The Multifaceted Nature of Civic Participation

A Literature Review

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Civic participation is an ideal concept in most democratic societies. People are encouraged to support neighbors, communities, and causes that combined contribute to the quality of life in their environment. However, too often the study of civic participation is carried out in a narrow intra-disciplinary manner that prevents a real understanding of what civic participation is and how to assess it. In this review, Cnaan and Park document how key writings are limited in scope and are either nonprofit, political science or environmental studies oriented. They then review many definitions of civic participation and form one that best captures the concept. They follow this with a set of six major forms of civic participation, each with numerous sub-categories and relevant statistics illustrating their occurrences. Cnaan and Park conclude with a call for future research of civic participation to be both comprehensive and sensitive.

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Ram A. Cnaan, Ph.D (University of Pittsburgh), is a Professor and Director of the Program for Religion and Social Policy Research at the School of Social Policy & Practice, University of Pennsylvania. He is a Global Eminent Scholar at Kyung Hee University Graduate Institute of Peace, South Korea. Cnaan has published numerous articles in scientific journals on a variety of social issues, and serves on the editorial boards of ten academic journals. He is the author or editor of eight books including The Other Philadelphia Story: How Local Congregations Support Quality of Life in Urban America (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2006) and Cases in Innovative Nonprofits: Organizations That Make a Difference (Sage, 2014) edited with Diane Kaplan Vinokur.

Sohyun Park is a PhD student at the School of Social Welfare at Yonsei University, South Korea. Her research interests include philanthropy, management of nonprofit organizations, and collaboration between public and private sector in welfare service. Her articles have been published in the Journal of Korean Social Welfare Research and the Korean Journal of Social Welfare, among others.
List of Tables
Editorial Introduction
Abstract
1. Introduction
a. What is Civic Participation?
b. Civic Participation and Social Capital
c. Measuring Civic Participation
2. The Many Faces of Civic Participation
a. Association Participation
b. Giving
c. Volunteering
d. Environment-Friendly Behavior
e. Political and Social Behavior
f. Supporting or Helping Other Individuals
g. Other Pro-Social Behaviors?
3. Conclusion
a. Limitations
b. The Way Forward
Anyone interested in the field of civic participation worldwide, academics and researchers in anthropology, sociology, political science, environmental studies, economics, and psychology, and those interested in community studies, the social professions, and history.
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