The sense of community is lost

IELTS Writing Task 2 with sample answer.

You should spend about 40 minutes on this task.

With the increasing number of people in cities, most do not know their neighbours and the sense of community is lost. What is causing this? How can we turn it around?

Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.

Write at least 250 words.

Model Essay:
Global capitalism fueled by industry has caused radical social change. Conventional assumptions about the nature of society are no longer valid. People are moving from countryside, where they worked as peasant, into the cities as they sight new economic opportunities generated by the boom in industry and its subsequent need for labour. Consequently, cities are becoming densely populated. Although this change has uplifted the quality of life for most city dwellers, unfortunately they are losing their sense of community.

As people move to cities, the sense of communities is lost little by little. People tend to become more and more individualized and dependent only upon themselves in order for their livelihood rather than seeking to foster the entire community. Individuals in cities want to entertain their own interests and needs. In cities, individuals associate with each other not because they feel the deep sense of community but rather because the other person poses something that the individual considers as satisfying a particular immediate need. City, thus, forms a mechanical society weakening close, long-lasting primary knits in favour of superficial secondary relationships.

However, as far as I believe that religion would be a handy tool to hone the sense of community. Most religions on the earth have some kind of forms of practicing community. For example, “umma” or community is the cornerstone of Islam, the communion of saints in Christianity is a form of community, and community is a distinguished notion in Judaism. Religion teaches us being human is not only about being an individual, but also it is about belonging to the community. Thereby, religiously active women and men are very often more sensitive to others, more likely to be helpful without desiring material gain, and more likely to serve those in need.

All in all, increasingly number of people are leaving countryside to city and the city is become heavily populated. But ironically, the people become fully assimilated into the melting pot of the urban mechanical society and they lose their ties with each other. But there is still hope and the deep sense of community can be retained if we practice the religious principles of community.