ERIC Number: EJ924426
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2004-Jul
Pages: 29
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0039-3746
EISSN: N/A
Available Date: N/A
Neutrality, Pluralism, and Education: Civic Education as Learning about the Other
Weinstein, Jack Russell
Studies in Philosophy and Education, v23 n4 p235-263 Jul 2004
The purpose of this article is to investigate appropriate methods for educating students into citizenship within a pluralistic state and to explain why civic education is itself important. In this discussion, I will offer suggestions as to how students might be best prepared for their future political roles as participants in a democracy, and how we, as theorists, ought to structure institutions and curricula in order to ensure that students are adequately trained for political decision making. The paper is divided into six sections. In the first two sections, I argue that community is a learned understanding and that such education, even when it supports liberal commitments, cannot be neutral. I use the social contract tradition as an entrance into the perpetual nature of conflict within a pluralist society. In the third and fourth sections, I develop a pedagogy geared towards educating students into what I call "cognitive conflict," and argue that the arts, widely understood, should be privileged over other disciplines. In the fifth section, I examine two difficulties inherent in my pedagogy--first that it seems to demand that all perspectives be taught, and second that it seems to promote anxiety among students. In the final section, I ask that political theory reexamine the role of harmony in justice. I conclude that a managed conflict is a more acceptable organizational description of liberal political structures.
Descriptors: Citizenship Education, Teaching Methods, Cultural Pluralism, Citizen Participation, Political Socialization, Citizenship Responsibility, Decision Making, Citizenship, Democracy, Conflict, Role of Education, Perspective Taking, Social Attitudes, Justice, Peace
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Descriptive
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
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