A citizen is one among the many—one among others. Citizens are members. We are always citizens “of.” “Of what?” Of the many? Yes. But citizens are not mobs or crowds. Citizens are members of civic communities, and citizens create and re-create civic communities. The civic, in other words, comes into existence when we participate in civic conversations as citizens.
As we look at high unemployment figures in Northern Africa, or in Spain or in the United States, it should make us wonder what is going on when there is so much work to be done.
According to Aristotle, even though families and clans preceded the emergence of the city, the city was the end that human communities aimed for. To be a good member of the city—a good citizen—was the human telos or final end. In some ways I think he was right.
How different from the world that Adam Smith created for us that treats everyone as traders, engaging in the exchange of properties to become wealthy. The truth is that we today live more in the legacy of Adam Smith than of Aristotle. We tend to define the good life in terms of ownership instead of membership.
In my business ethics classes, I ask students to take on the role of a citizen when we consider the ethics of business in society. What does that mean, especially in a classroom filled with students from perhaps ten to twelve different countries? What would it look like for a student from China or from Indonesia to take on the role of citizen in an ethics class in the United States?
I begin the exploration of this question by sharing the original meaning of citizen. A citizen is a “member of a city.” Citizenship, in other words, provides us a consciousness of membership. Today, of course, we would extend membership beyond any particular city to the global community. I think of global citizenship, for of all, as an awareness of belonging to this generation. In our global, pluralistic world, to see oneself as a member of this generation is no small undertaking.
Marvin T. Brown, Ph.D teaches business and organizational ethics at the University of San Francisco and Saybrook University in San Francisco.
This book is the culmination of 30 years of teaching and writing on business and society from a communicative perspective. Visit workingethics.com for more information.
Adam Smith American Dream Atlantic trade banks biosphere citizen Citizens United civic civic conversations civic economy Civicism civic membership civilizing the economy civil war Commons corporate citizen corporations democracy disagreement economics of property economics of provision Egypt health care reform human dignity invisible hand John Locke libertarianism Libya living wage membership money moral equality ownership property property rights protection Scotland slavery Smith and slavery Smithian economics sports sustainability system of provision taxes tobacco trade