The Citizens' Campaign Against Hunger and Poverty and For Life is a nongovernmental organization in Brazil that recruited and organized more than three million volunteers to distribute food baskets, support gardening and water projects, provide basic health care, create jobs, assist homeless children, and encourage local and state governments to…

A qualitative study examined how formal and informal social and cultural learning for political action was incorporated into two women's organizations in Colombia: the Association of Daycare Mothers and the Community Mothers. Research was guided by the historic hermeneutic method, which identifies experience through the narrative testimonies of…

Rural communities are often dependent upon their agricultural bases, which have undergone drastic changes. For communities to remain viable as economic units certain measures must be taken. Strategic planning can assist communities in assessing their situations and in developing plans and implementation schedules. Initially used in the business…

A strong local economy which allows residents of a community to work and shop near their homes is perhaps the best safeguard against the threats of urban sprawl, economic stagnation, physical deterioration and loss of unique identity facing many small towns. Utilizing a six-phase process advocated by the University of Wisconsin-Extension,…

Drastic change is taking place in America today. If drastic change does indeed foster revolution then our challenge is to help bring about peaceful revolution by making those changes that give power to the powerless. Both the majority and the minority groups are presented with the challenge of developing strategies and techniques for implementing…

This report summarizes 1997 activities of the Inter-American Foundation (IAF), an independent agency of the U.S. government. The IAF promotes equitable, participatory, and sustainable self-help development in Latin America and the Caribbean by awarding grants directly to local organizations, as well as by entering into partnerships with public-…

This report summarizes 1998 activities of the Inter-American Foundation (IAF), an independent agency of the U.S. government. The IAF promotes equitable, participatory, and sustainable self-help development in Latin America and the Caribbean by awarding grants directly to local organizations, as well as by entering into partnerships with public-…

The Fundacion Social, a grassroots organization in Colombia, uses profits from its 14 companies to fund community self-help initiatives aimed at eliminating poverty. Social programs focus on community integration, microbusinesses, recycling, education, and communication. The organization seeks to eliminate structural poverty and is currently…

A guide for community leaders, extension staff, and community or rural development practitioners outlines the evolution of a regional training model for community-based problem solving in rural areas experiencing economic decline. The paper discusses the model's underlying concepts and implementation process and includes descriptions of four…

Four rural communities in northern Maine were the setting for a pilot program in Indian adult education that featured a new kind of instructional model. Developed by the Human Resources Research Organization (HumRRO), it featured peer instruction, strict performance orientation, and insistance on mastery of certain skills. A HumRRO representative…

The development process in two communities, a mining county in rural Appalachia and a deteriorating neighborhood in a northern industrial city, is presented in case-study form. Concepts and commonly used terms are defined; a process of development is identified that can be used in groups small enough to permit attention to the growth of persons.…

The five articles in this report explore issues of rural and urban development, formal and nonformal education, and local and national needs in Africa. "Partnership for Productivity" (PFP) and "Brigades in Botswana: Their National Impact" focus on the development of managerial and nonagricultural vocational skills in rural…

Of the total number of illiterate people in the world, half are in India. National programs for adult education in India are the Community Development Program, Farmers Functional Literacy Project, and National Adult Education Program, participants in which include voluntary agencies, state resource centers, and district resource units. When the…

Institutional success of an instructional model that featured peer instruction, a strict performance orientation, and an insistence on mastery of specific skills led developers to believe the same model could be used by communities to disseminate skills and information at low cost and with efficiency. The system was utilized in setting up an…

A participatory action research process was used to support an Aboriginal men's group in Queensland (Australia). Using a reflective approach, the men's group defined principles and values to which they aspired, then identified four strategies to enable them to become constructive members of the community: personal development, employment,…