History of

Community
Organization
Western beginning
 To the extent that social work was identified at
the end of the nineteenth and early days of the
twentieth centuries.
 its emphasis was on what would now be
recognized as community organization.
 Reform efforts were directed towards achieving
change in social provisions, legislation, and
methods of rendering services to people.
 Theearly American can social workers-reforms
organized people on a house-to-house basis,
identified and studied the dimensions of social
problems, devised policies and program proposals ,
formed pressure groups, and conducted various
campaigns to achieve change objectives.
Four major
periods
The charity organization period (1870-
1917)
 This era is the beginning in social welfare in USA.
 The first citywide Charity Organization Society
(COS) was established in the buffalo in 1877 in
USA.
 This movement was started with the influence of
London Charity Organization established in 1869.
Charity organization was concerned
about two things
 Providing adequate personal services to families
and individuals in need.
 Take steps to address the issues/problem in social
welfare.
 Apart from this service, the COS also took
initiatives in promoting co-operation among the
various welfare agencies.
 From this movement of charity organization
emerged many such service oriented organization.
i.e.
 social service exchange,
 community welfare councils,
 councils of social agencies.
The rise of federation 1917-1935
 The second period of community organization.
 The central phenomenon was the rise and rapid
growth of community chest and councils of social
agencies.
 Financial federation among voluntary social
welfare agencies to have originated in Liverpool,
England about 1873.
 In Denver, in 1887, a “Charity Organization Society.”
conducted a joint campaign that raised $21,700 for ten
organizations.
 The Cleveland federation for charity and philanthropy
established in 1903 is usually thought of as the first
modern community chest, uniting the concepts of both
joint fund-raising and joint budgeting.
 In 1917 there was a mushrooming growth 300 to 400 “
war chest” or financial federations concerned wholly
or partially with war appeals.
 1920’s many war chest where converted into
peacetime community chests.
 1930, the community chest plan had become the
established pattern for financing
 Three types of councils originated about the time
of world war I
 Cincinnati Public Health Federation, established in
1917, the first independent council in an American
City.
 Some of the first rural community councils were
organized in Massachusetts bet. 1912 and 1918.
 Origin to Berkeley, California , in 1919.
 Early 1930, the plan began to spread through
California, and later beyond the boarders of the
state.
Expansion and Professional
Development (1935-1955)
 Itwas marked by a recognition of the broader
implications of community organization and by an
increased concern with the analysis of the process
and the development of professionals skills.
 Thestock market crash of 1929 heralded the
beginning of the great depression of 1930’s.

 One important development during this period was

the greater use of the community organization
process in the field of public welfare.
HISTORY OF C.O. IN THE
PHILIPPINES
HISTORY OF C.O. IN THE
PHILIPPINES
 Pre-Colonial to Colonial Era
 1950s-60s Reconstruction Period
 1960s-70s First Development Decade
 1970s-80s Second Development
Decade Participatory Development
 1980s-90s Socio-Economic Work
 1990s Sustainable Development and
Gender Development
PRE-COLONIAL ERA TO
COLONIAL ERA
First Organizations: Tribes (Negrito, Indones
and Malay) and the existence of balangay.
 Damayan and bayanihan were an
expressive of mutual aid among their clan and
barangay. This helped to foster cooperation
and unity among them.
Pre-Colonial Era to Colonial Era
 Organized peasants from various provinces in
the country launched not less than 200 peasant
revolts against feudalism and Spanish
colonialism.
 Anti-colonialism organizations: La Liga Filipina,
KKK and HUKBALAHAP
1950s – 1960s
RECONSTRUCTION PERIOD

 Community organizing was employed to make

adjustments between meeting resources and need.
Programs then were relief distribution, self-help
projects, relocations and resettlements.

 Community development had its birth through the

initiative of the Social Welfare Administration (SWA)
with efforts focused on social amelioration in the rural
areas by providing health care, education,
infrastructure and finance for the peasants.
1950s – 1960s
RECONSTRUCTION PERIOD

 The President’s Action Committee on

Social Amelioration (PACSA) was
organized to direct the government’s thrust
on rehabilitating and reconstructing
communities.
1960s – 1970s
DEVELOPMENT DECADE
 During this period, the poverty situation worsen, the oil
price increased and the foreign debt established the
economic and political condition of the country.
 CO undertaken by various NGOs serves as venue to
express grievances to the government.
 However, the government’s organizing work introduced
a more organized social services to promote order and
minimize rallies and demonstrations employed by
sectoral based organizations.
1970s – 1980s
PARTICIPATORY DEVELOPMENT
 Marked the institutionalization of CO as an effective
strategy in development work.
 Philippine Ecumenical Center for Community Organizing
(PECCO), a church-based org. whose main concern is to
develop local organizers from the urban poor.
 Zone One Tondo Organization (ZOTO), first People’s
Organization (PO) formed since the institutionalization of
CO. Stopping the construction of International Port in
Tondo.
 People’s participation was given recognition.
 CO was influenced by Paulo Freire’s Liberative Education.
1980s – 1990s
SOCIO-ECONOMIC WORK
 The peak of NGO work in the Philippines.

 CO adopted the two-pronged approach,

strengthening of people’s organization to gain more
power, and implementation of socio-economic
activities to support immediate needs.

 Issue-based organizing also had its peak,

emerging from issues experienced by various
sectors such as the women, children, IPs, etc.
1980s – 1990s
SOCIO-ECONOMIC WORK

 Thepeak of NGO work in the Philippines.

 CO adopted the two-pronged approach, strengthening
of people’s organization to gain more power, and
implementation of socio-economic activities to support
immediate needs.
 Issue-based organizing also had its peak, emerging
from issues experienced by various sectors such as the
women, children, IPs, etc.
1990s – ONWARDS
SUSTAINABLE AND GENDER DEVELOPMENT

 Sustainable development framework: due to alarming

depletion of vital resources and degradation of the
environment, development institutions strategized
proper utilization and conservation of resources to
achieve goals of SD.

 Community practice centered on sectoral issues, the

90’s also marked the advent of women’s movement due
to the surfacing of various women’s issues such as
gender inequality, domestic violence, prostitution, etc.
Thank you.