Citizenship Teaching and Learning 6.1

June 16, 2010 9:52 Intellect/CTL Page-1 CTL-6-1-Finals

CONTENTS

3–4 Editorial

Articles

5–23 Comparative civic educationresearch: What we know andwhatwe need to knowCAROLE L. HAHN

25–42 Insights from formal testing ofcivics and citizenship learning inAustraliaSUZANNEMELLOR

43–60 Young people’s intentions abouttheir political activity

ALISTAIR ROSS ANDMELINDA DOOLY

61–75 From getting along to democraticengagement: Moving toward deepdiversity in citizenship education

CARLA L. PECK, LAURA A.THOMPSON, OTTILIA CHAREKA,REVA JOSHEE AND ALAN SEARS

77–90 Alternative policy measures forimproving citizenship education inHong Kong

GREGORY P. FAIRBROTHER

91–105 A good global neighbour:Scotland, Malawi and globalcitizenship

PENNY ENSLIN AND NICKI HEDGE

Reviews

107–108 Engaging young people in civiclife, James Youniss and PeterLevine (eds), (2009)

109–110 Knowing our place: Childrentalking about power, identity andcitizenship, Judith Gill and SueHoward, (2009)

110–111 Citizenship: A very shortintroduction, Richard Bellamy(2008)

111–113 The Internet and democraticcitizenship: theory, practice andpolicy, Stephen Coleman and Jay G.Blumler (2009)

113–115 Social studies today: Researchand practice, Walter Parker(ed.) (2009)

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CTL 6 (1) pp. 3–4 © Intellect Ltd 2010

Citizenship Teaching and LearningVolume 6 Number 1

© Intellect Ltd 2010. Editorial. English language. doi: 10.1386/ctl.6.1.3_2

EDITORIAL

Citizenship Teaching and Learning is, with the publication of this issue, enteringa new and highly significant phase. This is the first edition of the journal thatis published by Intellect, a respected academic publisher with a high profileposition across several fields. From its first edition in 2005, CTL has enjoyed anexcellent reputation for high quality academic articles and book reviews thathave had a clear and strong impact. Our research shows that the journal hasalready reached and been welcomed by very impressive numbers of readers.The established position of Intellect will allow CTL to become even more firmlyestablished, with a corresponding increase in subscriptions and readership.

Publication with Intellect has been made possible by the hard work ofmany individuals and through institutional collaboration which brings togetherCiCea (Children’s Identity and Citizenship in European Association) and cit-izED (an international higher education network for citizenship education).Both CiCea and citizED are already securely established with excellent interna-tional conferences, a wide range of publications and very positive professionaland personal relationships. This formal collaboration is, in itself, an indicationof the sort of collegial activity that is appropriate to citizenship and is sufficientlydynamic to allow for and encourage other collaborations.

In this issue there are articles and book reviews that indicate the scale of ourambitions concerning citizenship education. Carole Hahn provides an interna-tional review of civic education research emphasizing the significance of culturefor the characterization of key issues and identifies an agenda for work in thefuture. This overview is followed by articles that explore citizenship educa-tion in particular contexts in a way that illuminates ideas and practice acrossnational boundaries. Suzanne Mellor writes about formal testing of civics andcitizenship learning in Australia. She identifies levels of achievement and pro-vides explanations for them. Alistair Ross and Melinda Dooly discuss findingsfrom a survey of 2,400 young people in Poland, Spain, Turkey and England; in

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Editorial

the context of concerns about a democratic deficit, these authors discuss theintention of young people to act in similar ways to adults. Carla Peck, LauraThompson, Ottilia Chareka, Reva Joshee and Alan Sears argue that althoughpolicy and practice in Canada has moved away from attempts to assimilateminority groups, and towards fostering respect and appreciation for diversity,attention to diversity education remains superficial and limited. Gregory Fair-brother discusses developments in Hong Kong and, through an analysis ofdata, argues that citizenship education (as currently practised in Hong Kong)shows considerable continuity with the pre-1997 period and is not achievingintended results in areas such as the development of national identity andactive citizenship among students. In light of this he discusses the potential,and emphasizes the limitations, of developing citizenship education as a dis-crete subject. Penny Enslin and Nicki Hedge explore the idea of the globalneighbour: they identify it as a form of qualified moral partiality, appropriateto the shifting understandings of geographical borders occasioned by global-ization. Their reflections are placed within the context of relationships betweenScotland and Malawi, particularly in connection with higher education policy.The book reviews, edited by Mitsuharu Mizuyama, explore a wide range ofissues about forms of citizenship education within and across countries.

This issue of Citizenship Teaching and Learning is not comprehensive inits coverage of citizenship education but it demonstrates a commitment toacademic excellence, an international approach (that recognizes the value of in-country developments as well as connections across borders) and an inclusivecollegiality. Essential to the better understanding and practice of citizenshipis a commitment to equality, justice, diversity, respect for others and demo-cratic participation. Through the excellent work that has been included in thisfirst edition (created through new and continuing partnerships with Intellect,citizED, CiCea and others) an ambitious statement of intent is being made.

Ian Davies

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© Intellect Ltd 2010. Article. English language. doi: 10.1386/ctl.6.1.5_1

CAROLE L. HAHNEmory University, Atlanta, USA

Comparative civic educationresearch: What we knowandwhat we need to know

KEYWORDS

civic/citizenshipeducation

political socializationcivic education/socialstudies researchcitizenshipcomparative/

international studies

ABSTRACT

This article reviews research conducted in different regions of the world and interna-tional and comparative studies. It raises issues for consideration by researchers, suchas the importance of culture in understanding civic meanings. It concludes with aproposed agenda for needed future research.

INTRODUCTION

Scholarship on education for citizenship and democracy has greatly expandedover the past decade as researchers from all parts of the globe are conductingempirical studies that use a wide variety of methods. Clearly, the field of com-parative and international civic education has gone global. But what have welearned from this increased research activity? What do we yet need to know?In this article I will first review studies conducted within countries in differentregions of the world; then I identify several international and comparative stud-ies conducted cross-nationally. Finally, I will propose an agenda for researchneeded in the future.

BACKGROUND

The field that I call ‘Comparative Civic Education’ has its roots in citizenshipeducation, political socialization, and comparative and international education.

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Carole L. Hahn

Although for centuries scholars wrote about the importance of education forcitizenship, it was not until the 1960s that political socialization researchers(primarily in the United States and Western Europe) began to systematicallystudy how young people acquired their political knowledge, skills, and attitudes(See reviews in Ehman 1980; Hahn 1998). Those early researchers focused onhow agents of socialization, such as the family, school, and media, transmittedmessages about the political world to youth. Since then the term ‘civic educa-tion’ has expanded to include the many ways young people construct meaningsof civil society, as well as the political world. Importantly, today the dominantconstructivist paradigm posits that youth are active constructors of meaning,rather than passive recipients of adult messages (Torney-Purta, Schwille, andAmadeo 1999; Torney-Purta, Lehmann, Oswald and Schulz 2001). The con-structivist view of civic learning underlies much of current research. Beforelooking at that research, a few explanations are needed.

It would be impossible to include all of the studies from across the world.I have selected particular empirical studies to illustrate research that is beingdone in different regions and from different perspectives. The included stud-ies are limited to ones published in journals that use English. Further, it isimportant to realize that although civic education scholars from a wide rangeof countries conducted the studies I include, most of the researchers came fromor were influenced by societies that grew out of the European Enlightenmentand place a high value on individualism and democratic participation. Eventhe scholars who conducted studies in Africa, Asia and the Middle East that Idiscuss here were at least partially educated in Australia, Canada, the UnitedKingdom, or the United States. Thus, it is not surprising that they use con-cepts and examine variables that are prevalent in the West. Other world viewsmay shift research foci. Importantly, scholars and policymakers need to keep inmind that findings from one national or cultural context are not generalisableto other contexts; the findings may, however, serve as hypotheses to be testedelsewhere. Finally, due to space limitations, I point to highlights of varied stud-ies to convey an overall picture of the cumulative research rather than analysingparticular studies in depth.

With these caveats in mind I now review some of what we knowfrom the cumulative research. I begin by undertaking a round-the-worldtour of geographic regions, describing studies conducted within singlecountries.

RESEARCH FROM COUNTRIESWITHIN REGIONS

Numerous scholars have written descriptions of policies and practices for citi-zenship education in their particular country for edited volumes (Arthur, Daviesand Hahn 2008; Banks 2004; Cogan and Derricott 2000; Cogan, Morris andPrint 2002; Georgi 2008; Grossman, Lee and Kennedy 2008; Lee and Fouts2005; Lee, Grossman, Kennedy and Fairbrother 2004; Torney-Purta et al. 1999).To produce their descriptions, authors surveyed previous research and the his-tory of civic education in their country; some examined textbooks and/or policydocuments, interviewed students and/or teachers, and observed classroompractice. Recent case studies describe curricular reforms in post-conflict soci-eties (Freedman, Weinstein, Murphy and Longman 2008; Niens and Chastenay2008). The varied case studies describing the intended and implemented cur-riculum are important for understanding similarities and differences in civiceducation across countries and for contextualizing the empirical studies that

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Comparative civic education research: What we know andwhat we need to know

have been conducted in particular countries. I will now focus on some of thespecific studies that used samples from a single country.

THE AMERICAS

The diversity of cultures, economies, and political systems within the west-ern hemisphere is reflected in the differing traditions of civic education andresearch on the topic. In this section I discuss research from the United Statesat length because there is much cumulative scholarship and it is the tradition Iknow best. I will then mention a few studies from other countries in the region.

The United States

For many years scholars have conducted research on civic education and youthpolitical socialization in the United States. Much of the research has beenreviewed elsewhere (Ehman 1980; Hahn 2008). I highlight only the mostextensive and well-executed studies to illustrate ‘what we know’.

Over the years many scholars have analysed data obtained from surveysof large, nationally representative samples of youth. The National Assessmentof Educational Progress (NAEP) assesses student civic knowledge and experi-ences approximately every five years. Using this rich database, scholars haverepeatedly found that overall students tend to have a general – but not in-depth – knowledge of civic political topics (National Center for EducationStatistics (NCES) 1999; 2007). The researchers also found consistent patternsindicating that the following groups of students tend to perform less well on thetests of civic-political knowledge than their peers: students from low-incomefamilies, students whose parents had little education, and students who areAfrican-American or Hispanic (NCES 1999; 2007). Contrary to earlier years,girls now do as well as, or better than, boys on the tests. Similar findings wereobtained from the United States portion of the major international study ofcivic education (Baldi, Perie, Skidmore, Greenberg and Hahn 2001).

In a frequently cited study that used NAEP data, Niemi and Junn (1998)demonstrated that deliberate instruction in civics and government was associ-ated with student knowledge; students with such instruction performed betteron NAEP assessments than those without instruction. Other scholars who useddata from other nationally representative samples similarly found that studentswho received deliberate instruction in civics or government had higher levels ofcivic knowledge than their peers who lacked such instruction (Hart, Donnelly,Youniss and Atkins 2007; Torney-Purta and Wilkenfeld 2009). Evaluations ofa number of specially designed civic education programmes also revealed thatdeliberate instruction was associated with increased civic knowledge (see Hahn2008). Importantly, civic knowledge was associated with students’ anticipationof voting and actual voting eight years after completing high school (Hart et al.2007; Torney-Purta et al. 2001).

Much of the research from the United States has focused on the relationshipbetween students’ experiences of democratic participation in school and thedevelopment of participatory civic-political attitudes. Scholars who used largenationally representative samples and those who conducted studies in a fewschools came to the same conclusion: students who reported that they wereencouraged to discuss controversial public issues in an open classroom envi-ronment (where they felt comfortable expressing their views) were more likelyto have higher levels of civic knowledge, political efficacy, political interest,

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sense of civic duty, and expectations of voting as adults than peers withoutsuch experiences (Ehman 1980; Hahn 1998; Niemi and Junn 1998; Torney-Purta et al. 2001). Evaluators of issues-centred curriculum projects also foundthat students who explored and discussed issues reported increased politicalinterest and efficacy; they also followed the news, discussed politics with fam-ily and friends, and reported increased desire to participate in civic life (seeHahn 2008). Recently, Hess (2009) conducted a longitudinal study of studentsin classes where teachers regularly lead discussions about controversial politi-cal issues (CPI), revealing both the benefits and challenges to leading effectiveCPI discussions. Other researchers found that students who experienced inter-active discussion-based civic education had the highest scores on a measureof twenty-first century competencies, including economic knowledge, skill ininterpreting media, and positive attitudes toward diverse groups (Torney-Purtaand Wilkenfeld 2009).

In the United States other researchers focused on the importance ofstudents’ participation in extra-curricular activities and ‘service learning’programmes, whereby students provide service in the local community.Researchers found that extra-curricular activities and service learning wereassociated with civic knowledge, voting, and volunteering into adulthood(Baldi et al. 2001; Hart et al. 2007). In a recent longitudinal study, researchersfound that when students experienced a combination of ‘civic opportunities’(classroom instruction, service learning, and extra-curricular activities), theyincreased in civic commitments, concern for local issues, and expectations offuture involvement (Kahne and Sporte 2008).

Unfortunately, however, researchers find that such opportunities are notequally available to all students. Students from low-income, minority, andimmigrant families tend to have fewer civic opportunities than students frommiddle class, majority culture families (Conover and Searing 2000; Kahneand Middaugh 2008; Rubin 2007). Following a related line of inquiry, somescholars have been exploring specific meanings of citizenship in particular cul-turally embedded locations. For example, in one case study the researcherexplored how young people from a Native American background negotiatedtheir cultural, national, and global identities as citizens (Whitman 2007).

Taken together, studies conducted in the United States that used largenationally representative samples identified factors associated with studentknowledge and attitudes. In recent years, researchers are complementing suchwork with case studies that reveal the importance of particular socio-culturalcontexts in understanding civic education and political socialization.

Canada

In writing about civic education in Canada, authors note differing experi-ences of First Nations, anglophone, and francophone groups, as well as ofrecent immigrants to a multicultural society. Rather than trying to general-ize across cultural groups and provinces, Canadian researchers have focusedon the thinking of individual learners. Researchers have explored children andyouth’s understandings of concepts such as rights and freedoms, ethnic diver-sity, civic participation, and historical significance (Chareka and Sears 2005;Hughes and Sears 1996; Peck 2009; Peck and Sears 2005). Using a phenomeno-logical approach, with small samples of students, these researchers gainedinsights into the process of student meaning-making. Using that approach,Peck (2009) found that students’ ethnic identity served as the lens through

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which they interpreted and constructed a sense of the nation’s past. (In thisjournal Sears also discusses other research from Canada.)

Latin America

The Organization of American States (OAS) commissioned a secondary anal-ysis of the IEA Civic Education Study using data for students from Colombiaand Chile, as well as the United States and Portugal (Torney-Purta and Amadeo2004). School factors including perceptions of an open classroom climate, con-fidence in school participation, and the opportunity to learn in school to solveproblems in the community, correlated with expectations of adult engagement.

Other scholars conducted ethnographic studies of civic education. In Mex-ico, Levinson (2007) interviewed experts, examined policy documents, andanalysed textbooks. He also interviewed school administrators and teachersand observed civic education classes in two states to ascertain how educatorswere implementing a new course, ‘civic and ethical formation’ (Levinson 2007).Levinson identified a series of challenges to reform: insufficient teacher train-ing; undemocratic school governance; an emphasis on testing; a shortage ofresources in many rural schools; and an entrenched bureaucratic structure thatprovided few incentives for teachers to change.

Suarez (2008) conducted a content analysis of curricula in Costa Rica andArgentina at two time-periods to determine the extent to which the curric-ula reflected a human rights discourse. He found that ‘human rights’ was acentral concept in both countries (similar to Levinson’s finding in Mexico) butit was presented differently in light of the countries’ particular histories. Theonline journal Inter-American Journal of Education for Democracy, published inboth Spanish and English, reports on other studies from the region.

In Canada and Latin America the numbers of scholars doing research oncivic education has increased in recent years. It will be interesting to see if inthe future they continue to develop a particular focus on phenomenologicalstudies in Canada and on curriculum for democracy and human rights in LatinAmerican countries.

EUROPE

Although civic education is planned and implemented at the national level,the European Union and the Council of Europe have been active in bring-ing together scholars and practitioners around topics of civic education ata regional level. The Council of Europe, consisting of 47 member states asof 2008, launched the curriculum development project ‘Education for Demo-cratic Citizenship’ in 1997. In its third phase (2006–2009), the project aimed topromote education for democracy (EDC) and human rights education (HRE),with an emphasis on social cohesion, social inclusion, and respect for humanrights (Starkey and Osler 2009). The European Union’s ‘Children’s Identityand Citizenship in Europe’ SOCRATES academic network (CiCe) publishededited volumes containing descriptions of projects in varied countries (e.g.Roland-Levy and Ross 2003). Eurydice, the information network on educa-tion in Europe, published a set of reports on citizenship education at school inEurope. These regional networks provide a bridge across countries with distincttraditions of civic education and differing approaches to research. The diver-sity of these traditions is evident when comparing empirical studies that usedsamples from within single countries.

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Carole L. Hahn

The United Kingdom

Subsequent to Parliament making citizenship a statutory requirement for allEnglish secondary schools from 2002 onwards, the government funded a large-scale longitudinal study to monitor the implementation of the new initiativeand to determine its effects. The Citizenship Education Longitudinal Study(CELS) is the largest and most complex longitudinal study anywhere to date.The researchers followed a cohort of students from school year 7–13 in anationally representative sample of schools. They also administered question-naires to cross-sectional samples of pupils in years 8, 10, and 12 bi-annuallyand collected qualitative data in a purposeful sample of schools. In one of theearly reports the CELS researchers found that socio-economic status correlatedwith student knowledge, feelings of empowerment, levels of trust, communityattachment, engagement, and commitment to volunteering, participation, andpolitical engagement (Cleaver, Ireland, Kerr and Lopes 2005).

Most of the CELS annual reports, however, focused primarily on the imple-mentation of citizenship education (CE) in schools, rather than on studentlearning. The citizenship legislation deliberately left it up to each school todecide how it would implement the subject. As a result, there is a great range ofdelivery models and practices for CE in schools. By 2008, most schools reporteddelivering CE through discrete lessons, either as lessons within ‘personal,social, and health education’ (PSHE) or in a subject called citizenship (Keat-ing, Kerr, Lopes, Featherstone and Benton 2009). The report noted that therewas a dramatic change from 2002 when most citizenship teaching occurredthrough subjects across the curriculum, assemblies, and from the school ethos.The report also noted increased use of active instructional methods and teacherconfidence in teaching topics like the environment. However, teachers reportedlow levels of confidence in teaching topics for political literacy and attention to‘student voice’ was uneven (Keating et al. 2009). Taken together the projectreports provide valuable information about curricular change over time. How-ever, to date they have said little about how particular approaches to citizenshipaffect student learning.

Taking a different approach, the Nestlé Social Research Programme con-ducted telephone interviews with a representative sample of young people,ages 11–21 years old in England, Scotland, and Wales (Haste 2005). Theresearcher concluded that from 25 per cent to 50 per cent of young people werecivically engaged, either by helping in the community or ‘making their voicesheard’ or both. To capture the varied ways in which young people were or werenot engaged, Haste (2005) generated profiles. Importantly the youth who werethe most engaged and who expected to be engaged in the future were oneswho said that they had been consulted about the development of school rulesand policies, involved with planning their class work, and were encouraged tomake up their own minds about issues. Students who were encouraged by theschool to become involved with the community were more likely to be activelyparticipating in helping activities. This study’s identification of different typesof engagement/disengagement and of the importance of listening to studentsat school is echoed in other research.

Other researchers in the United Kingdom, along with colleagues elsewhere,wrote case studies of ‘student voice’ (Holden 2008) and the teaching of humanrights (Osler 2005). Other UK researchers interviewed youth to explore the flex-ible, multilayered, complex nature of identity, citizenship, and education forcitizenship in a multicultural society (Maylor and Read, with Mendick, Rossand Rollock 2007; Osler and Starkey 2005).

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Continental, Western Europe

Several researchers conducted comparative studies looking at samples ofschools and students in different continental European countries. For example,I studied adolescent political attitudes, beliefs, and experiences in a purpose-fully selected sample of schools in Denmark, England, Germany, and theNetherlands (Hahn 1998). I noted the differing role of the school in prepar-ing citizens across different countries and concluded that ‘there is no one formof democracy and there is no one way of teaching for democracy’ (Hahn 1998:236). Using mixed methods, I surveyed students at two time-periods, inter-viewed teachers and students, and observed lessons in civic-related subjects.In focusing on differing approaches to the teaching of controversial publicissues, I illustrated differences in pedagogical cultures embedded in distinctcivic cultures.

A team of anthropologists similarly looked at the ways that civic culturesimpact upon young people in the Netherlands, Germany, France, and England(Schiffauer, Baumann, Kastoryano and Vertovec 2004). Using ethnographicmethods over an extended time in one school in each country, these researchersfocused on the process of civil enculturation of students from Turkish back-grounds. They found that the immigrant youth took on the discourses of thedominant cultures to explain their position as minorities in their respectivesocieties.

In another study, Davies (2002) looked at policies and practices for pro-moting ‘student voice’ in schools in Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, andSweden. This study exemplifies a type of comparative education research – tolearn from others to inform policy research at home (Phillips and Schweisfurth2007). In this case, Davies and her colleagues sought insights for educatorsand policymakers in England who were undertaking new initiatives to pro-mote ‘student voice’ in school decision-making. Davies found that in differentlocales in the four countries, students were involved in school decision-makingthrough strong student councils, committees that advised on curriculum andinstruction, and processes for hiring and evaluating teachers. The December2008 issue of the journal Citizenship Teaching and Learning contained additionalreports of student voice in varied countries to illustrate students’ viewpointsrather than focusing on policies to involve students in school decision-making.

Central and Eastern Europe

After the fall of the Soviet Union, many non-governmental organizations inWestern Europe and the United States undertook projects with partners in cen-tral and Eastern Europe to promote education for democracy. Various projectsdeveloped curriculum materials in civic education and prepared teachers to usethe new curricula using student-centred pedagogy. Evaluations of two suchprojects illustrate the type of study that has been done in different countriesin the region.

‘We are Citizens of Ukraine’ was one such project, where developersdesigned lessons to teach skills for democratic citizenship, such as group coop-eration, decision-making, and civic action (Craddock 2005). The evaluators ofthe project found that students in the treatment group who used the newcurriculum outperformed a control group on a test of civic knowledge andthey compared favourably with respect to attitudes and behaviours. Otherresearchers measured the effects of similar projects in Bosnia (Soule 2002),Latvia, and Lithuania (Vontz, Metcalf and Patrick 2000).

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Other evaluators measured the effects of the project ‘Deliberating Democ-racy’ on students in Azerbaijan, the Czech Republic, Lithuania, and three citiesin the United States (Avery and Simmons 2008). The programme used a tech-nique called ‘structured academic controversy’ to scaffold student discussionsof public policy issues. Students who participated in the programme said they:learned about the issues, discussed national and international issues morewith their teachers than previously, and liked hearing diverse views and beingencouraged to express their own views. Additionally, both the teachers and thestudents found the approach easy to learn.

Recent research in Europe indicates interest in policy implementation andprogramme evaluation, as well as understanding student identity developmentin increasingly multicultural societies. Much of the research also focuses ondeveloping participatory attitudes, dispositions, and competencies.

ASIA AND THE PACIFIC

In recent years there have been numerous conferences drawing together civiceducation researchers in Asia and the Pacific. This cross-regional dialogue isreflected in a series of books that examine similarities and differences in con-cepts, curriculum, and pedagogy for civic education (Grossman et al. 2008;Kennedy, Lee and Grossman 2010; Lee et al. 2004). Several of the countriesin the region teach courses in civic and moral education as well as courses insocial studies, which includes history, geography, and civics. Across the regionthere is also a widespread interest in ‘national education’ to promote socialcohesion and attachment to the nation (Grossman et al. 2008). Some of theauthors of chapters in the regional book series cite empirical studies conductedin particular countries but, to date, the series has not published a book thatfocuses on research. Rather, it is necessary to look to the work of individualscholars working in the region.

Chinese societies

Fairbrother (2008) is one of the few researchers who used cross-sectional dataover time to test theory. Using theories of the state and political socialization hefocused on the concepts ‘hegemony’ and ‘resistance’. He surveyed and inter-viewed purposefully selected samples of university youth in Hong Kong andMainland China to assess the effects of the states’ messages about nationalism.He found that in both societies student attitudes reflected dominant messages,although some students showed signs of resistance through their scepticismand curiosity.

Other researchers have conducted small-scale case studies in Chinese soci-eties. For example, in Hong Kong, Leung and Yuen (2009) described oneschool’s efforts to promote participatory citizenship and student empower-ment. In Taiwan, researchers used a quasi-experimental approach to study theeffects of an issues-centred approach on students’ civic attitudes (Liao, Liu andDoong 1998). The Taiwanese students, like their counterparts in other simi-lar studies in other regions, exhibited enhanced civic participation attitudes,concern about social/political issues, reasoned thinking, and perspective-takingabilities. In Singapore, researchers Ho and Alviar-Martin (2009) explored howteachers think about diversity in a multicultural society. They found that theirsample of teachers used essentialized racial categories that reflected soci-etal discourse and state policies, rather than multidimensional and pluralistconceptions of multiculturalism promoted by scholars and teacher educators.

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Australia

Civic educators in Australia have been active in regional, as well as interna-tional, discussions of education for citizenship and democracy, as reflected intheir many contributions to edited volumes containing national case studies.Up until the 1990s, however, Australia did not have a strong tradition of civiceducation. As a consequence, researchers in two states found that on averagestudents exhibited low levels of political knowledge, political interest, efficacy,trust, and civic tolerance (Mellor 1998; Print 1995). Further, in a national studyof Australian youth’s attitudes toward voting and other forms of civic-politicalengagement, researchers found that many young people were alienated fromtraditional forms of politics (Print, Saha and Edwards 2005). Nevertheless,many young people expressed interest in social-political issues, having par-ticipated in protests related to issues such as the environment, the Iraq War,and refugees. The researchers concluded that many youth are civically engaged,despite their lack of faith in politicians and the electoral system.

To address what is perceived to be a general lack of political engagementamong young people, a succession of Australian governments initiated civicsprogrammes. As in the United States, student civic knowledge is now assessedregularly in a national assessment project, which will yield data for researchersto analyse for years to come. (In this journal Mellor further elaborates on someof the research from Australia.)

AFRICA AND THEMIDDLE EAST

A growing number of researchers have been reporting studies of civic teachingand learning in Africa and the Middle East to international audiences in recentyears.

Africa

In Africa, researchers have studied the effects of new civic education projects.They have also explored teachers’ and students’ perspectives of concepts like‘democracy’ and ‘citizenship’.

In South Africa, Finkel and Ernst (2005) conducted an evaluation of a civiceducation project developed by ‘Street Law South Africa’. The study is simi-lar to evaluations of new curricula in other regions where international NGOs,partnered with local NGOs, develop curriculum materials and train teachersin student-centred, issues-centred pedagogy. University students were trainedto teach a new curriculum, ‘Democracy for All’ (DFA), to students in grades11 and 12 across the country. The researchers compared interview data fromstudents who had the programme, students who had standard civic educationfrom regular teachers, and students who had no exposure to a civic educationcourse. The researchers found that exposure to civic education, either throughDFA or a traditional course, had strong effects on student civic/political knowl-edge. Importantly, moving from no exposure, to monthly exposure, to weeklycivics instruction, and finally to daily instruction led to progressively increasedlevels of knowledge (Finkel and Ernst 2005).

In another study Kubow (2007) studied selected South African and Kenyanteachers’ beliefs about democracy. The teachers defined democracy in terms ofequality, particularly gender equality, and freedom of thought and speech asexperienced in homes, schools, and communities. Kubow concluded that theteachers’ beliefs were informed by both global/western rights-based discourses

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and local/indigenous values of compassion, communalism, and concern for theinterests of community. Similarly, other researchers found (through interviewsand digital photography) that Ghanaian students defined concepts like citi-zenship, democracy, tolerance, patriotism, and rights and responsibilities interms of Ghanaian law and history (Groth 2006; Levstik and Groth 2005). InGhana and Rwanda, researchers also explored how history instruction can con-tribute to a sense of who ‘we’ are as a nation that transcends ethnic divisions(Freedman et al. 2008; Levstik and Groth 2005).

TheMiddle East

Most of the published articles on civic education and political socialization inthe Middle East have been conducted in Israel (Eisikovits 2005; Ichilov 2005;Perlinger, Cannetti-Nisim and Pedahzur 2006). Similar to scholars working inother regions, Perlinger and colleagues found students who had a civics courseexhibited higher levels of civic knowledge than those who did not (Perlingeret al. 2006). Further, among students who had civics, those who perceived anopen climate for discussion reported higher levels of political efficacy, politicalparticipation, and democratic orientations than students who experienced aless open climate.

In another study, Ichilov (2005) revealed challenges for civic educators ina divided society. Using data from the IEA ‘civic education study’ in Israel,she compared students’ responses from Hebrew state schools, Hebrew reli-gious schools, and Arab schools. Although, overall, eleventh graders in Israelsaid that they did not discuss politics a great deal, the Israeli Palestinian Arabstudents were more politically efficacious and they reported discussing politicsmore than students at either type of Hebrew school. Additionally, whereas theJewish students were more likely than the Arab students to expect to engagein conventional political activities (such as voting and obeying the law); theArab students were more likely to expect to be actively engaged in politics, toparticipate in social causes, and to engage in illegal protest activity. Not sur-prisingly, the Jewish students were more likely than the Arab students to havepositive attitudes toward the nation and its symbols. Ichilov (2005) concludedthat Israeli educators implementing a new civics curriculum designed to instila unified sense of Israeli identity and respect for diversity would face difficultchallenges.

In recent years, a number of scholars have reported on small-scale studiesconducted in Lebanon (Pederson, in press) and Jordan (Shirazi 2009). Pederson,like Kubow in South Africa, found examples of local and global discourses instudents’ conceptions of democracy. Shirazi, like Fairbrother in China, foundexamples of student resistance to the state’s intended policies. His ethno-graphic study provided rich, thick description of how resistance was enactedin one school.

I look forward to more scholars and NGOs working in Africa and the Mid-dle East reporting on their work in international conferences and journals. Ianticipate that in the future, research emanating from these regions will captureinsider, as well as outsider, perspectives.

In summarizing research from studies conducted in single countries andcultures, several themes emerge that might be treated as hypotheses to betested in other contexts. First, deliberate civic instruction may enhance civicknowledge, but civics courses or lessons alone tend to have little, if any, effecton student civic political attitudes. Second, when civic education incorporates

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active, participatory learning activities and there is an open climate for dis-cussion, then students may develop democratic attitudes. Third, students’ andteachers’ understandings of concepts, such as democracy, citizenship, partici-pation, and rights, vary according to the particular culture in which individualsare socialized. Fourth, notions of identity are multilayered, flexible, and com-plex. Fifth, implanting civic education in divided and post-conflict societiesposes particular challenges.

