What makes a community?

1- What did we understand as a form of community in the narratives within the WTFutures corpus?

People being part of the same territory, but on what scale? In the projects, participants describe forms of relationship in cities, neighbourhoods, valleys…, but never at the larger scale of a country.
People sharing a cultural identity. As an example, several projects are taking into account “indigenous” knowledge, practices, rituals, history, etc.
People in similar social positions – notably marginalized, vulnerable populations united by this common experience.
People sharing a common interest or cause.
Or simply people choosing to be together for a variety of reasons. Online communities are the most common examples.

2- What is “expected” from communities? Mostly what make them more than just collections of people:

Social bond.
Sense of belonging.
Care – community as an “antidote” to loneliness, individualism, polarization, etc.
Resilience, the ability to respond to catastrophes and traumatic experiences.
Resistance.
Agency, concrete changes, implicitly or explicitly contrasted with the lack of change coming from higher levels of decision.

Community as the starting point for stories

In some projects, the concept of community takes up a lot of space for the simple reason that it is the center of the futuring process. It is the case for the initiative Kijiji Cha Amani. The storytelling workshops, called “parachute mapping”, are built for the participants, all coming from the same place, to draw and discuss their conditions of living together.

In Parque Explora: Laboratorios Creativos, the participants expressed a need for future stories that talk about what they care about, something that resembles them, that suits their community, something they don’t seem to find in generic narratives or stories from other places of the world. According to Luz Helena Oviedo Villegas, who led the project, “the first lesson I learned was that the participants’ territory is very present in their answers. For participants from indigenous groups, in particular, their future projection is to go back to their territories and to do something for them.”

Community as a wish for social change

In other contexts, the “community” theme emerges as a wish, or even a call, for renewed human relationships in the city. Three French projects particularly emphasize this desire for social change. Destination Beauvais 2040 has seen this idea emerge as one of the main themes throughout the workshops. In Butterfly 2050, even the architecture adapts to this new way of living in some narratives: “Indeed, buildings are now much more focused on community living. They feature several shared spaces that allow for a variety of services.” (excerpt from La sagesse de l’habitat, The wisdom of habitat, translated from French)

In Aubervilliers 2124, the wish for community spirit is described as a renewal of citizens’ involvement in the life of their city or neighborhood.

Community as a factor of strength and healing

The collective force emerging from a community is also seen as a strong lever of change to get to preferable futures. Building, or rebuilding communities is part of the strategy of transformation, of the mechanics to counter climate change or other antagonistic elements. In Climate Futures in Brussels 2030, community resourcefulness is judged as more reliable than high tech.

The same lesson came out of Citadins, Citadines 2050: “as the participants’ creations tell us, the real key to resilience lies in social connection: the ability to act together, to help each other, to trust each other, to live powerful experiences together despite the harsh times.”

This strength of community in the narratives often comes from a lived experience of reliance on local human relationships in times of crisis. After hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico, many people felt left on their own by the lack of government action. That is why Puerto Rico 2054 invited students to specifically investigate how people helped each other and how communities rebuilt themselves in an organic way.

Crafting Change through Natural Dye-making presents another facet of community resilience: the concept of care^def:1, in this case expressing a form of collective healing in part based on indigenous cultures and practices: “Reconnection to artisanal and traditional practices as acts of care and resistance.”

Community as a way to build the future today

While politics at the level of a country can be slow and frustrating, the horizontal organization between people of the same territory is a way to see concrete change in the short term. It is a way for young people to get involved to transform an unsatisfying present in hopeful futures.

Enter Nusantara and Bagmati River Youth Project both put the community at the center to develop projects and build the future they want at the local level. The programs invite youngsters to imagine and engage in climate actions participating in what they want to see become reality.

In the ClimateWorks Lab or in the Centre for Reworlding, the community space is a platform for sharing knowledge, for intergenerational and cross-cultural learning, and for debating. It also forms the core of what participants want to protect.

“Climate change related disasters impact equity-denied people and communities more. Equity benefits everyone, yet it is frequently used to deepen divides between the powerful and the vulnerable, hence the reason why we frame our communities as ‘equity-denied’ instead of marginalised or vulnerable. Conflict resolution, speaking to people that disagree with you, problem solving issues that affect others, etc. is critical work now – actions that help build resilience and halt survivalist instincts.”
Centre for Reworlding

Finally, the theme of community is sometimes intertwined with another category of this analysis: Social justice (see Social Justice). It is particularly the case when the community is marginalized or precarious. Museo del Futuro called this “Social justice through design”: “Some [produced artefacts] envisioned a radically inclusive city where public spaces were co-designed by residents, especially in marginalized neighborhoods. Youths imagined new forms of housing, education, and care systems based on solidarity and mutual aid.”

Including both self and community care, this concept is about being attentive to the needs of oneself and others, showing support and compassion, assuming some responsibility towards it and meeting the needs when possible. It recognises that the well-being of all is the result of shared responsibility, despite the power dynamics that govern our interactions. Learn more with Mrs Roots.