The SFCP aims to promote the Critical Philosophy through the linked activities of education and scholarship.

Charity No

313712

Rene Saran of SFCP facilitated the dialogue. A Socratic Dialogue commences with participants sharing a personal experience relevant to the topic. The group then selects one example to work with. The chosen example concerned the refusal by a young person on reaching the age of 17 to learn to drive. He was totally convinced he did not want to drive, despite pressure from parents and peers. Not driving would benefit others and the eco-system. He saw his refusal to learn to drive as an act of active citizenship. It was no mere private decision; on the contrary, he asserted his views to class mates at a sixth form college, hoping to raise their awareness about the consequences of driving cars and putting emphasis on improved public transport.

The group then agreed that the following aspects of the particular example illustrated what active citizenship could involve:

making an active choice – not just being led;

influencing one’s peers, not simply going along with becoming a driver regardless of the consequences;

challenging the status quo on an issue (that on reaching 17 one learns to drive);

defending the human race against suicide through over-indulgence;

standing up for one’s belief in humanity;

trying to influence and shape social change (question: is this a political act?).

From the more particular points above, the group then considered at a more abstract level what they had identified as characteristics of active citizenship, so as to answer the original question set for this Socratic Dialogue.

It was then suggested that an ‘active citizen’ could be contrasted with an ‘ordinary citizen’, and that a person who is active on one issue might well not be on another. So an ordinary citizen was seen as someone who displays the usual, habitual behaviour, common to many others in the community. By contrast, the active citizen gives something extra voluntarily to the community (be it local, national or global). Such actions were usually associated with social change and standing up for one’s principles. Whether an individual ordinary citizen becomes an active citizen depends on the context; thinking and reflecting on a given issue; making one’s own decision (not being passive); actively challenging currently accepted norms; participating to bring about change.

Possibly the reader of the above will think the tentative conclusions and the method of reaching them are nothing more than commonplace; yet the group arrived at them through a process of sharing experiences and thoughts and came to recognise points by no means obvious to them at the beginning of the Socratic Dialogue. Citizenship is being introduced as a topic into schools, and is widely talked about in the wider society. So perhaps the conclusions reached by this working group will be of interest.