The irish taskforce on active citizenship – The clear analysis

Recent debates on citizenship in Ireland have ranged from minimalist legalistic definitions of Irish citizenship to efforts to encourage active citizenship. This article deconstructs the active citizenship debates of the Democracy Commission, the Democratic Audit and the Taoiseach's Taskforce on Active Citizenship, concluding that active citizenship involves social capital, deliberative democratic mechanisms and a readiness to take part in the more formal aspects of public life. The CLEAR framework developed by Lowndes, Pratchett and Stoker incorporates these three dimensions of active citizenship and is applied to the recent recommendations on active citizenship in Ireland. The CLEAR analysis concludes that the taskforce's recommendations go furthest in terms of active citizenship. The promotion of social capital features strongly in its recommendations, compared with the Democracy Commission's approach, which lays greater stress on the deliberative and readiness to take part in the more formal part of public life sections.