Communities First conference: Social connections in the community enhance happiness, health and life expectancy, a leading US academic and author has told a Dublin seminar.
Prof Robert Putnam, professor of public policy at Harvard, gave the keynote address yesterday at the Communities First conference, organised by the Dublin City Development Board and Dublin City Council.
Dublin Lord Mayor Cllr Michael Conaghan said the summit was part of a process in making Dublin a communities-friendly city and it would establish an action agenda for the re-creation of community.
Prof Putnam, author of Bowling Alone and Better Together said by the end of the last century in the US, membership of organisations, those attending meetings, and the dozens of ways in which people connected had fallen.
For example, people holding dinner parties was down 50 per cent, entertaining at home had become rare. Even going to bars and pubs had declined. There was also a fall in having dinner with families.
"Trends are down everywhere, with the exception of older people," he said. "Those now in their 70 and 80s all voted more, joined more when they were young and they continued when they retired, but they did not pass on these habits to children and grandchildren. Unless we begin to fix the problem, trends will get worse."
Research has shown that social connections in relation to happiness were enormously powerful. Attending clubs and organisations could have powerful physical health effects.
In premature death, social isolation has been cited as being as big a risk factor as smoking, the professor said.
At the beginning of the last century in the US, people left their villages and went to the cities. People were better off but felt disconnected. However over 20 years they invented new groups and organisations.
"I'm not saying we should recreate the past, turn off the TVs and put women back in the kitchen. Values are the same but structures are different."
Prof Putnam said there were different kinds of social connections. There was bonding with similar people and bridging.
"Where society has only bonding, communities become separate from each other, such as in Beirut or Belfast. The kind of social connection which is most needed is the hardest to build - that is bridging as our cities become more ethnically diverse."
City manager John Fitzgerald said he would differ with Prof Putnam on one point. He said many US and other cities had destroyed their hearts but Dublin had a vibrant city centre.
"Luckily, we recognise we still have a community. It hasn't collapsed and we're all working together and we are getting it right, but it is under threat if it is not dealt with," he said.
Predictions eight years ago were underestimated. There were now 100,000 cars on the roads, three times the housing output, and 50,000 immigrants coming to the city every year.
Dublin would have an estimated 1.75 million people by 2011, he said.
The population of the city centre was growing again.The quality of life was not about wealth, it was what people felt about living in a place.
"The biggest problem is trying to encourage families to build communities in the city centre in high density housing," he said.
Another problem was anti-social behaviour.
Local authority housing they could deal with as landlords, he said, but 85 per cent of housing was private.