Rebuilding Communities In An Age Of Individualism

As modern societies become increasingly individualistic, this fascinating book examines how we can maintain and revive local communities and community life. It demonstrates how the major developments and processes of our time, notably globalization, post-industrialism and de-traditionalization, contribute to this individualism to the detriment of community life. The author examines how community is a necessary and important component of human life and discusses possible ways in which to arrest its decline. In this regard, strategies geared to fostering trust and social capital are outlined as the basis for reinvigorating community life. The volume provides a coherent and distinct analysis of community as well as offering concrete policy prescriptions to counter the excessive individualism of our times. In both the nature and scope of its analysis, it offers a unique contribution to an extremely important issue in the contemporary period, one that increasingly preoccupies politicians, academics and ordinary citizens.

Pastoral Care in Worship draws on Christian heritage and illuminating psychological research to deepen and enrich the pastoral dimension of Sunday worship.

The term 'globalization' generally refers to the homogenization of cultures across the world due to Western encroachment. However, as this book explains, the process is far more subtle, complex and uneven. Taking as its starting point the fundamental question of whether globalization exists, Living with Globalization provides a lively discussion of one of the most used and abused concepts in the twenty-first century. If globalization is a valid construct, it manifests itself in lived experience, not in abstract theories. Examining the ways in which globalization is contributing to patterns of conflict, Living with Globalization explores a variety of case studies, ranging from 9/11 to identity formation. The book reveals the complex ramifications of globalization on society, government and everyday lives.

Understanding community is a highly topical text offering a clear understanding of policy and theory in relation to community. By examining areas of government policy, such as economic development, education, health, housing, and community safety, this book explores the difficulties that communities face and discusses new concepts such as community cohesion, social capital and community capacity building. Somerville challenges our understanding of community, both social and conceptual, and assesses the strengths and limitations of this understanding. This book is essential for students studying social policy, social work and sociology, and an invaluable resource for policymakers in community development, urban regeneration and allied fields.

​This open access book addresses the problem of creation and reproduction processes of contemporary urban communities, as well as cultural mechanisms and factors of these processes. Rejecting both the environmental determinism, and cultural reductionism of community studies, the book assumes that the postmodern city is a space of diverse urban communities that go far beyond the traditional concept of neighbourhood as well as personal and imagined communities, and thus proposes to comprehend urban community as social practice embedded in urban space. The book applies the Theory of Social Practice and the Theory of Scenes and develops the concept of socio-cultural opportunity structures in order to explain how cultural practices of individuals and symbolic dimensions of territory interact, leading to (re)production of various forms of urban community. It is assumed that culture in general and symbolic meanings of territory in particular, play a crucial role in the process of (re)production of urban communities, that this process takes place in collective cultural consciousness and is mediated by territorially embedded cultural practices of individuals. The book overcomes theoretical gaps in classical community studies and develops a new perspective on urban communal processes based on the analysis of social practices in urban cultural scenes.

This book addresses the challenge of providing good social care to the more than 6 million people who live in rural Australia, some in very remote locations. It emphasises the importance of a developmental approach which stresses proper planning, evidence-based policy, and the influence which practitioners can have. The first part of the book explains the processes for developing, implementing, and evaluating policies and social plans, including achieving impact through networking, formal consultations, community development, and lobbying. Part two of the book looks at types of social care and the challenges each present. The types of social care include community-embedded; specialised; statutory; and visiting. The authors devote specific attention to Indigenous communities and, through case studies, provide examples of social care programs in action. The authors have more than 40 years combined experience in rural social work and community development.

Rural community construction is an important topic of study in China. This book examines the development of various construction models, the reasons behind their emergence, and provides analyses based on their characteristics, problems, and trends.It offers insights from a historical perspective, through the study of organizational bases, structural functions, behavioral patterns and their roles in national governance, as well as social systems of rural communities in different periods.This book is also integrated with comparative analyses on urban and rural communities, and comprises of examples from China and other countries, including United States, Japan, South Korea, and more.

Christopher Craig Brittain offers a wide-ranging examination of specific events within The Episcopal Church (TEC) by drawing upon an analysis of theological debates within the church, field interviews in church congregations, and sociological literature on church conflict. The discussion demonstrates that interpretations describing the situation in TEC as a culture war between liberals and conservatives are deeply flawed. Moreover, the book shows that the splits that are occurring within the national church are not so much schisms in the technical sociological sense, but are more accurately described as a familial divorce, with all the ongoing messy entwinement that this term evokes. The interpretation of the dispute offered by the book also counters prominent accounts offered by leaders within The Episcopal Church. The Presiding Bishop, Katharine Jefferts-Schori, has portrayed some opponents of her theological positions and her approach to ethical issues as being 'fundamentalist', while other 'Progressives' liken their opponents to the Tea Party movement.