This article was originally published in the February 2011 issue of Universitas. The text is an edited transcript of Dr. Antonio’s University Day Lecture delivered on 13 August 2010.
By Dr. Emilio T. Antonio Jr.
Traditional framework: Citizenship by circumstances
The topic assigned to me is “Individual, Society and Citizenship.” Since I am an economist by training, I will approach the topic from the perspective of my discipline. …The first problem that an economist confronts in trying to understand the concept of citizenship is in its traditional definition. It is in terms of given circumstances and not of choices. Citizenship is an individual’s membership in a society. Traditionally, this is framed by the place of birth and/or blood relationship.
…[T]here are costs to being a citizen. These costs come in the form of the duties a citizen must assume. The labels for these duties sound nice: patriotism, civic responsibilities, and other romantic concepts a citizen is expected to internalize. Once we focus on the costs, it becomes easy to see that the traditional definition of citizenship opens up a Pandora’s Box of questions. Clearly, the definition has a very weak link to the duties of citizenship entails. Why should I be responsible for my place of birth? Why should my blood relationship with a particular race of people impose a set of responsibilities on me?
Citizenship by choice
Recent developments have added a new wrinkle to these realities: citizenship by choice. In an increasingly globalized community where physical and virtual travel has become easy, more people seem to have realized this possibility.
What makes these individuals choose to belong in a society, disregarding the origin of their blood and the space on earth where they were born? What makes them accept the new set of rights and responsibilities definitely different from what they were leaving behind?
From a purely economic standpoint, the answer to this question of choice is clear: the rewards involved in assuming this new citizenship are bigger than the cost of giving up their old status. Emotional attachments defined by relationships in their countries of origin give way to the promise of economic gains in the promised land of their choice.
From choice to commitment
It might be helpful to break down the choices that an individual makes in relation to citizenship into two steps.
The first step is the choice to belong or be part of a society. Perhaps, this can be easily justified by the circumstances of birth and the lure of economic gains from membership.
The second step is the choice to commit to the society where one belongs. That is, accepting and fulfilling with passion the responsibilities that this membership entails. What we want to understand better is the link between membership and commitment.
The question we need to address, therefore, is: “What could drive citizens to passionately embrace not only the rights but also, more important, the responsibilities that go with citizenship?” To help us answer this question, we need to… explore the roles and relationships among individuals, society and citizenship.
At the core is the individual. He is the one who has a soul with intellect and will and who can therefore make things happen. As an individual, he has a definite vocation clearly articulated in the recent encyclical of Pope Benedict XVI Caritas in Veritate: he has a vocation for development. But he lives and is expected to carry out his vocation in a society. In this society, he must recognize that there are other individuals undertaking the same journey and who have the same rights and responsibilities to be able to reach their final destination.
From these, it is clear that a society exists for the individual. …Society’s existence is defined by the need of the individuals to be able to fulfill their vocation for development. Therefore, the yardstick for society’s success is if society helps its individuals reach their final end.
Clearly, the individual and society are linked by a common objective: the vocation for development of the individual. Their developments, therefore, are intertwined. Society’s progress can only make sense if it results in the development of individuals… [H]is development must help society open up more possibilities to make the development of other individuals in that society also possible. In short, there is a clear need for reciprocity… The reciprocity I am talking about here, however, is not that variety where—“You scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours.” The reciprocity has to be moral.
This moral reciprocity can be a potent force to convert membership into a commitment. If the individual can see, feel, and touch that his development and society’s progress are closely intertwined, he is more likely to be concerned with how he can be of help to society. Behind that concern would be the reciprocal expectation that when the community prospers, so does he.
For citizenship to become a strong driving force for individuals to develop their commitment to their responsibilities in a society, the following conditions are clearly important:
- The individuals must be free to exercise their choice;
- Moral reciprocity between the individual and society must reign. That is
- Society makes it possible for individuals to reap the costs and rewards of their choices;
- Society benefits from the individual choices in terms of how these reinforce society’ capability to help its citizen in fulfilling their vocation to development
- There is an opportunity to participate in society’s governance. This is needed to help citizens recognize, internalize, and reinforce the sense of commitment that true citizenship entails.
Viewed from the opposite perspective, these are the same forces that would erode the sense of commitment to these responsibilities.
When society irresponsibly restricts freedom of choice, the sense of responsibility is suppressed. Responsibility, after all, can be assumed only when there is freedom of choice.
