|
|
|
| Current Issue |
|
|
| Resources |
|
|
|
Is Government Doing Enough? A Forum
| Article
# : |
18789 |
|
|
Section : |
CURRENT ISSUES
|
| Issue
Date : |
12 / 1991 |
3,414 Words |
| Author
: |
Gerald Campbell is president of Impact Group, specialists in
community-based programs. |
The World & I: How much is homelessness a problem of economics? Is an economic revolution needed in this country?
Gerland Campbell: I don't think it's a question of how much. I think it's a question of priorities, causes, and effects. I'm not here to argue that we shouldn't continue this assistance. We have to address the fact that certain people do need housing. They need jobs and they have drug and alcohol problems. They have problems with other economic problems.
But I think what lies underneath this and the thing that brings these things to light is the sense of detachment from the community; and it seems that the homeless problem today is different from what it was in the 1930s, when you had the Dust Bowl. That was truly an economic problem. Today it is a sense of spiritual alienation, a sense of not being bonded. I don't think you can separate the larger issues, the violence and the drugs, from homelessness. I think they are related, they go down to the same cause: a breakdown of community and the focus on the individual.
Kris Zawisza: I would just say that I agree with [Campbell] that this is part of the picture, but I object to the notion that moral and spiritual isolation are homeless. I think this is a problem that permeates society on all economic levels, and part of the isolation experienced by homeless people is their rejection by the rest of society.
I think there certainly are many people who, given the economic means, would function perfectly well, like many other people who are morally and spiritually isolated but have money.
Morgan Doughton: I think that what you're both really saying is that homeless people really reflect a lot of the problems we have in our society of creating effective links among all of us. It's not just we and them. It's us. It is a mistake if we think of the homeless as other than us, that everybody in our society is not as deeply involved in community in terms of being wedded to, allied with, and reinforced by community, as they should be. So in a very real sense we are all, to a degree, homeless, and I'm not saying that this is therefore a reason for thinking less of the problem for whom it becomes severe, but we have to find ways to get us all to care more deeply about each other.
This is the only answer, for instance, to the issue of whether a shelter should be allowed in our neighborhood.
...
Read Full Article
Look for this article in Ask.com
|
|