INTERNATIONAL AND COMPARATIVE STUDIES

International and comparative education are complementary ‘twin’ fields but,as Phillips and Schweisfurth (2007) note, it is not easy to know some-times where one ends and the other begins. International means betweennations, implying a potentially comparative aspect whereas comparative refersto explicit, direct comparisons usually across national borders. The distinction isblurred under globalization, where international schools, international partner-ships among schools, and local schools aim to prepare global citizens. In thissection, I discuss a few of the major findings from the large-scale cross-nationalCivEd Study, supported by the International Association for the Evaluation ofEducational Achievement (IEA). I will follow that with reference to a few com-parative studies in which researchers sought to explain their findings in lightof the distinct social, cultural, and historical contexts in which the research wasconducted.

The IEA civic education study

The largest and most comprehensive study of civic teaching and learning todate is the ‘civic education (CivEd) study of the International Association forthe Evaluation of Educational Achievement, or IEA (Torney-Purta et al. 2001;Torney-Purta et al. 1999). IEA will soon report findings from the subsequentstudy, the ‘international civic and citizenship study’ (ICCS) but at the time ofthis writing the results were not yet available. In the first phase of the CivEdstudy, researchers developed case studies of civic education in their particularcountries, using qualitative data, such as interviews and analyses of curricu-lar policies and textbooks (Torney-Purta et al. 1999). In the second phase ofthe study, researchers administered questionnaires to nationally representativesamples of 14 year-old students in 28 countries (Torney-Purta et al. 2001). Laterquestionnaires were administered to an older population of students in sixteencountries (Amadeo, Torney-Purta, Lehmann, Husfeldt and Nikolova 2002). Itwould be impossible to cover all of the findings from this massive study, whichhave been widely disseminated. Rather, I will highlight a few of the themesthat emerged and mention some of the subsequent secondary analyses thatwere conducted using this rich database.

Using a regression analysis to identify variables that predicted student civicknowledge and student expectations of voting as adults, the IEA researchersfound that in most countries students’ expected years of education, home lit-eracy resources, and perceptions of an open classroom climate for discussionpredicted civic knowledge. The variables ‘civic knowledge’ and ‘having learnedabout the importance of voting in school’ were predictors of expected voting(Torney-Purta et al. 2001).

Importantly, the CivEd Study not only measured knowledge; it alsoinvestigated student perceptions and attitudes with respect to a number of

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civic-political issues. More students across countries said that obeying the lawand voting were important to good citizenship than said discussing politi-cal issues or joining a political party were important. Young people in mostcountries tended to agree that social-movement activities, such as helping thecommunity and promoting human rights, were important. Most students alsoreported positive attitudes toward their country and held positive attitudestoward immigrants’ and women’s rights (Torney-Purta et al. 2001).

Following the publication of the international CivEd report, several ofthe participating countries published reports in their national languages andindividual researchers conducted secondary analyses of the data. A teamof researchers at the University of Maryland, in particular, have conductedsecondary analyses of the CivEd data set, using sophisticated and varied quan-titative methods. Although their reports are too numerous to list here, they areavailable on the project’s website (http://www.wam.umd.edu/∼iea).

Comparative studies

Several smaller studies in civic education have been explicitly comparative,in that researchers compared similarities and differences across countries andthen sought explanations in the historical, philosophical, and cultural contextof the particular countries. In one study, a team of scholars, as insiders, exam-ined civic education policies and observed classroom practice in their respectivecountries of Australia, Hong Kong, and the United States (Cogan et al. 2002). Inanother study, researchers conducted a secondary analysis of IEA data, seekingexplanations for student perceptions in Australia, Hong Kong, and the UnitedStates in light of the particular civic cultures in each society and of global factors(Kennedy, Hahn, and Lee 2008).

In a study of civic education in two international schools in the UnitedStates and Hong Kong, Alviar-Martin (2009) examined how secondary studentsdeveloped global perspectives and a sense of cosmopolitan citizenship. She wasparticularly interested in how local cultures and global discourse were evidentin the two settings. Two studies of school practices in European countries thatI described earlier were also explicitly comparative and sought explanations inlight of differing civic cultures (Hahn 1998; Shiffauer et al. 2004).

Other scholars focused on teachers’ perspectives cross-nationally in light ofboth local and global influences. In one edited volume, researchers (who wereinsiders) in Australia, Hong Kong, Russia, and the United States described thecontext of civic education, used the same questions to survey and interviewteachers, and explained their findings in terms of what they knew about the his-tory and culture of each specific country (Lee and Fouts 2005). Finally, as notedearlier, Kubow (2007) compared teachers’ perspectives in Kenya and SouthAfrica, seeking explanations in both local cultures and global forces. I hope thatin the future more scholars will undertake comparative studies that illuminatediffering conceptions across cultures.

FUTURE RESEARCH

In light of what we know from research in comparative civic education to date,I would like to propose an agenda for needed research in the future. As Iread studies conducted in one or two countries, I wondered if similar findingswould be obtained from replications in other countries. As I reflected uponthe conclusions that researchers drew from their findings, I began generating

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new questions. Below are my nominations for needed studies and questions forconsideration in the future.

1. More studies are needed of students’ and teachers’ understandings ofcivic-political concepts in different cultural and national contexts. Doethnic and other subgroups within countries experience civic learning dif-ferently, as has been found in several countries? Are similar profiles ofyouth civic engagement found cross-nationally? Under what conditionsdo students identify with or resist dominant narratives of history anddominant messages about citizenship?

2. Further explorations of the effects of school civic instruction and expe-riences on student knowledge, attitudes, and behaviour are needed. Isinstruction correlated with knowledge in additional national contexts? Areattitudes correlated with opportunities to discuss issues in open classroomclimates? What are the effects of instruction over time? Which school expe-riences appear to contribute to adult political and civic engagement? Whatdo students mean when they say that they discuss issues in an open class-room climate? What can teachers do that seems to contribute to such aperception?

3. Research on the relationship of gender and sexuality to civic attitudes andexperiences is much needed. Are gender differences in attitudes that havebeen found in some countries evident in other countries? How can the-oretical work on gender, sexuality, and citizenship provide new insightsto empirical studies? How are gender, sexuality, and gender-related issuestreated in curriculum, textbooks, and class instruction? Surprisingly fewscholars have looked at these questions to date (Arnot 2009; Hahn1996; Hahn, Bernard-Powers, Crocco and Woyshner 2007; Kennedy 2006;Torney-Purta et al. 2001).

4. There is a need for comparative studies of citizenship education for indige-nous groups. Are the experiences of teachers and students in schools withmany First Nations, Native American, and aboriginal students in Canada,the United States, and Australia similar? How do students in such settingsnegotiate their multiple identities?

5. More research is needed that focuses on classes and schools that servemany transnational students (immigrants, migrants, refugees, and mem-bers of expatriate families). How do transnational youth who are border-crossers think of themselves with respect to citizenship?

6. Additional studies are needed of schools, teachers, and societies imple-menting global or cosmopolitan citizenship education. What factors seemto enhance students’ global or cosmopolitan views? Do cross-case analysesyield similar or different findings?

7. In countries where there are inequalities in civic opportunities, such asthe United States, studies are needed of experimental treatments aimed atreducing such inequality. Which teacher education and/or particular schoolor district-level policies are particularly effective? What does ‘best practice’look like in schools serving many students from low-income families?

8. Research is needed on varied models of teacher education and the effectsof such teacher preparation on student learning. Using cross-case com-parisons, what elements of a teacher preparation programme seem to beeffective in differing settings?

9. Studies are needed that explicitly use varied theories of globalizationto analyse comparative civic education. Although globalization is the

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dominant paradigm in comparative education today, different theoriesof globalization would lead researchers to explore different phenom-ena (Spring 2008). Which of these are most useful to civic educationscholarship?

10. Finally, scholarship on all of these topics that moves beyond description toexplanation in terms of both global and local forces is much needed.

Clearly, civic education research has come a long way since the early daysof political socialization researchers. It is an exciting time to be working in thefield as scholars spanning the globe share experiences and viewpoints, andincreasingly form teams to examine questions using varied methods and bothinsider and outsider viewpoints to illuminate findings. This journal is playingan important role in fostering a dialogue about the past, present, and future ofcomparative citizenship teaching and learning.

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Arnot, M. (2009), Educating the Gendered citizen: sociological engagements withnational and global agendas, London: Routledge.

Arthur, J., Davies, I., and Hahn, C. (eds) (2008), The SAGE Handbook of Educationfor Citizenship and Democracy, London: SAGE.

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Hahn, C. (1998), Becoming Political: comparative perspectives on citizenship educa-tion, Albany: State University of New York Press.

Hahn, C. (2008), ‘Education for Citizenship and Democracy in the UnitedStates’, in J. Arthur, I. Davies, and C. Hahn (eds), The SAGE Handbook ofEducation for Citizenship and Democracy, London: SAGE, pp. 263–278.

Hahn, C.L., Bernard-Powers, J., Crocco, M. and Woyshner, C. (2007), ‘GenderEquity in Social Studies’, in S. Klein (ed.), Achieving Gender Equity throughEducation, Mahwah: Earlbaum, pp. 335–339.

Hart, D., Donnelly, T., Youniss, J. and Atkins, R. (2007), ‘High School Com-munity Service as a Predictor of Adult Voting and Volunteering’, AmericanEducational Research Journal, 44: 1, pp. 197–219.

Haste, H. (2005), My Voice, My Vote, My Community: a study of young people’scivic action and inaction, London: Nestle Social Research Programme.

Hess, D. (2009), Controversy in the Classroom: the democratic power of discussion,New York: Routledge.

Ho, L.C. and Alviar-Martin, T. (2009), ‘Singapore Teachers’ Perspectives ofDiversity and Multicultural Education’, paper presented at the annual

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meeting of the College and University Faculty Assembly of the NationalCouncil for the Social Studies, Atlanta, 10–12 November.

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Keating, A., Kerr, D., Lopes, J., Featherstone, G. and Benton, T. (2009), Embed-ding Citizenship Education (CE) in Secondary Schools in England (2002–08).Citizenship Education Longitudinal Study (CELS): Seventh annual report, DCSFResearch Report 172, October, London: Department for Children, Schools,and Families.

Kennedy, K. (2006), ‘The Gendered Nature of Students’ Attitudes to Minori-ties’, Citizenship Teaching and Teacher Education, 2: (1) pp. 1–11.

Kennedy, K. J., Hahn, C. L. and Lee, W-O. (2008), ‘Constructing Citizenship:comparing the views of students in Australia, Hong Kong, and the UnitedStates’, Comparative Education Review, 52: 1, pp. 53–91.

Kennedy, K., Lee, W. and Grossman, D. (eds) (2010), Citizenship Pedagogies inAsia and the Pacific, Dortrecht and Hong Kong: Springer and Centre forComparative Education Research.

Kubow, P. K. (2007), ‘Teachers’ Constructions of Democracy: intersections ofwestern and indigenous knowledge in South Africa and Kenya’, Compara-tive Education Review, 51: 3, pp. 307–328.

Lee, W. and Fouts, J. (eds) (2005), Education for Social Citizenship: perceptions ofteachers in the USA, Australia, England, Russia, and China, Aberdeen: HongKong University Press.

Lee, W., Grossman, D., Kennedy, K. and Fairbrother, G. (eds) (2004), CitizenshipEducation in Asia and the Pacific: concepts and issues, Comparative Educa-tion Research Centre, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong: KluwerAcademic Publishers.

Leung, Y. W. and Yuen, T. W. W. (2009), ‘Participatory Citizenship and StudentEmpowerment: case study of a Hong Kong school’, Citizenship Teaching andLearning, 5: 1, pp. 18–34.

Levinson, B. (2007), ‘Forming and Implementing a New Secondary Civic Edu-cation Program in Mexico’, in E. D. Stevick and A. Levinson, ReimaginingCivic Education, Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield: pp. 245–271.

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Liao, T., Liu, M. and Doong, S. (1998), [in Chinese] The Impact of Issues-CenteredApproach on Students’ Civic Participation Attitudes for Grade 8 and 11 Stu-dents, Research report, Taiwan: National Science Council, [in English] paperpresented at the Hong Kong Institute of Education.

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Maylor, U. and Read, B. (with Mendick, H., Ross, A. and Rollock, N.) (2007),Diversity and Citizenship in the Curriculum: research review, Research Brief N.RB 819, London: Department for Education and Skills.

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SUGGESTED CITATION

Hahn, C.L. (2010), ‘Comparative civic education research: What we know andwhat we need to know’ Citizenship Teaching and Learning 6: 1, pp. 5–23, doi:10.1386/ctl.6.1.5_1

CONTRIBUTOR DETAILS

Carole L. Hahn is the Charles Howard Candler Professor of educational stud-ies at Emory University in Atlanta, USA. She was the US national researchcoordinator for the ‘Civic Education Study’ of the International Associationfor the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA) and she is an AdvisoryProfessor at the Hong Kong Institute of Education. She is a past president ofthe National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS) and recipient of the JeanDresden Grambs Distinguished Career Research Award from NCSS. She has

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conducted comparative studies of citizenship education and written about civiceducation in the US and comparatively.

Contact:

Carole L. Hahn, Educational Studies, North Decatur Bldg-Suite 240, EmoryUniversity, 1784 N. Decatur Rd., Atlanta, GA 30322, USA

E-mail: [email protected]

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SUZANNEMELLORAustralian Council for Educational Research

Insights from formal testingof civics and citizenshiplearning in Australia

KEYWORDS

civics and citizenshipeducation (CCE)

Australiaknowledge and

understandingsdispositionsparticipation

active engagementnational assessmenteffects in achievementcurriculum

implementation

ABSTRACT

The national assessment programme in civics and citizenship (NAP-CC), conductedin Australia in 2004 and 2007, collected achievement data on the knowledge andunderstandings – of both cognition and dispositional orientation – of year 6 and year10 students. The test instruments for both cycles broke new ground, especially inrelation to the testing of student disposition to civics and citizenship participation andengagement, and enabled students to give creative and focussed responses to a rangeof citizenship concepts.

The ‘civics and citizenship literacy achievement scales’ for both cycles indicatestudent achievement is variable, and generally low level. The ‘student background sur-vey’ in the second cycle sought data and information about variables with explanatorypower as to the demonstrated levels of achievement. Analyses of student backgroundand school programme data identified factors that appear to have a significant effecton achievement.

The article describes contextual developments which influenced the assess-ments, provides an analysis of the achievement and background data and reflectson what the reported findings, especially from the second cycle, have revealedabout students and their civics and citizenship learning experiences in Australianschools.

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SuzanneMellor

INTRODUCTION

The first cycle of the NAP-CC in Australia, involving over 20,000 students inyear 6 and year 10 (aged approximately 11 and 15 years), was conducted with anationally representative sample of 567 schools in 2004. The second cycle wasconducted in 2007, with over 12,000 students from 618 schools. These assess-ments collected achievement and background data from students on their civicknowledge and understandings, and of their dispositional orientation to citi-zenship. The background data has also provided some insights into underlyingexplanations for those achievements.

POLICY BACKGROUND

There were several distinct stages in the development of the policy frameworkfor the conduct of the NAP-CC. In April 1999, all the Australian state, terri-tory and commonwealth ministers for education (meeting as the MinisterialCouncil on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs (MCEETYA))agreed to the Adelaide Declaration on National Goals for Schooling in the Twenty-first Century. This document (MCEETYA 1999) provides the framework for theassessment and reporting on student achievement in CCE, as part of the AnnualNational Report on Schooling in Australia (MCEECDYA 2000–2006).

Goal 1.4 of the document stated that, when students leave school, theyshould: ‘. . . be active and informed citizens with an understanding and appre-ciation of Australia’s system of government and civic life’ (MCEETYA 1999).

In 1999 MCEETYA also agreed to develop key measures to monitor andreport on national progress towards achieving these goals. Sample assessmentswere to join the already established annual, full-cohort testing in literacy andnumeracy. The additional areas for assessment were science, civics and citizen-ship education (CCE), and information and communication technology (ICT).

Through its performance measurement and reporting taskforce (PMRT), inJuly 2001 MCEETYA commissioned the construction of two ‘key performancemeasures’ (KPMs) for civics and citizenship education: KPM1, which focusedon civics knowledge and understanding; and KPM2, which addressed citizen-ship dispositions and skills for participation. The PMRT also commissioned atriennial NAP-CC. In October 2002, the PMRT commissioned a trial for thisassessment and, in October 2004, the first cycle of the triennial NAP-CC ofstudent performance in civics and citizenship was conducted. That report waspublished in December 2006 (MCEETYA 2006a). A team of researchers fromthe Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) won the contract forthe inaugural cycle, and the subsequent two, in 2007 and 2010. The authorof this article, who had been the project manager for Australia’s participa-tion in the phase 2 (testing) of the International Association for the Evaluationof Educational Achievement (IEA) ‘CivEd Study’ (conducted over the period1995–2001 (Mellor et al. 2002)), led the ACER team.

CURRICULUM CONTEXT

For the first cycle of the NAP-CC, the educational context was strikingly dif-ferent from such as prevailed for other national assessments, since it was nota key learning area in any Australian education jurisdiction, and teaching andlearning in the area was fragmented and marked by uncertainty (Erebus 2003).This was the situation despite the Discovering Democracy Program, an AustralianGovernment resource and professional development initiative (DEEWR 2004;Holdsworth and Mellor 2004), funded from 1997–2004 at a cost of $32 million.

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Insights from formal testing of civics and citizenship learning in Australia

Such a context presented unique (indeed, almost-insuperable) challenges forthose conducting national assessment.

In Australia, each state and territory jurisdiction has schools from threesectors: government, Catholic and private. Each sector provides schooling andreceives differential government funding. The curricula followed in each sectorare closely related to central curricula frameworks, but between-sector varia-tions in delivery, especially at the compulsory schooling levels, that is beforeyears 11 and 12, are common.

In order to develop a national test of learning in any area or field, it is nec-essary to develop an assessment domain (AD), which given the lack of clarityand agreement across jurisdictions and sectors was a significant challenge. TheNAP-CC AD was developed by ACER staff working with the NAP-CC reviewcommittee, specially convened by PMRT for this assessment programme exer-cise. Its members represented their relevant education jurisdictions and alsobrought a personal commitment to the area of civics and citizenship educa-tion. With considerable effort, good will and expertise, AD was developed andagreed, despite no such equivalent curriculum existing at a jurisdictional level.As will be described below, the AD critically defined the field in terms of bothcivics and citizenship. The full AD is available in both national reports from theMCEECDYA website (MCEETYA 2006a and 2009a).

By the second NAP-CC cycle of assessment, conducted in 2007, how-ever, some national curriculum policy frameworks had been developed. TheNational Statements of Learning in Civics and Citizenship had been released in2006 (MCEETYA 2006b). This document defined nationally agreed understand-ings as to what should be taught in CCE and at what year level, and this wasto be implemented in all jurisdictions’ curricula. In much of this developmentthe NAP-CC AD, since it was the only national document of CCE learningoutcomes, and had been manifestly well-received in the 2004 assessment,was treated as a default curriculum model. Therefore, much of the curriculumdevelopment, in the statement of learning (SOL) and across jurisdictions, wascongruent with the AD. As a result of this by the second cycle of the NAP-CC, CCE had a more prominent place and agreed focus in curriculum policiesthan it had had in 2004. But this kind of policy progress was recent and wouldnot make a universal difference at the level of classroom or even school provi-sion, nor to student learning. Variability in CCE programming between schoolshad also been evidenced in CCE programme evaluations conducted by juris-dictions (Erebus 2003); some schools had well- developed CCE programmes,while many other schools had not even conceptualized the area. The provi-sion of professional development in the area had also been variable within andacross jurisdictions and sectors.

THE ASSESSMENT DOMAIN (AD)

The AD comprised the domain descriptors for the two key performancemeasures (KPMs) and a professional elaboration. The AD contained twosub-dimensions, applicable at both year levels.

In the AD, civics education was conceptualized as the study of Australiandemocracy – its history, traditions, structures and processes – and of the waysin which Australian society is managed, by whom and to what end. Citizenshipeducation was conceptualized as the development of the skills, attitudes, beliefsand values that will predispose students to participate: to become and remain

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KPM 1: Civics: Knowledge and understanding of civic institutionsand processes

Knowledge of key concepts and understandings relating to civic institutionsand processes in Australian democracy, government, law, national identity,diversity, cohesion and social justice.

KPM 2: Citizenship: Dispositions and skills for participation

Understandings related to the attitudes, values, dispositions, beliefs andactions that underpin active democratic citizenship.

Figure 1: Civics and citizenship dimensions of assessment domain.

engaged and involved in their society/culture/democracy. The underlying con-ceptualization of what was needed for ‘a good or competent citizen’ (that is anelaboration of what the Adelaide Declaration was seeking to make schools createand the NAP-CC assess) was that he/she should have civic knowledge and adisposition to engage in citizenship activities. Thus both were the proper focusof CCE, and both needed to be taught. This conceptualization of CCE and theNAP-CC was considerably broader that that attempted by the IEA study, forinstance (Mellor et al. 2002). This conceptual complexity constituted anothermajor challenge to the project’s survey and test developers.

Reflection on the concepts mentioned in figure 1 will show that bothKPMs indicated there is a range of contested dimensions to be encounteredin the teaching and learning of civics and citizenship. The literature associ-ated with the AD, and the professional development provided to teachers insome jurisdictions, emphasized that interpretation lies at the heart of all CCE.The case was made that effective CCE learning and achievement requires arich and complex set of understandings, based on civics knowledge, attitudesand dispositions, and that this could not be achieved without students beingprovided with the opportunity to experience and practise civic and citizenshipcompetencies.

The second level of the AD – that of the domain descriptors – demonstratesthe key conceptual understandings: that is the range of knowledge and con-texts students are expected to grasp. Many relate to principles as well as to theuse of them, in the Australian context. For both KPMs this level of the AD is acombination of facts and concepts, with a distinct orientation to social justice ina democracy as the dominant concept. The third level of the AD, that of profes-sional elaboration, contained substantive detail (curriculum content) and fur-ther explicated the kinds of knowledge, understandings, dispositions and skillswhich students were required to demonstrate in the assessment. The profes-sional elaboration was the focus of test developers during the development ofthe items, as these were the learning outcomes being tested in the assessment,and which, by implication, should also be the focus of CCE teaching.

THE TEST INSTRUMENTS

The assessment was representative of all elements identified in the AD. Theitems were developed in units that comprised one or more assessment itemsthat related directly to single themes or stimuli. Various item types were used,

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including dual choice, multiple choice, closed and constructed response items.The test instruments for both cycles, 2004 and 2007, broke new ground, chal-lenging common assumptions about assessment and about the kind of contentthat could be assessed. The decision to test student disposition to civics andcitizenship participation and engagement was a particular challenge to testdevelopers’ skills. The constructed response items’ format and the markingrubrics required to consistently assess the tests were innovative design ele-ments. The analyses conducted indicated that the test instruments resulted ina validated process of questioning. This process enabled students to give cre-ative and focussed responses to citizenship concepts, and could be scaled. Foreach cycle the number and range of item types, and the rotated cluster designof the test booklets, enabled coverage of the domain. The first cycle confirmedthat the two sub-dimensions were linked and a single scale was developed todescribe student achievement. Examples of all item types, for both KPMs, withthe score guides for the coding of them, from both cycles of the NAP-CC, areavailable in the school-release assessment materials files (MCEECDYA 2009b).

THE BACKGROUND SURVEY INSTRUMENTS

The student background survey was conducted in both cycles. The backgroundsurvey instrument collected information about students’ gender, age, Indige-nous status, language background, school location and family background.The survey in the 2007 cycle sought additional information about variableswith possible explanatory power regarding demonstrated levels of achieve-ment. It asked students about the opportunities available for participation incertain specified civics and citizenship-related activities in their school, andthe actual levels of participation they experienced at and outside school, andstudent views on those activities. Findings on relationships between thesebackground characteristics and achievement, as measured by the scaled scoreson the assessment, were published in the 2007 national assessment report(MCEECDYA 2009a).

THE SAMPLE

In both cycles, at both year levels, a sample of schools was selected with aprobability proportional to size. Then, in the first cycle, a random sample oftwo classrooms, and in the second cycle a random sample of one classroom,was selected from those schools. The sample design and procedures, the highstudent response rates (in the second cycle, 92 per cent for year 6 and 86 percent for year 10) and the low levels of exclusions ensured that there was verylittle bias in the sample. Additionally, few schools have been involved in bothcycles.

THE CIVICS AND CITIZENSHIP LITERACY SCALE

The civics and citizenship (C&C) literacy scale is an interval scale, with noabsolute zero, that has been standardized to have a mean score of 400, witha standard deviation of 100, for the year 6 sample (2004). The mean for thenational year 6 sample was 405.9 with a standardized deviation of 107.7 (2007).The mean for the national year 10 sample was 501.7 with a standardizeddeviation of 120.6 (2007). The 2007 technical report provides a more detaileddescription of the scale and how it was constructed (Wernert et al. 2009).

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THE PROFICIENCY LEVELS

The C&C literacy scale was overlaid with six proficiency levels, ranging from‘below level 1’ to ‘level 6’. The proficient standard for year 6 students was setat level 2 and the proficient standard for year 10 students was set at level 3, forboth the 2004 and 2007 cycles. These standards were not defined as ‘a mini-mum competency’, but as ‘a challenging level of performance’. A descriptionof how the proficiency standards were developed is provided in Chapter 3 ofthe 2004 report (MCEETYA 2006a). All proficiency bands were described in the2004 national report (MCEETYA 2006a: 42) and in greater detail in the 2007national report (MCEECDYA 2009a: 49–52). Figure 2 defines the understand-ings and competencies embedded in the achievement scale, and the level ofachievement (or competency) expected by the two proficiency standards.

STUDENT ACHIEVEMENT

The C&C literacy scale for both cycles indicates student achievement leavesmuch to be desired. The 2007 cumulative percentage of year 6 students achiev-ing at or above their proficient standard was 52 per cent. For year 10 it was only41 per cent. These figures represent low achievement levels and only marginalimprovement from 2004. Figure 3 shows the 2007 achievement of both cohorts,distributed across all six proficiency levels.

Given the educational context of the provision of CCE in Australian schools,it can be no surprise that learning in C&C, as indicated by the achievementdescribed by the 2007 CCE literacy scale, was not high, and that it had onlymarginally improved from the 2004 assessment. However, from the point ofview of the jurisdictions there were some embarrassments: since the provision

Characteristics of proficiency level 2 – Proficient standard for year 6:

Students who achieved at proficiency level 2 demonstrate accurate factualresponses to relatively simple civics and citizenship concepts or issues in theirresponses to multiple-choice items (MCIs) and show limited interpretation orreasoning in their responses to open-ended items (OEIs). They interpret andreason within limits across KPMs. They recognize the division of governmen-tal responsibilities in a federation, that respecting the rights of others to holddiffering opinions is a democratic principle, and can identify a link between achange in Australia’s identity and the national anthem.

Characteristics of proficiency level 3 – Proficient standard for year 10:

Students who achieved at proficiency level 3 demonstrate relatively precise anddetailed factual responses to complex key civics and citizenship concepts or issuesin MCIs. In responding to OEIs they use field-specific language with some flu-ency, and reveal some interpretation of information. They recognize some keyfunctions and features of parliament, identify the importance in democracies forcitizens to engage with issues, and analyse the common good as a motivation forbecoming a whistle-blower.

Figure 2: Characteristics of proficient standards for years 6 and 10.

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Below level 1 Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Level 4 Level 5+

% CI % CI % CI % CI % CI % CI

Year 6 11.3 0.7 35.2 1.2 43.5 1.3 9.7 0.6 0.3 0.1 – –

Year 10 3.8 0.7 15.8 1.1 38.9 1.4 34.4 1.1 6.9 0.7 0.2 0.1

NB: There were no significant differences from 2004 to 2007 in the proficiency levels.

Figure 3: Distribution of year 6 and year 10 students by proficiency level, 2007 cycle.

of CCE curriculum had been handsomely funded, and professional develop-ment had been provided (albeit somewhat randomly, despite the rhetoric ofsuccessful implementation), improvement in achievement had been antici-pated. Data was only analysed and reported at a jurisdictional (not sector)level, but considerable variances in achievement between state and territoryeducation jurisdictions were reported. These were taken, especially by the suc-cessful parties, as reflecting better implementation of curriculum developmentin schools and classrooms. The national report indicated that there might bemany explanatory factors, including whole school programmes, not just CCEcurriculum provision. It urged a more critical interrogation of the jurisdictionaldata, of other factors referenced in the 2007 national report and of other localdata available on implementation.

C&C LITERACY ACHIEVEMENT AND BACKGROUND CHARACTERISTICS

Part of the role of the background survey was to seek student-level data thatcould assist in better understanding the variation in student achievement acrossthe proficiency levels, and between and across the different year levels (that is,years 6 and 10). There was also a perception at PMRT that the year 10 achieve-ments were closer to those of year 6 than they should have been. The 2007background survey enabled researchers a closer examination of individual levelvariables, including student activities and attitudes, and brought greater inter-rogative precision to bear on the variations, allowing insights into some schooland non-school level effects on student achievement. The report providedresults of analyses which examined relationships between student performanceand each of the individual background characteristics on which data had beencollected through the background survey.

PARENTAL BACKGROUND

Data was sought from students on both parental occupation and education,but collection of the year 6 data was systemically flawed and many year 10 stu-dents could not provide data on parental education. For this reason, year 10data on parental occupation was used as an indicator of social-economic status(SES). Five categories were classified using the MCEETYA endorsed classifi-cation. Where occupations were available for both parents, the higher-codedoccupation was used in the analyses (Wernert et al. 2009: Chapter 4).

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Figure 4: Year 10 students’ mean scores on the C&C literacy scale, by parentaloccupation.

Differences in mean scores among students from each of the occupationgroups followed the expected pattern, being based on underlying socio-economic differences, and the differences between the adjacent groups werestatistically significant. Figure 4 shows the linear trend of mean achievementscores on the CCE literacy scale, according to occupation group, and theassociated confidence intervals.

In terms of trends from 2004, the gaps in achievement between theoccupation groups were greater in 2007. The most notable improvement inachievement, by group, from 2004 to 2007, was of the highest occupation group,and this was statistically significant. The strength of the association betweenparental occupation background and achievement in civics and citizenshipwas broadly similar to that revealed in other similar studies, such as for read-ing literacy in the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), (OECD2000). The increase in that tendency may be enhanced by the curriculum con-text, which is characterized by previously mentioned variability and paucity indelivery. Whatever the explanation, the trend is a concern.

INFLUENCE OF ALL DEMOGRAPHIC BACKGROUND VARIABLES ONACHIEVEMENT

A multiple regression analysis was undertaken to investigate the unique influ-ence of each of the background characteristics on year 10 achievements, andalso the amount of variation in achievements explained by included variables.

The analysis explained 13.2% of the total variance in performance, of whichabout 1% was joint variation. The most powerful effect (at 9%) was that gener-ated by parental occupation (which constituted approximately 70% of the totalof the explained variance). For a student whose parent is in the top occupa-tion group, the likely effect of this variance is that they will achieve 40 pointshigher on the C&C literacy scale than a student whose parent was in the second

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Figure 5: Disaggregation of variance and explained variance in studentperformance, by background variables.

occupation group. It is noteworthy that this variance in performance, explainedby the social and demographic predictors, is comparable to results in othernational assessments in Australia.

