How do we help people engage civically with each other and the world?

Political and other types of polarization seem to have reached all-time highs, particularly in the United States. However, there is some evidence that people overestimate political polarization and that, instead, it is emotional polarization that is making civic discourse more coarse and problematic. This suggests that part of the path forward toward better civic reasoning and engagement lies in understanding not only how people think but also how they feel and interact with each other, so that we can understand how to shape more emotionally- and interpersonally-positive environments where truly civil discourse can occur.

In their latest article, Lee et al. (2024) argued the science of learning development describes ways of creating such environments, which can, in turn, help the people in them reason and engage in more civic ways. They leverage research from neuroscience, psychology, human development, and civics education to describe how civic reasoning, discourse, and participation evolves and can be educated.

Here's a great quote that sums up their views:

"we argue that civic reasoning and discourse require a complex understanding of the structures of governance and a deep knowledge of a range of topics that inevitably arise in the public domain. Most importantly, though, they require a disposition to seek new knowledge while maintaining the epistemological dispositions of valuing complexity and rejecting overly simplistic solutions to complex problems. To do this requires ethical commitments to weigh the good for others and not just for the self, to evaluate historical contexts and future implications, and to consider the sustainability of potential solutions and systems. Undergirding these all is a required disposition to listen to others, to consider their and one’s own perspectives reflectively, and to weigh competing evidence. Socializing this range of knowledge and dispositions can and should be informed by our understanding of foundational principles of learning and development, bringing to the center human proclivities for sociality, agency and goodness" (pp. 69-70).

This isn't just an article that people interested in civic education should read, it's an article that everyone, including politicians, should study.