DEVELOPING COLLABORATION IN RURAL POLICY: LESSONS FROM A STATE RURAL DEVELOPMENT COUNCIL



♦ Advocates for resources to overcome technical∕fιnancial constraints
to community priority projects.

• Uses professionals and their organizations to carry out projects.

• Produces process outcomes that are difficult to measure.

These two paradigms were played out as an IRDC task force de-
veloped an Americorps application for community development. In
discussing where to place student volunteers most effectively for
rural Idaho, there were several who advocated placing individual
volunteers at the service of local Gem Community organizations.
There they would work on implementing whatever projects that
community had identified as important, serving as a local contact
and initiator. They were advocating empowerment.

In contrast, others suggested placing volunteers as regional spe-
cialists in certain types of projects, e.g., a forestry major working on
community tree-planting projects or an architecture major focusing
on several downtown revitalization projects. This specialization
would be a more efficient way to get projects done. Since the com-
munity had identified the problems, it was argued this approach was
sensitive to local needs.

Lesson 2. Collaboration Creates Social Capital

We became confused. It was very possible that the regional spe-
cialist approach might be a more efficient way to deliver projects
into a community. Yet this approach did not seem satisfying because
the volunteer was not located in each community directly working
for the local group. What was missing?

The answer came from Dr. Cornelia Flora, who spoke to the
IRDC Community Leaders Forum in Pocatello. The empowerment
model creates more social capital.
Social capital is the interactions,
linkages, networks, and trust that help individuals in a community
coordinate and cooperate for mutual benefit.
It is the mutual respect,
the trust, the group confidence, the momentum created by the suc-
cessful completion of one project that encourages the group to tackle
the next problem.

Dr. Flora called social capital a necessary precondition for effec-
tive government and community development. Its presence en-
hances investments in the other two types of capital—physical and
human capital (Putnam).

Social capital is a peculiar resource, because it diminishes if not
used and grows when it is used. In other words, success breeds suc-
cess. But it does take considerable time and effort to create. Much of
the groundwork is already laid in small towns, because people there
already see one another in several different roles and places, e.g., in
church, at the grocery store, at the football game, in the Rotary
Club.

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