Introduction
Participation in civic life has long been considered a core element of democracy and a fundamental expression of civil society. In recent years, a range of different forms of civic participation have taken on a growing prominence in public policy debates, with governments and scholars variously promoting these activities as vehicles for citizen choice, as counters to the decline of “community,” and more recently, as core expressions of modern citizenship. Indeed, the involvement of people in the business of civic life is often seen as a central element of political, as well as social, life in many countries.
In this context, there has been an increasing concern over the perceived decline of civic participation, with social, economic, and cultural shifts damaging the “civicness” of communities. Although this is by no means a matter of complete consensus, many writers have traced the decline of individual and collective participation in a diverse range of activities which...
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References/Further Readings
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Dacombe, R. (2010). Civic Participation. In: Anheier, H.K., Toepler, S. (eds) International Encyclopedia of Civil Society. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-93996-4_126
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