r Citizenship, Democracy and Lifelong Learning r Citizenship, Democracy and Lifelong Learning Carolyn Medel-Añonuevo Gordon Mitchell Editors The UNESCO Institute for Education, Hamburg, is a legally independent entity. While the Institute’s programs are established along the lines laid down by the General Conference of UNESCO, the publications of the Institute are issued under its sole responsibility; UNESCO is not responsible for their contents. The points of view, selection of facts, and opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily coincide with official positions of the UNESCO Institute for Education, Hamburg. The designations employed and the presentation of the material in this publica- tion do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the UNESCO Secretariat concerning the legal status of any country or territory, or its authorities, or concerning the delimitations of the frontiers of any country or territory. © UNESCO Institute for Education, 2003 ISBN 92 820 1128-3 Produced and Printed in the Philippines Editorial consultant Laura L. Samson Book design and layout Cecille P. Mantes Cover design Joanne de Leon Clerical and technical assistance Michel Ruf, Adela Cho, and Krissy Aren Inocencio Printed by COR-Asia, Inc. UNESCO Institute for Education Feldbrunnenstr.58 • 20148 Hamburg, Germany Tel.: (+49 40) 44 80 41-0 • Fax (+49 40) 410 77 23 www.unesco.org/education/uie • uie.unesco.org r Contents Preface • vii Adama Ouane Introduction • xi Carolyn Medel Añonuevo and Gordon Mitchell Learning for Citizenship in Ireland: The Role of Adult Education • 1 Helen Keogh The Role of National Languages in Promoting Democracy in Africa • 43 Sassongo Silué Creating an Environment for Democracy through Adult Education: Some Lessons from Belize • 71 Dylan Vernon Moral Education in Colombia • 85 Alexander Ruiz, et al Turning a Gay Gaze on Citizenship, Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity: Contesting/ed Terrain • 99 Robert J. Hill CONTENTS v i Fostering Cross-cultural Relations to Promote Civic Participation • 141 Myrna Nateras Intercultural Education for Democracy: The Case of South Africa • 153 Gordon Mitchell An Intercultural Program from a Balkan Perspective • 169 Emilia Ilieva Training Teachers for Citizenship Education • 175 Svetlana Poznyak r Preface Citizenship, democracy and lifelong learning are among the mostrecurrent words in the development discourse and practice in the 21st century. Yet review of existing literature will show that across the world, these terms carry on a range of meanings as they are used in different contexts. This field is not a new concern to the UNESCO Institute for Education (UIE). In September 1952, the very first semi- nar the Institute organized was entitled Adult Education Towards De- veloping and Strengthening Social and Political Responsibilities. Hav- ing just emerged from the ravages of World War II, relearning demo- cratic practices was among the main challenges for adult education. Through the years, the Institute has sought to address the different di- mensions of democracy and education by relating it to areas like literacy, lifelong education, women’s empowerment, inter-cultural dialogue and intergenerational learning. As UIE turned fifty years in June 2002, revisiting this topic was perceived as a matter of urgent concern. It is in this context, that the Institute organized a seminar on Strengthening Democracy and Criti- cal Citizenship through Lifelong Learning as part of the celebration of its fiftieth anniversary. The aim of this program was to bring to- - vii - viii CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING gether women and men who are working in this field of democracy to help unpack some of the theoretical and conceptual underpin- nings and their implications for the development of programs and projects. The main objective of the seminar was to contribute to a deeper understanding of the relationship between democracy and education in the context of lifelong learning, and to promote cre- ative practices of social integration. Fifty years after the first encounter on this critical issue, very few will disagree that the challenge remains. Questions like “how adult education and lifelong learning could contribute to democra- tization” or “how best to teach/learn democracy” or “how does one teach citizenship” or “how adult education can help in the formation of critical citizenship” continue to be raised and take on a more ur- gent tone as we are witness to all sorts of transgressions of democracy and the persistence of “democracy deficit.” Fifty years after, we con- sider the June seminar as an opportunity to revisit our very first semi- nar and to reexamine the new challenges in our globalized world. Organizing the seminar is also one of UIE’s follow-up efforts to the Fifth International Conference on Adult Education (CONFINTEA V). As one of the ten themes of CONFINTEA V, adult education and democracy remains to be a critical area of con- cern of UNESCO. The dominant discourse on lifelong learning as a means of retooling skills to help in employment should be matched by the discourse on lifelong learning as means of promoting and strengthening democratic practices, social inclusion and critical citi- zenship. The task of organizing this three-day international seminar, bringing together more than thirty participants, has been made lighter by our collaboration with the Faculty of Education of the University of Hamburg. I wish to thank all the participants who have contrib- uted to the exciting debates that took place during the plenary as well as during the small group sessions. This publication reflects their diverse and rich input, their worries and hopes. PREFACE ix The mission of UIE is to promote lifelong learning as a means of transforming societies where every individual, each with rights and responsibilities, plays an active role in promoting, strengthening and sustaining democratic practices. We hope that these fruitful ex- changes and deliberations have sharpened the issues and marked one step towards attaining this goal. Adama Ouane Director UNESCO Institute for Education Introduction r Carolyn Medel-Anonuevo and Gordon Mitchell The positive correlation between education and democracy is gen-erally taken for granted. Multilateral agencies’ documents, gov- ernment development plans, university researches and students’ text- books abound with the rationalization that increasing the number of years in school is equivalent to increasing democracy in society. Yet there are examples all over the world which easily challenge this as- sumption: countries whose population have a high rate of enrolment yet have very poor records of democratic practices, and communities with minimum exposure to schools but demonstrate democratic lo- cal governance. What makes this relationship problematic is the meaning of democracy, this being a much contested term. While it is common to associate free elections, freedom of the press and right to indi- vidual expression as features of democracy, democratization is more *Senior Research Specialist, UNESCO Institute for Education **Professor, Faculty of Education, University of Hamburg xii CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING than a check list of desired outcomes. Davies (1999) explains that it is “not a single definable entity but the broad term for a set of politi- cal processes towards the ends of justice, prosperity and peace” while former Czech President Havel talks of democracy as an ”open sys- tem that is best able to respond to people’s basic needs—that is, as a set of possibilities that continually must be sought, refined and brought into being.” Based on a historical analysis, Rueschemeyer, Stephens and Stephens (1992) defines democratization “in terms of inclusionary purposes and the institutionalization of opposition to government. Democratization depends on the ways in which the interests based on class and gender are constructed, with these con- structions varying according to conditions unique to each country.” The intimate relationship between democracy and social integration is, therefore, critical to underscore for as McGinn(1996) points out, ”democratization—understood as the participation of all people in framing and making decisions that affect them—is essential to social and political integration, because it makes possible concerted action without erasing fundamental differences.” Finally, the contribution of feminists in widening the scope of democracy to include the per- sonal, the intimate and the sexual, previously excluded in a “public” discourse on democracy, has indeed transformed the nature of what constitutes democratic practices. Given the contested nature of democracy, the role of learning and education, in promoting democratic processes could be interro- gated. The literature on the relationship between education and de- mocracy is, however, dominated by studies and researches on stu- dents in the formal school system and/or adults in highly industrial- ized countries (e.g Putnam,1995, Hahn,1998) leaving people to pon- der on what happens in the non-formal education sector, what hap- pens to adults, how education for democratization is carried out in Southern countries. The experiences are rich but scattered and dis- parate: the peace education classes held in Africa or Eastern Europe, citizenship education in the Baltic region, women’s leadership semi- INTRODUCTION xiii nars in Latin America, Asian trade union members learning more about collective bargaining in the context of globalization, Middle Eastern youth learning about their rights in peer education, indig- enous groups and migrant groups in workshops and seminars articu- lating their visions in Latin America and in Western Europe, respec- tively. Governments, women's groups, social movements, universi- ties, training centers and NGOs are all contributing to this complex process of making societies more democratic. It is clear that all over the world, learning democracy and democratic practices do not stop with formal education. It is evident that learning to be tolerant, learn- ing to participate actively in community affairs, or learning to be critical, is a lifelong process. It is to the challenge of understanding these learning experi- ences that the UIE project on Strengthening Democracy and Critical Citizenship through Lifelong Learning wanted to respond to. While there are many encouraging practices of democratization, there are also overwhelming examples of wars, ethnic conflicts, racism and other forms of violence still present in our modern world. No region seems to be exempt from democracy deficits/malaise and intoler- ance. We, therefore, need to urgently learn from experiences across the world on how lifelong learning can help build or revitalize de- mocracy. We need to learn from experiences around the world on how different educational and learning experiences strengthen people's participation. There is no doubt that analysis and broad dissemina- tion of these lessons can contribute to more creative practices in life- long learning and adult education in other parts of the world. This publication contains a selection of papers, chosen to rep- resent key issues that were addressed during the seminar. It does not claim to contain an exhaustive discussion on citizenship, democracy and lifelong learning, but it aims to highlight questions that are not often raised. We sought to represent in this publication the rich and diverse experiences from different countries and regions of the world. Throughout discussions during the seminar, it was clear that while xiv CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING there were common issues (e.g. the complex relationship between content and process in learning for democracy), these were mediated by specific contexts which required tailor-made solutions. The seminar did not aim to come up with one grand narrative on how lifelong learning can “solve” the “democracy problem” of the world. What we wanted to do was to unpack the range of experi- ences and knowledge bases that were being generated in the hope that by critically reflecting on such trends, we would be able to fine tune our concepts and practices. All the papers raise critical questions on the complexities of learning democracy in different locations. We have travelled quite a distance—from the Athenian democratic notion of women as non- citizens to the 21st century notion of cyber citizens. Helen Keogh’s contribution looks at the range of meanings the term citizenship has been associated with and examines the issues in adult education work in Ireland as it responds to the formation of its citizens. Sassongo Silue’s paper reflects on the the debate on monolingual versus multi- lingual policies in promoting education for democracy in Africa. The experience of the non-government organization in Belize, SPEAR, in facilitating awareness about elections and other political issues through a range of mass media campaigns is the focus of Dylan Vernon’s presentation. The Moralia research group of Colombia il- lustrates the importance of moral development and consequently the role of moral education in promoting democracy. Robert Hill’s contribution documents the different arenas where LGBTIQ groups in USA have been engaged in as they try to empower themselves at the same time, educating the broader public of the need for unlearn- ing hatred and exclusion of LGBTIQ individuals and communities. From South Africa, Gordon Mitchell describes how in countless or- ganizations—financial houses, gold mines, factories and government departments—diversity workshops were held to make this “rainbow nation” a reality. How different immigrant groups in the Central Valley of California are able to use their understanding of their cul- INTRODUCTION xv tural differences as a source of strength so they are able to work to- gether is the focus of Myrna Nateras’ paper. Emilia Ilieva shows how an intercultural program can facilitate understanding among young people in Balkan area. Finally, Svetlana Pozynak describes the neces- sary task of training teachers in Ukraine so they can incorporate not only content on citizenship education but also adopt participatory and democractic processes as they teach. Indeed, as we gain a more nuanced understanding of the meanings and practices of democracy, we realize that we need to acquire new skills, competencies, knowl- edge and attitudes—all throughout our lives—not only to know de- mocracy but to experience it in all areas of our lives. References Davies, L. 1999. “Comparing definitions of democracy in educa- tion,” Compare, 29: 2, 127-140. Hahn, C. 1998. Becoming Political: Comparative Perspectives on Citi- zenship Education. New York: SUNY. McGinn, N.F. 1996. “Education, democtratization, and globaliza- tion: A challenge for comparative education,” Comparative Education Re- view. 40, 341-357. Putnam, R.1995. Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of Ameri- can Community. New York: Simon and Schuster. Rueschemeyer, D., E.H. Stephens and J.D. Stephens. 1992. Capi- talist Development and Democracy. Cambridge: Polity Press. Learning for Citizenship in Ireland: The Role of Adult Education r Helen Keogh* I come to the topic of adult learning for citizenship as an adulteducator rather than a social or political scientist. As discussion of citizenship and adult learning for citizenship does not get promi- nent attention in Ireland, with the notable exception of the discourse in the community development and community education sectors, my paper will be “thoughts in search of dialogue” (Fleming 1996) rather than any kind of final word on the subject. In setting out my thoughts, I draw on reflections and personal insights along with re- ported academic analysis. This paper aims to explore the extent to which adult education policy and practice can contribute to the development of citizenship in Ireland. Firstly, I describe the context in Ireland. Secondly, I ex- plore the concept and practice of citizenship. Then I outline the contribution adult education can and does make to the development *National Coordinator, VTOS, Dublin, Ireland. 2 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING of citizenship, in Ireland, in particular. Next, I describe the chal- lenges to the effectiveness of adult education in supporting the de- velopment of citizenship in Ireland. Finally, I suggest ways in which learning for citizenship may be strengthened to enable us to meet emerging challenges. 2 The Context in Ireland The period since the mid-1990s in Ireland has been one of accelerated change—economic, social and cultural. As a small open economy dependent on foreign investments, Ireland is particularly subject to the impact of globalization and, as we realized in 2002, the recent economic prosperity of the country is also subject to the vagaries of the global economy. The period 1996-2001 saw unprec- edented economic growth in Ireland. The general government bal- ance went from a deficit of 0.3 percent of GDP in 1996 to a surplus of 4.6 percent in 2000. In 2001, this had fallen to 1.1 percent and in 2002, the government is took strong measures to avoid a return to deficit. Unemployment fell from 11.5 percent in 1996 to 3.7 per- cent by September 2000. Net annual immigration went from 8,000 in 1996 to 26,300 by 2001 (Kiely 2002). The foundation laid by social partnership since 1987 has been cited by many commentators as a major factor in Ireland’s economic success. Over the past six years, there has been a new sense of national self-confidence at many levels—economic, social, and cultural. How- ever, the new prosperity has brought its own challenges. Consistent poverty has declined, but the disparity between higher income earn- ers and the socially excluded widened, and poverty may be intensify- ing in certain areas (Government of Ireland, no date). As a result, social partnership has begun to concentrate more on structural and public provision policies such as health, education, housing, trans- port and childcare than on macroeconomic matters (Johnston 2002). In addition, the reversal of the 150 year-old mass emigration trend, means that we have had to come to terms with a much wider LEARNING FOR CITIZENSHIP IN IRELAND: THE ROLE OF ADULT EDUCATION / HELEN KEOGH 3 ethnic mix and to reassess relationships within our society. Recent surveys suggest that a considerable section of the population is, to say the least, ambivalent about diversity, or, in educational terms, is not equipped to respond positively to it (Amnesty International 2001 cited in IATSE 2001). Cultural diversity is not new in Ireland, but our response to that cultural diversity through the development of interculturalism is just emerging. There are a number of minority ethnic groups among the population of 3.918 million, all of whom are small in number. The Traveller community constitutes the long- est standing minority ethnic group with up to 25,000 members. There are also growing Islamic and Chinese communities and a long established Jewish community. Refugees and asylum seekers have come to Ireland from various countries in the last five years and busi- nesses have been increasingly recruiting from abroad to overcome labor shortages in the recent period of economic prosperity (Pavee Point 2002; IATSE 2001). The Irish state is founded on the principle of representative de- mocracy, but there appears to be a growing “democratic malaise” with only 62.73 percent of the electorate voting in the general election in May 2002, down from a high of 76 percent in 1981 (Irish Times 2002). This malaise was more obvious in the June 2001 referendum on the European Union Treaty of Nice when almost two-thirds of the elector- ate did not turn out; the campaign slogan which seemed to strike the loudest chord was, “If you don’t know, vote no”—a comment on the perceived absence of debate on the treaty. Local elections give rise to even more concern among commentators with the turnout for the 1999 local government elections reaching only 49.5 percent nationally and a low of 19 percent in some polling stations in areas of high social exclusion. It is significant that local government in Ireland operates mainly as an administrative system providing a limited number of es- sential services. Accordingly, the state has created new, more flexible agencies involving community participation and/or utilized civil soci- ety to deliver programs and services at local level. The community and 4 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING voluntary sector has been recognized as major players in socio-eco- nomic development with its inclusion as full social partners in national planning and in government-led task forces and in new strategic plan- ning structures and bodies (Community Workers Co-operative 2000). In a country where the relevance of representational democracy has 4 been questioned (Hardiman and Whelan 1994; Connolly 1996; Fleming 1996, 1998; Lloyd 1998), it is claimed that community par- ticipation is, in fact, the only experience of democratic processes for many people. This is echoed by the claim of the European Commis- sion that community sector participation in Europe is providing “an opportunity for citizens to participate actively in new ways other than or in addition to, involvement in political parties or trade unions” (Com- mission of the European Communities 1997 cited in Community Workers Co-operative 2000). Learning for Life: White Paper on Adult Education published by the Department of Education and Science in 2000 (Department of Education and Science 2000) defines adult education as “systematic learning undertaken by adults who return to learning, having con- cluded initial education or training.” Interculturalism is a core prin- ciple of the White Paper in recognition of the fact that: . . . the growing phenomenon of immigration par- ticularly from non-traditional sources poses new challenges to the nature of identity, introducing a dimension of ethnic and racial diversity heretofore unknown in the country (p. 33-34) The White Paper identifies six priority areas in setting out a role for adult education—citizenship, consciousness-raising, cohesion, competitiveness, cultural development and community building. In rela- tion to citizenship, the function of adult education is to enable indi- vidual members of society to grow in self-confidence, social aware- ness and social responsibility, and to take an active role in shaping the overall direction of the society—culturally, socially, economically and environmentally—and to engage proactively in community and LEARNING FOR CITIZENSHIP IN IRELAND: THE ROLE OF ADULT EDUCATION / HELEN KEOGH 5 societal decision-making. It could be said that the key role of adult education is the development of citizenship. The White Paper underscores the persistent age-based differen- tial in educational attainment among Irish adults, with some 1.1 million people or 45 percent of the population aged 15-64 having completed a maximum of lower secondary education in 1999. Many Irish adults, especially those over 45 years of age, have not experi- enced explicit citizenship education in initial education, but they have experienced the general socializing process of the school cur- riculum and what Rowe (1995) has identified elsewhere as conscious patriotic and religious models of general learning for citizenship. In fact, it was stated in 1962 that the aim of secondary schools in Ire- land was to prepare pupils “to be God-fearing and responsible citi- zens” (Ireland: Council of Education 1962 cited in Ó Fathaigh and O’Sullivan 2000). The nexus between Roman Catholic Church in- fluence and education personnel and programs has been predomi- nant in education up to recent times. Majority of the school-going population are taught the civic virtues of service to others through the Roman Catholic religion. There is virtually no dichotomy be- tween public values and private beliefs. The other model of learning for citizenship encountered in school by many adults in Ireland is the patriotic model where the nationalizing project of promoting national identity and social cohesion is to be achieved through the teaching of the Irish language, Irish history and Gaelic sports in pri- mary and secondary schools. The last three decades have seen a steady decline in the domi- nance of confessional and nationalistic values in Irish education (Ó Fathaigh and O’Sullivan 2000) with a consequent transformation of the narrow prescriptive conception of citizenship into a more inclusive one as society modernizes and “detraditionalizes” (Beck 1998). In the mid-1970s, Civics was introduced as a subject at lower secondary level. It was generally taught by non-specialists, tended to be “low status” and was preoccupied with the acquisition of facts through mainly pas- 6 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING sive learning. In the early 1990s, Civics was replaced by a program of Civil, Social and Political Education (CSPE), first on a pilot basis, and since 1997, on a mandatory basis for all schools. CSPE aims to prepare students for active, participatory and reflective citizenship through the development of knowledge, skills and attitudes. Concerns have been 6 raised over how far schools can actually promote democracy, given a possible over-concentration on knowledge in CSPE and the fact that active learning does not necessarily result in real life participation. Cur- rently, the introduction of education for citizenship into upper sec- ondary education is being explored. Another feature of the education system that adults would have experienced—generally in a taken-for-granted way—is inequality based on social class, one of the most enduring realities in education in Ireland over the past three decades. Indeed, education seems to have played the role of consolidating social class difference (Drudy and Lynch 1993; Drudy 2001). This has real implications for citi- zenship in today’s Ireland. Giddens (1998) contends that “a demo- cratic society that generates largescale inequality is likely to produce widespread disaffection and conflict.” In summary then, the adult population in Ireland, depending on their age, have experienced Civics education or, in the case of the youngest adults, CSPE. The majority have experienced some form of nationalistic and religious education for citizenship. Their participa- tion in representative electoral democracy is declining and an inde- terminate number are exercising democratic participation through the local voluntary and community sector. In light of very rapid so- cial and cultural changes that have occurred in Ireland over the past six years, and the fact that as a Member State of the European Union we need to look beyond Ireland, we have to think about European citizenship and global citizenship, with all the knowledge, skills and dispositions necessary to fulfill these multiple roles. It is obvious that Ireland as a nation is well placed for an urgent consideration of how adult education might promote learning for citizenship. LEARNING FOR CITIZENSHIP IN IRELAND: THE ROLE OF ADULT EDUCATION / HELEN KEOGH 7 Adult Education for What Kind of Citizenship in Ireland? The first question that arises is: Adult education for what kind of citizenship? Or perhaps the question should be rephrased as: Adult education for what kind of citizenships? This is a genuine question in light of the fact that, as already pointed out, apart from the commu- nity development and community education sectors, citizenship as a concept or practice does not figure prominently in any debate in Ireland. It is also a genuine question in light of the contested nature of citizenship itself. The concept of the 1990s as the “decade of citizenship” (Dahrendorf 1994) appears to have passed Ireland by—the fact that societal changes that frequently herald a national debate on citizen- ship (Oliver 1996) began in the mid- to late 1990s may be a factor. Discussion on citizenship in the literature on adult education in Ire- land tends to take the form of an oppositional stance to seeing adult education in purely economic terms rather than as practice which promotes the personal, social, cultural and political development of participants and ideally, according to some commentators (Fleming 1996, 1998; CORI 1998, 1999 and 2001; Aontas 2000), should lead to social and political action. But there is no tradition of explicit efforts toward development of citizenship in adult education. Devel- opment of citizenship appears to be left to the usual agents of social- ization—to general learning in adult education or community edu- cation, and to informal learning through community involvement, the media and other sources—or to chance. The result is that there is no consistent framework in which to posit discussion of the topic. There is also no solid research base to facilitate judgements about whatever practice there may be. There is no public or academic consensus in the international literature in English on what constitutes citizenship (Beck 1998). In fact, one prominent adult educator warns that citizenship is “one of those buzz words which can mean very different things to different 8 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING people and needs to be used with caution” (Thompson 1996). Defi- nitions of citizenship are many and varied (See Marshall 1950; Coun- cil of Europe 2000a, 2000b, 2001; Commission of the European Communities 1997b, 2001a, 2001b; Griffith 2000)—are materi- ally, socially, culturally and politically bound, and differ according 8 to fundamental views on human nature and according to the charac- teristics of societies across time and political ideologies (Griffith 1998). The majority of definitions distinguish between two key dimensions of citizenship—citizenship as status and membership, and citizen- ship as rights, duties and practices. Martin (2000) points to the two major traditions of citizenship in western thought—the liberal and the civic republican. The former reflects a definition of citizenship as an individually ascribed political status which is exercized mainly through the ballot-box. The latter embodies a collective construc- tion of citizenship as a continuing, creative and open-ended process which is exercised within civil society—the “slice of life” between the state and the individual. The citizen is seen as a member of the glo- bal, national and local communities, a family member, a consumer of public and other services and goods, an employee, an employer and a lifelong learner (Assessment and Qualifications Alliance 1999). Both expressions of citizenship need to work hand in hand if democ- racy is to be a way of life as well as a fact of life (Martin 2000). Defi- nitions of citizenship also range from what have been characterized as minimal to maximal interpretations. The former stress the cogni- tive and informational elements of citizenship while the latter un- derline critical understanding, reflection and participation (McLaughlin 1992). In addition, current concepts of citizenship in representative democracies have moved beyond the idea of basic ne- cessities to the idea of inclusion (Parker 1998) and are based on un- derlying values of equality, fairness, freedom and justice (Assessment and Qualifications Alliance 1999). Turnbull (2002) asserts that citizenship is a “multi-layered con- cept that acknowledges local, community, national, international and LEARNING FOR CITIZENSHIP IN IRELAND: THE ROLE OF ADULT EDUCATION / HELEN KEOGH 9 global identities.” But concept and language appear to be straining to capture a shifting and diverse reality that is constantly changing for individuals, communities and societies. The general term citizen- ship appears to be overburdened and to have lost clarity and specific- ity (Heater 1990). This has given rise to the plethorization of citi- zenship into a web of overlapping “adjectival” citizenships which gives an adult educator some indication of the contested nature and com- plexity of the concept and practice. Depending on the time, place, purpose and commentator, one finds reference to a veritable A to V of citizenship: active citizenship (Heywood 1994); biological citi- zenship (Gross and Dynesson 1991); comprehensive citizenship (Andrews & Lewis 2000); corporate citizenship (Turnbull and Muir 2001); cosmopolitan citizenship (Martin 2002); critical citizenship (UIE 2002); cultural citizenship; cyber-citizenship (UIE 2001); democratic citizenship (Heywood 1994); dialogic citizenship (Giddens 1998); ecological citizenship (Commission of the Euro- pean Communities 1997b)); economic citizenship; educational citi- zenship (Griffith 1998); egalitarian citizenship (Commission of the European Communities 1997b); European citizenship (Commission of the European Communities 2001a); formal citizenship (Kazepov et al 1997); global citizenship (Council of Europe 2000b); homoge- neous citizenship (Miranda 2002); identitary citizenship (Council of Europe 2000b); inclusive citizenship (Martin 2000); intercul- tural citizenship (Commission of the European Communities 1997b); legal citizenship; limited citizenship (Heywood 1994); modern citizenship (Wexler 1990); multicultural citizenship (Miranda 2002); multiple citizenship (Oliver & Heater 1994); nationalistic citizenship; normative citizenship (Miranda 2002); participatory citi- zenship (Gray and Harrison 2001); pluralistic citizenship (Johnston 1998); post-corporatist societal citizenship (Council of Europe 2000b); postmodern citizenship (Gilbert 1992); post-national citi- zenship (Council of Europe 2000b); “real” citizenship (Martin 2002); reflective citizenship (Gray and Harrison 2001); reflexive citizenship 10 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING (Johnston 1998); social citizenship (Marshall 1950); statutory citi- zenship (Council of Europe 2000b); substantive citizenship (Kazepov et al 1997); total citizenship (Heywood 1994); virtual citizenship (Wexler 1990). While a critique of the multiple variations and dimensions of 10 citizenship is beyond the scope of this paper, the challenge for me as an adult educator has been to explore the myriad of concepts, argu- ments and counter-arguments about citizenship so as to identify key understandings that have implications for adult education policy makers and practitioners. The framework for this exploration is a working definition of citizenship as “the whole of the relations be- tween the individual and the government system” with four dimen- sions to what I construe as an active relationship: economic, social, cultural and political/legal (Bron 1996). In addition, I interpret citi- zenship as not being confined to vertical relationships between indi- viduals and the state but as also embracing horizontal relationships between individuals, and between groups and communities (Coun- cil of Europe 2000a), that is, citizenship as belonging to and acting in a community or communities (Marshall 1950; Heater 1990) where the central values are collective rather than individualistic. A key understanding for an adult educator relates to the con- tested, indeed essentially contested, nature of citizenship. The concept of citizenship is expanding over space and time with the diversifica- tion of modes of being in the world and of relations with others, hence the range of “adjectival” citizenships (Council of Europe 2000a). The “Reiffers” Report (Commission of the European Commu- nities 1997a) states that citizenship is closely related to the kind of society and polity we want to live in and is thus a normative idea. The concept of citizenship underpins that of democracy (Benn 2000) and democracy, another highly contested concept, has been charac- terized as “a set of practices and understandings that requires con- tinuous negotiation within a continuing process of development” (Council of Europe 2000a). Democracy requires a particular kind of LEARNING FOR CITIZENSHIP IN IRELAND: THE ROLE OF ADULT EDUCATION / HELEN KEOGH 11 citizen—“one who is an informed person skilled in the processes of a free society, who is committed to democratic values and who not only is able to, but feels obligated to, participate in social, economic, and political processes” (Parker and Jarolimek 1984 cited in Shaver 1991). Participation has many meanings and extends well beyond the minimalist action of voting in elections to cover economic, social and cultural participation. Citizenship is a process in that it covers courses of action and sets of procedures as much as a status or membership. Oliver and Heater (1994) claim that it is “vital that citizenship is experienced.” Citizenship is a practice in that the actions and proce- dures are repeated and habitual, and require capacity-building of individuals, groups and communities for their participation in deci- sion-making at all levels. The “never-ending” nature of citizenship experience is clear (Council of Europe 2000a). Citizenship is lifelong and lifewide, it is in permanent construction. Being a citizen requires lifelong learning. The increasing com- plexity of society means that society needs people who can make decisions in light of evidence; evaluate arguments and definitions of problems, and articulate their own position in relation to con- temporary political debates (Assessment and Qualifications Alli- ance 1999). Citizenship is frequently linked to learning because civic virtue does not develop naturally but like an understanding of the rights of citizenship, must be developed and encouraged. (Heywood 1994). The “knowledge” economies and the “learning” societies have made learning for citizenship even more urgent. Martin (2000) reminds us of the need to see adult education as an agent of active citizenship, social inclusion and a democratic soci- ety. Learning for citizenship has moved away from knowledge as the basis of citizenship to an emphasis on experience and practice; and from feelings of belonging and obedience to collective rules; to a more individualistic citizenship