Towards a framework for critical citizenship education



Provided by Institute of Education EPrints

Towards a framework for critical citizenship education

Abstract

Increasingly countries around the world are promoting forms of “critical” citizenship in the
planned curricula of schools. However, the intended meaning behind this term varies markedly
and can range from a set of creative and technical skills under the label “critical thinking” to a
desire to encourage engagement, action and political emancipation, often labelled “critical
pedagogy”. This paper distinguishes these manifestations of the “critical” and, based on an
analysis of the prevailing models of critical pedagogy and citizenship education, develops a
conceptual framework for analysing and comparing the nature of critical citizenship.

Keywords: citizenship education, critical thinking, critical pedagogy, citizen participation

Introduction

In the last twenty years or so school systems around the world have undergone a plethora
of reform measures designed to reorient and/or strengthen the role of citizenship education.
This has ranged from the introduction in many nations of new school subjects and cross-
curricular themes (under a range of curriculum labels including citizenship, civics,
democratic education, national education, and political education) to major reforms of
existing curricula. Whilst historically the primary role of citizenship and civics education
in nation states was linked with the process of state formation and designed to build a
common identity, inculcate patriotism and loyalty to the nation (Green 1990), it is now
often expected to achieve a far more complex set of purposes which broadly reflect
changing conceptions of what it means to be a good citizen. Major shifts which have
contributed to this change and the consequent reform of citizenship curricula, beyond a
concern for membership of a nation state, include: the emergence of global and cross-
national bodies such as the UN and EU, creating pressures for schools to promote forms of
supranational citizenship; multiculturalism, limiting the validity of ethno-nationalistic
forms of identity; and associated attempts to promote forms of citizenship based on the
promotion of a common set of shared values (e.g. tolerance, human rights and democracy)
which prepare young people to live together in diverse societies and which reject the



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