OPPORTUNITIES TO PARTICIPATE IN CIVICS AND CITIZENSHIP ANDGOVERNANCE ACTIVITIES AT SCHOOL

Schools can provide opportunities for students to participate in CCE andschool governance activities. Indeed the Adelaide Declaration and MCEETYAdocumentation state that schools are obliged to provide such opportuni-ties. The student background survey collected data on students’ school-basedopportunities to participate in certain specified activities. Figure 6 shows thestudent-reported availability of such activities.

The 2007 survey also asked students about their actual participation in theseC&C and governance activities. Three quarters of year 6 and two thirds of

Figure 6: Opportunities for participation in C&C-related activities at school.

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year 10 students had voted for class representatives. Approximately one thirdof year 6 and one fifth of year 10 students had served on a student repre-sentative council (SRC), and of those, approximately three quarters believedthey had ‘contributed to school decision-making’. Less than a third of stu-dents reported that they had contributed to school decision-making in non-SRCways. Variable numbers said they had participated in peer-support programmes,helped create a school newspaper, represented the school, or participated insuch activities outside school. These responses indicate that only a minor-ity of students were actively engaged in such activities (other than voting forclass reps), but when they were engaged they felt they ‘had made a usefulcontribution’.

Students were asked to identify whether they had learnt the following atschool:

• The importance of voting in elections (80% of year 6 and 60% of year 10reported ‘Yes’)

• To be interested in ‘how my school works’ (80% of year 6 and 60% of year10 reported ‘Yes’)

• How to represent other students (80% of year 6 and 70% of year 10 reported‘Yes’)

• That I can contribute to solving problems at my school (80% of year 6 and70% of year 10 reported ‘Yes’)

• How to work cooperatively with other students (90% of both year 6 andyear 10 reported ‘Yes’)

The strongest pattern here is the consistently higher level of agreement inresponses as to their participation, from students in primary schools, comparedwith those in secondary schools. There is an argument that primary schools areoften smaller communities, more like families than secondary schools, and soindividuals can have a clearer sense of identity there. But another view is thatthe younger students are probably likely to have fewer queries and suggestionsabout school governance that may be perceived by staff as threatening. Schoolleaders commonly express concerns verbally about allowing student ‘control’in schools, and such views can be assumed to influence staff support for suchopportunities, especially to the full range of the student population. Certainly,as figure 6 showed, only a minority of students in both primary and secondaryschools had had these opportunities. But it is pleasing that given the diversity ofthe population in Australian schools so many students reported they thoughtthey had learnt how to work cooperatively with others. This is a significantfinding for a multicultural nation and indicates the power of positive schoolingin creating a cohesive society.

A correlation analysis of all the variables related to C&C participation,conducted in 2004 (and in 2007 including its additional data), revealed smallcorrelation coefficients exist between all the variables. This suggests that therewas little association made by students between opportunities to participatein C&C activities and what they have learned about governance. This is asalutary reminder that students do not always learn in the way their teach-ers expect them to, or make the desired connections. However the revealedrelationship between actual opportunities and actual participation indicatesthat when students are offered opportunities to participate they are willing totake them up. It appears we should speak less about disengaged students and

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ask more about schools that do not actively encourage engagement in theirstudents.

RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN OPPORTUNITIES TO PARTICIPATE ATSCHOOL AND CIVICS AND CITIZENSHIP ACHIEVEMENT

The key purpose of the questions in the background survey was to assist inidentifying any relationships that may exist between school programming (thatis opportunities to participate) and C&C achievement (as represented by stu-dents’ achievement levels on the C&C literacy scale). Such relationships, if theyexisted, would assist in explaining how schools programming assists studentlearning in the area of CCE.

The results of an analysis of the relatedness of participation in school gov-ernance activities and achievement are demonstrated in figure 7. Schools werecategorized, on the basis of their student descriptions of what arrangementsexisted in their school, as being a high, medium-high, medium-low or lowlevel provider of opportunities for participation in the two key areas previouslyanalysed in this article. Figure 7 also highlights the mean achievement scoresfor each of the school categories, with the correlation coefficient for the twoparticipation variables with the achievement score.

Figure 7: Mean C&C achievement by level of opportunity for participation at school.

Figure 7 shows that for both year levels, as the level of opportunity pro-vided by schools for student participation in the two kinds of activity increases,so too do the mean achievement scores. Low achievement (that is less CCElearning) correlates with fewer opportunities to participate: higher achievement(that is more C&C learning) correlates with more opportunities. The associa-tion is much stronger for the year 10 students than it is for the year 6 students,and this may be a further explanatory possibility for the year level differencespreviously mentioned.

OPPORTUNITIES TO PARTICIPATE IN CIVICS AND CITIZENSHIP ANDGOVERNANCE ACTIVITIES OUTSIDE SCHOOL

Students were asked to indicate if and how often they participated in specifiedcivics and citizenship-related activities outside school. The frequency optionsprovided were ‘Never or hardly ever’, ‘At least once a month’, ‘At least once a

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week’ and ‘More than 3 times a week’. The trends in student responses werevery similar for both year groups.

• Of the four options for gaining news of current events, 80% of studentsnominated the TV news, frequently watched, as the preferred source, withthe Internet a distant fourth (40%). Radio and newspapers were rated byabout 70% of students as a preferred source, and the frequency of thembeing used was correspondingly lower than TV.

• About 60% of students talked with their family about political and socialissues, whilst only 40% talked with their friends about such matters.

• The out-of-school activity that had the largest participation (at over 80%)was sport, with participating in environmental, community or volun-teer work being at much lower levels (around 20% for each activityfor year 10 students, and 40% for year 6 students for environmentalactivities).

RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN OPPORTUNITIES TO PARTICIPATE IN CCEACTIVITIES OUT OF SCHOOL AND C&C ACHIEVEMENT

Relationships were found to exist between achievement and both the frequencyand number of civics and citizenship-related activities undertaken by studentsout of school. Figure 8 presents the mean scaled scores (that is, achievement)for both year 6 and 10 students, according the number of activities participatedin, and the associated confidence intervals. As was found with the activitiesundertaken at school, a linear trend is revealed, with the higher achievementbeing associated with participation in a greater number of activities. Tests ofsignificance supported the finding about this relationship (Wernert et al. 2009:Chapter 7). In year 10 each additional activity beyond the first one is associatedwith a significant increase in achievement, and at year 6 the trend is slightlyless clear over the full range of steps.

Figure 8: Mean scores on the C&C scale by number of CCE-related out-of-schoolactivities participated in.

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COMBINED EFFECT ON CIVICS AND CITIZENSHIP ACHIEVEMENT OFBACKGROUND AND PARTICIPATION VARIABLES

Figure 5 showed the influence of demographic background variables on year-10 student achievement, explaining 13.2% of the variance in achievement.Further analysis was conducted on the variables relating to participation inC&C activities, in and out of school: the findings for which were shown infigure 8. A second regression analysis resulted in an explanatory model to anal-yse relationships including both the background and activities variables. Whentaken together these variables were found to explain 23.6 % of the total vari-ance in performance. This increase of 10.4% in explanatory power indicatesthat participation in civics and citizenship activities has a substantial influenceon achievement, over and above the influence of background characteristics.Figure 9 shows the percentage of variance explained by each of the variablesfound to have had a significant influence on student performance on the CCEliteracy scale.

Comparison of this figure with figure 5 will show that in this second model,the explanatory power of parental occupation has been reduced from the 8.8%in the first model to 5.4%. This indicates that some of the influence of parentaloccupation may be due to differences in rates of participation in CCE activities,according to level of parental occupation. Correspondingly, the joint variance(that is the explained variance due to interaction between the explanatoryvariables) has grown from 1.1% to 5.5%.

Additionally, more detailed analysis of individual variables indicated thatparticipation in school governance activities accounted for 3.7% of the totalvariance. Of the out-of-school activities, the strongest explanatory power (hav-ing a unique significant effect of 2%) resided with the frequency of ‘talkingabout politics and social issues with my family’. Analysis found that the netdifference between a year 10 student who never, or hardly-ever, engaged inthese discussions and one who did so more than three times a week was over60 points on the CCE scale. Discussions with peers outside school had lesseffect but were also reportedly fewer. Programming discussions by students

Figure 9: Disaggregation of variance and explained variance in student performanceby student background and C&C participation variables.

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about politics and social issues is a strategy that schools could so readily adopt,and these findings indicate it may have a powerful effect on learning. It wasalso found that having voted for class representatives added about eighteenpoints to the achievement score, and feeling that one had contributed to schooldecision-making added about fifteen points to the achievement score on theC&C scale.

Finally, a general comment about the pattern of the influence can be made.The effect of all these variables, whether large or small, is that they are com-pounding in their influence (the joint effect of such activities is greater than thesum of the individual effects of each of them). The ramifications of this finding,for students and schools, are considerable.

DISCUSSION OF THE FINDINGS

The first point is a reminder that an assessment programme like the NAP-CC provides a snapshot of student achievement in CCE and an independentevaluation of implementation levels. The NAP-CC reports indicate that, despitehigh levels of government and public support for the teaching and learning ofC&C over several years, learning outcomes are poor and implementation isvariable and possibly weak. There is a need for a different approach by schools,if the achievement levels are to be raised.

The second point is a reminder to policymakers that, demonstrably, theimplementation of assessment regimes alone will not result in improvingteaching and learning outcomes. The levels of achievement revealed by thisassessment programme certainly indicate that unless national assessment is‘high stakes’ (which manifestly the NAP-CC was not, as it did not requireaccountability because it did not report on individual students and schools)then other incentives and support need to be provided before schools will seri-ously implement change, regardless of how important they believe an initiativeto be. Assessment of this kind does not work as a ‘policy-pusher’.

The third discussion point relates to what import the findings might havefor schools in the Australian setting or for schools in other jurisdictions wantingto support the teaching and learning of CCE in primary and secondary schools.

Due to the Australian education jurisdictions’ view that all their schoolswere implementing the CCE curriculum frameworks, it was not possible toquestion schools on their curriculum provision (either by a separate schoolsurvey or by asking students some basic questions about what CCE-relatedcurriculum they had experienced). So the effect of formal teaching and learn-ing on C&C achievement could not be examined. Therefore we are reducedto examining the effect of indirect learning. In its baldest form, the findingsindicate that even if schools do not provide students with a curriculum whichenables them to formally learn about the substance of civics (as in KPM 1) andcitizenship (as in KPM 2), their students, if provided with opportunities to par-ticipate in school governance and C&C-related activities in school, are able to‘get a grip’ on much of what is being assessed in the NAP-CC programme.

The corollary of this finding is that schools can make a big or small dif-ference, depending on the way such activities are administered, which in turnreflects the value the school places on student participation in school decision-making. To engage students in such an approach can be adopted regardlessof the capacity or willingness of the school to provide formal curriculum incivics and citizenship. Figure 7 suggested that schools where the whole studentcohort on average did better than the national average were commonly those

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which offered their students opportunities to participate, and that such activi-ties provide an additional effect on achievement. So schools can choose how todeliver C&C learning outcomes – there are more options than just curriculum(though to do both would seem to be the best option).

As the 2007 report stated:

If schools do not wish to provide a detailed or conventional civics andcitizenship curriculum to all their students, thereby adding to the stu-dents’ civic knowledge, this report’s findings indicate that worthwhilegains will come from a governance model which allows decision-makingby students in the school.

(MCCECDYA 2009a: 109)

The fourth discussion point relates to social justice, and the rights of citizensto know their rights and obligations so that they can become more active andengaged in their world. These findings crystallize the ways in which schoolscan give voice to their constituents, to empower them to seek to clarify theiridentities and to learn how to make a difference for themselves and for others,especially if the world does not seem to be their oyster. Schools are not able tohave an impact on parental occupation, though there is an argument that theyhave a social justice obligation to compensate for the demonstrated low levelsof interest in/ knowledge of C&C – much as they do for improving generalliteracy levels of students from homes where such literacy levels are not high. Ifit is agreed, by policymakers and the general public, that creating ‘good citizens’is a key purpose of schools, these findings indicate that the way forward is notobscure. Wyn asks the relevant questions and develops this argument about thepurpose of schooling in such a way as it can be discussed by all practitioners andbe implemented by any education jurisdiction (Wyn 2009). All it needs is will.

The fifth discussion point relates to the ways in which national assessmentcan provide much more than raw achievement data. If the right questionsare asked, through instruments additional to the testing, they can provide awealth of information on much more than simply the achievement data whichostensibly was the primary purpose of the assessment exercise. With skilledanalysis, researchers can provide insights into educational context and socialbackground and information on how schools are managed, the values theyaspire to, and the roles they allow all their constituents. They enable informedhypotheses to be developed about how some schools are able to activate partic-ipative values in the life of their community, whilst others seem not to be ableto do so. All such data can be used to good effect by those seeking productivechange in student learning.

Sixthly, programmes such as this one also enable a critique to be developedby schools and jurisdictions, on the basis of the school reports they receive aspart of the assessment feedback they receive. There is (or there can be) a lotmore to national assessment than initially meets the eye (especially the eyeof detractors of such programmes). One beneficial element of the NAP-CC,mentioned only in passing in this article, which feeds directly into the pedagogyof CCE, are the School Release Materials (MCEECDYA 2009b). These papers anddocuments relate to the AD, the test items and their marking score guides, andprofessional development programmes, and were prepared for school leadersand practitioners. These NAP-CC web links relate expressly to the testing asexperienced by all schools.

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In conclusion, the NAP-CC programme and the national reports showhow schools which wish to can inspire their students to be active citizens,by providing them with opportunities to learn and practise civic and citizen-ship competencies. The examples of such opportunities were all very ordinary,and their implementation self-evidently required no great rearranging to aschools programme and management. But they did require a school to thinkthat giving their students voice and opportunities to practice civic competen-cies was important. These findings indicate that certain pedagogies and wholeschool governance structures can provide young people with real opportuni-ties to learn more effective participation in their communities. The best news isthat such goals can be achieved, relatively easily; that such school-based pro-grammes will make a difference to the lives of their students. It is not oftenresearchers can be so bold in their conclusions!

REFERENCES

Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations (DEEWR)(2004), Whole School Approach Professional Development Activity(ACER), Canberra: DEEWR, http://www.civicsandcitizenship.edu.au/cce/professional_learning,9013.html. Accessed 15 October 2009.

Erebus Consulting Partners (2003), Evaluation of the Discovering DemocracyProgram 2000–2003, Canberra: Quality Schooling Branch, Department ofEducation, Science and Training, http://www.dest.gov.au/sectors/school_education/publications_resources/profiles/archives/evaluation_discovering_democracy.htm. Accessed 15 October 2009.

Holdsworth, R. and Mellor, S. (2004), Discovering Democracy in Action: Imple-menting the Program, Victoria: Department of Education and Training,http://www.eduweb.vic.gov.au/edulibrary/public/teachlearn/student/discoveringdemocracy.pdf. Accessed 25 January 2010.

Mellor, S., Kennedy, K. and Greenwood, L. (2002), Citizenship and democ-racy: Australian students’ knowledge and beliefs – The IEA Civic EducationStudy of Australian Fourteen Year Olds, Melbourne: Australian Council forEducational Research.

Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs(MCEETYA) (1999), The Adelaide Declaration on National Goals for Schoolingin the Twenty-first century, Melbourne: MCEETYA, http://www.mceecdya.edu.au/mceecdya/adelaide_declaration_1999_text,28298.html. Accessed 25January 2010.

Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs(MCEETYA) (2000–2006), National Reports on Schooling, Melbourne:MCEETYA, http://www.mceecdya.edu.au/mceecdya/anr/. Accessed 25 Jan-uary 2010.

Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs(MCEETYA) (2006a), National Assessment Program – Civics and CitizenshipYears 6 & 10 Report 2004, Melbourne: MCEETYA, http://www.mceecdya.edu.au/mceecdya/nap_cc_2004_years_6_and_10_report,17149.html.Accessed 25 January 2010.

Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs(MCEETYA) (2006b), National Statements of Learning – Civics and Citizenship,Melbourne: MCEETYA, http://www.mceecdya.edu.au/verve/_resources/SOL_Civics_Copyright_update2008.pdf. Accessed 25 January 2010.

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Ministerial Council for Education, Early Childhood Development and YouthAffairs (MCEECDYA) (2009a), National Assessment Program – Civics andCitizenship Years 6 and 10 Report, Canberra: MCEECDYA, http://www.mceecdya.edu.au/mceecdya/nap_civics_and_citizenship_2007_yrs6_and_10_report,26602.html. Accessed 25 January 2010.

Ministerial Council for Education, Early Childhood Development andYouth Affairs (MCEECDYA) (2009b), National Assessment Program –Civics and Citizenship-School Release Materials, Canberra: MCEECDYA,http://www.mceecdya.edu.au/verve/_resources/FINAL_Yr6_SRM_NAPCC_Feb09.pdf and http://www.mceecdya.edu.au/verve/_resources/FINAL_Yr10_SRM_NAPCC_Feb09.pdf. Accessed 15 October 2009.

Organization of Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) (2001),Knowledge and Skills for Life: First Results from the OECD Program for Interna-tional Student Assessment (PISA) 2000, http://www.pisa.oecd.org/document/46/0,3343,en_32252351_32236159_33688686_1_1_1_1,00.html. Accessed15 October 2009.

Wernert, N., Gebhardt E. and Schulz, W. (2009), National Assessment Program –Civics and Citizenship Year 6 and Year 10 Technical Report 2007, Melbourne:Australian Council for Educational Research, http://www.mceecdya.edu.au/verve/_resources/NAP_CC_2007_Technical_Report.pdf. Accessed15 October 2009.

Wyn, J. (2009), Touching the Future: Building skills for life and work, AER55,Melbourne: ACER Press, http://research.acer.edu.au/aer/9/. Accessed 25January 2010.

SUGGESTED CITATION

Mellor, S. (2010), ‘Insights from formal testing of civics and citizenshiplearning in Australia’ Citizenship Teaching and Learning 6: 1, pp. 25–42, doi:10.1386/ctl.6.1.25_1

CONTRIBUTOR DETAILS

Suzanne Mellor, a senior research fellow at the Australian Council for Educa-tional Research since 1990, has worked on many policy and survey researchprojects, some of them evaluative of education policy and programme imple-mentation. She has a practitioner background, having taught in secondary andtertiary institutions for over twenty years, coordinated curriculum writing foraccrediting bodies, devised a wide range of professional development activitiesfor teachers, and written text books for many levels and in a range of method-ologies. In 2002 she was joint-researcher for the World Bank project ‘PromotingSocial Tolerance and Cohesion Through Education’ in the South Pacific. Sheproject-managed the national Australian component of the IEA ‘Civics Edu-cation Study’ 1995–2002, and prepared the national report. In 2000–3 sheconducted the evaluation of the Victorian ‘Discovering Democracy ProfessionalDevelopment Programme’, resulting in Discovering Democracy in Action: Imple-menting the Programme (Department of Education and Training 2004). From2003–2009 she project-managed the national sample assessment in CCE ofyear 6 and 10 students in Australian schools, for MCEETYA. She is SeriesEditor for ACER’s major research journal: Australian Education Review andco-authored AER 47: The Case for Change: A review of contemporary research

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SuzanneMellor

on Indigenous education outcomes, (see http://research.acer.edu.au/aer/7/) firstpublished in 2004.

Contact:

Suzanne Mellor, Australian Council for Educational Research, 19 Prospect HillRd, Camberwell, VIC, Australia 3124.


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ALISTAIR ROSSLondonMetropolitan University

MELINDA DOOLYUniversitat Autònoma de Barcelona

Young people’s intentionsabout their political activity

KEYWORDS

youthpolitical activitypolitical intentionsactive citizenshipapathyparticipation

ABSTRACT

We discuss some implications for citizenship education, based on a survey of youngpeople in four European countries in which they were asked how they think they willact politically when they are adult. The empirical sections of the article are based on asurvey of 2,400 students aged between 11–17 in 2008–2009 in Poland, Spain, Turkeyand England. This study is discussed within the broader context of a widespread con-cern about a so-called ‘democratic deficit’, and in particular about the political apathyof youth. We suggest that young people appear to intend to act in very similar ways asadults do. We raise questions about expectations of political activity, especially con-cerning particular kinds of political behaviour, about young people’s own intentions,and about what might be an appropriate educational response to these intentions.

INTRODUCTION

This article presents some of the results from a two-year, four-country study1 of 1 The project was aEuropean ScienceFoundation ECRPprogramme (06 ECRPFP007) that linkedgrants from the PolishMinistry of Scienceand Higher Education(Grant ESF/84/2006),

young people’s current political engagement as well as their outlook on theirpolitical behaviour in the future (Krzywosz-Rynkiewicz, Zalewska and Ross2010). From our analysis, we suggest that children and young people do impli-cate themselves in political behaviour – an argument that stands in contrastto frequent narratives suggesting that indifference to political issues is com-monplace among youth. We interrogate these depictions of young people and

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Alistair Ross andMelinda Dooly

propose that their particular kinds of political behaviour should serve as a pointof departure for appropriate educational response to citizenship education.

We begin by reviewing some current discussions about the meaning of

the SpanishInter-ministerialCommittee on Scienceand Technology (CICYT)(Grant SEJ2007-29191-E), the TurkishScientific andTechnological ResearchCouncil of Turkey(TUBITAK) (Grant107KT66) and the BritishAcademy (Small GrantsAward SG 49353). Theproject teams consistedof (Poland) University ofWarmia and Mazury,Olsztyn (Dr BeataKrzywosz-Rynkiewicz,PI, and WojciechSiegien) and WarsawSchool of Social Sciencesand Humanities (PI,Professor AnnaZalewska and AgnieszkaBojanowska); (Spain)Autonomous Universityof Barcelona (PI, MelindaDooly, Maria Villanueva,Claudia Vallejo, EstherCollados and MontserratOller) and University ofCordoba (PI, Dr CarmenTabernero and Dr ElenaBriones Pérez) andUniversity PompeuFabra (Dr Antoni Luna);(Turkey) IstanbulUniversity (PI, Dr NilüferPembecioglu, Nadi GülerIlkay Kanik, BurcuAkkay, Ece Kayrak,Cemal Uzunoglu andGökçen Ardiç) andEskisehir AnadoluUniversity (PI, Dr ErolNezih Orhon) and (UK)London MetropolitanUniversity, Institute forPolicy Studies inEducation (PI, ProfessorAlistair Ross, Dr KimAllen, Sarah Minty andSumi Hollingworth) andUniversity of Exeter,School of Education (PI,Professor Cathie Holdenand Harriet Jones). Theproject is largely reportedin Krzywosz-Rynkiewicz,Zalewska and Ross 2010.

political participation and action, and suggestions that young people areincreasingly cynical about, and alienated from, ‘the political’. We argue thatthere is a need to review the traditional view of what constitutes the political,and new social movements may better help us explain different kinds of civicengagement. Many of the young people in our sample indicate that they havea lively and intelligent engagement with contemporary politics, and that theyintend to connect with a range of political processes in the future. We concludethat predictions of a coming ‘death of politics’ are premature: political action,construed as a broad spectrum, will most likely form part of these young peo-ple’s adult lives, and citizenship-education programmes need to address theagenda being set out by young people.

THE CONTEXT: DIFFERENT READINGS AND CONCEPTIONS OF‘POLITICAL ACTIVITY’

There is no shortage of concerns about the decline in political participation.A considerable literature has developed on ‘the democratic deficit’ across theglobe (for example Moravsci 2004; Hirschhorn 2006). There are particular con-cerns in the European Union, where the European vote is often lower than thenational election vote (Avbelj 2005; Mitchell 2005). It is claimed that the per-centage of young people voting in national elections is in decline (IDEA 2006),and – even more so – in elections for the European Parliament (López Pintowand Gratschew 2004; EurActive 2009).

Examining youth apathy across Europe, Forbrig points out that ‘[. . .] manylament a dramatic decline in the political involvement of younger generations,and decreasing levels of youth participation in elections, political parties andtraditional social organisations are seen to provide ample evidence of this’(Forbrig 2005: 7).

Responses of this nature have been reported from the four countries thatare the focus of this study. In Poland, Horowitz identifies ‘general concerns thatyoung people in these post-communist nations may grow up to be unsupport-ive of democratic institutions or to be citizens who do not participate in politics’(Horowitz 2005: 83). Oriza’s study of Spanish voting interest noted that in 198133% of young people aged 15–24 professed to have a substantial interest inpolitics, but by 1994 this proportion had declined to just 20% (Oriza 1996: 262):this decline was also noted by Serrano et al. (1997).

Likewise, in Turkey, youth’s interest in politics is compared unfavourablyto that shown by earlier generations. ‘Post-1980 Turkish youth are commonlyseen as apolitical consumers of a global market [. . .] All the young people inter-viewed stated that they are not really interested in politics and they do nottrust political parties and political leaders’ (Lüküslü 2005: 33, 34). These con-cerns are paralleled in the United Kingdom. Griffin identifies the ‘widespreadconcern amongst academic researchers, policymakers, youth workers, educa-tors and elected politicians over the levels of apparent political disaffection andapathy amongst young people [. . .] (Griffin 2005: 145).

This perceived decline in political and social participation noted abovehas become of substantial concern and the subject of extensive media andpolitical comment (Norris 2002; Lister and Pia 2008). It is also of interest to

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Young people’s intentions about their political activity

educationalists, because the fundamentals of how individuals interact withsocial organizations begins in childhood and adolescence, and thus in the yearsof schooling. This seems to beg the question: what do we know of young peo-ple’s social participation, and how might schooling contribute to the processesof their social learning and activity? The information that we have on whovotes in elections is not sufficiently detailed to really ascertain whether it isyounger voters in particular who have become less inclined to vote. There maybe generational changes, or it may simply be that younger people have alwaysparticipated in elections to a lower extent than older people.

The foregoing claims of youth political apathy are predicated on particularforms and patterns of political participation; principally the traditional markersof political involvement in post-1945 western states. It can be argued that sucha ‘traditional’ political activity as voting is not the only possible way to partic-ipate, and indeed is rooted in an outdated concept of what constitutes a civicculture, i.e., something that simply requires most people to have a fairly irreg-ular and passive participation in the political sphere, leaving a small politicalelite to undertake more regular and effective activity.

Much commentary on ‘the democratic deficit’ is rooted in a particular formof civic culture, in which most citizens were required (and expected) to qui-etly endorse the political system, making occasional selections between partiesthat put forward broadly similar slates of policies. This, it might be argued, wasrelated to the international climate of the cold-war years. The classic expositionof such a civic culture was made by Almond and Verba (1965), who positedthe theory of a ‘passive culture’ in which most citizens accept existing politicalsystems and structures, and a few are more actively involved in political roles.Perhaps this was a sufficient level of political activism in the period from 1945to 1990, particularly as the ruling elite saw itself as engaged in internationalcold-war confrontation.

Norris (2002) argues that such forms of political and social engagement arebeing replaced. Using Lasswell’s definition of politics as ‘who gets what, whenand where’ (Lasswell 1936), Norris suggests that:

Political participation is evolving in terms of the ‘who’ (the agencies andthe collective organizations), ‘what’ (the repertoires of actions commonlyused for political expression) and ‘where’ (the targets that participantsseek to influence). (Norris 2002: 4)

Plausibly, traditional electoral participation and political party membership isbeing replaced by informal political and social participation through demon-strations, political activism around single issues, petitions and boycotts, andperhaps by greater participation at the micro level. Lister and Pia (2008) sug-gest that in many European countries there has been an increase in the numberof people who profess to have an interest in politics.

The World Values Survey [. . .] provides evidence that civic participationis increasing, with membership of and participation in civic organiza-tions both seeing significant increases (particularly so for environmentaland global justice issues). It seems that the claim that there has notbeen a general decline in citizen’s political activity has some considerablepurchase.

(Lister and Pia 2008: 93)

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They do add that these activities remain minority pursuits, and that taking partin elections remains more popular. Nevertheless, voting participation has grad-ually declined over the past thirty years, and informal political activism hasrisen sharply over the same period. European youth appear to be progressivelydisenchanted with politics while exercising their political participation in waysthat differ from traditional electoral participation.

Why might this be so? The three major competing theories (the socio-economic resources model, the rational choice theory and the social capitaltheory) as to why individuals do (or do not) participate in the social arena allappear to have limitations.

The socio-economic resources model (Verba and Nie 1972) argues that indi-viduals with better material resources, education and time are more likely toparticipate – it is the better educated and better off who vote (and stand forelection, and participate in informal political activities). But diachronic stud-ies point out that in European societies overall educational levels and levelsof material wealth have greatly increased, while voter participation rates havefallen (Pattie et al. 2003; 2004).

Rational choice theory suggests that participation occurs when benefits out-weigh costs. It has been suggested that the citizen is better off not voting,because the chance that an individual vote will have any impact on the out-come is virtually zero (Downs 1957). The rational decision is not to participatein any collective activities, but to freeride (Olson 1971). Yet this is not the case:many people (still) behave ‘irrationally’ and vote; among many political sci-entists, this has been termed the paradox of participation (Green and Shapiro1994; Mansbridge 1990).

Social capital theory proposes that if individuals participate in socialgroups – (e.g. associations) – then social capital in the form of cooperation, trustand reciprocal behaviours develops (Putnam 1993; 2000). Higher levels of socialcapital lead to higher levels of participation, which in turn lead to higher levelsof social capital. But how (and why) should this be so? One critic argued ‘Canwe imagine rates of voter participation and organized public activity sharplyimproving if people heed the call to hold more picnics and songfests?’ (Skocpol2003: 57).

Some analysts have identified what are termed ‘new social movements’emerging from the mid-1960s onwards. Such movements – which focus onenvironmental issues, feminism and human rights – have resisted incorpora-tion into traditional political parties based on social class or trade unionism(Pichardo 1997).

On the other hand, many in the citizenship education movement, and oth-ers, would also aspire to educational processes that empower active citizens –individuals who will critically engage with, and seek to affect the course of,social events. The distinction between active and passive citizenship has beenparticularly debated over the past five to six years (Ireland et al. 2006; Nelsonand Kerr 2006).

Torney-Purta et al. (2004) begin to distinguish types of participation whenthey suggest that the type of engagement with political and social issuesmay be related to the different agents of influence, distinguishing between‘conventional political participation’ and ‘community participation’ such asvolunteer work, charity work and so forth. Others have noted these trendsmore vigorously. In Spain, for example, Blanch (2005) describes young people’sparticipation in the Galician Nunca Mais (Never Again) activism against eco-logically disastrous oil spillages on the coastline. ‘The Nunca Mais movement

46



was generally supported by a broad spectrum of citizens spanning much of thecentre-left, and although it gradually became an umbrella for anti-governmentslogans, its status remained that of a movement’ (Blanch 2005: 66).

He concludes new forms of participation are not conventional, and that

youth are not disinterested in politics in a broad sense, and periodicallybecome actively involved in movements, volunteering and social activ-ity. Even though social-capital indicators such as levels of association,interpersonal trust and political confidence have not increased in Spain,unconventional participation levels suggest that youth are not politicallyalienated.

