Trabajo social comunitario en territorios de alta diversidad culturalla experiencia del proyecto de intervención comunitaria intercultural en Elche

Abstract

Local communities have played an essential role in socialisation – and they continue to do so. Specifically, local communities embody domains of transmission and internalisation of the knowledge, values, norms of conduct and worldviews of the cultural environment. It is no coincidence, therefore, that diversity management policies have been resolutely adopted at the local level. These policies – understood as instruments of social intervention – are impregnated with ideological elements and implicit values. Naturally, notions of diversity and difference may differ, as well as their conceptual content and the measures and procedures used, or their scenarios of application. In fact, in practice they do differ, ranging from authoritarianism, imposing standards of cultural unity, to participatory, reflective and critical methods, and to paternalism and assistentialism. The present thesis addresses these questions as well as others. The objective was to contribute to the epistemological and methodological foundations of Community Social Work in particular, and Social Work and other applied and relevant sciences, generally. To do so, we described and explained how the Intercultural Community Intervention Project (ICI) unfolded in the municipality of Elche (Alicante, Spain) between 2010 and 2016. The study design was descriptive, explanatory and evaluative, based on a logic chain. Specifically, a case study was performed. Indeed, the aim was to understand the intercultural community intervention that took place in all its complexity, with its strengths, weaknesses, uncertainties and contradictions. A plural qualitative-quantitative methodology was deemed appropriate in this regard. Secondary sources were reviewed as a large part of the data was produced by the researcher himself in the course of his work. This data collection, however, had taken place at an earlier stage and was not directed towards the objectives of the present study. A total of 2,077 documents with structured (statistical) and unstructured (textual) data were selected in order to reconstruct the case and its foundations. The results obtained provided evidence of: (1) the establishment and continuation of relationships with and among social actors; (2) the building of shared knowledge of community realities; (3) the design and implementation of a joint programme of actions in the neighbourhood; (4) the participatory evaluation of the collective work carried out; and (5) the documentation and information process required to conduct the initiative. The analysis of these elements allowed us to conclude that the ICI Project constituted a reformist initiative in line with the rights and freedoms framework. The Project integrates rational procedures of positive cultural diversity management as well as direct citizen participation into public policies that improve local conviviality, partially at least.