that focuses on individual rights and responsibilities (Williamson 1998) within a community con- 12 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING text. Learning for citizenship includes access to the skills and com- petencies that people need for effective economic participation and for living in culturally, ethnically and linguistically plural worlds (Commission of the European Communities 1997b, 2001a, 2001b). Hoggart (1995) says that when people are alienated from 12 politics what is missing is “critical literacy” which enables people to debate, argue, disagree, challenge, evaluate, resist and ensure that democratic discussion itself is protected in society. In pluralist societies, learning for citizenship can play an im- portant role in forming a set of shared values that can promote cohe- sion and lead to the development of social capital within the com- munity (Gross and Dynesson 1991). The European Commission (Commission of the European Communities 1997b, 2001a) notes that the basic idea of democratic citizenship, for example, is that active participation and commitment to one’s chosen community supports the creation of knowledge, responsibility, common identity and shared culture. Civil society is a primary site for the development of citizenship knowledge, skills and attitudes (Commission of the European Com- munities 2001a; Community Workers Co-operative 2000; Fleming 1998). According to Cohen and Arato (1992 cited in Fleming 1998) civil society is composed primarily of the intimate sphere, (the fam- ily), the associational sphere (voluntary organizations) and social movements. Civil society includes the extended family, neighbor- hoods, community groups, youth clubs, local businesses, voluntary associations, churches, farmers’ organizations, and trade unions. Civil society operates on the assumption that the government is not fully representative of the people; it plays an important role in promoting collective interests, trust and cooperation; in giving voice to the con- cerns of citizens; and in delivering services that meet people’s needs (Fleming 1998). LEARNING FOR CITIZENSHIP IN IRELAND: THE ROLE OF ADULT EDUCATION / HELEN KEOGH 13 How Can Adult Education Support the Development of Citizenship? Clearly, a multifaceted conception of citizenship challenges adult education policymakers and practitioners on many fronts, philosophi- cally, methodologically and pragmatically. A key question is: How does an individual learn to be and act as a citizen in a democratic society? Commentators acknowledge the vital role of adult education—for- mal, nonformal, informal—in the development of citizenship knowl- edge, skills and dispositions (See UNESCO 1996; UIE; Commis- sion of the European Communities; CORI; Council of Europe; OECD 1999; Martin 1999, 2000, 2002; Benn 2000). Indeed, Bogard (1993) asserts that the very legitimacy of adult education requires it to play a fundamental role in the construction of demo- cratic structures and the affirmation of human rights in societies “where knowledge has taken on a new and crucial role” (Halstead and Taylor 2000). Many commentators also emphasize the indis- pensable role of adult education in promoting social inclusion and the development of social capital (OECD 1999; Marsh and Richards 2001; Martin 2002) which are considered essential precursors to, and products of, citizenship. Martin (2002) claims that “we cannot speak of citizenship without speaking of democracy, and we cannot speak of democracy without speaking of social justice and equality.” Indeed, OECD (1999) sees adult learning as offering preparation for social inclusion and participation and is also an element of it, since education is a form of social inclusion itself and learning represents one of the most important means of overcoming social exclusion. This is a vital step in enabling an individual to practise her/his citi- zenship. Commentators diverge in defining the nature of adult educa- tion and learning for citizenship. Adult education is never neutral— it reflects the ideologies of the providers and this, along with his- toric, institutional and community contexts, shapes the many differ- ent forms and practices of adult education for citizenship (Entwistle 14 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING 1989; Tobias 1997). Johnston (1999) identifies four overall ap- proaches to adult education—the radical, the liberal, the post-mod- ern and the so-called “third way,” each of which has implications for the kinds of citizenship development it supports. Radical adult education seeks to equip adult learners to chal- 14 lenge and change what are considered essentially unjust structures (Freire 1972; Lovett 1975; Fleming 1996, 1998). It has always been concerned with issues of citizenship and democracy (Martin 2002) and it could be styled “adult education for change” in that the edu- cator does not claim to be neutral, but rather wishes to concentrate on “really useful knowledge” for “empowerment” (Thompson 1996). The educator strives to facilitate the development of what has vari- ously been termed “perspective transformation” (Mezirow 1990), “conscientization” (Freire 1972) “critical thinking” (Brookfield 1987) and the “reconstruction of citizenship” (Martin 1999). This kind of learning which sets itself the task of democratizing the state and the economy, strengthening civil society, and promoting inclusive, re- flexive and active citizenship does not always find favor with the state or the economy (Fleming 1998). It also stands accused of being at risk of ultimately operating to indoctrinate learners into social ac- tion, thereby denying them their independence and self-agency (O’Sullivan 1993; Ó Fathaigh and O’Sullivan 2000). Johnston characterizes liberal adult education as providing in- dividuals with knowledge which they are free to use as they wish, individually or collectively. Liberal adult education sees itself as “neu- tral” and embracing learning “for its own sake,” for citizenship or for other reasons. Its critics charge its providers with generally promot- ing the preservation of the status quo, supporting individual rather than community development, and overlooking the social and cul- tural causes of alienation and exclusion. According to Johnston, the last decade has seen the develop- ment of a postmodernist approach in adult education discourse which has placed liberal and radical approaches to adult education under LEARNING FOR CITIZENSHIP IN IRELAND: THE ROLE OF ADULT EDUCATION / HELEN KEOGH 15 the microscope but has not offered alternative ways forward, concen- trating instead on deconstruction and diversity. In describing the characteristics of “third way” adult education, Johnston draws on key concepts and issues identified by Giddens (1998) who sees the re- newal of civil society as involving new social movements and a greater focus on learning within civil society. Johnston interprets this orien- tation as offering possibilities for new and flexible learning generated by the communities themselves and geared to the achievement of their own rather than outsider goals. “Third way” adult education supports the development of reflexive citizenship involving self-criti- cal and dynamic learning and active citizenship for involvement and action in civil society. It is obvious that these four broad models of adult education are based on differing philosophies of education and learning, and operate out of different understandings of the role of adult education and adult educators. Underlying the four models are varying degrees of understanding of, and enthusiasm for, the unique potential of adult education to be a catalyst between minimalist and maximalist inter- pretations of citizenship and to enable adults to make connections between formal and substantive constructions of citizenship. The question arises: Within these models of adult education and allowing for their inherent differences, what actual learning for citizen- ship can or may take place? Not surprisingly, there are many different responses to these questions. In the context of the Council of Europe’s project on Education for Democratic Citizenship and acknowledging the reservations of several commentators about the value of drawing up lists of “generalizations and commonplaces,” Audigier (2000) pre- sents the knowledge, skills and dispositions required for citizenship in a cultural, ethnic and linguistically plural world as three sets of interdependent competencies: a) cognitive competencies involving knowledge about legal, political and current affairs and the prin- ciples of democratic citizenship; the ability to make reasoned argu- ments; problem solving; utilization of modern media and technol- 16 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING ogy; critical thinking skills; b) affective competencies which refer to the ability to make ethical and value choices and the capacity to live with others; interpersonal skills; intercultural understanding; and c) action competencies which include the capacity for action and pub- lic debate. 16 Audigier also presents Veldhuis’ classification which distin- guishes four dimensions of citizenship: a) a political and legal dimen- sion which requires knowledge about the law and the political sys- tem, democratic attitudes and the capacity to participate; b) a social dimension referring to knowledge of how relations between indi- viduals work and the ability to live and communicate with others; c) an economic dimension relating to knowledge of how the economy works and the skills to participate; d) a cultural dimension relating to collective representations, imaginations and shared values; historical competence and recognition of shared heritage. In both these classifications, theory and practice, content and process, reflection and action come together in dynamic relation- ship. This gives rise to a further question for adult educators: In what kinds of adult learning settings—formal, nonformal, informal, inciden- tal—are these competencies and dimensions of citizenship to be developed and practised? Socialization which operates through mainly tacit, unrecognized or incidental learning is the ongoing process through which both mainstream and hidden political cultures are passed on from genera- tion to generation. Socialization plays a key role in the development of knowledge, skills and dispositions of citizenship. For adults, it occurs through all aspects of their lives, including through adult edu- cation itself where, since “pedagogy is never innocent . . . (and) is a medium that carries its own message” (Bruner 1996). It occurs through the “hidden curriculum” of the underlying model of adult education in operation which influences how adult education is struc- tured, organized, made available, funded, valued and accredited. So- cialization is unplanned and mainly unconscious learning (Merrifield LEARNING FOR CITIZENSHIP IN IRELAND: THE ROLE OF ADULT EDUCATION / HELEN KEOGH 17 2002) and gives rise to the “taken-for-grantedness” and general ac- ceptance that enable particular power relations and “ways of doing things” to exist in an uncontested way in society. However, in the context of socialization, the influence of gender, sexuality, ability, ethnicity, age, class and nationality in creating differently empow- ered citizens—in terms of effective participation in society and the construction and presentation of identity—must be acknowledged (Assessment and Qualifications Alliance 1999). As society in Ireland becomes more complex, fragmented and pluralistic, and as we grow in awareness of the rights of heretofore excluded groups of people, learning for citizenship through socialization is seen as becoming less adequate and reliable. As already indicated, the institutions and organizations of civil society, including the community sector, are claimed as key sites for informal learning of the knowledge, skills and dispositions of citizen- ship through the “third-way” and often radical adult education and learning. Lillis (1996) describes the community sector as engaged in a range of actions which contribute significantly to learning for citi- zenship and providing access to learning opportunities in a wide va- riety of ways and settings. Conservative community development works at the level of maintaining existing power structures (Connolly 1996), but radical trends in community development are commit- ted to encouraging people to take control of their own lives, and to promoting empowerment at personal and community levels—com- munities come to seek changes at policy and institutional levels, of- ten highlighting the need for the redistribution of society’s resources (Aontas 2000). In almost every neighborhood, village and town in Ireland, groups have been set up with the explicit aim of responding to local needs, including employment, educational, sporting, environmental or cul- tural needs. Participation in community development groups where people work together on issues of common concern facilitates the de- velopment of individual and community strengths not only through 18 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING informal and unplanned, but also through planned and nonformal learning, enabling adults to engage in a critical review of their society and how it works (Community Workers Co-operative 1998, 2000; Collins and Ryan 1996; Johnston 1999). As part of the national anti- poverty strategy, community development has taken on a new signifi- 18 cance as a force for social change, as active citizenship—without its being called that—began to be fostered by government as a way of involving geographic communities in planning and development ini- tiatives at the local level. The Community Development Program es- tablished under the Department of Social Welfare enables the com- munities it targets to devise their own solutions through a network of mainly educational projects. The community sector participates in national agreements, and under the local area-based partnership ap- proach, community representatives have been appointed to the local development partnerships. The OECD (1995) study of the partner- ship initiatives viewed them as laboratories of democratic experimen- talism declaring “the partnerships that we have seen are extraordinarily innovative.” Similarly, the Devolution Commission (cited in Collins 1996) identified partnerships as a form of participative democracy and as an extension of national social partnership to local areas. The Council of Europe project, Education for Democratic Citi- zenship, supported an Irish citizenship site from 1997 to 1999 in Tallaght, Co Dublin, the third largest urban center in Ireland. The approach taken was that of community development based explicitly on inter-institutional cooperation to empower adults, especially women through community education, and also to facilitate the par- ticipation of Travellers in the local community (Council of Europe 2000b). Community development principles also underpin general de- velopment in the Traveller community in Ireland. The distinctive Traveller lifestyle and culture, based on a nomadic tradition, sets Travellers apart from the majority population (Pavee Point 2002). The majority of older Travellers have not attended formal education. LEARNING FOR CITIZENSHIP IN IRELAND: THE ROLE OF ADULT EDUCATION / HELEN KEOGH 19 The Equal Status Act 2000 aims to protect Travellers and other groups from racism and discrimination and to promote cultural diversity in Ireland. The key challenge in this respect is to develop the advocacy capacity of local Traveller organizations to ensure that they are in a position to assist Travellers who seek to use the legislation (Pavee Point 2002). Adult education has played a key role in the emergence of Traveller spokespersons, mainly women, who have availed of op- portunities to engage in learning for personal development, for Trav- eller community development and for enhanced awareness about Trav- eller issues (Joyce 1999). Since 1998, Traveller women have been involved in providing community health services for the Traveller community, a development which strengthens Travellers’ input into the planning and delivery of health services to the Traveller commu- nity (Irish Traveller Movement 2002). The year 2000 was the first full year of the Citizen Traveller Campaign—a public information, informal learning and awareness program aimed at bringing about greater understanding between Travellers and the majority population. The campaign also helps strengthen Travellers’ confidence in their own culture and their iden- tity as citizens, and in gaining support from the wider community for the implementation of long standing recommendations to ad- dress problems faced by Travellers in their everyday lives. There is growing direct involvement of Travellers themselves in their repre- sentative organizations in a paid capacity and in voluntary work (Ginnell 2002). Nonformal adult education and learning in the shape of what is known as community education (Department of Education and Science 2000) is also claimed as a key site for learning for citizenship (Collins 1996; Collins and Ryan 1996; Fleming 1996, 1998, CORI 1999, 2001). Community education has been defined by Coolahan (1996) as: A process designed to enrich the lives of individuals and groups by engaging with people . . . to de- 20 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING velop, voluntarily, a range of learning, action and reflection opportunities determined by their per- sonal, social, economic and political needs (P. 29). The 1980s saw the development in Ireland of socially critical adult education where researchers and practitioners reflected on the 20 nature and impact of ideology and power in society (O’Sullivan 1992; Aontas 1986). The 1990s saw the growth of this socially critical adult education into community education, one of the most dynamic and distinctive elements of the adult education sector in Ireland (Department of Education and Science 2000). The participants in community education have almost always been women, and women in Ireland have “a long history of participation and taking leadership in collective community activities” (Lynam 1996). Collins (1996) tells us: The phenomenon of community education . . . has arrived in Ireland where most new movements or para- digms have arrived here—out of a feeling of discontent and a sense of exclusion from the dominant ideology and establishment on the part of a large part of the population, coupled with support form a number of key individuals from within the centre... (p. 94). Community education as actually practised in Ireland does not fit neatly into any of the four models of adult education—radical, liberal, post-modern and “third-way”—described by Johnston (1999). But Martin (1987) asserts that most community education happens in “the blurred areas between the models.” Despite the sometimes contested nature of the term community education it is possible to identify particular features which distinguish community education from other kinds of adult education: its personal and affective ethos, its flexible structure, its location outside formal education structures, its social and formative techniques, and the methodologies it em- ploys. (O’Sullivan 1993; Aontas 2000). The term community edu- LEARNING FOR CITIZENSHIP IN IRELAND: THE ROLE OF ADULT EDUCATION / HELEN KEOGH 21 cation implies “accessiblity, familiarity and relevance to the daily lives of community members” (Aontas 2000). Community education seeks to ensure that “the affected population becomes the active popula- tion” and to facilitate an active and self-determined participation (Coolahan 1996). This is what is “distinctive and, hopefully, subver- sive” about it (Martin 2000). Community education which is user-driven rather than system- driven ranges along the continuum from conservative or compensa- tory, through liberal and reformist, to radical; from structured learn- ing in secondary school academic subjects, crafts, ICTs, homemaking skills, parenting and higher education access courses through discus- sion groups on social, political and cultural topics, leisure activities, personal development to capacity building, social analysis, leadership skills, political awareness and social and political action. Participants come to community education for a multitude of reasons: to overcome their isolation in the home, to learn how to support their children in school, for home management skills, to cultivate an interest or hobby, to develop or update skills for employment, for higher education ac- cess, and to develop their human potential. Depending on the model espoused by the providers and learners, community education will provide stronger or weaker opportunities for the development of citi- zenship knowledge, skills and dispositions. In Ireland, community education and community development are closely allied. The main difference tends to lie in their origins and primary goals. Activities that are termed community education often have personal development and individual achievement of partici- pants as a starting point, but, arising from increased social and po- litical awareness, participants frequently go on to address local issues on a collective basis. Community development, on the other hand, tends to emphasize collective community as opposed to individual development as a primary goal, but may incorporate a strong ele- ment of planned learning and frequently facilitates individual devel- opment and progression. 22 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING There are currently over 1000 women’s groups, involving up to 25,000, women in community education in cities, large towns and, more recently, in small towns and rural villages throughout Ireland. They generally cater to women who are marginalized by gender and class and who are, at first, struggling to pass “the confidence barrier” 22 that seems to develop in women who have spent extended periods as homemakers (Drudy and Lynch 1993). The women experiment with collaborative and supportive ways of learning (Aontas 2000). Through- out the 1990s, these women’s groups began to work with national organizations, higher education institutions and government depart- ments. Many of the women began to develop a more critical percep- tion of Irish society and to recognize that the “political is more than just collective actions and campaigns in the public world” (Segal 1987 cited in Curtis 1997). Through this process, their knowledge, skills and dispositions as citizens are being developed. The POWER Partnership program is an example of an innova- tive cross-border (Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland) learn- ing program with an explicit citizenship dimension. The program was initiated by higher education and women’s organizations with the aim of supporting women’s political development and placing women’s learning and participation in community development within a political context. Entitled A Women’s Political Development Program: Feminist Approaches to Politics, the State and the Economy in Ireland, North and South, the course aims to enable participants to understand the nature and principles of power and politics, and to provide them with the information and skills to make and create choices about working within existing political structures and/or chal- lenging those structures. Participants included women experienced in grass roots activism, in trade unions and in the women’s move- ment and/or with a commitment to increasing women’s political par- ticipation. In terms of education levels, they ranged from early school leavers to holders of higher education qualifications. The program integrated models of social analysis and feminist pedagogy. Activ- LEARNING FOR CITIZENSHIP IN IRELAND: THE ROLE OF ADULT EDUCATION / HELEN KEOGH 23 ism—organizing, networking, lobbying, and agenda building—was a key outcome goal. Actual outcomes included moderate to signifi- cant increases in personal and general organization, increased infor- mation, stronger conceptualization and enhanced activism (Power Partnership 2000). Overall, attitudes to the efficacy of community education in facilitating the development of citizenship—be it active, critical, re- flexive, participative or other “adjectival” citizenship—are mixed. Much of the discussion centers on the issue of “empowerment.” Some commentators see community education as a radical model of adult education and as an engine of social change and personal empower- ment (Fleming 1996, 1998; CORI 1998,1999, 2001). Others (O’Sullivan 1993; Mulvey 1995; Ó Fathaigh and O’Sullivan 1997; Connolly and Ryan 1999) admit that the reality of social and politi- cal action outcomes may fall short of the rhetoric of some commenta- tors because much community education in marginalized commu- nities is a “second chance” compensatory model that is not expressly concerned with politicization. And, indeed, commentators point out that wishing to impose such activities on learners may leave the adult educator open to suspicion of, at best, imposing values and, at worst, indoctrination (O’Sullivan 1993; Ó Fathaigh and O’Sullivan 1997). Ó Fathaigh and O’Sullivan (1997) developed a typology of the levels of “empowerment” that a group of mainly women involved in a com- munity education course might have achieved. Instrumental empow- erment which includes communication, critical skills and knowledge was the level of empowerment most widely achieved. Expressive em- powerment which includes confidence and assertiveness was also widely reported by the participants. Ideological empowerment which is the ability to question beliefs and explanations in society was sub- stantial though less widely reported than the two first levels. Activist empowerment which refers to the motivation and will to take action for social and /or political change and development was more or less absent. 24 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING Ryan (1997) believes that the greatest weakness in community education in Ireland is that personal change may not be accompa- nied by political change, that is, that community education is con- servative rather than radical, post-modern or “third way” adult edu- cation. However, she concedes that political change in outlook, if not 24 accompanied by emotional politicization, is of limited effect. She believes that community education needs feminist/politicized facili- tators who are able to incorporate social analysis, radical politics and feminism into community education courses which will also meet the felt and expressed needs of women for a focus on their personal and domestic lives. She also believes that politicizing personal devel- opment courses by taking feminist post-structuralism and post-mod- ern analysis into account is one of the necessary responses to this many-faceted challenge. However, Zacharakis-Jutz (1988) reminds us that empowerment is not something that is done to adult learners by adult educators, rather it is a more subtle process whereby people come to recognize their own situation and develop the ability to do something about it. In addition, Stanage (1986) points out that the realization of empowerment is contingent on having an appropriate political context for it to happen. All that any educational process can do is give people the opportunity to develop a critical capacity that generates empowerment. Educators cannot control the use people make or do not make of this capacity (Ó Fathaigh and O’Sullivan 1997). Meanwhile, the preoccupations of many in the community edu- cation sector itself involve gaining recognition as a distinct and le- gitimate adult education sector as well as a teaching and learning approach; securing guaranteed funding from statutory and other sources; gaining accreditation for courses and certification for learn- ers, progressing from individual and/or collective endeavor to indi- vidual advancement in education and/or employment. The more formal adult education system in Ireland is funded directly by the Department of Education and Science, much of which LEARNING FOR CITIZENSHIP IN IRELAND: THE ROLE OF ADULT EDUCATION / HELEN KEOGH 25 comes under the liberal education, vocational education, continuing education and “second-chance” banner in further education colleges and adult education centers. There is no explicit education for citi- zenship—that such learning for citizenship takes place is implicit in learning for personal development, for employment, for cultural de- velopment, for progression to further and higher education, and for career advancement. Plans are underway for a direct intervention in further and adult education to support the development of interculturalism in Irish society. The White Paper on adult educa- tion sees interculturalism as referring to the need to frame educa- tional policy and practice in the context of serving diverse popula- tion groups and the development of processes, materials, training and in-service courses, as well as modes of assessment and delivery which accept such diversity as the norm. A report on interculturalism along with guidelines for both a modular and an integrated approach to interculturalism in the further and formal adult education sectors is currently being drawn up for the Department of Education and Science. Draft materials indicates that exploration of the concepts and practices of citizenship have a key role to play in the approach to interculturalism proposed. Some attention has been paid to interculturalism in primary schools (IATSE 2001) but, overall, this is a new area of concern, research and development in Ireland. Kenny (1997) warns against a fixed cultural content approach to interculturalism in place of a more open approach where all learners can locate themselves. In addition, all sectors of the education sys- tem including further and adult education of all kinds have submit- ted proposals to the Department of Education and Science on the role of the educational system in developing interculturalism and combating racism. It remains to be seen what will emerge from this consultation process, especially from the adult education sector. A key question for adult educators is: Within the range of adult education models and locations, which adult education methodologies and topics/subject areas contribute to the development of citizenship? The adult 26 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING education methodologies proposed by commentators for the develop- ment of citizenship depend, like much else, on their definitions of citizenship and their philosophies of adult education. Some believe the pedagogical approach adopted in any subject or at any level can be one that encourages reflection and critical thought considered essen- 26 tial by most commentators for participation as citizens or it can simply be one of “banking” information (O’Sullivan 1993). Fleming (1998) believes that Habermas’ (1990) “ideal speech” situation is the core principle of transformative adult education which he sees as facilitat- ing the development of “perspective transformation” (Mezirow 1990), an essential requirement for and a product of, participation in civil society and the practice of dialogic citizenship. Similarly, Nevins (1998) tells us that dialogic education and situated pedagogy where the teacher/ tutor and learner can grow together in the teaching and learning pro- cess are essential for learning for citizenship. The “Reiffers” Report (Commission of the European Communities 1997a) proposes “border pedagogy” as “the most significant current advance” in the field of education for citizenship. It is defined as a strategy for learning about the cultural “other,” by looking critically at how images, representa- tions and texts are constructed. Border pedagogy facilitates the identi- fication of one’s own borders, those of others, and the borders of the external social world. The report also stresses the importance for citi- zenship of the development of the meta-processes of thinking about our thinking. But the OECD (1999) adopts an open approach, hold- ing that in the context of the development of citizenship competen- cies, formal and non-formal methodologies are not superior to one another—just different but essential parts of the overall response. Other commentators concentrate on the “content” of learning for citizenship. Some look to specific programs of citizenship educa- tion to include the direct development of knowledge, skills and atti- tudes for citizenship. This tends to be a minority approach in adult education, however, as it is generally considered that since adults engage in learning on a voluntary basis, specific courses/modules on LEARNING FOR CITIZENSHIP IN IRELAND: THE ROLE OF ADULT EDUCATION / HELEN KEOGH 27 citizenship are unlikely to reach anything other than a small minor- ity. At the opposite end of the scale, other commentators contend that education for citizenship is so broad and contains so many ori- entations and approaches that almost anything taught to adults might be considered some form of citizenship education. Other commen- tators consider a liberal education approach to include literature, history, geography and/or the social sciences as critical to the devel- opment of citizenship knowledge, skills and dispositions. Yet others claim that the basic skills and the core transferable skills are the key skills for democratic citizenship (Benn 2000). These include literacy, numeracy, ICT skills, the ability to identify problems, find informa- tion, locate issues in a political and social context, work collaboratively, assume responsibility, take initiative and deal with diversity and, at times, conflict. Interestingly, it is suggested that these skills can be learned in any adult learning situation and that it is a preferable approach to obliging adults to participate in dedicated citizenship education courses. However, Benn also claims that while citizenship has to be learned like any other skill the most effective learning will take place not through the formal curriculum but through positive experiences of participation and, therefore, the adult education expe- rience should itself be an experience of participation. Further, commentators claim specific literacy learning as a me- dium for the development of knowledge, skills and dispositions of citizenship, but only if it is located within a full and rich curriculum which will encourage learners to develop the skills, analysis and con- fidence to make their own voice heard and take a full and active role as citizens in society (Crowther et al 2001). Athough the potential of ICTs to exclude people is acknowledged, they are also viewed (Youngs 2002) as having the potential to bridge the public and private spheres, in particular for women in the home who can be among the nodes of cyber citizenship with significant potential to participate meaning- fully in the development of the knowledge society. Web-space is also seen by Marsh and Richards (2001) as offering possibilities to vir- 28 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING tual ‘communities of learners’ trying to make sense of a world “in which there are no grand narratives and where cultural pluralism is the ‘norm’ so as to “uncover meaning, develop understandings of self and others”—all key citizenship activities. 