Community Inquiry (122)

Communities face a wide variety of challenges in areas of health, education, economic development, sustainable environments, and social order. But regardless of the difficulty of these challenges, a necessary condition for addressing them is for communities to find ways for members to work together. Too often, community members work at cross purposes and fail to develop what Jane Addams called “the capacity for affectionate interpretation." Community Inquiry is what Addams and Dewey called their theory and practice for reshaping communities and, thus, society at large. Community Inquiry provides a theoretical and action framework for people to come together to develop shared capacity and work on common problems in an experimental and critical manner.

Text: Ann Bishop & Chip Bruce