we become.
“Individuality, Community, Sustainability, and Democracy”
Center for Critical Inquiry Theme, 2009-2010
At its most basic, modern democracy is an approach to co-existing and managing the many issues that make up human affairs. Humans are destined to live together, but we remain individuals shaped by specific historical and cultural traditions. To achieve a balance between the individual and the collective, democracy requires a social, cultural and physical environment, an ecological, interpersonal, and discursive field, which supports and sustains not only life, but patience and intellectual vitality as well. Unfortunately, what we do as collectives and as individuals can put this field at risk.
Modern democracy cannot afford to be deaf to this dilemma. If it is to be sustained, citizens must engage in meaningful discourse about just solutions to the inevitable conflicts between communal values supported by the majority and the free and vocal defense of individual rights. Doing so involves listening to the views of all, while recognizing that all perspectives may not be of equal value.
In today’s world, these tensions are aggravated by democracy’s romance with and struggle against the voracious appetite of global capital accumulation. No longer just the responsibility of individual nations, modern democracy’s goal of human freedom and freedom of the market are conflated on a global field that raises new problems. Fundamental questions of individual health, education, prosperity and well-being are influenced by multicultural forces that must be a part of any democracy’s civil discourse, but that complicate our notion of a communal good. Can democracy be sustained in an era of globalization? Can citizenship, civil society and respect for the dignity of the individual be sustained in multicultural communities on a changing planet whose societies are driven by global economic forces? If so, how will humanity develop and spread a sense of community and of person that is capable of sustaining the balance?
If you are interested in learning more about forming groups related to the CCIs 2009-2010 theme, please contact Greg Grieve (gpgrieve@gmail.com), Ali Schultheis (tanagerlodge@yahoo.com ), or Roy Schwartzman (docroy@triad.rr.com).