Community Innovations Studies Center (CISC)

CPAf Units

The Community Innovations Studies Center (CISC) is one of the transdisciplinary research and extension unit of CPAf. The center focuses on integrative community development studies, agrarian studies, and rural advisory services. As a process, community development involves developing and enhancing people’s ability to act collectively. As an outcome, it entails taking collective action and the result of that action is for the improvement of the community’s physical, environmental, cultural, social, political, and economic dimensions.

The CISC aims to:

develop ideas, frameworks and methodologies on analyzing policy, governance and institutional issues affecting communities;
co-generate platforms for actions with communities that aim to reduce poverty and inequality;
provide a forum for community learnings; and
build networks and partnerships that strengthen collaboration among and between peoples and institutions.

The CISC has three main thrusts:

Community Education. As a research focus, community education encompasses social development work that encourages lifelong learning with individuals and groups in their communities.

Communities in Transition. A major focus of this program is to generate an understanding of the development pathways communities in transition take. Communities in Transition (CiT) can be described as communities undergoing changes in attributes from being predominantly rural to acquiring urban features. These communities are characterized by a mix of urban and rural land uses and economic activities, heterogenous and rapidly changing socio-economic groups, whose livelihoods often draw from the natural resource-based activities and urban employment opportunities.

Community-Based Strategies for Sustainable Development. Sustainable development is that maintains or enhances economic opportunity and community well-being while protecting and restoring the natural environment upon which people and economies depend. Sustainable development meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. With the desire to attain sustainable development, several community-based strategies have been developed. This program will analyze the present initiatives by the communities and other supporting institutions and develop through action research, community-based strategies for sustainable development.