Citizenship and Civic Life

Models of Citizenship

Based on reading by Herman van Gustaren

Van Gustaren presents a conception of citizenship grounded in the political form of a REPUBLIC

In a REPUBLIC

“A citizen is both governor and governor” (36).

A mantra of American political culture is “government

Of the people,

By the people,

For the people.”

Yet, van Gustaren asserts that this

“double role is unusual and awe-inspiring. It is all the more remarkable when one considers that in a republic the exercise of authority is geared towards recognition and regulation of differences between the citizen and the state, and not towards elimination of those differences” (36).

He enumerates three qualities that citizens must have to perform this role well:

Autonomy (freedom)

Sound judgment

Loyalty

This is why early republics required CITIZENS to be property owners

Property ownership gave them or demonstrated in them these qualities

THE MODERN REPUBLIC

Expanded the notion of citizenship to apply to all

Universal manhood suffrage, enfranchisement

Finally, universal suffrage

Enfranchisement through THE WELFARE STATE!!!

“They provide welfare facilities that protect the less wealthy from having to give up their independent political judgment and action for the maintenance of their lives, sustenance and other elementary necessities” Social security and welfare assistance are thus the functional equivalents of property as a prerequisite for citizenship” (37).

This is an odd notion for Americans to consider!!!

Discuss. Reflect upon this.

Can you convince yourself that this could possibly be true?

Three models of citizenship

Individualist Citizenship aka Liberal Citizenship

Citizen as calculating bearer of rights and preferences

demands, self interest unmoderated

the only limit is respect for rights of others

Problem with this form of citizenship?

It leads to problems like the tragedy of the commons

Too much individualism

Also “tyranny of the majority” or simply

Bad judgment, bad choices

Basically he says, people are sheep

– “least common denominator” kinds of choices

– Ortega y Gasset rule by the uneducated masses

Lacks CIVIC VIRTUE, a public ethic

A conception of the common good that needs to be weighed against the individual good

Without this, he says, democracy perishes into self-seeking

Think “war of all against all”

Too much weight on “public good” – devolves into fanaticism

Think Taliban

He cites Tocqueville’s insight in Democracy in America

That “religion maintained individuals within reasonable limits of freedom” (40)

But you can’t use this insight to force people to be believers

Need education to lead people to freedom not make them free

Model Two: Communitarianism

Being a citizen means being embedded in a

historically developed community (41)

“Individuality is derived from it and determined in terms of it” (41)

Ponder this.

How does this differ from how we normally think about individuality?

“Judicious action,” “constancy,” “stability of character” depend upon

a community of like-minded people, similarly acting mates, shared life-styles

Think about this.

Are you persuaded that this is true?

How is this observation in tension with commonly held beliefs about

“American character”?

** “Individual autonomy and competent judgment are not what they appear to be. They are dependent upon the community against which they often brace themselves.” (41)

“This dependence remains hidden in a naïve self-consciousness.” (41)

“A community that is merely expedient is not a community.” (41)

Criticisms of Communitarian Model

1. distinction between “organic” and “manufactured” communities

a. organic – i.e., naturally arising

b. manufactured – inauthentic; won’t stick

basically, they’re saying you either got it or you don’t

yet there are many today living in
“intentional communities”

religious communities, co-housing movement

2. communities can be stifling, authoritarian, dogmatic

“right thinking”

cultish

“the modern state offers protection against such dangers” (42)

It does? Most Americans would NOT think this.

Could this be true? Possible? Can you think of any examples of a “modern state” protecting people from the “unjust bondage of community”?

Model Three: (Old School) Republicanism

Virtues: courage, devotion, military discipline, statecraft

DUTY

The individual attains satisfaction, his place through action in public life

“uniformly masculine” (42)

Criticisms of Republicanism

Militarism dangerous (think brown shirts, black shirts)

Insufficient emphasis on economics and trade

Can’t accommodate diversity, plurality of communities

Citizenship in Modern Society

None of these models will work today – why?

A. Modern societies are highly complex

Not comprised simply of “autonomous individuals”

But “large organizations and accumulations of capital are the main determinants of affairs” (43)

“corporate” society – has “stunning variety of ‘communities’

the traditional kinds of “communities”

based on nationality, religion, trade unions, corporate life (think associational life)

BUT ALSO “a host of less familiar and established bonds that often play an important role in the lives of individuals, but that we can’t easily call communities” (43)

Actually, in American contemporary language we call them “communities” all the time

What kinds of “bonds” or “communities” do I mean?

B. Political and social identities are “less stable” “more varied”

“The individual – the substrate of the citizen – is a bouquet” (43).

He/she is “not a natural bearer of civic-mindedness, civic virtue nor is he/she inclined to calculate all action in terms of his/her own wealth and power” (43).

“middle class society” bound by work, home and the state cannot accommodate the identities of the post-modern individual

C. Thus, relatedly, the relatively homogenous middle class has disappeared

This had been the “backbone” of the “stable republic of citizens”

“not rich enough to buy the support of others, and not poor enough to sell their vote” (44)

“small business owners, paid employees, households that lived on their incomes”

“Postmodern life-styles and post-industrial processes of production have caused the old middle class to dwindle to a minority that has rapidly lost its attraction for new recruits” (44)

Really, it no longer produces or sustains such people in large numbers.

D. This state of social flux [he calls it TUS: The Unknown Society]

has created a crisis of GOVERNANCE for MODERN state

It can’t plan, achieve economies of scale, create systems adequate to managing these changes

So we need a new model of citizenship that can PRODUCE and ARTICULATE and MEDIATE

The claims, needs, interests of this new breed of citizen

Model Four: neo-Republicanism

Has elements of each of the three

Individualist –

Autonomous, capable of sound judgment

Individuals hold the OFFICE of CITIZEN

They perform a SPECIAL DUTY

**The citizen is not identical to the entire or the ordinary person (i.e., individuals are not reducible to citizens; we are MORE than citizens)

**the exercise of citizenship should be linked to requirements of COMPETENCE (i.e., autonomy, loyalty, judgment)

**citizenship does not require social equality; just political equality

Communitarian –

“the republic creates and protects the freedom of individuals to form communities”

New virtues – valuing debate, reasonableness, democracy, choice, plurality and carefully limited use of violence

“sensible, compentent and responsible treatment of authority” (i.e., rule of law, culture of restraint among lawmakers)

Competence of citizens has to include VIRTUES and A PUBLIC ETHICS

“A citizen’s contribution is more that the mere sum of the opinions and desires he or she has as a (non-civic) individual” (46)

Republican –

The state’s role is the organization of plurality

the state is responsible for the REPRODUCTION OF CITIZENS (47)

“Qualifications are required for admission to and the exercise of citizenship. The republic must not only facilitate these, but must also formulate and maintain the required qualifications” (46)

“Citizenship is learned and confirmed primarily by its exercising, and in the organization of plurality. Family, church, school and other connections are important and possibly indispensable contributions but in a plural society they can never be the officially designated sites where citizenship is defined and the citizen is formed” (47).

How/where is citizenship defined and the citizen formed in the American republic?