The Public and Its Problems · Chapter
V: Search for the Great Community explained
Dewey distinguishes between democracy as a social idea and political democracy as a system of government, arguing that the idea is broader and must permeate all human associations.
What happens
Dewey distinguishes between democracy as a social idea and political democracy as a system of government, arguing that the idea is broader and must permeate all human associations. He critiques the identification of democratic forms (suffrage, majority rule) with the democratic idea itself, noting that these forms arose from technological and historical changes, not from the idea. The chapter emphasizes the need for free social inquiry and artful communication to transform the Great Society into a Great Community, where an organized public can emerge. Dewey also discusses the manipulation of public opinion through propaganda and the role of art in breaking through routine consciousness to convey deeper truths.
Themes in this chapter
The Great Society vs. The Great Community
Central theme: the need to transform the Great Society, characterized by complex indirect consequences, into a Great Community where these consequences are known and an organized public emerges.
Communication and Democracy
Dewey argues that artful communication and free social inquiry are essential for democracy, as they break through routine consciousness and enable the public to understand and act on shared consequences.
Inquiry and Social Intelligence
The chapter emphasizes the need for free social inquiry and the presentation of its results through art to create informed public opinion and a functioning democratic community.
Characters to notice
- Walt Whitman
Cited as the seer of democracy as a life of free and enriching communion.
Key passages
“Artists have always been the real purveyors of news, for it is not the outward happening in itself which is new, but the kindling by it of emotion, perception and appreciation.”
Artists convey true news by evoking emotional and perceptual responses to events, not merely reporting facts.
Dewey emphasizes the role of art in making public issues meaningful and accessible.
“Democracy will come into its own, for democracy is a name for a life of free and enriching communion.”
Democracy is realized as a way of life characterized by free and fulfilling shared experience.
This encapsulates Dewey's ideal of democracy as a communal, communicative practice.
“The old saying that the cure for the ills of democracy is more democracy is not apt if it means that the evils may be remedied by introducing more machinery of the same kind... But the phrase may also indicate the need of returning to the idea itself, of clarifying and deepening our apprehension of it.”
More democracy does not mean adding more of the same political mechanisms, but rather rethinking and deepening the democratic idea itself.
Dewey distinguishes between superficial institutional fixes and a genuine renewal of democratic principles.