Abstract
This chapter examines the meanings of community that shape community art. While a seemingly natural category, community is in fact mobilised by governmental programs which enlist citizens into wider strategies of power. By examining how community has been defined by communitarian thinking and in political discourses of social cohesion, it is argued that community art carries an uncertain normative power: citizens are positioned within programs of governmental responsibilisation but also encouraged to express themselves through art. The history of Footscray Community Arts Centre highlights the practical problems with defining community. While historical definitions of community have tended to rely on consensual and homogenising visions of community, community arts’ organisations have a role in enabling more provisional and open-ended forms of belonging.
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