When does a Community lose its Way?

There are obstacles that keep a group from becoming a community. These are the same obstacles that trip up a community, and change it, so that it loses the spirit of a community, and revert back to becoming a group.

These obstacles are the ones that obstruct communication, between individuals within the community, and between the community and others, either individually, or collectively.

Exclusivity is the commonest obstacle a community has to face, because it is the first one that the identity of the community. Either it adapts and evolves by including new members, or it excludes them and maintain the status quo. Neither decision is easy, and both requires consideration work if the community is to remain one. Otherwise, it will either revert back to pseudo-community where everyone struggles to be the average standard to remain in community, not rocking the boat, not sticking out, not causing waves, not giving cause to be excluded, or the community will revert back to chaos, where the new members, or the act of including the new members, will cause divisions and confrontations, until a new consensus is achieved. In the worst case scenerio, when all the members are too stubborn or too proud, or when the group dynamics trapped the members in a path of irreversible division, then the community will cease to exist, and lose its way.

Withdrawal is the other common obstacle that every member in any community must face everyday. Participation in any group, especially in a community, is hard work. It is alway easy and tempting to withdraw, to give up, and leave the group, leave the community. Sometimes, that may be the wisest choice. Sometimes, that may be the worst decision one can make. It is not an easy decision. Just like a community must agonize over any decision to exclude any member from its embrace, any member who considers leaving a community must also agonize over the decision to withdraw. Without commitment and loyalty, no community can survive the hard times in chaos. But the commitment and loyalty must be voluntary and consciously given by each and every individual, not demanded nor enforced, nor coerced.

To bully its members into submission, into commitment, into loyalty, is the other common obstacle that afflicts every group close to achieving community. Just like every member in a community must go through the stage of Emptiness, so too must the group as a whole, as a collective, must empty itself of pride and self-interest, to allow each individual to make its own decision.

Fortunately, in spite of all the obstacles, there have been many successful communities in human history, and some that have endured beyond a human generation. The early Christian churches, for example, were true communities. The early communist countries, during their struggle against a common foe, were often communities of safe refuge. The many liberal democracies around the world today, may not seem to be real communities, but they may be a collection of transient communities that persists over a framework that is the most sustaining community-making framework in human history. Only time will tell.