Making a Difference: The Social Ecology of Social Transformation

TLDR

The paper proposes a multidisciplinary, multilevel framework for social transformation that includes capacity‑building, group empowerment, relational community‑building, and culture‑challenge. Intervention approaches for each goal are outlined across setting, geographic community, and societal levels. Four exemplars—Accelerated Schools Project, Meyerhoff Program, ManKind Project, and the women’s movement—demonstrate synergistic interactions among the four goals across levels, and the paper ends by outlining three challenges for advancing social transformation.

Abstract

A multidisciplinary and multilevel framework for social transformation is proposed, encompassing four foundational goals: capacity-building, group empowerment, relational community-building, and culture-challenge. Intervention approaches related to each goal are presented at the setting, geographic community, and societal levels. Four exemplars of social transformation work are then discussed: the Accelerated Schools Project, Meyerhoff Program, ManKind Project, and women's movement. These examples illustrate the synergistic relationship among the four transformational goals, within and across levels of analysis, which is at the heart of the social transformation process. The paper concludes with three challenges to guide our efforts as we enter the new century: (1) to move social transformation to the center of our consciousness as a field; (2) to articulate jointly with allied disciplines, organizations, and citizen groups an encompassing, multidisciplinary, and multilevel framework for social transformation; and (3) to do the above with heart, soul, and humility.