(Blanch 2005: 66)

Similarly, Siurala (2000) tries to distinguish old and new forms of politicalparticipation, using the terms ‘modern’ and ‘postmodern’. Thus the modernis ‘representative participation and direct participation with all their variants,such as NGO-based structures, co-management, youth parliaments, schoolcouncils, youth hearings, demonstrations’, while postmodern participation is‘various types of expressive, emotional, aesthetic, casual, virtual and digitalparticipation’ (Siurala 2000: 1).

In the UK, young people interviewed by Eden and Roker (2002) were infavour of citizenship education in British schools on condition that it coulddemonstrate relevance to their lives and local communities. The respondentswere not committed to political parties, and, while distrusting politicians, gen-erally intended to vote. What they wanted discussed in schools were nationalpolitics and voting, racism, sex education and local issues (Griffin 2005: 151).Other studies found young people wanting discussion on domestic violence,racism, animal rights and other environmental issues (O’Toole et al. 2003; Hennet al. 2002).

Active citizenship is, very broadly, about doing things, while passive cit-izenship is generally seen as related simply to status, to the act of being.The delineation between the two is under debate (Ireland et al 2006; Nelsonand Kerr 2006), and though there is no international consensus, the modelsuggested by Kennedy (2006) may be helpful. He distinguishes four formsor levels of activity in citizenship. The first level – the level at which thoseconcerned with the democratic deficit would have us act – is engaging invoting, belonging to a political party, and standing for office. The secondform of activity lies in social movements, in being involved with voluntaryactivities; it is essentially conformist and ameliorative in nature, intending torepair rather than to address causes. The third form consists of action forsocial change: the individual is involved in activities that aim to change polit-ical and social policies (ranging from letter writing and signing petitions toworking with pressure groups or participating in demonstrations and pressuregroups). Kennedy’s fourth active form is of enterprise citizenship, in whichthe individual engages in such self-regulating activities as achieving financialindependence, becoming a self-directed learner, being a problem solver anddeveloping entrepreneurial ideas.

These distinctions are not necessarily clear-cut, and Nelson and Kerr’s anal-ysis (2006) demonstrates strong cultural variations in what might be consideredas appropriate ‘active’ citizenship. In some countries many of the attributescharacterized as passive and concerned with accepting status are elements ofactive citizenship that are to be encouraged and developed. This may depend

47



on the particular historical development and configuration of the state: in somecountries (perhaps particularly in Europe) there is a greater perception that cit-izenship and national identity may now be seen as social constructs, and thatactive citizenship may embrace a diverse range of relevant political scenarios inwhich to be a ‘politically active citizen’.

Researchers and theorists must consider the way in which ‘political engage-ment’ is understood. While our research indicates a certain level of scepticismtowards political leaders’ intentions, this does not necessarily cover non-traditional areas of youth activity and attitudes, in particular online activitiesand online communities. While we have quoted assertions that young citizenshave become disengaged and apathetic, there is also evidence to suggest thatthey may be engaging in their own ways – with issues that they consider asrelevant to their everyday lives.

METHODS

The work we report here was part of a large study of about 2,800 young people:700 each in Poland, Spain, Turkey and the UK, and divided between one largeurban context, and one small town or rural locality. In each, we selected fourclasses (between 100 to 120 pupils) aged 11–12, 13–14 and 17–18. The field-work was carried out in 2008–2009. Parental and pupil agreement was obtainedfor those under 16 (pupil agreement alone for the older pupils). All data wasmade anonymous, including the identities of the participating schools. Pupilswere asked to respond to a multi-part questionnaire that asked about a rangeof related topics: their hopes and fears for the future (personal, local, and glob-ally), with particular reference to socio-political topics (violence and conflict,economic futures, health, tolerance and diversity); how likely it was that theywould act in particular ways in the future – by voting, for example, or by takingpart in pressure group or NGO activities.

We asked about what kinds of political activities they might engage inwhen they were adult. They were offered five different kinds of activity.Three of these related to easily understandable traditional political activities,voting, standing for office, and joining a political party. One was specifi-cally about non-traditional political activity, campaigning or working with anon-governmental organization. Our fifth activity potentially covered bothtraditional and non-traditional activity: ‘talking about politics with friends’.

For each of these they could indicate ‘definite’, ‘possible’, ‘not sure’ or ‘no’.Responses were entered into an SPSS database and analysed. A chi-squaredtest was used to determine levels of confidence, and all data reported hereis significant at the 95 per cent level or greater (p<0.05). The total numbersresponding varied slightly from question to question, but were between 2,302and 2,344. Following the questionnaires, smaller groups of students were askedto participate in focus groups to discuss their answers in more detail.

THE FINDINGS OF OUR STUDY

Our research shows that many young people intend to participate on politi-cal issues, in a variety of ways, both traditional and non-traditional. They holdstrong, articulated opinions on issues which affect their own lives, althoughthey may demonstrate little patience with political debate, in part because theyfeel that politicians follow their own course, independently from people’s lives.While some may feel that there is little, if anything, to do to change matters,

48



others do not. As has been pointed out, it should not be assumed that childrenand youth are apathetic. Their lack of participation in traditional political pro-cesses may be a way of expressing that dissatisfaction and frustration, or theymay be turning to non-traditional means of political and social engagement.

Table 1 shows that over the entire sample 82% of students were ‘definite’or ‘possible’ future voters, 44.4% thought that they would talk about politicswith friends, 34.2% thought they might join some form of campaigning orga-nization, 17.5% thought that they might stand for election, and 16.5% thoughtthey might join a political party.

Only 2.6% of all respondents said that they did not expect to do any ofthese, so the great majority of these pupils at least considered that they mightparticipate in at least one way; and only 7.3% responded ‘unsure’ or ‘no’ to allfive options. Conversely, only 1.6% said that they expected to participate in allof the five suggested ways.

These overall figures suggest that the great majority of these students con-sider it possible that they will be ‘politically active’ in some way. However,within these overall figures there is a considerable degree of variation as to whointends to participate, depending on how participation is defined. In terms ofoverall intention, it should be noted that Turkish young people showed a sig-nificantly greater propensity to see themselves as politically active in the future.This is seen more clearly as we analyse each political activity in turn.

Voting in elections

Looking first at the most popular intended political action, participating in elec-tions, there is a very clear overall difference between Turkey and the UK. Turkishstudents are more likely to project themselves as future voters and UK studentsleast likely, both by statistically significant margins.

This apparent level of political activity in the UK sample is, however, betterunderstood when looking at the variations in response by age. The 11-year-olds

Definite Possible Unsure No N

%Definite

andpossible

Voting inelections 55.8 26.2 10.2 7.6 2,344 82.0

Talking aboutpolitics withfriends 16.9 27.5 27.8 27.2 2,320 44.4

Joining acampaign or anNGO 11.5 22.7 34.2 31.2 2,320 34.2

Trying to beelected 7.6 9.9 24.1 58.2 2,313 17.5

Joining a politicalparty 6.5 10.0 25.1 57.9 2,302 16.5

Table 1: Responses to ‘When you are an adult, which of the following things do youthink you might do?’

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Country

Poland Turkey Spain UK All

Definitely 56% 74% 58% 39% 56%Possibly 30% 11% 27% 34% 26%Not sure 8% 7% 11% 14% 10%No 6% 8% 5% 12% 8%

Table 2: Responses to the question ‘When you’re an adult how likely is it that youwill be voting in elections?’

are much less likely to vote than those of the same age in the other countries,and at age 17 the intention to definitely or possibly vote is between 89–91% inall four countries. Figure 1 shows these changes in detail. Why are UK 11-year-olds so much less likely to think that they will vote than their peers in the othercountries? And what happens between the ages of 11 and 14 that so increasestheir propensity to vote?

These results showed very little variation by gender, and there were noconsistent gendered patterns by country or by age.

Trying to be elected

The second potential activity (generally far less popular) was to stand for elec-tion. Again, the proportion of Turkish students who are either definitely orpossibly considering standing is significantly higher than in the other countries.

While voting intentions appear to increase with age, the intention to possi-bly stand for election generally seems to decrease with students’ age. This mayreflect a possible increase in political realism linked to age, as older students

50

60

70

80

90

100

11 14 17Age

Pe

rce

nta

ge

Poland

Turkey

Spain

UK

Average

Figure 1: Changes in propensity to vote in elections (definite and possible) by ageand country.Note: scale starts at 50%.

50



Country

Poland Turkey Spain UK All

Definitely 5.2% 20.8% 3.7% 3.9% 7.6%Possibly 5.9% 14.8% 7.8% 12.5% 9.9%Not sure 26.3% 29.5% 19.3% 22.9% 24.1%No 62.6% 34.9% 69.2% 59.1% 58.0%

N 615 461 643 594 2313

Table 3: Responses to the question ‘When you’re an adult how likely is it that youwill stand for election?’

Country

Age Poland Turkey Spain UK All

10–12 year olds Definitely 6% 24% 4% 4% 10%Possibly 5% 20% 12% 14% 13%Not sure 32% 31% 25% 28% 29%No 56% 25% 59% 53% 47%



Table 4: Respondents’ intentions to stand for election, by country and age.

recognize alternative (or more obvious) ways of taking part in the political pro-cess. Table 4 shows the data in full, and Figure 2 shows the declining numberswho are definitely or possibly intending to stand, and the rising numbers ofthose who say they do not intend to stand for election.

Males were more likely than females to consider running for office, in eachcountry, and in each age group (only Polish 17-year-old females were slightlymore likely to seek election than boys).

Talking about politics with friends

Talking about politics with friends was the second most likely predicted activityin the overall sample. While the Turkish students again seem most predisposedto this activity, the Spanish students seem less likely to engage in this activity.

However, there are again variations by age, and this, like voting, is anactivity that seems to be considered more probable as students grow older.

This activity is also gendered, though to a much lesser extent than standingfor election. Males are more likely to say that they will do this, and this generallyincreases with age.

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-60 -40 -20 0 20 40 60 80

11

14

17

11

14

17

11

14

17

11

14

17

11

14

17

Possible Definite Will not stand for election

60 40 20

Poland

Turkey

Spain

UK

Average

Figure 2: Changes in propensity to stand for election by age and country.

Country

Poland Turkey Spain UK Total

Definitely 14.4% 32.9% 10.5% 13.9% 16.9%Possibly 29.2% 27.4% 25.0% 28.7% 27.5%Not sure 28.4% 27.8% 29.4% 25.7% 27.8%No 28.0% 12.0% 35.1% 30.0% 27.2%N 617 468 639 596 2320

Table 5: Responses to the question ‘When you’re an adult how likely is it that youwill talk with friends about politics?’

Joining a campaign or an NGO

Taking part in campaigning groups was seen as a potential activity by abouta third of the whole sample. This figure is significantly raised by the Turkishstudents’ high levels of positive responses: 58% were definitely or possiblyintending to take part in campaigning activity. In comparison, only 17% ofPolish students intended this. The Spanish and the UK students were morelikely to say that this was a possibility, rather than something that they woulddefinitely do.

There were variations by age in the responses: broadly, in Turkey, Spainand Poland older students were less likely to participate, while in the UKthe intention to participate increased with age. At the same time, qualitative

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-70 -60 -50 -40 -30 -20 -10 0

11

14

17

11

14

17

11

14

17

11

14

17

11

14

17

Possible Definite

Poland

Turkey

Spain

UK

Average

70 60 50 40 30 20 10

Figure 3: Changes in likelihood of talking with friends about politics when adult, byage and country.

Country



N 616 468 642 594 2320

Table 6: Responses to the question ‘When you’re an adult how likely is it that youwill join a campaigning group or NGO?’

responses indicated that many students intended to participate in more‘individual’ activism (e.g. buy responsibly, work for health or environmentalimprovements, etc.)

Joining a political party

Joining a political party was generally less popular than campaigning for spe-cific issues. But there were very significant differences between countries.Again, the Turkish students are much more enthusiastic than in any of theother countries, but Polish students’ disaffection with political parties is clearlyevident, as it is, to a lesser extent, in Spain – in both of these countries verysubstantial proportions of students said that they would not join a party.

53



0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

11 14 17Age

Perc

en

tag

e

PolandTurkeySpainUKAverage

Figure 4: Changes in likelihood of joining a campaign or NGO when adult, by ageand country (percentage definite or possible).

Country



N 613 461 641 587 2302

Table 7: Responses to the question ‘When you’re an adult how likely is it that youwill join a political party?’

In both Turkey and the UK there appeared to be particular disillusionmentaround joining a political party in the middle age group: as they approachedleaving school, their intentions rose. The Polish students seemed particularlydisenchanted with political parties, and the Spanish only slightly less so. It isparticularly noticeable that there are, in almost all instances, more respondentsrejecting the idea of political parties outright than there are those who think itpossible that they might join.

There were also gender differences. Males were more likely to intend to joinpolitical parties than females, in every country.

While the rate of membership to more traditional campaigns was relativelylow, in the qualitative data and focus groups, alternative participation in activ-ities related to today’s ‘knowledge society’ was mentioned. Their responsesindicated that they are aware of the transformative potential of new technolo-gies as a means of participation. ‘I would participate in a “cazuela” like we did

54



-40 -20 0 20 40 60 80

11

14

17

11

14

17

11

14

17

11

14

17

11

14

17

Possible Definite Will not join a political party

Poland

Turkey

Spain

UK

Average

40 20

Figure 5: Changes in intention to join a political party.

Country


Males 12% 34% 16% 19% 20%Females 5% 28% 10% 17% 15%

Table 8: Likelihood of joining a political party.

with our SMS messages in the 11-M’ (Spanish focus group of 14 year olds).The respondent is referring to an ‘underground’ movement, begun with thediffusion of texts messages sent by cellphones, in which Spanish youth wereurged to demonstrate on the streets of all the major cities leading up to the2004 elections.

DISCUSSION

These responses show a number of interesting patterns. Intention to take partin voting seems fairly consistent, and most popular, in all countries, and theintention to do so rises as these young people approach voting age.

Far fewer young people consider standing for election, or joining a politicalparty: as students get older any intentions to do so generally decline. This maybe a growing sense of realism in the case of standing for election, but in termsof joining a political party, this may also reflect growing cynicism about thesepolitical institutions (perhaps coupled with an increasing intention to vote).It may also indicate a growing awareness of the potential to make social and

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political changes through less conventional means, such as online campaigningor participating in non-traditional political events.

In terms of ‘conventional’ political activity this data seem to suggest thatthe coming generation of voters will not be very different from their immediatepredecessors:

• They show a propensity to vote (at similar levels that have been commonin elections in recent years).

• Most do not intend to run for office – though a small number seem intenton considering this, and a somewhat higher proportion in Turkey.

• A small number think that they will join a political party – about 6.5%(4.1%, if one excludes the generally more enthusiastic Turks). But this levelmatches adult levels of political party membership in Europe, which hasfallen from 15% of adults in the 1960s (Mair and van Biezen 2001) to anaverage of 3.7% (Lister and Pia 2008).

Informal participation is seen as a more likely form of political activity by theseyoung people. Talking with friends about politics is a more probable activitythan either standing for office or joining a party. This is also more likely tobe a male activity. As students grow older, they feel they will definitely talkabout politics, and are more likely to see this as a definite and possible activity.Other informal political activity, through campaigning, is also a fairly popularintended activity – especially with the younger and the older students. This issignificantly more likely to be a female activity. Polish students were, again, verysignificantly less likely to see themselves as engaging in this.

The Turkish students were most likely to see themselves as politicallyengaged, in both formal and informal politics, at almost all ages. The Polishstudents were generally most disaffected from politics of all kinds, formal andinformal. Spanish students seemed more interested in informal activities – talk-ing and campaigning – rather than working with political parties. UK studentsseemed inclined to engage in both formal and informal activities, though notnearly to the same extent as their Turkish peers.

Formal activities – standing for election and joining parties – appealed gen-erally more to males than females. Males were also slightly more likely to seethemselves as engaging in political discussion. Females, however, were moreinterested in campaigning.

CONCLUSIONS

These findings both support and challenge other studies that suggest that thereis considerable political interest amongst young people in these four countries –though not necessarily political interest in the conventional sense of traditionalparty political activity.

These young people suggest that they will behave politically in very similarways to current generations of adults. The majority will participate in elec-toral activity, but party membership and standing for office will be activitiesfor small minorities (as they are for most adults). Taking action through cam-paigns and campaigning organizations will be important for about a third ofthese young people, and a possible activity for a further third. Approachinghalf of them – 44% – will probably be involved in political discussions withtheir peers; suggesting that political apathy amongst youth is chimerical.

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Young people are being politically socialized to act in ways very similar toadults. The various distinctions between different types of active citizenship,described earlier, are useful in distinguishing different kinds of activity, and inidentifying the propensity or otherwise of different groups to act in one way oranother: for example, in our survey males seemed somewhat more inclined thatfemales to participate in ‘conventional activities’, and females to be involved inless conventional activities. Young people have always been more involved indirect, issue-focused political action than their elders, who are more engagedin traditional forms of activity.

These findings support Blanch’s previously cited observations on the Mun-cia Mais (2005). In Turkey, Lüküslü reports that, despite the affectations ofconsumerism, young people still ‘emphasized that they are concerned aboutthe problems of the country and its future, and that they are interested in whatis going on locally and globally’ (Lüküslü 2005: 34), but see the discourses ofthe political realm as old fashioned ‘ossified structures that prevent youth fromexpressing itself freely’ (Lüküslü 2005: 34), thus preferring to discuss mattersin spheres they see as non-political. This is challenged by our data, whichsuggests Turkish youth have a relatively high propensity to become involved.Griffin (2005) argues that in the UK, ‘once young people in Britain are invitedto discuss politics in their own terms (thereby widening the definition of poli-tics and political participation), then there is evidence of much higher levels ofpolitical interest and activity’ (Griffin 2005: 148).

Our findings concur with those of Forbrig (2005), who observes, despitethe negative views of many traditional observers across Europe, there are also‘[. . .] more optimistic voices [that] stress the changing forms of youth politicalparticipation, away from involvement in conventional democratic institutionsand towards novel patterns of youth engagement’ (Forbrig 2005: 7).

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Henn, M., Weinstein, M. and Wring, D, (2002), ‘A generation apart? Youth andpolitical participation in Britain’, British Journal of Politics and InternationalRelation, 4: 2, pp. 167–192.

Hirschhorn, J. (2006), Delusional Democracy: fixing the republic without overthrow-ing the government, Monroe, ME: Common Courage Press.

Horowitz, E. (2005), ‘The family and the media in the political socialisation ofPolish youth’, in J. Forbrig (ed.), Revisiting youth political participation: Chal-lenges for Research and democratic processes in Europe, Strasbourg: Council ofEurope Publishing, pp. 83–92.

International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA) (2006),Voter turnout by gender, http://www.idea.int/gender.vy.cfm. Accessed 15November 2009.

Ireland, E., Kerr, F., Lopes, J. and Nelson, J. (2006), Active citizenship and youngpeople: Opportunities, experiences and challenges in and beyond school. Citizen-ship Education longitudinal study: Fourth annual report, London: Departmentfor Education and Skills.

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Krzywosz-Rynkiewicz, B., Zalewska, A. and Ross, A. (eds) (2010), FutureCitizens: 21st century challenges for young people, Krakow (Poland): Impuls

Lasswell, H. (1936), Politics: Who gets what, when, how, New York, NY: McGrawHill.

Lister, M. and Pia, E. (2008), Citizenship in contemporary Europe, Edinburgh:Edinburgh University Press.

López Pintow, L. and Gratschew, M. (eds) (2004), Voter turnout in WesternEurope since 1945: A regional report, Strömsborg: International Institute forDemocracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA).

Lüküslü, G. D. (2005), ‘Constructors and constructed: youth as a political actorin modernising Turkey’, in J. Forbrig (ed.), Revisiting youth political partici-pation: Challenges for research and democratic processes in Europe, Strasbourg:Council of Europe Publishing, pp. 29–36.

Mair, P. and Van Biezen, I. (2001), ‘Party membership in twenty Europeandemocracies 1980–2000’, Party Politics, 7: 1, pp. 5–21.

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Attitudes and behaviour in Britain’, Political Studies, 51: 3, pp. 443–469.Pattie, C., Seyd, P. and Whiteley, P. (2004), Citizenship in Britain: Values,

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Review of Sociology, 23, pp. 411–430.Putnam, R. D. (1993), Making democracy work: Civic traditions in modern Italy,

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community, New York NY: Simon and Schuster.Serrano, G., Godás, A., Rodríguez, D. and Mirón, L. (1997), ‘Psychological

profile of Spanish adolescents’, Psychology in Spain, 1, pp. 90–103.Siurala, L. (2000), ‘Changing forms of youth participation’, paper presented

at the round table on new forms of youth participation, Biel, Switzerland,www.coe.fr/youth/research/participation. Accessed 10 November 2009.

Skocpol, T. (2003), Diminished democracy: From membership to management inAmerican civic life, Norman OK: University of Oklahoma Press.

Torney-Purta, J. and Amadeo, J. (2003), ‘A cross-national analysis of politicaland civic involvement among adolescents’, Political Science and Politics, 36,2, pp. 269–274.

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SUGGESTED CITATION

Ross, A. and Dooly M. (2010), ‘Young people’s intentions about theirpolitical activity’ Citizenship Teaching and Learning 6: 1, pp. 43–60, doi:10.1386/ctl.6.1.43_1

CONTRIBUTOR DETAILS

Alistair Ross is currently Jean Monnet ad personam Professor of Citizen-ship Education and Emeritus Professor at London Metropolitan University. Hedirected the EU Academic Network Children’s Identity and Citizenship in Edu-cation from 1998 to 2008, and was Director of the Institute for Policy Studies inEducation from 2000 to 2009. He has particular academic interests in children’ssocial and political learning, in diversity and social equity in education. Hismost recent book, A European Education: Citizenship, identities and young peo-ple (2009) is published by Trentham. He is currently making a study of youngpeople’s identities in the ‘borders’ of Europe.

Melinda Dooly is currently Head of Graduate Studies for the language andliterature teaching methods department, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona.She is the author of various journal articles and books dealing with language

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teacher training and citizenship education. She has been a guest teacher at uni-versities in Europe and the USA and has participated in several internationaleducational projects. She is the national coordinator (Spain) of the AcademicNetwork Children’s Identity and Citizenship in Europe (linking over 100 uni-versity departments in 30 countries (1998–2009). She has recently edited a bookentitled Their hopes, fears and reality: Working with children and youth for thefuture (Peter Lang, 2010), based on the study discussed here.

Contact:

Alistair Ross ([email protected]), Institute for Policy Studies in Educa-tion, London Metropolitan University, 166–220 Holloway Road, London N78DB, UK

Melinda Dooly ([email protected]), Universitat Autónoma deBarcelona, Facultat de Ciencies de l’Educacio, Edifici G5-108, Bellaterra(Barcelona), E-08193, Spain

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CARLA L. PECKUniversity of Alberta

LAURA A. THOMPSONAcadia University

OTTILIA CHAREKASt. Francis Xavier University

REVA JOSHEEOntario Institute for Studies in Education/University of Toronto

ALAN SEARSUniversity of New Brunswick

From getting along todemocratic engagement:Moving toward deepdiversity in citizenshipeducation

KEYWORDS

citizenship educationCanadamulticulturalismdiversityeducational policy

ABSTRACT

For much of Canada’s history, diversity has been a defining characteristic of the coun-try and has preoccupied and bedevilled policymakers. Policy and practice in Canadahas moved from attempts to assimilate minority groups to fostering respect and appre-ciation for diversity. We argue, however, that attention to diversity education remainssuperficial and limited. In this article we provide an overview of policy and practice in

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Carla L. Peck, Laura A. Thompson, Ottilia Chareka, Reva Joshee, and Alan Sears

education about and for diversity in Canada, make connections between that and pol-icy and practice in citizenship education. We also review findings from research in thearea, and lay out possible directions for moving the field forward. Like other democ-racies Canada has struggled to balance recognition and respect for diversity withconcerns about social cohesion and we believe Canada’s unique experience in this areacan provide valuable insights to researchers and practitioners in other jurisdictions.

INTRODUCTION

In 1837 the British colonies of Upper and Lower Canada were both torn apartby rebellions. The following year Lord Durham (1839) was dispatched by thenew Queen Victoria to help sort out the mess and reported:

I expected to find a contest between a government and a people: I foundtwo nations warring in the bosom of a single state: I found a struggle, notof principles, but of races; and I perceived that it would be idle to attemptany amelioration of laws or institutions until we could first succeed interminating the deadly animosity that now separates the inhabitants ofLower Canada into the hostile divisions of French and English.

Until the mid-twentieth century, policy and practice generally followed LordDurham’s sentiments in seeking, as much as possible, to stamp out diversityin favour of a single, shared (English-)‘Canadian’ identity. Since World WarII, official policy has shifted first toward openness and then toward celebra-tion of Canada’s diversity, including recognition of minority ‘nations’ withinthe Canadian state (Sears 2010).

Kymlicka posits that, over the past several decades, this trend towardgreater recognition and accommodation of diversity has been common acrossvirtually all the western democracies. He argues that this is true in severalrespects: increased autonomy for national minorities; a move away from policesof assimilation of immigrants toward integration; and greater recognition ofthe rights of indigenous peoples. Canadian policies have largely followed thesetrends and have not been particularly unique. However, ‘Canada is distinctivein having to deal with all three forms of diversity at the same time’ and ‘in theextent to which it has not only legislated but also constitutionalized, practices ofaccommodation’ (Kymlicka 2003: 374, original emphasis).

In this article we provide an overview of policy and practice in educationabout and for diversity in Canada, make connections between that and policyand practice in citizenship education, review findings from research in the area,and lay out possible directions for moving the field forward. Like other democ-racies Canada has struggled to balance recognition and respect for diversitywith concerns about social cohesion and we believe Canada’s unique experi-ence in this area can provide valuable insights to researchers and practitionersin other jurisdictions.

THE EVOLUTION OF DIVERSITY POLICIES

Contemporary factors related to globalization, including changing patterns ofmigration and citizenship have created ‘a growing awareness of the multi-ethnic nature of most contemporary nation-states and the need to account

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From getting along to democratic engagement: Moving toward deep diversity in citizenship education

for this aspect of pluralism in public policy’ (Johnson and Joshee 2007: 3). ForCanada this is not a particularly new phenomenon. As Kymlicka notes, ‘issuesof accommodating diversity have been central to Canada’s history’ (Kymlicka2007: 39). Jaenen, for example, argues that certain conditions of Canada’s his-torical development make it uniquely suited to pluralism. He posits four factors:the English-French dualism, which has been ‘a fundamental characteristic ofCanadian society’ (Jaenen 1981: 81) since the Loyalist migration at the endof the eighteenth century; the more diverse British, rather than exclusivelyEnglish, nature of early Anglophone Canada; the separation of church andstate (and relative religious liberty that has always existed in Canada); and thefact that control over education was made a provincial, rather than a federal,responsibility.

Joshee and Winton (2007) contend this diversity was recognized early onin legal and constitutional structures. They note that ‘The Royal Proclamationof 1763’ recognized aboriginal right to self-government and the ‘Québec Actof 1774’ ensured that French language and culture would be maintained, eventhough the territory of Québec had come under British control. The same ethosis reflected in the constitutional arrangements that established the Canadianstate in 1867. ‘The founding compact of Canada’, they write, ‘implicitly recog-nized the value of retaining a connection with one’s ancestral culture’ (Josheeand Winton 2007: 22). These constitutional arrangements included a divisionof powers between the federal and provincial governments largely establishedto protect ‘la nation canadienne française’ (Morton 1993: 51) and prevent thekind of assimilation advocated by Lord Durham.

Since 1867 constitutional reform has broadened the range of nationalminorities accorded constitutional recognition and protection, and has alsoembedded multiculturalism as an interpretive frame for the constitution (Kym-licka and Norman 2000; Kymlicka 2003). For example, aboriginal rights, includ-ing treaty rights, are affirmed in the ‘Constitution Act of 1982’. This act alsoestablishes English and French as the official languages of the province of NewBrunswick, largely to protect the place of the Acadian People who have a defi-nite understanding of themselves as a national group within Canada. Central tothe act is The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms with a clause that states,‘This Charter shall be interpreted in a manner consistent with the preservationand enhancement of the multicultural heritage of Canadians’ (Department ofJustice 1982).

The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms also has a clause that recog-nizes and protects Canada’s official language minorities and their educationalrights to French first-language schooling (outside Québec) and to English first-language schooling (in Québec). While section 23 of the charter provides fora constitutional guarantee of educational rights at the federal level, Albertaand Ontario have also introduced provincial policy documents that outline therole and aims of francophone education in particular. In 2001, the Alberta gov-ernment introduced a framework for French first-language education in theprovince: this specifies the importance of francophone education focusing oncommunity belonging and pride (Alberta Learning 2001). In 2005, the Ontariogovernment also implemented a policy for the province’s French-languageschools and francophone community. The Ontario policy specifically mentionsthat new admission policies, to take effect in January 2010, were developedin response to the changing composition of the province’s francophone com-munity and the need to make French-language schools ‘more welcoming’ toFrench-speaking newcomers and to newcomers who speak neither French nor

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English (Ontario Ministry of Education 2009). The Government of Canada, inits commitment to Canada’s linguistic duality and the future of official languageminority communities, continues to target urban centres in Ontario, Albertaand New Brunswick to attract and retain more French-speaking immigrants(Jedwab 2002; Quell 2002).

DIVERSITY IN THE CURRICULUM

Since the nineteenth century in Canada, education has been a central institu-tion for the implementation of policy in the area of diversity and multicultur-alism. Joshee (2004) and others have documented shifts in educational policyand practice related to ethnic diversity over the years, from an emphasis onassimilation, to more contemporary efforts to promote understanding of, andrespect for, diversity (Bruno-Jofré and Aponiuk 2001; Hébert 2002).

While there is evidence of a retreat from the activist social justice curric-ula which appeared in some jurisdictions in the 1980s and 1990s, developingunderstanding of ethnic diversity is a key goal of education generally, and socialstudies education in particular, across the country, and this includes schoolsfor Canada’s francophone minority communities (Joshee 2004; Osborne 2001;Sears and Wright 2004). For example, Ontario guides curriculum develop-ment in all subject areas by stating that the principles of anti-racism andethnocultural equity ‘should equip all students with the knowledge, skills, atti-tudes, and behaviours needed to live and work effectively in an increasinglydiverse world, and encourage them to appreciate diversity and reject discrim-inatory attitudes and behaviour’ (Ontario Ministry of Education and Training1993). While this 1993 document applies to all Ontario’s schools (includ-ing francophone schools), the more recent Aménagement linguistique policyspecifically guides francophone curriculum development in all subject areasfor French first-language schools. One of its principles states that ‘French-language education is characterized by openness to diversity and contributesto the development of a sense of belonging to the francophone communityof Ontario, of Canada and of the world’ (Ontario Ministry of Education 2005:12). The Foundation for the Atlantic Provinces Canada Social Studies Curriculum,a policy document that outlines a framework for curriculum development insocial studies across Atlantic Canada, sets overall standards for the subject areain general and the area of diversity in particular (Atlantic Provinces EducationFoundation 1999). One foundation standard states that students should be ableto ‘demonstrate understanding of their own and others’ cultural heritage andcultural identity’ (Atlantic Provinces Education Foundation 1999: 6). Anotherstates, in part, that ‘students will be expected to demonstrate an understandingof culture, diversity, and world view, recognizing the similarities and differencesreflected in various personal, cultural, racial and ethnic perspectives’ (AtlanticProvinces Education Foundation 1999: 12). The Alberta social studies curricu-lum (Alberta Education 2005) also clearly identifies diversity as a central toits educational goals. The programme rationale and philosophy reads, in part:‘Students will have opportunities to value diversity, to recognize differences aspositive attributes and to recognize the evolving nature of individual identi-ties’ (Alberta Education 2005: 5). The Alberta social studies programme alsoaims to provide learning opportunities for francophone and non-francophonestudents alike to understand both ‘the historical and contemporary realitiesof francophones in Canada’ and ‘the multiethnic and intercultural makeupof francophones in Canada’ (Atlantic Provinces Education Foundation 1999:

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4). As Sears and his colleagues (Sears, Carke and Hughes 1999: 113) note,this commitment to ‘the pluralist ideal’ is endemic in Canadian social studiescurricula.

