call for papers: Civic Politics and Global Order

“Civic Politics and Global Order”: A Special Issue of The Good Society: A Journal Of Civic Studies

More than a century ago, US President Woodrow Wilson asked Congress to declare a state of war with Germany—a radical step in pursuit of a radical objective. Seeking “no conquest” and expecting “no indemnities” for any life or treasure lost, Americans, Wilson declared, would fight “for democracy, for the right of those who submit to authority to have a voice in their own governments, for the rights and liberties of small nations, for a universal dominion of right by such a concert of free peoples as shall bring peace and safety to all nations and make the world itself at last free.”

The “concert of free peoples” that emerged from the Great War’s ashes—the League of Nations— never gave adequate international expression to such democratic civic ideals, nor could it prevent a second global conflict. Yet it laid grounds for a complex of institutions—among them the World Bank, United Nations, NATO, and European Union—that for decades after World War II embodied for millions of people the possibility of an increasingly stable and just world order. Now the prestige of that order has reached a historic low, and its continued existence has come into doubt.

Simultaneously, however, citizens and societies worldwide continue to seek ways of achieving Wilson’s essential vision: a vision of self-governing communities collaborating, despite conflicting interests, on the otherwise impossible task of creating a safe and just world.

Aware of such strivings and persuaded of their importance, the editorial board of The Good Society invites submissions from scholars and practitioners exploring the relationship between civic politics and global order. What interests do self-governing communities at the national, subnational, or transnational level have in maintaining international or global order? What normative commitments are required, and what independent and collaborative actions are advisable, to advance such interests while maintaining due regard for divergent local, cultural, and historical contexts?
What strategies and tactics—proven, novel, or forgotten—are ripe for implementation, experimentation, or rehabilitation? Above all hangs the question: Is there a regulative ideal of global order that self-governing aspirants and civic agents should adopt? If so, how can it be formulated, disseminated, theorized, and realized in a manner that respects the plural as well as universal interests and experience of humanity?

The editorial board invites papers of 6,000 to 8,000 words that address the questions above, as well as other relevant questions emerging from serious inquiry into the character of a good society and the conditions for achieving and maintaining it. Please submit papers by May 1, 2019 to: http://www.editorialmanager.com/gs/default.aspx

For more information regarding this call, write Trygve Throntveit, editor, tthrontv@umn.edu

The Good Society is the flagship journal for the interdisciplinary (between disciplines) and transdisciplinary (beyond disciplines) field of Civic Studies. For more information on Civic Studies, please visit http://civicstudies.org/about/ .

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About Peter

Associate Dean for Research and the Lincoln Filene Professor of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Tufts University's Tisch College of Civic Life. Concerned about civic education, civic engagement, and democratic reform in the United States and elsewhere.