Skip to main content icon/video/no-internet
icon backReturn to Entries

Community Dialogue

Community dialogue gathers people from different groups in the community together to meet for the purpose of engaging in deep democratic discourse. These groups include both stakeholders in the community and service providers. The participants in the process are people who jointly face common issues, problems and tensions that stem from their encounter or from shared situations that influence their lives in different ways. Usually, dialogue is generated to fill one or more of the following functions: problem-solving, providing a concrete response to a need, preventing the escalation of a situation such as inter-group conflict or laying the foundations for co-operation and influence stemming from an aspiration to engage difference and the challenges it poses.

The power of community dialogue lies in the interpersonal and inter-group co-operation that enhances the ability of communities to deal with problems. It enables people to get to know each other, to exchange information and to express thoughts and perspectives. It also enables them to influence the community's agenda, to discuss conflicts and dilemmas and to arrive at common solutions.

Community dialogue is not appropriate for every community and, in any event, requires adaptation to the cultural norms, values and goals of the specific community.

There are many parallels between action research and community dialogue. They share a common set of guiding principles as well as methods. As will be seen, the two methods tend to go together and complement each other in different ways.

Guiding Principles of Community Dialogue

Community dialogue is guided by a number of general principles. These principles may contradict each other and need to be applied by each community according to its unique situation.

Deep Democracy

The depth of democracy is achieved through determined and honest efforts to enable a wide range of people in the community to have their voices heard, including those who are generally not heard. These efforts help democracy go deeper than the limited concept of democracy as ‘majority rule’, ‘governance by the people’ or defence of minority rights. Deep democracy is characterized by the legitimization of diverse interests, full transparency, listening and well-informed decision-making based on significant learning about the issues involved.

Deep Multiculturalism

Community dialogue strives to create a public space characterized by fairness and critical awareness of the explicit and implicit power relations that constitute it. Power relations among cultural identities do not enable the formation of a neutral space because different cultures possess resources and barriers that place their members in different positions in the space. Deep multiculturalism means adapting the public space to the different characteristics of the community members. This process of adaptation requires dealing with intercultural interactions through open discussion, negotiation and decision-making according to criteria that are explicit and clear to everyone.

Solidarity and Shared Responsibility for the Community

Developing a community perspective expresses common loyalty and concern among people with different identities. This commitment and concern apply to both the relationships among individuals and the public space that is considered to be common to all.

...

  • Loading...
locked icon

Sign in to access this content

Get a 30 day FREE TRIAL

  • Watch videos from a variety of sources bringing classroom topics to life
  • Read modern, diverse business cases
  • Explore hundreds of books and reference titles

Read next

More like this

Sage Recommends

We found other relevant content for you on other Sage platforms.

close

Have you created a personal profile? Login or create a profile so that you can save clips, playlists and searches

close
close
close Signed In to profile You are signed in as:
close
Logged in Institution Institution