WHAT MAKES A GOOD CITIZEN?

Attitudes towards civic virtue in Europe and how social and political participation impact upon them.

FLORIAN PICHLER AND CLAIRE WALLACE

Abstract

In all the debates about citizenship, it is assumed that a virtuous citizen is one that votes, obeys laws and participates in their society. Furthermore, the discussion of so-cial capital has assumed that strong social capital is a way of promoting good citizen-ship. However, the idea of the good citizen is hardly explored. In this paper, using the European Values Survey for 1999 we look at normative models of good citizenship, focusing upon the role of citizen towards the state on the one hand the role of the citi-zen towards the public good on the other hand. We consider the individual character-istics of people who support either strict or lenient models of citizenship and we look at in which countries each particular view prevails. Finally, we consider the relation-ship between norms of good citizenship, social capital and political participation in order to test whether these things are indeed associated.


Paper presented to CINEFOGO conference, Roskilde, June 2007.