Community Dialogue, a book review

Some months ago, Parvin Pakzadmanesh and Mostafa Pakdelnejad and me (Saeid Nouri Neshat) edited a book in Farsi entitled: "Hamandishi Mahlehee va Jayegah aan dar modiriat mahaleh" (or Community Dialogue and its role in Community Management). The book was published in Tehran by Jameeshensasan publication.

The book has four chapters. The first chapter starts with the concept of dialogue in Iranian culture and continues with the concept of mahaleh (or community) with an aim to show how important is the role that "dialogue" can play in a community. It also studies, in brief, local management in communities that was prevalent in the past in Iran. From there, it reviews how the new structure of communities works in Tehran and suggests that "dialogue" has to be revived in communities. It also defines other necessary concepts such as "facilitator", "community researcher" and "community dialogue". The chapter moves further and tries to show that a dialogue can result in actions and therefore, defines "action plan" as a major result of such interactions at local level.

The second chapter is a conceptual framework. It uses an approach of local development based on "the symbolic interaction" and tries to show that citizens in a city could be neighbors that are responsible for their communities.

The third chapter studies the process of "community dialogue" project implemented by the Tehran Municipality (Research Center) in Tehran. It analyzes the data collected from the dialogues facilitated in 1388 (2009-2010) and 1389 (2010-2011) and proves how effective community dialogues have been organized in Tehran.

The fourth chapter is like a suggested framework for an effective dialogue within a community. Any facilitator or community member needs this part, if they are going to be engaged in a dialogue with certain positive results.  It has many useful points regarding facilitation, training and empowerment, participation, sincerity, trust, decision-making, citizenship, community management, neighborhood councils, differences among communities, special groups in need, special issues in communities, women's participation and involvement, practicality, monitoring and evaluation.

The book has been published in Farsi, and I am thinking to translate the book in English, since I think any community worker needs to read the book. 

Community management and facilitation

In Tehran, a city council whose members are directly elected by Tehran citizens is in power. Still for a metropolitan city like Tehran, such council acts mostly at macro level. After some time, and by a decree by the Tehran city council, neighborhood councils were established. These negiborhood councils (or Shora-yari or friends of the council) are again elected by the direct votes of people in communities. Tehran has been divided into 374 communities, and each of them has one established neighborhood council.

After sometime, a new mechanism was introduced: community manager (or Modir Mahaleh). A new concept that was brought into the communities to resolve the problems with the city council (who cannot decide for every community in Tehran) and the neighborhood councils (who had only limited duties of monitoring the municipality and keeping communication with the city council). The new community manager now has come into scene, with more powers, to help the community development.

To select one capable community manager,  a new entity was established in communities in Tehran: Community Trustees' Committee (or Heyat Omanaye Mahaleh), composed of members from neighborhood council, community mosque, local active groups (CBOs) and the representative of the Municipality at sub-district level. This entity helps the community manager to better decide and act in the community. 

It seems a little bit strange that in less than 20 years we have created five new mechanisms in Tehran: City council, neighborhood councils, Community Trustees' Committee, local groups at community level, and community manager. I think such mechanisms cannot work well without the people who know how to talk, how to create a constructive dialogue, how to decide in groups, and how to cooperate with each other. Facilitation can be an effective tool for all those who intend to have results at the end, since it will assist to have communicative process at various levels. In fact, facilitators can be much useful in creating common visions and objectives at various levels from smaller groups of community-based organizations to committees and neighborhood councils.

Diversity in Mahaleh (Community)

The level or better to say the "intensity" of diversity in communities or in local groups, is not the same as the diversity in bigger organizations, especially those organized from different communities. Does it mean that a local group shaped in a community has to be very week since they are only from the community and the members are not diverse. Is that true ?
When I look back at my experience in working with different communities and local groups in Iran, I can imagine how week the groups were. In some cases, some female villagers, with not enough knowledge, came together, while they were trying hard to create a change in their own community; they were not enough empowered since, at least, for one reason, they were not diverse. What has to be done ?
I think that we have to create diversity and contribute to it, as much as we can. If the group are only men, we have to encourage them to include women too, and the reverse is also true. Age diversity is another fact. Is there possible to invite various individuals from different age groups ? The third is to create diversity through involving various people from different perspectives.
In one village, I remember, I suggested students (university students) to join the group. The students were not in the village (they were students in other cities), but they came back the village when there was a holiday. That would be good, since these students could act as a bridge between the community and the resources available outside the community.
There are many other ways to guarantee the diversity within the local group, but, as facilitators, we have to ask the local people how they can add to their own diversity or to the diversity of their own group. Of course, the people attending the meetings have to be trained on diversity, so that they can understand the concept better. They have to understand diversity as "source of knowledge" which may be much helpful.

