Community development is a process where members of a community come together to carry out collective actions and generate solutions to common problems seeking to create sustainable, cohesive and inclusive societies, governed by principles of equity and justice.[1]​.

It is a broad term given to the practices of civic leaders, activists, engaged citizens, and professionals to improve various aspects of communities, usually with the goal of building stronger and more resilient local communities.[2]​.

There are numerous overlapping approaches to community development. Some focus on processes, others on results/objectives. They include:

In a study published in the prestigious UNED Research Journal in 2010, the emergence and evolution of institutionalized community development in Costa Rica is analyzed, framed within the “inward development model” promoted by the Economic Commission for Latin America (ECLAC) and other related epistemic networks. This approach sought to replace the traditional structures associated with the agro-export model—also known as the “outward growth model”—with a more rational model, focused on industrialization, regional integration and state planning.[3]​.

During its early years, especially in the 1960s and 1970s, the Community Development Program, implemented mainly through the Community Development Associations, played a key role in the productive modernization of the country, particularly in rural and border areas. These associations were consolidated as base structures to facilitate citizen participation and accompany agroindustrial transformation processes.[3]​.

However, towards the end of the 1970s, the external debt crisis that affected the region seriously weakened the capacity for state intervention, which negatively impacted the continuity of the model and institutionalized communal development. From then on, criticism arose from different sectors: the political leadership questioned alleged links with politicking, the social democratic intelligentsia pointed out the lack of discussion on major national issues, and the academic left reproached a supposed abandonment of the participatory impulse. Despite these criticisms, the study highlights that both the National Directorate of Communal Development and the Development Associations emerged with a different agenda, oriented towards specific objectives that they managed to fulfill effectively during their initial implementation period.[3]​.