Citizen - Building and Place Making in the Design of Cities

In this paper, which draws from my current research on back to-the-city movements in America, I suggest a direct correlation between a predominant emphasis on values of self advancement, individual rights, and mass individual consumption (consumership) and a parallel underdevelopment of values focused on family and civic responsibility (citizenship). I define consumership as a way of thinking and living, broadly guided by three interconnected perspectives: an overarching emphasis on material relationships, a paramount concern for maximum efficiency in human institutions, and a view that our environment is a commodity. I define citizenship as a unique quality of community gained from exercising our human capacity to care, share, and trust beyond our immediate ties of lunship, friendship, and ethnicity; ie., a quality of caring, sharing, and trusting that honors nature’s rhythms and serves as a source of empowerment for individuals seeking to build common opportunities.

https://doi.org/10.35483/ACSA.Intl.1995.17

Volume Editors
John K. Edwards