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| Neighborhood Wellness |
| Sources for Language : |
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The Social Capital Foundation
- "Social Capital" is about revitalizing social cohesiveness, and can be defined as a set of mental dispositions and attitudes favoring cooperative behaviors within society.
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Social Cohesion Statistics – New Zealand
- "Social cohesion exists where the different communities in a society work well both within each community and with each other."
- "Social cohesion exists where: people feel part of society; family and personal relationships are strong; differences among people are respected; and where people feel safe and supported by others."
- "Access to the natural environment and the design and form of public space can also support or hinder social cohesion. For example, levels of access to natural environments such as the coast, national parks and public walkways, can influence people’s perception of the natural environment and their ability to join together to protect it and to interact with each other. The way that public spaces are designed can also impact on people’s social interaction, for example public space allowing use by those with access needs (such as wheelchair and pram access), and allowing people to move around without threat of crime or injury."
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Characteristics of a Sustainable City
- "Economy, ecology and social cohesion
are the pillars of a sustainable city. These must
be in balance and therefore require an integrated
approach. Dialogue is the basic principle for achieving
this for Local Agenda 21." Conference Strategies for
Sustainable Cities (The Hague, 23, 24, 25 June 1999:
http://www.denhaag.nl/sust.cities99/theme.htm)
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Finland’s EU Presidency (July 2006)
- Speech on the Environment by Executive director, EEA, Jacqueline McGlade at the informal meeting of EU Environment Ministers, 15 July 2006 "The new opportunities on the environment … need to be exploited by … providing better argumentation on the value of caring for ecosystems and moving in general towards a more socially cohesive Europe on the basis of a shared vision and civic acceptance of the critical role of our endangered life support systems and natural capital"
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| Social Cohesion: Definitions |
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A powerful innovation in the UEI 2006 strategic plan is to create a Neighborhood Wellness Director. The role of this person is to connect UEI programs to each other, integrate social connection outcomes and values into the Education and Healthy Environment programs, and evaluate UEI’s work for its impact on these social indicators. The academic body of literature that is emerging in this area describes this as social cohesion. Some of the indicators UEI is interested in measuring include the number of people who:
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- Know their neighbors
- Feel that they can call on a neighbor if they need help
- Feel safe walking outside at night
- Care for their local spaces and home
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A recent article in the Boston Globe stated that community groups from across the city are beginning to measure these exact outcomes. Furthermore, the article announces that the federal government will begin to collect data on social cohesion across the country. The Neighborhood Wellness Director will connect to the academic community that is measuring social cohesion and, through the UEI and UEC networks, collaborate with other groups who are interested in measuring these outcomes
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The Neighborhood Wellness Director will support connections among UEI programs (and those of allied organizations) within each Boston neighborhood to magnify social cohesion outcomes. For example, the Director will find ways to connect youth crews in the educational program with tree planting projects in City Roots, and parents at the BCLC’s with the forest inventory. The Director will analyze our work to identify overlapping programming in UEI and allied organizations to connect youth and adults around specific projects that will increase the connections between neighbors. The Neighborhood Wellness program will also work with partners to develop ways to measure and report on the social cohesion effects of our work in both programs.
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