One of the most useful books of the past five years in terms of the work I do is Peter Block’s Community: The Structure of Belonging.  In it he aggregates the wisdom of those of us who have been practicing participatory process for the last 30 years in North America.  The essence of the work is that social fabric, created through conversations that produce relationships, is the foundation for improvement in communities and the fundamental pre-requisite for effective and sustainable problem solving.

This set of videos is a great introduction to Peter’s work.  View parts one, two and three.