Encouraged by transnational organisations, curriculum policy-makers in the UK have called for curricula in schools and higher education to include a global dimension and education for global citizenship that will prepare students for life in a global society and work in a global economy. We argue that this call is rhetorically operating as a…

This short paper is a response to Nel Noddings's article on schooling for democracy. Whilst agreeing with the basic premises of Noddings's argument, it questions the possibility of parity between academic and vocational tracks given the inequitable social and educational contexts the two types of learning would have to coexist within. Drawing on…

This article attempts a contrast to the contribution by Hugh Starkey. Rather than his account of the inexorable rise of human rights discourse, and of the implementation of human rights standards, human rights are here presented as always and necessarily scandalous and highly contested. First, I explain why the UK has lagged so far behind its…

An overarching methodological focus in this issue of the "Journal of Educational Administration and History" has been to engage Michel Foucault's concern with "a history of the present". In this article, the author begins her overview of the collection in the present--specifically, and in keeping with the topic for this special…

This article revisits radical playgrounds of the past to offer a productive dialogue with recent debates on how child environments can foster citizenship and community. Joan Littlewood's playground projects are familiar examples of theatre techniques being applied to develop children's sense of belonging in a city. This essay considers the less…

The aim of this paper is to provide a positive case for increasing the role and importance of religious morality within the subject of religious education in British schools. The argument is structured in the following way. First, attention is given to the diminished role accorded to moral education within religious education that followed the…

This article explores the issues of citizenship, diversity and national identity in the context of the introduction of citizenship education in the UK. It considers the historical context of national identity in the UK and notes that the "British national identity has historically implied diversity". It also analyses the views of British…

It's almost a year since the revolution--the "Learning Revolution," that is. This was the Government's long-term vision for the development of "informal adult learning", as laid out in the White Paper of March 2009. The vision was expansive, embracing informal learning in the workplace, promoting a "new" culture of…

This paper considers Thomas Hobbes's educational thought both in its historical context and in the context of his political philosophy as a whole. It begins with Hobbes's diagnosis of the English Civil War as the product of the miseducation of the commonwealth and shows that education was a central and consistent concern of his political theory…

For the past twenty years, the training of teachers in England has consisted of little more than instruction in 'delivering' the National Curriculum. In this piece, Derek Gillard argues that there are now encouraging signs of a resurgence of interest in the history of education. He reviews the new edition of Clyde Chitty's "Education Policy…

For over ten years, London's National Theatre, under the banner of "Connections", has been commissioning ten professional playwrights per year, each to write a play for young people. The plays are workshopped and performed by secondary schools, colleges and youth theatres across the United Kingdom and Ireland, and are presented in a…

This introductory piece highlights key themes raised by Sir Bernard Crick and Professor Tariq Ramadan. Firstly I consider why citizenship is on the agenda and how these discourses are increasingly linked to discourses of diversity and identity. Secondly, I consider understandings of integration, especially with respect to Muslims, and thirdly,…

In this essay, Naomi Hodgson reconsiders the value of Michel Foucault's normalization thesis to the study of educationalization in relation to contemporary educational policy and research. Hodgson begins by analyzing educational researchers' response to the recent introduction of citizenship education in England, focusing specifically on a review…

Notes the debate in the United Kingdom about programs claiming to improve students' thinking skills. Outlines the six objectives in a philosophical approach to teaching children to think. Delineates education programs' pedagogical elements that attempt to teach students to create a community of inquiry and philosophical elements that attempt to…

This article comments on keynote speeches given by Keith Ajegbo and Audrey Osler. The programme of study for citizenship derived from the Crick report and did not emphasise race equality and national unity for security. Osler argues that the Ajegbo review addressed teaching of ethnic, religious and cultural diversity but did not confront the…