This book compares the current status of democracy in selected Eastern European countries. The focus is on young people’s attitudes towards and experiences of democracy, including active political engagement. In many of these countries, democracy has been hard-won and may well need to be defended again in the future. The contributors collectively reflect on young adults exercising their civic rights and how they can influence the political system at both formal and informal levels. The chapters present different issues that arise in unique contexts but overall reflect the changing status of democracy and its effects on young people’s citizenship activity and education. The volume compares perspectives of three groups of Eastern European countries with different traditions and past histories of democracy and citizenship: Central European countries (Poland, Czech, Hungary); Baltic countries (Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia); and post-soviet republics (Ukraine, Moldova). These countries differ in the status given to democracy, citizenship action traditions and education. At the same time, many countries have experienced recent turbulence related to democracy and different kinds of actions by young people. Comparing them leads to conclusions about omissions made in current citizenship education provision and what needs to be done for a better understanding of the needs of citizenship education in these difficult times. This volume will be of interest to students and scholars in citizenship and civic education, sociology, political science and Eastern European Studies.

In Democracy at the Crossroads, the editors argue that there have been too few scholarly attempts to provide a comprehensive critique of the assumptions behind citizenship education. In particular, they ask the distinguished contributors to this volume to address difficult but essential questions that are often avoided or intentionally overlooked: What do all-embracing terms like 'global citizenship' really mean? What does democracy mean internationally? A timely work, Democracy at the Crossroad provides a necessary examination and re-interpretation of international perspectives on democracy and global citizenship as they apply to social education.

This dynamic Handbook offers state-of-the-art analysis of the new generation of youth activists who are demanding change. Bringing together eminent scholars, rising academic stars and youth activists, this Handbook provides a unique and essential insight into the power of youth activism today.

Until recently, youth have become the great absence regarding matters of citizenship, justice, and democracy. Rarely are young people taken up with the important discourses of freedom and citizenship, especially discourses that transcend national boundaries and academic disciplines. Richard Mitchell and Shannon Moore have put together a brilliant book that not only fills this void, but makes one of the most powerful cases I have read for addressing young people in terms that not only allow them to talk back, be heard, but also to enjoy those rights and freedoms that give democracy a real claim on its ideals and promises. Every educator, parent, student, and all those young people now making their voices heard all over the world should read this book. Henry A. Giroux This diverse collection will appeal to students in senior undergraduate and graduate courses looking into the new cosmopolitanism in social policy, citizenship or cultural studies, in child and youth studies, and in post-colonial approaches to education, sociology, and political science.

Cheng articulates the extent to which knowledge management approaches can create Intellectual Capital (IC) and contribute to improvements in education quality. He argues that public schools have long contended with the requirements of quality assurance in a competitive environment of decreasing student numbers, increasing parental choice and rising standards of accountability. As public organisations, schools have to demonstrate appropriate resource management and show evidence that they are meeting defined development plans and goals. Cheng proposes a strategic approach, IC management, to help schools respond to and cope with the increasingly competitive environment while enhancing school capacity for improving student learning. First, the book guides readers to understand the development of IC theory in the context of education to address the requirements of quality assurance and accountability. It then introduces Lesson Study, e-Learning, and Information and Communication Technology (ICT) as key resources and drivers for building school IC, and examines the organisational factors that enable knowledge management approaches for developing IC in schools from both Asia and Europe. It concludes by offering strategies and implementation methods to manage school IC for sustainable development. Combining research from Asia and Europe, this edited volume will be useful for school leaders and policy makers, as well as those researching school leadership and IC.

This book explores the problems present in Bengal villages specifically, which represent problems found within the rest of rural India, therefore the same measures with very little modification could be employed in the work of rural reconstruction and rural education in those parts. The author discusses issues related to the government, as well as the caste system, and the social and religious customs, which he has argued not only hampered the path to progress, but reduced the people further and further to misery and despair.

Shortly after Canadian confederation, Thomas D'Arcy McGee proclaimed that education was "an essential condition of our political independence" and that its role was to form citizens for the new regime. Comparing this idea of education for citizenship, or civic education, to the modern goals of education, Liberal Education, Civic Education, and the Canadian Regime explores the founders' principles, their sources, and the challenges that threaten their vision for Canada. The collection's first essays analyze the political thought of early Canadians such as Brown, McGee, Ryerson, and Bourinot, while later chapters examine enduring principles of liberal democracy derived from Aristotle, de Tocqueville, and Hobbes. The final chapters bring the discussion forward to such topics as the decline of Canadian Catholic liberal arts colleges and the emerging role of our Supreme Court as a self-appointed "moral tutor." Moreover, as it deals with the changing roles of universities in contemporary Canada, Liberal Education, Civic Education, and the Canadian Regime engages current debates about the value and place of a traditional liberal education and the consequences of turning our back on the concepts that inspired our founding leaders. Considering whether Canada’s early documents and traditions can revive past debates and shed light on contemporary issues, this highly original collection presents education as an essential condition of our independence and asks whether current educational principles are threatening Canadians’ capacity for self-government.

This volume argues that educational problems have their basis in an ideology of binary opposites often referred to as dualism, which is deeply embedded in all aspects of Western society and philosophy, and that it is partly because mainstream schooling incorporates dualism that it is unable to facilitate the thinking skills, dispositions and understandings necessary for autonomy, democratic citizenship and leading a meaningful life. Drawing on the philosophy of John Dewey, feminist pragmatism, Matthew Lipman’s Philosophy for Children program, and the service learning movement, Bleazby proposes an approach to schooling termed "social reconstruction learning," in which students engage in philosophical inquiries with members of their community in order to reconstruct real social problems, arguing that this pedagogy can better facilitate independent thinking, imaginativeness, emotional intelligence, autonomy, and active citizenship.

Those making decisions about education today argue that market strategies promote democratic educational reform, when really they promote market reform of education. Michael Engel argues against this tendency, siding with democratic values and calls for a return to community-controlled schools.

Though certainly not a new idea, citizenship education manifests in unique and often unpredictable ways in our contemporary neoliberal era. The question of what it means to be a productive and recognized citizen must now be understood simultaneously along both global and local lines. This edited volume offers an international perspective on citizenship education enacted in specific socio-political contexts. Each chapter includes a pointed conceptualization of citizenship education—a philosophical framework—that is then applied to specific national cases across Europe, Asia, Canada and more. Chapters emphasize how such frameworks are implemented within local contexts, encouraging particular pedagogical/curricular practices even as they constrain others. Chapters conclude with suggestions for productive change and how educators might usefully engage contemporary contexts through citizenship education.