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It’s time for organizers to take their boxing gloves off, for developers to take their hard hats off, and for funders to come out from behind their desks, to begin a serious dialogue about how organizing can be integrated into – and, yes, drive – community development strategies.

When Nutley, New Jersey, Police Chief Robert DeLitta and Sgt. Steve Rogers saw a letter in the local newspaper from an African-American woman who was having trouble renting an apartment […]

When we rethink the problem as one of political voice rather than community consensus, it opens up new, innovative techniques to determine public priorities.

In the September/October 1995 issue of Shelterforce, William Traynor wrote that the principle of “community building” is gaining prominence among community-based organizations and their funders. One important branch of this […]

Many people in the community development field are conflicted about the police presence where they work. We invited a group of practitioners to share their experiences and talk through this tension.

Community development has much to celebrate from its thirty or so years of existence. The field has achieved a solid level of national respect and support, and has grown from […]

Community schools support kids, families, and neighborhoods in their mission to improve education.

Born amid 1960s strife, nearly 1,000 Community Action Agencies fight poverty all over America today. While CAAs deliver essential services, a renewed focus on citizen involvement and collaboration is needed […]

After a brief, shining moment following the 2008 Republican National Convention, when it seemed community organizers would rule the country, they are now back on the defensive.

In a struggling, isolated Portland neighborhood, a group of neighborhood women have organized a Neighborhood Pride Team (NPT) over the past few years. They started their community building work by […]

Academics often get a bad reputation for studying poor communities without involving them in study design. But some researchers are doing it differently.

Five women from diverse backgrounds who span the country—Missouri, New Mexico, Hawaii, California, and Texas—got together with Shelterforce to talk about the community development field and their work in it.