Civic Education Curriculum

Civic education is a social studies discipline that addresses the teaching of government, development of the citizen, and political and civic participation, but its themes resonate through the entirety of schools. Most school mission statements claim to develop good citizens. Perspectives from curriculum studies impact the responses to the fundamental questions that define this good citizen—what kind of citizen and a citizen of what—and organize this entry.

Civic education weaves its way into schools and arises as a unique subject because it is historically and politically accepted that the future of the nation rests upon an educated citizenry. A nation is not a clearly defined entity. Although lines exist on maps, the real meaning resides in the imagination of its citizens. Their shared imaginary defines the nation and the perpetuation of that imagination maintains it. As public entities, schools are central to [Page 109]developing and sustaining that imagination. Civic education is typically relegated to government or civics classes. But the concept of citizen is reinforced through the organization of the school—behaviors expected of citizens are reproduced in rules and expectations of student participation in all curricular and noncurricular arenas. Some schools assess participation through citizenship grades. Although there is agreement about the importance of citizenship, there is debate over what it means to be a citizen, particularly in this global era.

A citizen is defined against its counterpart—a subject. Citizen arose to distinguish active participants in a democracy from the disempowered masses under a monarchy. These origins frame the common representation of citizen in U.S. curriculum today. This Kantian perspective purports that a citizen is someone who belongs to a country and upholds its political institutions. In order to uphold these institutions, it is essential that good citizens are personally responsible, have a common understanding of their country's political history, understand their civic rights and responsibilities in relationship to the national government, and participate accordingly. The particular responsibilities emphasized in this literature are those that maintain the formal institutions of democratic governance such as voting, participating in community service, and acting politically through activities such as donating money, working on campaigns, and signing petitions. These forms of political participation are taught in government classes and reinforced through school elections and student councils.

A less common representation of the citizen is proposed by critical theorists who draw heavily from the civics education curriculum of the 1970s. They define democracy as a process that requires deliberation, not a product. Deliberation occurs through rich dialogue involving marginalized and empowered voices to decide what is best for the community. Deliberation entails difficult questions about how and why the community is organized as it is and who benefits from this arrangement. Although understanding institutions and structures is helpful to this dialogue, the approach shifts in emphasis from learning about the structures to developing the skills to engage with them. Teachers and curricula that privilege this form of citizenship have students actively participating in democratic structures, raising critical questions about the functioning of these structures, and evaluating rather than accepting the core values of democracy. Critical theorists argue that good citizens do not merely uphold the image of the nation, but ask questions about why, how, and for whom that image exists.

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