Literary Art in the Formation of the Great Community: John Dewey’s Theory of Public Ideas in The Public and Its Problems

In his books Public Opinion and The Phantom Public, Walter Lippmann argued that policy leaders should deny the public a significant role in policy-making. Public opinion, he argued, would inevitably be ill-informed, self-interested and readily manipulated. In The Public and its Problems, Dewey countered Lippmann by arguing that the problem of the public was neither self-interest nor misinformation, but lack of community. He proposed a theory of public ideas - new public social science and a new journalism that gave social investigations the “potency of art” as a means for community formation. Dewey added nothing in The Public and its Problems to explain just how literary art could weld individuals into a community. In this paper I draw on the Dewey corpus to flesh out that crucial phase of his argument. The double merger account I offer also illuminates hidden connections between the ‘Great Community’ (chapter 5) and the necessity of local exchanges in ‘The Problem of Method’ (chapter 6) of The Public and its Problems. Dewey’s account is that (1) works of social inquiry presented with the “potency of art” (e.g., works of investigative creative non-fiction) provide broad audiences with immersive common experiences, and (2) local exchanges stemming from these immersive experiences can lead to a blurring of personal, ego-centric identities in a common citizen identity that supports effective common action

Democracy and Education and Europe

1. A Travelling Classic On the centennial anniversary of the publication of Dewey’s Democracy and Education (New York, Macmillan, 1916) this symposium (including contributions from European and non European scholars) explores both the epoch-making significance and the topicality of the ideas in Dewey’s masterpiece for the development of European educational reflection. Democracy and Education has frequently been represented as a turning point in educational discourse, inaugurating a radically..

Re-reading Democracy and Education Today: John Dewey on Globalization and Democratic Education

This article provides a close reading of Democracy and Education,situated in the context of Dewey\u27s work prior to and during World War I, to illuminate the close tie between Dewey\u27s overriding concerns during this period and today\u27s educational concerns. The analysis suggests two projects for contemporary democractic educators