Reflections and findings on the critical citizen: Civic education – What for?

Abstract

Abstract. The Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe proclaimed the year 2005 the ‘European Year of Democratic Citizenship through Education’, but the question is: What does the democracy‐promoting citizen look like? This article focuses on the question of whether satisfied and supportive citizens or critical citizens have attitudes that promote democracy. The discussion of this question is based on empirical results from a survey of German citizens (N = 2,000), applying bivariate and multivariate methods. Political criticism is measured by indicators of dissatisfaction, attentiveness and system preference; five types of citizens are constructed: satisfied‐attentive, satisfied‐inattentive, dissatisfied‐attentive, dissatisfied‐inattentive citizens with a preference for a democratic system, and one type preferring nondemocratic systems. The article examines which of these types are more consistent with the ‘ideal citizen’– defined as a citizen who participates, is well‐informed, identifies with democracy and politics, has good internal efficacy and is willing to defend democracy. The data show that attentive citizens are more likely to promote democracy than inattentive ones. Attentive citizens are politically more knowledgeable, identify more strongly with the democratic system, feel more politically competent and are more willing to defend democracy. Political satisfaction or dissatisfaction has less of an influence on these dispositions.

Standby citizens: diverse faces of political passivity

“…Moreover, critical citizens have sometimes been regarded as an asset to a vital democracy. The idea of public criticism as a resource for democracy has become widely accepted in the past two decades (Geissel, 2008: 36; see also Klingemann, 1999;Norris, 1999;Axtmann, 2001;Dalton, 2002Dalton, , 2004.…”

All the same? Examining the link between three kinds of political dissatisfaction and protest

“…It is therefore insufficient to focus on political support when discussing the origins and implications of political dissatisfaction as has often been the case in previous literature (Dalton, 2004;Norris, 2011). As others have noticed, it is also necessary to consider the subjective political empowerment of citizens to appreciate why people are dissatisfied with politics and what manifestations their grievances can take (Almond andVerba, 1963/1965;Gamson, 1968;Stoker, 2006;Geissel, 2008). The second hypothesis concerned the possibility of identifying groups of citizens based on these two dimensions (cf.…”

“…While this classification is not necessarily the only fruitful typology of political dissatisfaction (cf. Geissel, 2008), it shows that this approach is viable in comparative research and it may shed new light on the causes and consequences of political dissatisfaction. Future research ought to examine the usefulness of different typologies based on a wider range of empirical indicators.…”

“…The second hypothesis concerned the possibility of identifying groups of citizens based on these two dimensions (cf. Geissel, 2008;Webb, 2013). A cluster analysis identified four groups of citizens with different combinations of values on the two dimensions: a group of satisfied citizens with high values on both dimensions and three groups of dissatisfied citizens.…”

“…2 Previous studies have constructed typologies based on central variables of interest (Geissel, 2008;Webb, 2013), but these have been based on single countries and it is therefore unclear whether they are useful in comparative research. 3 Webb (2013) considers stealth citizens as both unsupportive and disinterested.…”