An examination of curricula and standards in social studies education inCanada reveals a clear assumed progression from knowledge of diversity,through acceptance and respect, to justice. For most scholars and educatorsin the field however, knowledge of difference is not enough: ‘justice demandsthe public recognition and accommodation of diversity (Kymlicka and Opal-ski 2001: 1). The desired end then is not only an understanding of difference,but also willingness to adapt, to accommodate and to advocate for accommo-dation (Joshee 2004; Varma-Joshi 2004). Kymlicka contends that diversity andaccommodation of difference is a question on the agenda of a growing numberof countries around the world. He argues, there is ‘a striking worldwide trendregarding the diffusion and adoption of the principles and policies of multicul-tural citizenship’ which has reached way beyond the West, to ‘even the mostremote regions of Peru, the highlands of Nepal, and the peripheries of Com-munist China’ (Kymlicka 2004: xiii). However, Banks notes that ‘the attainmentof the balance that is needed between diversity and unity is an ongoing processand ideal that is never fully attained’ (Kymlicka 2004: xii). A central concernwherever cultural policy is discussed is, ‘how can we ensure that the recogni-tion of diversity does not undermine efforts to construct or sustain commonpolitical values, mutual trust and understanding, and solidarity across grouplines? (Kymlicka 2004: xiii).

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN DIVERSITY AND CITIZENSHIP

The centrality of diversity in Canadian history and contemporary circumstanceshas been a key factor in shaping policy in citizenship and citizenship education.In Kymlicka’s words, ‘Learning how to accommodate this internal diversity,while still maintaining a stable political order, has always been one of the mainchallenges facing Canada, and remains so today’ (Kymlicka 2003: 368).

A key component of citizenship in any country is the people’s identifi-cation with the nation, in other words, their sense of national identity. Oneresult of the significant diversity present in Canada has been the search to dis-cover, or create, some sense of shared national identity. An American observerwrites, ‘National identity is the quintessential Canadian issue’. He goes on toargue, ‘Almost alone among modern developed countries Canada has contin-ued to debate its self-conception to the present day’ (Lipset 1990: 42). McLean(2007: 7) documents early twentieth century attempts by federal parliamen-tarians to create a national education system largely to address a perceived‘crisis of citizenship’ including the lack of a sense of Canadian national identity.When the first Canadian ‘Citizenship Act’ was proclaimed in 1947 a leadingadvocate of citizenship education wrote, ‘Canada is legally a nation, but theCanadians are scarcely yet a people’ (Kidd 1947: n.p.). More recent writers havemade the point that, while Canada exists as a state, it is not a nation in thesense of Canadians sharing a profound sense of ‘group affinity and shared val-ues’ (Resnick 1994: 6). The fear of deep differences and lack of understandingamong Canada’s disparate peoples and regions has been a dominant theme ofliterature in the fields of citizenship and citizenship education in Canada.

Curtis describes this process of ‘public construction’ in nineteenth centuryOntario (Curtis 1988: 111, original emphasis). He argues that in establishingearly public education the state was concerned with the overlapping functions

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of institution building and ‘political characterization of the population’. He alsodocuments the long and often contested process of centralizing state controlover schools, curriculum and teachers, contending that this was a deliberateeffort to take control of education away from parents and local communitiesso the state could be more effective in using education for political socializa-tion. According to Curtis, the elites who pushed for, and achieved, universalpublic schooling in Canada in the nineteenth century were concerned about‘the creation in the population of new habits, orientations, [and] desires’ thatwere consistent with ‘the bourgeois social order’ including ‘respect for legiti-mate authority’ and for standards of a ‘collective morality’ (Curtis 1988: 366). AsBruno-Jofré writes, ‘The public school was conceived as an agency for nationalunity and social harmony’ (Bruno-Jofré 2002: 114).

The standards of collective morality to be inculcated in early English Cana-dian schools were essentially British in nature. In Canada’s early years, schoolhistory courses and other subjects focused on Britain and the Empire, and patri-otic ceremonies and symbols were not directed toward the new nation buttoward the growing empire.

English speaking children were raised with the historical myths of Britishnationalism, as conveyed by adapted editions of the Irish National Readerand authors as diverse as MacCauly and G.A. Hently. What mere Cana-dian citizenship could compete with the claims of an empire that spannedthe known universe?

(Morton 1993: 55)

DIVERSITY AND CITIZENSHIP EDUCATION

Bruno-Joffre argues that citizenship education in schools, at least until the endof World War II, was focused on supporting this orientation. During this period,she writes, ‘the aim of public schools in English Canada was to create a homo-geneous nation built on a common English language, a common culture, acommon identification with the British Empire and an acceptance of [certain]British institutions and practices’ (Bruno-Joffre 2002: 113). While this approachto citizenship education did violence to the linguistic and cultural traditionsof many, it was particularly devastating for Canada’s aboriginal Peoples. Bat-tiste and Semaganis describe something of this ‘cognitive imperialism’ arguingit was, and largely still is, an attempt to extinguish ‘Aboriginal conceptions ofsociety’ (Battiste and Semaganis 2002: 93).

The focus on Britishness as a state constructed, unifying national identitybegan to wane during World War II for several reasons, including the declineof Britain and the British Empire as major forces in the world. Most impor-tantly, however, it simply was not working. Although early public schooling wasdecidedly assimilationist (the ideal of the British Empire and the goal of ‘Angloconformity’) it was largely unsuccessful in unifying the population. Non-Britishnewcomers to Canada did not identify with the empire and clung doggedly totheir ethnic communities and loyalty to distant homelands (Granatstein 1993).Furthermore, French Canadians in Québec did not identify with the BritishEmpire, but rather relied heavily on the Catholic Church for governance from1867 until the 1960s. Given the religious nature of the Québec educationalsystem, religion was far more important as a social-educational institutionthan ‘social studies’ curriculum. To put it more accurately, the Church was

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the curriculum: teaching moral and patriotic values was the primary focus of‘history’ and ‘geography’. As Lévesque writes:

This nation-building approach to history and geography was very muchfocused on the survival of the French Canadian nationality and the cleri-cal ideologies that made this ‘église-nation’ unique in Canada. EnglishCanada was treated as a separate imperialist nation, with a differentlanguage, culture, and religion.

(Lévesque 2004: 58)

Such a strong religious and nationalistic emphasis on a French-Canadian andCatholic nation suggested that, when the time came to ‘catch up’ with EnglishCanadian and American social studies initiatives, Québec would undergounprecedented educational reform from the 1960s to the 1990s in order to‘modernize’ their national-religious society. Currently in Québec, history andcitizenship education does not focus on a nation-building approach, but ratheron a more inclusive and pluralistic approach (Lévesque 2004). Thus, the chal-lenge remains to develop, teach and learn shared conceptions of citizenship,history, and identity.

In more recent years, the attempt to create civic cohesion around a largelyBritish identity has given way to a focus on respecting, celebrating and accom-modating diversity. While pluralism and inclusion are central to the rhetoric ofsocial studies and citizenship education policy and programmes across Canada,we argue it has largely been an iconic rather than a deep pluralism. From the1970s the idea of education as a doorway for individuals and groups to feelincluded in the mainstream civic life of Canada has extended to at least attemptto include the voices of a range of previously marginalized or excluded groups.This has resulted in a widespread educational policy framework that promotesthe ‘pluralist ideal’ (Sears, Clark and Hughes 1999: 113). Central to this is anactivist conception of citizenship in which every citizen, or group of citizens,will have the knowledge, skills and dispositions needed to participate in thecivic life of the country and feel welcome to do so. As Sears and Hughes put it,good citizens in this conception

are seen as people who are: knowledgeable about contemporary soci-ety and the issues it faces; disposed to work toward the commongood; supportive of pluralism; and skilled at taking action to make theircommunities, nation, and the world a better place.

(Sears and Hughes 1996: 134)

It is important to note that what citizens are being included in, then, is notcitizenship in the ethnic or sociological sense of belonging to a community but,rather, they are being included in the community of those who participate, whojoin in a process.

In this approach the deeper more potentially difficult aspects of differenceare largely avoided, in part because they are complex, difficult to deal with andhave the potential to generate conflict. In studies of policy and practice in sev-eral Canadian provinces Bickmore found that schools and teachers generallyavoided difficult issues with high potential for conflict including those involvingethnicity and identity. Instead, they focused on what she calls ‘harmony build-ing’ and ‘individual skill building’ (Bickmore 2005a: 165), approaches rooted in

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conflict avoidance. The first includes attention to the ‘appreciation of diversecultural heritages’ but does not explore the real difference between and amongthose heritages.

Bickmore (2005b: 3) argues that teachers largely avoid more difficultapproaches to citizenship inherent in opening up and exploring identitybecause their own background, preparation and opportunities for professionaldevelopment have not provided them with the tools needed.

To teach for democratization, in the context of student diversity and glob-alization, requires more substantive knowledge, more skills, and morecomfort with openness and uncertainty than to teach for unquestioneddominant ‘common sense’. This can feel overwhelming, especially fornovice teachers.

(Bickmore 2005b: 3)

These overlapping desires, to avoid neo-colonialism and social conflict,have largely underpinned the move to generic approaches to citizenshipeducation, which do not do justice to the complexities of difference andaccommodation in contemporary life.

In the policy arena this avoidance is sanctioned through the language of‘social cohesion’. Social cohesion is a term that gained currency in Canada inthe 1990s and is now a key goal of the federal multiculturalism policy (Joshee2009). In its most benign form, social cohesion is about maintaining a conflict-free society where citizens put their trust in the state to work on their behalf.Within recent Canadian policy discussions diversity has been named as a ‘chal-lenge to social cohesion’ (OECD 2004) and the federal minister for citizenship,immigration, and multiculturalism has proclaimed that the focus on socialcohesion is important because it prevents young people from new immigrantcommunities ‘getting into trouble’ (Kenney 2009a). The minister’s concern isnot that Canadians learn to engage with diversity, and each other, in a deepand meaningful way but rather than diversity results in ‘ethnic enclaves’ andleads young people to ‘criminality or extremism,’ which undermines safety andsecurity (Kenney 2009b). Following from this logic, diversity is something to beavoided at all costs.

The other limiting aspect of Canada’s approach to diversity in citizenshipeducation is virtually complete inattention to developing the kinds of trans- orsupra-national understandings of citizenship that globalization makes possibletoday alongside national understandings. The Canadian state’s internal strug-gles with multiple forms of diversity have often led to a national navel gazingas it struggles to maintain social cohesion and foster some sense of nationalidentity. There was a surge of interest in global education curricula in the late1980s and early 1990s (Sears and Hughes 1996) but that has largely waned andCanadian social studies and citizenship programmes overwhelmingly focus onCanadian issues, themes and topics. Citizenship education in Canadian schoolsstill focuses, almost wholly, on creating citizens to operate in the context of thenation state.

Osler and Starkey discuss balancing complex and cosmopolitan identities.They write, ‘The young people in our research demonstrated multiple anddynamic identities, embracing local, national and international perspectives.An education for national citizenship is unlikely to provide a sufficiently com-prehensive context for them to integrate their own experiences and identities’(Osler and Starkey 2003: 252). Similarly, Hébert describes a recent study of

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second-generation youth in three Canadian cities who ‘demonstrated theircapacity to engage in three forms of mobility: mobility of mind, body, andboundary, all forms of mobility responding to globalization’ (Hébert 2010: 235).In spite of the potential capacity of young people to engage with wider concep-tions of citizenship, Canada and (recent evidence would suggest) many othercountries (Reid, Gill and Sears 2010) have been paralysed by perceived tensionsbetween fostering diverse identities and social cohesion, and have not movedbeyond nation-centred approaches to citizenship education.

BREADTH AND DEPTH: A CALL FOR FUTURE RESEARCH

Essential for moving forward toward a citizenship education that engages crit-ically and productively with Canada’s deep diversity is a more substantialunderstanding of just what that diversity is and how people – particularlystudents and teachers – conceptualize it. In April 2008, the Association forCanadian Studies reported that 12.9 million people living in Canada indicatedthey had multiple ethnic backgrounds on the 2006 census: an increase of 15 percent from 2001 figures (Jedwab 2008: 8). The report stated that, ‘at this rhythm,by 2021, should the question on ethnicity remain unchanged, the majority ofCanadians will likely be “hyphenated” ’ (Jedwab 2008: 8). Although there areno clear-cut definitions of ethnicity or ethnic diversity – indeed, Pryor et al.describe ethnicity as a ‘conceptual maze’ (Pryor et al. 1992: 215) – theoristsagree on a number of characteristics (Barker 1999; Hall 2003). First, ethnic-ity is fluid and plural in nature. The enunciation of one’s ethnic identity maychange depending on the social, political, and/or cultural context in which onefinds oneself. Second, the development of ethnic identity is both a personaland social process, which occurs through inter- and intra-group boundary for-mation. Individuals look not only within themselves, but also ‘within group’for clues to their ethnic identity. Individuals also take cues from the larger soci-ety – people, social, and political institutions – to define their identity. Finally,some of the markers associated with ethnic identity include language, reli-gion, appearance, ancestry, regionalism, non-verbal behaviour, values, beliefs,cultural symbols and practices.

We believe that in order to understand an individual’s propensity to accom-modate diversity we must first understand the variety of ways he/she constructsor conceptualizes it. If knowledge is the starting point for both respect and jus-tice, it seems strange to us that there is almost no research in Canada on howyoung people or teachers understand ethnic diversity. Constructivist researchin science and mathematics has produced a growing body of knowledge aboutthe way young people understand important concepts and ideas in those fields.In social education, history educators have made a significant start at buildingthe same kind of knowledge base for how students understand historical ideasand processes (Levstik and Barton 2008; Peck 2009).

Outside of that work, very little has been done to map how young peo-ple and teachers understand the social world in general and ethnic diversity inparticular. Despite the fact that advocates of multicultural education argue that‘educators . . . have to have an understanding of how their students under-stand difference and adjust delivery of the material accordingly’ (Varma-Joshi2004: 152), little has been done to provide them with that understanding. Verylittle research on prior knowledge of topics related to multiculturalism or diver-sity, in Canada or internationally, exists. Some notable exceptions include thework of Varma (2000), who found that elementary students in Moncton, New

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Brunswick (NB) envisioned Canada and Canadians as ‘white-only’; Short andCarrington (1992), whose research with British students found that studentswho received religious education had more sophisticated understandings ofthe term ‘Jewish’ than those who did not; and Peck and Sears (2005) and Peck,Sears and Donaldson (2008), who found that NB students lacked sophisticatedunderstandings of ethnic diversity, with some not recognizing expressions ofethnic identity (such as wearing the hijab) at all. These studies comprise thefew qualitative studies that focus on understandings of versus attitudes towardethnic diversity, and all of these focus on students’ understandings, not thoseof teachers. Given that teachers are responsible for interpreting and imple-menting school curricula generally, and outcomes related to ethnic diversityin particular, an investigation of their understandings of ethnic diversity seemswarranted.

We do not contend that a simple accumulation of knowledge of diversitywill be the cure for all the diversity-related ills of Canadian society. However,it seems to us that, without even a basic understanding of what it means to beMuslim, or Jewish, or Hindu, or francophone, or Jehovah’s Witness, or (fill inthe blank), young Canadians will have difficulty understanding formal formsof accommodation such as The Charter of Rights and Freedoms or more informaland local forms of accommodation. They will also have limited sense of how toengage with the wider world in civic activities beyond the national context.

CONCLUSION

While western liberal-democratic forms of citizenship and civic engagementare often traced to their presumed origins in ancient Greece, close examina-tion shows they are very different. As Samons argues, ‘To put it simply, neitherAthenian thought nor Athenian society ever became fundamentally demo-cratic in the modern sense with its emphasis on political rights rather thansocial duties’ (Samons 2004: 11). That is not to say that there is no connectionbetween the two but it is to argue that democracy is a fluid concept shiftingin meaning and form across both time and contexts. One could hardly expectthe representative democracy of a modern nation state to mirror exactly thatof an ancient city state. Similarly, we should expect that the democracy of apostmodern globalized world would look different again. A key challenge forcitizenship education in Canada (and elsewhere) is to look beyond modernistforms to try to anticipate and shape the democracy that is yet to come.

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SUGGESTED CITATION

Peck, C.L., Thompson, L.A., Chareka, O., Joshee, R., and Sears A. (2010), ‘Fromgetting along to democratic engagement: Moving toward deep diversity incitizenship education’ Citizenship Teaching and Learning 6: 1, pp. 61–75, doi:10.1386/ctl.6.1.61_1

CONTRIBUTOR DETAILS

Carla L. Peck is assistant professor of social studies education in the depart-ment of elementary education at the University of Alberta. Her researchinterests include students’ understandings of democratic concepts, diversity,identity, citizenship and the relationship between students’ ethnic identitiesand their understandings of history. She is currently principal investigator onan SSHRC-funded research project designed to map students’ and teachers’understandings of ethnic diversity.

Laura A. Thompson is an assistant professor of social studies and curriculumstudies at Acadia University’s School of Education. Her research interests focuson exploring how Canadian francophone communities outside Québec inter-sect with identity formation and notions of belonging within various publicspaces, including educational and cultural heritage institutions.

Ottilia Chareka is an assistant professor in the faculty of education at St.Francis Xavier University. She obtained her DAUS, M.Ed. and Ph.D. fromthe University of New Brunswick. Her areas of specialization are citizenshipeducation, multicultural education, global education, and human rights educa-tion. She teaches quantitative and qualitative research methods in education,programme evaluation and school data management, critical research liter-acy in education, educational research methods and global education in theM.Ed. program. She also teaches social studies, inclusive practices and diversecultures in the B.Ed. programme.

Reva Joshee is an associate professor and chair of the department of theory andpolicy studies of the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the Universityof Toronto where she teaches courses on social diversity and policy studies. Herresearch examines issues of citizenship, diversity, and policy in India, Canada,and the United States. She is co-editor (with Lauri Johnson) of MulticulturalEducation Policies in Canada and the United States (2007, University of BritishColumbia Press).

Alan Sears is a professor in the faculty of education at the University of NewBrunswick. His research interests include citizenship education, social stud-ies education, history education and educational policy. He has directed anumber of national studies on the policy and practice of citizenship educa-tion in Canada. He is currently principal investigator on an SSHRC-funded

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research project designed to map young people’s understanding of key ideasand concepts related to democratic citizenship.

Contact:

Carla Peck, Ph.D.Assistant Professor, Social Studies EducationDepartment of Elementary Education551 Education SouthUniversity of AlbertaEdmonton, AB Canada T6G 2G5


Laura A. Thompson, Ph.D.School of Education, Box 57Acadia UniversityWolfville, Nova Scotia, Canada B4P 2R6


Ottilia CharekaSt. Francis Xavier UniversityFaculty of EducationBox 5000, Antigonish, Nova Scotia, Canada B2G 2W5


Reva JosheeChair, Department of Theory and Policy Studies in EducationCo-Director, Centre for Leadership and DiversityOISE, University of Toronto252 Bloor Street WestToronto, ON CanadaM5S 1V6


Alan SearsFaculty of EducationUniversity of New BrunswickP.O.Box 4400Fredericton, NB E3B 5A3Canada


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GREGORY P. FAIRBROTHERThe Hong Kong Institute of Education

Alternative policy measuresfor improving citizenshipeducation in Hong Kong

KEYWORDS

citizenship educationHong Kongpolicy instrumentcurriculumactive citizenshipnational identity

ABSTRACT

Despite adjustments to Hong Kong’s citizenship education since the 1990s transitionperiod to Chinese sovereignty, survey research and public opinion suggest that citizen-ship education, as currently practised in Hong Kong, shows considerable continuitywith the pre-1997 period and is not achieving intended results in areas such as thedevelopment of national identity and active citizenship among students. This articleaims to contribute to explanations for such ineffectiveness and to determine whetherthere are more effective government policy measures which could improve the provi-sion of citizenship education. Specifically, the article explores the question of whetherthe Hong Kong government should mandate a compulsory, independent subject of cit-izenship education at the secondary school level. Based on interviews with sixteeneducation leaders from government bodies, education concern and advocacy groups,teachers’ unions, citizenship education-related teachers’ associations, student asso-ciations, political parties, and academia, it addresses more specific questions aboutthe intended outcomes of citizenship education, the role of government in attempt-ing to achieve those outcomes, the strengths and weaknesses of current citizenshipeducation practice, suggested methods for improving upon ineffective practices, andthe possibility of (and obstacles to) mandating an independent citizenship educationsubject. The article concludes that while making citizenship education compulsorywould address many concerns about its current ineffectiveness, the independent sub-ject approach would not necessarily help to achieve improved outcomes and wouldraise other substantial concerns from the education community and society at large.

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Gregory P. Fairbrother

INTRODUCTION

The goal of this article is to explore the question of whether the Hong Konggovernment should mandate a compulsory, independent subject of citizenshipeducation for secondary schools. It does so by reporting the views of educa-tion leaders on specific questions about the role of government in attemptingto achieve citizenship outcomes, the strengths and weaknesses of current citi-zenship education delivery, suggested methods for improving upon ineffectivepractices, and the possibility of (and obstacles to) mandating an independentcitizenship education subject. The article bases its discussion of citizenshipeducation upon Janoski’s definition of citizenship as ‘passive and active mem-bership of individuals in a nation-state with certain universalistic rights andobligations at a specified level of equality’ (Janoski 1998: 9). Along these lines,citizenship education first covers teaching and learning about membershipin the nation state, including national identity, national history and culture,national values and morals, and other knowledge and attitudes shared bymembers. Second, citizenship education functions to arm learners with knowl-edge of and attitudes toward citizens’ shared rights and duties, including thoseof political participation.

Since 1985 the Hong Kong government has recommended that schoolsconvey citizenship education through one of three approaches: permeation,whereby relevant content is incorporated into the teaching of multiple subjectsthroughout the school curriculum; as an integrated subject, such as integratedhumanities or social studies; or, as an independent school subject (Morris andMorris 2001). In support of implementation of any of these modes, the govern-ment issued civic education guidelines in 1985 and 1996 and renewed directionon moral and civic education in the 2002 Basic Education Curriculum Guide(Fairbrother 2006a). The merely advisory nature of these guidelines, however,has resulted in considerable diversity in the interpretation of the aims of citizen-ship education, disparity among schools in attention to implementation, andcommunity and scholarly concern about the appropriate balance among civic,moral, democratic, and patriotic emphases (Cheng 2004; Fairbrother 2006a;Law and Ho 2004; Lee and Sweeting 2001; Leung and Ng 2004; Leung 2008;Morris and Morris 2001; Tse 2007; Yuen and Byram 2007).

These concerns about the nature and implementation of citizenship educa-tion have been compounded by research findings and community perceptionsof numerous inadequacies with regard to the citizenship knowledge and atti-tudes of Hong Kong youth. Comparative research has found that youth arerelatively weak in knowledge of and positive attitudes toward the nation (Fair-brother 2008), relatively politically passive and disengaged (Kennedy, Hahnand Lee 2008), and below international means with regard to economic andsocial responsibilities, positive attitudes toward the nation, and support forwomen’s political rights, even as they are above international means in civicknowledge and trust in government and the media (Lee 2003). Popular per-ceptions of youth within the Hong Kong community have focused on theweakness of their social morality, civic consciousness, political understandingand interest, national pride, and numerous other social and political attitudes(Fairbrother 2005).

Accompanying these concerns have been numerous calls in Hong Kongsociety and political circles for citizenship education to be instituted as a com-pulsory, independent subject in the secondary school curriculum (Fairbrother2006a). In essence, these calls are for the government to shift from the policyinstruments of capacity building measures and decentralization to a mandate,

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Alternative policy measures for improving citizenship education in Hong Kong

in the interest of securing more effective implementation of citizenship educa-tion (McDonnell 2004; McDonnell and Elmore 1987). This would bring HongKong into line with other societies using a compulsory, independent subjectapproach to citizenship education (Torney-Purta, Schwille and Amadeo 1999).However, because such a move would also move Hong Kong’s citizenshipeducation practice closer to that of Mainland China, there has been concernin some sectors that an independent, compulsory subject would amount toindoctrination (Fairbrother 2006a).

This article does find that concern about indoctrination is one aspect ofresistance to an independent, compulsory approach to citizenship educationamong leading educators, but also that this is but one of several more practicalconcerns about effective implementation. These concerns are revealed throughinterviews with sixteen education leaders from government bodies, educationconcern and advocacy groups, teachers’ unions, citizenship education-relatedteachers’ associations, student associations, political parties, and academia, asone part of a large project addressing the question of what Hong Kong’s educa-tion policymakers, relevant interest groups, principals, and teachers view as themost appropriate and effective form of citizenship education for Hong Kong interms of its aims, content, and delivery.

METHODS

The following sections report the views of sixteen education leaders on thefollowing questions:

• How can the government best support the achievement of expectedoutcomes of citizenship education?

• What are the strengths of current citizenship education practice?• What current practices in citizenship education are relatively weak or

ineffective?• How could citizenship education be improved?• What would be the potential for an independent, compulsory subject of

citizenship education?

The sample of interviewees was drawn based on an open-ended socio-metric,by which interviewees were selected based on their reputations in the fieldwhile allowing for an enlarged sample as interviewees recommended otherswho could provide insight into the relevant issues (Kennedy, Lo and Fairbrother2004).

Interviews, conducted in Cantonese, were carried out between April andAugust 2009, with respondents assured of anonymity and confidentiality.Interviewees were most familiar with the permeation and integrated sub-ject approaches adopted by most Hong Kong secondary schools, and mainlydiscussed the independent subject approach as a potential alternative.

The interviews were intended to be exploratory, with the objective of gain-ing insight into the nature of attitudes on the issue of curricular approach,and the interview schedule was semi-structured along the lines of the aboveresearch questions. Analysis of the responses consisted of identifying andclosely examining portions of responses according to the main themes ofexpected citizenship education outcomes, strengths and weaknesses of cur-rent practice, areas and potential methods for improvement, and obstacles

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to moving toward an independent subject approach. Interviewees’ responses,based on a small sample, were taken not to be representative of any largergroups, but rather to demonstrate a range of views on the questions at hand.In the following presentation, therefore, actual numbers of responses are notreported, lest they give an impression of broader levels of support for one oranother view. Also, because of the qualitative nature of answers, without aquantitative instrument allowing interviewees to indicate their level of agree-ment or disagreement, it is not possible to indicate the comparative strength oftheir views.

THE ROLE OF GOVERNMENT IN ACHIEVING CITIZENSHIPEDUCATION OUTCOMES

In discussions, interviewees addressed the question of how the Hong Konggovernment could support the achievement of numerous outcomes, includingnational identity, critical thinking, and knowledge of rights and responsibili-ties. Their answers emphasized the importance of placing citizenship educationon the policy agenda, as well as mandates and inspection, capacity buildingmeasures, and the devolution of curriculum delivery. First, noting that policyimplementation in Hong Kong was a largely top-down process, the govern-ment, and the Education Bureau in particular, was called upon to place citi-zenship education more squarely on its policy agenda. With policy only partlydependent upon pressure from the public and the Legislative Council, HongKong’s executive-led government would be able to swiftly implement any mea-sure. While some interviewees claimed that the government had already donemuch to support citizenship education (most recently with priority accorded to‘national education’ and an overall review of moral and civic education withinthe 2001 and 2002 curriculum and basic education reforms), others felt thatstrong government action on citizenship education was hindered by politicalconsiderations, resulting in, for example, a very narrow approach to nationaleducation. Others felt that the government did not regard citizenship educa-tion as important, exemplified by an apparent lack of clear vision, the absence ofrelevant consultations or policy documents in comparison to previous admin-istrations, no comprehensive planning or evaluation, no standard curriculum,and the inclusion of moral and civic education in the curriculum only as one offive ‘other learning experiences’.

One option mentioned by several interviewees would be for the gov-ernment to mandate for all schools an independent, compulsory subject ofcitizenship education, as it had done with the subject of liberal studies inthe senior secondary curriculum. Such a move would be followed by schoolsand textbook publishers making the necessary arrangements to accommodatethe change, and by the government inspecting schools to ensure that imple-mentation was taking place. The implications of this potential measure will beelaborated toward the end of the article.

An alternative policy instrument currently utilized by the government tosupport schools’ implementation of citizenship education is that of capacity-building, including the provision of a set curriculum and relevant resources.Building upon 1985 and 1996 guidelines on civic education, in 2002 the Cur-riculum Development Council (CDC) designed and since then has encouragedthe implementation of a ‘moral and civic education’ curriculum framework.The CDC recommends this central curriculum to schools as a reference, with

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schools encouraged to make use of and adapt it to the needs of their teachersand students. It provides the direction, approach, and strategies for moral andcivic education, emphasizing both moral and civic education through a holistic,values-based approach. This framework was revised, updated, and expandedin 2008.

Some interviewees commended the government for providing additionalresources for citizenship education since Hong Kong’s return to Chinesesovereignty in 1997. First, it has sponsored and organized professional develop-ment programmes for teachers, including short-term programmes, seminars,and workshops. Second, it has developed additional teaching and learningresources with a regular updating of online resources for schools’ use. Third,the Education Bureau itself has organized various citizenship-related activi-ties for students. Particularly prominent has been the provision of resourcesfor national education, with study tours to Mainland China organized andsubsidized by the government.

Despite these measures, several interviewees felt that resourcing was insuf-ficient and that the government needed to increase the level of support toschools and teachers. As an example, there has been no teaching load reductionfor citizenship education coordinators in schools, who are left with little time todesign coherent programmes. Financial resources provided by the governmentare also limited, and comprehensive training for teachers is lacking.

For other interviewees, the government’s resourcing of specific citizenshipeducation activities was problematic. For some, government involvement inthe provision of citizenship education was viewed as interference, because ofits conservative nature. Specific mention was made of the inadvisability ofthe government’s organization and sponsorship of study tours to MainlandChina for teachers and students. Such resources should instead, accordingto some interviewees, be provided directly to schools to be used at theirown discretion. A related issue was that of content, with concerns that thesetours would only highlight China’s positive achievements without touchingupon the sensitive issues of censorship, freedom of expression, and one-party rule. Therefore, the government was advised by some to continue andexpand the current practice of funding non-governmental organizations todevelop citizenship-education teaching materials and programmes. On theother hand, this approach was alternatively viewed by some as evidence of gov-ernment neglect and an abdication of its leading role in citizenship educationprovision.

