The Premise and Promise of Citizenship and Civil Society for Renewing Democracies and Empowering Sustainable Communities

Abstract

State regimes have launched policies to “reinvent” government and “regenerate” communities in peripheral impoverished rural and urban areas to build sustainable communities and reduce poverty. We investigate the impact of policy concepts–the empowerment paradigm, citizenship as citizen participation and inclusion, and associations between the state and civil society–on local areas' success in leveraging dollars to foster sustainable economic and community development in persistently poor rural areas of the U.S. The thirty‐three rural sites of the Empowerment Zone/Enterprise Communities Initiative of the Clinton‐Gore Administration comprise our database. We find that empowering area‐based, low‐income residents through the election mechanism to choose their representatives on the local sites' governing board is strongly and significantly related to both inclusion and citizen participation. Also, the presence of elected citizens with connections to civil society on the governing body contributes strongly to later success in leveraging dollars.

Urban Democracy and the Local Trap

“…Again, the force with which this argument is articulated varies from person to person. This tradition includes research on democracy and citizenship at the neighbourhood level (Berry et al, 1993;Fung, 2004), on 'community-based' development and planning (Fainstein and Fainstein, 1995;Mesch and Schwirian, 1996;Greenberg, 1999;McNulty, 1999;Gittell et al, 2000;Green and Haines, 2001;Wells, 2002;Murphy and Cunningham, 2003;Smock, 2003;Diers, 2004) and on governing institutions more generally (Council of Europe, 1985;UNDESA, 1992;Pratchett, 1999Pratchett, , 2004Weir and Beetham, 1999;Madon and Sahay, 2000;Aigner et al, 2001;Hambleton et al, 2003;Latendresse, 2004;Speller and Ravenscroft, 2005). While some have begun to question if localised decision-making is necessarily good (Peterman, 1999;Mohan and Stokke, 2000;Boudreau, 2003), the prevailing wisdom follows Latendresse's (2004, p. 40) logic about Montreal, that "by decentralizing power to the boroughs, the Montréal megacity created some of the necessary conditions for a greater democratisation of urban life".…”

Understanding the link between benefits from protected areas and their relationship with surrounding communities: An exploration in Costa Rica

“…reduce the use of natural resources and limit agricultural expansion, but on the other hand, protected areas present opportunities to preserve ecosystem services and boost tourism revenue (Andam et al, 2010;Otuokon et al, 2012;Park et al, 2012). If local governance is lacking, and by extension community participation, then residents may lose the opportunity to reap the socioeconomic benefits that a relationship with the protected area can offer (Aigner et al, 2001;MolinaMurillo & Clifton, 2014). Other factors such as organizational structure, leadership, and political participation are also important to realize these benefits (Adams & Hutton, 2007;Laverack, 2001).…”

Urban community in China: service, participation and development

“…Recent literature indicates that because of struggles with global reconstructing (market-dominated globalisation) and its changing ideologies (the collapse of communist groups), community development has since changed focus in developing countries (Banks, 2000). While governments have gradually withdrawn from their practices of intervening in social affairs and have left more space for civil society (Aigner, Flora & Hernandez, 2001), this trend has promoted a search for alternatives to state-controlled social programmes, and to centralised, hierarchical, top-down, institutionalised structures of decision-making.…”