Encouragement of dialogue in communities: active listening

I have heard it many times that people in Iran have an oral culture and tradition; which means that messages are mostly transmitted in speech or songs, and will takes various forms of sayings, folktales, chants, etc. It also means that they talk but the do not write; however it seems people do not listen too.
In our workshops in various Tehran communities (mahalah), we had to encourage an dynamic dialogue on major problems among people living in a community. People, especially women and the members of local councils, loved such 2-3 hour meetings since they had a chance to talk about their own problems in presence of neighboring individuals; we found that people do not tend to listen. We, as facilitators, were there to encourage "dialogue". Dialogue means a process of talking and listening. Of course, when we are talking about listening, it is mostly active listening. As an active listener, he or she should be able to repeat back in his/her own words what he/she has been told (or what she/her has heard). This does not mean the listener agrees with what she/he has been told, but rather understands what others are mentioning. In fact, active listening - as a part of dialogue - improves mutual understanding in a community.

To be able to encourage "listening" in our project in Tehran communities, we used the five following techniques:

• Before the meeting starts, the facilitators remind the participants that they have two ears but one mouth. It is better to listen twice than they talk.
• The facilitator reminds people to listen carefully what others mention and not to refer to anything repeated during the brainstorming.
• Creating a pause either through paraphrasing or repeating, would help the participants to actively listen and think about the comments.
• The facilitators have to use the same language as people using, and to avoid expertise and literary words. People may listen better to a familiar language. 
• The facilitators will mention the fact that we are here not to judge but to understand what exactly people think about their own priorities in community.

Community acts in an environment

I remember, once in a local community, people were invited to attend a planning programme. I started to facilitate the meeting based on the process that had been designed. During the meeting, one of the local authorities thought that he should intervene, and when necessary, he started to continue the meeting without me. I let him continue, since I was really tired on that day (and of course I had no other choice); but then I found that he was just trying to end the meeting, since somehow, he might have thought that the people might demand something more than the capacity they had as local authorities of the municipality (as a governmental ). That was one of the worse memories of my facilitation activities.
Community empowerment will not happen without a general change within the system. The whole administrative system has to accept that such empowerment activities are a part of the general policy. In fact, the community acts within an environment and receives so many inputs from the environment. An enabling environment can help a community to move forward while a disabling environment impedes a community to progress.
However, a facilitator who is involved in community empowerment cannot wait until the system accepts the general idea of community empowerment. He or she has to start her work, even if there are problems. It means people have to experience participatory decision-making. That can start with very small projects in community. Such small activities will affect the environment.

Community Studies or Mahaleh Studies

Today, I was just moving around in UM library, and I found a book entitled: Community Studies. The book edited by Colin Bell and Howard Newby was first published in 1971. The book opens discussions on community that "was thought to be a good thing", however "its passing was to be deplored, feared and regretted." The author continues to find community position within the whole literature of eighteen to twentieth century. When reading that, I was thinking why we have not tried to look carefully at our notion of "mahaleh" in our own Iranian culture; a notion that now Tehran Municipality is trying to revive. About 130 years ago, Tehran had only five major mahaleh; now Tehran has been divided into 374 mahaleh.

In Mahaleh, the concept of neighborhood is so powerful. Mahaleh can be somehow a community, in which people are connected since they are living together. Ham-Mahaleh-ee, or the person who is living in the same mahaleh, is a powerful notion. Mahaleh could create a social identity, which may motivate people living in one mahaleh to help each other, to work for their own mahaleh. Mahaleh had a name; when somebody was asked where he/she had been born, you might hear he/she referred to the name of mahaleh. Now, reference to a mahaleh in responding to the place of birth has been forgot, since Tehran has really become a big city.

Facilitation and Trust

Social trust plays a major role in cohesion in a group. When group members trust each other, they are somehow let the group act in harmony. Every member of a group acts like an essential part of a group and every member trusts others, this let the group move more smoothly.

When individuals who are members of a group - and that are in relationships characterized by high levels of social trust, then they are more apt to openly exchange information, since they know that by such exchanging the information, they will not be hurt.

I do not know whether there has been any research focused on social trust or not, but I know well that there is a direct relationship between social trust and the power of a group.

The role of a facilitator is to strengthen the social trust among members of a group, through designing the best trust-building activities, and using effective techniques based on social trust in group activities.

I will try to find more cases of social trust within groups in the next post.