SPRING TERM ASSIGNMENTS

Boise Demographics Analysis

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Leading Discussion

 

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Sunday, April 04, 2004

1) What do you think of the way Arendt sets up her discussion? How does our political body resemble (or not resemble) Arendt's description of Greek democracy?

I found the setup of Arendt’s discussion extremely interesting and informative. Her usage of specific terms and the connotations she associates with them are pivotal to her argument. And as I have before, I return to the topic of perception as the basis of this abstract she calls Human condition.
It is not just the difference in speech versus action or political versus social realms that defines humans as an evolved species. This progression from the private to the public sphere has increasingly denoted ‘freedom’ throughout the world.
First there were families and monarchies living in a private lifestyle where equality was unknown. Since the paternal power dictated how survival was to be obtained, he had the power. Freedom was then a matter of being the one in power, and having enough force to maintain that rule, through violence if necessary. Freedom is always defined in relation to necessity. The lowest of slave labor is to be forced to perform tasks necessary to the survival of a master. ‘Freeing’ oneself from that, they are able to choose how to secure their own survival. And above that rests what we have talked about as the violent freedom of having the capacity to force others to take care of you.
The politic realm was then a combined public effort to live the opposite of a private life. As Arendt explains, neither are we ruled, nor do we rule others in a true polis. Freedom is in the fact that one has risen above mere subsistence. They now have the time and ability to speak instead of labor, or fight. That politic even grows to pure contemplation. Wouldn’t it be great to be able to just sit around and think? Freedom shifts from being obtained by violence to persuasion. We present a case, argue its communal benefit and persuade others to act or vote as we do. In the politic realm everyone has an equal say, and all have the chance to persuade they others. That is how they are free.
But the politic realm and the private realm have been separate and distinguished the whole time, up until the invention of a nation-state and social realm. This is the one phrase I haven’t figured out yet. Arendt describes the private family life as social (being opposite the political) and cites the mistranslation, and the meaning of social as the alliance for a cause (which a family is). However she also uses social to define the modern government we have established that seeps from the public into the private, controlling more and more of the familial realm than ever before. The ‘national housekeeping’ binds each family to those around them in towns, states and nations. This is the public realm of today that describes the human condition. To rise above subsistence and spread our community into a closely knit national family. We work together, recreate together, and even define together the laws that mold our lives as the opinion of the majority, or even one person elected to serve the populous.
There is no division from private to public. The social realm has molded the two. Now both speech and action are present throughout the world as powers for change. So if our world is not private, where freedom is won through action, or public where freedom is attained by speech and persuasion, how then are we free today.

Monday, April 12, 2004

2) Describe the relationship between the social, the political and the private, according to Arendt.

Arendt portrays the connection of private, political, and social realms as a progression of theories, and the governments they represent. While she explains in great depth the philosophies behind each doctrine, I didn’t feel she offered an opinion as to one being better or more effective than another. Arendt rather illustrates the hypothetic definitions of each and allows for individual interpretation.

The most obvious relation is a chronological evolution from one realm to the next. The private seems to be the oldest of these, encompassing rudimentary family life to ancient empires and kingdoms. A majority of civilizations (if you can call them that) pre-dating the Roman and Greek democracies fall into the realm of private government. The public or political realm did not take the place of the private, but instead augmented its existence. The politic is the essence of basic democracies—or those who have not been tainted by views of the social realm. The social is the last and more permeating realm that invades both private and public to create what Arendt described as the super family, all working together for the common wealth, or good.

It is interesting how the level of activity grows dramatically from one realm to the next. Private life was concerned only with basic survival. Arendt talks about the play of force and violence as a measure of power. Using this we can divide the private into three classes: 1) Those slaves who are forced to provide for the subsistence of their master. 2) Those freemen who work their own land to provide for themselves and their families. 3) Those who have the power and ability to force others to work, reaping the benefits of survival and comfort in an otherwise barbarian realm. Force and violence bring power, which ensures freedom.

But this freedom is attained by altogether different means in the public realm. Men participate in politics who have already secured their mode of living, either through slavery, or inheritance or by another approach. Having no need to worry about survival, they spend their time thinking, speaking, and persuading. This is the ‘new’ means of attaining freedom. If one has the ability to speak in a way to persuade those around him of his viewpoint, he then has power to change his existence by affecting the existence of those around him. The body politic has no need of force or violence, but instead its weapons are words, and the logical and rational delivery of those.