28 Challenges to the Role of Adult Education in Relation to Learning for Citizenship in Ireland Clearly, the fact that there is no agreement among commenta- tors as to the models of adult education, the methodologies or the adult learning topics/subject areas that best support the develop- ment of the knowledge, skills and dispositions of citizenship, of what- ever kind, poses challenges for adult education policymakers and prac- titioners in Ireland seeking guidance on how they might address is- sues of citizenship through adult education. In addition, certain realities of life and of adult education in Ireland present challenges to any efforts that adult educators might make to facilitate the development of a broad conception of citizen- ship. A major challenge arises from the fact that the narrow ballot box version of citizenship which prevails in modern democracies (Williamson 1998) is considered the sum total of citizenship by many people in Ireland. This general “democratic malaise” challenges adult educators to find ways to put a broader concept of citizenship on the agenda. Another challenge to the role of adult education in the devel- opment of citizenship arises from the limited reference to citizenship in the general discourse in Ireland and its almost complete absence from most discussions and writings on adult education. Implicit ref- erence may be made to citizenship through reference to skills and dispositions for participation in civil society and for challenging the existing system, but it rarely goes beyond that. A further challenge arises from the fact that apart from the state- ments about the role of adult education in relation to citizenship in the Introduction, the White Paper on adult education (Department LEARNING FOR CITIZENSHIP IN IRELAND: THE ROLE OF ADULT EDUCATION / HELEN KEOGH 29 of Education and Science 2000) makes no further reference to citi- zenship and concentrates its attention and funding on literacy, re- turn to learning and continuing learning with a relatively small amount of funding being indicated for the community education sector where direct learning for citizenship is more likely to happen. In a similar vein, many adult educators have traditionally paid more attention to the role of adult education in developing human capital than to the role adult education plays in building social capital. Nor has the majority of adult educators paid much attention to the com- plexities of civic life or to the knowledge and skills needed to partici- pate fully—or even what to participate means (Merrifield 1997). More- over, some commentators (Ronayne 1999 cited in CORI 1999) be- lieve that even when adult education policymakers in Ireland accept that human potential development is as important as human resource development they may not have come to accept that adult education must be a collective as well as an individualistic experience if com- munities are to see the benefit of learning and not experience the “uprooting” of the learners who make individual progress through adult education (Council of Europe 1974). If adult education is to be a vehicle for the development of citizenship competencies it is necessary to keep in mind the low rate of overall participation in adult education in Ireland where under 20 percent of adults engage in any form of structured learn- ing in any one year. The higher the level of initial education an adult has the more s/he is likely to participate in ongoing adult learning with the result that the educational gap increases between those with and those without high levels of initial education. Those who participate in structured adult learning are already from an active social minority whereas those who do not participate in soci- ety in general are typically non-joiners in adult education. This reality points to the “double-edged promise” of adult education (Tuijnman 1996) which renders it an instrument of inclusion and exclusion, a reality which militates against the development of citi- 30 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING zenship through adult education for a big proportion of the com- munity in Ireland. The fact that many participants in adult education see it in traditional meritocratic terms means that qualifications rather than the critical capacities and skills of citizenship are their goal, a situa- 30 tion which is exacerbated by the fact that education for economic advancement tends to have a higher status generally than citizenship education (Council of Europe 2000a). But even where adults may be open to explicit citizenship education, there is a complex relation- ship between learning and citizenship, and there is lack of research to establish empirically the link between them and, indeed the link between learning and social inclusion. In fact, Thorne (1998) won- ders if there is a real link between any of them. Ongoing research is vital (OECD 1999). It appears that enlightenment does not neces- sarily lead to civil or political engagement. Research on citizenship in Colombia, Portugal and Chile showed low civic knowledge but high civic/political engagement; conversely, data from Finland, Nor- way and the Czech Republic showed high civic knowledge but low civic/political engagement (Torney-Purta 2001 cited in Schugurensky 2001). In addition, there is a need for more research on what the role of adult educators should be in relation to the development of citi- zenship knowledge, skills and dispositions (Merrifield 1997). The serious economic and social divisions (Government of Ire- land, no date) that exist in Ireland present a real challenge to active and equal citizenship. But, on the other hand Martin (2002) advises adult educators: to delimit rather carefully the interest in citizenship education for which we can reasonably be held ac- countable. We need to think about how the other non-educational preconditions for citizenship, like electoral and parliamentary systems, work. He is also firmly of the opinion that adult educators must draw a clear distinction between education for citizenship, and training LEARNING FOR CITIZENSHIP IN IRELAND: THE ROLE OF ADULT EDUCATION / HELEN KEOGH 31 people to be “good citizens,” and that this must start from “a vital set of moral, political and material connections.” Yet another challenge is the urgent need for pre-service and in- service education for teachers, tutors and trainors if adult education is to achieve its potential to support learning for citizenship. The majority of adult educators have not themselves participated in any kind of explicit education for citizenship from their initial educa- tion, their pre-service education and training. In summary, it appears that the fundamental challenge for adult educators is to create a culture of lifelong and lifewide learning among all sectors in our society for the lifelong and lifewide making and re- making of citizenship. But a few caveats are necessary. The danger of “commodifying” citizenship and turning learning for citizenship into another “shopping list” of knowledge, skills and dispositions to be ticked off must be borne in mind. The fact that most learning for citizenship takes place outside educational settings through commu- nity and other organizations (Elsdon et al 1995) challenges adult educators, particularly in terms of decisions about process and con- tent, and strategic alliances. And last but certainly not least, it should be borne in mind that the very notion of educating for citizenship, especially in a multicultural and pluralist society, comes under fire from some commentators as high-handed and patronizing especially where there is no agreement about the concept and practice of citi- zenship to begin with. What Needs to be Done in Adult Education to Create an Environment for Learning for Citizenship in Ireland? A word of caution to create an environment for learning for citizenship in Ireland, adult educators should avoid what (in relation to development education) has been termed the “deployment of gen- eralities” and the process/product “fudge” (Storm 2000). Concepts should be clarified and the discourse should be sharpened. Adult educators need to be able to convey in clear terms to all stakeholders 32 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING what they are about. Complexity and obfuscation should be avoided. Adult learning for citizenship should be put on the national agenda. A public debate is needed about “public virtues,” “the com- mon good,” “the future of our society” and how citizenship and learning it and/or for it are to be understood. Citizenship develop- 32 ment should be explicitly addressed throughout the programs that are set out in the White Paper on adult education. In doing so, and to avoid a “deficit” model of citizenship which considers learning for citizenship to be for marginalized people only, questions should be posed and answered about whether education for citizenship should focus on the most vulnerable in the sense that the social integration of potentially marginalized groups is a first and very important step towards active citizenship. However, it should also be recognized that learning for citizenship is equally important for “the ordinary mainstream citizen”—for adults enrolled in post- graduate courses, for adults in employment of all kinds, and for adult educators themselves. Creative ways should be developed to engage the 80 percent of the population who do not generally par- ticipate in any kind of structured learning. To do so, adult educa- tors need to make alliances with a wide range of agencies—social, community, sporting, workplace—that already work with these people. Good examples of practice should be sought in countries where the debate about adult education and citizenship has had a head-start. Adult education for citizenship should not try to encompass all urgent social, economic, or intellectual problems. It must avoid be- coming the “dustbin” (Butt 1989 cited in Martin 2002) into which all the problems of society are pushed. Yet it must be broad enough to go beyond sheer information to include political values and con- cepts (Martin 2002). In the same vein, we need to avoid classifying everything that happens in adult learning as learning for citizenship. A balance should be maintained between all the dimensions of citi- zenship—the cognitive, the affective and the pragmatic. The con- LEARNING FOR CITIZENSHIP IN IRELAND: THE ROLE OF ADULT EDUCATION / HELEN KEOGH 33 tent/process debate should be addressed. A recent survey carried out in UK indicates that while individuals feel that they gain some of the skills for citizenship through participation in adult education ses- sions, rarely, however, do they acquire the requisite knowledge from this site (Benn 2000). It would appear, therefore, that there may be a role for learning activities dealing explicitly with citizenship. How- ever, it should be remembered, as already pointed out, that partici- pants in adult education are volunteers who may not want to partici- pate in such activities. There should be an emphasis on learning as construction rather than instruction with the learner at the center of the learning process within a lifelong learning agenda (Department of Education and Sci- ence 2000). The separation between deliberation and decision-mak- ing, and the separation between discussion and social action in much adult learning should be addressed. Adult educators should reflect on the critical and creative functions of adult education for indi- vidual and social life. Some consideration should be given to whether the dominant pedagogy in adult learning should be “collective, fo- cused primarily on group as distinct from individual learning and development” (Martin 1999). Structures and relationships between teacher and learner in adult education should always be democratic. Adult educators should facilitate and, where necessary, demand and support the democratization of knowledge generation and owner- ship for learners, especially those on the margins. All institutions should aspire to becoming learning environments where learning for democracy as well as other types of learning will take place. To this end, attention should be paid to the civil life in the adult learning institution through the development of a civil charter incorporating, for example, democratic procedures for settling disputes. There is a need for better articulation between the existing ar- eas of adult education that engender learning for democratic partici- pation and other areas of adult education and the general education system. Particular support should be given to the development of 34 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING community education as a “citizenship site” which will involve com- munity education facilitators and tutors putting a more explicit em- phasis on education for citizenship within community education set- tings and closing possible gaps between the rhetoric and the reality of community education. 34 Research should be carried out on the links between adult learn- ing—formal, informal, non-formal, incidental—democratic partici- pation and active citizenship (OECD 1999). We also need research in the humanities and social sciences. Thornhill (1998) claims that: the pace of economic, social, scientific and techno- logical changes is now so rapid, and the effects on individuals, communities and societies so pervasive and profound (in Ireland), that research in the hu- manities and social sciences is of increasing impor- tance in equipping us to explain, interpret and evalu- ate our society and our role as individuals and as members of that society (p. 57). The adult educators themselves should be given opportunities to gain the skills, knowledge and dispositions to enable them to fa- cilitate the development of adult learners’ citizenship knowledge, skills and dispositions. The adult educator must be prepared to be “the lead learner” (UIE 2001) in relation to citizenship. We may need to reconceptualize the role of the adult educator somewhat along the lines of the typology suggested by Lovett (1975)—adult educator as network agent within civil society; as resource agent; as educational guide and advisor; and as teacher in the Freirean mode. The estab- lishment or consolidation of local, regional, national and European networks of practitioners and researchers for experimenting on and developing education for, citizenship should be supported (Turnbull and Muir 2001). The processing of the submissions currently being made to the Department of Education and Science on the topic of interculturalism LEARNING FOR CITIZENSHIP IN IRELAND: THE ROLE OF ADULT EDUCATION / HELEN KEOGH 35 and anti-racism should be located within an overall framework of learning for citizenship in its broadest sense. 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Silué * Introduction The 1946 United Nations’ Human Rights Declaration that edu-cation is a fundamental human right must have been decreed to raise people’s awareness of their rights to receive proper instruction. Education was then treated as an ordinary issue alongside other con- cerns listed on the UN agenda. It was not until 1975, during the Teheran UNESCO Conference that education was singled out as a key operational factor for development, especially when it became obvious that in spite of massive international assistance, Third World nations were under extreme constraints in settling economic and so- cial development on a sustainable basis. Therefore, it was recognized that development strategies needed to concentrate on education as a solution to enhance participatory community actions. *Institut de Science (ISTC), Technique de Communications, Boulevard de Université, Abidjan, Côte d’ Ivoire. 44 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING However, development is a complex undertaking that will not automatically come out given an improved social context, say, a demo- cratic environment. No wonder that the 1997 UNESCO conference in Hamburg identified Adult Education and Democracy as one of the most outstanding “challenges of the twenty-first century” (CONFINTEA 1997). If we admit that literacy is the backbone of human capacity build- ing, ranging from creative skills to optimize production activities, to critical participation to press for better social systems (i.e. democratic change), should we not address the literacy issue with greater original- ity, especially in Africa where formal education has been at great pains to reduce illiteracy? Should we not turn to African native languages as the most reasonable pedagogical option to speed up the dissemination of literacy skills across African populations? Experience teaches that the identification of a solution is the first stage to problem solving. The actual implementation of solu- tions is quite a different matter. So, how do we set up largescale adult literacy programs across the multilingual African society? If such strat- egies turn out to be effective, would that mean that the way out to participatory development strategies for democratic development in Africa lies nowhere else but in native languages? Do we have reasons to believe that emerging democratic practices are undermined right from the start in Africa if the multilingualism issue is not properly addressed? The paper is organized in four sections: section 1 will concen- trate on the relationship between language(s) and democratic prac- tices. Section 2 will discuss the dialectical interaction between literacy and democratic development; in this second section, we shall argue that even though development seems to be the ultimate objective of education, sustainable development will not be achieved except in the context of an improved social system where democracy stands out as the primary condition. Section 3 will then assess the underachieve- ment of formal education in African nations, and suggest alternative THE ROLE OF NATIONAL LANGUIAGES IN PROMOTING DEMOCRACY / SASSONGO SILUÉ 45 ways out. In the last section, we shall give an overview the Pan-African project set up in the Centre for Advanced Studies of African Societies (CASAS) that aims to work out technical solutions for the social and political advancement in Africa, on a long-term basis. Language, Democracy and Competing Political Forces Democratic practices requires the existence of social forcers or groupings that have direct or indirect relations to political power. In all areas of the world—in developed societies in the West as well as developing countries in the Third World—such forces do exist even though they relate to various modalities of political management. As for the relationship between language and democracy, the link is not self-evident. In any case, if such relationship were to exist, linguistic issues in Europe on the one hand, and language problems in African na- tions on the other hand, do not impact on the democratic process quite the same way. Language and democracy: a far-fetched relationship? Language and ethnicity Language and ethnicity generally overlap because language is a defining factor for the identification of ethnic entities (Fishman 1982; 1988). In Western industrialized nations, however, language issues hardly interfere with the practice of democracy; if they ever do, they are generally intermingled with odd factors such as cultural or ethnic self-identity. We can readily mention the cases of Yugoslavia and Spain where claims to self-determination negatively interfere with efforts to consolidate national integrity. By contrast, on the African conti- nent, the tensions between language issues and democratic practice are likely to raise quite different concerns. African states are newly-born political entities made up of an aggregate of ethnic groups using, in most cases, different speech forms. 46 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING Considering the primary requirement of democracy, that is, the co- existence of different social forces, African societies have the necessary profile for the democracy exercise, but only in theory. In fact, de- mocracy is more than the presence of competing forces. Democracy brings together different social forces competing for the conquest and control of political power with the ultimate objective to improve national welfare through efficient nation-building. In turn, nation- building is constrained by the linguistic profile of most African na- tions (Mansour 1995). The practice of democracy necessarily calls for interaction among social forces, and any social interaction is mediated through language. Thus, the relationship between language(s) and democracy stands out clearly. While in Europe we would readily expect ideological and economic interests to override ethnic or racial affiliation, in Africa where nation-building along with citizenship is yet to consolidate, social forces are likely to engage in ethnic rivalry. If nation-building is really constrained by the linguistic factor, the linguistic profiles of each African nation is likely to interfere in the democratic process and the construction of citizenship as well. Linguistic heterogeneity as a negative factor to democratic advancement Democracy is an ongoing process, and flattering democratic achievements in the Western societies are the result of long-standing social adjustments, often punctuated by major crises. Understand- ably, African nations who gained independence in the same period (i.e. in the 1960s) but whose national language policies are con- strained by a different linguistic landscape have achieved quite dif- ferent democratic records. In countries where the management of national languages is being facilitated by a relatively homogenous linguistic profile, democracy is likely to make significant progress; however, in those areas where linguistic diversity is the norm, na- tion-building, along with the consolidation of citizenship can be more demanding and make any political change relatively more eventful. THE ROLE OF NATIONAL LANGUIAGES IN PROMOTING DEMOCRACY / SASSONGO SILUÉ 47 Tanzania can be regarded as a linguistically homogenous na- tion with Ki-Swahili having a favorable effect on the nation-building process; in comparison, neighboring Uganda and Kenya displaying less linguistic homogeneity, are seen to strive desperately toward genu- ine democratic change. In West Africa, Mali is also a linguistically homogenous nation with Mandingo being spoken nationwide; com- pared to other nations like neighboring Cote d’Ivoire which is made up of an aggregate of some 60 different languages and dialects. By international standards, Cote d’Ivoire still has a long way to go be- fore it improves its democratic record. Far away in Madagascar, the political unrest in late 2001 might have been much bloodier had the relatively homogenous linguistic situation not had a mitigating ef- fect on ethnic friction. Had a similar crisis occurred in the 450-lan- guage strong nation of Nigeria, clashes would have been more imme- diate and would have claimed more human casualties. However, the hypothesis that linguistic homogeneity has a fer- tilizing effect on democratic advancement, while linguistic heteroge- neity is likely to hinder democratic progress should be handled with caution. The linguistic heterogeneity hypothesis leaks In West Africa, both Benin and neighbouring Togo display the same linguistically heterogonous profile and still, Benin scores quite encouragingly on the democratic scale, while Togo has been striving hard to bring political leaders to the negotiating table. For years and following contested presidential elections, legislative elections have been endlessly rescheduled. Compared to Benin, Burkina Faso is far more linguistically homogeneous, and yet, the democratic process there is less advanced. Guinea and Mali have almost the same lin- guistic profile, namely with transborder Mandingo and Fulany lan- guages stretching over both countries. Guinea experiences chronic political unrest; this cannot be accounted for by the slightly higher linguistic heterogeneity due to a linguistically fragmented zone in the southern region adjacent to war-torn Liberia. 48 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING In Central Africa, the Central African Republic has a nationwide local pidgin—Sango—which is used by more than 98 percent of the population and yet, the democratic process has been regularly dis- rupted by military intrusion. The neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo had managed in the 1970s to launch an African cultural revolution and had standardized Lingala as the official national lan- guage alongside Ki-Swahili in the east. Unfortunately, this nation has been sustaining one of the severest political crises since the late 1990s. In the same region, Rwanda and Burundi are the best examples that seriously contradict our initial hypothesis: Ki-Rundi is almost the only language of the Hutus and Tutsis, however, the ethnic rivalry there has brought about unprecedented human disaster. And finally, in North Africa, local Arabic is the most widely used language, beside English or French, and yet these Maghreb nations have had great difficulty in adapting to generally acceptable democratic norms. The hypothesis that linguistic homogeneity does correlate with democracy is further challenged, though to lesser extent by Botswana and South Africa. Botswana and South Africa are by far less homoge- neous that the Maghreb states and yet in these nations, the demo- cratic process is fairly well on track. So, should we look for other factors accounting for either poor, or steady democratic advance? And how can India, which has an unparalleled linguistic heterogeneity—with some 900 languages and dialects, be one of the biggest democracies in the world? How do we account for democratic advance in Benin, in contrast to uphill democratic reforms in neighboring Togo, in as much as both these countries are both linguistically heterogeneous? To what extent does Botswana differ from the Central African Republic or Rwanda? We would suggest that the most reliable factor that fosters democratic progress is likely to be literacy. It is true that raw figures on literacy in Benin are not very high, but African academics have unanimously named Benin Le Quartier latin Ifricain after the significantly large number of intellectuals in THE ROLE OF NATIONAL LANGUIAGES IN PROMOTING DEMOCRACY / SASSONGO SILUÉ 49 this nation at the time of independence. Thus, democratic achieve- ments in Benin have presumably stemmed from a colonial and post- colonial literacy inheritance. Senegal which is doing fairly well at democracy had, reportedly had its first college in the early 19th cen- tury. As for Botswana, this nation scores among the highest in its literacy—about 70 percent according to the 1995 UNESCO esti- mates. More importantly, in Botswana, the education policy favors the integration of the major national languages in the educational system. Therefore, literacy seems to have a reinforcing effect on the advancement of democracy. Literacy and Development: The Content and Process Approaches1 to Development The contribution of literacy to sustainable development is now so unanimously established that international funds providing for development projects in the developing world have adopted what looks like a dogmatic stand: an adult literacy module must now be attached to any development project; failure to do this may some- times result in the suspension of financial assistance. Indeed, empirical observation and statistical evidence highlight the relationship between literacy and development (Silué 2000: 15). But statistical evidence is what it is, and we should not jump to the conclusion that literacy strongly and unequivocally correlates with development. Do we not have other sound reasons to hypothesize that some random factors actually cause literacy to favor develop- ment? In any case, before addressing these questions we should first agree on what development actually is. Defining development The content approach to development The term “development” can be confusing if we simply rely on customary definitions that are implicit in the methodologies of in- 50 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING ternational organizations. The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, generally assess development with purely quantitative criteria like the Gross National Product (GNP), the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and other cold indicators such as the number of telephone lines, cars or TV sets per household, etc. (Silue 2000). The quantitative approach to development gives the wrong impres- sion that development is an end-product, that is, a mere content. Thus, by quantitative standards, countries that happen to have im- portant natural resources would, to some extent, be more developed than most European nations as the former generally score better on the GNP or GDP scale than the latter. By way of example, oil-pro- ducing countries like the Arab emirate states would rank better than Europe countries due to their financial potential to purchase techno- logically sophisticated infrastructutres. However, insofar as the ac- tual exploitation of such natural resources is highly dependent on external expertise, are we still justified in relying on ostentatious mod- ern infrastructure to assess development achievements? Are we con- fusing development and living standards? Development cannot just be bought as a ready-to-use gadget. The content approach to development is inconsistent because it tries to capture development within a very limited span of time. No won- der that the cash-and-carry development is generally fragile and of- ten results in major economic, social and political disillusionment. All this might have inspired international development experts to better refine the concept with a new coining: sustainable development. The sustainability dimension gives development its qualitative value, and this is the process approach to development. The process approach to development The process approach describes development along qualitative lines and as a long-standing process. Silue (2000: 8) defines develop- ment “as the body of actions undertaken in a community with the view to improving significantly individual and collective living con- ditions.” Surely, development is a long-standing process that stemmed THE ROLE OF NATIONAL LANGUIAGES IN PROMOTING DEMOCRACY / SASSONGO SILUÉ 51 long ago from the built-in intellectual capacities of human societies to conceptualize the possible mastery of the natural environment— i.e. adaptation and assimilation. It goes without saying that modern development would have been impossible without the advent of the industrial revolution in the 18th century; and for its part, the industrial revolution could hardly have gone steadily had not the social environment significantly im- proved. The long-standing transformations of the natural environment through scientific and technological revolution cannot readily be par- alleled with social revolution in which intellectuals have acted as lead- ing figures. There is no exaggeration in insisting that democratic achieve- ments are the results of the intellectual capacities of human societies to envisage and work out models of social structures and organizations— e.g. capitalist, socialist, and communist dogmas. Education in gen- eral, and literacy in particular, can be regarded as the most significant trigger to progressive social adjustments and, subsequently to various democratic advancements. If our hypothesis holds, then we feel confi- dent to state that the literacy skills that were disseminated across west- ern societies through formal education (Graff 1981; Scribner and Cole 1981; Kouassi 1999) have been a key factor in their industrial and economic development. However, modern development could not have become progressively sustainable in western societies had not a signifi- cant literacy environment reinforced participatory reflexes among edu- cated citizens, leading to social and democratic change. While the cause and effect relationship between literacy and development is widely acknowledged, scientific honesty requires that we recognize that this relationship is mediated through improved social systems where a steady democratic environment is the ultimate condition. Figure 1 summa- rizes the two approaches to development and highlights its relation- ship both with education (literacy) and with improved social systems (democracy): Clearly, the process approach better represents the relationship between education and development than does the content approach. 52 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING In (B) development does not directly derive from education; rather, it is mediated through an empowered social system (i.e. democracy), and democratic practice is a step to sustainable development.2 In contrast, in (A) improved social systems (i.e. democracy) and devel- opment are unconnected processes in their relation to education. FIGURE 1. Education, democracy and development Improved Social System Democracy Education (-> literacy) DEVELOPMENT A) Literacy and development: The content approach Education (-> literacy) Improved SUSTAINED Social System DEVELOPMENT Democracy B) Literacy and development: The process approach Literacy and Democratic Process in Africa Assessing democratic processes From principles to actual implementation As a social and political process, democracy at first seems very easy to define but when we concentrate on various modalities of fairly good democratic practices, we become less confident about knowing what it really is. Democratic practices assume the free and fair par- THE ROLE OF NATIONAL LANGUIAGES IN PROMOTING DEMOCRACY / SASSONGO SILUÉ 53 ticipation of citizens in decision-making, and consider elections to be its most straightforward manifestations. However, some recent political develoments compel us to become more critical with regard to these primary signs of the democratic exercise. India is often named “the biggest democracy of the world” (pre- sumably referring to the size of its population), and yet the system has great problems in grappling with the interferences of religion into democratic practices, which often results in violence. The Ameri- can self-proclaimed model of democracy is also running out of steam: it took the American superstructure no less than four weeks before they declared who won the 2000 elections. In principle, the elected president is not contested but one could comment that just as “too much salt spoils the sauce,” too much democracy kills democracy… In any case, the four weeks of political uncertainty is an indicator that something must be going wrong. Old democracies in Europe are not immune to such intriguing developments. The 2002 presidential elections in France have re- corded a desperately low turnouts; a large proportion of citizens (over 30 percent) have stayed away from the electoral contest, the cause being that the French electorate had the impression of being offered no real choice: the difference between the contending forces was more abstract than real. Shall we condemn the political leadership for sail- ing demagogic promises or shall we blame the French citizens for being unable to spell out what the actual stakes were? The democratic process in Africa On the African continent, things are different in nature, and the implementation of democracy is more problematic. Ever since the 1990s, with the end of the cold war and the return of most African nations to the multiparty system, many African regimes have been praising themselves for being democratic! They generally flag the great number of “authorized” political parties, so embarrassing the toughest human rights watchdogs find it hard to challenge this fact; indeed, the number of existing political parties that can be ob- 54 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING jectively checked is usually well-documented. The qualitative assess- ment of democratic achievements—independent press, free access to state media, critical participation of the population to the electoral process following a non-contested electoral census, etc., are much harder to evaluate. Surely democracy is more than the mere existence of political parties, free access to state media, and free and fair participation in electoral operations. Genuine democratic practice requires the for- mation of political parties according to criteria other than ethnic affiliation, the citizens’ critical choice of political leaders, a clear un- derstanding, and evaluation of electoral programs, the intellectual ability to sort out honest and realistic promises from demagogically fooling ones. If these few indicators were used to judge democratic advancements in Africa, then very few African states would qualify for the democratic test. However, it would be unfair to blame such inconsistencies on the African leadership. We all must find ways to give African popula- tions the intellectual capacities to smoothly process their internal social changes towards democracy. This will be possible on the con- dition that they develop the cognitive abilities needed to gain access to historical, economic and political information: a functioning lit- eracy environment through a generalized educational systems is a reliable alternative. Therefore, the African leadership is faced with the inescapable task of devising its own creative policies to dissemi- nate literacy skills across the population and immediately. Formal education and literacy in Africa The complexity of literacy skills To what extent and why is literacy crucial for the mind so as to influence significantly human capacity building? There is substan- tial literature on the role of literacy for human capacity building (Ong 1986; Denny 1991; Canieso-Doronila 1996; Bernardo 1998; THE ROLE OF NATIONAL LANGUIAGES IN PROMOTING DEMOCRACY / SASSONGO SILUÉ 55 Silué 2000; ). Literacy must not be restricted to the mere ability to read and write; literacy skills stem from the principle of making a thing stand for something other than itself, using various techniques of representation. As such, literacy is a highly abstract skill allowing the individual to disconnect himself from the immediate environment and then form elaborate context-free representations (Denny 1991:84). There are reasons to believe that normal human beings cer- tainly ground their thinking strategies on a combination of prior experience (based on contextual information) and anticipatory re- flexes (to predict possible happenings). While literate individuals skillfully capitalize on these two opposite processes to empower their thought, the non-literate are bound to rely on contextual informa- tion (experience) essentially. This is why Silue (2000:24) readily com- pares the literacy-empowered individual to a computer.3 We would imagine literacy skills to be articulated onto any de- cision-making at two separate levels; the first level of articulation corresponds to primary and internal capabilities—the know-how; this first articulation deploys intrinsic aptitudes essentially. The second articulation corresponds to the use of thinking strategies to secure a cognitive content—the know that. It follows that the reaction to any kind of change involving decision-making requires acute thinking (know how) and the processing of available information (know that). Illiterate and literate individuals are much likely to react in different ways; since the former’s thinking strategies are poorly equipped with know-how and know-that skills, one should expect him to resort to non-novel moves, that is sheer imitation.4 Supposing that this hy- pothesis holds, the illiterate will be seen react to current constraints either by developing conservative instinct (time-related experience) or staying away from action; a second alternative is to react emotion- ally and instinctively and doing like other mates (space-oriented behaviour) that results into ethnicity-driven behavior. If literacy works this way, this means that the acquisition of 56 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING primary literacy skills—reading and writing—represents a huge in- tellectual investment, especially for adults whose cognitive system has grown rigid—without room for the highly abstract manipula- tion of scriptural representation. Therefore, the selection of the me- dium of instruction to bring in literacy skills into adults’ lives is of crucial importance. Training an adult with a language other than his/her own considerably increases the learning task. By way of ex- ample, a native speaker of an African language being taught literacy skills