Everyday life's constraints on citizenship in the United States

Abstract Citizenship is a topic of important concern to the futures community. This paper discusses five serious kinds of constraints that people in the United States must overcome to meet their citizenship responsibilities. The constraints are: work (e.g. long hours, disruptive schedules, transfers); consumerism (e.g. time spent watching television, shopping, and engaging in entertainment activities); lack of social capital (e.g. social networks not `tight' enough to foster people working together to address community issues); personal fears and anxieties (e.g. fear of reprisals from neighbors); and the built environment (e.g. lack of meeting places, car- rather than people-oriented land uses). The charge to futurists is to image and work toward implementing futures that overcome these constraints.

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