3.2 Citizenship
3.2.1 Communitarian Citizenship
According to Arthur (2000), citizenship is concerned with the social relationships between people and the relationships between people and the institutional arrangements that are afforded by the state and the society. According to communitarian thinking, citizens need a society with a degree of common goals and sense of collective common good. According to Arthur (2000), Preece and Mosweunyane (2004), Delanty (2003), and Bagnall (2010) a citizen earns the right of citizenship through their participation in a society, by attending to duties and responsibilities which are the defining characteristics of the practice of
citizenship. A person needs to be a member of the community in communitarian citizenship and to be part of a group of people who are committed to sharing, dividing and exchanging the social goods among themselves, which is done through socialization as indicated in Biesta (2011). This means that from a communitarian perspective or dimension of citizenship, values are shared among all members who perform similar practices in a community. Furthermore, Delanty (2003) and Jarvis (2008) postulate that citizenship is a learnt process through social interaction that reflects a lifelong learning process in a cultural citizenship discourse, where traditions, experiences and culture are transferred from
generation to generation.
Communitarians think that the state should create an opportunity to empower citizens and that the local community should encourage participation (Arthur, 2000; Kolisang, 2012;
Preece & Mosweunyane, 2004). Therefore, people need to be motivated to participate so as to become active citizens with the aim of working towards a collective good. Similarly, Preece and Mosweunyane (2004) note that in communitarian discourse citizenship is viewed as participation by the community of people who also identify with that certain cultural community. Bagnall (2010),Biesta and Lawy (2006), and Jarvis (2008) have all illustrated that citizens engage by participating in different ways, either by the sharing of
62 knowledge, skills or by committing their time in certain activities, so that they can belong to a community. Unity, therefore, is provided by this community towards its members, who share the same values and principles. In this type of citizenship, voluntarism and self-help are the core practices within a community life and important institutions are the family, religious groups, chieftainship, neighbourhood and voluntary groups (Arthur, 2000; Preece
& Mosweunyane, 2004).
This notion of citizenship is similar to the values that are discussed under traditional
leadership, where people were dependent on chiefs for their entire living, and so had to pay allegiance to the chiefs by respecting them, obeying the laws and conforming to certain values. Communitarian citizenship is linked to communitarian democracy, which emphases the value aspect that produces good citizens. In the same vein, communitarian citizenship is one of the African values, on which societies were largely based, through the notion of the collective rather than an individual orientation (Duncan et al., 2007; Pacho, 2013; Waghid, 2010, 2014). Traditionally, Lesotho exercised communitarian ways of social living, which is still popular in the remote rural areas.
Biesta (2011) emphasises stability and order for a communitarian practice of democratic politics. Munoz and Wrigley (2012) affirm that adult civic engagement requires the use of the adults’ experiences to solve challenges and find durable solutions to social, economic, cultural and political issues affecting people and their communities generally. This requires that citizens should act collectively by caring and connecting with one another in efforts to advance peace in their communities (Pacho, 2013; Waghid, 2010, 2014; Waghid & Smeyers, 2012). Communitarian citizenship, as Mahafza (2014) contends, expresses the national pride and national loyalty among citizens, who should have knowledge of the nation’s values and skills, thereby promoting good relationships between themselves and their communities.
However, citizens are culturally and socially shaped (Fincham, 2012) and created in terms of their identities in different dimensions. When referring to the Palestinian context, Fincham stated that:
…[i]n the absence of state structures, the social and political divisions between the school and the community become blurred as multiple civil society institutions, such
63 as the family, political organisations, the media and religious institutions, work to produce and regulate identities in daily life (2012, p. 119).
It follows, therefore, that identity construction, according to Fincham (2012), does not only depend on distinguishing character, as Lappegard (2008) reflects, or what Mason and Vella (2013) and Yeatman (2007) explain in regard to what citizens practice, but also on social groups that serve as references, as Sindic (2011) illustrates. Rosenberg (2007) also argues that national identity serves as an original point and space rooted in how people identify and define themselves, through symbolic uniqueness and difference from other people of other nations. Here, Rosenberg (2007) illustrates how Basotho (people of Lesotho) reveal their sense of pride by their ubiquitous Basotho hat known as Mokorotlo, and the blanket which symbolizes the honouring of Lesotho’s founder, Chief Moshoeshoe (Rosenberg, 1999). Thus their collective identity unifies the individual citizens.
In addition, language is identified as a unifying factor (Fincham, 2012; Kelly, 1995; Mason &
Vella, 2013) that is shared by people of the same communitarian citizenship. Language plays a key role in connecting people together, as in the African ideology of botho and ubuntu (see Chapter Two). In this ideology people express themselves as I /We (Lekoko & Modise, 2011) to show a strong sense of interconnectedness where people care for and support each other. Language has the capacity to advance good relationships amongst people even if they do not know each other. There is an element of trust and increased respect, each for the other, especially for people who share the same language that can even convey the values and other cultural beliefs between different citizens. The notion of language as a unifying factor and one of mutual respect emerged as features for analysis in this study (see Chapter Six for more discussions).
However, communitarian citizenship is criticized by Pickett (2001) for being too sympathetic to community, while being hostile to the individual. Indeed, Bennett, Wells, and Rank’s (2009) assertion is that collective identity is declining, whereas individualism is now
commonly expressed and endorsed by young citizens as a personal identity. Communitarian citizenship puts more emphasis on the membership of a particular community, where the member has to abide by the values, customs and practices of sharing, and of unity or collectivity. While there is a common good element in sharing, especially as it boosts and uplifts the destitute and the vulnerable people, it may also have negative elements for other
64 people. This is because some people may conform out of fear and intimidation by others, while in fact it is not their character or intention at a particular point in time to share with other needy people. Communitarian is criticized for promoting dependency and slowing down the process of self-independence and the development of people who depend on others in a community (Pickett, 2001). An alternative vision for communitarian is expressed through civic republican citizenship.