Information Literacy for an Active and Effective Citizenship

Contemporary citizenship and democracy encompass a wide range of political, civil and social rights and responsibilities for both the individual and the state. An active, effective and responsible citizenship, in contemporary times, requires that people be empowered to exercise those rights and responsibilities towards other people, the community and the state. Citizens should be vigilant regarding the responsiveness of the state towards them and the members of their community and should be motivated to participate in public life. To participate, each person needs to acquire specific skills. Education for citizenship should be continuous, both in the formal education system and in the more informal adult education for lifelong learning. These skills range from literacy, to communication and information literacy skills. They enable one to locate, access, retrieve, evaluate, interpret and act on information to be able to participate in community affairs, to develop community involvement and to have an informed opinion about problems occurring locally, nationally or internationally. In most developed societies, an increasing volume of information for citizenship is produced by or about national and local government, government departments and public sector organizations on the Internet; political parties, civic societies and interest groups are increasingly using bulletin boards, chat groups, list servers and e-mail to communicate with their membership and to promote civic engagement skills through the use of Information and Communication Technologies. These are being seen, by some, as a valuable supplement to traditional forms of communication and in some cases may even become an alternative way to communicate. However, policy makers at national and global level, when devising strategies to facilitate progress towards an information literate citizenry cannot ignore the Digital Divide. This term, now commonly used to describe inequalities that exist regarding the use of Internet and other telecommunication services, encompasses divergence of access between industrialised and developing societies, the gaps between the information rich and the information poor in each nation, as well as the difference between those who do and those who do not use digital resources to engage and participate in public life. This paper offers some insight into how to foster the development of information literate people for an active, effective and responsible citizenship; it considers the development of information literacy skills within “education for citizenship” programmes both in the formal education system and in the informal adult lifelong learning schemes. The role of public libraries, school libraries and other public and civil society institutions will be pointed out, as well the importance of promoting the acquisition of information literacy skills by those that act as intermediaries to the disadvantaged groups in society. Information policies that may have an impact on the access and provision of information for citizenship will be explored. Some key areas requiring further research will be pointed out. 1 1. CITIZENSHIP In the political tradition of the Greek city states (polities) and the Roman republic (res public), citizenship means participation in public life and involvement in public affairs by those who have the rights of citizens: to take part in public debate and directly or indirectly, to shape the laws and decisions of a state. The French Revolution and its aftermath, created a constant pressure to broaden from a narrow citizen class of educated property owners, to achieve female emancipation and include every member of society—the economically deprived, those who are terminally ill or have physical disorders, the unemployed, as well as the elderly—to achieve freedom of speech, equity and justice before the law and to make transparent the process of government. Citizenship can be described as participation in a community, particularly the relationship between the individual and the state. Contemporary citizenship is facing formidable challenges from several quarters—political and economic integration, such as the formation of the European Union; fragmentation of previously united multinational political communities (such as Yugoslavia, the Soviet Union, Czechoslovakia); mass migration and the flux of asylum seekers; and mass unemployment—they all exclude millions of people, even in the richest nations, from a sense of full membership in the civic community. The problems of citizenship, exacerbated by ethnic conflicts, create a dichotomy between national identity and citizenship; cultural inclusion in societies that are each time more multicultural constitutes new challenges for modern citizenship (Beinern, 1995). In a well-known analysis by Marshall, in 1950, the concept of citizenship was divided into three elements—civil, political and social (Barbalet 1988; Beiner 1995). Later, Turner (1993) and others criticised the Marshall theory as it did not cover the economic and cultural elements of citizenship. They expanded the citizenship definition by including reference to a collection of practices that individuals need to become competent members of their community. All of the above elements involve reciprocity between rights and responsibilities for both the individual and the state. For example, political rights are the rights to participate in the exercise of the political power including the right to vote, to make democratic choices, to hold institutions to account (i.e. national and local government funded bodies have to prove they are efficient, effective and economic). Civil rights concern the right to freedom of speech, thought and faith, the right to own property, and the right to justice and equality before the law. Social citizenship stretches the notion to include a range of rights to economic welfare and security, the right to share, to the full, in the social heritage and to live the life of a civilized human being, according to the standards prevailing in society, i.e. the right to employment, housing, health care and other social welfare benefits. Cultural rights are those that enable an individual to play a full part in the culture of a community – in this sense, all organizations in the education system and cultural heritage (or communal memory) organizations (such as, libraries, museums and archives) make a fundamental contribution to cultural citizenship. In turn, citizenship responsibilities include upholding the law, in letter and spirit, to participate in the public process, including both support and opposition to established policies (Mosco, 1998). The importance of the Civil Society is increasing for contemporary citizenship and the sustainability of democracy. This means membership of non-official, voluntary groups, at local, national and international level and membership of social movements whose links to government and businesses are tenuous, but which aim to represent constituencies for or in opposition to the state and the private sector (Mosco, 1998). Freedom and full citizenship in the political sphere is strengthened in 2 a society where participation in informal groups, involving voluntary and communal activity is encouraged and will reinforce electoral turn-out, attention to public issues in media, and citizens’ involvement in election campaigns and demonstrations (Klein, 1999). In this context, contemporary citizenship is in a state of flux: changing laws; changing rights and responsibilities; impacts of Information and Communication Technologies (mass media, mass communication, Internet) and related global trade agreements are all urging people to “think globally” as opposed to the notions of “national belonging/national identity” (Mosco, 1998). The objective of this paper is to provide an insight on how policy makers, globally and at national and local level, can create an environment that will develop information literate workers and citizens. This is a complex undertaking, because the world is “digital divided," and the details of individual rights and responsibilities vary between states, reflecting the details of its political, civil and social structures (Steele 1997, p. 4). Norris (2001) clarifies this aspect by stating, Democracies differ significantly in their core institutions and constitutional features, mostly in terms of their majoritarian or proportional electoral systems, the range of competition in party systems, whether executives are parliamentary or presidential, whether the state power is centralised or dispersed. These institutional structures have significant consequences for patterns of political participation such as levels of voting turnout and types of election campaigning, as well as in the rates of party membership and activism (¶ 6). 1.1. Active and Responsible Citizenship Contemporary citizenship faces challenges that are highlighted in the report “Education for citizenship and the teaching of democracy in schools," published in 1998, by Qualifications and Curriculum Authority, on behalf of the Citizenship Advisory Group, of the UK Parliament. These are: .... citizens must be equipped with the political skills needed to change laws in a peaceful and responsible manner; ... individuals must be helped and prepared to shape the terms of such (civic) engagements by political understanding and action; ... volunteering and community involvement are necessary conditions of civil society and democracy (QCA 1998, p. 10). The report also points out that preparation for these skills and competences, at the very least, should be an explicit part of education. This is especially important at a time when governments worldwide are attempting a shift of emphasis from state welfare provision and responsibility towards community and individual responsibility. The same report claims that “active citizenship and civic engagement” involves “social and moral responsibility," “community involvement and service to the community” and “political literacy;" it goes on to explain, ... it involves participation in the affairs of one’s community – these require concepts of fairness, and attitudes to the law, to rules, to decision-making, to authority, to local environment and social responsibility;