When moral reciprocity is undermined, the drive to act as responsible citizens also is stifled. This happens
- When society cuts the link between individual choices and their consequences; and
- When individual choices tend to undermine society’s capability to perform its responsibility to the other members of society
- When opportunities to participate in society’s decisions are severely limited either by society’s structure for governance or the abuse of these structures by some individuals. When a clique, for example, monopolizes governance and hangs on to power over long periods of time, other individuals lose their opportunity to experience leadership… [and] the chances to be fully connected to society are undermined.
The framework vs Philippine realities
Let us now use these concepts to explain, anticipate, and examine how we can influence the sense of citizenship Filipinos have.
What do we usually blame for this poor quality of choices? Lack of sense of nationhood combined with lack of education, the role of media, and the influence of financial power are what we consider as the usual suspects. Definitely, all these play a role. But from the perspective of what we have previously discussed, could the reason also be the failure of the individuals to see, or even more important, to strongly feel, the link between their choices and the consequences of their decisions?
The challenge then to keep the fire of citizenship burning seems to lie in how the three C’s of citizenship converge: how circumstances and choices are linked and transformed to commitment. Circumstances and economic choices easily fan membership. Converting membership to commitment requires that individual and society’s decisions be aligned to serve the common good. Alignment requires appreciation of moral reciprocity, which, in turn, requires structures that enable the frequent practice of bringing to life the potential reciprocal and moral benefits of individual choices.
It is always appealing to resort to the famous exhortation of Kennedy in his inaugural address: that we should not ask what the country can do for us but what we can do for the country. In the real world, the realities confronting ordinary citizens do not prompt them to ask this question. In fact, it is the opposite that is more likely to be asked.
Can this be changed? If we use the same framework, we need to work hard on two things: (a) developing the sense that individual and society’s fates are closely intertwined; and (b) making this sense real through participatory practices of governance that gives opportunities to everyone to lead and to follow… [T]hese are difficult to achieve specifically when one deals with the national level.
What then can be done? Perhaps a more realistic strategy is to work on the smaller “societies” that make up the nation. Moral reciprocity would be easier to touch, see, and feel in the smaller units—the home, school, and the place where one works. As the sense of citizenship in these smaller societies is developed, the intertwining of an individual’s fate with those of the other members of these societies is brought to the fore through actual experiences. Moral reciprocity becomes a living concept that could help them develop the sense of responsibility and commitment to bigger societies where these smaller societies belong. It will help develop values, structures, and practices that can convert circumstances and choices forming the initial foundations of membership in a society into passionate commitment to contribute to society’s goals.
Let me consider the possibilities at the level of family, school, and workplace. Passionate commitment to these smaller societies can be stimulated or undermined depending on whether or not moral reciprocity between the individual and these societies is a living reality.
Citizenship in the family
…[C]ommitment to the family can be strengthened or weakened by the presence or absence of moral reciprocity in the acts of the family members. We did not choose to be born in the specific family but we feel obliged to take care of the members of our families. Nevertheless, fulfillment of family duties become harder whenever a member feels that the development of the family as a whole does not mean anything for his own development.
Citizenship in schools
Most of the time, it is parents who choose the children’s school. Nevertheless, the sense of belonging grows when the sense of moral reciprocity is reinforced. How they treasure the experiences that they had matter. If the experience is good, the bond is likely to be strong. And if the bond is nurtured after they have left the school premises, the alumni could remain committed citizens of the school.
Citizenship in companies
In these societies, you could either have workers who have jobs or have “citizens” who are committed to their responsibilities. If we want our employees to work with passion, their personal objectives must be aligned with the company’s mission. This would be more probable if the employees strongly feel that their fate and the fate of their company are strongly intertwined… [A]lignment of personal objectives with corporate mission develops a culture where the search for personal excellence is disciplined by the need to contribute to the company’s goals because if the company progresses, so would he. …The commitment of the workers blossoms when commitment of their companies to the workers is practices, not just preached.
Conclusion
Converting family membership into citizenship. Converting students and teachers into committed citizens of schools. Converting employees into citizens of the companies. In all these, the individuals get to see that they belong to a society, which is there to help them reach their ultimate end. The probability that the sense of belonging to these societies could be converted into commitment increases when moral reciprocity is seen, touched, and felt. These become apparent in the values that the society believes in, the structures for decision-making, and the participatory practices that allow the citizens to become leaders and followers. This sense of citizenship in smaller societies could be a more solid foundation for the sense of citizenship in terms of the nation.
Leave a Reply