Abstract
In liberal democracies, fundamental rights and freedoms can conflict, and if they do, it is not always clear which right the state should prioritize. Should the right of parents to choose education in line with their own convictions prevail, or should the right of children to be prepared for a future life in a liberal democratic society be given more moral weight? While the former might lead to establishing and subsidizing orthodox religious schools, the latter implies “liberal”, “autonomy-facilitating” education. In order to make this tension concrete, we focus on a case study of an ultra-orthodox Jewish (Haredi) school in Flanders (Belgium), where “controversial issues” are excluded from the curriculum and where education is not fully in line with the core principles of “liberal education”. Subsequently, we explore the legal educational context in liberal democracies, with a particular focus on the freedom of religion and education. Then, we scrutinize several arguments for or against ultra-orthodox faith-based schools. We conclude that there are no convincing arguments for state support for these kinds of schools and that the recent Flemish policy of homeschooling might be a reasonable alternative, wherein a balance is found between children’s rights and parental rights.
Highlights
In liberal democracies, fundamental rights and freedoms can conflict, and if they do, it is not always clear which right the state should prioritize
The debate is complex, it is reasonable to say that the main questions being addressed are the following: (1) what makes an issue controversial in an educational context, and (2) how should teachers deal with controversial issues in the classroom? In order to answer the first question—i.e., “What criteria should be used in order to determine whether or not an issue is controversial?” (Von der Lippe 2019, p. 2)—epistemic, political, behavioral, and diversity criteria have been discussed (e.g., Archard 1998; Cooling 2012, 2014; Dearden 1981, 1984; Hand 2007, 2008; Hand and Levinson 2012; McKay 1997; Petrovic 1999, 2002; Steutel and Spiecker 2004)
The cost of excluding children from this minimal condition would be too high: In response to the charge that mandatory education for autonomy is unfair to certain traditional ways of life that are incompatible with autonomy, liberals must insist that the inability to make rational judgments about one’s way of life is too high a cost to allow parents to impose on a child in order that she should be raised in the traditional culture, especially when one remembers that autonomous persons can and often will exercise their autonomy to endorse the substantive values and beliefs with which they were raised
Summary
Within the education research of the last twenty years, a recurring topic is the teaching of “controversial issues”. This is, for instance, the case for ultra-orthodox primary school X.3 It was recognized and subsidized by the Flemish Community, when the school was inspected in 2002–2003, it turned out that the educational aims of biology and the Dutch language were not being reached. Because the school did not want to change these religiously based practices, it lost its subsidies and recognition This decision was, after the school took the state to court over the issue, affirmed by the council of state, which argued that “the right to obtain subsidies is limited by the ability of the community to make subsidies dependent on the requirement of the common good, such as appropriate education.”. In 2012, school Y, which is a secondary school run and populated by the ultra-orthodox Belz community and recognized and subsidized by the Flemish Community, was inspected but did not obtain the required quality of education for geography, history, and the Dutch and French languages. By November 8, 2020, it will lose its recognition and subsidies
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