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The Common Good Week 3 Values

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26 views16 pages

The Common Good Week 3 Values

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gabbymags1206
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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The Common Good

Week 3 Lesson in Values 9


What is Common Good?

• In ordinary political discourse, the “common


good” refers to those facilities—whether
material, cultural or institutional—that the
members of a community provide to all
members in order to fulfill a relational
obligation they all have to care for certain
interests that they have in common.
• Some canonical examples of the common good in a
modern liberal democracy include: the road system;
public parks; police protection and public safety;
courts and the judicial system; public schools;
museums and cultural institutions; public
transportation; civil liberties, such as the freedom of
speech and the freedom of association; the system of
property; clean air and clean water; and national
defense.
• The term itself may refer either to the
interests that members have in common or to
the facilities that serve common interests. For
example, people may say, “the new public
library will serve the common good” or “the
public library is part of the common good”.
•The common good is a notion that
originated over two thousand years ago in
the writings of Plato, Aristotle, and Cicero.
More recently, the ethicist John Rawls
defined the common good as "certain
general conditions that are...equally to
everyone's advantage".
• As a philosophical concept, the common good is
best understood as part of an encompassing model
for practical reasoning among the members of a
political community. The model takes for granted
that citizens stand in a “political” or “civic”
relationship with one another and that this
relationship requires them to create and maintain
certain facilities on the grounds that these
facilities serve certain common interests.
• The common good is an important concept in
political philosophy because it plays a central
role in philosophical reflection about the public
and private dimensions of social life.
Public Life
• Let’s say that “public life” in a political
community consists of a shared effort among
members to maintain certain facilities for the
sake of common interests.
Private Life
• Consists of each member’s pursuit of a distinct
set of personal projects. As members of a
political community, we are each involved in our
community’s public life and in our own private
lives, and this raises an array of questions about
the nature and scope of each of these
enterprises.
Example of Common Goods
• Examples of particular common goods or parts
of the common good include an accessible and
affordable public health care system, an effective
system of public safety and security, peace
among the nations of the world, a just legal and
political system, an unpolluted natural
environment, and a flourishing economic
system .
Who Came up with The Common Good?

• Aristotle (384–322 BC) in particular is


widely regarded as a foundational thinker on
this subject. While Plato (427–347 BC) also
had a notion of the common good, Aristotle
was the first to make the common good a
central concept of his political theory
(Morrison 2012).
The Principles of Common Good
• Personhood- The dignity of a human person.
• Common Good - “the sum total of social conditions which allows
people, either as groups or as individuals, to reach their fulfilment
more fully and more easily.”
• Solidarity - No human being can live for himself alone; he is always
dependent on others.
• Subsidiarity - Every task of society should be assigned to the smallest
possible group that can perform it. Only if the smaller group is unable
to resolve the problem itself should a group at a higher level assume
responsibility. This idea is summed up in the principle of subsidiarity.
Why is it Important to Contribute to the
Common Good?
• The common good is achieved when we
work together to improve the wellbeing of
people in our society and the wider world.
The rights of the individual to personal
possessions and community resources must
be balanced with the needs of the
disadvantaged and dispossessed.
How can we help the common good?
• The short answer is: by forming relationships
with people who have different life experiences
and whom we may not agree with. This is not
easy, and goes against the way we're often
encouraged to think and act. But it's when we
collaborate across the things which divide us
that we begin to build the common good.
Notebook Activity 1:

1. Why do you think “The Common


Good” is important in our society?
Justify your answer.
2. What are the examples of common
goods?
NOTEBOOK ACTIVITY 2: (COPY AND
ANSWER)
Answer the question briefly. 100 words minimum.

Question: How can you help in order for you to


contribute to “The Common Good”? What are the
things that you will do? Justify your answer.

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