Politics, Development and Democratic Education
The Politics, Development and Democratic Education thematic route covers key contemporary educational debates amongst policy- makers, practitioners and researchers in the UK and internationally. It demonstrates the relevance of educational theory, particularly within the social sciences (economics, politics, sociology) and the humanities (philosophy and history) to educational policy concerns and practices. Such theory contextualises and assesses central and local policy and school practices in relation to such fundamental concepts as equality, democracy and justice. The course covers topics such as class, gender, multicultralism, citizenship and social change in terms of contemporary concerns with globalisation, modernity and development. Those teaching the course have international reputations in their various fields and it is the key course in the Education, Equality and Development academic group in the Faculty.
The course encourages participants to engage critically with educational policy, practice and provision in global, national, institutional and temporal contexts, and to move between the macro, structural levels of historical change and development to psycho-social processes. It offers opportunities to consider a wide range of ameliorative and democratic educational reforms in the context of nations that are income-rich and/or in developing economies
Students are encouraged to critically investigate specific models and applications of democratic schooling and their relationships to concepts of power, participation and social inequality, together with the relevance of such models for development contexts, European education and citizenship education.
Topics covered in the first term explore the relationship between modernity; knowledge and the public sphere; education and democracy; and different theories of social change. There are opportunities to engage with contemporary debates about social justice; equality and cultural diversity; social exclusion and the city; gender difference, globalisation and policy; colonialism and international aid. These conceptual and substantive issues and their relevance for education are also examined from a broad philosophical perspective on, for example, the principles of liberal democracy; challenges to liberalism power, culture and the curriculum; liberty and individualism; citizenship, and pluralism Reference will be made to significant thinkers both historical (e.g., Plato, Locke, Mill, Dewey) and contemporary (e.g., Habermas, Rawls, Nussbaum and Foucault)
The second term explores the relationship between historical themes and contemporary issues of development and globalisation. Drawing upon thinkers such as H-G. Gadamer, P. Ricoeur, Q. Skinner and B. Anderson, it covers topics relating to the nature of historical research including for example, what is 'history', 'memory' and 'forgetting'; the notions of temporality and identity and 'imagined' national communities. The inter-disciplinary framework that is built into the course provides opportunities to think critically about globalisation, the state and modern society and engages, also, with the role of education within economic development , concepts of national identity and governance, international aid, feminist debates about gender, concepts of human capabilitity and security.
The course encourages critical readings of, for example, colonial legacies in education, measurements of economic progress and development, disability and vulnerability, youth citizenship and global human rights agendas. It aims for both depth and breadth in knowledge within a rich multidisciplinary framework. Its concerns are global in scope and it provides an opportunity for students from a wide range of national and cultural backgrounds to come together to investigate issues of common, current concerns around the politics of democracy and education