Participation and empowerment are two essential concepts in community development, which is a unique method in development programmes aiming to improve the living conditions of the community. This is also a strategy to involve villages and communities in building their own lives, thereby contributing to national progress. The social and economic conditions are expected to improve through the voluntary and cooperative nature of the community. In the process of community development, people’s participation is essential when making decisions that affect their lives in order to gain confidence, self-esteem, knowledge and new skills.

In some community development practices, participation is seen as a mean of achieving a series of objectives or goals. In other words, the targets are predetermined and then completed by using the economic and social resources of rural people. While in different practices, participation is seen as an end, a dynamic, unquantifiable and unpredictable process that gradually builds up participants’ confidence and solidarity. It is a bottom-up influence and involvement created and activated by local needs and circumstances.

As for the empowerment in community development, it is considered as an essential goal to empower people and their communities. The core of the concept is powerful. Two things decide the possibility of authorization: First, the power can be changed. Otherwise, it is inherent to the position of the person and unable to empower in any meaningful way. Second, the power can be expanded. In other words, it is a process of change by which individuals or groups with little or no power gain the power and ability to make choices that affect their lives.

Based on the possibility of empowerment – if power can be changed and expanded, the empowerment becomes workable. If participation is regarded as mean, people are passive in such process and unable to control their lives, hence cannot be empowered either. But when participation is considered as an end, people are directly involved and will be empowered and able to control while making decisions that affect their lives. Therefore, it seems that participation as an end can lead to empowerment.

In such a bottom-up approach, community affairs are mainly managed by the community, and the community members participate in the entire process from decision-making to evaluation. During the process of decision-making, the community acquires greater power and control to improve the quality of life. Thus, they will become more independent and empowered. Since the community is capable of meeting their needs without outer assistance, community development becomes sustainable. Some theories assert that empowerment can be achieved through a bottom-up approach. Empowerment involves grassroots actions, creating self-awareness, and social transformation, so as to achieve negotiation and sharing of power in urban management and other aspects[1]

Therefore, in the practices of community development, to achieve a higher degree of empowerment, we should attempt to make the initial planning more bottom-up in the reasonable range and regard participation as an end. Only in this way can the participation of people be effective rather than superficial and meaningless.

[1] Abbott, J. (2013) Sharing the city: community participation in urban management. Routledge.