Public services as a lost opportunity for the renaissance of the public sphere

Abstract

The aim of the study is to present relationships between public services and the public sphere as key areas for social development. The following research question is: what is the basic link between the public sphere and the public service? The critical literature review in the field of sociology, philosophy and economics was used as a basic research tool. The public space is considered to be an inanimate part of the civilized landscape which can, and should, serve as a kind of a scene for the public sphere which, in contrast to infrastructure, has a societal, non-tangible, and spiritual level to it. Basing on works of J. Habermas, H. Arendt, and Z. Bauman, one can indicate that the public sphere becomes an agora only when it is focused on a community while at the same time neglecting utilitarian factors. The community-oriented nature is, in turn, strictly connected with the very notion of goodness. At this point, the crossing point between the public sphere and the service-oriented sector of industry can be encountered. To provide (a service) means to perform a good deed, which is highlighted by K. Rogoziński. Therefore, servicing, especially in its public variation, had a great potential with regard to saving the quickly disappearing public sphere. Unfortunately, it turns out that the current age, which is officially referred to as a post-industrial one, can be perceived as an re-industrial or even hyper-industrial one. Industrial patterns are being transferred to the service provision-oriented sector on a massive scale. The progressing digital transformation of the service sector takes away the required space for meeting and dialogue. The atomized society exists in a virtual world. The public sphere dies out, leaving an empty space that has to be filled in.