Insights on the relationship between social development projects, local culture, and community interventions

Abstract

The article revisits the argument expressed by C. Wright Mills, who stated that if we want social sciences to be meaningful today, in addition to the abundant information we have at hand about society, what we need is sociological imagination. This proposition gives rise to another argument contending that social science professionals would do well to work together with professionals from other disciplines when designing and implementing development projects aimed at benefiting communities. These kinds of development projects are expected to be successful, but the fact is that often times they do not reach their goals because there is a lack of multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary, and transdisciplinary communication, but particularly because the cultural characteristics of the communities are not always taken into account.