In order to develop theory any community of scientists must agree as to what constitutes its phenomena of interest. A distinction is made between phenomena of interest and exemplars. The concept "prevention" is viewed as an exemplar, whereas the concept "empowerment" is suggested as a leading candidate for the title "phenomena of interest" to Community Psychology. The ecological nature of empowerment theory is described, and some of the terms of empowerment (definitions, conditions, and periods of time) are explicated. Eleven assumptions, presuppositions, and hypotheses are offered as guidelines for theory development and empirical study.

The research integrates the citizen participation literature with research on perceived control in an effort to further our understanding of psychological empowerment. Eleven indices of empowerment representing personality, cognitive, and motivational measures were identified to represent the construct. Three studies examined the relationship between empowerment and participation. The first study examined differences among groups identified by a laboratory manipulation as willing to participate in personally relevant or community relevant situations. Study II examined differences for groups defined by actual involvement in community activities and organizations. Study III replicated Study II with a different population. In each study, individuals reporting a greater amount of participation scored higher on indices of empowerment. Psychological empowerment could be described as the connection between a sense of personal competence, a desire for, and a willingness to take action in the public domain. Discriminant function analyses resulted in one significant dimension, identified as pyschological empowerment, that was positively correlated with leadership and negatively correlated with alienation.

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Comments on and summarizes some of the themes of a special issue on empowerment. Extends empowerment theory with the suggestion that both research and practice would benefit from a narrative approach that links process to practice and attends to the voices of the people of interest. Narrative theory and method tends to open the field to a more inclusive attitude as to what counts as data and to cross-disciplinary insights as well as citizen collaboration. Communal narratives are defined at various levels of analysis, including the community, the organizational, and the cultural. A definition of empowerment that includes a concern with resources calls attention to the fact that communal narratives and personal stories are resources. Implications for personal and social change are suggested.

Inspired by a literary-feminist reading of biblical texts, it is suggested that the mission of community psychology/social science can be understood as a calling to use our tools (research methods, critical analysis and observation, scholarship, social influence) to assist others in the job of turning tales of terror into tales of joy. Such work is the essence of personal and social change. These are not things we can do alone; they require collaboration between us and the people of concern. Applying concepts from narrative theory, including description and critical analysis of community and setting narratives, dominant cultural narratives, and personal stories, we can learn from our own communities and we can use our resources to help make known (perhaps even help to imagine new) tales of joy. Some of these themes are illustrated in three very different contexts: a religious community that has made itself inclusive of gay and lesbian people, a mutual help organization that offers a sense of community and hope for the future to people with a history of serious mental illness, and a public elementary school.

and, especially, Marc Zirnmerman for comments on an earlier version.'There is probably too much jargon in this agenda statement. I am often asked what do I really mean by empowerment? I admit to a certain lack of precision in the term. For example, one might be asked to define things like confexf, influence, and decisions. And it would be helpful to specify just what is meant by a phrase such as u$ect their lives. Nevertheless, despite the difficulty of specification I have discovered that it is not very difficult for the people who are the target of our research or our interventions to understand what it means. Empowerment has also been written about by political scientists, journalists, and poets (e.g., Boyte & Reissman, 1986; Neruda, 1987).*Of course, this does not mean that outsiders should be the only people studied. One may learn quite a bit by studying those who are empowered "insiders" and by studying settings that are empowering (Maton, 1989; Maton & Rappaport, 1984) as well as people who have become empowered (Kieffer, 1984). There are also certain uses that, although not totally congruent with the intention to retain the term empowerment for issues concerned with outsiders, do not distort its meaning and from which we probably can learn a great deal-for example, empowering teachers or parents in the school context (see Gruber & Trickett, 1987).

A common way for researchers to think about mutual help organizations is as alternative treatments for people with problems in living. This approach, illustrated here in the context of a series of empirical studies conducted by the author, views people as service seekers. Although much can be gained from research in which there is collaboration between professionals and the self-help community, there remains a need for work that uses theories and methods consistent with the experiences of the members and the ethos of the organizations. A different way to understand mutual help organizations is to view them as normative narrative communities where identity transformation takes place. This approach forces us to listen to the personal stories that people tell about their lives. It has several advantages, including the reduction of professional centrism and the explicit linking of individual lives to community processes. A narrative studies framework also has the advantage of tying mutual help to a great deal of cross-disciplinary research, including cognitive psychology, anthropology, sociology, and literary analysis. General features of models for understanding the role of narratives, autobiographical memory, and personal change through identity transformation are described in the context of mutual help organizations.