I recently returned from a speaking tour of Australian cities where my message regarding the importance of community organizing was well received. While there, I learned that community organizing was also a focus of the Republican National Convention, where it was subjected to ridicule. I was incredulous -- after all, community organizing is as American as kangaroos are Australian.
When Alexis de Toqueville, a French count, toured the United States in 1831, it was the abundance of community associations that he identified as uniquely American. He was impressed by the way in which neighbors came together to accomplish what they could not do on their own whether that was raising a barn, operating a volunteer fire department, or participating in a town meeting.
Today, our sense of community is threatened by increasing mobility, suburban sprawl, electronic screens, economic stratification, and institutional growth. Robert D. Putnam's 2000 book Bowling Alone documents the decline of community and its associations. Yet strong communities are more important than ever.
It is as a community that we identify with and support one another. Our relationships are the key to crime prevention and our capacity to respond to emergencies.
Our very welfare and happiness are tied to our sense of community.
Not only do community members care for one another, but they care for the place they share. The future of our planet depends on our ability to be more concerned with the common good than with individual gain. It is in community that we are accountable for our individual actions and know that our collective efforts will have an impact on climate change.
And, it is as a community that we have the power to demand social justice. Saul Alinsky, the father of modern community organizing, observed that there are two kinds of power in our society