Politics: the rhetoric of active citizenship

I received an email today from Howard Dean. I get emails from him from time to time, and from others (John Conyers from time to time, Russ Feingold emailed me today too, reminding me why he’s a Progressive Patriot). It feels nice that these guys keep in touch.

One of the things Howard mentioned today made me think. He said that what he’s fighting for is (something like) “active citizenship” – sorry I don’t have the direct quote, I deleted it too soon. Anyhow now I’m sitting in a downtown Missoula coffee shop (not) working on one of my overdue philosophy papers and something occurred to me, and it runs something like this:

1. I like the Democratic party because they generally support higher taxes and a stronger social infrastructure (health care, retirement plans, education, and so on).
2. With a good social infrastructure, I don’t have to worry so much about those things and can enjoy life and pursue my livelihood (eventually teaching and writing) wholeheartedly.
3. But since I don’t worry about those things, I tend to be rather ignorant about them (education being an exception in my case).
4. Therefore my ability to make intelligent decisions about how my beloved government ought to manage those things is severely curtailed.

On the other hand is the Republican party (boo, hiss), which in most cases would argue that:

1. People, not the government, know best how to spend their money.
2. People, through the free market, are the quickest to respond to changing economic landscapes.
3. Government management quickly becomes stale, bureaucratic, and corrupt – While no government would be anarchy and terrible, we should have the smallest government possible (this may be more of a libertarian than a strictly Republican claim – see Robert Nozick for the most cogent philosophical argument for such a system)
4. Thus taxes represent people handing over their responsibility for “active citizenship” to a government that is inherently untrustworthy.
5. Keeping money, and responsibility for social issues, in the hands of people forces them to stay alert and active in their citizenship, resulting in a creative, dynamic society.

hmph…

I like the idea of “active citizenship” and for me that translates into fighting for a better educational system (teaching people how to think, not so much what to think). But at the same time I like the idea of a government that handles the details on my behalf, so I can focus on the things I love in life. I find that I pay less attention to my government itself (it’s depressing, and often enough on both sides of the isle – as witnessed as Hillary Clinton addressed Progressive Democrats this week) and more to so-called special interest groups like the National Resource Defense Council and Democracy for America.

But can I consider myself an active citizen when I pay so little attention to the government itself, and less to the intricacies of issues outside my limited sphere of interest? Am I spoiled by the social infrastructure which allows me to know so little? Would I be better off with lower taxes and more decisions to make (i.e. more choices)?