civics n.

1540s, "pertaining to a city or citizenship," originally in civic crown (Latin corona civica), a chaplet of oak leaves awarded to one who saved the life of a fellow citizen in battle, from Latin civicus "of a citizen," adjectival derivative of civis "townsman" (see city). Sense of "having to do with citizens" is from 1790.

in the names of sciences or disciplines (acoustics, aerobics, economics, etc.), a 16c. revival of the classical custom of using the neuter plural of adjectives with Greek -ikos "pertaining to" (see -ic) to mean "matters relevant to" and also as the titles of treatises about them. Subject matters that acquired their English names before c. 1500, however, tend to be singular in form (arithmetic, logic, magic, music, rhetoric). The grammatical number of words in -ics (mathematics is/mathematics are) is a confused question.