Community Development Journal Advance Access published online on February 12, 2009
Community Development Journal, doi:10.1093/cdj/bsp004
Introducing a community work perspective in local policy-making: a pilot community intervention in the Municipality of Aigeiros, Thrace, Greece1
Address for correspondence: email: vkaragk{at}otenet.gr
The decentralization process that has been introduced during the last decades in Greece, along with initiatives co-funded by the EU, forms a different context for the Greek society. This provides the ground for an academic and political dialog concerning the ability of local societies to participate in planning and implementing social and local development policies. Focusing on a case study of a small, multicultural municipality in Thrace, Greece, the aim of this paper was to participate in this dialog by presenting it as an example of using techniques and methods of community work, ‘real conditions’ planning, empowering and encouraging community participation in a multicultural region, finding pathways to build on social capital and support local development and thus making the most of EU co-funded projects against social exclusion. The case study was an action research that took place in the context of a PhD thesis2 from October 2005 to December 2006. The paper discusses the role of community work in an effort to identify and confront the problems that were faced by the community. The aim was to set a multicultural and more responsive to the local needs and particularities perspective in the procedure of the local authority policymaking.