Professional Documents
Culture Documents
People, Partnerships,
People, Partnerships, and
Communities series is to
assist The Conservation
and Communities
Partnership to build
capacity by transferring
information about social
science related topics
USDA Natural
Resources Understanding
Conservation
Service Community Power Structures
Social
Sciences
Team
What is power
Power is Not
in a community?
a “Dirty” Word
Power in a community is the ability to affect Often when people identify
the decisionmaking process and the use of words they associate with
resources, both public and private, within a power, negative responses
dominate. Power is seen as
community or watershed group. Power is
manipulative, coercive, and
simply the capacity to bring about change. It is destructive. A once-popular
the energy that gets things done. All levels of idea was that a few key people
The Conservation Partnership need to know used power to block changes
about community power structures in order to that benefited others, and that
more effectively implement and maintain “nice” people stayed away
from power. Attention
locally led conservation
focused on the idea of power
initiatives. A community can be defined as a over people. Increasingly,
watershed, region, town, county, or other the concept of shared power
geographic or geopolitical boundary. is being recognized as repre-
senting a more sustainable
Examining the concept of power involves and effective approach.
Power, used in implementing
looking at the sources and structures that locally led conservation,
influence local should be viewed as the
communities and exploring the relationships ability of citizens and civic
that shape cooperative efforts. The conser- leaders to bring together
vationist who has a basic understanding of diverse community members
in initiatives that lead to real,
social power and who can identify the power measurable change in the
actors in a community can enhance the lives of their community.
opportunity for success in conservation
initiatives.
• Other communities have a small, tightly knit group – the power elite – that
controls policy-making for the community.
• Finally, some culturally diverse communities base their power almost totally
on democratic principles and unanimity.
The “power pool” may be the most common kind of power structure. The other structures are special
cases found in communities with unique characteristics. The “power pool” has at least the following
implications for conservationists and other change agents:
1. The same power actors may not be relevant to every issue, so each issue
needs to identify appropriate power actors.
2. There are communication networks within the pool. A discussion with one
or more power actors provides an indirect method for communicating a
message to several other power actors. It also provides a means for
communicating to other people in the community.
3. Members of the power pool change over time. In addition, the power of
one individual relative to another may change, so the assessment of power
actors cannot be viewed as a one-time task.
There are two kinds of power structures: formal and 3. Decisionmaking method –
informal. The formal power structure is easily Study the history of community
recognized and includes elected and appointed decisionmaking to determine the
government officials and leaders of civic organiza- power actors who actively partici-
tions. The informal power structure, which exists pate in community actions. Sources
together with the formal power structure, is harder of information include meeting
to identify and may hold a greater influence over a minutes, press reports, and partici-
community’s development. pant interviews. It is possible to
determine members of a general
Four methods have been developed that will help power structure using this method,
conservationists identify the community’s formal and whether specialized power
and informal power structures. structures exist that deal with single
issues.
The following is a summary of the steps to take when assessing power structures and identifying key leaders
in a community or watershed group.
o Chrislip, David D., and Carl E. Larson. “Collaborative Leadership: How Citizens
and Civic Leaders Can Make a Difference.” San Francisco: Joey-Bass Publishers,
1994.
o Kretzmann, John, and John McKnight. “Building Communities from the Inside Out:
A Path Towards Finding and Mobilizing A Community’s Assets.” Chicago: ACTA
Publications, 1993.
o Michigan State University, Michigan State University Extension, and USDA NRCS
“Developing Your Skills to INVOLVE COMMUNITIES in Implementing Locally
Led Conservation.” Module 5, Power in Communities. Grand Rapids, Michigan:,
1999.
o Putnam, Robert D. “Bowling Alone.” New York: Simon and Schuster, 2001.
***
Establishment
The Natural Resources
Conservation Service
established the Social Sciences
Team (SST) in September 2004
in order to more fully integrate
the social sciences into Agency
programs and activities. The
goal is to more effectively serve
our rural and urban customers
and to increase adoption of
conservation.
Mission
The Social Sciences Team
integrates customer opinion and
field work with science based
analysis to discover how the
social and economic aspects of
human behavior can be applied to
natural resource conservation
programs, policies, and activities.
Vision
The Social Sciences Team will
be a recognized leader in
developing and transferring
practical social sciences
technology to assist in the
productive, equitable, and
environmentally sound use of
our global natural resources.
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