Community and Community Development in Resource-Based Areas: Operational Definitions Rooted in an Interactional Perspective

An understanding of community development in resource-based areas must begin with an awareness of what a community is and how it develops. In this article I provide a conceptual foundation for operational definitions of community and community development. The proposed working definitions are grounded in sociological theory and empirical research. This endeavor is timely since so much of our social, economic, and political rhetoric makes reference to these two concepts yet fails to provide adequate interpretations for the terms.