in French will have the daunting task of coping simultaneously with the target skills—reading and writing—and the French gram- mar, vocabulary and the unimportant arbitrary orthographic con- ventions. Formal education in Africa: the weakest link Like some Asian countries, most African states gained their in- dependence in the 1960s. Today the educational systems in most African nations cannot compare to those of Asian countries, espe- cially emerging ones. Educational systems in Africa, in general, have not been able to set up effective formal systems to reduce illiteracy significantly. Most African states have fallen short of most modest expectations regarding the reduction of illiteracy. The World Educa- tion for All Meeting held in Senegal in 2000 came to the bitter conclusion that aggregate literacy rates on the continent have hardly improved; while these rates may have slightly increased in a few cases, in most cases, they are on the decline. So what has been going wrong in our formal educational systems? Shortly after independence, newly created African nations in- vested significant proportions of state budgets in education. Unfor- tunately, today, the results are far from flattering, and there are both objective and subjective reasons for this sorry state of affairs. The objective reasons are the exponential and uncontrolled population growth as against the weaknesses of educational infra- structures. The system is comparatively costly because almost all the training equipment is imported from abroad. As a result, the African THE ROLE OF NATIONAL LANGUIAGES IN PROMOTING DEMOCRACY / SASSONGO SILUÉ 57 schooling system has, at its best, favored the emergence of privileged elite perfectly disconnected from the largest proportion at the grass- roots. Under such conditions, the literacy skills acquired at a costly price could not have the expected impact on social improvement, as well as economic and political endeavor. The subjective reasons for the failure of African formal educa- tional systems are the actual content of teaching programs and the pedagogical options associated with them. The content of the cur- ricula does not always comply with African social realities; the me- dium of instruction is also inappropriate. Using foreign languages as the medium of instruction results in literacy skills becoming harder to acquire. To sum it all up, formal educational systems in Africa have had a quantitatively limited impact on African populations, since many adults are left out. In qualitative terms, the system is also leaking because the limited literacy skills derived from formal schooling are of little help for developing reflexes of participative development and enlightened political commitment among the population. Quite obviously, all these neither serve the cause of development in general, nor can it help educate adults—the largest proportion of the popula- tion who could have been the vanguard of the still tertiary agricul- tural production and other related economic activities. From their size, adults could have been more active to press for social change and improved democratic systems. The question is how to dissemi- nate literacy skills as extensively across the population and as rapidly as possible. Adult literacy programs as the best alternative For the rapid and systematic dissemination of literacy skills across adult populations, both in industrialized westerns societ- ies and understandably in developing ones, non-formal educa- tional systems offer, comparatively, greater advantages. While for- mal education is costly in time and financial terms, non-formal 58 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING education better fits adult literacy schemes. Adult literacy projects are easily tailored for the specific needs of target learners, since their professional activities are generally well identified. And finally, adult literacy instills reading and writing skills faster because learners are matured and the medium of instruction is generally their own native language or something reasonably close to it. Nonetheless, the decision to use the learners’ native languages as the medium of instruction has not always been taken for granted by all institutions involved in adult education. In many areas of Af- rica and especially in French-dominated African nations, some NGOs still teach literacy skills to adults in the colonial language! The argu- ment goes that the acquisition of this foreign language—generally the official language of the country—is the best option to anticipate more rewarding professional opportunities along with social mobil- ity. Unfortunately, such adult literacy projects generally fail due to massive dropouts. Adult learners generally feel impatient and frus- trated: they invest their time and money without being able to ac- quire the required reading and writing skills or to master the French language. In fact, this pedagogical option is simply an unfortunate confusion between teaching literacy skills and teaching a foreign lan- guage! Needless to say, it remains an unacceptable argument that us- ing native languages as the medium of instruction would require developing teaching materials for each single speech community, which is technically and financially untenable. National or regional adult literacy projects, it is argued, would be impossible to implement, given the heterogeneous profile of African nations. The heterogeneous linguistic profile of African nations is over- stressed in general, but it would be unrealistic and unfair to ignore this thorny issue. The issue is even more complex: how to launch national or regional adult literacy programs when most African na- tions are multilingual. THE ROLE OF NATIONAL LANGUIAGES IN PROMOTING DEMOCRACY / SASSONGO SILUÉ 59 The African Linguistic Diversity and the CASAS5 Project The CASAS project to minimize dialectal variation Today, nobody can honestly tell how many languages and dia- lects we speak in Africa; but this does not mean that the African continent is a linguistic disaster! Linguistic diversity in Africa sounds much more like a myth fuelled by ideological considerations and supported by scientifically questionable linguistic research methods (Bamgbose 1994). It is now fairly well-established that the first mis- sionaries who landed on the African continent bear a major historical responsibility in overstressing the linguistically heterogeneous pro- file of African states (Lim 1999). Early missionaries, most of whom were anything but linguists, praised themselves on “discovering “ now and then new speech forms as they moved from one adjacent speech community to the other and within the same region.6 CASAS is a research network of Pan-African academics based in Cape Town, South Africa, which launched a widescale project in the mid-1990s. The project aims at collecting the most accurate infor- mation on African societies and their culture with a focus on African languages as the backbone of this ambitious scientific undertaking. The ultimate objective of the project is to revitalize African languages as powerful working tools for development by equipping them with the least cumbersome writing systems. The first phase of the project has concentrated on the clustering of most African speech forms based on fairly high mutual intelligibility (85 percent). We must pause to note that the CASAS methodology sharply differs from Greenberg philo-genetic classification of African languages. While Greenberg’s classification simply makes use of morphological information (word information), the CASAS methodology identifies and clusters Afri- can speech forms on purely functional grounds, that is, mutual com- prehension between speech communities. The next phase of the project seeks to harmonize existing orthographic conventions for all African languages so that they 60 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING may eventually be written and used for modern social, economic, and political purposes. The orthographic harmonization is completed for most languages of Southern Africa (South Africa, Botswana, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Mozambique, etc.). The last CASAS workshop in May 2002 in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire, has completed the orthographic harmonization for Akan languages across the Ivorian and Ghanaian boarder and for Mandingo languages of Cote d’Ivoire, Mali, Guinea, Gambia, Sierra Leone, Burkina Faso, Senegal, etc. Similar workshops for the Gur languages spoken in Cote d’Ivoire, Burkina Faso, and in the north of Ghana, Benin, and Togo are scheduled, and in this respect, the West African region is almost covered. The CASAS research team is fully aware that clustering speech forms and devising orthographic conventions is the easiest part of the task. The first stage was easy to complete because it all depended on the researcher’s own motivation and personal commitment together with the support of private donors. The subsequent stages, namely the standardization process will be more problematic since part of its actual implementation no longer depends on the advocacy of research- ers. Success is highly dependent on how successfully the writing sys- tems will come into the lives of African peoples. This undertaking is even thornier since missionaries who have out-distanced the CASAS research team on the field have been using their own orthographic conventions and for quite restrictive purposes. In fact, CASAS has reached the point where institutional support, at the highest levels, has become crucial for the ongoing success of its work. The impact of writing on linguistic harmonization The CASAS project aims at contributing to the slow but steady emergence of a literacy environment in Africa, an inescapable way out for Africans to rethink their own social, economic, and political development. We are confident that if this passionate and yet hard task comes to fruition, some positive side effects that were not antici- pated in the first place would reduce the alleged African linguisti- THE ROLE OF NATIONAL LANGUIAGES IN PROMOTING DEMOCRACY / SASSONGO SILUÉ 61 cally heterogeneous landscape down to a reasonably limited number of speech forms. Simple observation allows one to note that linguis- tically homogeneous areas of the world coincide with areas that have established a long-standing literacy tradition; in such societies, read- ing and writing has become an unconscious and casual daily behav- ior. In contrast, areas where literacy is perceived as a form of witch- craft,7 linguistic heterogeneity seems to be the norm. It should be emphasized that if Western industrialized societies have been able to set up a firmly established literacy tradition, it is not because they were lin- guistically homogeneous in the first place; rather, it is the literacy phenom- enon that has reduced their linguistic heterogeneity to major standard(ized) languages. The absence of literacy and written literature correlates with well- established oralture. Oral speech is spontaneous and bound to vary permissively. In the long run, oralture stresses and reinforces dialectal variations and even stresses differences between dialects that have the same philosophical origins. This is so because speech variation starts as temporary stylistic or idiosyncratic deviations away from synchronic norms. Language evolves over time and space, and simple observation reveals that the range of variation in oral speech is much greater than variation in written speech. As oral stylistic variation extends over many speakers (evolution over space) and is modified from one generation to others (diachronic evolution over time), some mainstream bodies of variation fossilize into conventional speech forms or subsequently branch out into dialectal variants. Figure 2 illustrates a) how oralture favors a long-term linguistic diversity and b) how, on the contrary, literacy can have a unifying effect on speech forms at large. It should be underlined that the heterogeneity process is synchronically unconscious, while harmonization is a carefully planned undertaking. If African scientists would commit themselves to generalize literacy skills across African societies, this would be a major contribution to codifying African dialects and so deter inces- sant variations. 62 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING FIGURE 2. LINGUISTIC DIVERSITY AND LINGUISTIC HOMOGENEITY 2.1. The diversifying effect of culture (-) ------------------------------- heterogeneity ---------------------- (+) Stylistic variation Dialectical variation Linguistic diversity dialect 1 dialect 2 Language 1 dialect n + 1 dialect 1 dialect 2 Language 1 dialect n + 1 (T1) ------------------------------ course of time ----------------------- (Tn + 1) THE ROLE OF NATIONAL LANGUIAGES IN PROMOTING DEMOCRACY / SASSONGO SILUÉ 63 2.2. The harmonization effect of literacy (-) ------------------------------- homogenization process -------------------------- (+) Linguistic diversity Dialectical clustering for literacy harmonization purposes empowered languages dialect 1 dialect 2 Cluster 1 dialect n + 1 Language A dialect 1 dialect 2 Cluster 2 dialect n + 1 dialect 1 dialect 2 Cluster n + 1 Language X dialect n + 1 (T1) ------------------------------ course of time -----------------------------(Tn + 1) Conclusion Do languages have a role to play in promoting democracy? The answer is unequivocally, “yes.” Indeed, competing forces to take power for the control of social, economic and political decision-making are bound to interact and interaction necessarily means communication; and there will be no effective social communication beyond language(s). Do languages play the same role to enhance democratic 64 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING practices, whatever the area of the world? The answer is less straight- forward. In linguistically homogeneous nations, like western indus- trialized societies, the impact of languages against or for democratic practices is not that much as a determinant. However, in more lin- guistically heterogeneous areas like African nations, the interaction between the ongoing democratic processes remains a thorny issue. In a still great number of African nations, social forces often draw on ethnic affiliation, and ethnic groups define themselves along linguistic lines. The interaction of such forces in the political arena is likely to result in political rivalry. The shift from ethnicity-driven political rivalry to fair and free democratic competition remains prob- lematic. It would seem that an improved social system, that is, a sound democratic environment, is the prime condition to achieve sustainable development, and literacy is the main factor to fuel democratic ad- vancement. However, formal education has desperately failed to re- duce illiteracy among adults; the most important and also the most economically active proportion of the African population is excluded from decision-making. Therefore, the African leadership is left with no other alternative but to devise strategies to accelerate the spread of literacy across the continent. One such solution seems to be the rapid implementation of adult literacy programs in which African languages shall be the exclusive medium of instruction. At first sight, largescale adult literacy programs are constrained by the pervasive linguistic diversity in most African states. This is where African intellectuals, with linguists on the frontline, have the greatest contribution to make. Linguists have the responsibility to help fight back the ideology-driven African linguistic heterogeneity. The Pan-African research network in CASAS has launched a wide- scale research program across African speech communities with the ultimate objective of equipping all speech forms clustered on purely functional basis with orthographic systems. The most crucial stage of the project will be the standardization of African languages. On a THE ROLE OF NATIONAL LANGUIAGES IN PROMOTING DEMOCRACY / SASSONGO SILUÉ 65 long-term basis, script-equipped speech forms will be utilized in all important aspects of social, economic and political life. This is how the much-needed literacy skills will extend—across adult popula- tions and for the good of the African peoples—positive social change, and democratic evolution that will allow sustainable development. Therefore, African languages could play an important role in the advancement of democracy and in the development of citizenship. Endnotes 1The content and process approaches are concepts that were first developed and extensively used in the theoretical framework of psycholinguistics to account for two opposite types of language learning. 2 President Gbagbo of Cote d’Ivoire is correct when he draws an axiomatic relationship between democracy and development perfor- mances: all developed nations appear to be democratic societies while the poorest nations of the world have in common a resistance to any democratic change. 3 The operating system of computers stores prior information (re- corded data and software programs) on the Read Only Memory (ROM) and uses the Random Access memory (RAM) to concentrate on current tasks; as a result, computer systems are able to solve highly complex tasks with a perfection that human brains will never reach. 4 Imitation certainly draws on spatial clues (acting to conform with the other mates) and on time-related clues (reacting according to prior personal experience). 5 C.A.S.A.S. is the Centre for Advanced Studies of African Societies. 6 Note that the most spoken language in West Africa, Mandingo, is alternatively called Malinke, Bambara, Diula, etc. As for the Fulany lan- guage that stretches from West Africa down to Cameroon in Central Africa, it is named Pular, Peulh, Toucouleur, Fulfulde, etc. Instead of 2 languages these inconsistent methodologies came up with a total of 9 languages! 7 In Sub-Saharan Africa, and not in the Maghreb or in Arab states, some Muslim leaders play an important social role as fortune tellers. 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Yambi, J. 1994. “Literacy and development, Africa: The case of Tanza- nia,” in Verhoeven, L., ed. Functional Literacy: Theoretical issues and Educational Implications, Amsterdam, Philadelphia: John Ben- jamin Publishing Company, pp. 291-301. Yanga, T. 1998. “Harmonisation and the emergence of ‘state languages’: A case from Zaire,” in Prah, K. K., ed. Between Distinction and Extinction. Johannesburg: Witwaterstand University Press, pp. 173- 186. Creating an Environment for Democracy through Adult Education: Some Lessons from Belize r Dylan Vernon* There are two seemingly contradictory trends in the Belize ex-perience with democracy over the past decade. One is that of decay in democratic institutions and practice, with more and more people losing faith in the nation’s democratic institutions and po- litical leaders. The other is that of initiatives in rethinking and re- newal of the institutions of democratic governance, represented by a people-led process of democratic and constitutional reform. My aim is to share how adult and public education have contributed to creating a positive environment for democratic reform in Belize, Central America. My “right” to speak on this issue with some validity comes mostly from my active participation in the process of democratic reform and democratic education in Belize between 1994 to 1998 as the Executive Director of the civil society organization (CSO) that *Assistant Resident Representative, UNDP, Belize. 72 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING led the reform campaign—the Society for the Promotion of Educa- tion and Research (SPEAR). It is also based on my experience in coordinating the national Political Reform Commission in 1999 and 2000. At UNDP-Belize, I have continued my work in democratic governance which is now a program area of the organization. My presentation is organized in five parts: 1) Brief look at the context of the reform and education effort, 2) Brief overview of the process and actors with focus on CSOs, 3) Role and methods of adult education as part of the process, 4) Summary of results of reform efforts, and 5) Key lessons learned in the Belize experience. The Context: Why Political Reform Because of the historical difference in identity and political cul- ture of the colonizers, Belize is the only nation in Central America that does not practice a republican/executive presidential model of government. Elements of Belize’s political system and political cul- ture were evolving well before Belize’s independence and adoption of a new constitution in 1981, and while Belize was still a colony. Like other former colonies of the United Kingdom, Belize chose to adapt the British Westminster Parliamentary model of government as the basis of the new nation’s democracy. The Belizean version of this model has the following key characteristics: • The National Assembly, constitutionally charged with mak- ing legislation and policy, is made up of an elected House of Representatives with 29 seats and an appointed Senate with 8 seats. • There is a parliamentary executive in that the Cabinet comes from the National Assembly. • The Prime Minister is the person supported by the majority party in the House to exercise this function and is usually the leader of this party. This post is not directly elected. The Gov- CREATING AN ENVIRONMENT FOR DEMOCRACY ... / DYLAN VERNON 73 ernor-General appoints the Prime Minister. • In practice, the model provides an Executive that can exercise strong leadership; it is easy to translate political will into leg- islation, having built in majorities in both the House of Rep- resentatives and the Senate, and in practically every govern- ment board or council. This is normally referred to as Cabinet government. • The Constitution provides for an independent Judiciary un- der which the people of Belize ultimately enjoy the protection of the law. • The electoral system is a “first past the post” system which has separate elections in each of 29 constituencies. The overall popular vote can be irrelevant to the election outcome in that even the party with a smaller share of the popular vote can win more seats in the House of Representatives. This occurred in Belize in the national elections of 1993. • Opposition parties have no real power outside making some official appointments and preventing constitutional amend- ments if the majority party does not have the required 2/3 or 3/4 of the seats in the House. • The Governor-General represents the Queen of England who is Belize’s monarchial Head of State. There is a separate local government system that is not consti- tutionally enshrined and that is subject to significant control from central government. In 1994, and thirteen years after political independence from Great Britain in 1981, it was becoming clear that many aspects of the inherited political system were inadequate to deal with the young nation’s economic, political and social relations. SPEAR’s analysis of Belize had led it to the conclusion that the centralized nature of the political system, lack of effective popular participation, poor levels of awareness and education, and growing official corruption were major 74 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING causes of injustice, and pose several constraints on people’s empow- erment. By 1994, others in Belizean society were also expressing frus- trations with the political process. Some in the electorate observed that as political parties alternately took control of government, nei- ther made any significant improvements in the quality of life of most people. Increasingly, SPEAR noted that the Belizean people on the streets, in talk shows, in conferences, in the newspapers, and in small communities were criticizing politicians, political parties and the po- litical system. SPEAR felt that Belizeans were ready to examine how effectively the nation’s political democracy has been serving the people’s interest. Based on this analysis, SPEAR decided to coordinate a national campaign directed at stimulating education, debate and action around reform of the political system and its corresponding institutions. The campaign began in March 1994 and continued up to the next na- tional elections of 1998. Its general objectives were: 1) To encourage national debate and increase awareness about the current political system. 2) To increase awareness of the rights and responsibilities of the citizens and non-partisan groups to participate in democratic change. 3) To gather concerns and proposals for change that people across Belize have about the political system. 4) On the basis of these concerns, to develop recommendations for reform and lobby for their acceptance. It is important to note that education was prioritized by SPEAR as the key goal of the national campaign. Even before the campaign, SPEAR had always highlighted democratic education as a perma- nent strategy in all its work. This was based on the assessment that the educational system and other socializing institutions of society had failed to effectively create a citizenry and an electorate that were CREATING AN ENVIRONMENT FOR DEMOCRACY ... / DYLAN VERNON 75 aware of their rights, that understood the political system, and that could make informed decisions on important issues in the society. As SPEAR has always maintained, democracy, democratic reforms, and potential people power mean nothing without the capacity for sus- tained action. As the campaign proceeded, SPEAR would become even more convinced of this and would grow to see the campaign as first and foremost a process of national democratic education. The Political Reform Process Phase one: the call for political reform (1994-1998) Key highlights of the process: • It was a long-term consistent campaign with a clear plan. • It involved very participatory nationwide consultations—57 public consultations. • Wide range of education and advocacy techniques were used. • Other CSOs came on board and the networks were especially important. • Media took up the issue with regular news items almost on a weekly basis. • Recommendations for reform were developed and debated: SPEAR’s main conclusion is that: “Democracy in Belize is in crisis. Excessive concentration of powers, lack of political aware- ness, poor level of participation, rampant official corruption, and growing public disillusionment permeate all aspects of the politi- cal process.” SPEAR called for a national process of reform. • The Belize Civil Society Movement drafted a “People’s Mani- festo” for the 1998 elections with political reform as the cor- nerstone. • The Government in power was lukewarm to campaign and failed to set up a national commission process. However, the 76 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING Opposition, which won the 1998 election, ran with it. • People readily admitted that their understanding of the work- ings of the system was limited, and this could explain their limited participation. It was, therefore, not surprising that one of the proposals with widest support dealt with increas- ing political education. • By 1998, there was greater debate about the political system, and both major political parties had been pushed to make political reform one of the top issues in the election campaign. But there was still no formal national state sanctioned process of political reform. • A UNDP sponsored opinion poll of 1998 showed that 85 percent of Belize City residents believe that the nation’s de- mocracy needs to be strengthened and politicians were among the group of people in society that they trusted least. Phase two: the commission process (1999-2000) Clearly then, the national commission process in Belize was a direct outcome of the civil society campaign process; the party that won the 1998 elections kept its promise to establish a commission. This was done three months after the election, in December 1999, when the Prime Minister Said Musa announced that it was estab- lishing a broad-based Political Reform Commission (PRC). • The mandate of the PRC is to consult Belizeans with a view to review Belize’s system of governance and develop proposals for reform. It was officially launched on January 13 and given one-year to complete its mandate. It did so in December 2002. • PRC had fourteen members: each political party had two mem- bers each, and ten organizations had one each—Belize Coun- cil of Churches, Chamber of Commerce, Belize Business Bu- reau, Bar Association, Association of Senior Public Managers, Trade Union Congress, Media Association, National Garifuna Council, Women Issues Network, Association of National De- CREATING AN ENVIRONMENT FOR DEMOCRACY ... / DYLAN VERNON 77 velopment Agencies (ANDA). All organizations named their owned representatives. Most were from civil society, and four representatives were women. • The Belize Civil Society Movement was given the right to name the chair. ANDA was given this right and named the organization SPEAR. There was an Executive chairperson who coordinated the process with the assistance of a one-person secretariat. • Nationwide public consultations were held involving public meetings, a weekly radio show, visits to key interest groups, written input, calls, and presentations to the commission. Or- dinary citizens were involved but many complained about not having the opportunity to give input, especially in rural areas. • There were 103 recommendations that were formally pre- sented in a report to the Prime Minister at a public ceremony. The report was widely distributed. Phase three: post-PRC • By January 25th, the government had completed the first review of the recommendations. Of the 75 recommendations for change (28 called for no change), the government accepted 35 for implementation. The other 40 were said to be for dis- cussion. • After that announcement, there was a period of 12 months with very little activity. Some recommendations were imple- mented but the trend is slow and there is significant cyni- cism. • SPEAR did a summary document of the recommendations indicating which were accepted and which were not. But gen- erally, CSOs were very quiet after the report. Some seemed to feel that the battle had been won when the government ac- cepted to do the PRC process. 78 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING • CSOs are now slowly becoming more active again as it be- comes more evident that the government will not act on more recommendations without public pressure. Role and Methods of Education So how have SPEAR and other institutions in Belize approached education in the national campaign for democratic reform? SPEAR launched an educational campaign in the following: • Fundamental rights and freedoms, • How political systems work and do not work, • How to act for change, and influence decisions, • Key issues of development facing Belize, • Reform campaign and how to get involved. Methodologies and Techniques 1. Use of the media • Radio is still the most popular and the most effective of the various forms of mass media in Belize. SPEAR had its own national weekly radio show for most of the period and demo- cratic reform was an ever-present topic. In addition, SPEAR leaders frequented the national and regional talk shows. PRC also had a weekly radio show dedicated to the issues of re- form. • Television: SPEAR used existing TV talk shows frequently to get their messages across. • Newspapers: Techniques included inserts, press releases, up- dates on the reform process, and stimulating feature articles. • Media awareness breakfasts were also scheduled. 2. Production of popular/information materials • Newsletters: Political Reform Update was published to educate CREATING AN ENVIRONMENT FOR DEMOCRACY ... / DYLAN VERNON 79 on key issues and keep focus on the reform agenda. • Cartoon books: Two very successful books were designed and produced and widely disseminated—one on the constitution and one on individual rights. These were used extensively in workshop sessions. • Reports: Democracy in Crisis was mass produced. • People’s Manifesto on the 1998 national election. 3. Use of popular education techniques during public consultations: • Board Game: The primary aim was to educate. • Mr. Politician: Stimulating participation • Ballots 4. Targeted democratic education sessions • Students • Interest groups • Media 5. Video: “A closer look: Democracy in evolution” SPEAR produced an educational video focusing on how de- mocracy can play out itself in a real life situation. It was cheaply produced and widely used. 6. Democracy and you: A workshop kit on exercising people power This was the culmination of SPEAR’s democracy education work motivated by mounting evidence that the problem of lack of aware- ness about the democratic system, and lack of capacity to act for change, needed to be further addressed. In a very real sense, it brought together all SPEAR’s learning strategies and techniques of democratic education into one educational tool. 80 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING 7. Advocacy for democratic education: summary of key results Since the political reform process began in 1994, the following have been some key positive achievements: • There is no doubt that SPEAR made progress in fostering debate about the political system and putting the issue of reform on the national agenda. • Increased awareness did come directly from SPEAR’s sharing of information on constitutional rights and responsibilities of citizens. However, it is more likely that more awareness was generated by the experience of participation and observation of the political reform exercise itself. In a nation where politi- cal issues were considered the sole right of political parties, here was a non-partisan organization talking about political reform and providing the space for anyone to join the discus- sion. The entire campaign process was a lesson in how citizens can participate in political change outside of a political party. • There was active participation by civil society in the reform process. • Political parties have prioritized the issue. • Primary school curriculum has more items on governance and civic education. • Some concrete reforms done by present government since 1998 were: the Referendum Act, Town Board and City Council Acts, Ombudsman Act, Office of Contractor-General Act created, Village Council Act, and 39 Constitutional Amendments (Ju- diciary, Public Service, Oath of Allegiance etc., Senate, Cross- ing floor) However, one may ask, what is the real impact? While there have been some reforms, there are still high levels of political disillu- sionment, political corruption and centralized government. The real impact of the political reform process on decision-making and on the people’s development is too early to tell. CREATING AN ENVIRONMENT FOR DEMOCRACY ... / DYLAN VERNON 81 Key Lessons for Democracy and Education • SPEAR’s experiences in Belize have confirmed the organization’s long held belief that raising consciousness, and particularly political consciousness, has to be an indispensable ingredient of all activities related to people’s development. Sustained ac- tion for long-term change has to be based on awareness and knowledge of a critical mass. Consequently, raising awareness about democracy and the political system was integral to SPEAR’s political reform campaign. • Raising consciousness is always a key goal of advocacy in a democracy. SPEAR envisioned the entire political reform cam- paign as an educational activity that would increase awareness of political democracy, and of the rights and responsibilities of citizens. Therefore, efforts were made to ensure that the printed materials, the consultative sessions and public ses- sions all included the sharing of information, and discussion of how the current political system works and the role of the citizen in it. • The most effective way to educate is through participation in the actual process of democracy—as a national campaign grounded in reality. It is a long-term process with no short- cuts. • In a nation like Belize where the local media does little in terms of public education programming, SPEAR has shown that civil society organizations have a major information and education vacuum to fill in. SPEAR’s use of national radio has been relatively effective. • In doing public education through the media, publications, conferences, and public fora, much attention has to be paid to language and tone. SPEAR’s most popular publications have been those that use popular language. These have included the booklets that presented the constitution of Belize in car- 82 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING toon format and the Democracy in Crisis report. • Training of trainors is a key factor in the effective use of educa- tional tools such as the video and democracy kit. One organi- zation cannot do all the training. • Increasing people’s awareness and participation are challeng- ing to measure. More attention needs to be given to develop- ing qualitative indicators. One approach at qualitative evalua- tion is to trace the development and level of involvement of individuals and individual organizations. • Belize’s multi-ethnic and multi-lingual society presents unique challenges for work in democratic education. Strategies such as translation of some documents to Spanish, use of popular language, doing nationwide consultations, facilitating cross- cultural awareness workshops, and direct contact and work with cultural organizations have helped, but there is a long way to go. • A significant lesson is that participatory techniques can also be successfully used with larger groups and at the national level. SPEAR’s political reform consultations used creative tech- niques that were fun and that encouraged the sharing of expe- riences. • Democratic reform is demand driven: the onus for its success in terms of effective process and monitoring of implementa- tion and practice, is squarely on the shoulders of people in civil society and their capacity to mobilize for change. Conclusions In essence, SPEAR’s political reform campaign shows how a small individual civil society organization, even in a context of disempowerment, can stimulate collective advocacy for changes at the national level that lead to people’s empowerment. The campaign CREATING AN ENVIRONMENT FOR DEMOCRACY ... / DYLAN VERNON 83 is already influencing systemic changes that could make it easier for people to participate in decision-making at the village, town and national levels. Most importantly, it has increased awareness about the rights and responsibilities of Belizeans to speak out and organize for social change outside of political parties. Indeed, the long-term success of the campaign will be based largely on how much it stimu- lates and educate people to organize themselves for further change. A most important lesson from the Belize experience is that in the process of promoting democracy through adult education, there must always be a clear focus on the real reason why we are doing it. The end is not to make technical and systemic changes to a branch of government just for the sake of doing it. It is not to educate for education’s sake. The true end of developing a better process of gov- ernance is improving the lives of our people. Moral Education in Colombia r Alexander Ruiz, Marieta Quintero, Bibiana Restrepo and William Sánchez (Moralia Research Group*) The Phenomenon of Violence in Colombia The unfortunate history of violence in Colombia has led socialscientists in this country to become the pioneers in studying violence (the so called Violentología). Indeed, the apparently diminished explanatory power of tradi- tional theoretical paradigms used in the study of the phenomenon of violence in our country has favored the development of new theories relevant to the resolution of conflicts, moral education problems, and the generation of democratic alternatives, among others. How- ever, this accumulated knowledge does not seem to be compatible with the actions carried out by the state to reduce the spiral of vio- lent actions. * Moralia is a Colombian research group interested in moral edu- cation, with teachers and students of Universidad Distrital (Bogota) and a non-government organization, Funvhec. 