ABCD

Increasing crime spend more on police enforcement. Literacy issues blame the schools. Neighborhood degeneration look to city planners for a solution.

As a society, it's a common attitude to look to institutions and agencies to solve our problems and shape our communities. But the simple fact is our institutions and agencies can't solve all our problems. And when it comes to providing more services, most of them are at their capacity. Additionally, institutions and agencies can't create community; only people can create community. So if we're concerned with creating safe, inclusive, and vibrant communities, the responsibility for change lies with the citizens living in the community.

The ABCD training group was developed by Mike Green and Henry Moore to develop resources and conduct workshops on mobilizing communities to change. Mike and Henry have worked all over North America and throughout Europe assisting groups to develop community-based solutions to a wide range of issues. They've consulted with cities and local government, Human Service organizations, Community Development agencies, foundations, schools, and religious groups.

Asset-based Community Development, or ABCD, is a collection of principles, strategies, and insights that can be used to mobilize a community to get stronger. There are five fundamental concepts to the ABCD model. First is that there are many assets in the community that aren't recognized or utilized. Discovering the assets rather than focusing on the deficits is a fundamental building block for change.

Second, discover what people care enough to act upon. As citizens, there are many issues we're concerned with, but relatively few that we care enough to really do something about. Discovering the motivation to act in individuals can connect people of mutual interest and can create an army of dedicated, motivated, and passionate citizens.

Third, develop strategies to mobilize groups to act. All communities contain existing groups and organizations that have the potential to act for a stronger community. Discover what groups care about and learn how to mobilize them to create a powerful force for change.

Fourth, discover the difference between the roles that programs or agencies can best play and those that citizens must play for successful community building. Historically, programs or agencies hold most of the power and control most resources for community development, while citizens have minimal power, authority, and responsibility. Correcting this imbalance is fundamental to effective change.

Lastly, organizations that are successful using the ABCD model have discovered how to lead by stepping back rather than offering a traditional set of services to meet specific needs. They become committed to learning and investing in what people want to do and helping them to do it. ABCD challenges conventional thinking on community development and places control and responsibility for change where it can be most effective: with the people in the community. Organizations and agencies have their roles and responsibilities, and individuals and community groups have theirs. With this DVD, it's our hope that the insight shared by Henry and Mike will encourage you to create change, to develop community partnerships that really work.

According to the 2005 US Census, 37 million people in America live in poverty. Of those, over 6 million people are receiving welfare or assistance. Poverty has become a critical and controversial issue. In a consumer-based society, we value the independence created by adequate money, and we're critical of those living without. But regardless of whether someone is working or not, the stigma of living in poverty is overwhelming.

"It was hard, hard to be on welfare and hard to be poor. I didn't have a lot of self-esteem to begin with, and being on welfare uh did not help that, uh especially the the food stamps and all of that, going to the store and everybody's looking at you and you're handing them your food stamps, going, yeah, like a failure, like a a failure to society and a burden to society, a failure to my children because my children were young at the time. I um felt like uh people believed that I was never going to be anything, that I was never going to get anywhere, um regardless of whether I had given them that opinion of myself or not, they just automatically already believed that."

So not only are people living in poverty disadvantaged by a lack of resources and opportunities, but emotionally they're affected by the stigma and the attitudes of others. The Department of Human Services enhances the debilitating effects of poverty with a dehumanizing service model.

"Going to sign up for services through DHS, you feel, well, first of all you're a client, you're a problem that needs to be solved in their eyes; that's how you felt. And so yeah, you just really feel like you're not worth anything. It was um isolating in a sense to be uh poor and to only have my family to deal with was really really kind of isolating. You dealt with like the Department of Human Services, but that in itself is a isolating organization to be involved with when you're in need. If you go to a government agency, you become a case number and you're treated with about that much dignity. You become a case number and there's no difference between 87412 and 87413."

The typical model for providing services to people in poverty is the polar opposite to the values of asset-based Community Development. The typical model views people living in poverty as a problem that the government needs to fix. DHS and their case workers hold all the power, while their clients do whatever they can to qualify for support. The agency-client relationship creates a perpetual dependency that further incapacitates those they're trying to serve. Contrast the typical model with the approach taken by Beyond Welfare, and you begin to see the overwhelming impact asset-based Community Development can have.