Community Empowerment and National Development (Conclusion)

• Expectations in Newly Independent Countries
• To Decree That Participation is Allowed does not Guarantee It
• The Community is the Medium Where it Can Work
• Do not Ask a Chicken for Milk, or a Cow for Eggs

Key points

When so many countries became independent of colonial rule after World War II, what did they expect, and why? Why were they disappointed? Many national politicians were convinced that there should be community participation in local projects, and many aid projects said there should be community participation. Why did that not happen? If a newly independent country is to become self reliant, and to decrease poverty, where should it begin to ensure those happen? Why is the community the most effective level for that to happen? If you want national development and a decline in poverty, go to the right place to get it, the community. Decreeing that it would happen will not make it happen; an intervention is needed, and that needed intervention is the community empowerment methodology.

Discussion

Content generated from student discussions Expectations in Newly Independent Countries To Decree That Participation is Allowed does not Guarantee It The Community is the Medium Where it Can Work Do not Ask a Chicken for Milk, or a Cow for Eggs

Outcomes

The student will understand the role of community empowerment in national development The student will understand an important factor (among several) in the failure of newly independent countries to become self reliant The student will understand that new rules or laws allowing community participation do not guarantee that there will be community participation (the government or alternatives must take a proactive role in stimulating and encouraging community empowerment interventions) The student will understand the necessity of obtaining needed resources from the right sources. (Cows do not provide eggs)