86 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING Different forms of violence have arisen during the history of the formation of the state and society in Colombia. The civil wars of the 19th century were characterized by the confrontation of governing elites, while the outbreak of violence of the 1950’s is an example of social revolt led by the poorer classes, mainly peasants, who demanded for change in the state. While the Conservative Party was in power, out-of-control right- wing armed groups used unconventional ways of persecuting and killing Liberal Party members. This rural violence that arose in the 1950’s and expanded in the following decade, encouraged the migration of peasants to the cities, and in turn, the growth of population in urban areas, living under conditions (lack of electricity, lack of fresh tap water, poor sewer- age system, inadequate health and educational services) that do not guar- antee a good quality of life. Under these circumstances, different Colom- bian left-wing guerrilla groups emerged. Many attempts have been made to solve the civil strife in Co- lombia. However, the bureaucratic political agreements between tra- ditional political parties and some guerrilla groups, have not been accompanied by a real alternative plan to address the critical eco- nomic, social and human situation in Colombia. The lack of mutual trust between the guerrillas and the government in their attempts to bring about lasting peace, resulted in the creation of paramilitary forces, and right-wing armed groups, supported by rich peasants and unofficially by some members of military forces. Violent confrontations between paramilitary and guerrilla forces brought about civilian displacement resulting to the exodus of one and a half million Colombians over 15 years (between 1985 and 1999). Estimates indicate that 62 percent of this population have not been able to return to its territories, 55 percent are under 18 years of age, and 12 percent are under 15 years. These figures indicate that, besides the men who died unofficially in war, the affected population is made up mainly of children, adolescents, and mothers who are heads of their families. During the last two decades, these young people represent the MORAL EDUCATION ... / ALEXANDER RUIZ, ET AL 87 “main” recruitment base of outlaw groups. Youthful gangs, recruited by guerrilla groups, paramilitary forces, drug dealers and organized common crime come mostly from the poor urban and rural popula- tion. Drug dealers, for example, besides penetrating particularly the economic and political life of the country, established their influence in suburban areas—where young gangs are based. Among the youth, school children and adolescents have also been affected, not to mention that, in general, the school commu- nity has suffered this general violence phenomenon as some figures in our research show: From 1996 to 2000 - 408 teachers were murdered - 308 teachers were forced to migrate From January to June 2001 - 119 children were kidnapped - 26 students were kidnapped - 10 teachers were kidnapped In another political initiative, in 1998, as a result of the expan- sion of guerrillas and paramilitary forces, Colombia’s government car- ried out what was called mandato ciudadano por la paz (citizen’s mandate for peace) that led to the selection of five town areas in the country where meetings with the left-wing guerrillas were to be held. However, an increase of guerrillas’ attacks on the civilian population, kidnapping incidents, taxation on drug crop production, and forced displacement of civilians led the peace talks between guerrillas and government to fail.1 Some Previous Studies about Moral Education in Colombia In a study by Mejía and Restrepo,2 that could be considered a paradigmatic one for Colombia, it is clear that it is impossible to un- 88 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING derstand the problems of democracy and peace in this country with- out a deep analysis of how important the educational issue is in mak- ing democracy work. The following are some extracts from that work: Violence becomes a current issue thanks to culture and the minds that express that culture. However culture is not unavoidably unfortunate. Culture changes, that is its own essence (…) Indeed, it would mean education, in general, as a form of public power, is similar to the other rights established by the Constitutional Act. (p. 240-241) Following the same line of analysis, in a research project titled Educación para el desarrollo moral (Education for moral development) Maria Cristina Villegas3 deals with the problem of moral education at schools. Based on some statistics, she argues that, in a generic sense, we would barely achieve the second stage of moral develop- ment proposed by Kohlberg. This stage refers to the fulfillment of personal interests, in other words, a strategic morality lacking a con- cern for what is fair for the other. Fairness is, however, a basic aspect with regard to morality. Led by an interest in studying the moral development of uni- versity students, Moralia, our research group, conducted research on the logic in the reconstruction of moral discernment of young university students in Barranquilla4 . Based on their perception of values and norms, findings show that these young people do not recognize the cognitive, rational and argumentative ability of individuals to inter- pret rules based on moral principles, values, virtues and maxims. They instead link norms to formal justice or the positive canons in the legal codebooks. As a result, breaking the rule just implies a legal condemnation or penalty. Only in a few other cases do young people associate moral propositions with cultural criteria. Youngsters tend to consider norms as mere propositions of rights. Those norms, linked to the formal ways of justice, are seen as rights, not imperatives. Analyzing the point of view of youngster, it becomes evident that MORAL EDUCATION ... / ALEXANDER RUIZ, ET AL 89 the established norms are far beyond the ability of people and social groups to change. In such circumstances, there can be no demand for any kind of social responsibility other than enforcing the rules strictly. This would mean two things: not recognizing the critical and argu- mentative ability of individuals as well as reducing their participative role as citizens in the (re)construction of the social fabric web. Under the pragmatic view of morality, young people’s discourse reflects a cluster of propositions featuring regulatory ways of com- munication. This means that, in their interpersonal relations, they try to obtain agreements among the different members of the group. They conform to the norm to gain acceptance or obtain success or reach a previously established goal. Analysis of young people’s discourse allows us, on the one hand, to identify the reasons that underlie moral retribution or sanctions that are morally mandatory (forgiveness, regret, truth). On the other hand, very rarely does the ideal of distributional justice appear, in which reciprocity is required as a condition to act justly. The individual actions that youngsters consider “just” are lim- ited or restricted to the here and now processes of interaction, with- out overcoming situations prone to be generalized (social systems). According to Piaget, this phenomenon seems to be the result of the lack of a “group rule, a sui generis product of a shared life” required for real reciprocity to exist. We found, first, that the justice criteria used by the young people come from the reduced social context of action: experiences or situa- tions that they, their family or close social group members have gone through. Secondly, reward and avoidance of social sanctions seem to be the reasons for them to be attached to a system of values. Here, the underlying idea of justice is closer to the notion of compensation rather than one of recognition of a system of principles. Finally, there is the idea of justice, understood as equal opportunities. Another project in the field of Moral Education, “Análisis de la relación ética, política y pedagogía en un contexto de formación de 90 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING docentes”5 (Analysis of the relationship of ethics, politics, and peda- gogy in the context of teacher education”) was carried out in the School of Education and the target population consisted of univer- sity students and professors. Among others, there were objectives designed to determine the importance accorded to the moral and political dimensions in a list which also included the affective, aca- demic, and pedagogical perspectives. There were also items intended to detect the reasoning underlying the hierarchies constructed and the kind of moral valuation resulting from it. The following are some of the most interesting and worrying findings of this study. With respect to Ethics and Education, after completing the questionnaires and the interviews, a representative sample of both students and professors (a third in both groups) was asked whether they consider the moral aspect as a priority in their education and personal lives. The results reveal a negative crossed-perception in the members of the other group,6 either the students referring to their professors or vice versa, are not willing to place the moral dimension in the first or second place of the hierarchy. This perception of the other giving low importance or value to the moral aspect uncovers an educational environment in which direct discussions about moral topics involving students and professors, are avoided. What has to do with morality is left wandering in a sea of ambiguity. Here, communication is based on mistrust, to the point that none of those interviewed “took the chance” of stating that this dimension could be a priority for the other. We would like to finish this synthesis of empirical references by commenting on the need to develop systematic studies on the moral phenomenon, particularly on the way the moral justifications and ac- tions are constructed in the context of self-formation. In reference to this, Lelio Fernández7 (professor of Philosophy at Universidad del Valle) highlights the importance of us having at least access to a descriptive morality from the social sciences: “There is the need to cultivate a moral memory of society, something like a goal to reach—empirical research MORAL EDUCATION ... / ALEXANDER RUIZ, ET AL 91 can bring up valuable contributions for this purpose as it can uncover the disagreements in the real average behavior and the ideal codes, en- hancing the concrete description of morality (…) If the studies which show these disagreements are to be “meaningful,” it is necessary to study the real role of these codes, the causes of their permanence, and the ongoing processes of social changes that may be clues (if they are not reactions) to the above mentioned perceptual disagreements. Some Theoretical Guidelines Since the time of the enlightenment in the 17th century, the notion of autonomy has achieved its most important development within Kantian thinking. According to Kant, the key point of moral autonomy is anchored on the questions posed when we must make decisions to face the dilemmas and conflict situations in our daily life: What do I do? What is a fair or correct decision? What is the good thing to do ? These questions guiding modern philosophical thought were especially important in the 20th century in Germany for the devel- opment of movements like the Frankfurt School. Theorists like Horkheimer, Adorno, Marcuse and Habermas criticized the instru- mental rationality that in the modern society had made it impossible for people to achieve the moral age, an ideal condition from a Kantian perspective. The issue of autonomy, when discussed in pedagogical contexts, leads us to the field of moral development. At the moment of defining axiological dimensions we have to consider two important perspec- tives: from a conceptual point of view, it is necessary to recognize, just as Habermas points out, that the logic of moral development rests in four interconnected and decisive dimensions: social perspectives, argu- ing procedures, cognitive structures and moral stages. From a method- ological point of view, we can establish four basic principles: a) Moral competence is not seen directly, but only indirectly by means of observing performance; 92 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING b) Moral competence is developed in socialization processes in which an incidental role is played by the relationships be- tween adults and peers (family and school); c) The construction of the moral conscience is associated with the world of experiences lived by the individuals, and with the knowledge developed in cooperative relationships, in the interaction with others, and derived from actions and atti- tudes. d) The moral conscience at the external level is expressed in the actions (performance) as manifestations of the internal level (moral feelings). Although we are aware that it is not its exclusive function, we want to know about the role of the educational system in the con- struction of the moral judgment. The following questions show us the type of information we need to collect and the kind of instru- ments we need to use. • Does the school, as an important agent of the secondary so- cialization, intentionally accomplish its function of promot- ing the self-reflection, and self-recognition of one’s own moral action? • Does the school promote the development of moral compe- tence? Does it generate a participative attitude in ethical situ- ations (in Strawson) or in moral dilemmas (in Kohlberg)? • Does it promote the process of recognizing one’s own moral values, of subjecting one’s own moral feelings to consideration by others, and of identifying the type of experiences in which the moral phenomenon takes place (moral action)? • Does the educational system, as a social institution, promote understanding instead of obedience? To address challenges for the educational field, we consider the theoretical classifications done by Habermas to be valuable and per- MORAL EDUCATION ... / ALEXANDER RUIZ, ET AL 93 tinent. He studied the development of moral awareness and the logic of communicative action. Habermas proposes, besides the cognitive stages defined by Piaget, and the stages of the moral development elaborated by Kohlberg, various types of social interaction and com- municative action linked to these situations. Additionally, the contribution of Habermas to this project con- sists in offering us theoretical and methodological tools to under- stand moral development as a process, from one lower stage to a higher one. Consequently, since such stages are hierarchical, irrevers- ible and structured, they are not only related to the individual but to the society as well. As to the contributions of Habermas to the study of moral de- velopment in education, it is important to mention the role played by the theory of communication in the what for and in the how of pedagogy, not only in the field of ethics. When studying the communicative dimension or the language of morality, it allows us to reflect on the language used in pedagogic interactions: Is it a language that just introduces people to knowl- edge of the objective world, linked to a disciplinary knowledge? Or is it a language that permits people to recognize themselves, to establish relationships with others, to use arguments to confront their per- spectives, to propose and to substitute that prevalent idea, that say- ing doesn’t have any thing to do with doing? In moral terms, this would contribute to the lessening of the tension between the prescriptive and normative character of moral discourse (moral competence) and the moral actions (moral performance). Conclusion Based on the empirical and theoretical findings presented above, it is clear there is a need to develop research in the educational con- text to establish the role of the Colombian school system in the for- mation of axiological dimensions in teachers and students. This analysis calls for a critical study of the objectives proposed in the programs of 94 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING values formation, and for the proposal of policies and programs to promote moral education in our country. From the perspective of education, it is necessary to understand that both the competence and the action are imperative in the devel- opment of morality. A kind of education that promotes the develop- ment of moral competence implies an institution that encourages “understanding” and not only obedience. Similarly, in this kind of educational contexts, it is very necessary to focus efforts on the search for a basis for moral education. It is, therefore, inadequate for moral education to be a subsidiary of “a deontological moral perspective.” Moral education necessarily implies a set of procedures that links ways of acting to circumstances of the moment, such as in giv- ing priority to certain values over others, or as a consequence of spe- cific actions and interventions in the educational setting and in the investigation of problems in the hegemonic values of culture. This should not mean a severe restriction of freedom for those involved as respect must be given to the choices people make when opting for beliefs and traditions by which basic agreements and ethical visions of the future are constructed. Endnotes 1 Gonzales Fernán. Una Nación Fragmentada: Una aproximación a la violencia colombiana. Director of Cinep. 2 See Marco Raúl Mejía y Gabriel Restrepo in Formación y educación para la democracia en Colombia. Apuntes para un estado del arte. Bogotá: Instituto para el desarrollo de la democracia “Luis Carlos Galán”- UNESCO, 1997, 240-41. 3 Departamento de Sociología, Universidad de los Andes and Colciencias – ECE, Bogotá: 1999. Quoted in Guillermo Hoyos and Alexander Ruiz’ Formación ética, valores y democracia (Formation in ethics, moral values and democracy), in Myriam Henao and Jorge Castro’s Estado del arte de la investigación en educación y pedagogía en Colombia (State of the art of the research in education and pedagogy in Colombia). Bogotá: Colciencias – SOCOLPE, 2000. MORAL EDUCATION ... / ALEXANDER RUIZ, ET AL 95 4 Marieta Quintero, Bibiana Restrepo, and William Sánchez. It is worth noting that this research team, under the joint-direction of Alexander Ruiz, is currently developing a study work called “Análisis desde la ética de la responsabilidad, de los criterios valorativos éticos, políticos y pedagógicos, en los procesos de formación en valores (Análisis, from the per- spective of the ethics of responsibility, of ethical, political and pedagogical criteria in the formation of moral values) under the sponsorship of COLCIENCIAS for the 2001-2002 period. Some of the objectives of this study include the description of the moral decisions made by the teachers in their everyday work; to analyze the political approach that frames teachers’ views and actions when teaching values and to get to know the pedagogical views that support the knowledge and moral actions of teachers. 5 See Alexander Ruiz’ Pedagogía en valores. Hacia una filosofía moral y política de la educación.Bogotá: Plaza & Janés, 2000, the unit entitled “La relación ética, política y pedagogía: una experiencia de investigación educativa desde un enfoque cualitativo” from where excerpts were taken to be presented here. 6 The meaning of “group” here refers to a general category about which a general perception is expressed, eg.: “most of the professors I’ve had classes with at the university…” It is worth noting that all those interviewed indicate that there are fortunate exceptions who mainly jus- tify the efforts in the process of formation and self-formation. 7 Lelio Fernández. Ética y moral: relaciones entre vida buena y obligación. Colciencias-CSH (1995), quoted by Hoyos and Ruiz, Ibid, pages 166-167. References Adorno, W. Theodor. 1998. Educación para la Emancipación. Madrid: Morata. ___________ y BECKER, Hellmut. 1994. Educación para la Mayoría de edad. En: Revista Colombiana de Psicología, No. 3, pp 11-18. Allison, Henry E. 1995. Kant’s Theory of Freedom. Cambridge University Press. Cortina, A., De Zan, J., Michelini, D. 1991b. Ética Comunicativa y Democracia. Barcelona: Crítica. __________ “La situación del hombre como problema ético,” En: Palacios, X. y Jarauta, F. (edits) Razón, Etica y Política. El Conflicto de las 96 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING Sociedades Modernas. Madrid: Anthropos, 1989, Pp. 23-45. Buxarrais, M.R. 1997. La Formación del Profesorado en Educación en Valores. Propuesta y Materiales. Bilbao: Desclée Brouwer. __________ y Martinez, Miquel, coord. 1996. Educación en Valores y Desarrollo Moral. Barcelona: ICE-OEI. Camps, V. 1997. “El derecho a la diferencia,” En: Olivé, L (comp.) Ética y Diversidad Cultural. Santafé de Bogotá: F.C.E. pp. 85-100. __________ 1993. Los Valores de la Educación. Madrid: Alauda. __________ 1993. Virtudes Públicas. Madrid: Espasa – Calpe, 204 p. __________ 1992. Historia de la Etica. (Tomos 1-3). Barcelona: Crítica. __________ 1976. Pragmática del Lenguaje y Filosofía Analítica. Barcelon: Península. Carr, W. 1996. Una Teoría para la Educación. Hacia una investigación Educativa Crítica. Madrid: Morata, 1996, 173 p. __________ 1990. Hacia Una Ciencia Crítica de la Educación. Barcelona: Laertes. Cramer-Ruegenberg, I. 1976. Lenguaje Moral y Moralidad. Las Tesis de la Etica Analítica. Discusión, Crítica y Contramodelo. Alfa: Buenos Aires. Habermas, J. La Inclusión del Otro. Estudios de Teoría Política. Barcelona: Paidós, 1999. __________ 1996. Textos y Contextos. Barcelona: Ariel. __________ 2000. Conciencia Moral y Acción Comunicativa. Barcelona: Península. __________ 1987. Teoría de la Acción Comunicativa. Tomo 2. Madrid: Tauros. Hoyos Vasquez, Guillermo. 1999. “Apel vs. Habermas: afinando la ética discursiva,” En: Revista Anthropos. Huellas del Conocimiento. Barcelona, No. 183, marzo-abril, pp. 64-70. ___________ 1994. “Derechos humanos ética y moral,” En: Escuela de Liderazgo Democrático. Santafé de Bogotá: Viva la ciudadanía / Fundación social / Universidad Pedagógica Nacional. __________ 1996a. “Ética y sentimientos morales,” En: Colombia, Ciencia & Tecnología. Santafé de Bogotá. Colciencias. Vol. 14, No. 4, (Oct. - Dic). pp 23-31. Kant, I. 1996. Fundamentación de la Metafísica de las Costumbres, Barcelona. Ariel. MORAL EDUCATION ... / ALEXANDER RUIZ, ET AL 97 __________ 1985. “¿Qué es la Ilustración?” En: Filosofía de la Historia, México: F.C.E. Piaget, J. 1975. El Criterio Moral en el Niño. Madrid: Morata. Stevenson, Ch.L. 1984. Ética y Lenguaje. Barcelona: Paidós. Strawson, P.F. 1974. “Freedom and Resentment,” En: P.F. Strawson, Fredom and Resentment and Other Essays. London: Methuen. Turning a Gay Gaze on Citizenship, Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity: Contesting/ed Terrain r Robert J. Hill* Introduction There is an obvious nexus between campaigns around rights forwomen and those for sexual minorities1 in so far as both move- ments challenge the ways in which citizenship has historically been rooted in patriarchy (Nash 2000:173). In this paper, I would like to explore what it means to be a member of a sexual minority in the United States (U.S.) today. Since such a task is extremely complex, I will focus on issues consonant with this UNESCO Institute for Edu- cation workshop—critical citizenship, democracy, adult education and lifelong learning. In this essay, I frequently use the term “the State” by which I mean a governing entity made up of values, beliefs, and traditions— *Assistant Professor of Adult Education, University of Georgia, USA. 100 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING largely of male, heterosexual ownership and control; and “the expro- priation, domination, and selective representation of citizenship rights, thereby establishing selective participatory democracy” (Darling 1999:217). I will provide examples of both local grassroots democratic ef- forts from Georgia, where I am actively engaged in anti-oppression education, and at the federal level where efforts are undertaken largely by institutionalized/bureaucratized/professionalized non-government organizations (NGOs) and academe. The part of the title, “Turning a Gay Gaze,” is intentional since my subject position is as a gay man; however, it is not meant to suggest that I will avoid speaking about my understanding of the experiences of other sexual minorities. I conceptualize “lifelong learning” to include adult learning in many different environments. This paper explores my research and advocacy with lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersexual and queer (LGBTIQ) communities in the U.S. related to educational opportuni- ties: to take control of our own lives, for our personal safety and sur- vival; to gain equal rights; to construct counter-narratives that resist mainstream representations of LGBTIQ individuals as criminal, sick, sinner, and pathological; to create new critical spaces and social prac- tices; and to become full citizens in the context of U.S. culture. Heterosexuality/Gender Stereotyping: Structuring Democratic Rights while Creating Invisible/Persecuted Citizens I construct the subject position, “citizen,” in multiple ways. Citizenship, intricately linked to education for democracy, involves the individual and the State, as well as civil society. Notions of lib- eral citizenship have been developed around a heterosexual norm and gender stereotypes to the exclusion of a significant number of indi- viduals. Nash (2000) shows how “the traditional nuclear family…has structured citizenship rights in the past” (p. 173), suggesting that it “might be expected…that…lesbians and gay men would have a com- mon cause [together with feminists] against ‘compulsory heterosexu- TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 101 ality’ which relegates those who do not conform to inferior citizen- ship rights” (p. 173). Certain sexual practices (largely heterosexual and based on gender stereotypes) are enabled and others (mostly homosexual, Queer, and gender-variant) are disciplined in U.S. cul- ture and law. Many societies, and the governments that represent them, re- gard LGBTIQ people to be depraved, degenerate, and a menace to public order. An individual or group’s perceived moral status im- pacts their access to full citizenship and the exercise of democracy. For a very long time and throughout the world, homophobia has caused LGBTIQ people to be subjected to ‘’legal’’ violence made up of discriminatory practices (Ungar 2000) relegating them to second- rate (or lower) citizenship. Sexual minorities have seen what hap- pens when one is considered indecent, offensive, anathema, to pub- lic sentiments and social organization—marginalization and silenc- ing. Individual and communal responses to these range from resis- tance to assuming agency to actively construct a new politics of citi- zenship. An analysis of pedagogical practices within LGBTIQ groups confirms Nava & Dawidoff ’s (1988) contention that, “what is sought by gays and lesbians is not new or special rights, but, rather, the extension of existing rights guaranteed to all American citizens” (p. 150). Sullivan (1995) argues that equal citizenship rights for sexual minorities would merely entail extending the same civil rights to LGBTIQ individuals as those enjoyed by other citizens. Policy di- mensions would include: the end to all proactive discrimination by the state; an end to sodomy laws that apply only to sexual minori- ties; recourse to the courts where equal protection is absent; equal legal age statutes; inclusion of information on sexual minorities in school curricula; equal recourse to justice where governments dis- criminate; equal opportunity and inclusion in the military, and legal marriage and divorce (pp. 171-172). Adult education and lifelong learning are integral to the struggle in all of these areas (Hill 1995). 102 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING Situating Sexual Minorities Within Global Initiatives on Adult Education and Lifelong Learning Lifelong learning by sexual minorities around sexual orienta- tion and gender identity are clearly consonant with many initiatives, promulgated by global educational organizations and institutions. Despite this congruency, few recommendations, guidance, or decla- rations from these organizations seem to extend to sexual minorities. CONFINTEA V The Fifth International Conference on Adult Education was held in Hamburg, July 14-18, 1997, on the theme, Adult Learning: A Key for the Twenty-First Century.2 The Conference, interested in social and political responsibility, concluded, “only human-centered development and a participatory society based on the full respect of human rights3 will lead to sustainable and equitable development. The informed and effective participation of men and women in every sphere of life is needed if humanity is to survive and to meet the challenges of the future.” Adult education was positioned as more than a right—it was lauded as a “key to the twenty-first century,” and was seen as “both a consequence of active citizenship and a con- dition for full participation in society.” Adult learning was posited as activities that take place in formal and continuing education, non- formal learning and the spectrum of informal and incidental learn- ing available in a multicultural learning society. While adult learn- ing was broadly and dynamically conceived within a framework of lifelong learning, five years later, that dynamism has yet to include education related to sexual orientation and gender identity, and gen- der expression to any significant extent. The Conference recognized that adult education has undergone substantial changes and experi- enced enormous growth in scope and scale during the preceding de- cade—but adult education’s burgeoning does not seem to have aided sexual minorities in substantive ways. TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 103 Minority seminar report (1998) from CONFINTEA V The Minority Seminar Report (1998) from CONFINTEA V, published by the Minority Rights Group, has proposed general guide- lines for educational work with minorities that are applicable to sexual minorities, stating: “one of the first areas for minority education should be for the minority community to look at its own identities and discuss why it is a minority…[and] look beyond any imposed characteristics and identify its own intrinsic characteristics….The role of a minority’s knowledge and memory patterns in community edu- cation must be recognized….Curriculums’ potential homogenizing effects must be avoided [such as] imposed values…[that] in most cases serve the purposes of the dominant community (p. 6). Today, a plethora of learning projects undertaken by sexual minorities—as individuals and collectively—explore our identity, excavate factors leading to our marginalization, develop our own sense of meaning- making and knowledge construction, re/member our history, and challenge the hegemony of heterosexism.4 These endeavors are con- sonant with the Minority Seminar Report (1998) from CONFINTEA V. The Delors Commission Report Probably the most forceful argument can be made by the ap- plication of the “four pillars” that form the basis of the UNESCO Task Force for Education in the 21st Century, Delors Commission on Education.5 Here, we learn that individuals have the right to engage in: • Learning to be (“Education should contribute to every person’s complete development—mind and body, intelligence, sensitiv- ity, aesthetic appreciation and spirituality. All people should receive in their childhood and youth an education that equips them to develop their own independent, critical way of think- ing and judgment so that they can make up their own minds on the best courses of action in the different circumstances in their lives.”) This directive entails the rights of self-expression, 104 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING self-identification and self-discovery for LGBTIQ individuals and communities. • Learning to know (“People have to learn to understand the world around them, at least as much as is necessary for them to lead their lives with some dignity…and communicate with other people.”) This entails the right of agency for LGBTIQ indi- viduals and communities. • Learning to live together (“Violence all too often dominates life in the contemporary world….One of education’s tasks is both to teach pupils and students about human diversity and to instill in them an awareness of the similarities and interdepen- dence of all people…[people] should be taught to understand other people’s reactions by looking at things from their point of view.”) LGBTIQ individuals and communities are all too familiar with the marginalization, misunderstanding and vio- lence that surrounds us. We engage in pedagogical practices that make possible concerted action without erasing fundamen- tal differences. • Learning to do (given the changing nature of the workplace, it is vital to ask, “how do people learn to act appropriately in an uncertain situation, how do they become involved in shaping the future?”) This pillar is about the right to self-development; LGBTIQ individuals and communities are fully aware of the right of employers to dismiss us without cause in most states in the U.S., of our expulsion from the military, and of dimin- ished rights to a full future. The Ocho Rios Declaration In the context of international adult education, sexual orienta- tion and gender identity were recognized for the first time at the 6th World Assembly in Ocho Rios, Jamaica in 2001, when the issue was addressed in the meeting’s final Declaration.6 Hope was expressed or a new international community of justice, democracy and respect for differ- TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 105 ence. Participants declared that “Economic globalization…exacerbates di- verse forms of discrimination based on gender, race, disability, class, reli- gion, sexual orientation or personal preferences, age, linguistic and ethnic differences; and discrimination against aboriginal peoples, refugees, mi- grants and displaced persons.” In a post-assembly publication, using the Ocho Rios Declaration, Hill (2001) argues that governments and civil society will remain impoverished until alliances are built with sexual mi- nority communities, and until ‘difference’ is recognized as a fundamental human right. He concludes with 13 policy implications for adult educa- tion beyond the Assembly that will assist in building democratic partici- pation. Democratic Struggles: Cultural Contest in Civil Society and Government Hill (1996) states that cultural production involves developing intellectual and moral faculties within communities at the level of civil society. McLaren (1994) shows how cultural production often is a field of struggle in which particular forms of knowledge and experience are central areas of competition and conflict. Frequently, dynamics of legitimation, delegitimation, rebellion, resistance, ac- quiescence and quiescence are present. Learning and education are central to the struggle. Education about the self, the self ’s relation to the world, and to others (Willis 1990) are components of the contest. Civil society is a primary site for these struggles. It remains important to ask, “Why isn’t democracy developing social equality?” Evidences show that we, LGBTIQ individuals, need to gain constitutional-, civil-, and human-rights, as we strive for so- cial integration. Civil society is the site where social processes and political activities are engaged from the bottom up. We, LGBTIQ individuals and groups, are fighting for our rights as full members of U.S. society from the grassroots. CONFINTEA V outlined one vision of the State as the essen- tial vehicle a) for ensuring the right to education for all, particularly 106 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING for the most vulnerable groups of society such as minorities and in- digenous peoples; and b) for providing an overall policy framework for this right. Yet, in the U.S., the State reproduces unbridled capi- talism, heterosexism/heterocentricity, patriarchy, sexism, homopho- bia, and other oppressions. As a result, the hostility of the State has been contested by sexual minorities in numerous ways. In addition to democratic struggles occurring at the level of the State, Nash (2000) reports that …democratic struggles in contemporary society take place in cultural politics distinct from those of the State in at least three important senses. First…in the case of social movements, they are as much about changing practices in civil society as they are about policy-making and passing laws. Secondly, they are concerned with redefining the remit [message] of the state itself. In the case of citizenship rights, the scope and capacities of the state are contested and redefined in relation to the identity of citizens and what they may legitimately expect from it. While this type of cultural politics is conducted through the institutions of representative democracy as well as between civil society and the state, in so far as it is concerned with the practices through which the state itself is formed, it necessarily goes beyond existing institutions. Thirdly, democracy at the level of the nation-state is problematized in a way not consid- ered by the older traditions as a result of processes of globalization” (219-220). The State’s role “in including or marginalizing any group in society is particularly revealing for what it tells us about the social construction of the state’s interest” (Darling 1999:215). While CONFINTEA V offered that the ultimate goal should be the cre- ation of a learning society committed to social justice and general wellbeing—in the U.S., it seems we are not very close to achieving this. For full citizenship for sexual minorities, the State must accord TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 107 LGBTIQ individuals the constitutional provisions of freedom, pri- vacy, equal rights, and due process provided in the law for others. The political will to do this is currently absent. In the U.S., the State does not include protection for LGBTIQ people as a compelling in- terest; this impacts law, jurisprudence, ethics, and social policy. Sev- eral consequences of the State’s abandonment of sexual minorities include silencing, invisibility, marginalization, and violence—which weaken democracy. Alternatives to mainstream civil society and State oppression have been developed by sexual minorities, such as community cen- ters, HIV/AIDS support systems, adoption networks, and associa- tions of all types vital to LGBTIQ life. Hill (1995) has explored three types of quasi-educational organizations engaged in building a just society for sexual minorities: cultural organizations (e.g. librar- ies), service organizations, and occupational associations. For example, he found that service organizations are premiere sites of democratic adult learning. Non-profit gay and lesbian centers were shown to function as resource centers for learning and recreation, lending li- braries and historical archives, sites of oral history and networking, telephone hot lines, speakers bureau and other services. Gay and les- bian community centers sponsor lectures, workshops, classes, con- ferences, political events, meetings for mobilization and activist strategizing, “rap” and talk sessions, and coffeehouses. Topics cov- ered a wide range of issues including legal advice; health and wellness education; women’s advocacy; drug- and alcohol abuse education; youth and elder’s programs; personal development; bereavement sup- port; various arts, literature and poetry programs; safer sex educa- tion; and personal self-defense. These centers provide a safe haven for disenfranchised LGBTIQ religious groups, and a gathering place for special interest groups, including those for PWAs (persons with AIDS), HIV positive individuals, transsexuals, victims of domestic abuse or violence, drug and alcohol abuse, and those recovering from life in dysfunctional families and society. 