Citizenship Teaching & Learning - Volume 8, Issue 1, 2012

The concept of patriotism (as opposed to National Identity) has received little attention in the literature and discourse surrounding education for citizenship in English schools. In seeking to address this gap, a case is made here in favour of the teaching and promotion of patriotic attachment based on the substantive notion of 'civic patriotism'. As such, an attempt is made to counter the suggestion that teaching for patriotism is outside of the legitimate aims of education and education for citizenship. Attention is also given to fruitful areas of deliberation regarding the curricular content and processes through which this form of patriotism might be taught.

This article proposes the concept of peopleship education, embodied by an analysis of four major Chinese educational policy documents since the 1990s. The Chinese 'people', different from 'citizens', are abstract, correct and materialistic. Such 'people' are produced by peopleship education, understood as state hegemony through public education to create Chinese individuals who leave the legitimacy of the Communist Party of China (CPC) unquestioned. Situated within a framework of state hegemony that consists of political socialization and depoliticization, China's peopleship education is underlined by two distinct features, i.e., historical representation and materialistic modernization. The former refers to a historical conditioning and translating of people's abstractness and correctness, via which the CPC claims its legitimacy in representing the people and the society. The latter refers to a subtle shift of power from the realm of party-state legitimacy to a limited field of modernization as economic productivity - a shift that produces a materialistic people whose interests are to be justified by economic answers rather than political ones. Implications are further discussed, regarding policy analysis in China and comparative citizenship studies.

There is a complex relationship between national identity and cultural identity in France. School has played an important role in reducing the 'other' to the 'same' by promoting a monistic citizenship and by considering the secularist (non-clerical) ideology as neutral. The need to 'teach the Nation' in a country where education is determined nationally (the same for all) can be explained by a number of historical facts. In our political history the part played by the modern state in the birth of the citizen starts with the teaching of common values seen as an ideology and school contributes to a sense of national identity. France's history is an essential part of such an ideological system. But a universalist perspective may explain what lies behind ideas of identity and nation. This vision of what it means to be a citizen relegates what Durkheim coined 'mechanical solidarity' not to the political sphere but to the cultural sphere, not to the public sphere but to the private sphere. If it is considered that citizenship denies personal allegiance, whether it is infra- or supra-national, it cannot be denied that national identity is a narrative identity that is often put at stake in a power struggle. Today schools addressing what ethno-religious minorities can bring to national identity in the context of religious and cultural pluralism.

This article explores a comparatively undocumented gap in the history of citizenship education in England. Drawing upon archival material from the Civic Education League, the study analyses calls for citizenship education around the time of the First World War and its aftermath. On the face of it social and political circumstances after 1918 were propitious for citizenship education. The article goes on to explain why arguments in favour of enhancing citizenship education in schools failed to gain significant purchase.

Gender-based violence (GBV) among adolescents has been an understudied phenomenon in Europe, despite the prevalence of studies that deal with violence against women and intimate partner violence. Drawing on the results of a research study conducted with Greek-Cypriot adolescents and teachers in secondary education schools in Cyprus, the present contribution aims to highlight common forms of GBV in adolescent intimate and peer relationships, as well as the much neglected gender dimension in the perpetration and toleration of bullying in schools. Furthermore, the author aims at examining the models of attraction that Greek-Cypriot teenagers maintain and their possible interconnections to violence. By investigating the various forms of gender-related violence the author aims to expose the diverse needs of youth in relation to this phenomenon, but also to examine the contribution that a reformulated citizenship education can make in addressing such violence and discrimination. For this purpose, the author takes a critical look on the management of gender and other social inequality-related issues through the citizenship education philosophy and curriculum, with a special focus on the Cypriot context, and argues for a more inclusionary concept of citizenship that would represent the everyday realities of diverse social groups and contribute to social change.

This article investigates English adolescents' intentions to take part in future protest activities as a part of their participation in society. The study draws on data from the International Civic and Citizenship Education Study 2009 (ICCS), but uses an alternative approach to data analysis. Reference is made to the 2011 riots in England and links are made to students' conceptions of active citizenship. Implications for citizenship teaching and learning and its assessment are discussed.

EDUCATING FOR PEACE IN A TIME OF "PERMANENT WAR": ARE SCHOOLS PART OF THE SOLUTION OR THE PROBLEM?, PAUL R. CARR AND BRAD J. PORFILIO (EDS) (2012) New York: Routledge, 292 pp., IBSN: 978-0-415-89920-8, h/bk, £80.00

TEACHING CONTROVERSIAL ISSUES IN THE CLASSROOM, PAULA COWAN AND HENRY MAITLES (EDS) (2012) London: Continuum, 239 pp., ISBN 978-1441124845, p/bk, £24.99

WHAT MONEY CAN'T BUY: THE MORAL LIMITS OF MARKETS, MICHAEL SANDEL (2012) London: Allen Lane, 235 pp., ISBN: 184614471X(978-1846144714), h/bk, £20.00