A related policy instrument at the government’s disposal for promotingthe implementation of citizenship education is the devolution of authorityfor implementation to organizations and schools. Along these lines, inter-viewees explained that with only a few schools actually operated by thegovernment, most Hong Kong schools are government-subsidized but actuallyoperated by a variety of school sponsoring bodies, which each enjoy a relativelyhigh degree of autonomy in implementing certain education policies. Underthese circumstances, while the government provides the planned curriculum,decisions on its actual implementation are devolved to schools, mediatedby their sponsoring bodies (see also Morris and Morris 2001). The result isconsiderable diversity in citizenship education practice, ranging from conser-vative to anti-establishment, with schools permitted to adapt the curriculumframework according to the mission, vision, and tradition of their sponsoringbodies as well as the views of school leaders and the needs of teachers andstudents.

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THE STRENGTHS OF CURRENT CITIZENSHIP EDUCATION PRACTICE

This autonomy, flexibility, and diversity in delivery was viewed by some inter-viewees as one of the key macro-level strengths of Hong Kong’s citizenshipeducation provision, given Hong Kong’s complex political and social conditionsunder ‘One country, two systems’. Within the limits of the ‘education ordinanceand education regulations’ – the legal basis by which the government guardsagainst biased political education in schools and calls on teachers to presentinformation only in an unbiased, objective, and rational manner (see Fair-brother 2006b) – schools and teachers are free from government interferenceto make decisions on how to deliver citizenship education. They may chooseamong permeation, integrated subject, and independent subject approaches;choose to emphasize local, national, or global perspectives; and choose theappropriate blend of Chinese or western concepts based on diverse overseasmodels of citizenship education. Within the general approaches, schools areoffered the choice of delivery through the subjects of economic and publicaffairs, social studies, integrated humanities, civic education, or other relevantsubjects, and are free to decide upon appropriate pedagogies, extra-curricularactivities, and teaching materials. Among the teaching materials and teacher-training programmes available are those produced and organized by a varietyof concerned non-governmental organizations of diverse religious and politicalbackgrounds.

The independent subject approach was mentioned by some as an effec-tive practice in that it guaranteed that citizenship education enjoyed a setproportion of the school timetable. Others considered that treating citizen-ship education as a form of whole-school education was particularly effectivesince its scope was very broad, relevant to numerous school subjects, andencompassing of knowledge, skills, and values. In this respect, citizenship edu-cation effectively integrated classroom learning and practical activities, as wellas both the formal and hidden curriculum, as recommended in the 1996 civiceducation guidelines. An interdisciplinary, permeation approach was seen aseffective, based on a perception of the successful cultivation of citizenshipqualities among the latest generation. In this way, citizenship education, andin particular elements of national education, could be infused into nearly allschool subjects, ranging from economic and public affairs to Chinese history,geography, biology, and chemistry.

THE INEFFECTIVENESS OF CURRENT CITIZENSHIP EDUCATIONPRACTICE

Discussions with interviewees revealed a plethora of perceptions of weak-nesses and ineffective practices in citizenship education. Some weaknesseswere specifically attributed to the government’s overall management of citizen-ship education. One aspect of this overall strategy, the granting of autonomy toschools to choose a specific curricular approach, was seen by some as a prob-lem because it offered schools too much discretion as well as a choice betweentwo ineffective curricular approaches.

As described earlier, there were perceptions of a general neglect of citi-zenship education by a government lacking the will to implement it properly.Specific criticism was made of the broad scope of citizenship education, whichhindered teaching in the absence of clear government guidelines. Hong Kong’sapproach was described as unorganized, unsystematic, ad hoc, and neglectful

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of a clear progression of intended outcomes for different grade levels. Fur-thermore, government policy was seen as inconsistent and dependent uponpolitical considerations of the time. These factors made it difficult for teachersto know what to teach and created worry about moving citizenship educationpractice in the wrong direction.

Thus, while the autonomy granted to schools in citizenship educationdelivery was perceived by some as a strength, for other interviewees it sig-nified the government’s foregoing of its own responsibility. Autonomy wasalso seen as creating a series of other problems. First, the variation amongschools accompanying autonomy was viewed by some as problematic, withdifferent schools teaching similar topics through different curriculum and activ-ities, implying different understandings of citizenship education. Second andmore problematic, autonomy meant variation in the level of attention paidby different schools, with conscientious schools organizing numerous activ-ities and ambivalent ones few. Third, autonomy left too much to chance,with provision dependent upon individual schools’ will, effort, and the abil-ity and personality of individual school leaders. All of this meant that it wasnearly impossible to comprehensively assess and measure schools’ citizenshipeducation performance.

Autonomy in implementation was also interpreted by some as contributingto the potential for biases or imbalance in specific emphases of citizenship edu-cation in different schools, seen as a reflection of a lack of societal consensuson major socio-political issues. Some considered citizenship education con-tent to be overly moralistic and focused on ethics, with schools focusing theirefforts on the relatively safe arenas of family, community, moral, and sex educa-tion. Others saw current citizenship education discourse as too politicized andcritical. Along this line, inappropriate practices included inviting politicians orradio talk-show hosts to give talks to students, discussing controversial politi-cal events such as the Tiananmen Incident, and even using newspaper articlesfor class discussion, all because of the potential for anti-government, negativebias.

Related to this was considerable discussion of potential bias reflective oftwo of Hong Kong’s major political camps: the pro-democracy camp and thepro-Beijing patriotic camp. Bias toward the democratic camp was seen as exem-plified by an overemphasis in citizenship education on human rights and therule of law, and a neglect of national history, education about contemporaryChina, and the encouragement of students to support Chinese governmentpolicies. Others conversely perceived that education in democracy and humanrights were neglected, especially after 1997, pointing to some schools’ percep-tion of human rights education as subversive and worries that students taughtmore about their rights would abuse them. Along similar lines, there were per-ceptions of an increasing overemphasis on national education and propaganda,to the detriment of ‘civic education’, creating potential for schools to promote asubmissive citizenship. Some criticized national education for being one-sidedand inconsistent with reality, particularly by only presenting China’s positiveachievements. Patriotic rituals such as the flag-raising ceremony were singledout as formalities with no educational purpose other than indoctrination.

As discussed earlier, some interviewees perceived the whole-school perme-ation and integrated subject approaches as a strength. Others saw the choice ofthese approaches granted by school autonomy as creating a variety of problems,implying that autonomy and choice basically resulted in further ineffectiveness.The permeation approach was explicitly mentioned as ineffective by several

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interviewees. According citizenship education only very limited space in thecurriculum was seen as insufficient, especially compared to societies where itconstituted a formal subject in the curriculum, such as Mainland China, Tai-wan, and the United States. The result was perceived to be unrealized learningoutcomes.

Fundamentally, the permeation approach was viewed as according cit-izenship education only superficial treatment. It was described as diluted,perfunctory, piecemeal, unsystematic, ridiculous, laughable, infrequent, frag-mented, and limited. The permeation approach was seen to represent an overallneglect of citizenship education, with few schools allocating significant time forrelated education and activities, only conducting it in their spare time. Someinterviewees perceived that schools were ambivalent and unwilling to exert theeffort at best, and engaged in self-censorship at worst. This type of situationresulted from schools’ own lack of civic consciousness and ideals and an instru-mental approach to education as human resources training. Schools’ numerouspriorities were seen to rest outside citizenship education, with emphasis insteadplaced on students’ academic results, preparing for public examinations, andother activities that improved schools’ reputation and enhanced their account-ability to the public. Permeation, integrated approaches were seen as having nolasting impact on students, making it difficult for students to engage in deepthought about citizenship issues, and providing them with few opportunitiesto express their own opinions.

Within schools, the non-compulsory, integrated nature of citizenship edu-cation affected teachers’ attitudes as well. Few teachers saw it as useful,important, or meaningful and were thus reluctant to teach it. Teachers ofestablished subjects in the curriculum paid little attention to integrating intofixed subject syllabuses non-examined citizenship education elements, and sawtheir primary responsibility as faithfully teaching their subjects and preparingstudents for examinations. Teachers lacking in civic consciousness and idealswould also lack the passion to motivate their students to understand diffi-cult and potentially sensitive concepts and issues. There was even a perceptionthat teachers (most of whom had grown up during Hong Kong’s colonial era)lacked national identity and were concerned more with their own rights thancontributing to the nation.

The lack of attention accorded by schools and teachers to whole-schoolapproaches to citizenship education was seen as affecting students’ attitudestoward it. For the most part students were not interested in citizenship educa-tion, treated it as unimportant, lacked the motivation to participate in relatedactivities, and were often bored by it. This was because the subject was notexamined, students had often learned related content in earlier stages of edu-cation or in other activities, and because many teaching materials being usedwere outdated.

IMPROVING CITIZENSHIP EDUCATION

Some interviewees maintained that any reform of and improvement inHong Kong’s citizenship education practice would require substantial societalchange and democratization. Other more realistic suggestions for improve-ment reflected the very problems with citizenship education identified above,but revealed the lack of consensus even among this small group of intervie-wees. Citizenship education content could be improved by increased emphasiseither on morals and values or on civic and political issues. An overemphasis on

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content concerned with democracy, law, and rights could be assuaged by morecontent on national education and responsibility, and vice versa. Alternatively,a good balance among different concepts and elements could be sought andrelated teaching resources more evenly distributed. While some felt that citi-zenship education should be made more relevant to students’ daily lives, otherssuggested the enhanced use of patriotic rituals. Others saw improvement com-ing more from a stronger emphasis on critical thinking, even encouragingstudents to be more critical of China, with discussions of both positive and neg-ative events in Chinese history fostering a more comprehensive understandingof their nation among students. One interviewee concluded that citizenshipeducation should transcend the political divisions in society to strive to beunbiased, balanced, critical, and factual.

Interviewees suggested several ways the government could increase itssupport for citizenship education. The provision of enhanced teacher trainingand the production of additional teaching resources (and funding to non-governmental organizations to produce an even wider variety) would help todemonstrate that the government acknowledged the importance of citizen-ship education. Another government measure would be to issue new clearguidelines to schools and develop a curriculum with clear targets for eachgrade level to meet students’ needs and avoid repetition and overlap of cur-ricular content. Even more broadly, it was suggested that the governmentestablish a task force to comprehensively review citizenship education pol-icy, conduct consultation, and develop a revised overall plan for citizenshipeducation.

For some interviewees, such a plan should maintain the spirit of autonomygranted to schools to implement citizenship education according to their needsand strengths, a strategy again perceived as less subject to government con-trol. Citizenship education would continue to be school-based, but would beclearly distinguished from teaching to prepare students for public examination.Rather than mandating an independent compulsory subject, some compulsorycomponents of citizenship education could be formally integrated into subjectsthroughout the existing curriculum, ensuring that all students would learn basiccitizenship concepts. Such an enhanced permeation approach would help tofoster students’ interdisciplinary understanding and thinking skills, in additionto fostering their civic consciousness.

THE POTENTIAL FOR A COMPULSORY, INDEPENDENT SUBJECT OFCITIZENSHIP EDUCATION

For other interviewees who viewed permeation and integrated subjectapproaches as empty talk and fundamentally unfeasible because of a lack ofroom within existing subject curricula to infuse further content on citizenship,citizenship education would only be improved with the mandate of an inde-pendent, compulsory subject, placing it on par with other school subjects. Thisapproach would help to ensure a comprehensive, systematic method of deliv-ery, with a well-structured curriculum, clear guidelines, and targets for studentachievement in each grade. The subject could consist of several modules cover-ing, for example, key concepts of national identity, rights and responsibilities,the rule of law, ethics, and family values. This approach is similar to that ofMainland China and Taiwan; content would focus on the core principles ofcitizenship, but would be delivered not only through classroom teaching but

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also through games, field trips, project learning, dialogue, enquiry, discussion,debate, drama, and exchange programmes. One alternative would be to atleast formalize Chinese history as an independent compulsory subject ratherthan the current approach of infusing its content into the subject of integratedhumanities.

Supporters of a compulsory, independent subject expected that with thegovernment taking the lead in this way, other supporting features would follow.For example, textbook publishers would publish citizenship education text-books and teaching materials; the subject would be taught by teachers withspecialist training; and students’ achievement would be assessed, providingextrinsic motivation for students to focus attention on learning. It was alsosuggested that assessment measure not only knowledge but also take intoconsideration students’ moral attitudes and behaviour.

To make such a move, and to enhance the effectiveness of citizenship edu-cation, a number of obstacles would need to be overcome. First, if assessed,an independent subject would need to manage Hong Kong’s examinationculture and emphasis on knowledge acquisition, memorization, and the recita-tion of facts. Related to this would be concerns of citizenship educationamounting to ideological indoctrination, one-sided national education, valuestandardization, and government intervention. Suggestions for overcomingthese obstacles included emphasizing the development of students’ criticalthinking skills and the use of a variety of pedagogies and activities. This, inturn, would require overcoming the obstacle of a lack of qualified teacherswith specialist knowledge and able to make use of non-traditional pedagogies,through government planning and support for citizenship-education teachertraining.

An additional obstacle would be the perennial concern about a lack of cur-riculum space for an additional independent subject, with the time allocatedto other subjects needing to be reduced or other subjects eliminated. Relatedto this would be the question of the slippery slope, with other integrated andpermeated subjects also potentially clamouring for compulsory, independentstatus. This in turn raised the fundamental question of the very rationale formandating an independent subject, with interviewees asking what the objec-tive criteria were for such a move and whether teachers and students wouldunderstand the purpose of the subject. Interviewees also noted that an addi-tional shift in education policy could be viewed with resentment and resistanceamong schools, parents, and students.

Interviewees also noted that experience had shown that only a few schoolshad voluntarily chosen the independent subject approach to citizenship edu-cation, raising the issue of school autonomy in choosing citizenship educationcurricular approaches. With a mandated independent subject, schools wouldlose this autonomy, would have less flexibility in implementation, and wouldpotentially have different understandings of the subject based on their back-grounds and sponsoring bodies. There was also a related concern about acompulsory, independent subject going against what was seen as a worldwidetrend towards curriculum integration.

A final obstacle to mandating an independent subject would be the lackof societal consensus over its value and content. Interviewees predicted thatunder Hong Kong’s current political and social circumstances, planning forthe citizenship education curriculum would involve heated public debate andsubstantial difficulties in reconciling diverse opinions. These difficulties would,potentially, not end with the mandate: different school sponsoring bodies

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would still understand the concept of citizenship differently and there wouldbe continuing societal contention over its delivery.

Overcoming these last obstacles would require concerted effort on thepart of the government. Extended consultation over the content would berequired, and the government, schools, and teachers would need to workclosely together to decide how to deliver the subject. The government wouldalso need to demonstrate its determination, publicly recognize and empha-size the importance of citizenship education, and strongly encourage itsimplementation.

Supporters of an independent subject were optimistic about its potential,noting that the government had been successful in mandating the subject ofliberal studies in the recently reformed senior secondary school curriculum.Others, however, were less hopeful, stating that the larger political environ-ment would not permit such a move until Hong Kong had made furtherprogress toward democratization and rid itself of traditional values and colonialideology through generational change.

CONCLUSION

This article set out to answer the question of what Hong Kong’s educationpolicymakers and relevant interest groups view as the most appropriate andeffective form of citizenship education for Hong Kong in terms of its aims,content, and delivery. It has specifically focused on whether the Hong Konggovernment should mandate a compulsory, independent subject of citizenshipeducation for secondary schools. The article concludes by taking each sectionabove as an angle from which to view this question.

From the first angle of policy instruments at the disposal of the govern-ment, it is clear that Hong Kong relies on capacity building and devolutionof authority to schools for implementation, rather than a mandate. The inter-view data presented in this article first suggest that a potential shift in policyinstrument would first require the government to place citizenship educationmore firmly on its policy agenda than is currently the case. With regard to theadvantages of specific instruments, McDonnell and Elmore (1987) suggest thatmandates are the instrument most likely to produce compliance with and uni-formity of efforts toward intended goals. With regard to current policy, however,while there appeared to be concern among some interviewees that capacity-building measures and resources provided by the government were insufficient,the level of resourcing was not such that implementation was significantly hin-dered. Similarly, while devolution of implementation to schools appeared toresult in diversity in the nature and level of delivery, because of the Hong Kongeducation system’s well-established tradition of autonomy, such diversity withregard to citizenship education was, to some extent, actually valued more thancondemned.

Viewing the question from the second angle of the strengths of current citi-zenship education practice, we can ask the question of whether a mandate of acompulsory, independent subject would significantly enhance those strengths.Many of the strengths identified in interviews existed regardless of the cur-ricular approach, and school autonomy and the permeation and integratedsubject approaches were explicitly identified by some interviewees as strengthsin themselves. While some viewed a compulsory, independent approach asa strength, it was again unclear whether, on balance, this approach wouldoutweigh the benefits of other approaches.

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From the third angle of weaknesses of citizenship education practice, wecan ask the question of whether a mandated compulsory, independent sub-ject would resolve the major issues. On one hand, it is possible that such amove would help to make citizenship education more systematic, uniform,focused, and balanced, and encourage schools, teachers, and students to treat itmore seriously. Here, however, we could break up the question to ask whetherwhat is important is the mandated and compulsory nature of citizenship edu-cation or, alternatively, the independent subject approach. From the specificweaknesses identified, it appears that a mandate of compulsory citizenshipeducation (accompanied by clear direction and firm guidance) would improveon ineffective practices, but that an independent subject alone would not do so.

From the fourth angle of recommendations for the improvement of citi-zenship education, we can ask whether a mandated compulsory, independentsubject would better achieve improvement. Again the answer to this questionappears to require examining the mandate and compulsory nature of deliveryseparate from the curricular approach. Many of the suggestions offered wereperipheral to the curricular approach, and most boiled down to stronger orga-nization, direction, balance, support, and resourcing. A mandate of compulsorycitizenship education could contribute to these, but again an independentsubject alone would not necessarily do so.

The final section of the article explicitly addressed the question of the advis-ability and implications of mandating a compulsory, independent subject ofcitizenship education. In conclusion, we can first ask whether the identifiedbenefits of doing so would also be achievable through other approaches. Look-ing closely at these identified benefits, it would appear that the improvementsmight not take place without a government mandate of some form of compul-sory citizenship education, but that they could actually come from varying cur-ricular approaches and would not necessarily require an independent subject.With regard to overcoming the various obstacles to a shift of government pol-icy and curriculum approach, interviewees themselves suggested appropriatemethods, drawing attention to concerted effort, determination, and resources.The only obstacle to a mandated compulsory, independent subject that wouldbe impossible to overcome would appear to be any strong sentiment for schoolautonomy in making decisions on the delivery of citizenship education.

Given the numerous considerations at the levels of society, governmentpolicy, the education system, schools, curriculum, pedagogy, teachers, and stu-dents explored in this article, there appears to be insufficient support for theidea of the Hong Kong government mandating a compulsory, independentsecondary school subject of citizenship education. More worthwhile to improvecitizenship practice and outcomes, however, would appear to be a mandate thatsome form of citizenship education be compulsory, with decisions on how todeliver it within this requirement left up to schools. The possibility of such amove occurring, however, given the range of opinion in society represented bythe interviewees in this study, would seem to depend upon the appearance ofstrong policy advocates in Hong Kong’s evolving political context.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The research upon which this article is based was funded by a Public Pol-icy Research Funding Scheme project (HKIEd8001-PPR-3) of the Hong KongResearch Grants Council. Kerry Kennedy and Leung Yan Wing providedvaluable feedback and Ng Hoi Yu provided invaluable research assistance.

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Kennedy, K. J., Lo, Y. C. and Fairbrother, G. P. (2004), ‘Directions for the futureof schooling in Hong Kong: vision and reality in a post-colonial society’,International Journal of Educational Research, 41, pp. 534–542.

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Tse, T. K.-c. (2007), ‘Whose citizenship education? Hong Kong from a spatialand cultural politics perspective’, Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics ofEducation, 28: 2, pp. 159–177.

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SUGGESTED CITATION

Fairbrother, G.P. (2010), ‘Alternative policy measures for improving citizenshipeducation in Hong Kong’ Citizenship Teaching and Learning 6: 1, pp. 77–90, doi:10.1386/ctl.6.1.77_1

CONTRIBUTOR DETAILS

Gregory P. Fairbrother is associate professor in the department of social sci-ences and associate dean (research and postgraduate studies) of the faculty ofarts and sciences at The Hong Kong Institute of Education. His primary areasof research include citizenship education, political socialization, education pol-icy, and student political attitudes in Hong Kong and Mainland China. Hismost recent research has dealt with the politics of citizenship education pol-icymaking and implementation in Hong Kong; the influence of schooling andcritical thinking on Hong Kong and Chinese students’ national attitudes; andprovincial-level citizenship education policy implementation in China. He isthe author of Toward Critical Patriotism: Student Resistance to Political Educationin Hong Kong and China (2003, Hong Kong University Press).

Contact:

Gregory P. FairbrotherThe Hong Kong Institute of Education10 Lo Ping RoadTai Po, New TerritoriesHong Kong


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PENNY ENSLIN AND NICKI HEDGEUniversity of Glasgow

A good global neighbour:Scotland, Malawi and globalcitizenship

KEYWORDS

global citizenshipgood neighbourpartialityglobalismfencesbordersScotland-Malawi

partnership

ABSTRACT

Used to express the international aspirations of Universities Scotland, the idea ofthe good global neighbour is reflected in the 2005 ‘Cooperation Agreement’ betweenScotland and Malawi and represents a challenging metaphor for global citizenship.We develop a critical but sympathetic account of the idea of the good global neigh-bour and its uptake in Scotland. The notion of the global neighbour is identified asa form of qualified moral partiality, appropriate to the shifting understandings ofgeographical borders occasioned by globalization. In this article, we highlight thatthis qualified partiality is reflected in Scottish policy, and its historical basis is alsodescribed. Finally, in considering a potential postcolonial criticism of this deploymentof the idea of the good global neighbour, we reflect on implications for higher educationpolicy in Scotland and its implicit assumptions about global citizenship.

GOOD GLOBAL NEIGHBOURS

The term ‘good global neighbour’ has been used by Universities Scotland(2007a), the body that represents Scotland’s higher education institutions(HEIs), in describing their collective aspiration to friendship and understand-ing with the rest of the world. This goal seems to accord with the more specificaim declared in the Cooperation Agreement between Scotland and Malawi

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Penny Enslin and Nicki Hedge

(Scottish Government 2005a) to work together in a civic coalition for theirmutual benefit. Jack McConnell, then First Minister of Scotland, declared thatthe agreement ‘intertwines our small countries to a shared future together’.In doing so McConnell pointed to the duty of elected politicians as ‘citizensof the world’ to be ‘good neighbours’, playing their part in addressing globalchallenges (Scottish Government 2005b: 8).

The notion of the global neighbour indicates a shift from long entrenchedassumptions about relations between citizens – from fellow citizens within thedomestic confines of a sovereign nation state to a much wider, global frame.A global perspective is now widely regarded as a necessary feature of citi-zenship education (Dower 2003; Osler and Starkey 2005). Under globalizedconditions, expansive conceptions of citizenship of the kind espoused in theScotland-Malawi agreement are now commonly depicted in national policieson education and on international development, in which assumptions aboutcloser associations between national citizens and those of other sovereignstates are explicitly or implicitly present. Yet, having acknowledged this shift inour conception of citizenship, the idea of the global neighbour demands closerscrutiny, given the common use of the term ‘neighbour’ to refer to someoneliving close by, and of the term ‘neighbourhood’ as the area in which we live.And what is it to be a good neighbour to those not physically proximate, espe-cially as the term ‘neighbour’ usually connotes physical proximity but can alsosuggest moral distance?

The metaphor of the good global neighbour is a complex if not puzzlingone. In the critical conceptual exploration that follows we will largely supportthe broad assumptions underpinning the idea of the good global neighbour asexpressed in Scottish government policy, while raising and addressing somepotential issues that need to be addressed in developing a defensible under-standing of the concept. In this discussion we begin with an account of theScotland-Malawi agreement and the aims and assumptions declared to under-pin that partnership. We then explore the idea of the global neighbour, notinghow its emergence indicates a shift in international ethics from those of thebounded Westphalian state to the more nuanced forms of partiality created byglobalization. In concluding with an assessment of how Scottish universitiesappear to be pursuing the objective of being good global neighbours, we willconsider the potential objection that the good global neighbour is merely theexpression of either an ethically suspect politics of benevolence or competi-tive self-interest. Although this discussion takes Scotland as its example, as theprofessional context in which the authors are positioned, our intention is toraise and address challenges of global citizenship likely to be relevant to similarcontexts and transnational initiatives.

THE SCOTLAND-MALAWI AGREEMENT

The Cooperation Agreement of 2005, endorsed and extended since 2007 bythe now Scottish National Party-led (SNP) minority administration, set outto reflect a partnership1 in which combined expertise and skills would fight

1 The signing of the 2005CooperationAgreement followedthe launch, in 2004, ofthe Scotland MalawiPartnership (seehttp://www.scotland-malawipartnership.org/)which coordinatesand provides servicesto a number oforganizations andindividuals involved ininitiatives withMalawians, in closecollaboration with theScottish government.We take the terms ofthe 2005 agreement asa civic vision forScotland’s partnershipwith Malawi.

poverty and support Malawi in pursuit of its ‘Millennium Development Goals’(MDGs). Targeted at the broad streams of civic governance, sustainable eco-nomic development, health and education, the partnership’s educational ini-tiatives include support for teacher education and exchanges, twinning schoolsand higher education institutions, vocational and further education, and sup-port for empowerment of vulnerable groups. ‘Good neighbours’ here are clearly

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A good global neighbour: Scotland, Malawi and global citizenship

not those in close spatial proximity (Edinburgh and Lilongwe are some 8482kilometres from each other), but are linked instead by a shared history thatbegan with the missionary work of David Livingstone; thus we are told that for‘150 years Scots have worked with the people of Malawi, helping them developbasic education and health systems’ (Scottish Government: Scotland’s Linkswith Malawi, n.d.).

Notwithstanding these commonalities, there are striking inequalitiesbetween these two countries. The Scottish Government’s ‘Malawi EconomicBrief’ notes that ‘Malawi is one of the ten poorest countries in the world withan income per person of around $160 per year: 170 times less than the aver-age Scot’s income’ (2005c: 8). Scotland and Malawi are comparatively smallcountries, but with a population more than double that of Scotland, Malawi’seconomy is only a little over 1% of the size of Scotland’s. Further compar-isons point to significant differences with, for instance, the number of MalawianHIV/AIDS orphans approximating the population of Edinburgh, life expectancyhalf of that of the average Scot, children under five 27 times more likely to diethan those in Scotland, one qualified teacher for every 95 pupils compared toone for every 14.9 pupils in Scotland, and some 60% of the population livingbelow the poverty line in Malawi. Currently Malawi ranks 160 out of 182 coun-tries on the United Nation’s (2009) human development index with the UnitedKingdom ranking at 21. In 2005, when the Scotland-Malawi agreement wassigned, the World Bank suggested that Malawi was unlikely to reach any of theMDGs by 2015 apart from primary school enrolment.2

2 In 2008, the Malawi‘MillenniumDevelopment GoalsReport’ is rather moreoptimistic, suggestingsome of the MDGtargets – eradicatingextreme poverty andhunger, achievinguniversal primaryeducation, reducingchild mortality,combating HIV/AIDS,malaria and otherdiseases, ensuringenvironmentalsustainability anddeveloping a globalpartnership fordevelopment – are ontrack and all goals arelikely to be met withthe exception ofuniversal primaryeducation, which isprojected to be only‘potentially feasible’.

Malawi’s aspiration to fulfil such development goals indicates challengesfor the exercise of citizenship, whether understood in terms of the role thateducation plays as both a citizen right and in promoting opportunities for itsexercise, or in relation to achieving those levels of health and material prosper-ity that enable the full exercise of citizen rights. That Scotland’s citizens, whilefacing their own collective problems as an unequal post-industrial society, donot have to aspire to a similar set of development goals, sums up both theinequalities between these two countries and the conditions of global injusticein which their friendship is enacted. Alexander McCall Smith, author and donorto the Malawi appeal, starkly acknowledges this: ‘Scotland and Malawi are oldfriends. We are rich; they are not’ (McCall Smith 2005: 1). Such inequalitiesbetween the partners could make for an unequal if not patronising relationship,a risk to which we return later.

Against this backdrop, in the Scotland-Malawi agreement there is muchemphasis on principles of equality, reciprocity and mutual benefit. The agree-ment refers to the relationship between the two countries as a reciprocalpartnership based upon increased collaboration, sharing experiences and skills,recognition of the needs of the two countries, and their long-standing friend-ship. The emphasis on mutuality is notable, expressed in references to areciprocal partnership in which mutual needs are recognized as the cooper-ating partners’ collaboration enables them to learn from each other, helping,supporting, exchanging, sharing, linking and twinning. The Scottish govern-ment described its friendship and partnership with Malawi as not only ‘uniqueand historic’; the agreement between the two countries was ‘for the longterm . . . signed in a spirit of tolerance, solidarity and respect’. For McConnellthe partnership would not only benefit Malawi, for the relationship would‘make Scotland a better place too’ (Scottish Government 2005b: 8).

Following the transition to SNP leadership in 2007 the agreement remainsintact, with the government committed ‘to developing the special relationship

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that exists between our two countries as a distinct programme’ (ScottishGovernment 2009) within its international development policy (Scottish Gov-ernment 2008a). That policy reflects a commitment to advance ‘Scotland’splace in the world as a responsible nation by building mutually beneficiallinks with other countries’ (Scottish Government 2008a). The policy notes the‘distinctive contribution’ Scotland can make to developing countries as it rec-ognizes its ‘global responsibility’, supporting the work of the UK Departmentfor International Development (DFID) but ‘building upon both the historicaland contemporary relationships that exist between Scotland and many coun-tries within the developing world’, through development that will ‘in turn helpsupport an inclusive society in Scotland’. Key values and principles underpin-ning the international development policy locate the needs and priorities ofdeveloping countries as ‘paramount’ suggesting that whilst ‘Scotland will learnand benefit from the experience of working in partnership with developingcountries . . . these benefits will not detract from the development strategies andpriorities identified by developing countries’.

Committing some £3 million a year to its work with Malawi, in the spendingreview period from 2008 to 2011, the partnership will reflect the develop-ment policy ‘emphasis on country-led identification of need, organizationaland institutional capacity building and community-led development’ (ScottishGovernment 2008a). There is a continuing emphasis on mutuality of concernand benefit, alongside a balance of power and directionality. One neighbour,Scotland, is not responsible for setting the agenda in Malawi; rather the workof the partnership will reflect the ‘development priorities of the Government ofMalawi and the intelligence gained from the independent review of projects inMalawi’ (Scottish Government 2009).

