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Engaging Individuals Experiencing Poverty in Poverty Initiatives
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- Author / Creator
- Wallace, Emma-Lynn
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Despite increasing awareness of poverty in Canada, the number of individuals living in poverty is still rising. In response, all three levels of government and in particular, municipalities, are directly taking on responsibilities for reducing poverty. Across these municipal initiatives is a remarkable commitment: engaging those experiencing poverty in their efforts. Specifically, EndPovertyEdmonton—recognizing that community engagement is seen as crucial in addressing complex social issues and nurturing sustainable communities—is paying a lot of attention to how those experiencing poverty can be engaged in their governance structure. However, they are struggling with how to proceed in ways that are not tokenistic and there is a lack of literature to guide this process. However, there are many other initiatives in Canada that are attempting to engage those living in poverty in their efforts and learning from would be advantageous. Therefore, this thesis describes how community engagement is understood by people working in poverty-related initiatives. Using focused ethnography, I conducted interviews, participant observation, and document review to present peoples’ understanding of community engagement, along with their experiences of success, struggle, and hope. In the discussion and conclusion (Chapters 5 & 6), I go into detail on why and how these results are relevant, not only to initiatives looking to engaging people experiencing poverty in their work, but also to the community engagement literature.
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- Subjects / Keywords
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- Graduation date
- Fall 2019
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- Type of Item
- Thesis
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- Degree
- Master of Arts
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- License
- Permission is hereby granted to the University of Alberta Libraries to reproduce single copies of this thesis and to lend or sell such copies for private, scholarly or scientific research purposes only. Where the thesis is converted to, or otherwise made available in digital form, the University of Alberta will advise potential users of the thesis of these terms. The author reserves all other publication and other rights in association with the copyright in the thesis and, except as herein before provided, neither the thesis nor any substantial portion thereof may be printed or otherwise reproduced in any material form whatsoever without the author's prior written permission.