The
Democratic Academy Workshop Call
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A Message from Robert D. Putnam
In recent years, I have written widely on the subject of civic disengagement in the United States. As a social scientist, one of my goals has been simply to document the depth of this phenomenon. As a concerned citizen, however, I also have been motivated by a keenly felt desire to sound the tocsin as a prelude to taking action to address the key socio-economic and political issues confronting the nation. At the risk of oversimplification – and to paraphrase Thomas Dewey -- the solution to the problem of civic engagement is more civic engagement. Seen from this perspective, we would do well to remember that America at the end of the 19th century suffered from many of the same problems we have today. At that time, the country was passing through an era of rapid and unprecedented economic change and social change. The Industrial Revolution was altering people’s lives in fundamental ways. The gap between rich and poor was growing. Society was becoming increasingly diverse as waves of people flooded into our cities uprooting families, undermining traditions, and hollowing out long established institutions. As part of this process, America at the turn of the last century also exhibited an all too familiar concern about the relationship between money, politics, and the integrity of our democratic system. This, after all was the era of the Robber Barons and Tammany Hall. As charges of corruption and cronyism filled the headlines, cynicism about politics was grafted on to the more general sense of anomie already felt by many citizens. Yet in a remarkable burst of creativity, Americans responded to these challenges by endeavoring to build a new type of civil society – one that would serve to both empower the people and rejuvenate their communities. Hence, in the space of a generation, most of the major civic associations we have come to know – the Boy Scouts, the Red Cross, NAACP, the League of Women Voters, Hadassah, clubs such the Rotary, Moose, Kiwanis, United Way and the Knights of Columbus – had been created as a way of addressing the social, economic, and political concerns of ordinary citizens. Perhaps the most striking thing about this so-called progressive movement was that many of the creative social entrepreneurs leading the way were young people. With this mind, I remain rather optimistic about the future of democracy in the United States and the contribution that younger Americans can make to the process of civic renewal. In some respects, people in their teens and their early 20s are already leading the way. Nationwide, for example, there has been a decline in the amount of volunteer work Americans perform on annual basis. Among younger people, however, the trend is in precisely the opposite direction. In fact, today’s high school and college students are engaged in more forms of community service than any previous generation in American history. Obviously, volunteerism represents an important first step in the process of rebuilding social capital in America. Not only do such experiences nurture a sense of empathy and personal responsibility on the part of individuals, community service also serves to bridge differences and build connections between and among individuals who otherwise might be bowling alone. From here, it is short step from “doing for” other people to “working with” other people in the pursuit of collaborative solutions to the serious problems of social justice that remain in America. In my view, this is the special challenge for today’s generation of younger Americans. As educators, we have are own special challenges to address in this regard. Indeed, the way we teach students about community engagement and political participation is likely to have a powerful and long lasting effect on the way younger Americans think about the problems and possibilities of achieving an authentically democratic society. In light of this, I regard The Democratic Academy as a quite promising – and perhaps revolutionary – approach to civic education. The pedagogical strategies and instructional techniques associated with this initiative emphasize the importance of active and experiential learning in courses and programs across the curriculum. As such, the approach is premised upon building social capital within the institution of higher education itself by bridging differences and establishing connections among academic programs that historically have existed as largely departmentalized and, hence, isolated fields of specialization. In contrast, The Democratic Academy presents a paradigmatic alternative - an institutional design rooted ultimately in the broader social purpose of promoting civic renewal and democratic practice. The boldness of this vision deserves careful consideration.
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