Understanding the Role of Communication in Promoting Active and Activist Citizenship

Abstract

State and nation‐building practices are central to governments around the world. The definition of citizenship – of who does and does not belong, and the rights, obligations and practices associated with being a citizen – is at the crux of these concerns. This article considers what is meant by citizenship and explores the ways in which government ideals of the ‘active’ citizen are negotiated and translated by citizens in everyday life, often resulting in the emergence of the ‘activist’ citizen. Particular attention is paid to the ways in which the idea(l)s of citizenship are communicated and contested, not only by governments through citizenship education and citizenship tests but also by civil society and citizens who draw upon multiple influences to contest and makes claims to citizenship in ways that disrupt government ideas of ‘good citizenship’. Of growing concern to these negotiations are the ways in which multiple stakeholders use new technologies and social media to in engage in, and mobilise around, debates about values, meanings and practices of citizenship.

Cultural education and the good citizen: a systematic analysis of a neoliberal communitarian policy trend

“…Formal citizenship education programmes provided in schools have emerged as a particular focus of scholarly research on this subject. Such programmes tend to focus on democratic practices and active citizenship (Bennett et al, 2009;Hartung, 2017;Hammett, 2014) but have also been utilised as a space to educate young people about multicultural realities (Brooks and Holford, 2009). In the UK, for example, following on from the recommendations of the Crick Report (Crick, 1998), perceptions that multiculturalism was undermining community cohesion and driving different communities, defined in terms of ethnic identity, to lead segregated lives (Cantle, 2001) led to the introduction of a citizenship education curriculum in schools.…”

Developing ‘active citizens’: Arts Award, creativity and impact

“…In broad terms, active citizenship is understood as any kind of productive contribution to society, although that contribution remains strongly associated with paid work (Hammett, ). By contrast, researchers of arts impact have drawn attention to the ways in which engagement with different forms of arts activities can inform everyday actions which also contribute to society (Rooke & Kendall, ; Catterall et al ., ; Bennett & Parameshwaran, ; Flinders & Cunningham, ).…”

AMEND: Open Source and Data-Driven Oversight of Water Quality in New England

“…Ultimately, resources like AMEND that seek to increase access to public data and its importance in informing the public policymaking process serve to change the configuration of political agency (Kaun, Kyriakidou, & Uldam, 2016) in the states where they are deployed. By extending the decentralization of political discourse and action to information about policymaking contexts and outcomes and providing new forums for communication about this information, public data repositories and open source analysis platforms can play a role in a communications-oriented perspective on defining politi-cal agency in the digital age (Kavada, 2016) and promote the practices of active citizenship (Hammett, 2014) and proactive data activism (Milan & Van Der Velden, 2016).…”