The Sociology of Modernization and Development

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Table of Contents

Community
Empowerment
Community development
Social Capital
Globalisation
References

Community

In sociology, the term community is used to refer to a group of interacting people who have certain common parameters or conditions that bind them together; within a community, members have the sense of belonging and have collective identities among them.

Communities can be studied at micro and macro level where at micro level it will cover a few households that share certain attributes that hold them together; the common attributes may include geographical location, career, values, culture, and age. At a macro level, the world and individual countries qualify to be called communities as they share certain attributes (Giddens, 2010).

Human beings are social animals, they tend to live in groups where they share common life aspects; with the nature people feel the urge to create structures of belonging in the form of institutions that are governed by certain attributes that the people share.

In traditional human life, before the 19^th century, people used to live in territories that had certain attributes that kept them together, in modern globalized world, the world can be taken as a community where certain values and social phenomenon are shared.

With a community, the action of one member is likely to be felt by the other member as the structures create an interlink among them (Andersen and Howard, 2007).

Empowerment

Different communities have their capacity and strength, the capacity and strength is in the resources they have within their reach as well as powers they have entrusted other community institutions.

Efforts that are aimed at improving, strengthening spiritual, political, social, or economic strength of a community are referred to as efforts that promote empowerment.

Within the definition of empowerment, it may be specific to a particular group within a community that might have been suffering low prestige but when the prestige has been given, it can take the form of empowerment (Harrison, 1988).

Although the word may have different meanings in different subjects in sociology the work is used to mean any effort made to those people who are in social discrimination or marginalized with the aim/ objective of improving their lives.

The advocacy for empowerment arises from the concept of equality and respect to human kind irrespective of someone’s social-economic or gender stand.

Empowerment is mandated with the role of addressing a certain social evil or undesired phenomenon prevailing in the community, the main objective of the moves is to improve the marginalized population (in this case the particular one on target) and making their economic, political, and social environment better (Wallace,1982).

Community development

Communities have resources that need to be exploited and managed effectively to ensure that the needs of the community have been met effectively; resources are both human and physical.

Community development is societal management phrase used to refer to those efforts undertaken within a community to improve their living conditions, socially, economically, and politically; it has the aim of making community lives better and building capacity for continued standard of living improvement (Timmons,and Hite, 2000).

Resources are limited whereas needs are insatiable; how well a society utilize the available common resources determines the level of utility the society derives; community development programs ensures that the resources are exploited effectively and in case need be other resources are added from other sources.

When exploiting resources, people tend to do so their own benefit; there lack corporation among themselves without a controlling body; controlling body regulate exploitation of common resources for the benefit of the larger population.

Governments and nongovernmental organization have assumed the role of the controlling bodies in various communities; to undertake this role, Governments and nongovernmental use community development approach to address variety of issues facing communities within their jurisdictions (Hoatson and Dixon, 2003)

The science of sociology has developed the phrase Social Capital to define the collective strength that exists within communities by the virtue that they are living and having social relations among them; the social capital according to sociologists is power that drives a certain community but it’s inclined with the power vested in the human capital.

When people have good social relations, the default outcome is social capital where as a collective whole people can target and address a certain phenomenon facing their community.

When the concept of social capital is use, there is tendency to connect it with the role larger community where an action which is good within the community is done with the aim of benefiting the larger population and not single individuals (Jim, 2002).

Governments and community based institutions have the role of mobilizing social capital existing within a certain community and with the capital they seek solutions to the issues facing the particular community.

The collective whole to manage public goods is done for the benefit of individuals within the community; it reinforces the need to have the community in the forefront before taking some individualistic decisions.

Some social capital that is implemented in modern security life is community policing, under the policy, people is motivated to solve their own security issues with the assistance of the government (Kenny, 2006).

Globalisation

Globalization is a process of integration of regional economies and cultures into a global network of trade. In most cases the term globalization is used in economic terms. Economic globalization refers to the increase in national interdependence of economies through an increment in international trade.

This is the process of promoting economic integration between economies of different countries with the aim of establishing a global market (Bhagwati, J2004). Through economic integration, nations get a wider access to the world economy and their dependence on local resources is reduced.

It can be in the form of an F.T.A. (Free Trade Agreement), whereby there is no restrictions to trade or W.T.O. (World Trade Organization) where trade is regulated by an internationally body.

Social-economic integration makes international trade easier through the removal of trade barriers and tariffs. It can also be through protection of investors in order to promote their capital investments.

With economic integration, good and services, labor and capital find their way in the country where they can be put into maximum use. Maximum use on the other hand results to economic growth and development. Increase in mobility of factors of production faces some negative challenges especially because of the economic pressures in the global market.

Today, the global economy has increased to significant levels and all this have been facilitated by trade agreements. Several factors influence globalization which includes: socio cultural, technological, economic and political factors. Globalization can also be used to refer to the national movement of culture, languages and ideas (Bukley and Ghauri, 2004).

References

Andersen, M., and Howard, T.,2007. Sociology: understanding a diverse society. London: Cengage Learning.

Bhagwati, J. N., 2004. In defense of globalization A Council on Foreign Relations Book Series. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Bukley, P. and Ghauri, P. ,2004. Globalisation, Economic Geography and the Strategy of Multinational Enterprises.”Journal of International Business Studies, 35(2), p. 81.

Giddens, A.,2010. Sociology: Introductory Readings. New York: Polity.

Harrison, D.,1988. The Sociology of Modernization and Development. London: Routledge.

Hoatson, W., and Dixon, J.,2003. Community Practices in Australia. New South Wales: Pearson Education.

Jim, L., 2002. Community Development: Community-based Alternatives in an Age of Globalisation, New South Wales: Pearson Education.

Kenny, S.,2006. Developing Communities for the Future: Community Development in Australia. Sydney: Nelson ITP.

Timmons, R., and Hite, A.,2000. From modernization to globalization: perspectives on development and social change. New Jersey: Wiley-Blackwell.

Wallace, P ,1982. Theories of development. New York: Taylor & Francis.

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