A key aspect in private and public societies is that of property. In the private realm, it was a link to heritage, and a means of providence. Survival was based upon how much land one had to hunt or farm on in order to obtain food. In a monarchy, a ruler’s power was often measured by how much land he dictated over.

This essence of property did not diminish in the public realm, but instead took on what Arendt calls a sacred undertone. A man’s political participation depended on his possession of land. Rights as to what occurred on that land were still reserved to the owners, but the fact of owning land, how much, and where, became of public significance.

The social realm is the most different of the three, in that it is a melding, or erasure of the preceding two. Land no longer carries the political weight it once did. Politics are determined now by age and citizenship. There is virtually no difference between family life and public life, because of this so called social or national family. The predominant theory of these social realms is that if we live together, everything we do—in or out of the home—should be of benefit to the community. Thus all that occurs either publicly or privately is the business of the society. Social existence has gone way beyond mere life sustaining activities to include economic, recreational, and cultural activities designed not only to maintain life, but to enhance and enrich our human lives.

A social realm is by far the most complicated of the three realms and for this should provide the greatest quality of life. However, as mentioned before, it is up to personal interpretation.

 

3) Discuss and compare two essays from the first section of Rooted in the Land.

I need to compare here the very first essay “Leave If You Can” with Helena Norberg-Hodge’s “Living With the Land.” I’ve mentioned before how every community is different and what works for one may not necessarily work for its neighbor. These two works touch subtly on this, but they do it by illustrating the lack of understanding one community may have for another.
Both tied to place, it doesn’t matter whether the members of these societies are rich or poor. However Norberg-Hodge and Paige both utilize the less privileged as a better means to prove their point.
In the imaginary Sal se Puedes, the narrator is somewhat of an outsider who cannot understand why these people don’t ‘escape’ to a more inviting environment. In her description of Ladakh, the narrator attempts to attribute the community’s simple lifestyle to its isolated position. I’m not sure if they are trying to emphasize the pros or cons of these two places, but whatever you read into it, the final purpose is to understand their attachment to the land they call home.
I suppose in a way the inhabitants of Paige’s southwestern town are trapped down there, depending on one’s viewpoint. We spoke in class about social cohorts and how people are scared to leave the comfort zone of their established communities in order to develop new connections that might be of equal or even more communal value. Paige explains that these residents are ‘trapped’ by opportunity—they can’t leave their current employment in order to find a better situation elsewhere—or duty—they’ll stay to care for the elderly until they themselves begin to age and the cycle repeats with their own children—and some he says by inertia—it’s just easier to stay in the path of east resistance.
What he doesn’t touch on that I think deserves a bit more attention is that if this group did uproot and meld into another metropolis, they would never feel like true members of that community. Their homes were in Sal se Puedes. And very few of them feel any remorse about their decision to stay where home has always been.
Even more so in Ladakh, they don’t even feel the desire to uproot. Everything they would need for survival and happiness is provided close to home. It doesn’t seem to be a case of leave if you can, but rather a question of why would anyone want to go to the trouble of traveling and contacting and establishing new ties when everything is already here. They had enough work to keep them busy, enough food and recreation to keep them happy, and enough dependence to keep them loyal to one another.
I feel it is true that people fear change. It makes them uncomfortable. But who is to tell these people that they are wrong for living the simple life? Even I have discussed in previous papers how communities should be, that the national community should not be sacrificed because of the local, for example. Maybe instead it is a balance that must be decided by each person in their own right. That is how communities are formed: people make priorities and band together with those prioritizing the same values. Local to local, national to national, urban to urban, rural to rural.
Even in the super-nation-state-family land is considered as sacred as Arendt described in the political realm. Communities are those people actively deciding what should be done with their community land.
Those living in Sal se Puedes can influence what goes on in their city, as can the people of Ladakh. And that security is what keeps them bonded as a community.
 

Thursday, May 20, 2004

 

  4) Discuss and compare two essays from section two of Rooted in the Land.

Kristin Shrader-Frechette uses various ecological models to describe a very humanistic problem. In ‘Biological Explanations and Environmental Expectations,’ her main point is that while it would be of great benefit to understand the natural boundaries of biotic communities, no one can agree on a definition of community or anything relating to it for that matter. What’s worse is that they run each other in circles trying to be the first to come up with this definition that so perpetually eludes them.

