Civic Passion: A Cultural Approach to the "Political"

Within media studies the default perspective of "the political" and "the civic" is overly rational. This rational bias can be observed within various research traditions. Two obvious examples are traditional, mainstream research of political communication, and substantial parts of the large body of research drawing on Jurgen Habermas's theory of the public sphere. Starting from a short review of the rational view of the political/the civic presented within these traditions, Peter Dahlgren's notion of civic culture is analyzed as a perspective that offers a complementary view. This article elaborates on its intellectual origins by paying special heed to the connection between the civic-culture view of the political and the civic and the perspectives offered by pragmatist philosopher John Dewey. Departing from these insights, the article presents empirical illustration of everyday workings of civic culture, and concludes with reflections concerning what becomes of the media within a civic culture approach.