The Relational Genesis of Community: Self–Other Dialogue

Of late, there is increasing interest in the dialogical foundations of the self and community. Indeed, dialogical theory points to the embeddedness of community in self–other relations. This article proposes a dialogical approach to community that draws upon four key themes of discourse: the sociality of the self, the realm of interindividual relations, the constructive role of social representations, and the emergent properties of collective action. The ‘between’ constitutes a valuable concept for theorizing fundamental processes of relational existence and responsive meaning‐making, including the co‐constitution of community. In the process of coming into dialogic relation with one another, individuals construct meanings, experiences, and actions that profoundly shape both selfhood and community. Thus conceived, community is founded on dialogic interaction and intersubjective representation, thereby becoming the conscious object of reflection and action. The intention here is to theorize the relational genesis and continued transformation of community through self–other dialogue. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Measuring Relational and Intrapersonal Empowerment: Testing Instrument Validity in a Former Soviet Country with a Secular Muslim Culture

Research and evaluation studies measuring the construct of empowerment within international community development and human rights initiatives are rare due to a lack of validated measures appropriate for the cultural context. This study represents an initial effort to develop and test the Brief Azerbaijani Empowerment Scale (BAES), an instrument designed to assess relational and intrapersonal components of psychological empowerment among adult community residents (n = 350) in Azerbaijan, a former Soviet country with a predominantly Muslim culture. Exploratory factor analysis was used to examine the underlying dimensionality of the BAES, and path analysis was used to examine relationships between subscales of the BAES and a set of conceptually relevant variables (i.e., alienation, sense of community, and involvement in community organizations). Findings supported the reliability and validity of the BAES, which may be useful to future efforts to develop more comprehensive measures of intrapersonal and relational empowerment. Implications for future research and practice are discussed.     

Governance Processes and Change Within Organizational Participants of Multi-sectoral Community Health Care Alliances: The Mediating Role of Vision,Mission, Strategy Agreement and Perceived Alliance Value

Multi-sectoral community health care alliances are organizations that bring together individuals and organizations from different industry sectors to work collaboratively on improving the health and health care in local communities. Long-term success and sustainability of alliances are dependent on their ability to galvanize participants to take action within their ‘home’ organizations and institutionalize the vision, goals, and programs within participating organizations and the broader community. The purpose of this study was to investigate two mechanisms by which alliance leadership and management processes may promote such changes within organizations participating in alliances. The findings of the study suggest that, despite modest levels of change undertaken by participating organizations, more positive perceptions of alliance leadership, decision making, and conflict management were associated with a greater likelihood of participating organizations making changes as a result of their participation in the alliance, in part by promoting greater vision, mission, and strategy agreement and higher levels of perceived value. Leadership processes had a stronger relationship with change within participating organizations than decision-making style and conflict management processes. Open-ended responses by participants indicated that participating organizations most often incorporated new measures or goals into their existing portfolio of strategic plans and activities in response to alliance participation.     

礼之用,和为贵?和谐管理理论视角下团队亲社会违规氛围对团队绩效的影响

当前关于亲社会违规行为的研究主要集中于个体层面,但实践和理论都表明我们有探究团队亲社会违规氛围的必要性。为此,本研究聚焦于团队亲社会违规氛围这一概念,以和谐管理理论为基础,分别引入团队和谐作为中介变量和团队互依性作为调节变量,探讨团队亲社会违规氛围对团队绩效的影响机制和作用边界。本文以74个团队和334名团队成员为研究对象,通过对三阶段所获取的数据进行分析,结果显示:(1)团队互依性对团队亲社会违规氛围与团队和谐的关系具有调节作用:当团队互依性高时,团队亲社会违规氛围对团队和谐的负向影响更强;(2)团队和谐对团队绩效具有显著的正向影响;(3)团队互依性调节了团队亲社会违规氛围通过团队和谐对团队绩效的间接效应:当团队互依性水平较高时,团队亲社会违规氛围通过团队和谐对团队绩效的负向效应会被增强。本研究证实了团队亲社会违规氛围对团队绩效的作用机制与边界条件,拓宽了亲社会违规行为和团队和谐的相关研究。     

Value Concern of Ecological Rationality and Exploration of the Chinese Path to Modernization

The COVID-19 pandemic has raged around the world over the recent years, raising the global community’s awareness of the interconnection of human civilizations and urging the reconsideration of the humannature relationship. The escalating worldwide ecological crises are putting human survival and development at risk. The phenomenon has aroused the awareness of “ecological rationality,” consciousness of “economic value” and appeal for “ecological justice” in the universal sense. The endeavor of promoting ecological civilization has been included as part of the fivesphere integrated plan for building socialism with Chinese characteristics since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC). General Secretary Xi Jinping’s thought on ecological civilization has fully manifested the value and goal of comprehensively promoting ecological civilization and adhering to the Chinese path to modernization. The Chinese path to modernization, which has reflected on and outclassed the Westernstyle logic for modernization, shows a unique horizon and independent wisdom. Focusing on addressing the uncertainties facing human survival in the New Era and aiming at embracing the future, the Chinese path to modernization has shifted the mindset from economic rationality to ecological rationality, abandoned anthropocentrism, and firmly upheld and fulfilled the code of conduct for rational “economic man.” The endeavor of building an eco-friendly society and an ecological community has showcased the favorable institutional practice in Chinese modernization and China’s wisdom, demonstrated rational planning, prudential design and effective implementation for the prospect of mankind and highlighted a progressive trend in human civilization.     

