6.2 Frameworks
6.2.2 The Framework of Asset-Based Community Development
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103 rather than focusing on its problems and needs.254 ABCD is a model against a need-driven approach to community development and to development practice in general. 255 Thus, the need-driven approach focuses on the needs and deficiencies of the people.256 The researchers stress the point that building a community cannot be achieved through what people do not have. People have to start with the assets that are found in a particular community and also making use of the talents that people do have.257
6.2.2.3 ABCD as a Principle of Empowerment for Women of St Alois Mission
While it is a fact that the ABCD was formulated to help some of the cities of America, the approach is equally relevant to the context of women of St Alois Catholic Rural Mission Station who are living with HIV and AIDS. The relevance of ABCD is rooted in the idea of mapping the assets within a given community. In this case, it is the mapping of assets within the local community of St Alois Mission. It is about knowing and making use of the individual’s gifts and capacities for the purpose of developing and transforming people’s lives. Therefore, ABCD empowers the poor people who in this study are women living with HIV and AIDS.
In view of the model, the idea is to empower the poor with their own skills, especially those people who are not aware of their skills. We can see that the approach involves people at grass roots level and this system helps members to appreciate their own talents. By so doing, the poor people feel part of the whole program and therefore can participate with courage and good will. This empowerment helps members to appreciate their own talents. By uncovering their capabilities, the poor people begin to realize how important they are as human beings in contributing to the growth and development of their own communities. Automatically, they realize that they are not recipients of development but rather producers in the process of community development and goal owners.
There is always a good and an unhelpful approach to assisting the needy in any given situation. The good way builds up the dignity and responsibility of the needy and gives them
254 John P. Kretzmann and John L. McKnight 1993, pg. 5.
255 John P. Kretzmann and John L. McKnight 1993, pg. 1-4.
256 John P. Kretzmann and John L. McKnight 1993, pg. 9.
257 John P. Kretzmann and John L. McKnight 1993, pg. 1.
104 a sense of their importance and value to the community. The unhelpful way degrades them and makes them feel dependent, hopeless and useless. The ABCD approach as mentioned above, empowers the poor people with skills that can help them to become self reliant. It is empowerment, therefore, that is a key principle in bringing about transformation in the process of developing and improving the lives of HIV positive women of St Alois Catholic Rural Mission Station who are in a vulnerable situation. Defined by Narayan (2002),
“Empowerment is the expansion of assets and capacities of poor people to participate in, negotiate with, influence, control, and hold accountable institutions that affect their lives.”258
6.2.2.4 Asset-Based as a Principle of Human Dignity
This implies that the use of the ABCD approach can help HIV positive women of St Alois with opportunities to use their assets and capacities in order to influence change. They need to be given the opportunity to start their own projects that can help them to be self-reliant rather than to remain dependant on their male counterparts.
People who are empowered have that freedom and action which enables them as individuals or communities to better influence the decisions which affect them. By being empowered, they are included in decision making. Inclusion and participation of women of St Alois Mission through the ABCD approach is certain to create space for them to debate issues at the level affecting their own lives. The ABCD, therefore, is a model that can build poor people’s self-confidence and make them believe in themselves and allow them to realise their own dignity. To a greater degree, empowerment makes the poor people stand on their feet and influence change.
From a Christian perspective, ABCD is concerned with the development of the whole person, which I see as a demonstration of God’s concern for humanity. God created human beings not in order to suffer but to have life and have it abundantly.259
258 D. Narayan (ed). 2002. Empowerment and Poverty Reduction: A Sourcebook. Washington: The World Bank, pg. xviii.
259 John 10:10
To have abundant life is to grow and be fulfilled spiritually, physically, socially, intellectually, emotionally and culturally. To be shut out from participating is to be denied opportunities for growth and
105 opportunities for contributing to the growth of others.260 Yet when we look at women of St Alois who are living with HIV and AIDS, we can see that to a greater extent, they are denied the fullness of life. Since human beings are created in God’s image, ABCD tries to promote the dignity of a human person. By recognising the assets and capabilities of women of St Alois, making them participate in dialogue and allowing them to participate in economic development, their standard of living is raised to the level of other human beings. “The dignity of a human person realised in community with others is the criterion against which all aspects of social and economic life must be measured.”261