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Recommendation 3

That a Positive Systems Approach be used in community development

There are at least four key principles which our experience has shown need to be followed in developing sustainable communities:

  1. AN INTEGRATED COMPREHENSIVE APPROACH to community development i.e. all aspects of the community's life economic, cultural, social, and political need to be addressed simultaneously.
  2. ALL AGES in the community need to be involved in programs which are creating the future for the community.
  3. The programs need to ADDRESS THE UNDERLYING ISSUES - this will vary from community to community e.g. in some communities it may be: ‘No significant engagement or role for the men’ because if this problem is not addressed, then all the problems which flow from this one will remain unresolved. In another it may be that people are living out of a ‘Victim’ image.
  4. Engaging community members in the creation of art, song, dance and story in forms appropriate to local culture and that symbolise important traditions and knowledge is THE KEY TO TRANSFORMATION of a community's relationship to the past, and the present and to future possibilities.

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Training Resources

Recommendation 2