Understanding Community: Perspectives & Empowerment

• Understanding the community means strategically intervening and empowering it by developing resources to improve conditions, enhance lives, and unlock potential.

Community Perspectives

• A community exists in various forms, influenced by social, institutional, and civil perspectives.
• Communities can be defined by shared interests rather than physical location.
• Institutionally, communities are professional activities across institutional boundaries.
• In civil society, communities are social groups connected to share resources and culture.
• Local communities consist of interacting people sharing an environment, shaping shared intentions, beliefs, resources, needs, and risks.
• Grassroots groups are local people collaborating to solve shared problems without outside leaders, impacting local politics and national efforts.
• Social groups create relationships, leading to defined roles, status, expectations, and responsibilities, like religious, ethnic, work, school, or sports affiliations.
• Social structure involves repeated behavior patterns through interactions, information sharing, and relationships, providing order and predictability.

Theories of Social Change

• Social change was once seen as progress, regardless of its positive or negative nature.
• Evolutionary Theory posits societies become more complex through adaptation.
• Equilibrium Theory states societies strive for internal balance, adapting to outside forces until achieved.
• Conflict Theory emphasizes economic factors, like class conflict, in shaping social change.
• Cyclical Theory proposes societies rise and fall based on how creatively they address challenges.

Classifications of Community

• Communities can be classified based on locality, virtual presence, or shared associations.
• Locality-based communities are found in specific territories.
• A state is a large community with its own independent government.
• Rural communities are small, share similar traditions, and experience slow change.
• Urban communities are large, diverse, and undergo rapid change.
• Virtual communities are online groups sharing resources and a cyberculture.
• Associational-based communities share social identities or belong to the same organizations.

Universal Declaration of Human Rights

• The UDHR, established by the UN in 1948, lists basic rights and freedoms.

Types of Rights

• Natural rights are inherent, God-given rights that enable a happy life.
• Constitutional rights are protected by a constitution and cannot be changed by lawmaking bodies.
• Statutory rights are established by law and can be modified or abolished by the same body.

Classification of Constitutional Rights

• Political rights allow participation in government.
• Civil rights ensure individual happiness in the private sphere.
• Social and Economic rights ensure well-being and economic security.
• Rights of the accused protect individuals during criminal proceedings.

Misconceptions about Human Rights

• The belief in absolute individual freedom, free from regulation, ignores the balance needed with responsibilities and others' rights.
• The idea that rights come solely from the government overlooks their inherent and universal nature.

Limitations of Human Rights

• Rights are balanced with responsibilities and the rights of others.
• Every right entails a duty to respect it and avoid harming others.
• Unlimited rights could lead to chaos, necessitating laws and ethics for order.
• Ethical, spiritual, and legal rules ensure fairness in society.

Social Justice

• Social justice is a constitutional duty to ensure equal opportunities and resources, helping the underprivileged.
• It involves upholding social justice at all levels, protecting dignity, ensuring welfare, and reducing inequalities.
• Social justice can be achieved through equal job opportunities, agrarian reform, support for fishermen, incentives for landowners, resettlement for the poor, and healthcare for the disadvantaged.
• Social justice requires full employment and equal work opportunities without discrimination.
• Workers have rights to self-organization, collective bargaining, secure conditions, fair compensation, and participation in policy-making.
• The state should implement agrarian reform with support like credit, legal aid, and farm modernization.
• Subsistence fishermen have rights, and the government must support them with fair access, tools, research, and financial aid. It should also protect local waters and ensure fair wages.
• The state should provide investment incentives to landowners, increasing agricultural production and boosting industries.
• The government should provide incentives to landowners, stimulating industry growth and job creation.
• Resettlement of the urban and rural poor involves lawful and humane processes with proper consultation.
• The government must protect and promote healthcare for the disadvantaged, providing affordable services and support for rehabilitation.
• The state must recognize people's organizations and advocacy groups, listening to their concerns through peaceful means, and using proper consultation mechanisms.

Advocacy

• Advocacy ensures that vulnerable people can voice their concerns, defend their rights, and have their views considered in decisions.
• It helps people express views, access information, defend rights, and explore options.

Empowerment

• Empowerment enhances the capacity of individuals or groups to make choices and act on them, leading to meaningful change.
• It fosters self-determined improvement in quality of life.

Four Areas of Practice for Empowerment

• Access to information empowers informed decisions and rights advocacy.
• Inclusion and participation give marginalized groups a voice.
• Accountability holds institutions responsible.
• Local organizational capacity empowers community-based change.

Gender Equality

• UNESCO prioritizes gender equality through programs in education, science, culture, and communication.

Disparities in Education

• Girls in the Philippines generally outperform boys in school.
• Boys often leave school early because of economic needs or lack of motivation.

Challenges

• Roughly 2.2 million Filipino women have experienced partner violence.
• The Philippines is a significant hub for human trafficking.
• Women face employment issues like lower-paying jobs.
• Women have less presence in political leadership roles.