Wes Jackson’s protagonist in ‘Matfield Green’ encounters a variation of this very theme. Living in an area of past prosperity that now boasts the cheapest land prices and an unnerving solitude, This character has a vision of this back country’s potential. However, like Shrader-Frechette’s bio-community researchers, Jackson’s character is the only one with this imaginative ideal that cannot seem to fabricate itself.

The problem with communities is that each of us can’t create our own society of one with the capability of pursuing our individual dreams. Matfield Green probably would be better off with energy-efficient photo-voltaic cells and non-corporate meat distributors throughout the area. But our hero appears to be the only one defining this as the ideal community.

Unlike the fidgety biologists that work around but never towards specific results, Jackson’s character actually has a plan of action and a process to ensure the creation of his utopian community. His theoretically pension-laden professors are the answer, with the means to educate a new generation about the benefits of the Midwest, and fund the development of this so-called potential. These academics would have to not only agree with this theory, however, but also prioritize it as an imperative project that society can’t do without. Someone needs to convince them.

We’ve spoken about the necessity of communication in the maintenance of communities, and we have analyzed the breakdown that occurs as that communication dissolves. Understanding is a huge part of this communication. Everyone has a different agenda they believe is best for their community. It is only when these agendas coincide that success is accomplished.

When researchers cannot define what it is they are researching, nothing gets done. When communities cannot decide what is in their best collective interest, again, nothing gets done. Communication is a two-way process that enables communities to asses their position, direction, and purpose. From these they can build the community they want.
 

5) Discuss and compare two essays from section three of Rooted in the Land.


In the first essay of section three, Richard Cartwright Austin explains a theoretical process to redeem the land. This hypothetical society seems to place everyone on the same level in a utopian socialistic community. The odd thing is that they have completely separated themselves from their national community. Wherever this county may be, the adopted scrip has made them an entity unaffected by American economy. Stock values have no meaning to them, nor does consumer focused competitive pricing. The emphasis on local purchases does create a strong communal bond, but at what sacrifice? Is it worth severing national or even global ties in order to further ‘community unity’? It would seem someone had forgotten the required federal tax system. How does one calculate taxes on three-fourths dollar and one-fourth scrip? This isn’t to say the communal idea is unsound, but we have been defining community for so long as a neighborhood or city, while our country is not built like that anymore. The human race strives to expand, learn, and influence an ever growing sphere around them. To restrict the innovative mind to the confines of a few hundred square miles is to stunt evolution.
Cornelia Butler and Jan L. Flora approaches community ‘building’ in a more realistic light. Instead of cutting all ties to the world around them, they suggest we come to terms with the fact that every community is made up of both old time county folk and big city escapees. The new comers could be forced into a life of ruralism or seclusion. The older inhabitants could cut off or shun their new neighbors. However, as secluded as one may think himself, humans just plain like to grow. It is the melding of different theories that betters our lives. This nation was built on the principle of every man utilizing his talent for the better good of the community. Both old and new citizens have something to contribute, and it is more by natural selection than by municipal mandate that these contributions arise.
Flora and Flora’s title “creating social capital” is exactly that—an attempt to understand a natural phenomenon. And that’s actually what asset mapping is all about. We study what has worked or is currently working, and try to determine what makes it so. Why is one neighborhood successful while one nearby is a social failure? This second essay suggests that people build community ties because they interact with people on such a regular basis that they can make each other’s lives better through mutual assistance. Church, little league, and school activities are a few of the things that bring people together. It is then their choice to continue together, or expand upon their chance encounter.
We could live the ‘private’ life. There is enough land in this world for everyone to subside for themselves. Not everyone is of that persuasion. Instead each human being has a specific set of traits he or she can bring to the improvement of a group setting. Since each one of us is different, each community made up of a number of us will be distinct, and work in its own way.