Implicit in this partnership lies a set of aspirations about relations betweenthe citizens of Scotland and Malawi. But what, in a global context, are we tounderstand by the claim that this evolving policy is an expression of neigbourli-ness? Scrutinising the idea of the neighbour, we find a concept of considerablecomplexity in relation to who one’s neighbour is, how one relates to them, whatwe owe our neighbours – whether proximate or distant – and why. In commonusage, a neighbour is someone who lives nearby. Yet their proximity does notnecessarily mean either intimacy or extensive obligations; even good neigh-bours may enjoy and indeed prefer relationships that are polite but bounded,hence the common belief that ‘good fences make good neighbours’.

THE IDEA OF GLOBAL NEIGHBOURS

Considering this idiom in the context of changing conceptions of territorialborders, John Williams (2003: 25) notes the continuing intuitive appeal of bor-ders as fences that promote peaceful interaction. Invoking Robert Frost’s poem‘Mending Wall’, in which two neighbours agree that to repair a wall will providea physical border to keep separate their properties and thereby allow them to begood neighbours, Williams likens this to a scenario in international relations inwhich ‘even the most friendly states know where the border lies and recognizethere may be circumstances where controls along it are necessary’ (Williams2003: 26). But in his treatment of the diminishing salience of sovereign borders,Williams observes that political geography has challenged the reified image ofterritorial borders as fences between sovereign spaces, noting how territorialborders can be usefully reconsidered in normative international relations the-ory as social practices and institutions (Williams 2003: 27). As demarcations

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between national and international politics have become blurred, territorialborders no longer mark a point at which ethical considerations end. Thatethics has become a legitimate topic in international relations is prominentlyacknowledged between Scotland and Malawi, though this is not without itsproblems, as we will show.

The traditional Westphalian sovereign state acting in its own self-interest –or exclusively in the interests of its own citizens – still largely dominates con-ceptions of political membership and of duties of justice. But a growing numberof commentators (e.g. Moellendorf 2002, Pogge 2002, Fraser 2008) have con-tributed recently to a remapping of the boundaries of justice on a more globalscale. With its attendant shifts in the ways that space and time affect humanlives, globalization poses a fundamental challenge to traditional political the-ory’s assumption that nation states can be regarded as self-sufficient, boundedcommunities (Scheuerman 2006). Nation states have only limited control overa growing number of cross-territorial activities and social relations. The dissi-pation of the previously clear distinction between domestic and foreign affairsraises the issue of whether normative political commitments can be realizeddomestically while not also achieved globally and is echoed in the Scottishgovernment’s statement: ‘it is simply intolerable that when we in the devel-oped world have so much, so many in your world have so little’ (ScottishGovernment 2005b: 8).

Such loosening of boundaries applies not only to territorial and ethicalfences between states. The concept of neighbourhood seems to become bothmore fluid and more extensive. If the idea of neighbourhood implies socialnetworks and interaction (Forrest 2009) then we must ask what neighbour-hood means under current conditions. Pointing to the application of MarshallMcLuhan’s ‘global village’ (McLuhan 1967: 63), Forrest notes the UnitedNations’ international appropriation of neighbourhood. Exemplified in White-head’s statement that ‘the global village becomes the global neighbourhoodas a moral space through which to manage the complex economic, politicaland ecological problems of the planet’ (Whitehead 2003: 277), Forrest suggestsit ‘continues to invoke positive attributes of mutuality, solidarity, connected-ness and a sense of shared responsibility and destiny’ (Forrest 2009: 140). Thelanguage of global neighbourliness expressed in the Scotland-Malawi agree-ment inclines towards this expansive conception of neighbourhood. Yet whilstacknowledging today’s ‘spatially diffuse and overlapping social networks’ For-rest concludes that the local neighbourhood retains its status ‘as a key site forthe routines of everyday life which appear to be an important part of our socialidentity’ (Forrest 2009: 139).

Forrest is not alone in voicing this caution. Geography remains salient. Itsboundaries and scales cannot be dismissed and need ‘to be reconceptualizedperpetually in order to understand their material/discursive meaning in thetransforming world’ (Paasi 2004: 542). While some would prefer to treat geo-graphical boundaries as ethically contingent rather than as bearing intrinsicworth, Williams argues that there are good reasons for believing that ‘borders,including territorial ones, do possess ethical value that whilst not absolute, eter-nal and constant, is nevertheless deeply seated in conceptions of ethics andcommunity that cannot be overlooked easily in the name of cosmopolitan stan-dards’ (Williams 2003: 33). He associates the continuing relevance of sovereignborders with the ‘need for division in human ethical life’ (Williams 2003: 38),returning us to the scene of Frost’s neighbours agreeing to repair a brokenwall, unnecessary for any other reason than to preserve good neighbourliness.

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Accordingly Williams defends a separation of us and ‘Other’, of inside fromoutside, of foreign from domestic and, importantly for this article, he suggestssuch borders and boundaries ‘divide those to whom we owe primary allegiancefrom those who come second (if anywhere) in moral calculation; they divide usfrom them’ (Williams 2003: 38).

At this point we acknowledge an area of considerable controversy in con-temporary normative political theory, marked out on the one hand by a positionwe might describe as universalist or globalist – that is that duties of globaljustice are owed impartially and equally to all, across national boundaries, tothe extent that neighbourliness as global justice demands a radical redistribu-tion of resources from rich to poor states. This stance contrasts clearly with theassumption that the neighbours to whom we owe duties of partiality are limitedto fellow citizens of the sovereign Westphalian state, already noted as chal-lenged by the implications of globalization. We suggest that other possibilitieslie between these two alternatives, turning to Marilyn Friedman’s (1993) qual-ified defence of partiality as a way to understand Scotland’s moral relationshipto its global neighbour, Malawi.

Noting that special attentiveness and responsiveness in close personal rela-tionships is inevitable, Friedman points to ‘genuine impartiality’ as ‘humanlyunachievable’ (Friedman 1993: 37). But what of partiality towards our neigh-bours? In a narrow interpretation (for Friedman) decisions on whether neigh-bours need special moral attention depend ‘both literally and metaphorically,on where we live’ (Friedman 1993: 56), suggesting that our neighbours (andpartiality towards them) extends only to those one knows – those in closeproximity in preference to ‘unknown strangers’ (Friedman 1993: 58). For know-ing something of a person will render it more likely that she can be cared foror assisted effectively. Nonetheless such ‘considerations modify, but they donot override or even substantially diminish, the moral importance of social andeconomic conditions in determining how practices of partiality should be orga-nized society-wide’ (Friedman 1993: 58) and Friedman warns that partiality, ifnot paralleled by the redistribution of wealth or resources, will likely lead to‘the integrity and fulfilment of only some persons, but not all’ (Friedman 1993:59). Friedman argues that the issue of global moral concern relates to ‘whetherconcern for distant and unknown people is an immediate moral motivation ofthe social self’ (Friedman 1993: 87) concluding, reluctantly, that there are morallimits to the social self.

Where, then, does this leave our account of the possible meanings andutility of the metaphor ‘the good global neighbour’? That Friedman notessome reasons to favour the interests of ‘neighbours and acquaintances, eventhose with resources, over the interests of unknown strangers’ (Friedman 1993:57–8) returns us to the relationship, current and historical, between Scotlandand Malawi. Whilst the Scotland-Malawi agreement acknowledges a contin-uing need for some ethical division in emphasizing its primary duty to use its‘powers for the betterment of the people of Scotland’, complete partiality intheir favour would have considerable implications for those excluded and soa form of expanded moral partiality is adopted. Although Malawi’s people aregeographically distant, a shared history and the reduction of distance occa-sioned by globalization mean they are not unknown strangers. The agreementeschews the polarities of a now ethically discredited Westphalian self-interestand the practically impossible demands of an all-encompassing globalism.Scotland’s duties of partiality enable it to behave as a good global neigh-bour to a chosen partner with whom it enjoys ‘a long history of collaboration’

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(Scottish Government 2005a). Having made sense of the idea of Scotland as aglobal neighbour to Malawi, we now turn our attention to a consideration ofthe basis for such neighbourly partiality.

SCOTLAND ANDMALAWI AS GLOBAL NEIGHBOURS

The ‘long history of collaboration’ referred to in their 2005 Cooperation Agree-ment alludes to a complex association between Scotland and Malawi that defiessimplistic analysis and is imbricated in both Scotland’s colonial past and its con-temporary aspirations to a social democratic identity as a ‘responsible nation’(Scottish Government 2009: 26). While the agreement traces Scotland’s asso-ciation with Malawi to David Livingstone, it is important to note that there ismore to their history than friendship and collaboration and it also defies sim-plistic treatment as merely a history of colonialism, exploitation and oppression.Scotland’s relationship with Malawi began with ‘David Livingstone’s appropri-ation of East and Central Africa for Scotland’ in a role that cast him as a hero ofthe British Empire (McKenzie 1998: 222). Scottish missionaries played a centralpart in drawing the indigenous population of what was to become Malawi intothe British Empire and the colonial economy.

Yet the Scots missionaries who followed Livingstone played an ambigu-ous role, in bringing the native population into the empire, in generating localleadership for the independence struggle, and in their relationship with theMalawian state after independence. Between the 1891 declaration of a Britishprotectorate over Malawi and the eventual emergence (in the 1990s) of criticalopposition from churches in Malawi to Hastings Banda’s authoritarian rule, ‘thechurches have often provided the most effective civil opposition to the extremesof government. In the early colonial period this opposition came most activelyfrom the Scottish missionaries. . .’ (Thompson 2005: 575).

Although Scottish missionaries played a part in the British colonization ofMalawi, subsequently, from the early days of the Protectorate, the missionar-ies came to be seen as siding with the natives against the administration andvoicing concerns about relations between European settlers and the indigenouspopulation (for example, opposing the imposition of a hut tax and the systemof forced labour, encouraging Africans in ideas above their station (Thompson2005)). This was a history of opposition from missionary and local Christiansto unjust policies. Relationships with the authorities and white settlers weresometimes tense, with missionaries perceived as siding with the Africans andagainst European interests. Scottish mission schools were the pre-eminentproviders of education for the emerging African elite, some of them as ministersof the local Presbyterian Church.

At the same time Scotland’s historical relationship with Malawi played itspart in the development of Scottish identity. These two small countries didbecome associated through Scotland’s role in the creation of the British Empireand so the partition of Africa by the major European powers. Scots were indeedinfluential in all the colonies (McKenzie 1998), as explorers, soldiers, ministers,traders, administrators, teachers, doctors and scientists. Glasgow and Dundeewere imperial cities, building the empire and profiting from it. Yet Scotland’srole in this empire must be read too, in the context of the historical backgroundto her reciprocal partnership with Malawi, as a facet of her continuing questfor a political identity,3 and in the geo-political context of devolution in which

3 McKenzie points to ‘thegreatest paradox ofall’, that the BritishEmpire, far from beinga means of creating acommon Britishnational identity,made it possible fornations like Scotlandto foster their ownethnic identity:‘Perhaps the Empirewas more notable inpreserving a pluralityof British identitiesthan in weldingtogether a commonimperial tradition’(McKenzie 1998: 230).

sovereign borders are more fluid, defined by an expanded set of neighbourly

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relationships that do not depend on referencing England as the significant,proximate other.

But, in the twenty-first century, postcolonial and post-devolution context,there are now further questions to ask about the ‘good’ element in the ideaof the good global neighbour. Having made some sense of the idea of moralpartiality to a non-proximate but known neighbour associated with Scotlandthrough a history that has complex significance for both parties, what does ittake, to be good? Can a history of imperialism and colonialism be transcended?We attempt to address this big question by turning our attention in conclusiontowards the example of higher education, in relation to implicit conceptions ofcitizenship in public policy.

ON BEING A GOOD GLOBAL NEIGHBOUR

Discerning an imperial project in the recent discourse of global citizenship4,

4 Jefferess is stronglycritical of theexamples of ‘globalcitizenship’ he cites,defending instead aform of cosmopolitancitizenship. Weacknowledge thisissue, but do notengage with thedistinction in thisarticle. For ourpurposes here, wetreat global andcosmopolitan asinterchangeable.

David Jefferess emphasizes the unequal relations that prevail between ‘thosewho help and those who are in need of being helped’ (Jefferess 2008: 27). ForJefferess, ‘as an ethics of action the global citizen is defined as one who helpsan unfortunate Other’ (Jefferess 2008: 28), identified as one in need of upliftingand in receipt of benevolence, if not pity. This makes for an ethics that dis-guises the unequal material circumstances between the active, privileged partyand the recipient of aid. This framework, furthermore, elides the imperial his-tory that created current global relations. ‘ “Our” convenience continues to belargely dependant on “their” exploitation’ (Jefferess 2008: 33). This line of cri-tique may dismay those in pursuit of global friendship, but it should not beread simply as a dismissal of initiatives like the Scotland-Malawi partnership.While Jefferess warns of the pitfalls of global citizenship initiatives, which aresusceptible to the politics of benevolence, his version of cosmopolitanism offersthree anti-imperial criteria which, we suggest, are reflected in elements of theScotland-Malawi agreement: ‘commitment to diversity, self-awareness, and anopenness to new ideas’ (Jefferess 2008: 30).

We take the first of these, commitment to diversity, as a criterion that raisesthe principles underpinning a relationship cast in terms of global neighbourli-ness. While the agreement does not explicitly cast itself as about diversity assuch, it does espouse a wide set of principles, highlighting the aims of mutualbenefit, equality, reciprocity, tolerance, solidarity and respect. More specifically,commitment to diversity is discernible in both the emphasis on the role ofMalawians in identifying needs, priorities and community-led developmentstrategies, and in the statement previously noted that ‘[Scotland’s partnershipwith Malawi will] help support an inclusive society in Scotland’.

Acknowledging that its partnership with Malawi can help foster inclu-siveness in Scotland can also be read as reflecting Jefferess’ second criterion(openness to new ideas), which is referenced in the agreement as a ‘recipro-cal partnership based upon increased collaboration, sharing experiences andskills, an opportunity to learn from each other’ (Scottish Government 2005a).This is also prominently addressed in the 2008 ‘Review of projects’ (ScottishGovernment 2008b), which emphasizes complementarity between the ‘strongtechnical expertise of the Scottish partner and a strong regional knowledge ofthe Malawian partners with inputs encouraged from both during inception andimplementation phase’ (Scottish Government 2008b, executive summary, point5: 28). The partners are cast as bringing equal but different knowledge to theircollaboration (Scottish Government 2008b: 4). The report argues that

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The notion of a mutual relationship rather than of a donor/recipient rela-tionship is important for people in Malawi so that partnerships are notseen to be one way. Furthermore, people in Scotland can learn from theway in which their Malawi counterparts respond to the challenges in theircountry and adapt technologies and techniques to meet needs.

(Scottish Government 2008b: 7)

We suggest that learning from partnership should be more expansively inter-preted than this and will return to this observation in our conclusion. Yet suchstatements promise to substantially address the kind of postcolonial critiquesto which partnerships like the one under discussion could be vulnerable. Theyalso address the third criterion under consideration: self-awareness. We havealready alluded to the need to take account, in assessing the idea of Scot-land as good global neighbour, of this civic project as a facet of developingScotland’s sense of nationhood in a globalized world. Such self-awareness isevident in the review’s stipulation that one of its policy-level outcome indica-tors is ‘Scotland’s identity as a responsible nation’ (Scottish Government 2008b:26). From the perspective of educational implications for Scotland and its citi-zens, we find this third criterion the most significant and challenging. No doubtself-awareness can be prompted by exchanges, twinning and the experience ofScottish participation in development projects for those Scots who enjoy suchopportunities. But how demanding should we make this criterion? This ques-tion takes us back to Universities Scotland as exponents of the actual metaphorof the ‘good global neighbour’. The Scottish government’s interpretation of itsrelationship with Malawi provides one expression of what it might mean to be a‘good global neighbour’. We have largely endorsed this interpretation, thoughwe believe the metaphor has further potential as an idea whose imaginativeinterpretation could yield further, radical implications. But now we turn to acontrasting reading by Scotland’s HEIs (as expressed by their representativebody, Universities Scotland).

Identifying six challenges for the future in ‘Helping to Transform Scotland’,Universities Scotland discusses the sixth challenge, ‘Scotland’s world standing’,largely in terms of global competitiveness:

Increasing globalization means that it is essential that Scotland canattract the best people to live and work here, and that it can exportsuccessfully to the world’s fast-growing economies. Building Scotland’sreputation as a home of enterprise, of learning and discovery, of cre-ativity and innovation, of dynamic cities and environmental integrity,is central to developing a strong international profile. Other key ele-ments in the profile include establishing Scotland as a good globalneighbour, promoting Scotland’s culture, and enhancing mutual under-standing and friendship between the people of Scotland and the rest ofthe world.

(Universities Scotland 2007a: 11)

This statement encapsulates what we see as a severe tension at the heartof Universities’ policy on internationalization, despite their avowed commit-ment to a role in establishing Scotland as a good global neighbour, which sitsuncomfortably alongside the emphasis on developing Scotland’s export-driveneconomy, and the place of foreign students in this enterprise.

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Pointing to Scotland’s success in growing its international student mar-ket ‘especially given increasing competition’, Universities Scotland (2008a)proclaims Scottish universities to be amongst ‘the most internationalized’,well-placed to ‘compete at a world-class level to succeed within the newenvironment’ of increasing ‘globalization of economies and societies’. Highereducation is one of the strongest contributors to Scotland’s international status,according to Universities Scotland (n.d.), with over 27,480 international stu-dents in Scotland comprising some 12 per cent of full-time students in Scottishuniversities. Such international provision, added to non-credit bearing courseincome and support grants, earned Scotland’s HEIs £189 million in 2005/2006(Universities Scotland 2008a). In 2007, one in five students were from over-seas, paying £181 million in international fees with ‘an estimated £172m fedinto Scotland’s economy’ and one job created for every three overseas students(Universities Scotland 2008b).

With HEIs’ overall combined income set at some £2.1 billion in 2005/2006,Universities Scotland is keen to point out that only around 51 per cent of thiswas derived from core public funding. This is because HEIs have diversifiedtheir sources of income, raising ‘almost half themselves on the strength of theirperformance and reputation both nationally and internationally in the form ofinternational tuition fees, research contracts, consultancy and other services’(Universities Scotland 2008c). Generating ‘nine per cent of Scotland’s servicesector export earnings which makes it larger than Scotland’s land, water and airtransport industries’ (Universities Scotland 2008c), there is every indication thatin a tight fiscal environment the sector will strive to increase its income frominternational students at a time in which public sector financing is predicted tobe austere. Accordingly a recent Universities Scotland paper, ‘Innovating ourway out of recession’, notes that ‘universities should be recognized as the sev-enth key industry sector given their priority position within the governmenteconomic strategy and in recognition of their contribution to the country’seconomic, cultural and social wellbeing’ (Universities Scotland 2009: 9). Thatreport suggests that universities might be seen as ‘a £2 billion plus business,spending over £500m per annum on goods and services and directly employ-ing approximately 34,000 people’ stressing that they will ‘continue to work hardto grow international student recruitment, and with support, are well-placed todo so’ (Universities Scotland 2009: 9).

Against that backdrop of looking to overseas students as revenue sourcesrather than neighbours, Universities Scotland (2008a) points to ‘centuries ofexperience in developing effective international partnerships’ although thisclaim is immediately followed by references to such partnerships’ role in pro-viding a ‘a strong attraction-factor internationally, whether that is attractinginternational students and companies to Scotland or companies, governmentsand organizations overseas seeking our services’. Whilst Universities Scotlandclaim that higher education ‘offers, like no other sector, the opportunity forthe internationalization of Scotland as a nation’ that internationalization ispredominantly uni-directional, flowing into Scotland as revenue from exportsof ‘more than £400 million worth of services’ (Universities Scotland 2008a).It is, however, noted that work overseas includes that in developing nationsin which higher education initiatives contribute to capacity-building in sup-port of public services with international engagement helping ‘to empowerpeople to facilitate change as well as working in partnerships that have a long-term sustainable impact’ (Universities Scotland 2008a). In this respect, andcombined with student mobility programmes, we are told that the Scottish

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higher-education sector helps ‘to further countries’ ability to build and increasecapacity by transferring skills, knowledge and expertise as tools for academicsand students alike’(Universities Scotland 2008a) in its work with over half ofthe world’s nations. Additionally, universities delivered a third of all projectsfrom the Scottish government’s International Development Fund in 2007. Suchactivity may well go some way to establishing a more neighbourly, less one-sided economic relationship between Scotland and its global neighbours, butthe rhetoric of revenue generation is predominant. Even when diversity isalluded to, it tends to be expressed with a competitive edge. A UniversitiesScotland report on ‘Wellbeing Scotland’ highlighted the contribution of ‘thediversity of nationalities within Scotland’s student population’ with its 15.6 percent of Scotland’s students of non-UK domicile giving Scotland ‘a greater pro-portion of international students than anywhere else in the UK’ (UniversitiesScotland 2007a: 7).5

5 Whilst our own universitymakes much of itsimproving position innational andinternational leaguetables, its 2006–2010Learning and Teachingstrategy (University ofGlasgow 2009) is focusedas much on providing aninternationally relevantlearning experience toour students by providingthem with learningopportunities abroad, byensuring diversity of thestudent and staffpopulations, bydeveloping aninternationally relevantcurriculum, and throughengagement and mutualdevelopment withstrategic partners aroundthe world as it is oninward recruitment.Noteworthy, here, is theuniversity’s aspiration to‘provide graduatesequipped for globalcitizenship’. So, too, thatstrategy seeks to‘increase the university’sreach and standing inlearning and teachinginternationally, anddevelop the university asa culturally diverselearning community’.The fiscal continues todrive but is explicitlysupplemented, atinstitutional level, byconcerns for globalcitizenship and attentionto ways in which thediversity occasioned byinternationalizationmight benefit homestudents.

We have discussed elsewhere (Enslin and Hedge 2008) the implications forglobal justice of the neo-liberal imperatives that drive the ‘internationaliza-tion’ of UK universities and we recognize the fiscal pressures that impel theirinternationalization strategies to set so much store by the contribution of inter-national fees to their prosperity. On the evidence considered here imperativesto compete threaten to undermine Scottish universities’ aspiration to be goodglobal neighbours. We question the extent to which HEIs in Scotland collec-tively adopt an interpretation of the ‘good global neighbour’ that accords withthe Scotland-Malawi agreement’s sensitivity to Jefferess’ cautionary criteria. Insum, we find an emphasis on national interests that sits uncomfortably with thepost-Westphalian ethic considered earlier as a feature of global neighbourli-ness. Furthermore, we fear an interpretation of the value of diversity tied toonarrowly to this preoccupation with national and institutional economic com-petitiveness. These factors prompt doubt about the consequent extent to whichour HEIs can be genuinely open to new ideas of the kind likely to result frompursuing the meaning of ‘good global neighbour’ (beyond its most immedi-ate neo-liberal appeal). Having said this, we hasten to note that many of theScotland-Malawi partnership’s projects are based in Scottish universities, aswell as other sectors in Scottish civil society. Nor do we doubt that diversitypolicies and innovative curriculum development in individual HEIs promoteelements of good global neighbourliness of the types raised here.

It is in regard to Jefferess’ most challenging criterion – self-awareness – thatour gravest concerns occur. For a more reflective understanding of attunementto the demands of being a good global neighbour, and indeed of educatingcitizens about its meaning, would surely temper Universities Scotland’s cele-bration of the sector’s global competitiveness; given how much this rests onincome from international students, many from countries facing developmentchallenges similar to Malawi’s, in an unjust global system whose rules havebeen fixed by rich nations to ensure their own continuing competitiveness. Ofall institutions we would look to universities for deep and difficult reflection onthe very idea of what it is to be a good global neighbour, to recognize the oppor-tunities to ‘learn more about ourselves. . .looking at ourselves in the lenses ofthe other’ (Nussbaum 1996: 11). As well as seeking the views of Malawianson their partnership with Scotland, this could start with Paul Standish’s sug-gestion that the otherness of the neighbour might usefully be conceptualizedby acknowledging our own strangeness (Standish 2007). In this way the ideaof the good global neighbour is ultimately an educational issue that promptsradical reflection on what it means to be a global citizen.6

6 The authorsacknowledge thecomments receivedwhen an earlierversion of this articlewas presented at the16th InternationalConference on Learning,Barcelona, 1–4 July2009.

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There is much scope for taking up the idea of the good global neigh-bour in citizenship education. Scotland’s vision of itself as a responsible nationimplies an approach to citizenship education that loosens, but need by nomeans eliminate, national domestic commitments to include others beyondtraditional territorial boundaries. Yet its partiality to Malawi as a chosen partneraddresses potential objections to education for global citizenship by interpret-ing it in terms of modified partiality instead of an impractical globalism thatdemands that young people take on a potentially daunting responsibility for allof humanity.

Apart from suggesting an obvious place for such approaches to citizen-ship education as twinning schools and exchanges, there are wider curricularimplications, pointing to the importance of political, economic and culturalgeography as well as the history of colonialism to foster understanding of thecontext of such reciprocal relationships. This approach to citizenship educationwould, however, not sit easily with an ethos of education for the global com-petitiveness of the domestic economy. Given the inequalities between Scotlandand Malawi noted at the outset, Jefferess’ criteria have radical implicationsfor ensuring citizenship education in Scotland that avoids the pitfalls of aneo-colonialist politics of benevolence. Besides the crucial demands of a com-mitment to diversity, self-awareness and openness to new ideas, if reciprocityis genuinely pursued it would require equalization of opportunities for youth inboth countries to access citizenship education. Reciprocity that extends beyondnew citizen identities and ethics prompts us to ask if equality of provision is notalso essential.

REFERENCES

Dower, N. (2003), An Introduction to Global Citizenship, Edinburgh: EdinburghUniversity Press.

Enslin, P. and Hedge, N. (2008), ‘International students, export earnings andthe demands of global justice’, Ethics and Education, 3: 2, pp. 107–119.

Forrest, R. (2009), ‘Who cares about neighbourhoods?’ International SocialScience Journal, 59: 191, pp. 129–141.

Fraser, N. (2008), Scales of Justice: Re-imagining Political Space in a GlobalizingWorld, New York: Columbia University Press.

Friedman, M. (1993), What Are Friends For? New York: Cornell University Press.Jefferess, D. (2008), ‘Global citizenship and the cultural politics of benevolence’,

Critical Literacy: Theories and Practices, 2: 1, pp. 27–36.Malawi Government (2008), Malawi Millennium Development Goals Report,

Ministry of Economic Planning and Development, http://www.undp.org.mw/images/publications_and_reports/mdgs/Millennium_Development_Goals_2008.pdf. Accessed 7 December 2009.

McCall Smith, A. (2005), ‘Scotland and Malawi – Building Hope for the Future’,Scottish Government News Archive, 1 November, http://www.scotland.gov.uk/News/News-Extras/malawi. Accessed December 7 2009.

McKenzie, J. M. (1998), ‘Empire and National Identities the Case ofScotland’, Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, Sixth Series: 8,pp. 215–231.

McLuhan, M. [and Fiore, Q.] (1967), The Medium is the Massage, New York:Bantam.

Moellendorf, D. (2002), Cosmopolitan Justice, Boulder: Westview Press.

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Nussbaum, M. (1996), ‘Patriotism and cosmopolitanism’, in J. Cohen (ed.),For Love of Country: Debating the limits of patriotism, Boston: Beacon Press,pp. 3–17.

Osler, A. and Starkey, H. (2005), Changing Citizenship: Democracy and Inclusionin Education, New York: Open University Press.

Paasi, A. (2004) ‘Place and region: looking through the prism of scale’, Progressin Human Geography, 28: 4, pp. 536–546.

Pogge, T. (2002), World Poverty and Human Rights: Cosmopolitan Responsibilitiesand Reforms, Cambridge: Polity Press.

Scheuerman, W. (2006), ‘Globalization’, in Edward N. Zalta (ed.), The Stan-ford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Fall 2008 edition, htttp://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2008/entries/globalization/. Accessed 7 December 2009.

Scottish Government (2005a), Co-operation Agreement between Scotland andMalawi, http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Government/International-Relations/internationaldevelopment/malawi/agreement. Accessed 7December 2009.

Scottish Government (2005b), Report of the Conference ‘Malawi After Gleneagles:A Commission For Africa Case-Study’, The Scottish Parliament, Edinburgh,4–5 November, http://www.scotland-malawipartnership.org/documents/7-MalawiConferenceReportwithphotos.doc. Accessed 7 December 2009.

Scottish Government (2005c), Malawi Economic Brief: May 2005, http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2005/06/09132146/21482. Accessed 7 Decem-ber 2009.

Scottish Government (2008a), International Development Policy, http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Government/International-Relations/internationaldevelopment/internationaldevelopmentp. Accessed 7 Decem-ber 2009.

Scottish Government (2008b), Independent Review of Scottish Government Inter-national Development Fund Projects Focused on Malawi, Edinburgh: ScottishGovernment Social Research, http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2009/01/16092515/10. Accessed 7 December 2009.

Scottish Government (2009), Malawi Development Programme,http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Government/International-Relations/internationaldevelopment/idffundingguidance/malawidevprog. Accessed 7December 2009.

Scottish Government (n.d.), Introduction – Scotland’s Links with Malawi,http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Government/International-Relations/internationaldevelopment/malawi/introduction. Accessed 7 December2009.

Standish, P. (2007), ‘Who Is My Neighbor? Skepticism and the Claims of Alter-ity’, Society for the Advancement of American Philosophy, 34th AnnualMeeting, Columbia, USA, 8–10 March, http://www.philosophy.uncc.edu/mleldrid/SAAP/USC/DP14.html. Accessed 7 December 2009.

Thompson, T. J. (2005), ‘Presbyterians and Politics in Malawi: A century ofinteraction’, Round Table, 94: 382, pp. 575–87.

United Nations (2009), Human Development Report 2009 – Malawi, HumanDevelopment Index (2007 figures) http://hdrstats.undp.org/en/countries/country_fact_sheets/cty_fs_MWI.html. Accessed 7 December 2009.

United Nations (2008), Millennium Development Goals, http://www.undp.org.mw/images/publications_and_reports/mdgs/Millennium_Development_Goals_2008.pdf. Accessed 7 December 2009.

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Universities Scotland (2007a), Helping to Transform Scotland – 2007 SpendingReview: Universities Scotland’s Case, http://www.universities-scotland.ac.uk/uploads/publications/Transforming%20Scotland%202007.pdf. Accessed 7December 2009.

Universities Scotland (2007b), Wellbeing Scotland – The contribution of highereducation to Scotland’s wellbeing, http://www.universities-scotland.ac.uk/uploads/publications/Wellbeing%20Scotland%202007.pdf. Accessed 7December 2009.

Universities Scotland (2008a), ‘International Briefing’, http://www.universities-scotland.ac.uk/uploads/briefings/International%20Briefing.pdf. Accessed 7December 2009.

Universities Scotland (2008b), ‘Increase in international students’, NewsArchive, http://www.universities-scotland.ac.uk/index.php?mact=News,cntnt01,detail,0&cntnt01articleid=34&cntnt01returnid=23. Accessed 7December 2009.

Universities Scotland (2008c), Briefing: What is higher education?, http://www.universities-scotland.ac.uk/uploads/briefings/What%20is%20higher%20education%20brief%20NEW.pdf. Accessed 7 December 2009.

