The Social Circus in the Construction of Citizenship. A study from Citizenship Competencies for A Democratic Culture

Abstract

This research aims to investigate the role of the Social Circus in the construction of citizenship through the learning and practice of citizenship competencies. The Social Circus provides a platform for learning circus and creating spaces for collective creation to promote personal, group and community empowerment to improve the quality of life of the participants and the society that surrounds them. Previous research has focused on the Social Circus’ personal and group workspace, but there’s still little literature on the construction of community and citizenship. This research studies the qualitative component in more depth, using a case analysis approach and The Reference Framework of Competencies for Democratic Culture developed by the Council of Europe (2018). To achieve so, two projects that use the concept of Social Circus and have a community perspective have been selected. Semi-structured interviews, group discussion and data analysis were used for the selection process. The results indicate that the Social Circus is an ideal setting to learn and practice citizenship competencies for a Democratic Culture during class, in the preparation of the show or final exhibition and/or in the community spaces related to the project.