Reflections on Gemeinschaft vs. Gesellschaft

Back at the books . . . reflecting on readings from my Community Relations class . . . always a bit overwhelming when you first look at the syllabus . . . but this time a leadership class that speaks a lot to my personal style, thoughts on life and work experience.

Reading more of Sergiovanni who continues to challenge the accepted norms of relationships and interaction within society and organizations in his book, Building Community in Schools (1994). He applies the German metaphorical words noted by sociologist, Ferdinand Tonnies, gemeinschaft and gesellschaft, to explain two ideals of life or ways of thinking. These words are opposites on a continuum, but also symbolize the evolution of the conserving human institutions of family, community, and society. The closest English words to the German would be community and society, however, as is often the case, the extent of the meaning is hard to capture in just these two translations.

There are different forms of gemeinschaft, the sense that we see reflected in the concepts of community. The "we" identity is foundational to the sense of belonging from which community builds. Gemeinschaft can exist by kinship among families or extended family; of place, a common locale like a school or neighborhood; or gemeinschaft of mind, which can include people from different places who share common goals and a shared set of values. Unlike gesellschaft, in true community, relationships are not contractual, rather they are based on understandings about what is shared and on emerging webs of obligations that people follow to embody what is shared. "Communities are socially organized around relationships and the felt interdependencies that nuture them" (Blau and Scott, 1962). Communities are based on commitments, the sacred, the personal; society or organizations are more secular and relationships are contractual, more impersonal. Relationships in community or gemeinschaft thinking develop out of natural will, with no ulterior motive or tangible goal or benefit in mind.

Tonnies argues that as modern society evolves or advances, the world drifts further from the gemeinschaft end of the continuum toward the gesellschaft end. Connections between people are more contrived, artificially constructed. While in gemeinschaft, people can remain united despite separating factors, in the gesellschaft people are essentially separated in spite of all the uniting factors. Gesellschaft is the foundation for organizations and it is what promotes isolationism, independence and competition. Gesellschaft requires politeness as people exchange courtesies on the surface, promoting the good or all or equality. However, the underlying motive is self-interest; "what must I say or do to elevate my status or win a competition." People associate with each other for reasons; rational will examines the benefits of particular relationships. The hierarchy of corporations, organizations, and even schools run on this mentality.

There are many applications of this theory to the struggles we see in society and human relationships. Students who feel a lack of community within family or school will look for it in gangs. Organizations and schools are structured based on gesellschaft thinking, yet have the potential to embody some of gemeinschaft ideals. The reality is that human existance depends on some of both. Yet what struck me most is that, even in contexts that value community, how much we are taught to emulate the values of gesellschaft thinking. As professionals we are taught to act and evaluate organizationally, yet somehow embody community-mindedness.

One of my classmates and I were discussing how strange that, even in our leadership program, we are expected to create our vision as school leaders, yet this class re-emphasizes that vision is something that should come out of the members of the community. Our job is to mobilize people by helping them create their own vision and action plan based on felt needs and available resources within the community. If leaders create the vision for the community, there is less buy-in and it takes more effort from the leader to figure out all the details later. It is risky. The alternative is also tricky. Getting a community to create and develop its own vision takes lots of time and energy initially. It takes enormous effort from the leader to keep the momentum in the process as it begins. Yet it pays off later as more people are willing to help take the lead of various aspects of the action plan. The vision is more natural and fits the context. It, in itself, helps to build the sense of community, motivation and interconnectedness needed to nurture relationships.

I realize that my preferred style is the latter. Helping groups develop their own vision is what I did best in my work in Cambodia. But in that role, I saw myself as more of a consultant or an advisor. I merely facilitated the process. Even when I was a part of the leadership team, I acted more as a facilitator of the process. I see more and more that I am not so confident in coming up with a vision on my own and telling a group what they should be doing or even what "we" will be doing (though that is needed to a certain extent in most cases). My approach to any group or job or situation seems to be to try to assess the values or goals of the group to see how I can fit in or help the group process what they want to do. So even though my training has primarily focused on organizational thinking, I see more clearly that the values of community fit well with my personal style. This has been very helpful for me to identify as I continue in this program and consider what my vision really is as a leader in education.