Community: Definitions, Bases and Changing Concept of Community

Like the concept of society, the concept of community is ill-defined and loosely used in social sciences. It is a

term having numerous meanings both sociological and non-sociological. It is used in an omnibus way to refer to

a wide variety of specific social units.

In common parlance, the word ‘community’ is used for a collection of people who do related kinds of work,

such as the “teachers community” or the “doctors community”. It is also used to denote a collection of people

who share something in common as the “Hindu community”, the “Parsi community”, or the “Christian

community” without necessarily living in a particular area. Sometimes, it is used to describe a supposedly

coherent group, such as ‘international community. Such loose use of the word ‘community is always misleading

and indicate just to amorphous mass.

The term has been used in the sociological literature to refer directly to types of population settlements, such as

rural community or urban community, to supposedly ideal-typical ways of life in such places; and to social

networks whose members share common characteristics apart from or in addition to common location.

It has also been used to focus primarily cultural differences as traditional communities and modem

communities. A nineteenth century sociologist, F. Tonnies, who has been described as the founder of the theory

of community, defined ‘community in his book Geminschaft and Gesalbchaft (Community and Society) “as an

organic, ‘natural’ kind of social collectivity whose members are bound together by a sense of belonging, created

out of everyday contacts covering the whole range of human activities”. Tonnies contrasted this type of

collectivity with another, called an association, which is consciously organised for specific purposes and whose

members are bound together by common regulations or interests.

In nineteenth century thought this form of social association was characterised by a high degree of personal

intimacy, emotional depth, moral commitment, social cohesion, and continuity in time. It was feared that these

were precisely the features which were disappearing in the transition from a rural-based to urban industrial

society.

Definitions:

There have been many attempts to define the concept community. These have taken two distinct directions—the

‘organic’ conception and the ‘ecological’ conception of community. Scholars (such as F. Tonnies and Max

Weber), who have perused the organic conception, placed emphasis primarily on belongingness, close personal

contacts and identity of interests as the chief character sties of community, while the followers of second

conception, i.e., ecological, have highlighted its geographical or territorial character. For them, it is a

collectivity the members of which share a common territorial base of operations for daily activities.

As R.E. Park (1921) writes:

“Community, in the broadest sense of the term, has a spatial and a geographical connotation.” This geographical

conception of community involves the idea of a definite and permanent occupation of a given territory. But

community is not a mere geographical expression.

The relations among the people resident within an area must be such as to constitute those people a community.

There must be some degree of mutuality, organisation and consensus, some interaction and communication. By

‘community’, Weber meant that members “known each other” and have a degree of common consciousness and

identity and exclude those unlike themselves.

MacIver and Page write (1949):

“Wherever the members of any group—small or large—live together in such a way that they share, not this or

that particular interest, but the basic conditions of life, we call that group a community.” At other place, they

have defined it as “a strongly knit group occupying a single geographical area and living a common life”.

Sociologically, the idea of community often includes some commitment, identity and a feeling of common

living and shared fate. Thus, close-knit neighbourhood or religious groups are communities. In this sense,

Weber regarded status groups, like Indian castes, as communities. But MacIver and Page here differed with

Weber who has not regarded castes as communities. They have stated, “a social caste has social coherence but it

lacks the community’s territorial basis”. Many sociologists (past and present) have attached much importance to

the territorial character of the community as we see in the following definitions.

According to Bogardus (Sociology, 1952), “a community is a social group with some degree of we feeling and

living in a given area”. Similarly, Eshleman and Cashion (Sociology, 1983) defined it as “a collection of people

within a geographic area among whom there is some degree of mutual identification, interdependence or

organisation of activities”. For Dotson (1991), “a community is a spatial or territorial unit of social organisation

in which people have a sense of identity and a feeling of belonging”.

A recent textbook of sociology (Mike O’Donnel, 1997) has analysed the various definitions of community

and grouped them in three main categories:

1. The term ‘community’ is employed to describe a fixed locality (a given geographic area) as a basis of social

organisation. Thus, from this point of view, a traditional rural village is a community where people are born,

live and die.

2. Community is used to refer to a local social system or set of relationships that centre upon a given locality.

From sociological point of view, it is the concentration of relationships, rather than the geographical factor that

matters.

3. The term ‘community’ is also used to describe a quality of relationship which produces a strong sense of

shared identity. This usage does not give any importance to the spatial or geographical aspect of the community.

It does not depend on physical whereabouts or even on people having met each other.
For the last few years, this third sense of community is gaining ground and has been widely used. The old

territorial character of the community (closed boundary) has relatively little to do and more or less given up in

favour of quality of relationships (a sense of belonging and shared identity).

