Does Community Development Work?: Stories and Practice for Reconstructed Community Development in South Africa

What makes community development effective? How can we ensure that this work is responsive to the decolonial turn, the call for effectiveness and the need for justice? Highlighting useful practice frameworks for community development workers – both citizens and professionals – to navigate an increasingly uncertain world, Does Community Development Work? calls for a new quality of reflection and reflexivity. It sets out a post-structural, deconstructive and decolonizing perspective on community development. Grounded in stories of South African history and community development practice – dealing with issues such as housing, land, cooperatives, education, community protests and urban farming – this book combines story, conceptual insight and theoretical discourse. These detailed stories present a wonderful illustration of the global and South African history of community development. The book concretizes the vision of several notable individuals including Steve Biko, Mahatma Gandhi, Es’kia Mphahlele and Neville Alexander, whose writings and actions contributed to community development practice.

Peter Westoby has been involved in development practice for over thirty years, working as a grassroots practitioner, facilitator and scholar in diverse contexts such as Australia, PNG, the Philippines, Vanuatu, India, South Africa and Uganda. He is currently Associate Professor of Social Science and Community Development at Queensland University of Technology, Australia, and a Visiting Professor at the Centre for Development Support, University of the Free State, South Africa.

Lucius Botes is a professor in development studies and the director of research development in the Faculty of Economic and Management Sciences, at North-West University (South Africa) and a director of the Karoo Development Foundation and he acts as a development and research consultant to international and national organizations, government departments and companies, and is a director/trustee of various NGOs.