Shared Values of Humanity Are the Ethical Foundation for Building a Human Community with a Shared Future

On the basis of recognizing the diversity of cultures and civilizations in the world and the existence of different values among people of different nations, regions, and countries, the shared values of humanity pursue after the largest common ground and greatest convergence of values of all mankind. Shared values of humanity are the deep cultural structure of a human community with a shared future, and value and ethical consensus is necessary to form at the global level to promote the building of a human community with a shared future. Shared values of humanity embody the public good of all peoples and countries in the world in the fields of common interests, needs, and development, serve as the ethical guidelines for reconstructing the rules for interaction and order of communication of the international society in the era of globalization, and represent the ethical vision for the development of a human community with a shared future. Shared values of humanity lay the ethical foundation for promoting the construction of a human community with a shared future. Specifically, peace and development represent the ethical consensus on the survival of the community; fairness and justice advocate the new ethical consensus on international relations formed within the framework of the community; and democracy and freedom demonstrate the political-ethical consensus of the community.     

Equilibrium and Harmony of Emotional Conflicts in Cooperation: Between Chinese Traditional Culture and Modern Artificial Intelligence

Equilibrium and harmony elevate human emotions like pleasure, anger, sorrow, and joy to the highest ontological level. We are puppets of our emotions and feelings, without the possibility of parole. By implanting complex emotional reactions in the operating system of sex robots, we have created a virtual relationship that mimics human intimacy. In this way, a thing—in this case, a machine—takes on human characteristics. This could be called the humanization of things. Not only can things be humanized, humans can also be reified. If, by imitating neural networks and deep learning, intelligent robots are to make great strides in their ability to think, they may come into the possession of emotions and feelings. In traditional Chinese culture, equilibrium and harmony form the highest and most pervasive principle, value, and morality for nature, society, and life. The state of equilibrium (zhong 中 ) and harmony (he 和 ) is the fundamental root from which springs the world and the universal path that it must pursue. When we view emotional equilibrium and harmony in light of the theoretical doctrine of harmony and cooperation, the emotional lives of humans and machines are integrated and combined with the state of equilibrium and harmony to achieve the greatest good. Moreover, this can resolve all kinds of crises amid the emotions and feelings of humanoids created by humans, notably by leveraging the outstanding intelligence of humans to maintain the emotions of humanoids in a state of equilibrium and harmony. To this end, we must perform regulatory actions in several aspects. First, we must modulate emotions and feelings. Second, we must achieve a state of equilibrium, which can put all things in the right positions, allowing them to be nourished and flourish. Third, we must strive for mutual empathy between humans and machines, which can pave the way for collaborative creation in harmony, as well as their integration, camaraderie, emotional understanding, mutual respect and harmonious love.     

Culture and empowerment in the Deaf community: An analysis of internet weblogs

Although deafness is traditionally conceptualized as a medical problem or disability, about 500 000 deaf people in the United States identify as members of an ethno‐linguistic minority that takes pride in being Deaf. This study examined 416 Internet weblog posts authored by nine Deaf bloggers to describe aspects of Deaf culture and individual and community level empowerment strategies expressed in weblogs. Results highlight aspects of American Deaf culture, such as the value placed on American Sign Language and equal treatment of D/deaf and hearing people. Findings also provide evidence of expressions of Deaf culture such as the use of humour and supporting the community that have been less emphasized in previous literature. Community level empowerment strategies evident in posts included disseminating information, rallying the involvement of members and advocating for social justice. Overlap between expressions of Deaf culture and empowerment strategies were also found. Present results inform a growing literature on empowerment strategies that occur without intervention by professionals. Implications of the study for community research and action are discussed. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Community implementation of PMTO™: Impacts on referrals to specialist services and schools

Sigmarsdóttir, M. & Björnsdóttir, A. (2012). Community implementation of PMTO?: Impacts on referrals to specialist services and schools. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology 53, 506–511. In 2000, the city of Hafnarfjörður, Iceland, implemented Parent Management Training – Oregon Model (PMTO^?) to prevent and treat behavioral problems among children. This paper describes the implementation and findings regarding impacts in the community. As hypothesized, findings showed that the number of referrals to specialist services decreased in Hafnarfjörður following PMTO implementation and increased in two comparison communities not implementing the method. Within the Hafnarfjörður community, recorded instances of behavior problems reduced in elementary schools working in line with PMTO. The results presented are the first such findings in Iceland and suggest the kinds of systematic changes communities may experience following the implementation of an evidence‐based program.