108 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING These alternatives take up informal adult education practice that supports individual self-actualization and personal growth, so- cial and personal improvement, and social transformation. LGBTIQ NGOs and New Social Movements as Sites of Learning and Resistance It is important to distinguish between LGBTIQ non-govern- ment organizations (NGOs) and LGBTIQ social movements. LGBTIQ NGOs are voluntary associations of people with significant commonalities (as well as differences) around sexual minority status; they may be a part of a social movement. NGOs range from those that are bureaucratized/professionalized/institutionalized to others that are local and from the grassroots—both are fully essential for strengthening democracy. More regionally-restricted NGO initia- tives engage in political lobbying at the local level and provide non- profit community-based services, especially those not available through the State. For example, in Georgia, the NGO called GAPHAR, The Georgia Association of Physicians for Human Rights, holds Pride Health Fairs where gay, bisexual, and lesbian doctors provide free education and training, health screenings, and immunization in a public shopping mall7. LGBTIQ social movements, on the other hand, are “aggrega- tions of people and organizations with a shared set of ideas that seek to bring about social change consistent with a professed set of values” (Silliman 1999:154); NGOs are routinely “narrower in scope, con- stituency, and impact” (p. 154). The relationships between LGBTIQ NGOs and LGBTIQ social movements, as for other associations based on political interests, can be either antagonistic or mutually reinforc- ing (Silliman 1999:155). LGBTIQ NGOs are sites of political and social development and democratization. In a major study, Hill (1995) identified that “the body of adult education knowledge and practice constructed by people of same-sex orientation and those sensitive to it is largely, but TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 109 not exclusively, popular and folk liberatory education” (p. 148). Education projects are for self-knowledge and self-empowerment; education of others, largely in an effort to shape public opinion; and political transformation by changing social reality. These goals are essential for claiming full citizenship in the U.S. It is important to explore examples of adult education initia- tives to renew notions of citizenship, and to strengthen democracy, at four contested sites: a) practices in civil society, b) new policy making and legislative mandates, c) forcing the State to accountabil- ity, and d) redefining the limits of the State, in light of the State’s construction of limited interests. Education to Change Practices in Civil Society Education efforts to shape practices in civil society are far too numerous to list here. A few of the currently more contested terrains are illustrated. Family rights The language over “families” is a site of contestation today. For the first time, new census data show that less than 25 percent or one of every four households in the U.S. are made up of the traditional family structure of married couples with their children. Conserva- tives point to the findings as justification for the enactment of poli- cies they claim will strengthen the nuclear family (Schmitt 2001) and disenfranchise sexual minorities. The American Bar Association (ABA), Family Law Section esti- mates that there are four million gay and lesbian parents raising 8- 10 million children in the U.S. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) states that gay or lesbian American parents are raising 8-13 million children. Lambda Legal Defense & Education Fund esti- mates that there are from 6-10 million lesbian and gay parents who are mothers and fathers for an estimated 6-14 million children. As of 1990, between 6-14 million children were being raised in homo- 110 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING sexual households. According to the May 2000 edition of “Demog- raphy,” published by the Population Association of America, 21.6 percent of lesbian homes and 5.2 percent of male homosexual homes have children present (Dan Black, Center for Policy Research at Syra- cuse University, New York8 ). Since the violent events of 11 September 2001, public poli- cies around the social construction of “spouse” and “family” have been reexamined in the U.S. We must now ask, “Who, legally, constitutes ‘family’?” The deaths of lesbians and gay men on 9-11 put fresh pressure on U.S. social policy around definitions of these terms—words that LGBTIQ people have long battled to redefine. Post 11 September consciousness illustrates something that mem- bers of LGBTIQ communities have long known, namely, same-sex couples are robbed of rights as legitimate families. The result has been to refine public policy, since survivor benefits have now been given—in some instances—to same-sex partners of victims of ter- rorist attacks, a practice that troubles the traditional (religious) meanings of “family” and “spouse” upon which liberal notions of citizenship have been built. These changes will continue to re- shape formulations of citizenship and democratic practices in the U.S. in the coming years. They have significant ramifications for policymaking and legislative mandates, which may help to effectu- ate CONFINTEA V’s call for education as a condition for full par- ticipation in society. Sexual abuse Periodically, homosexuality is constructed as synonymous with pedophilia (sexual attraction to children) (Cahill & Jones, n. d.). The current frenzy around pedophilia in the U.S. (and global) Ro- man Catholic Church has become a generalized attack on homosexu- ality, conveniently (and uncritically) dismissing the fact that far more heterosexual child sexual abuse occurs, often within the traditional, nuclear family. It is estimated that 25-33 percent of all sexually abused children are boys and 67-75 percent are girls (Finkelhor TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 111 1994). Cahill & Jones (n. d.) report two studies that showed less than one percent of child molesters were gay or lesbian. In March 2002, Joaquin Navarro-Valls, the Vatican spokesper- son told the New York Times, “the incidents [of pedophilia] were a direct result of the ordination of gay men unable to resist molesting young boys” (Religion 2002:22). In April, the head of the U.S. Con- ference of Catholic Bishops denounced gays in the church. The dis- course that, ontologically, gay men (and of course lesbians and other sexual minorities) are intrinsically evil has developed. Grassroots and national groups are actively engaged in education to uncouple the no- tion that gay men are fundamentally oriented toward pedophilia. Violence Historically, heterosexism and homophobia have been cultural expressions of a public pedagogy of negation, erasure, and violence. Ungar (2000) identifies multiple types of violence against sexual mi- norities, including, state-sanctioned violence, semi-legal violence, and extra-judicial violence. Such violence robs individuals of their civil- and human-rights. State-sanctioned violence results from discriminatory laws and practices by State agencies. In the U.S., “gender profiling”—the sin- gling out of individuals solely because they appear as gender non- conformists (Wilchins 2002)—is a growing issue. A national cam- paign to educate people about gender-profiling, and to stop the prac- tice, has been undertaken by the NGO GenderPAC.9 Semi-legal violence includes killing, torture and harassment that materialize, at the hands of the State apparatus, such as police, or when lawful authorities willfully choose not to intervene when such acts are perpetuated by civilians. The experience of my friends Brenda and Wanda Henson is an undisputed example. Police and other local law enforcement agencies were slow to respond to death threats that the Hensons received at their lesbian-based Feminist Retreat and Education Center in Ovett, Mississippi.10 A U.S. House of Representatives subcommittee on Civil and Constitutional Rights 112 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING of the House Judiciary Committee heard testimony that summa- rized the harassment and violence that were committed against them, such as death threats by mail and phone, a dead dog hung on their mailbox, gunshot fire along the property line, gunshots aimed at a woman from a moving vehicle, and a high speed vehicle chase in- volving Brenda Henson and an unknown perpetrator. They cited instances in which law officials did not respond to requests for as- sistance or intervention and were directly antagonistic toward them. Only after persuasive arguments and a nationwide education cam- paign did the U.S. Attorney General provide federal marshals to protect Brenda and Wanda from local hate-mongers. Extra-judicial violence by vigilantes and other individuals and groups in society, technically occurs outside the law. In the U.S., the death of Matthew Sheppard at the University of Wyoming is one of many examples. Threats and actual bomb attacks on lesbian, gay and transgender bars, bookstores, restaurants and churches some- times occur. Web sites dedicated to the memory of transgender vic- tims at the hands of self-appointed authorities are commonly found on the Internet. One site11 provides a select list of more than 200 names from the many transgender people who have been beaten, strangled, stabbed, burned, shot, tortured and killed, choked, dis- membered, and sexually mutilated to death in recent years in the U.S. Hate crimes against the transgender community show how extreme the murders are. Victims are not just killed—they are bru- tally murdered by ferocious methods. New Policymaking and Legislative Mandates We members of sexual minorities engage in adult education efforts to affect laws, policies and actions of the State, and to shape practices of government. Gay “marriage” In 1996, the federal government specifically legislated that TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 113 states did not have to recognize same-sex marriages that were per- formed legally in other states, in a move that supported non-rec- ognition of homosexual relationships. The chief sponsor of this act was Georgia’s Bob Barr. However this legislation, called the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), apparently did not go far enough to satisfy conservatives in the U.S. Congress. On May 16, 2002, legislators introduced an amendment to the U.S. Consti- tution that calls for banning same-sex marriages and prevents all courts from overturning such a ban, in a move that violates indi- vidual state’s rights. In Georgia, despite vigorous efforts by grassroots groups with national help, Governor Zell Miller signed into law a bill that said same-sex marriages performed in Georgia or in other states are not entitled to the legal benefits of marriage offered by the state of Georgia; the law prohibits marriages be- tween persons of the same sex, and declares out-of-state marriages “null and void.” The struggles over marriage have spawned ongoing lobbying, litigation, protest, and direct action12 —all associated with aspects of lifelong learning, adult education, and pedagogical practices for adult human development. As a result, current notions of democracy are being challenged. One Delors Commission pillar recommends that we “learn to do;” our education is helping us to learn how to fight for our own future! Adoption Denying legal parent status to LGBTIQ people is a violation of civil rights that are given to (presumed) heterosexual individuals. The reality is that gay partners are often the primary caretakers of children, but they continue to lack parental rights and have no legal say in matters as simple as granting doctors’ permission to give an inoculation. Citing estimates that as many as 9 million U.S. chil- dren have at least one gay parent, the American Academy of Pediat- rics in February 2002 urged its 55,000 members to take an active 114 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING role in supporting legal measures that allow homosexual adoption and the same parental rights given to heterosexuals. Adult education by local and national organizations often supports the admonition of CONFINTEA V that “only human centered development and a par- ticipatory society based on the full respect of human rights will lead to…equitable development.” Hate crimes legislation Gelber (2000) points to many events that “have thrown the issue of hate crime into the public policy arena [on a global scale]” (p. 275). These events have resulted in international calls for the enactment of hate crime measures (Pollard 1998). In the U.S, a struggle is engaged over the need for—and limits of inclusion in— legislation against bigotry. The Local Law Enforcement Enhance- ment Act is a federal legislation aimed at addressing hate crimes. National and grassroots LGBTIQ groups are working to have this anti-discrimination law passed. In Georgia, local efforts are under way to add sexual orientation as a protected category to state laws related to crimes based on preju- dice. Through educational efforts, four local governments (of hun- dreds in the state) have civil rights ordinances, policies, or proclama- tions prohibiting sexual orientation discrimination. The City of Atlanta’s anti-discrimination law (passed December 2000) covers both sexual orientation and gender identity for employment, housing, and public accommodations. One powerful adult education practice is illustrated in ‘Take Back the Night’ events. These organized rallies or marches build coa- litions among grassroots organizations, local community service agen- cies, universities, religious organizations, governmental entities, busi- nesses, and private citizens. The early history—that these events were first organized by lesbians for safe night passage—has been lost as “Take Back the Night” events have evolved into pedagogical practices in opposition to violence against all women, specifically domestic violence, sexual assault, sexual harassment, and stalking (See, Lederer TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 115 1980). While these events are designed to build unity (including women with men), some grassroots groups, such as the Feminist Conspiracy, have claimed that this allows men to feel comfortable which circumvents the “disorienting dilemma” that triggers growth, learning and transformation.13 As a result, there are cases where cen- sorship has been used to stop actions aimed at making men uneasy during “Take Back the Night” rallies.14 Additionally, as sex workers continue to re-negotiate their citizenship status, and as sexual rights activists challenge notions of democratic inclusion,15 “Take Back the Night” events have resulted in clashes between “prostitutes” and anti- porn feminists over the meaning of sex, violence and men. Job discrimination based on sexual orientation Nearly a decade ago, studies showed that 80 percent of those surveyed in the U.S. favored workplace education on gay and lesbian rights (Davis 1993); five years later, more than 84 percent opposed employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation ac- cording to a survey conducted by Newsweek in January 1997. How- ever, discrimination based on sexual orientation forces lesbians to earn as much as 14 percent less than their heterosexual female peers with similar jobs, education, age and residence; and gay and bisexual male workers to earn from 11 percent to 27 percent less than hetero- sexual male workers with the same experience, education, occupa- tion, marital status, and region of residence (Badgett 1995). De- spite these data—U.S. federal legislators remain deadlocked on work- place parity. Efforts to pass the 1994 national Employment Non- Discrimination Act (ENDA), which will provide basic protections against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation (note that gender identity is not a part of this proposed legislation—one of many examples of prejudice faced by transsexuals), remain marginal. In the state of Georgia, Congressman Bob Barr has lashed out against ENDA, which he calls the “Preference for Homosexuals Act” (addi- tionally, he has spearheaded a movement to not include sexual orien- tation in pending hate-crimes legislation). 116 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING Forcing the State to Accountability Lesbian custody State-sanctioned discrimination against lesbian mothers remains the norm in the U.S. Examples are numerous where out lesbians have had their children taken from them, or have been denied cus- tody upon the breakup of their marriage. One of the most heinous examples of State irresponsibility occurred in Florida in 1995 when a lesbian mother lost custody of her daughter to her ex-husband even though he had served eight years for murdering his first wife (Freiberg 2002). Apparently in this jurisdiction, authorities have judged that it is safer for the child to be in the care of an ex-murderer than a lesbian mother. Lesbians missed in National Health Study on Women Between 1990 and 2000 “research on lesbian health began to emerge as a major area of study” (Roberts 2001:537). In 1997, the U.S. National Academy of Science, Institute of Medicine, Committee on Lesbian Health acknowledged the need for research on lesbian health as a priority concern. CONFINTEA V recommends that adult educa- tion offer significant opportunities to provide relevant, equitable and sustainable access to health knowledge. Yet, in May 2002, the federal government’s Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) re- leased its first comprehensive statistical report on women’s health, titled Women’s Health USA-200216 that had no mention of lesbians.17 When asked about the absence, a spokesperson for the government’s HSS said that lesbians were not included in the report (Lesbians left out, 2002), even though there is strong evidence that they have unique health needs. A search of the HSS Website for this paper revealed 22 encounters of the term “lesbian”—all referencing actions of former Presi- dent Bill Clinton’s administration; none are associated with the cur- rent George W. Bush leadership. The National Institutes of Health (NIH), an agency within the Department of Health and Human Services, launched the Women’s TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 117 Health Initiative (WHI) in 1991, with the enrollment of some 162,000 women completed in 1998. The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) now administers the WHI. The first results from the WHI clinical trials are expected in 2005. Many health activists hope that lesbians will be a formal part of these re- search findings. CONFINTEA V reports that government and social partners must take the necessary measures to support individuals in express- ing their educational needs and aspirations, and in gaining access to educational opportunities throughout their lives. Certainly many examples could be cited where health education in the U.S. for the LGBTIQ communities is neglected by the State—especially for women. In the continued absence of State-sponsored health initia- tives (and the presence of State policing of gay and lesbian health discourse), numerous groups have organized for self-help, and to call governments to accountability. Redefining the Limits of the State Itself It has been noted by political process theorists that the wider political system, especially the federal government in the U.S., opens up and closes down opportunities for organizing resistance. From the perspective of LGBTIQ communities, an example of “opening up possibilities” is illustrated in the defeat of several statewide amend- ments to curtail the rights of sexual minorities.18 Grassroots groups challenge accepted power structures, services, politics, and organiza- tion of the State. Education In 1998, a 13-year-old Georgia youth was beaten to death by his 15-year-old neighbor who called him “gay,” and was heard to say that “gay people deserve to die.” Incidents like this, regrettably, oc- cur across the U.S. Students in K-12 grades, who describe them- selves as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgendered, are five times more 118 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING likely to miss school because of feeling unsafe; 28 percent are forced to drop out of the educational system; on average, hate-filled words like “fag,” “dyke,” “homo,” and “queer” are heard by students 25 times each day while in school; the vast majority of victims of anti- lesbian/gay violence—possibly more than 80 percent—never report incidents, often due to fear of being “outed”; 85 percent of teachers oppose integrating lesbian, gay and bisexual themes in their cur- ricula; 26 percent of self-identified lesbian and gay youth are forced to leave their homes; 42 percent of homeless youth identify as les- bian, gay or bisexual; 75 percent of people committing hate crimes are under age 30—one in three are under 18—and some of the most pervasive anti-gay violence occurs in schools; lesbian, gay and bi- sexual youth are at a four times higher risk for suicide than their straight peers. Despite these appalling statistics of injustice, the Georgia Su- perintendent of Schools, Linda Schrenko, referring to lesbian and gay interests, has said, “I’m not in favor of that lifestyle, period. Par- ticularly not teaching that in public schools” (Douglas-Brown 2000). Such statements corroborate the notion that “sexuality in general and homosexuality in particular are highly contestable areas in edu- cation theory and practice” (Quinlivan & Town 1999:509). While individuals in a moral democracy have the right to hold specific be- liefs, they are not entitled to allow those beliefs to affect their profes- sional conduct in ways that infringe on others’ rights. In a compel- ling argument, Petrovic (1999) distinguishes between moral democ- racy and moralistic positions and their relationship to schooling. He convincingly argues, “democracy requires the positive portrayal of homosexuality in schools and precludes teachers expressing their be- liefs against it.” CONFINTEA V asserts that basic education for all means that people have an opportunity, individually and collectively, to realize their potential. For us members of sexual minority groups, self-edu- cating our way out of invisibility, marginalization and violence is the TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 119 most viable means to achieve our full capabilities. LGBTIQ peda- gogical practices penetrate areas traditionally considered as hetero- sexual domains, such as schools and other educational institutions. While in many ways we are harassed out of an education, we are fighting back. Immigration Until 1991, homosexuality was grounds for exclusion from ad- mission to the U.S. under section 212(a)(4) of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, since gay men and lesbians were considered to be sexual deviants. The power of “narratives” as a type of adult learning and adult education practice is illustrated in U.S. immigra- tion reform. As the Partners Task Force for Gay & Lesbian Couples20 reports, “Winning the battle for the repeal of ‘homosexual exclusion’ presented a unique opportunity for activists in the immigration and gay and lesbian communities.” By launching a “National Story Col- lection Drive,” adults affected by the former law documented the effects that immigration discrimination had on their lives. Through collecting the personal stories of people, a powerful tool was devel- oped to a) gather data, b) empower affected individuals, and c) edu- cate others who were not familiar with this injustice. Movement mem- bers learned about the many ways in which immigration laws dis- criminate against gays and lesbians. On another front, only partial victory has been won in regards to immigration and HIV/AIDS status. While the ban on immigra- tion of infected individuals continues, a waiver is possible for persons with HIV if they have a qualifying relationship, i.e., a U.S. citizen or permanent resident spouse, parent or child, and if the applicant can prove they are not likely to become a public financial burden. Once again, gay and lesbian immigrants, least likely to have such qualify- ing relationships, were excluded from the waiver. The Partners Task Force for Gay & Lesbian Couples reports, “While the law allowed for a waiver for the HIV+ spouse of a U.S. citizen, the waiver is not extended to the same-sex partners of U.S. citizens.”21 120 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING The military The U.S. Armed Forces have a policy called “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, Don’t Pursue, Don’t Harass”22 to deal with gay and lesbian people in the military. It is the result of former-President Clinton’s failed effort to end the ban on gays in the military, and was spurred by the brutal death of Allen Schindler, a member of the U.S. military due to allegations about his sexual orientation. The current policy, sup- ported by the U.S. Congress for the first time (1993) acknowledged that lesbians, gay men and bisexuals serve our nation, honorably; stated that sexual orientation was no longer a bar to service; sought to end intrusive questioning about sexual orientation; and sought to regard privacy and free association of service members as something confidential. However, in practice, the Armed Forces continue to engage in federally sanctioned discrimination. In 2001, 1,250 les- bian, gay or bisexual service members were dismissed—more than any in a single year since 1987. To date, 7,800 have lost their mili- tary jobs because of anti-gay discrimination at a cost of $US 230 million to facilitate the policy. A Department of Defense Inspector General Report (2000) states that 80 percent of 75,000 service members surveyed hear derogatory anti-gay jokes; 57 percent had not received training on U.S. military policy related to sexual orientation; 9 percent reported threats based on sexual orientation; and 5 percent witnessed or experienced anti- gay assaults. In 2001, a blue-ribbon panel recommended repeal of the military’s sodomy statute, yet one year later, Department of De- fense and Congressional representatives have taken no action to ad- dress the panel’s concerns or recommendations. Repeal of sodomy laws often presages lifting a military’s gay ban, as was done by Great Britain in the recent past (One year after, 2002). In light of this, numerous NGOs (e.g., the Servicemembers Legal Defense Fund) and several universities have established research, advocacy and edu- cational efforts related to sexual minorities and the military. Addi- tionally, LGBT service members link via the Internet and through TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 121 other informal networks to share their stories, offer resistance to the government, and provide support to each other in self-directed learning projects for survival. The judiciary In the southeastern U.S., examples abound where the values and actions of the states’ political leadership, exerting raw bias against LGBTIQ people, is being contested by popular education efforts and NGO nonformal education initiatives. For example, in spring 2002, Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore stated that homosexuality is “an inherent evil, an act so heinous that it defies one’s ability to describe it” and in Mississippi a few weeks later, judge Connie Wilkerson wrote, “in my opinion, gays and lesbians should be put in some type of mental institution instead of having laws…passed for them” (Freiberg 2002:33). Alabama’s judicial in- quiry commission dismissed complaints when a grassroots group and a national NGO filed concern about Moore. The commission claimed it found no reasonable basis to charge violation of judicial ethics in his statement. Complaints against Wilkerson are still pending. One can only wonder the kind of justice a member of the LGBTIQ com- munity would receive before these judges’ benches. The Radical Right’s Backlash: Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity as Contested Terrain Minimally, the State’s role is to provide services and guarantee basic needs of its citizens. A fuller construction of the State, based in feminist notions, points to a more dynamic process (Connell 1990). Darling (1999) offers out that the State “is a governing entity made up of values, beliefs, and traditions of male ownership and control; and the expropriation, domination, and selective representation of citizenship rights, thereby establishing selective participatory democ- racy” (p. 217). Historically, the State was much more covert in cen- soring sexual minorities, yet it retains significant control over who is 122 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING empowered to participate in democracy; sexual minorities are, in nu- merous ways, prohibited. Many advances in regard to sexual minority rights and modest social integration have been realized in the U.S. in recent decades due, in large part, to adult education around LGBTIQ issues. Gone are the days when the State undertakes raids on places where sexual minorities gather, such as restaurants, bars, and social clubs.23 There is generally less evidence of a police state that patrols the boundaries of both public and private behavior (Chauncey 2000). Where police activities, such as entrapment, still occur they are often challenged by a groundswell of activism that leads to legal action in defense of sexual minorities. For example, in May 2002, a local gay-rights orga- nization in Detroit, the Triangle Foundation,24 successfully settled a lawsuit that charged entrapment because police routinely arrested gay men for simply sitting in cars together or for flirting. As a result of the State’s behavior, activists aggressively provide education on “same-sex solicitation” laws that target soliciting sex as an offense for members of the same sex, but which allow equally offensive solicita- tion between opposite sexes to go unchallenged. While the movement toward fuller citizenship must be acknowl- edged and celebrated, sexual minorities appear to be losing ground in some arenas as members of the conservative Right-wing attack the LGBTIQ project for equal rights. Anti-gay, conservative efforts in the form of lifelong learning are built on a deep awareness of how to play cultural politics (Chauncey 2000:314). The Right is success- fully monopolizing regimes of truth and knowledge in an effort to construct their version of how the world should be—and there is little place for LGBTIQ people in this construction. The State is increasingly beholden to conservative, Right-wing, fundamentalist interests rather than to tolerance, inclusivity, and cel- ebration of difference, thus eroding progress made by LGBTIQ so- cial movements (Berlet 1995). In the U.S., because of our sexual orientation and politics, we TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 123 LGBTIQ individuals, are attacked by the religious Right and cen- sored by the State. In fact, a vibrant, conservative “counter adult education” offers resistance to the social and political gains that sexual minorities have made. The Right has steadily progressed in elec- tions—a primary vehicle to organize and mobilize—to local school boards and other political offices, engaging in social engineering that is predicated on a heterocentric, “anti-gay” agenda. When I lived in Pennsylvania, a few years ago, a rural local school board passed a “pro-family resolution” that was promoted by a na- tional right wing organization, Concerned Women of America (CWA), a conservative group dedicated to “traditional family values” and main- taining a “proper place for women.” The resolution passed in less than 20 minutes, with no public input. The resolution read, in part, “Whereas the traditional family, of one man married to one woman and their children through birth or adoption, has been the norm in all civilized societies throughout history…the traditional family is under relentless attack by those who want to redefine family to include ho- mosexual and lesbian couples and by those who want to indoctrinate children in pro-homosexual propaganda against their parents’ wishes; therefore, be it resolved [we] hereby endorses this Pro-Family Resolu- tion and affirm that pro-homosexual concepts on sex and family…will never be tolerated or accepted in this school” (Rutt, 1996). A public uproar ensued, and, as a result, concerned citizens in the municipality formed a self-organized, action-oriented grassroots group, Common Sense. Their goals included support for teaching students to think critically and to understand and respect views different from their own. Success came when the pro-family resolution was reauthored to better reflect the composition of the community. Responses to grassroots pedagogi- cal practices such as those of Common Sense are complex. For some individuals they offer a sense of hope and possibility, while for others they are unwelcomed intrusions into arenas produced, maintained, and distributed by heterosexuals (or LGBTIQ people who comply with heteronormative behavior). 