A review of Conditions of Liberty: Civil Society and Its Rivals, by Ernest Gellner.
About the Author
Marc F. Plattner is a member of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) Board of Directors. He was on the NED staff from 1984 until 2020, serving first as the director of the grants program. In 1989, he became founding coeditor (with Larry Diamond) of the Journal of Democracy. He later served as codirector of the International Forum for Democratic Studies and as NED’s vice-president for research and studies.
Civic education can enhance democratic values and participation among adults in young democracies, but the training must be frequent and participatory. Otherwise adult civic education may not be worth doing.
Read the full essay here. The recent history of Eastern Europe can best be understood as a transition to a new social contract between the postcommunist state that emerged from…