Universities Scotland (2009), Innovating our way out of recession, http://www.universities-scotland.ac.uk/uploads/publications/Innovating%20our%20way%20out%20of%20recession.pdf. Accessed 7 December 2009.

Universities Scotland (n.d.), ‘Our Contribution’, http://www.universities-scotland.ac.uk/index.php?page=our-contribution. Accessed 7 December2009.

University of Glasgow (2009), ‘Learning and Teaching Strategy’, http://www.gla.ac.uk/services/planning/staff/public/learningandteachingstrategy/.Accessed 7 December 2009.

Whitehead, M. (2003) ‘Love thy neighbourhood – rethinking the politics ofscale and Walsall’s struggle for neighbourhood democracy’, Environmentand Planning A, 35: 2, pp. 277–300.

Williams, J. (2003), ‘Territorial Borders, International Ethics and Geography: DoGood Fences Still Make Good Neighbours?’, Geopolitics, 8: 2, pp. 25–46.

SUGGESTED CITATION

Enslin, P. and Hedge, N. (2010), ‘A good global neighbour: Scotland, Malawiand global citizenship’ Citizenship Teaching and Learning 6: 1, pp. 91–105, doi:10.1386/ctl.6.1.91_1

CONTRIBUTOR DETAILS

Penny Enslin is Chair of Education at the University of Glasgow and Emer-itus Professor at the School of Education, University of the Witwatersrand,Johannesburg. Her research interests are; education for democratic citizenship;gender and education; liberalism; higher education; deliberative democracy;cosmopolitanism; peace education; social justice.

Nicki Hedge is the Director of Learning Innovation in the Faculty of Educa-tion, University of Glasgow. She is responsible for courses in advanced researchmethods at doctoral level and teaches mainly on the Doctorate in Education

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programme. Nicki’s research interests and activity centre on internationaliza-tion and inclusion, gender in education, and the role of affect and emotions inlearning and teaching.

Contact:

Professor Penny Enslin, Faculty of Education, University of Glasgow, St.Andrew’s Building, 11 Eldon Street, Glasgow G3 6NH.


Dr Nicki Hedge, Faculty of Education, University of Glasgow, St. Andrew’sBuilding, 11 Eldon Street, Glasgow G3 6NH.


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© Intellect Ltd 2010. Book Reviews. English language. doi: 10.1386/ctl.6.1.107_5

BOOK REVIEWS

Books relevant to the scope of the journal are welcome for review at any time.Please send one copy of the book you would like to be reviewed to the reviewseditor Professor Mitsuharu Mizuyama at the following address:

Kyoto University of Education,1, Fukakusa-Fujinomori, Fushimi, Kyoto, Japan, 612-8522

If you are interested in becoming a reviewer for Citizenship Teaching and Learn-ing, please contact Mitsuharu Mizuyama by e-mail: [email protected]

ENGAGING YOUNG PEOPLE IN CIVIC LIFE,JAMES YOUNISS AND PETER LEVINE (EDS), (2009)1, Nashville, USA: Vanderbilt University Press, 304 pp.,ISBN-13: 978-0826516503 Paperback, £29.95

Reviewed by Liz West, University of Cumbria

This is a thought-provoking book. It is collection of articles that grew out ofmeetings regarding youth civic engagement in the US between researchers,policymakers and professional advocates held at the Catholic University ofAmerica, Washington DC. The editors make clear that the meetings soughtto define how ‘evidence could be connected to specific recommendations andhow best to place research and policy ideas before the public and decision mak-ers with the power to influence strategies and programs’ (2009: 2). As such,there is a clear sense of the book being a call for action.

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The first section focuses upon research on civic engagement in US schoolswhile the second section focuses upon engaging young people beyond schoolprogrammes. The first chapter starts by countering ‘myths’ regarding youthparticipation and argues for an approach that emphasizes ‘youth’s potentialinstead of their problems’ (2009: 5). Carmen Sirianni and Diana MargineanSchor’s research on how city governments in Hampton, Virginia and SanFrancisco sought to promote youth civic participation illustrates how crucialthis shift in perspective was to initiatives. Chapter 2 (by Joseph Kahne andEllen Middaugh) synthesizes a research project into how schools can counterinequalities in civic engagement amongst urban populations. Their researchconcludes that far from challenging inequalities linked to socio-economic sta-tus, academic attainment and familial educational achievement, schools mightbe accentuating these inequalities through the unequal provision of opportu-nities for civic engagement. They argue for a more inclusive approach but notethat this goes beyond the remit of schools alone, which presages the chapterby James Gimpel and Shanna Pearson-Merkowitz. This notes that experienceof institutional injustice serves to weaken any inclination to participate: theauthors therefore call for a redistribution of resources and a commitment torooting out corrupt practices in order to ‘convey the message that participationis worthwhile’ (2009: 98).

The third section offers comparative studies of citizenship education andcivic engagement programmes beyond the US, notably in Western Europeand Canada. This diversity of contexts provides a stimulus for reflection onhow we define ‘civic engagement’ and how context, political constitutions andcultural norms influence definitions of and sites for youth participation. Forexample, Henry Milner’s review of young people’s electoral participation inCanada and Scandinavia notes that the definition of ‘civic engagement’ dif-fers according to context. Milner distinguishes between ‘civic engagement andelectoral participation’ (2009: 188), and argues that the former is highlightedin US studies in contrast to the other countries. The third section brings thefocus back onto schools and education for democracy and citizenship with MarcHooghe and Ellen Claes’ concise comparative review of policies followed by theNetherlands, Belgium, and France. In this section, David Kerr and ElizabethCleaver also provide an overview of the history of recent citizenship educationinitiatives in England.

The diversity of contributions is one feature that could make this bookof value to students and tutors on programmes of educational studies andyouth work, as well as those interested in the development of citizenshipeducation. Read as a whole, the reader is prompted to ask further questionsabout the studies. For example, it would be interesting to explore the corre-lation between participation in the youth commissions examined in Sirianniand Schor’s study and the characteristics of those young people most likelyto participate in civic action as outlined in other chapters. It would also beuseful to interrogate further the argument by Gimpel and Pearson-Markowitzregarding the importance of developing integrated facilities including hous-ing. Non-US readers would no doubt find further clarification of the details ofeducational pathways, such as the AP programme, helpful. The editors notethe optimism about youth participation in the wake of the 2008 presidentialprimaries and this book poses the challenges and opportunities that are nowpresented.

Contact: [email protected]

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KNOWING OUR PLACE: CHILDREN TALKING ABOUT POWER,IDENTITY AND CITIZENSHIP,JUDITH GILL AND SUE HOWARD, (2009)Camberwell, Vic., Australia: ACER Press, 186 pp.,ISBN-13: 978-0864318725, Paperback, £36.50

Reviewed by Libby Tudball, Monash University

This is an important book for many reasons. First, the book represents the prod-uct of a long period of collaborative research undertaken by authors, JudithGill and her late colleague Dr Sue Howard, and provides a lasting testamentto their view that educational researchers must rigorously listen to and takeinto account the voices and experiences of children. Together they examine theways in which children think and speak about their world, and provide richinsights into questions of citizenship through their data analysis (and their dis-cussions in relation to existing related theories). They also add considerably toour theoretical understanding of how children come to a sense of belonging intheir community of nation, family, classroom and school. Second, as ProfessorCedric Cullingford writes in the foreword to the book, the research ‘pays dueregard to the ideas of children and the influences on them’ (2009: vii) and pro-vides powerful insights into how ‘children understand the concept “otherness”,of the clashes between people and the assertiveness of the self against what isdefined as different in other people’ (2009: ix). Third, issues of power, iden-tity and citizenship in Australia have been under-researched from Australianyoung people’s perspectives, yet the ideas and questions explored also haveuniversal relevance, particularly in a time when values and education for activeand informed citizenship are receiving increased attention across the world, ascore elements of school education.

The authors agree that while the fundamental aim of the book is to identifyand describe aspects of children’s thinking as they grapple with their develop-ing sense of being in the world, and how they feel about their own country,the findings from their research provide implications for citizenship education.It is made clear that children learn about society through the structures of theschool, they learn about power through observations of teachers and principalsin hierarchical positions, and they learn about rules, rights and responsibilities.They also learn through their peers. Cullingford notes that in giving children avoice, the authors ‘provide a liberating experience that bolsters their resiliencebut, importantly, it also uncovers the fact that children already have a strongsense of reality’ (2009: x).

Knowing our place also provides interesting analyses of the open and thehidden experiences, and the unofficial and personal experiences of schoolingfor children, where real notions of citizenship are developed. In the chapters,selected experiences from data drawn from over 400 young people in SouthAustralia present the children as ‘knowers’. The authors see the children ‘not[as] empty vessels waiting to be filled with the relevant facts, but as youngpeople actively engage in constructing their understanding of how their societyworks’ (2009: 3). The insights are a joy to read, and the reader is easily engagedin the children’s views and the authors’ analyses. For example, in Chapter 1they describe how children’s constructions of power, politics and democratic

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citizenship are like the impact of a pebble thrown into a pond, which createsever increasing concentric circles as the children develop their perceptions andunderstanding. It is fascinating to see (in the early chapters) how much can belearned from two 5 year-olds, and throughout the book, through so many othervoices.

Other chapters raise questions about the importance of schools providingopportunities for young people to explore what it means to be Australian, andtheir own identity, but also to look beyond the nation from an early age, and tobe given opportunities to ‘think globally’ as citizens of the world.

This book should be widely read in the educational community by teach-ers, teacher educators and policymakers, and also by parents. The findings inChapter 4 show that schools can function as a bridge between what is learnedin the home and the wider community. In Chapter 5, an interesting discus-sion is provided about the critical importance of place and space in children’sconstructions of the world. For educators, one finding is that there should befurther development of school curriculum related to knowledge of society andculture. This will enable children to develop their own views on social issues,and to empower them to develop better understanding of Australia as a socio-political entity with a past and a future, in an increasingly globalizing world.Chapter 9 notes that children relish the opportunity to engage in discussionof real ideas. In the final chapter, the authors make the case for continuingresearch in the adolescent years in issues of power, identity, community andcitizenship. This book provides powerful insights that add to our knowledgeabout how children learn, what they know, and how much children can tell usabout their learning as young citizens.


CITIZENSHIP: A VERY SHORT INTRODUCTION,RICHARD BELLAMY (2008)Oxford: Oxford University Press, 133 pp.,ISBN 978-0-19-280253-8, Paperback, £7.99 $11.95

Reviewed by Shigeo Kodama, The University of Tokyo

In these days of globalization and post-industrialization, public education facestwo different social pressures: the pre-eminence of the market initiated byneo-liberalism on the one hand, and the rise of technocratic and bureau-cratic control defended by the old type of social democracy on the other. Itis at this point that a new kind of citizenship education is sought for the pur-pose of breaking down the dichotomy of neo-liberalism and old-type socialdemocracy.

In this book, Richard Bellamy tries to break the dichotomy by highlightingthe irreducibly political nature of citizenship. According to Bellamy, previousgeneral introductions to citizenship have a tendency to suffer from focusingnarrowly on the social, moral, or legal aspects of citizenship at the expenseof its political dimension. This book is an attempt to reintroduce the politicaldimension of citizenship.

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For example, neo-liberals regard the free market as sufficient to ensureequal rights, whereas social democrats are more likely to wish to see a pub-licly supported social security system for assuring the equality of rights. As aresult of such a political disagreement, ‘the rights of citizenship have to be seen,somewhat paradoxically perhaps, as subject to the decisions of citizens them-selves’ (2008: 14). Bellamy calls this paradoxical aspect of citizenship the ‘rightto have rights’.

This paradox, Bellamy says, rests on our rights as citizens being dependenton exercising our basic citizenship right to political participation in cooperationwith our fellow citizens. By focusing on the paradox and political dimensionof citizenship, this book makes it possible to see citizenship not as a static,ready-made concept, but as a more dynamic idea.

In that sense, it could be said that this book poses a very interesting posi-tion concerning the political thought of citizenship: a position which is similarto that of Hannah Arendt, who, in her The Origins of Totalitarianism, equated the‘abstractedness’ of ‘Men’s Rights’ with the concrete situation of those popula-tions of refugees that had fled all over Europe after World War I (Rancière 2004).Like Arendt, Bellamy poses a polemical statement against the static theory ofhuman rights.

This book is useful and suggestive not only for people who are researchingthe theory of citizenship, but also for teachers and general readers who areinterested in citizenship education all over the world.

REFERENCE

Rancière, J. (2004), ‘Who Is the Subject of the Rights of Man?’ The South AtlanticQuarterly, 103: 2/3.

Contact: skodama.p.u-tokyo.ac.jp

THE INTERNET AND DEMOCRATIC CITIZENSHIP:THEORY, PRACTICE AND POLICY,STEPHEN COLEMAN AND JAY G. BLUMLER (2009)Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 232 pp.,ISBN: 978-0521520782, Paperback, £14.99

Reviewed by Ian Davies, University of York

This is an extremely good book that will be of interest and value to all thosewho have a professional and/or academic interest in citizenship education. Itis well organized, fluently written, based on cogent incisive arguments withsupporting evidence and sensible, practical recommendations that aim at theachievement of a better democracy. The authors are well-respected figures. It isthe best book I have read for quite some time: it is essential reading.

What is the central argument? ‘The premise of this book is that democ-racy is in trouble and that the Internet possesses vulnerable potential toimprove public communication’ (2009: 166). The authors suggest that theseeming disenchantment of citizens with the processes and institutions of thedemocratic state need to be recognized and action should be taken. In a context

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in which relationships between politicians and citizens are in flux and polit-ical communication is currently weak, digital media, the authors argue, havethe potential to improve public communications and enrich democracy. TheInternet is seen as ‘an empty space of power which is both vulnerable to state-centric (and, for that matter corporate) strategies and open to occupation bycitizens who have few other spaces available for them to express themselves inconstructive democratic ways’ (2009: 9).

Coleman and Blumler are not unaware of the challenges that any attemptto promote deliberation will face. There are potential problems, both funda-mentally, with deliberation as a form of political engagement, and in relation tothe process of facilitating deliberation through the use of new technologies. Inrelation to deliberation itself, Coleman and Blumler are not starry-eyed ideal-ists. They recognize the arguments that highlight the difficulties of democraticengagement: the numbers of citizens in any modern polity are large and hardto reach; individuals may not always be able to deal with complex problems;outcomes will not satisfy all, and so on. In this situation it seems risky to takepolitical involvement and engagement seriously (as opposed to continuing touse the rhetoric of democracy in order to merely continue with the exercise ofpower by elites in representative democracy). In the face of these and otherarguments, the authors declare that ‘we are sceptical about the claims anddemands of deliberative democracy. We are happy to settle for a more deliber-ative democracy’ (2009: 38). This is an attractively realistic position, from whichthey explain that they wish to encourage and take seriously forms of public talk.They feel that governments should operate on the basis that there is room fordiscussion to feed into policy formation, legislation, policy scrutiny and post-legislative review.

They also recognize that new technologies do not offer a panacea. Theyknow that potentially new political processes that might be associated withengagement through new technologies could simply be absorbed into exist-ing hierarchical environments. Perhaps there is little that is, in itself, new insupposedly ‘new’ technologies (although the scale of involvement and the pro-cesses that allow it may, if things go well, not have been seen before). It ispossible that new technologies are still more available to those who occupyprivileged positions in society and even if computers were more evenly dis-tributed than they are now it would still be those who already have politicalskills who would make most use of them. It might become an initiative that ismore libertarian rather than liberal. But all of this is directly or indirectly rec-ognized and the argument for the ‘vulnerable potential’ of the Internet to berecognized by innovative policy action is very attractive.

In order to achieve their goals the authors suggest that ‘a key aim of thisbook is to argue for an institutional innovation that could nurture critical citi-zenship and radical energy, while at the same time opening up representativegovernance to a new respect for public discourse and deliberation’ (2009: 3).This initiative turns out to be an online civic commons that they have arguedfor in previous publications. The proposal is here outlined and developed, inpart, by reference to recently gathered empirical data and also by responses tothose who have commented upon their earlier positions. Such an online civiccommons would allow for several key shifts. They want virtual co-presence(between politicians and citizens and between citizens), networking across dif-ferent contexts, and improved dialogue in which people explain their ownpositions. This is to be a finely balanced initiative: an online community thatis publicly funded but politically independent, radically transformative but not

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idealistically utopian, combining virtues of amateurism with professionalism(2009: 175–6). It does not intend to repeat the failures of ‘e-democracy fromabove’ (in which political elites simply look for support) but to avoid prob-lems faced by the leaders of some radically intentioned initiatives (which havelooked for e-democracy from below).

There are some issues and omissions. No book can deal with everything andI looked for more than the passing references given here about education. Cole-man wrote a very good appendix to the ‘Crick Report’, which introduced thekey ideas about citizenship education prior to the introduction of the nationalcurriculum for citizenship into England and Wales, and so there is some veryrelevant experience in education to draw from. But beyond a very general con-cern with public education (and what would not come into that category?) thisbook will not supply any real help to professionals looking to assist with thedevelopment of political literacy. Perhaps implicitly a point is being made aboutthe need for public funding for an initiative that is not restricted by the verymany disadvantages of state education?

There is a sense, in this generally very well organized book, of perhaps toomany lists of ideas with outlines of potential advantages and disadvantages.Connected to this is a feeling that some of the suggestions are phrased in waysthat could brook very little disagreement (and this can be seen in some of thestatements referred to above, which may be read by some as wanting to haveyour cake and eat it too).

But these are weak criticisms. The authors are not educationalists and this isnot a book about education and certainly not a book about schooling. They aretremendously impressive as they anticipate criticisms and develop persuasive,carefully phrased and evidence-based arguments. Their well-written work isaimed at the achievement of a very good cause. They want a

transition from a counting democracy where citizens are valued only asaggregated voters to an accounting democracy in which before and aftervoting people’s accounts of who they are, how they live and what theywant are accorded fundamental political value.

(2009: 41)

Who could disagree?This is a very readable academic text with contemporary political resonance

that will have an impact. Excellent.


SOCIAL STUDIES TODAY: RESEARCH AND PRACTICE,WALTER PARKER (ED.) (2009)New York and London: Routledge/Taylor Francis Group, 280 pp.,ISBN-13: 978-0415992879, Paperback, £23.99

Reviewed by Elizabeth Washington, University of Florida

Walter Parker’s edited book offers a series of essays on some of the most press-ing current issues in social studies. His stated purpose for the book is to assist

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school practitioners, policymakers, and researchers to take a fresh look at theseissues and to think through some of the field’s most intriguing questions, withthe help of some of the field’s top scholars. The book’s setting is primarily theUnited States; however, Parker argues that the book can be useful elsewhere inthat it provides points of contrast and comparison as well as by addressing anumber of universal questions.

Parker sets the stage for the book’s thought-provoking discussion byasserting the following:

• Research and practice are ‘interdependent and on an equal footing’ (2010:ix), and together they equal learning.

• Social studies are at the heart of any good curriculum, from the earliestgrades onward, ‘because it is where students learn to see and interpretthe world’ (2010: 3); students who do not have access to social studies are‘intellectually and socially disabled’ (2010: 4).

• Social studies means different things to different people – thus the con-trasting models of ‘social science’ and ‘social education’.

• Social studies has been a lightning rod in the ‘culture wars’ that have takenplace in many US schools, where controversies grow from disagreementover whether schools should change or preserve the status quo, who shoulddecide what is taught, and what should be included in the curriculum.

• Social studies have suffered as the result of the school accountability andhigh-stakes testing movement that began in the late twentieth century.

The book’s 23 chapters are organized within five thematic sections. Section oneincludes five chapters that focus on the purpose of social studies. First, WilliamStanley explores the issue of whether social studies educators should transmit(preserve) the social order or transform it through criticism. Second, RonaldEvans provides a useful historical overview of the American ‘social studies wars’from the 1916 Report of the Commission on the Reorganization of Secondary Edu-cation to the ‘revival’ of history in the curriculum during the 1980s. Next, KeithBarton and Linda Levstik wrestle with the ongoing question of why someteachers engage in historical interpretation with their students, while othersexpect their students to reproduce historical information. In the fourth chapter,S. G. Grant describes how American teachers are responding to high-stakestesting mandates. Finally, Bruce King, Fred Newmann, and Dana Carmichaelexplore the implications of authentic intellectual work for knowledge construc-tion as well as for the research and policy arenas, and they provide examples ofwhat AIW might look like in students’ academic work.

Section two, ‘Perspective Matters,’ comprises four chapters: essential prin-ciples of education for diversity by James Banks and seven co-authors (whoare all members of the Multicultural Education Consensus Panel); culturallyresponsive instruction by Kathryn Au; the status of gays and lesbians in thesocial studies curriculum by Stephen Thornton; and the relationships betweensocial identity (e.g. race, gender) and learning national history by Terrie Epsteinand Jessica Schiller.

The chapters in Section three delve into current issues within specific socialdisciplines. Sam Wineburg and his co-authors discuss their research on theinfluence of popular culture – specifically, the influence of the film ForrestGump – on students’ historical understanding, especially with regard to bothcollective memory and collective occlusion. Bruce Vansledright addresses the

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questions of what it means to think historically and how one teaches histori-cal thinking. Within the field of geography education, Sarah Bednarz, GillianAcheson, and Robert Bednarz examine ‘best practices’ that teachers can useto help develop students’ map skills and spatial- thinking abilities – in otherwords, their ‘carto-literacy’. Jere Brophy and Janet Alleman’s chapter on theteaching of cultural universals – e.g. shelter, clothing, food etc.– in the earlygrades argues that children can systematically build their knowledge of how oursocial system works and enhance their decision-making abilities. Joseph Kahneand Ellen Middaugh offer a model of a high quality civic education curricu-lum and discuss how it can be made accessible to all students. Finally, SimoneSchweber tackles the difficult topic of ‘Holocaust fatigue’ in today’s schoolsand offers suggestions for teaching the Holocaust in a way that generates deepunderstandings of the subject matter.

In ‘Global Matters,’ the fourth section, Merry Merryfield and MasatakaKasai explore how teachers are responding to globalization; Margaret SmithCrocco uses the case of the novel Shabanu to show how literature can be usedto teach about Muslim women; Ross Dunn describes competing and conflict-ing models of teaching world history; and Carole Hahn reports on her researchon teaching civic engagement in Denmark, Germany, the US, the Netherlands,and England.

The final section, appropriately named ‘Puzzles’, explores such questionsas whether discussion in social studies is worth the trouble (Diana Hess), whatconstrains meaningful social studies teaching (Catherine Cornbleth), what con-nection exists between curriculum and instruction (Avner Segall), and whethertolerance can be taught (Patricia Avery).

Parker concludes by weaving together the myriad strands of the book intoa compelling model for ‘a proper curriculum for democracy’ that ‘requires thestudy and practice of democracy’ (2010: 258). He identifies the key resourcessocial studies educators need and indeed already have, as well as the threeactions that he considers key to achieving this goal. In precise, elegant lan-guage, he makes the case for orienting the social studies curriculum toward thecultivation of ‘enlightened political engagement’. Social studies today: Researchand practice is a landmark contribution to the field as well as essential readingfor policymakers, scholars, and practitioners alike.


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NOTES FOR AUTHORSBy accepting publication in the journal contributorsgrant the right to the editorial committee to publishcontributions electronically and in hard copy.Contributors should bear in mind that they areaddressing an international audience and so mustavoid the use of jargon, acronyms withoutexplanation or the use of specialist terms (e.g., inrelation to grades, ages, phases of schooling). Pleaseensure that writing is, as far as possible, free frombias, for instance, by avoiding sexist and racistlanguage. The Oxford English Dictionary (OED)should be used as a guide for spellings. Permissiblealternative spellings should follow the OED, e.g.,verbal forms that can end in -ize or -ise should begiven the -ize form.

Contributions can only be considered if they can beread using Microsoft Word.

MetadataContributors must check that each of the followinghave been supplied correctly:

• Article Title.• Author Name.• Author addresses – the submitted material

should include details of the full postal ande-mail addresses of one nominated contributorfor correspondence purposes.

• Author Biography – authors should include ashort biography/ies of around 150 words foreach author, specifying the institution(s) withwhich they are affiliated.

• Copyright consent form – this form gives usyour permission to publish your article should itbe accepted by our peer-review panel will besent to the main author electronically by thejournal editor.

• Abstract of 300 words; this will go on to theIntellect website.

• Keywords – six words, or two-word phrases.There is a serious reduction in an article’sability to be searched for if the keywords aremissing.

• Bibliography – titled ‘References’ (see below).

ReferencesReferences should be indicated in the text by givingthe author’s name, with the year of publication inparentheses. Please note that use of ‘op cit’ and ’ibid’is not acceptable. If several papers by the sameauthor and from the same year are cited, a, b, c, etc.should be put after the year of publication. Where apage number is to be referenced, the style should be(Author Year: Number) e.g., (Hahn 1999: 232). Thereferences should be listed in full at the end of thepaper in the following standard form:

Hahn, C. L. (1999), ‘Citizenship: an empirical studyof policy, practices and outcomes’, Oxford Reviewof Education, 25: 1&2, pp. 231–250.

McLaughlin, T. (2003), ‘Teaching Controversial Issuesin Citizenship Education’, in A. Lockyer, B. Crick,J. Annette (eds), Education for DemocraticCitizenship: issues of theory and practice, Aldershot:Ashgate.

Ratcliffe, M. and Grace, M. (2003), Science Educationfor Citizenship: teaching socio-scientific issues,Maidenhead: Open University Press.

Please also note the following guidance concerningreferencing:

‘Anon.’ for items which do not have an author(because all items must be referenced with anauthor within the text)

A blank line is entered between referencesYear date of publication in bracketsCommas, not full stops, between parts of each

reference

Absence of ‘in’ after the title of a chapter if thereference relates to an article in a journal ornewspaper

Name of translator of a book within brackets aftertitle and preceded by ‘trans.’, not ‘transl.’ or‘translated by’

Absence of ‘no.’ for the journal number, a colonbetween journal volume and number

‘pp.’ before page extents

Personal communicationsPersonal communications are what the informantsaid directly to the author, e.g., ‘Pam loved the drums(personal communication)’. This needs no citation inthe references list. Equally the use of personalcommunications need not refer back to a namedinformant. However, a more formal researchinterview can be cited in the text (Jamieson 12 August2004 interview), and in the references list.

Website referencesWebsite references are similar to other references.

There is no need to decipher any place ofpublication or a specific publisher, but the referencemust have an author, and the author must bereferenced Harvard-style within the text. Unlikepaper references, however, web pages can change, sothere needs to be a date of access as well as the fullweb reference. In the list of references at the end ofyour article, the item should read something like this:

Bondebjerg, K. (2005), ‘Web Communication and thePublic Sphere in a European Perspective’, http://www.media.ku.dk. Accessed 15 February 2005.

Presentation/House styleAll articles should be written in Word. The fontshould be Times New Roman, 12 point. The title ofyour article should be in bold at the beginning of thefile, but not enclosed in quote marks. Bold is alsoused for headings and subheadings (which shouldalso be in Times New Roman, 12 point) in the article.Italics may be used (sparingly) to indicate keyconcepts.

QuotationsIntellect’s style for quotations embedded into aparagraph is single quote marks, with double quotemarks for a second quotation contained within thefirst. All long quotations (i.e. over 40 words long)should be ‘displayed’– i.e. set into a separateindented paragraph with an additional one-linespace above and below, and without quote marks atthe beginning or end. Please note that for quotationswithin the text, the punctuation should follow thebracketed reference. For a displayed quotation thebracketed reference appears after the full stop.

All omissions in a quotation are indicated thus:[. . .] Note that there are no spaces between thesuspension points.

When italics are used for emphasis withinquotations, please ensure that you indicate whetherthe emphasis is from the original text or whether youare adding it to make a point.

Where the quotation is not from a particular sourcethen the words should be surrounded by singleinverted commas e.g., In what ways do specialistsecondary school teachers characterize ‘educating forcitizenship’ and why?

RefereesCitizenship Teaching and Learning is a refereed journal.Strict anonymity is accorded to both authors andreferees.

IllustrationsIt is possible to include images illustrating an article.All images need a resolution of at least 300 dpi. Allimages should be supplied independently of thearticle, not embedded into the text itself. The filesshould be clearly labelled and an indication given asto where they should be placed in the text.

Reproduction will normally be in black-and-white.Images sent in as e-mail attachments shouldaccordingly be in greyscale.

The image should always be accompanied by asuitable caption (the omission of a caption is onlyacceptable if you feel that the impact of the imagewould be reduced by the provision of writtencontext). The following is the agreed style forcaptions: Figure 1: Caption here. Please note thecolon after the number and the terminating full point,even if the caption is not a full sentence. Copyrightclearance should be indicated by the contributor andis always the responsibility of the contributor.

NotesNotes may be used for comments and additionalinformation only. In general, if something is worthsaying, it is worth saying in the text itself. A note willdivert the reader’s attention away from yourargument. If you think a note is necessary, make it asbrief and to the point as possible. Use Word’snote-making facility, and ensure that your notes areendnotes, not footnotes. Place note calls outside thepunctuation, so AFTER the comma or the full stop.The note call must be in superscripted Arabic (1, 2, 3).

Any matters concerning the format andpresentation of articles not covered by the abovenotes should be addressed to the Editor.

OpinionThe views expressed in articles published inCitizenship Teaching and Learning are those of theauthors, and do not necessarily coincide with thoseof the Editors or the Editorial or Advisory Boards.

Permissions/Copyright/LiabilityCopyright clearance should be indicated by thecontributor and is always the responsibility of thecontributor. Unless a specific agreement has beenmade, accepted articles become the copyright of thejournal. The copyright clearance form should becompleted and sent to the Editors to accompanyevery submission.

Submission proceduresArticles submitted to Citizenship Teaching and Learningshould be original and not under consideration byany other publication. Contributions should besubmitted electronically as an e-mail attachment inMicrosoft Word format. Books for review should besent to the Reviews Editor, c/o the Editorial Office.

Articles should be sent by e-mail attachment to theeditor, Ian Davies ([email protected]). The editor willsend submitted articles for anonymous review. Tworeferees will review each submission. Should there bedisagreement between the reviewers, the editor willapproach a third person for a judgement.

Articles should be of between 4000 and 6000words, double spaced with ample margins.

All material must be submitted as intended forpublication. Tables and captions should appearwithin the text. Tables should be numbered byRoman numerals and figures by Arabic numerals.Captions should include keys to symbols.

Book reviewersReviews should be sent by e-mail attachment to theeditor, Ian Davies ([email protected]), who willacknowledge receipt and send the submission to thereviews editor, Mitsuharu Mizuyama([email protected]). The reviews editor willread each review to check for relevance to the journal.Where revisions are required the administrator andreviews editor will coordinate necessarycorrespondence to ensure that the final version of thereview has been formally accepted before publicationoccurs.

Book reviews should be between 400 and 600words in length. Please enclose a note with yourreview, stating that the review has not beensubmitted or published elsewhere.

This guidance is by nomeans comprehensive: it must be read in conjunction with Intellect Style Guide. The Intellect Style Guide isobtainable from http://www.intellectbooks.com/journals, or on request from the Editor of this journal.

Documents

Citizenship Teaching and Learning 6.1