Civic Obligation and the Common Good

Abstract

The beliefs that citizens are bound by civic obligation and the concomitant conviction that citizens should have a mind toward the common good are present within all civic republican theories. Furthermore, republicans remind us that these beliefs need to be formed in citizens through a range of educational processes, including those that take place in schools. Whilst these commitments represent a cornerstone of contemporary republican thought, the existence and importance of civic obligation and the common good have also found clear expression within the work of many prominent liberal writers over the last three decades. This does not mean, however, that civic republicans and liberals conceive civic obligation and a concern for the common good in similar terms — nor even that these concepts are understood in the same way throughout contemporary republican thought. In their contemporary theories, civic republicans have looked toward notions of civic obligations and the common good, but have largely furnished them with understandings which, whilst they speak to their roots in classical ideas, have provided them with particular modern meanings. The aim of this chapter is to explore how contemporary republicans have understood civic obligations and notions of the common good, including the role of educational processes in their formation and expression, and how these relate to the various republican conceptions of freedom introduced in Chapter 1.