The Careless Society

The events in New Orleans — weather, community, government and media — have me re-reading John McKnight’s Careless Society: Community and It’s Counterfeits

Service systems can never be reformed so that they will “produce” [or even “deliver”] care. Care is the consenting commitment of citizens to one another. Care cannot be produced, provided, managed, organized, administered, or commodified. Care is the only thing a system cannot produce. Every institutional effort to replace the real thing is a counterfeit.

Care is, indeed, the manifestation of a community. The community is the site for the relationships of citizens. And it is at this site the the primary work of a caring society must occur. If that site is invaded, co-opted, overwhelmed, an dominated by service-producing institutions, then the work of the ocmmunity will fail. And that failure is manifest in families collapsing, schools failing, violence spreading, medical systems spinning out of control, justice systems becoming overwhelmed, prisons burgeoning, and human services degenerating.

New Orleans under water sounds like a fast-forward version of this loss of care. And the scary thing about it, the nagging sensation that permeates our watching, is that we know that our own communities of care have also been decimated by institutionalization, professionalization, monetization into “services” of what used to be simple, powerful community practice.

We used to know things, in the places where we live. Now we might not even know many of the people. In this way, many many of us are living below sea level. McKnight’s response? Asset-Based Community Development.

UPDATE: via The Independent

… Although a government exercise last year predicted the course of the disaster, Mr Bush drastically cut back spending on city defences. Work on strengthening vital levees needed to keep out flood water stopped for the first time in 37 years.

What else, if not “careless?”

2 Replies to “The Careless Society”

  1. I welcomed a visit to your site and was encouraged by your remarks…until you mentioned Bush.
    who cares about Bush? He’s not responsible for creating a society that cares. Your comments above indicate that he can never be. why did you not mention the failure of the good people of New Orleans to build bridges between rich and poor, of rich residents to drive through poor communities and help evacuate their poorer neighbors. why did you not mention the responsibility of local leaders who are of that community – who cares about some government official living a thousand miles away. People are never going to succeed, survive, thrive, excell, overcome, be victorious by their own standards if they keep waiting on others to make ways for them. Please, please, please do not neglect to mention that the crime, violence, apathy, poor living conditions, etc that were broadcast worldwide were also perpetuated by the black community who continued to live in the hopes that someone would rescue them. No one is going to resuce them – but them. This si what Bill Cosby was so berated for – for telling the black community that they could and should take care of their own issues and stop waiting for the world. the damamge of slavery, genocide and economic oppression has been done. the effects that the white patriarcal system of manifest destiny has laready left its mark on the world. But people can still rise above it. forgive me for not remembering the man’s name who just died after 5 decades of tireless search to expose and bring to justice hundreds of nazis who brutalized jews in concentration camps. Do you think this person was waiting on the government, the UN, the Untied States, etc. to complete the work for him? NO He made it his reason for being, so that his people would never forget and so that the atrocities would never be forgotten…a community that does not care about itself will not care about others. A community cannot wait for other people to teach it how to care for itself…please continue your work and your eloquent words – and please empower people to do more than assign blame.

  2. Hi,
    Mr. Herman, I am a social worker, the Division Director of Ada S. McKinley Foster Care and Adoption Services. I have participated in and observed the transformation of social work into a bastardization, of what I believe, its intention to be. I am concerned and thoughtful about how to encourage a profession to support the natural evolution of individuals, families, communities, society, not to punish these expanding entities for adapting in the ways that they we all do… to influences.

    I would like for you to come to McKinley and facilitate a discussion around the important issues in Mr. McKnight’s books and your observations. How much does your facilitation cost?

    Let me know.

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