The Social Quality of Community

Together with SBS(Seoul Broadcasting Station), ISDPR has constructed ‘Quality of Community Index’ by expanding the framework of Social Quality (SQ). “Quality of Community Index” measures the participation levels of members into various communal activities and life scopes when secured of the socio-economic, -cultural conditions as well as its integrity, which ensure one’s well-being and empowerment. The quality of community and its potentials cannot be estimated simply by its economic power at a macro-level or its members’ life quality at a micro-level. Instead, we have created a holistic index that measures both levels to capture the social quality of a community accurately.

The Quality of Community Index is composed of three categories, “competence of community institutions,” “competence of community citizens,” and “community integrity.” The competence of community institutions has subcategories of welfare, education, culture, and medical sector; Competence of community citizens is constructed with the measurements of social participation and political participation; and community integrity with the mortality rate, fertility rate, crime rate, and suicide rate. The analysis in 2011 and 2014 includes 230 municipalities.

According to the analysis in 2011, 127 of the 230 local municipalities (55.2 percent) rated below the average, and only 12 municipalities (5.2 %) with high-level social quality. When compared between 2011 and 2014, Seoul has achieved the highest quality of local community in both years. While the overall qualities in metropolitan cities have improved in 2014, the individual municipalities and their performances show some variations. The communities of mid to small sizes have rated relatively healthy in their integrity but remained lower regarding civic competency compared to large cities. The social quality of local districts sits at the bottom in comparison to other cities.