Local communities

A local community is a group of interacting people sharing an environment. In human communities, intent, belief, resources, preferences, needs, risks, and a number of other conditions may be present and common, affecting the identity of the participants and their degree of cohesiveness.

A community has been defined as a group of interacting people living in a common location. The word is often used to refer to a group that is organized around common values and is attributed with social cohesion within a shared geographical location, generally in social units larger than a household. The word can also refer to the national community or global community. The word "community" is derived from the Old French communité which is derived from the Latin communitas (cum, "with/together" + munus, "gift"), a broad term for fellowship or organized society.

A sense of community refers to people's perception of interconnection and interdependence, shared responsibility, and goals.

Understanding a community entails having knowledge of community needs and resources, having respect for community members, and involving key community members in programs.

The author Robert Putnam refers to the value which comes from social networks as social capital in his book Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community. He writes that social capital "makes an enormous difference in our lives", that "a society characterized by generalized reciprocity is more efficient that a distrustful society" and that economic sociologists have shown a minimized economic wealth if social capital is lacking.

Putnam reports that the first use of the social capital theory was by L. J. Hanifan, a practical reformer during the Progressive Era in the United States of America. The following description of social capital is a quote from L.J. Hanifan in Putnam's Book:

Those tangible substances [that] count for most in the daily lives of people: namely good will, fellowship, sympathy, and social intercourse among individuals and families who make up a social unit…. The individual is helpless socially, if left to himself…. If he comes into contact with neighbor, and they with other neighbors, there will be an accumulation of social capital, which may immediately satisfy his social needs and which may bear a social potentiality sufficient to the substantial improvement of living conditions in the whole community. The community as a whole will benefit by the cooperation of all its parts, while the individual will find in his associations the advantages of the help, sympathy, and fellowship of his neighbors.

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