124 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING Transsexual Grassroots Activism—Self-organization for Survival in the Face of Unequal Protection Gender is a cultural configuration that entails “the totality of norms which members of the two sexual categories are obligated to conform in their performance of masculinity and femininity. Gen- der classifies, divides, and separates via a stipulation of social activi- ties that are considered proper or improper for each category” (Bauman & May 2001:106). Transsexuals are a group within the category of sexual minorities that expand the boundaries of critical citizenship and offer ways to probe hidden normative assumptions and gender stereotypes. As transsexuals cross the threshold of gender reassignment, they enter dangerous terrain where they are stripped of many formerly held rights. As a result, transsexuals—arguably the least understood and most stigmatized individuals in society—are engaged in the U.S. in a profusion of learning dynamics, critical education, oppositional practices and sense-making that are often aimed at democratic re- newal (Hill 2000). They can open the path to educational pedagogies that are radically democratic, unsettling and unsettled, dynamic, and inclusive. Several educational goals in transsexual communities are: iden- tity- and cultural-development; solidarity with non-tranny groups; capacity building to achieve social-, civil-, human-, and constitu- tional-rights; and resistance to energetic Right-wing conservative groups that challenge the social and political gains made by sexual minorities. Transsexual adult education challenges the way in which notions of citizenship have historically been rooted in heterosexism, gender stereotypes and patriarchy. The State’s response to trans- sexual initiatives reveals the social construction of the State’s inter- ests—which continues to be privileging heterosexuals, and advantaging normative notions of gender. My research with transsexuals explores the ways that transsexual knowledge is produced, used, and distributed in the contest to con- TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 125 trol their own lives; gain equal rights; construct counter-narratives that resist mainstream representations of them; create new critical space and social practices; and become full citizens in the context of U.S. culture. Findings document how transsexuals are fighting for their rights, to become complete members of U.S. society, from the grassroots—often without the assistance of other sexual minorities (e.g. gay men, and lesbians). Transsexual efforts are aimed at changing practices in civil society, as much as they are about policymaking and legislative efforts. Education is universally posited by transsexual community members as indispensable in the struggle for identity, acceptance and building an equitable society. The terms education and learning routinely emerge as key words in transcribed interviews, and concepts related to these terms dominate everyday life. There are multiple transsexual sites and opportunities employed in the struggle for cultural authority against the hegemony of transphobic discourses. If radical democracy is constituted through diverse experiences, needs, and desires of individuals and communities, then transsexual experiences and struggles are essential for reinvigorating notions of freedom, public and private spheres, equal rights, due process, law, jurisprudence, ethics, and social policy. Transsexuals challenge the adequacy of contemporary representations of the “we” as they at- tempt to expand the category of citizen. As a result of grassroots, community-based activism and education, very modest civil gains are being made; in 2002, six U.S. cities passed ordinances that in- clude protection from discrimination based on “gender expression/ identity” bringing the total to 2 (of 50) states, 8 counties, 35 cities, and 16 Fortune 500 companies that have joined the movement for transsexual rights. How each of these has been accomplished are case studies in strengthening democracy and critical citizenship through adult education and learning. 126 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING Intersexual Grassroots Activism—Self-organization for Survival in the Face of Medicalized Gaze Intersexuals are individuals who often display a complex range of anatomical conditions in which their anatomy at birth mixes sig- nificant masculine features with significant feminine features. The United States National Institute for Health defines intersexuality as congenital anomalies of the reproductive system, as does the Intersex Society of North America. The total number of people whose bodies differ from standard male or female types is estimated to be one in 100 births for some types of anomalies (Blackless, et al 2000). Dreger (1998) reports that “one of the first responses to the birth of a child of ambiguous sex by clinicians, and parents, is to seek to ‘disambigu- ate’ the situation: to assign the newborn’s identity as either female or male, surgically modify the child’s genitalia to conform believably to that sex identity, and provide other medical treatment (such as hor- mones) to reinforce the gender decided upon” (p. 25). In fact, the total number of people receiving surgery to “normalize” genital ap- pearance may be one or two in 1,000 births (Blackless, et al 2000). As a result, a substantial number of adults are “women by force” since in the U.S. five children are subjected to harmful, medically unnecessary sexual surgeries every day. Intersexuals argue that sur- gery is symbolic of society’s need to eliminate the intersexual “un- natural” body, and is the worst part of many intersexuals’ experi- ences. Now, as has occurred for fifty years, surgery is performed shortly after birth, at times without the consent of the child’s (victim’s) parents. To some educators working in the intersexual arena, justice for victims is sought from the perspective of disability rights, and through the lens of childhood trauma. In 1993, Cheryl Chase, an intersexual activist announced the formation of an educational organization by and for intersexuals, the Intersex Society of North America25 (ISNA). Koyama (2001) re- ports that, “since then, many other intersex activists emerged from their silence and isolation, crafting a new movement to take back the TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 127 dignity and integrity stolen and hidden from them by the archaic medical establishment and to prevent continuing victimization of intersex children” (p. 2). In the ensuing decade, this group has progressed from picketing at medical conventions to sharing their stories with health care professionals. Queer Citizenship: Disrupting “Sexual Minority” Claims The construction of citizenship based on sexual minority status presupposes that the group possesses immutable traits—inborn and unchangeable (e.g. parallel to race). Liberal democracy accords rights to groups only if their membership is clear (Nash 2000:177). The liberal notion of citizenship is, however, disrupted in a significant way by contemporary Queer theorists’ rejection of the existence of an identifiable “we” consisting of essentialized sexual outlaws. In fact, liberal claims to minority status by some lesbian, gay, and bisexual individuals actually may contribute to the construction of the cat- egory ‘abnormal minority.’ Younger generations of Queer activists in the U.S. “reject the fixity of the ‘sexual minority’ claim in favor of a more disruptive challenge to the status quo” (Nash 2000:176). To say that someone is Queer “indicates an indeterminacy or indecipherability about their sexuality and gender, a sense that they cannot be categorized without a careful contextual examination and, perhaps, a whole new rubric” (Hedges 1997). That which is Queer cannot be adequately defined or codified—but is about contingent knowledge whose meanings must be constantly re-evaluated and re- interpreted (Talburt & Steinberg 2000). Queer is not bounded by any particular label or desire. Queer knowledge refuses to be com- plete. Queer epistemology leads us to believe that we cannot know with certitude and finiteness. Talburt & Steinberg (2000) report that Queer is politically dissident; is more a verb or adjective than a noun which cuts across identities, subjectivities, and communities. It sees identity as a necessary term of affiliation—even while identity traps, blocks, stifles and retards—that never fully describes those it 128 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING purports to represent. It challenges heteronormativity as the root of its politics (Cohen 2001). Queer discourse interrogates, celebrates, and acknowledges dif- ference as fundamental to humanity; it employs fugitive knowl- edge—that is, ways of knowing that have escaped the control of those who authorize and make legitimate both the dominant (heteronormative) paradigm and the mainstream construction of homosexuality (Hill 1996). It comes from disenchantment with gay and lesbian politics, or the lack of politics in lesbian and gay communities. It derives from a different understanding of identity and power. It unsettles assumptions about sexed and sexual being and doing. Queer positionality jars and disrupts taken-for-granted truth claims by juxtaposing seemingly contradictory identities. It opens up possibilities for actions that interrogate, celebrate, and acknowledge difference as fundamental to humanity. Queer con- structions trouble and blur the boundaries of what constitutes male, female, gay, lesbian or straight (heterosexual)—positioning “iden- tity itself as the axis of domination” (Seidman 1993:132). They produce learning opportunities for richer understandings of hu- man sexuality; they also politicize them. As cultural work, Queer praxis—being queer/doing queer—opens an in-between learning space in society. Queer knowledges provide a location where iden- tities grow and areas such as diversity, identity, representation, au- dience, textuality, body image/consciousness, and self-definition expand (Grace & Hill 2001). Citizenship founded on Queer theory starts from the position that difference is a fundamental human right, and that “forced as- similation” is contrary to the U.S. Constitution, and to democracy. The work of Kenji Yoshino, a gay Asian-American law professor at Yale University is central to this construction. He is unsettled by the way that people of minority cultures are deprived of their rights if they do not assimilate or hide cultural trademarks. Kurtz (2001) sums up this reformulation of justice, when he writes that Yoshino TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 129 “expand[s] the meaning of constitutionally forbidden discrimination. Instead of prohibiting discrimination against ‘immutable traits,’ like skin color, Yoshino want[s] to read the Constitution as prohibiting discrimination based on anything that could be interpreted as a sign of a person’s social identity — their language, their hair-style, their personality, or their sexual orientation. In effect, Yoshino wants to use the Constitution to force people to “recognize and respect” atti- tudes and forms of behavior of which they disapprove.” Queer grassroots groups are expanding rapidly in the U.S. Examples include some chapters of the Lesbian Avengers, a direct action social movement group organized into local clusters. They focus on issues vital to lesbian survival and visibility, conducting education, direct action, letter-writing campaigns, and guerrilla pub- licity campaigns, while simultaneously flaunting lesbionic outra- geousness. Another is the Feminist Conspiracy,26 a multi-issue femi- nist action group and self-identified propaganda machine dedicated to empowering women and girls to make their own individual choices. They propose to “do away with the old tactics of feminist politics that are boring, puritan, depressing, disempowering, and ineffective.” One of their favorite tactics is flyer (leaflet) campaigns. Their themes range from advocating sex workers’ rights, counter- ing anti-choice rhetoric, fact-checking President George W. Bush’s “compassionate conservativism,” fucking with gender, and threat- ening pee-ins (mass urination in public). Also, the site Internet Resources for Queer Activism and Education27 is one of many sources that lists organizations, databases and resources centered on Queer, disruptive politics. Finally, to explore Queer pedagogi- cal happenings, one only has to visit lesbian and gay youth organi- zations in larger cities in the U.S. where an energetic generation is working on a new politics of citizenship. As one self-identified Queer told me at the 2001 Atlanta Pride Festival—“Hey guy, we rock!” 130 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING Radical Democracy and New Technologies This essay would be incomplete without at least passing men- tion that LGBTIQ groups are building radical, transformative, demo- cratic spaces on the Internet. Organizations involved in cyber activ- ism rapidly network with like-minded others, contact and commu- nicate with policymakers, and act as “watchdogs” against government malfeasance. One such group is the Human Rights Campaign28 that has an online Action Center, which allows individuals to com- municate directly—from a computer—with state and federal elected officials. Timely information about state and national legislative ef- forts is now a click of the button away—for those in the U.S. who are on the technological side of the digital divide.29 Conclusion Sexual minority communities take up formal, nonformal, in- formal, and incidental learning for multiple reasons, including to transform practices in civil society, to foster new policymaking and legislative mandates, to force the State to accountability, and to rede- fine the boundaries of the State in light of the State’s construction of limited (heterosexual/gender-normative) interests. The enormous adult educational practices and learning that are undertaken by and about lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and Queer people often challenge and strengthen notions of democracy. As such they con- test the terrain of heteronormativity. At times this is in response to the social construction of LGBTIQ individuals as pathological, sick, sinner, or criminal. At times it is a response to the State’s formation of its interests—which continue to be the privileging of heterosexu- ality and normative notions of gender identity and gender expres- sion, which present obstacles to full citizenship. Other times our educational efforts—grassroots organizing, advocacy, and activism— as members of LGBTIQ communities are for freedom of expression, and justice as we develop a new politics of citizenship. TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 131 Notions of liberal citizenship have been developed around a heterosexual/gender-stable norm to the exclusion of a significant num- ber of individuals. Many societies, and the governments that repre- sent them, regard sexual minorities (especially transsexuals who are perhaps the most oppressed) to be immoral, decadent, and a threat to public order. An individual’s or group’s perceived moral status impacts their access to full citizenship and the exercise of democracy. The democratic struggles of sexual minorities offer alternatives to liberal democracy in several unique ways that build critical citizen- ship (Sandilands 1993). Radical democracy is constituted through diverse experiences, needs, and desires of individuals and communi- ties. It makes possible the discovery of the multiple voices that are at play in society—voices that often have been marginalized and si- lenced. And, it reads texts as potentially political. While the liberal project can assume the refusal to be relational, LGBTIQ pedagogies are about relationships—but ones recognizing that difference is a fundamental human right. Developing the notion of citizenship requires an understand- ing of a “we” and can show how all are bound together across lines of race, class, gender, and sexual orientation. The democracy that is being envisioned in some LGBTIQ grassroots groups and national NGOs disturbs efforts to make our lives asexual, dispassionate, pri- vate, and solely personal. Sexual minorities confront the inadequacy of contemporary representations of a “we” built on assimilation. Sexual minorities open up the tensions around “affiliation and exclu- sion.” Sexual minorities challenge what knowledge is of most worth, and whose knowledge counts. Sexual minorities help expand no- tions of citizenship in critical ways. Critical citizenship offers oppor- tunities to interrogate claims to truth, to generate unruly perspec- tives, to impeach what appears to be innocent in society, and to probe hidden normative assumptions. It opens the path to educational pedagogies that are radically democratic, unsettling and unsettled, dynamic, and inclusive. Democratic practices from the vantage point 132 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING of sexual minorities must employ fugitive knowledge—that is, ways of knowing that have escaped the control of those who authorize and make legitimate the dominant (heteronormative and gender stereo- typical) discourse in society. Modest success at social integration has become contested ter- rain and has unleashed a counter-educational response from Right- wing conservatives in the U.S. that attempt to block practices of learning democracy. Sexual minorities and allies have mobilized in the dynamic political process of building critical citizenship in re- sponse. For some of us, there is no going back; we are shaping a future of promise and prospect through the dynamics of lifelong learning! Endnotes 1 By sexual minorities I refer to lesbians, gay men, bisexuals, transgender, intersexuals, and self-identified queer individuals—cited as LGBTIQ. 2 See, http://www.unesco.org/education/uie/confintea/. 3 All italics in this section have been added by the author and do not appear in the original quoted documents. 4 I have written elsewhere (Hill 2001, footnote 6) that the terms heterosexual privilege, heteronormativity, heterosexism and their variations describe the hegemony of heterosexual discourses. Heterosexism is the assumption that everyone is heterosexual. Heterosexuality permeates all aspects of the lifeworld, and as such, becomes unimpeachable, accepted uncritically, and beyond interrogation because of its commonplace sta- tus. Social, cultural, political and economic benefits and rewards follow those who are, or pretend to be, heterosexual. Social structures and prac- tices elevate or enforce it, subordinating and suppressing homosexuality. Heterosexuality imposes various regimes of truth by virtue of its omni- presence. Thus, for example, when thinking about “human couples,” the “natural” default is to assume male/female dyad pairing. Dualistic, oppo- sitional binaries are primary modes of intelligibility (ways of thinking) at least in most western and western-influenced countries. When detailing human sexuality, the polarities are hierarchical, patriarchal, and position men over and above women. The result is to construct heterosexuality as TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 133 ordinary, while homosexuality is described as deviant. A multiple, inter- locking system of intolerance and oppression emerges and homophobia and heterosexism are intertwined with gender injustice and sexism. 5 See, http://www.unesco.org/delors/fourpil.htm. 6 See, http://www.web.net/icae/eng/ordeceng.html. 7 Schatz & O’Hanlan (1994) report that in a nonrandom survey of members of the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association (GLMA), 67 per- cent of respondents believed they had seen gay or lesbian patients receiv- ing “substandard” care because of their sexual orientation; many lesbians and gay men have reported that their doctors are not sensitive to, or knowledgeable about, their particular health risks and needs, and do not disclose pertinent information about treatments or prevention; and, health care provider hostility, as well as instances of gay men or lesbians de- scribed as “deserving” of illness or unworthy of treatment, are not un- common. 8 See, http://www.buddybuddy.com/parent.html, Parenting Options for Same Sex Couples in the United States. 9 Gender PAC (See, http://www.gpac.org/index.html) is an NGO that educates, undertakes Congressional advocacy and works on gender law. 10 See, http://www.rainbowrv.com/css/ for information on the Femi- nist Education Center. 11 See, for example, http://gender.org/remember/about/index2.html. 12 Direct actions are individual or collective behavior or activities that disrupt routine operations or ordinary functions of society around specific issues such as environmental causes, animal rights, etc. 13 See, for instance, Mezirow & Associates (2000). 14 See, for instance, http://www.transfeminism.org/conspire/prop/ prop14.txt. 15 The Prostitutes Education Network (See, http://www.bayswan.org/ videos25.html) is one of numerous grassroots efforts to mediate life in a sexually complex and changing society. The 1991 video, “Sex Workers Take Back the Night!” (28 minutes) explores this shifting terrain. Addi- tionally, transsexual grassroots groups are turning their attention to sex worker education. 16 See, http://www.mchb.hrsa.gov/data/women.htm 17 See, http://newsroom.hrsa.gov/releases/2002releases/ 134 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING women2002.htm for a news release on the study; See, http:// mchb.hrsa.gov/data/women.htm for the actual report. 18 For example, in the recent past, conservative groups have at- tempted statewide referenda to limit homosexual rights in California, Maine, Oregon and Colorado. 19 These data are compiled from various sources, including: a na- tional survey of Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual Physicians (San Francisco, 1994); The Massachusetts Governor’s Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth; the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services; New York City Gay & Lesbian Anti-Violence Report (1996); Report of the Secretary’s Task Force on Youth Suicide-U.S. Department of Health & Human Ser- vices) and Schatz & Hanlan (1994). Since it is nearly impossible to gain accurate information regarding parental, teacher, and student sexual ori- entation and gender expression, the statistics represent wide-ranging es- timates. 20 See, http://www.buddybuddy.com/toc.html 21 See, http://www.buddybuddy.com/lgirtf-1.html 22 See, http://psychology.ucdavis.edu/rainbow/html/dontasklaw.html 23 In New York City alone, between the mid-1920s to mid-1960s, 50,000 men were arrested on homosexual charges (See Chauncey, 2000, p. 299). 24 See, http://www.tri.org/. The group has numerous initiatives for civil rights; one is program to discuss the ongoing lessons from the struggle for justice for all disenfranchised peoples. 25 See, http://www.isna.org/ 26 See, http://www.transfeminism.org/conspire/ 27 See, http://www.oberlin.edu/~lgbu/qresources.html 28 See, http://www.hrc.org/actioncenter/grassroots.asp 29 Falling Through the Net: Defining the Digital Divide is a study by the U.S. Commerce Department. It states that at the end of 1998, over 40 percent of American households owned computers; one-quarter of all house- holds had Internet access. At the same time, the report found evidence of a persisting digital divide between the information rich and the informa- tion poor, a gap that is widening over time: households with incomes of $75,000+ are greater than twenty times more likely to have access to the Internet than those at the lowest income levels, and more than nine times as likely to have a computer at home; between 1997 and 1998, the divide TURNING A GAY GAZE ON CITIZENSHIP, SEXUAL ORIENTATION... / ROBERT J. HILL 135 between those at the highest and lowest education levels increased 25 per- cent, and the divide between those at the highest and lowest income levels grew 29 percent. Whites are more likely to have access to the Internet from home than Blacks or Hispanics have from any location. 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The main focus of the presentation is a description of how cultural ex- change became a natural learning experience for immigrant activists participating in educational programs sponsored by the PVI. The Institute has been supporting several informal networks of immi- grants striving to have a voice in the development of policies that affect them and their families. In this paper, I will present two of the networks PVI collaborates with as they highlight how cultural ex- change has become a tool in building a civic voice. The first is a group of Southeast-Asians, Indigenous Mexicans and Latino women. *Program Coordinator, The Pan Valley Institute, American Friends Service Committee, Fresno, California. 142 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING The second is the Civic Action Network (CAN)—a cadre of over100 grassroots organizations working to promote civic participation among immigrants throughout California’s Central Valley. First, I will briefly mention some of the historic circumstances under which these groups came to California’s Central Valley. I will also discuss how they have responded to the policies designed to marginalize them. Migration is an important part of the history of California’s Central Valley. The Central Valley is considered one of the richest agricultural regions in the United States, with an annual production of 25 billion dollars, yet it is home to the poorest Californians: about 38 percent of its population live below the poverty line, of which the majority are immigrants. Most immigrants came to the Valley to work in the fields. During the months of April to October, about 342,102 farm-workers are employed in the fields of the Valley. The Valley is also considered one of the most ethnically diverse regions, with more than 100 ethnic groups, including South-East Asians, Mexicans, and Indigenous Mexicans, Guatemalans, Salvadoreans, East Europeans and many more residing in this region. The immigrant communities described in this presentation left their countries driven by particular political, social and economic factors. The immigration in large numbers of Mexican women started during the 1970s. These women were not only coming to join their families, but many of them were heads-of-households coming to work. This corresponds to the fact that in Mexico during the 1970s more women were entering the job market and began immigrating look- ing for jobs as were their male counterparts. Before the 1970s, most Mexican women were coming either to join their husbands or their parents that emigrated during the Bracero Program, a program es- tablished from 1940 to 1964 to bring workers, particularly from Mexico, to supply the depleted work force in the United States dur- ing World War II. An important change is the migration of indigenous Mexicans. Although there were antecedents of indigenous immigrants arriving FOSTERING CROSS-CULTURAL RELATIONS / MYRNA MARTINEZ NATERAS 143 during the Bracero Program, their presence did not increase in great numbers until late 1970s. The majority of indigenous Mexicans are Mixtecos, Zapotecs and Triquis, coming from the state of Oaxaca in Mexico. Along with the immigrant workers coming to the Valley, other groups were arriving as refugees of war. One of the largest groups was the Southeast-Asian refugees from the mountains of Laos. These refu- gees were brought to the Valley after they had spent several years in the refugee camps of Thailand after escaping the Vietnam War. At the same time, civil wars had broken out in Central America—El Salvador, Nicaragua and Guatemala—forcing large sections of their population to flee their country and emigrate to the U.S. Building a Political Voice Immigrant workers began to look for ways to become active participants in the political life of the Valley. Although the Bracero Program ended in 1964, the demand for migrant work did not stop. Because there were no programs in place to allow migrant workers to legally enter the Valley, they were forced to cross the border with no documents. The number of undocumented workers increased tre- mendously during late 1960s to the 1980s. In the late 1970s to early 1980s a movement emerged dedi- cated to recognizing the presence and important economic contribu- tion of undocumented workers. This movement resulted in an am- nesty in 1986 with passage of the Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) that granted residence status to about 3 million workers who were allowed to apply for citizenship after five years of residency. This amnesty gave more visibility to immigrants who were moving from the fields to other sectors of the labor market. The new citizens were also starting to make their political voice heard. A similar process was taking place in the refugee community; after almost ten years since their arrival to the Valley, their presence was becoming more visible in schools and social services. Similar to 144 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING the immigrant community, refugees were acquiring their citizenship, thus adding to the numbers of new citizens. This created anti-immi- grant sentiments among more conservative sectors of the population. These conservative elements promoted certain policies hoping that immigrants would stop coming if prevented from accessing social services. In 1994, in California, proposition 187 was passed by the then Republican Governor Pete Wilson, prohibiting undocumented immigrants from accessing social services. This affected immigrants, who by then were residents or citizens, due to the fact that some members of their families were undocumented. In 1996, a Welfare Reform program was passed. This program affected refugees because they greatly relied on government assis- tance; the elderly refugees, in particular, were having difficulties en- tering the job market. These policies were a wake-up call for many immigrants and refugees. They realized the importance of getting organized to defend their civil rights, to build a political voice and exercise their citizenship. To fully exercise citizenship and build a political voice, immi- grants needed to acquire certain skills such as learning English, build- ing coalitions, having a better understanding of the political system, and securing resources to strengthen their organizing efforts. To re- spond to this need, the American Friends Service Committee, work- ing in the Valley for more than 50 years, decided to create an educa- tional program to support immigrants in these new efforts toward becoming a political force. The Pan Valley Institute The Pan Valley Institute (PVI) was established in 1998 as a project of the American Friends Service Committee to support im- migrants’ participation in the civic life of California’s Central Valley. By providing opportunities for immigrants to come together, learn from each other, and develop strategies for exercising their rights, PVI seeks to strengthen local democracy and the voice of immigrants. FOSTERING CROSS-CULTURAL RELATIONS / MYRNA MARTINEZ NATERAS 145 PVI has supported this process by facilitating popular education work- shops with an educational approach inspired by the Highlander Re- search and Education Center.1 PVI’s learning approach consists of bringing together a group of 20 to 25 participants for multi-day gatherings that provide a space for dialogue and are part of a collective learning process. After these learning gatherings, participants go back with new insights and ex- periences that hopefully will strengthen their community work. A committee formed by PVI staff and participants designed the learn- ing content of these gatherings. The Institute’s role outside the gath- erings consists of facilitating the learning process, assisting partici- pants in accessing resources they have identified, and supporting and implementing projects designed by the collective. Immigrant Women Building Cultural Understanding The first gathering organized by the Pan Valley Institute was designed to develop strategies to provide learning opportunities that would strengthen immigrant organizing efforts. In 1998, a group of 15 activists, mainly Latinos and Indigenous Mexicans, came together to help the Institute identify areas where immigrant grassroots orga- nizers needed more support. One of the issues identified was the need to provide immigrant women with opportunities to develop and exercise leadership. The other important issue was the need to establish relationships with other ethnic groups residing in the Val- ley for which they requested that the Institute provide multi-ethnic gathering opportunities. Finally, another significant recommenda- tion was to look for ways of including immigrant contribution to the history of the Valley. In response to the request for building women’s leadership in February 1999, PVI convened a small group of women to form a committee to identify the learning needs and ways of strengthening immigrant women’s leadership. Three of the women invited to form the committee were part of the consultation group convened by PVI 146 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING in 1998. The committee began a planning process in which they discussed the main issues of interest to immigrants and refugee women. Some of the issues identified included tensions created by cultural differences in dealing with social institutions and services, and within their own families. The women also began talking about barriers they faced, first as immigrants and then as women, when they engaged in community work. After several planning meetings, the committee decided to con- vene its first multi-day gathering, bringing together 25 women rep- resenting Hmong, Mixteco, Latino and African American communi- ties. Included in the criteria for bringing women to the learning pro- cess was that they be somehow involved or interested in community work. For example, immigrant women who showed emerging leader- ship potential in the schools struggling for better educational pro- grams for their children, or also women struggling against abuses in the job market. Another important recruitment criterion was the representation of different ethnic groups. This was the beginning of PVI’s effort to support civic participation among immigrant women and at the same time to promote cross-cultural relationship building for immigrants and refugees to build a unified political voice. At the first gathering, cultural exchange was the main focus of learning because the women wanted to address the division and ten- sion brought about by isolation of ethnic clusters. This isolation al- lowed for misconceived notions about each other. The women de- cided it was important to learn who is building the Valley, which were the ethnic groups living in the Valley, what each of these groups is doing to help build the community, and how gender is defined in each culture. The women initiated the learning process with the hope of find- ing common threads and exploring ways of working together. They believed this was not the time to bring experts to teach them, but rather it was important to initiate an internal learning experience through dialogue and collective reflection. FOSTERING CROSS-CULTURAL RELATIONS / MYRNA MARTINEZ NATERAS 147 This first gathering presented more challenges than expected. It was the first time for most of the women to be in the same space with other ethnic groups. So they did not know how to react and what to expect. It was also for the first time they had the opportunity to talk about their immigrant and refugee experience. The staff and planning committee was to facilitate a multilingual dialogue because most of the women were monolingual. Despite these difficulties, the women felt it was important to continue the learning process and turn the challenges into learning experiences which may be used as the basis for further gatherings. The women felt the need to meet again to continue the dia- logue and the process of identifying issues that affect them and to find ways of collectively addressing those issues. At the second gath- ering, the women focused on describing and analyzing communities from their home towns and the new ones they are building in the Valley, and how the changes have affected them and their families. After this gathering, they came together for the third time. On this occassion, they moved ahead in taking control of the learning pro- cess, being their own facilitators. (PVI staff had facilitated the first and the second gatherings.) In the process of coming together, the women learned that sharing personal stories was a meaningful exer- cise that allowed them to have better understanding of each other. For the third gathering, the women decided to use personal stories as a learning tool. It is important to mention that in these gatherings cultural expression was always included as a learning component. After a series of three residential gatherings, the women de- cided to make their work more visible, to publicly share their stories. They considered the importance of taking ownership in telling the stories of immigrant women’s experiences. To accomplish this, they produced a calendar to communicate their life and experience as immigrant and refugee women. The calendar was designed as a legacy to their families and as an educational tool for schoolteachers and elected officials. The presentation of this calendar initiated a process 148 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING of opening access to public spaces where the presence of immigrant poor is not always welcomed. The calendar generated more positive media stories about immigrants, in general, and about women, in particular. This was important because the media tend to focus on negative aspects of the immigrant community. Another significant outcome of this calendar was telling the story of an effort in building cross-cultural relations, the possibilities and the challenges. After almost two years of dialogue and mutual education, the women felt they were ready to move into a more sophisticated type of civic participation. They, therefore, came to the idea of produc- ing a memory book to document and analyze what they have learned after two years of sharing experiences. The women intended to use the memory book as a tool to establish communication with elected officials. They believed this book would allow them not only to communicate, through their own voices, the presence of immigrant women in the Valley, but most importantly, to seize the opportu- nity to impact policies that affect migrant women and their fami- lies. In the process of developing the memory book, the women will meet with policymakers and researchers to gather more data for their analyses and to learn more about the process of policy devel- opment. Building Community through Cultural Exchange The Central Valley’s Partnership2 Civic Action Network (CAN) is a network of over 100 grassroots organizations that promote civic participation among immigrants throughout the Central Valley. CAN was created with the vision of building a diverse coalition of people, organizations, and institutions to work together to tackle local and regional problems, and ultimately to strengthen the voice, participa- tion and decision-making power of immigrant communities and or- ganizations across the Central Valley. The groups that form CAN represent different ethnic groups like Hmong, Cambodian, Mixteco, Mexican, and most recently Portuguese. The Central Valley’s Part- FOSTERING CROSS-CULTURAL RELATIONS / MYRNA MARTINEZ NATERAS 149 nership supports this coalition by providing small grants with the support of the James Irvine Foundation. The Pan Valley Institute, a member of the Partnership, pro- posed to provide learning opportunities to these groups, for which a series of learning gatherings was designed by PVI staff, CVP mem- bers and CAN participants. The gatherings were designed to build the capacity of CAN organizations for active civic participation, to support collaborative networking activities among CAN participants and with other community organizations, and to inform these orga- nizations of political and economic processes that shape life in the Central Valley. In a series of three gatherings, the groups came together, shared their projects, discussed their objectives, and identified resources needed to be more active in the civic life of the Valley . In the course of these dialogues, participants began learning that there are important cul- tural aspects needing more attention and dialogue. For example: How is civic participation defined and practiced for the Hmong commu- nity? What kind of leadership is exercised in the Mixteco community? What is the meaning of community for each of these ethnic groups? These groups learned that they have their own traditions not only in the cultural realm and in the arts, but also in the way they promote and exercise civic participation. For example, the Hmong community struggles between maintaining their traditional clan organization and adapting to new forms of social structure. Mixtecos share a strong com- munity tradition like the Tequio3 . Mixtecos and Hmongs learned that they share a tradition of collective leadership that clashes with the individualistic leadership promoted in the United States. As in the case of women in the gatherings of the Civic Action Network, cultural exchange became the learning experience that impacted participants the most, to the point that they saw the need for expanding this experience of cultural sharing in a broader public space. For this they planned a learning festival that they entitled the Tamejavi. 