What’s a Citizen?

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.