AbstractsSociology

"Action research is a pioneering frontier in synthesized and applied social science disciplines. The five-year experience of the Department of Research and Strategy of the Massachusetts Council of Churches is the only systematized attempt to apply this approach to church problems in the community context. The writer has served with the Rev. William J. Villaume, the Director, as one of two professional staff members for the past four years. The dissertation undertakes to provide a survey and critical analysis of that experience together with an ordered summary of present conclusions. Action research is, in essence, the creative synthesis of social research and social engineering and, in the limitations of the present treatment, has its own purpose not only the discovery of facts but help in altering certain conditions experiences by the community as unsatisfactory. The focus of concern is on successful application of action research methodology to church-community studies, in research integrated with and for action, rather than on the broader related field of recent research on action. The three major sections present (1) the historical background of church research and action research in the United States and of the development of this emphasis in the Massachusetts Department of Research and Strategy, (2) the actual study report prepared by the present writer on Boston's West End presented here as a major case study and (3) a final chapter of theoretical working conclusions and particularly relevant techniques developed from five years of field experience. Neither the history of church research or of the action research in this country has received prior systematic treatment in published form. The major part of the material on the history of church research has been drawn from unpublished manuscripts by William J. Villaume, Director of the Department of Research and Strategy, and from acquaintance and extended discussion with H. Paul Douglass, Ross W. Sanderson and other active participants in almost the full span of church research in the United States. Action research, best typified, by the work of the Research Center for Group Dynamics began with the Iowa studies in the late 1930's and, intensively with the founding of the center in 1945. Much of the source material is in scattered mongraphs, articles and dissertations. The scientific approach to problems of church planning and adjustment has its origin in the American social gospel movement. It was and is a tool of reform. One of its basic assumptions is the responsibility of the churches to their communities and the communities' needs. Graham Taylor was a pioneer in church research as in wider applications of emerging social science to institutional religion. The leveling of population, non-Protestant immigration, and the new urbanism gave impetus to church research. Its development was closely linked to developing ecumenicity in the "Federation" movement. The work of the Institute for Social and Religious Research was outstanding. However, diagnostic and…