Relearning to be a Citizen
I am taking part in my first book club and we are reading John McKnight and Peter Block’s book, The Abundant Community, Awakening the Power of Families and Neighbourhoods. A few chapters in and I have gone from confusion to amazement in my thinking process.
When we are born, we start our lives as citizens of our family and community, and slowly become consumers of products, services and systems that lead us to believe we are better off and safer. When we think like a system we tend to identify the problem by labeling a specific target - for example, the ‘youth problem’ - however, John and Peter point out that it is not the youth with the problem but the neighbourhood and community.
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