Understanding Community is a practical guide to understanding policies and underlying theories relating to community. This substantially revised edition draws upon theory from Marx and Bourdieu to offer a clearer understanding of community in capitalist society. Peter Somerville offers a close examination of government policies in areas such as economic development, education, health care, housing, and safety and sets them in the context of our understanding of crucial concepts like community cohesion, social capital, and capacity building. The book also explores the dark side of community to show how phenomena such as riots, gangs and terrorism can be understood as expressions of alternative ways to organize in search of community. The result is a book that challenges our understanding of community and assesses the strengths and limitations of our conceptual framework for thinking about and working with communities.
