Psychology & Buddhism.pdf

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Kathleen H. Dockett
competencies needed to have control over one’s life and to achieve one’s
personal goals (Alinsky, 1946; Kroeker, 1995; Maton & Salem, 1995).
Organizational empowerment focuses on changing the power structures of
society as they are manifested in a group or in a specific community. This
might include creating alternative settings or empowering organizations
within a neighborhood (Kroeker, 1995). An “empowering organization”
involves “processes and structures that enhance members’ skills and provide
them with the mutual support necessary to affect community level
change” (Zimmerman, 1995). In contrast, an “empowered organization”
involves “improved organizational effectiveness by effectively competing
for resources, networking with other organizations, or expanding its influence”
(Zimmerman, 1995).
Community empowerment involves “individuals working together in an
organized fashion to improve their collective lives and linkages among
community organizations and agencies that help maintain that quality of
life” (Zimmerman, 2000).
Societal empowerment or political empowerment focuses on changing the
larger social structures and institutions that maintain positions of powerlessness
and poverty (Albee et al., 1988; Alinsky, 1946; Freire, 1970;
Rappaport, 1986, as cited in Kroeker, 1995). This would include national
and international structures that influence resources and policies.
From a historical perspective, the concept of empowerment grew out of its
opposite – conditions of powerlessness. Early social activists such as Paolo Freire
(Pedagogy of the Oppressed) and Saul Alinsky (Reveille for Radicals; Rules for
Radicals) are known worldwide for defining the principles of empowerment
based on their work in disadvantaged communities. Empowerment became the
way to help people who were poor, disadvantaged, oppressed, and otherwise not
in control of their lives or their environments, to gain power. In many third-world
countries and in the industrialized nations as well, there are groups of people
and entire countries that do not have control over their natural resources, living
conditions, and opportunities for development. Especially people living in
extreme poverty, they do not have control over their lives. They do not have selfdetermination
or participation in the decision making of the community.
To reverse the conditions of powerlessness (in the minds of the people and
in their actual ability to control their personal lives and environment), the concept
of empowerment emerged. The goals of empowerment are to give the “power to
the people.” This calls for change on three levels: personal change, organizational
change, and societal transformation. Strategies for empowerment (or social change)
include grassroots activism, citizen participation, community development, community
organizing, education and information dissemination, and public policy
activities to change the laws (Duffy & Wong, 1996).