Social Work Practice with

Communities
What Is Community Organization?
 Community Organization
• Working with the community requires the
generalist practitioner to be able to assess
community functioning and design specific
intervention techniques.
• Community organization has been recognized
for many years as one of the main methods of
social work.
• CSWE, issued in l962 included community
organization, along with casework and group
work, as the three major methods of social work.
 Community Organization
• Kettner, Daley, and Nichols define community
organization in the context of a planned change
model.
• The three components of their model include the
change process, arenas for practice, and types
of interventive effort anticipated.
• In community organization work the client is the
community.
• The two major arenas for community
organization practice are community
organizations and the community itself.
 Beginnings of Community Social
Work
• The first attempts to coordinate community
activities and actions stemmed from the London
Charity Organization Society which tried to
eliminate duplication and fraud in relief
administration.
• In 1909 in Pittsburgh and Milwaukee, the first
community welfare councils in the United States
were established.
• They were called Councils of Social Agencies.
 Beginnings of Community Social
Work
• These councils generally focus on three
main areas:
– Health
– Welfare
– Recreation
* The development of federated financial
drives was also an important aspect of
community social work.
 Beginnings of Community Social
Work
• In 1887 the first federated drive in the United
States originated under the auspices of the
Associated Charities in Denver.
• In l99l there were approximately 2,100 United
Way Campaigns in the United States and they
collected $3.3 billion.
• About 32 million people, or about one out of
every three persons employed in the United
States, gave through their United Way.
Community Social Work Processes
• The purpose of research in community
organization is to define what community
realities are and what to the facts do show.
• Planning is purposeful formulation of
future action and ways of procedure.
• Coordination is the process of working
together to avoid unnecessary duplication,
effort and conflict.
Community Social Work Processes
• Organization is the process of establishing a
structure to accomplish certain goals.
• A formal organization usually gives substance to
a movement.
• Financing is the process of collecting, budgeting,
and spending funds in relation to community
needs and resources.
• Social work administration can be defined as the
process of transforming social policy into social
services.
Community Social Work Processes
• Committee operation is the essence of social
work community practice.
• For adequate committee operation there need to
be adequate representation for all of the groups
that may be interested and involved in relation to
a particular project.
• One of the significant developments in
community social work has been the increasing
emphasis on client advocacy.
• Examples of social action can be seen in the
Civil Rights Movement, the Grey Panthers, and
the National Association for the Mentally Ill.
Roles of the Community Organizer
• Rubin and Rubin have defined four key roles in
community organization as follows:
– Organizers as teacher
– Organizers as catalysts
– Organizers as facilitators
– A linking role
* The community organizers should have the
ability to relate to people, to analyze problems,
to locate resources, to see potential for change,
and to be able to create effective structures for
problem solving.
Roles of the Community Organizer
• The advocacy and social action elements of
community social work practice focus on
empowering individuals and communities.
• Much of community organization is done to
change systems, and many times the system
resists change.
• Social workers should have good technical skills
and be able to get along well with people.