6) Discuss effective strategies for community building from two of Putnam’s case studies

Putnam’s angle on community building is interesting because it delves into a broader spectrum of communities than just the traditional neighborhoods and cities. When he discusses schools or even businesses, there is a keen sense of why these institutions would want to involve themselves in the community. From what I have read of communities, it would be hard to extract any generalities that would be applicable to all communities. However from these excerpts, we could draw conclusions for comparable societies.
The two I would relate to the most are the Experience Corps and the UPS community. They use different approaches to community building, but both illustrate the imperative use of asset mapping in community structures.
The Philadelphia Public Schools, along with their cohort Temple University were the first to connect, and act upon a long-existing cultural barrier: the children weren’t getting enough attention, and the growing population of retired citizens were bored. This is what asset mapping does, analyzing the haves and the have-nots to determine a plan of action towards the balance of both. Once they had determined the two problems, the solution practically presented itself. As for community building, the aim is for the citizens to collaborate more one with another for the betterment of living. Obviously if you have two groups of people, comprising more than half of the population, their interaction and cooperation would go a long way to unify the community. Pairing the elderly with the school children was just the logical thing to do.
The solution presented here may or may not work in every community. In fact that is what defines communities is that they are different than those around them. They react differently to the same scenarios. But, the process is universal, and any community that can effectively identify its weaknesses can ascertain a solution as well.
I cite the UPS example here because of its uniqueness of community, being a business rather than a social or non-profit organization. Their obstacle came almost in the form of a double-edged sword. The government passed stricter equal opportunity laws for the benefit of the national community. UPS however did not see the immediate benefit to their microcosmic society of employment. Nevertheless, had these laws not been passed, maybe UPS would never have known the advantages of being civically involved.
The theory was to engage those who “would be future employees and future customers.” And that “ignoring people and their problems was bad for business.” UPS’ action plan turned out to be rather complex, but it boils down to a two-fold mission. Externally, their community internship program indoctrinated their managers about the community, and how the business could best serve society, Internally, committees chaired by lower management employees brought blue-collar issues to white-collar attention. The increased safety and communication resulted in higher moral and stronger camaraderie throughout the company, increasing productivity and decreasing turnover rates across the nation.
Again, it was a simple task of understanding the obstacles, and knowing the tools needed to overcome them. Asset mapping must lead to a definitive action plan turning knowledge into the power to build communities.

Monday, May 17, 2004

 

  7) Why does Putnam argue Portland is different? What makes us different? Do you agree or disagree? Why?

I agree that Portland has a vastly different past civically than its counterpart cities. But rather than discuss what makes Portland different, I want to discuss what made other cities unable or unwilling to follow.
The first several pages of Putnam’s treatise provide the statistical facts showing Portland’s rise to community activism. From reading these it would be impossible to disagree that the city developed while her sister cities dwindled. Public meetings, group interest in better government, letter writing campaigns, petition signings, and the number of officers in local organizations soared between the 70’s and 90’s.
I could delve into deep conceptual explanations, but it seems that people here just cared more than those of the rest of the country. For twenty years, no other community was able to reproduce the kind of success Portlanders were enjoying. And it was a give and take relationship. The citizens cared enough to become active in the “process” of change, and the government cared enough to listen to its voters and deliver on their demands.
Could it be that other communities didn’t have some sort of model to follow? Portland hasn’t moved in the last two decades, nor has it kept its civically engaged population a secret from the outside world.
In the contrast of interest and apathy we find the roots of community building. And as Putnam explained, it only takes a few kept promises and a few successful collaborations for the wheels of cooperation to start. As the residents saw petitions being honored and wishes being granted, it only fueled their desire to voice their opinions.
This is all I think anyone can really do to foster strong communities: communicate their desires, but also be supportive of others wants and needs as well. When people talk, but don’t talk over each other, then true asset mapping can be accomplished, and like an active economy, government can’t provide what they don’t know the populous wants. So it is extremely important to voice feelings and listen to others in order to prioritize any plan of action.
In Portland during this time of civic activity, their priorities were understood and respected so that something could be accomplished. Apparently the people wanted a park along the waterfront more than they wanted a wider Harbor Drive, so the Tom McCall Waterfront Park was constructed and other organizations compromised around it. This mostly happens when these organizations, such as the State Highway Commission, understand that a favor now will be returned somewhere in the future and others will be compromising to accommodate them. We talked about this earlier on in the year, and it is this social reciprocity that made Portland stand out among the rest. We understood ourselves. We understood each other. And we cared enough to work together. Portland’s interest contrasted the rest of the nation’s apathy, and this metropolis reaped the rewards of a strong and effective community for the better half of a generation.

 

Friday, May 21, 2004

 

  8) How does the OUV project relate to your understanding of community this year?

