Citizenship Teaching & Learning - Volume 15, Issue 2, 2020

Pedagogies about and for civic engagement are not clearly defined. We consider how these understandings have been constructed and how these pedagogical developments reveal a gradual yet fundamental shift from more transmission-oriented learning intentions and practices to more transformative orientations. We examine how particular broad and interrelated pedagogical considerations and experiences appear to enhance civic engagement learning (e.g. a focus on real-life and relevant political questions and issues, classroom to community, local to global). We review experiences that allow for the practice of different forms of civic engagement; varied ways of knowing and active involvement in the process of constructing knowledge in relation to these political questions and issues rather than simply receiving information passively; and building capacities for decision-making, public issue investigation, ethical thinking, peace-building and conflict management. We recognize that these matters are approached differently in the literature and in classrooms, schools and communities with varying degrees of emphasis and levels of sophistication. We contend that these contrasting approaches and practices reflect differing cultural and historical traditions and contexts, pressures being experienced locally and globally, and the guidance of educational policies and study programmes. The enactment of these developing understandings of civic engagement pedagogy is nominal and uneven in classrooms, schools and community sites within and across countries. Most forms of civic engagement pedagogy for youth tend to occur randomly in their communities, while school-based programmes are limited and most often involved in forms of civic action that are perceived as safe and minimal. We highlight – in the form of questions – some of the persisting challenges that face educators in developing appropriate pedagogies for civic engagement. This work originated from a three-year (2016–19), six-country project, ‘Youth Activism, Engagement and the Development of New Civic Learning Spaces’, undertaken by an international network of researchers (based in Australia, Canada, England, Hungary, Lebanon and Singapore) and funded by a Leverhulme Network Grant. We explore key ideas and issues about the ways in which young people participate in society and discuss what implications there are for education.

In this article, we examine Finnish class teachers as citizenship educators. Over the last ten years, the autonomous position of the Finnish teacher has become a symbol of the world-famous education system, and this study aims to illustrate how this freedom comes true in the framework of teacher as a citizenship educator. A prior study shows that teachers mostly share the same universal values, emphasizing altruism rather than individualism. Socially, teachers are more focused on maintaining the status quo and continuity of society than changing it radically. This article aims to answer the question how teachers define their role between society and individual learners and how they prioritize their social educational objectives. We collected our empirical data from teachers and conceptualized it using the framework of three kinds of citizens by Joel Westheimer and Joseph Kahne. This study demonstrates that the level of understanding and interest towards social and societal issues does not easily develop into preparedness or willingness to participate or act. This is a concern worth noticing in teacher education and studies regarding teacher profession in general.

Finnish schools are often pictured as models for open-ended, child-oriented and dialogic education. In this research article, I approached these phenomena by analysing the organization of a public space in one Finnish school. I used Hannah Arendt’s ([1958] 2013) phenomenological concepts – action and labour – to analyse what kind of consequences the organization of the public space of one Finnish school and the activities promoted within it has on the actions and thinking of the students. Did the studied school promote students active participation in the society or did it rather prepare the labour force for the society to keep functioning as it is? In phenomenology, the goal is to study the lived experience of the informants – in this case, of the people acting in the public space of a school. I collected the ethnographic data that was used in the article by doing observations and interviews in one Finnish school in two separate classrooms in the autumn of 2015. My findings elucidate that not everyone was treated equally within the public space of the school. More so, students did not have real opportunities to act freely, i.e. politically and collectively in the school because power was in the hands of the teachers. The students were mostly taught to labour individually, internalize proper behaviour and were recognized through their labour represented by school tasks. Furthermore, most of the classes were packed full, which meant that constant hurry was the pace for life in the school during most of the days. This again made the realization of activities, which would represent action, nigh impossible in the first place.

The chartered accountant (CA) profession plays a significant role in the South African business society, as individual members often fulfil leadership positions. Consequently, whether CAs are cultivated into being responsible and socially just leaders whilst they are at higher education institutions (HEIs) in South Africa is an important aspect to consider. Decoloniality and ubuntu principles, those associated with restoring human dignity through recognition, contribute to the fostering of the appropriate conditions for human engagement that could result in a social awareness. So far, the CA profession has largely ignored the call for decoloniality, and we argue for a certain response by the profession that will result in meaningful transformation of the profession, the fostering of relationships, and a socially just consciousness. In particular, such a response has to do with openness towards other knowledge systems, a willingness to deliberate and the adoption of deliberative teaching and learning approaches.

This article examines the civic mission of Indian schools by applying four civic orientations for Indian citizenship – liberalism, republicanism, ethno-nationalism and non-statism – to Indian education policy. The findings indicate that no one civic orientation dominates; therefore, Indian schools – at least at the policy level – must take up some version of each orientation. This political landscape raises several open questions about how Indian schools can cultivate democratic people – an important prerequisite to fulfilling the promise of Indian democracy.

Review of: Lowering the Voting Age to 16: Learning from Real Experiences Worldwide, Jan Eichorn and Johannes Bergh (eds) (2019)

Switzerland: Springer, 245 pp.,

ISBN 978-3-03032-541-1, e-book, €103.99