COMMUNITY SOCIAL ORGANIZATION

Community Social Organization

Community Social Organization

Social organization “describes the collection of values, norms, processes, and behavior patterns within a community that organize, facilitate, and constrain the interactions among community members” (Mancini, Martin, & Bowen, 2003, p. 319). Social organization is the process by which communities achieve their desired results for individuals and families, including the ability of individuals and families to demonstrate resiliency in the face of adversity and positive challenge.

Social organization includes networks of people, the exchanges and reciprocity that transpire in relationships, accepted standards and norms of social support, and social controls that regulate behavior and interaction. Like other definitions of social organization in the literature, our definition includes a focus on social networks, social controls, and the positive outcomes for individuals and families that can accrue from social organization.

For example, Sampson (1992) cites local friendship networks and rate of local participation in formal and voluntary organizations as key parts of social organization. In a similar vein, Furstenberg and Hughes (1997) suggest that social organization features include how individuals and families in the community interrelate, cooperate, and provide mutual support. In his work, Sampson (1991) also links the concept of social organization to the community's ability to implement “effective social controls” (p. 48), which Janowitz (1991) defines as “the capacity of a society to regulate itself according to desired principles and values” (p. 73). S

Social control is both centripetal (reining in or centering actions) and centrifugal (pushing outward and expanding actions toward growth and change). Social control can accrue from effective socialization, from scrutiny, from supervision that may result in penalties, and from rewarding social relationships and network experiences (Kornhauser, 1978). There is a link between social organization and the results that individuals and families are able to achieve, outcomes that are linked to what Sampson (1991) ...