As such, hamlets, towns, cities and under modem conditions, the whole world with all its differences of race, of

culture, and of interests are communities. Not only this, youth sub-cultures, especially the hippies, or adherents

of Osho’s thought are thought of as lifestyle communities. The commune movement (Kibbutzim) attempted to

give territorial reality to ‘search for community’.

Summarising the ideas of different writers, the characteristics of community may be stated as under:

(1) A grouping of people.

(2) A delimited geographical area or locality (not much applicable to modem communities).

(3) A common culture and a social system which organises their activities.

(4) Consciousness among the members about their unity and a sense of belongingness (we-feeling).

(5) Act collectively in an organised manner.

(6) A division of labour into specialised and interdependent functions.

Bases:

MacIver and Page (1949) have listed two important bases of community:
(1) Locality:

A community always occupies a territorial area. Almost all sociologists (e.g., A. Green, K. Davis, Lundberg,

Bogardus etc.) have mentioned it as a basic condition in their definitions of community. The strong bond of

solidarity that we find in the members of a community is derived from the conditions of locality—living in a

definite geographical area. This bond is weakening today due to the development of modem means of

communications. But, the extension of communication has in some other way helped in territorial bond.

Now, the territorial area of the modern communities is expanding far and wide. Common place of residence

does not automatically yield a community. “A community of like-minded men” and “the world-wide

community of scholars” are such expressions which deny sharing a specific and delimited area of residence.

(2) Community sentiment:

Locality, though a necessary condition, is not enough to create a community. There must be the common living

with its awareness of sharing a common way of life. Local areas, which lack the social coherence, cannot be

termed as community.

Such areas lack ‘community sentiment’, an utmost necessary condition for the existence of a community.

Community sentiment involves sufficient contacts and common interests to instill conscious identification with
the area along with ‘we-feeling’, i.e., a feeling of belonging together. It is a sense of what they have in common

—memories, traditions, customs and institutions.

According to Alex Inkeles (What is Sociology, 1965), the following three elements are relevant as a basis of a

community.

A community exists:

(1) When a set of households is relatively concentrated in delimited geographical area;

(2) Their residents exhibit a substantial degree of integrated social interaction; and

(3) They have a sense of common membership, of belonging together, which is not based exclusively on ties of

consanguinity.

Thus, the essence of community is a sense of common bond, the sharing of an identity, membership in a group,

holding some things physical or spiritual, in common esteem, coupled with the acknowledgement of rights and

obligations with reference to all others so identified (Alex Inkeles).

The natural small community of permanent residents such as a village, a town, or a neighbourhood combines all

these elements. F. Tonnies (1887), L. Wirth (1938) and many other sociologists contend that as community

grows in size, the nature of relationships between its member’s changes accordingly.

Wirth noted that the size of the community prevents residents from getting to know most of the people in the

community. It also facilitates spatial (or physical) separation, based on race, ethnicity, social class and lifestyles.

Physical proximity, though an important element of community, does not itself make a community. Direct face-

to-face interaction can be replaced to some degree by symbolic interaction fostered by the media of

communication.

Communities may be large as much as a vast nation or they may be very small like a primitive tribe, a horde, a

nomadic group, or neighbourhood. A village, a town or a metropolis are other examples of a community.

Community exists within greater communities—the town within a state, the state within a nation and the nation

within the world community.

There are certain human groupings for which there is no clear-cut answer about their community character.

Such groups may be termed as borderline cases such as a monastery, a convent, an immigrant group or a prison.

MacIver and Page have accepted these groups as a community.

Changing concept of community:

The stable, solidary and intimate primary group type of ‘perfect community’ is fast disappearing as a result of

industrialisation, urbanisation, modern means of communication and information technology. The local unit is
increasingly absorbed into the larger economic and political society. Individuals no longer live wholly or even

largely within the primary group but are oriented with reference to the larger social world outside.

Individual interests, transcending the locality, are integrated on a national or international level. As contacts

have become more varied and extensive, they have also become more formal and external. The person is

fractionalised, participating in each of his several or many groupings with only a limited aspect of his total self

As a concrete, total personality, he is commanded by no one group, not even by his family. Intimacy has given

way to acquaintanceship or to anonymity on the basis of above ideas some sociologists have put forth a thesis

known as “loss of community”.

Old characteristics of community, i.e., locality and community sentiment or ‘we-feeling’ are being eroded by

the forces of modernity. These forces have fractured the myth of ‘homogeneous community’. The ‘Muslim

community”, the ‘Hindu community’, the ‘Black community’ or the ‘women’s community’ are now fractured

into feminists versus conservatives or liberals versus conservatives or various other strands (leftist versus

tightest) of opinions.

At many times, it is seen that women do not necessarily side with women just because they are women or

belong to women community. In the end, we may conclude that the concept of community has become

uncommonly elastic when we hear about the newly developed concepts like ‘global village’ or ‘global

community. Thus, this concept is now no more limited to a single or limited geographical area.