Community V. Self-Interest: Citizen Perceptions of Schools as Civic Investments

Abstract

Some have suggested that the solution to citizen decline in confidence in government is to make public organizations more responsive to citizen demands. But governmental responsiveness can take at least two forms: one focuses on the self-interest of individual citizens and the other focuses on longer-term community interests. This article examines the relative strength of these two sides of responsiveness. Based on the responses of more than seven thousand citizens in an urban community in the Midwest, we found that in many cases community is a moderating influence on self-interest in terms of how citizens view civic investment in public education. These findings suggest that if government can elevate public discourse to focus on schools as civic investments, they will be more successful in engaging the community for the benefit of public education.