Making sense of the duality of social cohesion

Abstract

By implication, a society lacking cohesion would be one that displayed social disorder and conflict, disparate moral values, extreme social inequality, low levels of social interaction between and within communities, and low levels of place attachment - characteristics that are familiar to South Africa.2 Collective efficacy, a more recent development of the concept of social cohesion, refers to how social cohesion can prevent violence when it is translated into collective action for the 'common good' at neighbourhood level.3 While a lack of social cohesion is theorised to result in a state of disorder or conflict, low levels of social cohesion are also seen to undermine the effectiveness of crime prevention initiatives at local level. [...]far, the leading policy and academic work on social cohesion and collective efficacy has taken place in countries in the global North and has been oriented to address the problems of division in these contexts.