Community Development (CD) is a process to favour the socio-economic development of communities through the engagement of citizens, social workers, public authorities or non-profit organizations. Over the last decades, theories and practices of the CD have spread all over the world. Italy has a consistent “Third Sector” (TS) with a long-standing tradition; Despite the absence of a well-defined area of the Italian CD, in recent years, particularly within the so-called Third Sector (TS), there has been to develop characterizes of the CD. This paper aims to theorize the features of the CD in the Italian TS. The research engages representatives of 23 organizations—from neighbourhood associations to foundations and national bodies—and investigates through qualitative semi-structured interviews how they promote and conceptualize CD processes. Through the framework of international theories, it is possible to define the field of the CD in the Italian TS.

社区发展（CD）是通过公民、社会工作者、公共当局或非营利组织的参与来促进社区社会经济发展的过程。几十年来，裁谈会的理论和实践已遍布世界各地。意大利有着一贯的“第三部门”（TS），有着悠久的传统；尽管意大利CD缺乏明确界定的区域，但近年来，特别是在意大利CD中 所谓第三扇区(TS)，已经发展出CD的特征。本文旨在理论化意大利 TS 中 CD 的特征。该研究邀请了 23 个组织（从邻里协会到基金会和国家机构）的代表参与，并通过定性半结构化访谈调查了他们如何促进和概念化 CD 流程。通过国际理论框架，可以界定意大利TS中CD的领域。