7 - Conclusion

Summary

This concluding chapter reviews key findings and implications of partisan citizenship, namely, that democratic threat fractures consensus over core citizenship values, in which only some citizens recognize and respond to threat. I also argue that this divided citizenship makes democratic problems worse: it undermines an objective definition of what constitutes a threat, exposes fundamental disagreement over what democracy is, and the solutions itself become politicized. I raise skepticism that civic education or natural cycles can repair these deep divisions but, nevertheless, point to the necessity of trying.