A Meta-narrative review of conceptualisations and meanings of 'community' within and across research traditions

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Community is a contested concept that defies easy categorisation. We aimed to collect systematically the key ways in which community has been understood within and across research traditions. To do this, we used a meta-narrative methodology which attempts to unravel the 'storylines' of research. We identified a set of meta-narratives in sociology, anthropology and political theory. These ranged from pre-modern approaches to community as exemplified by the study of distant 'others' by early anthropologists to post-modern conceptualisations which emphasise new forms of commonality, difference and interaction in an era of globalisation and hypermodernity. We found considerable variability amongst the set of meta-narratives, particularly between 'real' and 'imagined' communities, and the ongoing tension between individual and collective political positions in framing the importance of communities. The findings from this review provide a framework from which to think more insightfully about 'community'. This framework could be used to facilitate a dialogue between academics and policy-makers on how different conceptualisations might translate into different types of interventions and might also help to guide decision-makers to consider their assumptions about community. Finally, we suggest some implications for future research around the use of an intersectional approach to study individuals' belonging to different communities.