Citizenship education revisited: policy, participation and problems

Abstract

This article revisits the underlying principles of the citizenship curriculum in England to address reports of communication breakdowns between schools and students and to consider whether the curriculum can do anything other than prescribe what democratic participation should be. Although the focus is on the curriculum in England, it has implications for citizenship education programmes around the world. The government agenda is contrasted with that of young people who may be politically active but in ways that place them outside the participatory framework of the curriculum. Two fundamentally opposed interpretations of democracy are considered. These, it is suggested, predicate incompatible understandings of what it means to be a citizen participating in a democratic society. The article then addresses their implications for the citizenship curriculum and concludes by suggesting that these different interpretations of democratic participation will inevitably lead to a curricular failure to move beyond political prescription.