In graduating with my Bachelors of Art in Political and Social Thought, I wrote a thesis entitled "What Holds Us Together: The Collapse of Civic Trust and the Path Forward". You can view the abstract the the entire thesis below.
ABSTRACT
Americans today are less connected to one another, less civically engaged, and less trusting in institutions than generations before them. Since the 1960s, there has been a significant decline in the frequency of every form of community involvement—from attending town halls and voting to joining clubs and having people over for dinner. Across the board, we are witnessing a citizenry that is distrustful—feeling less obligated to engage with their community or buy into community norms. Alongside increased polarization, the bonds with one another necessary for a flourishing democracy seem more strained than ever. Pundits, politicians, and everyday people alike are asking whether democracy can—or should—survive.
This thesis seeks to answer the question of how we got here and how we move forward through an examination of civic trust: the belief in the good intentions and potential of fellow citizens that imbues confidence in our ability as citizens to self-organize towards a greater society. Chapter I sets the stage for the collapse of civic community, defines civic trust, and posits an initial framework to describe how our belief in one another seems to be waning—a necessary component to hold the civic together. Chapter II and Chapter III examine how civic trust has collapsed from affective and structural lenses respectively. Chapter II explores how civic trust is threatened interpersonally through increased social distance and polarization by first analyzing shifts in our citizenship framework in the Civil Rights Movement and then in the modern day. Chapter III tackles market fundamentalism, a regime seeking to advance the market at the expense of the civic. Through its structural reframings, market fundamentalism renders civic trust unviable. The interlude maps how the affective and structural feed off one another to further degrade civic trust, disempowering the civic.
Chapter IV and Chapter V paint a path forward. Chapter IV discusses the potential of dialogue as a way to build attachment and cultivate trust in the Public. Chapter V builds on the former chapter to propose a concrete agenda, structural and interpersonal, for revitalizing civic trust.
Ultimately, this thesis aims to articulate an antidote of hope in otherwise unhopeful times for democracy. Through civic trust, this thesis aims to provide an explanation of why our politics feel so dysfunctional, our neighbors seem so distant, and democracy feels so lost—and also reasserts that we, as citizens, still have the power to collectively imagine the democracy we wish to share.