and use their unique gifts.
Stories. In universities, people know through studies. In businesses
and bureaucracies, people know by reports. In communities, people know
by stories. These community stories allow people to reach back into
their common history and their individual experience for knowledge
about truth and direction for the future.
Professionals and institutions often threaten the stories of community
by urging community people to count up things rather than communicate.
Successful community associations resist efforts to impose the foreign
language of studies and reports because it is a tongue that ignores
their own capacities and insights. Whenever communities come to
believe that their common knowledge is illegitimate, they lose their
power and professionals and systems rapidly invade their social place.
Celebration. Community groups constantly incorporate celebrations,
parties, and social events in their activities. The line between work
and play is blurred and the human nature of every-day life becomes
part of the way of work. You will know that you are in community if
you often hear laughter and singing. You will know you are in an
institution, corporation, or bureaucracy if you hear the silence of
long halls and reasoned meetings. Associations in community celebrate
because they work by consent and have the luxury of allowing
joyfulness to join them in their endeavors.
Tragedy. The surest indication of the experience of community is the
explicit common knowledge of tragedy, death, and suffering. The
managed, ordered, technical vision embodied in professional and
institutional systems leaves no space for tragedy; they are basically
methods for production. Indeed, they are designed to deny the central
dilemmas of life. Therefore, our managed systems gladly give
communities the real dilemmas of the human condition. There is no
competition here. To be in community is to be an active part of
associations and self-help groups. To be in community is to be a part
of ritual, lamentation, and celebration of our fallibility.
Knowing community is not an abstract understanding. Rather, it is what
we each know about all of us.
As we think about ourselves, our community and institutions, many of
us recognize that we have been degraded because our roles as citizens
and our communities have been traded in for the right to clienthood
and consumer status. Many of us have come to recognize that as we
exiled our fallible neighbors to the control of managers, therapists,
and technicians, we lost much of our power to be the vital center of
society. We forgot about the capacity of every single one of us to do
good work and, instead, made some of us into the objects of good
works--servants of those who serve.
As we think about our community life, we recognize that something has
happened to many of us as institutions have grown in power: we have
become too impotent to be called real citizens and too disconnected to
be effective members of community.
There is a mistaken notion that our society has a problem in terms of
effective human services.. Our essential problem is weak communities.
While we have reached the limits of institutional problem solving, we
are only at the beginning of exploring the possibility of a new vision
for community. It is a vision of regeneration. It is a vision of
reassociating the exiled. It is a vision of freeing ourselves from
service and advocacy. It is a vision of centering our lives in
community.
We all know that community must be the center of our life because it
is only in community that we can be citizens. It is only in community
that we can find care. It is only in community that we can hear people
singing. And if you listen carefully, you can hear the words: "I care
for you, because you are mine, and I am yours."
The previous essay first appeared in Social Policy, Winter 1987.
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