Creating Community

Idea for a research paper:

INTRO: The idea of community has been weakened or destroyed in the west by many different forces:

FIRST POINT:

1: Invisible Hand: everyone strives for personal goals and achieves social benefits.

2: The Great Transformation: Polanyi describes how sense of community was destroyed by emergence of Market Economy as dominant mechanism for distribution/production and exchange of goods.

3: Ariely describes how market mechanisms conflict with social ones, and use of market mechanism suppresses social mechanisms, emphasizing individuals over society.

4: Manicas describes the transition from polis to societas -- a community striving from common goals, to individuals striving for separate goals under common rule of law.

5: The philosophy the society is NOTHING MORE than a collection of individuals -- that is, if we can understand individuals acting separately, and just put them together, this is enough to analyze society. In opposition to this, there is the concept of EMERGENT properties -- things which happen ONLY when groups interact in certain fashions -- think of CRITICAL MASS and atoms. No individual property of atoms leads to explosions, ONLY interactions.

SECOND POINT: Islam stresses formation of community, preferring others over selves, Good Conduct (Akhlaq) which is essential to creating the love which forms the basis of cooperation.In economic transactions, we are told to behave in ways which are important to create solidarity. Give evidence from Ahadeeth and History.