Peer Reviewed Journal

2020

Sustainability has become a central concern in communities around the world. However, there have been limited attempts to define sustainability at ▶ community level. It is widely argued that sustainable communities are the ones that follow ecological, social, and economic aspirations and aspects of sustainable development. Accordingly, community sustainability can be defined as the total of community-based attempts to preserve a strong and successful economy, society, and environment; to adjust and respond to outside challenges and opportunities; and to provide quality of life for members in a persistent way (MacKendrick and Parkins 2004). In a more recent and comprehensive definition, Mischen and her colleagues (2019) describe community sustainability as sharing of collective resources by functionally and socially connected actors in "a way that engages members in a set of governance processes resulting in an equitable access to health, educational, and economic well-being while not disturbing future generations' or other communities' rights on these resources" (p. 10). Sustainable communities continue to develop sustainably, where this development is achieved as a fundamental part of the environment without harming it, and allows equal distribution of resources and opportunities among its members both today and in the future (Winther 2017). Sustainable communities have the power, agency, organization, and capability to realize sustainable development and change.

Sociological Inquiry, 2001

Over the past decade, environmental sustainability has emerged as a prominent theme in the community development literature. In fact, the concept has become a standard feature of most economic and social development plans. Most models of sustainable community development stress the importance of widespread participation in the decision-making process. Unfortunately, community studies document numerous barriers to broad involvement and the high level of activeness envisioned by proponents of sustainable community development. In searching for ways to overcome these barriers, scholars and policymakers have embraced the idea that we can enhance efforts to create more sustainable communities by increasing the local stock of social capital. We examine this line of reasoning in light of what we view as the most important conceptual issues surrounding the relationship between social capital and sustainable community development. We conclude that before social capital is endorsed as a central component of public policy, much work remains to be done in terms of developing a more precise definition of the concept, situating it within extant theories of community, constructing better measures of social capital, documenting the activities and networks most important in building social capital, and gaining a better understanding of the forms of social capital that are most important in developing sustainable communities.

2006

In a changing and unpredictable world, sustainable community development is less a goal than a dynamic process of working with the resources and information at hand. In order to sustain this dynamic interactive process, com- munities need to anticipate and respond to these dynamics and nurture their resilience in order to innovate and diversify. This is par- ticularly difficult for communities that are marginalized, dealing with poverty, homelessness, and addic- tion. However, social capital can be harnessed to create the commu- nity agency needed to foster sus- tainable development. This paper focuses on the ability of commu- nity networks to build social capital critical to the creation of the resil- ience needed to sustain communi- ties. It draws on a case study of a community-driven initiative taking place on the East Side of the city of Vancouver, British Columbia, a community with very low levels of economic capital.

There is an overall consensus that the poor governance and corruption plaguing many developing nations are main inhibitors to progress. These inhibitors also lead to the overwhelming feelings of desperation, apathy, and determinism. International development assistance programs utilizing capacity building have been created to deal with sustainable development issues in the developing world. Often these programs are fragmented and address results, not the causes, of problems. This study assesses how existing community development approaches could be aided through a strategic sustainable development perspective. A majority of the research involved creation of a holistic innovative community development approach, which encourages transformational change and effective leadership, and comparison of that to an existing community development approach. Strengths and limitations were observed through this comparison and generic recommendations were created to support current approaches. The study found that existing development assistance strategies are effective at building capacity and helping communities, but encompassing a more holistic perspective could align planning and decision-making with socio-ecological sustainability and thereby support mid-and long-term progress.

Community Development Journal, 2008

Research in Canada and Australia has shown that social capital is a necessary condition for sustainable community development as it enhances linking ties that increase access to resources outside the community. Social capital in and of itself, however, is not always sufficient to sustain and develop local community initiatives, as infusions of economic and human capital are often necessary; the larger 'social safety net' can play a critical role in local community development initiatives. More importantly, government policy alignment may be critical to establish a stable environment within which organizations can sustain and increase the scale of their operations. Governments have a critical leadership role to play by realigning policies and incentives to complement the existing social capital network formation by strategically targeting their interventions at pivotal points in the evolution of local organizations to optimize their access to outside economic and human resources. The role of government is explored in a case study outlining the actions of a local community initiative in a marginalized neighbourhood of Vancouver, Canada.

2010

Higher energy costs, climate change, and economic instability pose a "Triple Challenge" that requires creative action. Transition Towns is a positive, inspiring, bottom-up response that brings people together to build community resilience. Created in the U.K. and now being used by hundreds of communities around the world, the Transition process suc- cessfully engages large numbers of community members in building local security, well-being, and vitality. Thousands of people around the world are now organizing "Transition Initiatives" in their towns, cities, and neighbourhoods. How can the Transition process help increase social equity? This seminar will briefl y outline our global predicament and share pathways, actions, criteria, principles and on-the-ground successful models for including everyone as we strengthen our communities in a changing world.

IOP Conference Series: Earth and Environmental Science, 2018

Cultural dimension in development has been widely accepted to propose an alternative approach in development, in which an emic approach in development provides people's view and bottom-up approach in development. Gintingan is an example of socioeconomic and cultural institution, which has been implemented for decades by local people of Subang, West Java, Indonesia. The institution has been influenced by a Sundanese worldview of Tri Tangtu and implements the local wisdom of Silih Asah, Silih Asih and Silih Asuh. As the institution has been implemented in the region, local people's preferences varied based on their environmental location and affect its practices in terms of forms and purposes. This paper attempts to elaborate the practices of Gintingan and local people's preferences in the urban and rural area. The different practices of the institution between rural and urban area might affect to its sustainability and its role in sustainable community development.

EDIS

This document explores the idea of sustainable community development and what this type of development can do to improve the quality of life within communities. This document examines what sustainable development entails and provides examples of the threats to quality of life that traditional approaches to development can generate. This document outlines six steps to a more sustainable approach to community development. This document is FCS7213-Eng, one of a series of the Department of Family, Youth and Community Sciences, Florida Cooperative Extension Service, IFAS, University of Florida, Gainesville FL 32611. First published: September 2003. FCS7213/CD021: Sustainable Community Development (ufl.edu)

Applied Research in the Quality of Life, 2012

Understanding the uneven resilience of communities has been a preoccupation of the social sciences since the nineteenth century. Classical social theory and sociology was preoccupied with themes and questions about the cohesion, stability and integration of communities. While terminology has changed, debates in this area are still to be resolved. Despite, or perhaps because of this lack of resolution, enquiry over the past two decades has shifted sideways to potentially more fruitful lines of inquiry. The task of understanding “society”, and more locally, “community”, has increasingly intersected with a new set of preoccupations—sustainability, wellbeing and quality of life. The underlying task of enquiry thus has moved, at least rhetorically, from questions of social structure, regulation and function, to more agency-focussed questions dealing with issues such as sense of sustainability, community, wellbeing, quality of life, security from ‘risk’ or inclusion and participation. It is in this context that we developed a questionnaire instrument that provides an integrated assessment of community sustainability. The particular instrument we introduce is oriented towards these dilemmas in the following ways. It aims to measure the subjective attitudes of a community towards sustainability. It is geared towards understanding these attitudes both individually and as they relate towards the community as a whole, thereby treating community as a distinct and irreducible entity. It focuses upon both present wellbeing and future sustainability of the community. Finally, it adopts a “top–down” approach, where variables are predefined.