Envision Equality in John Dewey’s Creative Democracy and Jane Mansbridge’s Using Power/Fighting Power

How should we live as citizens?

In evaluating this question we must refer to the ideas offered by John Dewey’s “Creative Democracy” and Jane Mansbridge’s “Using Power/Fighting Power”. These publications, both, wish to achieve the same goal, which is equality, for it is of utmost importance to preserve the democratic way of life. Dewey and Mansbridge both speak of the way in which we ought to live as citizens to be able to achieve equality. Dewey believes that as citizens we should envision the idea of Amicable Cooperation or be able to deliberate on issues to reach our goals. While Mansbridge further expands on that idea and says in times where deliberation or amicable cooperation is not successful, we must pursue the idea of coercion to achieve the equality we as citizens wish to see. We as citizens should have a commitment to social, economic, and political equality. We must shift our democracy in that direction of achieving equality for if we are failing to do so; we are not doing our part as citizen in society. Before expanding on my view as to how we should live as citizens to achieve equality, we must first understand the major viewpoints of Dewey and Mansbridge.

In John Dewey’s Creative Democracy, he states that as a society

“We have had the habit of thinking of democracy as a kind of political mechanism that will work as long faithful as citizens were reasonably in performing their duties” (Dewey 1939, 2).

He challenges this idea by speaking of democracy as a concept that individuals within our society should live by. As he says

“Democracy is a personal way of individual life; that it signifies the possession and continual use of certain attitudes, forming personal character and determining desire and purpose in all th...

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...izing the standard of education we as citizens receive for if we are not educated enough on many issues, how must we able to express our ideas coherently? We as a society must strive for equality for all of us know how one feels when being neglected. Yet we fail to enact or put into place the policies that will help us circumvent this issues we are facing. The reason for this is because amicable cooperation is not occurring when dealing with issues of equality. For this reason these disadvantaged minority groups are not being heard for they are being constantly suppressed by the very conditions they are being inherently subjected to.

Works Cited

Dewey, John. "Creative Democracy: The Task Before Us." Address read by Horace M. Kallen at the dinner in honor of John Dewey. 20 October 1939

Mansbridge, Jane. 1994. “Using Power/Fighting Power.” Constellations 1: 53–73