citizen vs consumer

this comparison is essentially what i would call the government school vs private school.
my rights in a government school is made available to me as a citizen.
my rights in a private school is available to me as a consumer.

in theory (and potentially implementable practice), the rights of a citizen are far superior to the rights of a consumer.
so any move which facilitates privatisation of education in intrinsically converting citizens to consumers.
the oft repeated argument is the poor quality of the government service being the key driver necessitating the provision of better options to the public.
i trust that this quality enhancement is majorly doable if we work on building a participatory/democratic framework in the schools which allow all stakeholders to play their 'roles'.

in a related theme, in a discussion with sampat, a valuable point he raised was - "who will do the labour?"
more on that to follow.

earlier posts on such topics are "state of education", "more kids in private schools" and "dichotomy of activists"