I personally do not feel any real connection to Our United Villages or the are of Boise. It’s on the opposite side of the city from where I live and rarely do I have reason or necessity to go there. But if I let that disconnectedness close off my mind to any conceptual ideas I could learn, I would be as disengaged civically as the rest of the nation was during the 70’s and 80’s. Putnam explained the vast schism between Portland and other cities as the citizens here grew in activism and communal strength, while similar communities slowed or even reversed their development as a society.

This is a concept that could be applied to everything we do. From everything I encounter in life, I either learn something I wish to emulate in my own life, or something I hope to avoid in the future.

In our activity and collaboration with Our United Villages, the final results that ensue in Boise honestly do not matter to me personally. But just as much as I have learned from our literary sources, I can apply certain concepts in my life and my community involvement where I live.

We tried to illustrate the connection between the readings we have done, the Boise project, and then communities in general during our discussion leading on the 10th. Like any other subject, it should be a relating of applied knowledge to real world situations.

We applied the theories we have read about as we determined what aspects of community needed to be researched as pertinent to community building. We tried this research ourselves in the United Villages project to see just what information was available and what it meant to this community.

Now, if we are to truly gain something from this course, we will integrate this process in our own lives, within our own communities.

What I’ve learned the most is the general concept of asset mapping. It is to take what we have as resources in our community and compare that to what we lack, or think we lack. Then with this itemized information, to determine a plan of action to prioritize and implement the changes necessary to develop desired traits within the community.

The process of asset mapping is applicable in any type of group, be it social, academic, professional, or even recreational. It can be performed in any degree of magnitude, such as city-wide or just within one’s household. I see it as a very organized method to ascertain and attain exactly what we want from this coexistence we call community.

Tuesday, June 01, 2004

 

  9) Exploring the concept of "community." In a short essay, please define and analyze what community means to you. What is a community? How do communities function? Why are communities important? Consider the diversity of human communities and the responsibilities that we have to the communities of which we are a part.

Devon Bennett
Defining, Attacking, and Building Communities

The building of community is based on the continuity of life. If continuity is ensured, men have a purpose. The citizens of a community employ many factors and variables in determining the definition of that purpose, and the extent of their contribution to it. For instance the roles of men and women are based on their gender differences and joint capability of producing children. Food and its consumption take on a major role in public ceremonies for their inherent life-giving trait: nourishment. The advent of religion has, since the dawn of civilization, given mankind hope that there is truly something after death, and a renewal of life is possible. The very basic communal forms are those of survival. People ban together in search of food or shelter, and they create a bond of dependability. In more developed cultures where survival may not be as physically strenuous, the same cultural bonds are created to better the condition of that life, and governmental institutions are invented towards this end.

The requirements to sustaining a community seem here to be fairly straight forward. However many weaknesses arise from the way in which a community prioritizes these necessities. The balance of attention given to each critical piece of community is extremely delicate, and is also different from one community to the next. But the degradation of community is impossible to avoid and as strange as it may seem, necessary to build a strong community. Neighbors will discover where they lack in vision, or what issues have been neglected and they will see the consequences of such negligence. But since every community is different, they must use this discovered weakness to grow together. More serious catastrophes give light to heroes and heroic events as communities ban together to solve problems that affect the lives of every one. This collaboration gives them that old sense of combating for their continuity of life, but instead of mortality, they are fighting for continuity of the stability they once enjoyed throughout the community. Every society will fall apart to a certain degree. It is the recovery from that fall that teaches communities what to work on, and how to build a successful community from the errors of previous models.

Modern communities are made up of many elaborate institutions dedicated to community building. But even these institutions, which are directed to community building, are structured upon the building blocks of life. Many of the issues surrounding communal strengthening relate to securing an affordable home in a safe neighborhood in which to grow old and raise a new generation. After we have secured a stable means of living, mankind tends to branch out, and spread his influence. Survival prolongs life, but heritage, offspring, and genealogy attribute to an impression on the world that will last long after one ends their mortal life. Religious groups tend to have a larger investment in communities and more often than not are contributors to community betterment. As previously discussed, these religions have a larger investment because they believe in a higher potential for man. Communities are worth more to those that believe they can develop to serve the citizens for a very long time.

Communities are struggles to maintain just as life itself is a fight against death. But it is said there is strength in numbers, and those dedicated to the existence and permanence of life create communities. They learn from the past to build a personalized future as they define who their community is and what they stand for.

 

 

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