The relationship between citizens and political institutions in democratic systems all over the world seems to be experiencing a time of uncertainty: falling numbers of voters, an increase in populist discourses and parties, rising public protest demanding reforms of political systems and the new manifestations of organisations from civil society being set up to protect and fight for specific rights. Establishing the meaning of citizenship has occupied a great deal of space and effort among theorists who have defined the ideal character linked to the model of a good citizen, which is useful and valid for improving relations between society and the State. However, it is less common to find viewpoints approaching the issue of the meaning of citizenship by directly asking citizens themselves. This article deals with interpretations linked to the notion of citizenship and democracy, based on an empirical analysis, with a research developed largely in the Netherlands, examining data on Dutch citizens' ideals. The data is presented with the aim of seeking uncertainties and evidences that could help for understanding what appears to be a greater distancing between society and the State. With the aim of achieving this objective, this article first presents a brief analysis of the ideals associated with the notion of good citizenship in the literature. Secondly, it introduces some previous cross-national research with closed-ended questions to get grip on the meanings of good citizenship of ordinary citizens in different contexts. Thirdly, having introduced these two issues, an approach is made to the interpretation of the "good citizen" according to open questions to Dutch citizens in surveys carried out by the Netherlands Institute for Social Research (SCP), where one of the authors of this article carries out research work. Later, in a new point, interest is focused on a study of the attitudes and expectations of Dutch citizens with regard to democratic politics, data also collected via the SCP. Analysis of this data will show that, although Dutch citizens show clear acceptance of the democratic system as the best political system, they do not consider politics as something that is relevant. Moreover, they even consider it as rather tiresome and annoying. Citizens adopt a negative attitude towards politics and a high level of mistrust towards their political representatives. These results lead us to introduce some proposals on possible policies in the final part of the paper. These suggestions are not intended to be more than brief notes focusing on three key aspects: the incorporation of the principle of transparency, the introduction of mechanisms for direct participation by citizens and the recognition of the potential of civil society. They are proposals aimed at reducing the distancing between society and the State, believed to be useful for the Netherlands as well as for other possible contexts affected by similar symptoms.
