Courageous Citizenship Papers
Introduction
This new section of the Beyond Intractability contains introductions and links to the Tables of Contents for two sets of papers. The first is a set of papers produced for the Braver Angels Civic Scholar Council Summer 2026 meeting on Courageous Citizenship. Those are immediately below this introduction.
Following that is an introduction and link to a set of articles that we published in the Beyond Intractability Newsletter related to Courageous Citizenship, together with a few more papers on that topic which were published elsewhere.
Though already extensive, both sets of papers are expected to grow — more are already in the pipeline for both sets. If readers have something to add or a comment to make about either of these collections, please contact us!
Civic Scholars Council Papers | Additional Papers
Braver Angels Civic Scholar Council
Courageous Citizenship Paper Collection
Background
by Harry Boyte, Co-Chair Braver Angels Civic Scholar Council
After ten years as the leading organization in America building respectful relationships across partisan divides, Braver Angels developed a new large mission for its work in September, 2025: the promotion of “courageous citizenship:" the willingness to take risks in action with other citizens for a public-spirited purpose. To help advance this goal, it also created a Civic Scholars Council of twenty members bringing together leading scholars and reflective practitioners to define, challenge, and shape the meaning and practice of courageous citizenship in modern American life, to promote it across American society, and to work for culture change to make it an honored norm.
The new Braver Angels CEO, Maury Giles, asked the Council to invite paper proposals that explored the concept as a framework for democratic renewal in 2026, the anniversary year of the Declaration of Independence. Proposal writers were asked to use the closing pledge of the Declaration, in which signers committed to each other “our Lives, our Fortunes, and our Sacred Honor.” The CSC's call asked, “what does such a pledge mean today? Can courageous citizenship be a modern expression?” All authors were asked to write papers on that topic in accessible language for the general public.
The Council selected 43 papers for elaboration and dissemination, organized into three traditions of active citizenship:
- Civic Development: how people grow as mature stewards and courageous citizens in communities full of conflict and differences;
- Deliberative Democracy: in which citizens develop capacities for public judgment about “wicked problems” that need many perspectives to address successfully;
- A Public Work Perspective: in which citizens are co-creators of a democratic way of life.
All challenge views which reduce citizenship to legal status and are highly divisive, separating “citizens” from those labelled “noncitizens.” The papers provide inspiring stories of this partly forgotten tradition of citizenship in American history, examples of courageous citizenship in the present, and practical tools to put it into practice.
A link to the Table of Contents for 33 these papers is below. More will be coming soon.
The Braver Angels Civic Scholars Council very much appreciates the partnership with Beyond Intractability in publishing these papers.
And we, at BI, very much appreciate Harry Boyte, David Eisner, and others on the Civic Scholars Council's who were willing to share this valuable set of papers with us! -- Heidi and Guy Burgess
Civic Scholars Council Papers: Table of Contents
Additional Papers on Courageous Citizenship
As noted above, Beyond Intractability has a second set of papers on the topic of Courageous Citizenship that we have published in our Newsletter. Several were authored by Heidi and Guy Burgess, Co-Directors of Beyond Intractability, while others were authored by members of the Braver Angels' Civic Scholars Council, particularly co-Chair Harry Boyte and member David Eisner. (David is a close colleague of BI and has several other papers and interviews on BI as well.)
We have created a second Table of Contents for these papers also, to which we have added several other papers that were written by Harry Boyte and other members of the Civic Scholars Council that were published elsewhere, and are therefore not included in the Table of Contents linked above.
Additional Papers on Courageous Citizenship: Table of Contents