150 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING Tamejavi is derived from the Hmong-Taj laj Puam, Spanish - Mercado and Mixteco- Nunjavi words for a cultural harvest market. After September 11, 2001, such events became even more important to balance the mistrust felt by the general population in relation to immigrants. Organized by many different grassroots organizations, the Tamejavi festival was the first of its kind. It brought together differ- ent ethnic groups sharing their cultures—indigenous dance numbers from Mixteco, a Hmong play about the migration from Laos to the U. S. and their consequent challenges in becoming part of a new society without losing their roots, and an opera from the Cambodian community that is used to promote civic participation. There were educational fora for ethnic media, immigration and gender issues. It is apparent from this festival that people value the opportu- nity of having a public space to be seen and heard. Also, participants strongly valued the sense of accomplishment in building something together, and recognized that ultimately, cross-cultural relationships, although challenging, are possible. Summary For immigrant communities the process of becoming politi- cally engaged is more complex than simply learning how the system works. Building relationships among these communities is very im- portant so that they become a political force, since they share the same realities of being discriminated against and marginalized from the political decision-making process. Immigrants have to go through a process of defining the best way of becoming American. Should they discard their culture, language, and other traditions? Or should they contribute their own cultural and social experiences while adopt- ing new ones—creating, in this way a rich civic culture? If these communities do not address the issues that divide them their politi- cal empowerment will be threatened. FOSTERING CROSS-CULTURAL RELATIONS / MYRNA MARTINEZ NATERAS 151 Endnotes 1 The Highlander Research and Education Center is located in Tennessee and served as an important organizing base during the civil rights movements of the 1960s. 2 The Central Valley Partnership for Citizenship (CVP) is a col- laborative effort of more than a dozen nonprofit agencies working to support full civic participation among immigrants. 3 A tradition practiced by indigenous groups from Oaxaca, Mexico, in which each person has the commitment to voluntary work in all social, economic and cultural areas of building community. Intercultural Education for Democracy: The Case of South Africa1 r Gordon Mitchell* What is it that makes intercultural education in South Africa anecessary means of broadening and consolidating democracy? Part of the answer lies in the extreme historical circumstances which continue to shape the experience of most of its people. In the days of apartheid, the link between “culture” and political power was easy to see: only the white minority had any real democratic rights. The transition to democracy was supposed to change all this. Now, a decade later, increasingly, one hears concerns that the link between culture and power remains as strong as ever. Gender and sexual ori- entation, race, ethnicity, language, age and educational status, all in different and overlapping ways, continue to influence people’s abil- ity to be actors. Nobody denies the immense significance of the first election in 1994 where millions happily stood in long lines to cast * Professor, Faculty of Education, University of Hamburg, Ger- many. 154 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING their first votes. The concern now, however, is that the political tran- sition left the social fabric largely untouched. The call has, therefore, become for the transformation of society as a means of reducing the ongoing reality of discrimination. It was recognized early on that something needed to be done to overcome what were perceived to be cultural and ideological cleav- ages in society. As one traces the story, beginning with intercultural initiatives of nongovernment organizations (NGOs), the commer- cial sector and then later the State, it becomes clear that each had its own reasons for what it was attempting to achieve through education and training. A study of these initiatives can raise important issues for democracy education in that one is compelled to deal with the complexity of building democracy in a diverse society in ways that go beyond a mere attainment of the right to cast a vote in elections. An overview of the particular historical circumstances in which intercul- tural training emerged in South Africa is also necessary to provide adequate analysis of the programs within a broader context of educa- tional reform.1 Inventing the Rainbow People On the 10th of May 1994, just over a week after the elections, the inauguration of Nelson Mandela, the newly-elected State President, took place at the Union Building in Pretoria. It was a speech that everyone had been waiting for, and one sentence was splashed across the front page of almost every local and national newspaper: We enter into a covenant that we shall build a society in which all South Africans, both black and white, will be able to walk tall, without any fear in their hearts, assured of their inalienable right to human dignity— a rainbow nation at peace with itself and the world. The difference here is in the first place between black and white, but the reference to a rainbow expands the vision, perpetuating at INTERCULTURAL EDUCATION FOR DEMOCRACY / GORDON MITCHELL 155 the same time a fascination with color as a marker of difference, per- haps inevitably (Dickow 1996). The rainbow symbolism had been borrowed from the Rainbow Coalition in the United States, a civil rights network of minority political groupings. Initially popularized in South Africa by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the colors are not only a decisive acceptance of diversity, but the rainbow is a sign, at least for those who made the connection, of hope reminiscent of the end of the Biblical Flood (Tutu 1995). Both the President and the Archbishop played a very active role in placing the notion of reconciliation at the center of an emerging South African civil religion of inclusive patriotism. It is interesting to trace this concept’s career. For Liberation Theologians of the 1980s, reconciliation was the focus of a “hermeneutic of suspicion.” There could be no reconciliation without social justice. However, when we get to the 1990s, class analysis is forgotten, and anyone questioning the agenda of building a rainbow nation was decidedly out of step with this new mood. What is remarkable is the speed with which it happened. It is hardly surprising that the 1990s was an incredible boom time for intercultural training. Large corporations and parastatals re- sponded rapidly. The 40th Annual Convention of the Institute of Personnel Management held at Sun City in October 1996 was pro- moted by means of a dazzling brochure entitled Celebrating the South African Soul: Harnessing the Madiba Magic in Organizations. In the background, the South African flag is bursting into all the colors of the rainbow, with stars and party balloons. “Madiba,” as Nelson Mandela was fondly called, had set the example of being reconciled with former enemies. The same, it was argued, should be happening everywhere. “Diversity Workshops” were held in virtually every large com- pany, in government departments, in schools, or on mines. Availabil- ity of resources enabled this to happen on a scale unparalleled in other pluralist and cleavaged societies. The predominantly white 156 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING management echelon saw this as an opportunity both to contribute to national reconciliation and to improve relationships with the black workers (Bernstein, Berger & Godsell 1998). And even though many trade unionists had suspicions about the exercise, they generally kept these to themselves, convinced that it was the right time to talk. Unarticulated hesitations evidenced themselves in time-consuming negotiations at the beginning of workshops about establishing ground rules for discussion and about obtaining assurance about what would be done with the results of the workshop. If we look at these workshops, there is much that could found in similar workshops in other parts of the world. Indeed, much of the training materials were borrowed and then shamelessly marketed as uniquely home-grown South African products. Nevertheless, there are some particularly noticeable features of these workshops due to their being understood at the time as part of a wider agenda of nation building. Building a Nation The dramatically successful political transition seems to have fostered the belief that almost anything would be possible in South Africa (Waldmeir 1997). This optimism flowed into a kind of na- tional patriotism in which cultural diversity was elevated to be a source of pride. Workshops were part of this celebration of diversity and many participants were convinced that changing attitudes would be a relatively easy task. For the new band of Diversity Consultants this was an ideal situation. Programs which, under most other cir- cumstances, would have been regarded as disastrous, were here very well received. Widespread commitment to the ideal of multiculturalism could usually be assumed, and where opposition existed it very seldom made itself felt directly. Intercultural training was not only a beneficiary of such ideas, but itself contributed to the invention of a new national identity, to the extent that many in for- mal employment participated and that organizations were quick to INTERCULTURAL EDUCATION FOR DEMOCRACY / GORDON MITCHELL 157 display their political correctness in the media. Diversity training came to be seen as the way to cure all manner of ills in the society. On 24 February 1998, violent racial confrontation erupted for the second time at Vryburg High School, with pupils and parents getting into the fray. Officials of the North West Province’s Depart- ment of Education responded immediately with the appointment of a commission to investigate the causes and to propose recommenda- tions. Their report is a fascinating example of confidence in educa- tion (Department of Education, Province of the North West 1998). For pupils there are to be Diversity Workshops, for teachers there are to be Diversity Workshops, and for members of the school’s Govern- ing Body there are to be Diversity Workshops. In February 2000, the Ministry of Education launched the Val- ues in Education initiative (Department of Education 2000). Equity, tolerance, multilingualism, openness, accountability and honor are core values to be promoted by an educational system. In advocating “social honor,” the Working Group which produced the report is at its most cautious. Apparently some members felt that “patriotism” would have been more honest, but its euphemism prevails in the report. While the dangers of the nation-building project ending up as xenophobic nationalism are recognized, it is argued that a society, with such inherited divided loyalties as South Africa, can only ben- efit from the development of a shared civic pride. A distinction be- tween a “liberal” and a “civic-republican” notion of citizenship is made. Retaining a tension between these two traditions of individualism and communal responsibility, we are told, makes the emphasis on social honor an acceptable option. The proposal then concentrates on a set of regularly practised rituals: the singing of the national anthem, the veneration of the national flag and the communal reci- tation of a “Vow of Allegiance.” An example of such a text is offered: I promise to be loyal to my country, South Africa, and to do my best to promote its welfare and the well-being of all its citizens. 158 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING I promise to show self-respect in all that I do And to respect all of my fellow citizens And all of our various traditions. Let us work for peace, friendship and reconciliation And heal the scars left by past conflicts, and let us build a common destiny together. Respect for one’s own tradition and respect for others is at the center of this patriotic vision. “Tradition,” “culture,” “race,” were all used in different settings, but it is “culture” that emerged as the most widespread way of labelling difference. Harnessing Culture If we return for a moment to the Diversity Workshops, we will see how “culture” had become incorporated into the human resources training objectives. One of the central activities in Diversity Work- shops, which often spread over three days, was encouraging people to talk about their own culture and to listen to others describing theirs. When workshops were organized, it was therefore, usually attempted to maximize the level of cultural diversity of the partici- pants, which usually meant putting together a vertical slice of the organization’s hierarchy. Most whites would be in middle and senior management, most coloreds and Asians were clustered around the middle, and most blacks were in the lower job gradings. Culture and class therefore went rather neatly in hand, and only to a limited extent ameliorated by the presence of a sprinkling of newly appointed black managers. Facilitators, therefore, needed to go out of their way to generate a climate in the workshop where people would feel free to talk. Pride in ones’ own and respect for others were the important values to be enhanced. Such an emphasis which linked particular people to certain cultural expressions certainly did represent a re- markable about face for political correctness. INTERCULTURAL EDUCATION FOR DEMOCRACY / GORDON MITCHELL 159 For the apartheid ideologues, a nation should only have one language, one culture, one color. At that time, critical social scien- tists devoted considerable energy in countering this logic of essentialized ethnic identity. Neo-marxist and postmodernist theo- ries were used to support the conclusion that ethnicities were in- vented by colonial and apartheid regimes (West 1988, Mouton & Muller 1995). The political alternative to apartheid was “non-rac- ism”. To celebrate differences, as proposed by the rainbow nation ideal, almost inevitably lead to the demise of the ideal of “non-rac- ism” and its replacement by a “heteronationalism” in which the un- derstanding of culture has shifted significantly in an essentialist di- rection (Comaroff 1995). Now, a society can consist of a number of cultures existing side by side, a community of communities. A good example of this idea of culture as something which can be defined is the concept “African Management” presented in work- shops by a group of lecturers at the University of the Witwatersrand’s Business School (Mbigi 1993). They argued that a new society needs a new ideology and that the appropriate route is a management style which incorporates the best from all the different cultures of South Africa. In this way “western pragmatism,” “northern rationalism,” “eastern holism,” and “southern humanism,” together, offer an un- beatable combination! What actually happened in workshops was usually very different from what the planners had in mind. Everyone could think of examples of “northern managers” being not at all ra- tional, or of Black mangers who were authoritarian and not at all communitarian in their style (cf. Thomas & Schonken 1997). There was a clear distinction between the official philosophy of training handbooks and what actually took place in workshops. Abstract in- tellectual and traditional understandings of culture ran counter to the life experiences of many participants living in urban melting pots where other kinds of differences and commonalities operated. For example, women from different “cultures” usually had more in com- mon with each other than with any of the categories. What is also 160 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING interesting is the “discursive competence” (cf. Baumann 1999: 93) that people exhibit when they at one point make use of an essentialized view of culture to great strategic effect and at the next moment show that it is completely undermined by their experience. While it is easy to poke fun at attempts to use idealized notions of culture which bear little relationship to the criss-crossed identifi- cations of the real lives of people, it must be borne in mind that “culture” did. The focus of many of the workshops was on “African Culture” where the notion of Ubuntu became a way of emphasizing communitarian values (Mbigi 1995). Centuries of colonial and apart- heid rule had stigmatized African culture as primitive and of negli- gible value to modern civilization. By means of a cultural affirmative action, certain values and norms of African form were prioritised and synthesized for easy communication. This way marginalized cultures could be elevated and given their due status. Similar cultural move- ments were characteristic of other post-colonial societies where the notion of multiculturalism was understood as a generous inclusion of all (including the former colonizers). This at the same time, placed emphasis on indigenous culture. Towards the end of the 1990s in South Africa, the rainbow nation imagery was gradually overtaken by the African Renaissance of the new Mbeki presidency, and race had completely overshadowed issues of gender and class in the pub- lic discourse. Culture was practical in that it provided content which could be summarized on a flip chart and remembered. Such simplifica- tions, were however, not all that innocent. Confronting the past or dealing with gender equality were quietly left aside (Hamber 1999). The way this could happen was that organizations, or more specifi- cally their Human Resources Managers, had a range of courses from which they could choose, all being marketed by a range of consult- ants. There were indeed courses, such as anti-racism training, using the stereotype reduction methodologies. However, in the complex negotiations with senior management and sometimes with unions or INTERCULTURAL EDUCATION FOR DEMOCRACY / GORDON MITCHELL 161 black managers, it was tacitly agreed that potentially divisive materi- als were best avoided. Transforming Society By the end of the 1990s, it had become clear to people in many sectors of the society that the advent of democracy had not meant the shattering of glass ceilings. Those who did not possess the re- quired “cultural capital” were still unlikely to make much progress upwards. The dominant culture was seen to be still white and male. The call from both government and activist groups has hence been for “transformation.” In October 1998, the Employment Equity Act was passed in the parliament. It set out to address the problem of “pronounced disad- vantages for certain categories of people.” All organizations, from the public and private sectors, were required to make decisive efforts. New policies and skills, it was argued, are required to ensure that the sys- tems of recruitment and promotions, and management styles are sig- nificantly changed. In this context of transformation, intercultural training can achieve much more than improved communication skills: the task is to make the dominant culture of the organization multicultural. The discussion that ensued was forced to take account of the connection between culture and power. Training was needed to ensure “culture-fair” or even “culture-neutral” tools for appraising hu- man potential in recruitment along with the skill to recognize and reward the range of qualities evident in diverse settings. This shift created a space for NGOs which over the years had developed expertise in this regard. For most, the 1990s had been a difficult time as they faced severe cuts in their budgets when the old anti-apartheid funding was shifted elsewhere. Development funders prioritized budgets around the notion of “civil society”—lauded as the key to democratic transition (Cochrane & Klein 2000). Even prior to the General Election of 1994, a number of conferences spon- sored by donors addressed this theme. Papers delivered found their 162 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING way into publications, generally expressing considerable support for the necessity of a vibrant, critical and independent civil society in order to safeguard and consolidate democracy in South Africa (for example, Singh1993). Resources were consequently channelled to those organizations which could have a watch-dog role over the new democracy. Programs for intercultural training generally found them- selves only able to reach a very small number of people. Nevertheless, they did express a very clear vision of training as an aspect of social transformation in which multiculturalism signals the struggle for equality for all. The emphasis on getting to the root of problems, and building new values and institutions can be illustrated by two examples of NGO initiatives. The Community Conflict Management and Resolution (CCMR) is an NGO which specializes in developing within communities the capacity to manage conflict. They gained considerable experience prior to the 1994 Election in mediating conflict between political rivals Inkhatha and the African National Congress in the trouble-spots of KwaZulu-Natal and the townships of the East Rand. They established a network of Peace Committees consisting of both Inkhatha and ANC members. Their focus later shifted to the problem of xenophobia in schools with a high proportion of children from other African coun- ties. The particular approach of this organization is self-consciously based on African tradition (Mkhize 1991: 91): Disputants were encouraged to be free in their ex- pression of their grievances and emotions through peer group support. Their relatives would always accompany them to the place where the conflict was to be discussed. Those accompanying them would per- form acts of reconciliation before conflict resolution sessions were started. This type of atmosphere was conducive to free ventilation of anger necessarily re- quired to enable those in dispute not to withhold anything which might risk any peace decision. INTERCULTURAL EDUCATION FOR DEMOCRACY / GORDON MITCHELL 163 For CCMR this means more than merely engaging in stereo- type reduction workshops or simply training peer mediators to act in cases of conflict, it is to establish organizational structures for the maintenance of peace. Peace Committees (later changed to Children’s Charter Committees) with local and migrant pupils have been con- stituted in schools and meet regularly. Minutes are kept and prob- lems monitored. At first glance it all sounds very mundane, but what is being achieved is a concrete change in culture: the new wine of tolerance and Human Rights, they insist, also needs new wineskins! Another NGO which sees training in relation to the transforma- tion of society is the Early Learning Resource Unit located at the Uni- versity of Cape Town. Their handbook (1997) is entitled Shifting Para- digms: Using an anti-bias strategy to challenge oppression and assist trans- formation in the South African context. In a preamble, their task is de- scribed as “challenging racism, sexism, classism, able-ism, linguicism, heterosexism, adultism, age-ism, religious, cultural and other biases.” The uncritical use of “culture” is dispensed with as participants are encouraged to see the link between unjust structures and their own prejudices. Unlike the Diversity Workshops popular in industry, their learning technique has more to do with process than with content. At the same time, this handbook remains unmistakably a product of the new South Africa: on the front cover the converging colors of the new flag is a clear reminder of the patriotic ideal. A Model for Others? Immediately after the workshops or even a few months on, most participants would comment very positively about how they had ben- efited. As time passed, disillusionment often set in, and people were often willing to express this, usually in the form of a criticism of colleagues or managers who had not been serious about changing their attitudes and practices. Yet, even then there remained a recog- nition that the training had been a necessary step. Even with all the necessary caution with regard to ambitious claims about the capacity 164 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING of education to effect social change, its key role must still be ac- knowledged. So, if there was benefit in Diversity Workshops for South Africa, can this model be applied elsewhere? Obviously, there are elements that might have application to similar societies, but at the same time the special circumstances need to be taken into account. Like other former colonies within arbitrary national boundaries drawn during the scramble for colonies in the nineteenth century, South Africa had to find a way to manage differ- ences in such a way that the unity fostered during the liberation struggle would not dissolve into ethnic factions competing for scarce resources. The historian Benedict Anderson coined the phrase “imag- ined community” to describe such efforts at nation building in post- colonial nation states (Anderson 1991). What helped in South Africa’s case was the widely recognized fact that the enterprise occupied the political high-ground as the only legitimate alternative to an ideol- ogy of apartheid. Diversity, therefore, became a natural extension of the liberation struggle. There has certainly been a supportive ideo- logical environment in the media and from national leaders, which has been a decisive factor behind the educational achievements. Con- cerns will and must remain about the necessity for such nationalism. There are too many examples in history of nationalism run amok for the longer-term risks to be uncritically overlooked. What the South African case does indeed illustrate is that po- litical transition to democracy does not automatically mean equality for all. A decade later, not everyone has the same rights and opportu- nities, and specific categories of person find these severely limited simply because they are women, or black or both. Controversy con- tinues to surround interpretations of the democratic transition in South Africa. While political power may have shifted, economic and social relationships, it is argued, remain largely intact (Guelke 1999). The success of Diversity Training in promoting harmony in the work- place could then be a major victory for the business sector. It would nevertheless be a mistake to belittle countless changed attitudes and INTERCULTURAL EDUCATION FOR DEMOCRACY / GORDON MITCHELL 165 new relationships forged in a time of great social fragility. It would also be wrong to condemn out of hand the mobilization of culture within Diversity Training. Playing around with identity politics is of course inherently dangerous in a pluralistic society, and simplistic reifications of “culture” can camouflage other lines of difference. At the same time, it must be acknowledged that offering positive, even if idealized, views of different cultures in a setting designed to pro- mote mutual respect did offer a means of redress for historically marginalized cultures. The particular historical circumstances in the nineties resulted in a considerable resonance for these ideas. Un- doubtedly, there are risks, and the cause of indigenous knowledge can be hijacked by powerful elites even more easily than it can ensure democratic power for the weak. The merits and risks of any program are therefore best found in its contextualization. When this is prop- erly done, then the often ambiguous experiments with democracy and education in South Africa can be interesting for others living in pluralistic, cleavaged or post-colonial societies. Endnote 1 This article is based on secondary literature and on evaluations conducted by Maake Masango and Gordon Mitchell of Intercultural Resources CC, of Diversity Workshops during the period 1994 –1999. References Anderson, Benedict. 1991. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Ori- gin and Spread of Nationalism. Revised Edition. London/New York: Verso. Baumann, Gerd. 1999. The Multicultural Riddle: Rethinking National, Ethnic, and Religious Identities. New York/ London: Routledge. Bernstein, Anne, Berger, Peter L. & Godsell, Bobby. 1998. “Business and democracy: Cohabitation or contradiction.” In Business and Democracy. Cohabitation or Contradiction, pp. 1-34. Edited by Ann Bernstein & Peter L. Berger. London & Washington: Pinter. Cochrane, James & Klein, Bastienne. 2000. Sameness and Difference: 166 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING Problems and Potentials in South African Civil Society, South African Philosophical Studies 1. Washington DC: Council for Research in Values and Philosophy. Comaroff, John. 1995. “Ethnicity, nationalism and the politics of differ- ence in an age of revolution,” in Perspectives on Nationalism and War, pp. 243-76. International Studies on Global Change, vol. 7. Edited by John L. Comaroff & Paul C. Stern Uppsala/Fairfax: Gor- don & Breach Publishers. Department of Education: Province of the North West. 1998. Statement by MEC Tolo on the Vryburg High School Report, Mmabatho. Department of Education. 2000. Values, Education and Democracy. Re- port of the Working Group on Values in Education. Pretoria. Dickow, Helga. 1996. Das Regenbogenvolk. Die Entstehung einer neuen Civil Religion in Südafrika. Baden-Baden: Nomos. Early Learning Resource Unit. 1997. Shifting paradigms: Using an ant- bias strategy to challenge oppression and assist transformation in the South African context. Landsdowne: Early Learning Resource Unit. Guelke, Adrian. 1999. South Africa in Transition: The Misunderstood Miracle. London/New York: Tauris. Hamber, Brian 1999. Dealing with the Past and the Psychology of Recon- ciliation: The Truth and Reconciliation Commission, a Psychological perspective. Johannesburg: Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconcilliation. Mbigi, Lovemore. 1993. “The spirit of African management,” in Peter Christie, Ronnie Lessem & Lovemore Mbigi (eds), African Man- agement: Philosophies, Concepts and Applications. Randburg: Knowl- edge Resources, 77-92. Mbigi, Lovemore. 1995. Ubuntu: The Spirit of African Transformation Management, Randburg: Knowledge Resources. Mkhize, Pat. 1990. “Conflict resolution: An African style,” Family and Conciliation Courts Review, 28:1, 71-72. Mkhize, Pat. 1991. “Mediation: An old family practice dressed up as new”, in W Hoffmann (ed.), Family Mediation in South Africa. Present Practices and Future Vision. Johannesburg: South African Associa- tion of Mediators in Family Matters, 86-93. Mkhize, Pat .1994. “Mediation: A tool for facilitating integration in a changing South Africa,” in N Nieuwmeijer & R du Toit (eds), INTERCULTURAL EDUCATION FOR DEMOCRACY / GORDON MITCHELL 167 Multicultural Conflict Management in Changing Societies. Pretoria: Human Sciences Research Council, 251-257. Mouton, Johann & Muller Johan. 1995. “A typology of shifts in intellec- tual formations in South Africa.” in South Africa and Poland in Transition. A Comparative Perspective, pp. 163-197. Edited by: U. Van Beek. Pretoria: Human Sciences Research Council. Singh, Mala. 1993. “The role of civil society in promoting democratic development: Some aspects of the South African debate,” in The Role of Voluntary Organizations in Emerging Democracies: Experience and Strategies in Eastern and Central Europe and in South Africa, pp. 23-32. Edited by A. McKinstry Micou & B. Linsnaes. Denmark: Danish Centre for Human Rights. Thomas, Adele & Schonken, Johannes. 1997. “Culture-specific man- agement and the African management movement—verifying the pre- mises,” South African Journal of Business Management, vol. 29:2, pp. 67-76. Tutu, Desmond. 1995. The Rainbow People of God: The Making of a Peaceful Revolution. London: Bantam Books. Waldmeir, Patti. 1997. Anatomy of a Miracle: The End of Apartheid and the Birth of the New South Africa. New York/London: WW Norton. West, Martin. 1988. “Confusing categories: Population groups, national states and citizenship,” in South African Keywords: The Uses and Abuses of Political Concepts, edited by E. Boonzaier & J. Sharp. Cape Town: David Philip, pp.100-110. An Intercultural Program from a Balkan Perspective r Emilia Ilieva* The Balkans as a “Burdened” Notion Balkans and “Balkan” are terms that can best be described as“burdened.” Different interpretations and deliberate misuse dur- ing the last ten years have blurred the initial meaning, and nowa- days, definitions of the Balkans are almost as many as there are schol- ars trying to define it. At the same time, sadly, it is often used as a synonym for “backward,” “uncivilized,” and “problematic,” thus, mak- ing necessary the gradual replacement of the Balkan term with South- East European. Therefore, whenever the term Balkan appears in any written form, a special effort is needed to reach a common understanding. And the best way to do so is to go back to the initial meaning. The origins of the term can be found in the name of a wide mountain range, currently situated in Bulgaria (Stara planina, mean- *Project Officer, Institute for International Cooperation, German Folk School Association (IIZ-DVV), Sofia, Bulgaria. 170 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING ing Old Mountain) that through the centuries was named “The Balkan.” Later, the term “balkanization” appeared in the early years of 20th century with the gradual disruption of the Ottoman Empire and the appearance of small independent states on the Balkan Peninsula. The Balkans were given special attention after the collapse of the authoritarian regimes in the late 1980s and early 1990s in most of the Balkan countries and was marked by turbulent historic events and unfortunate conflicts. It gave to the region both a false image and a distorted interpretation of the notion of Balkan itself. An interesting interpretation of the word Balkan itself can be reached by literal translation of the two words “Bal” and “Kan”. In Turkish “bal” means honey and “kan” means blood. In other words, the “sweetness” and “bitterness” of the Balkans. Nevertheless, in the present paper, I will use the “Balkan” per- spective instead of “South East European,” trusting in the wisdom of the reader in differentiating the true meaning from prejudice. In this paper, I shall use “Balkans” to include the countries of Greece, Albania, Macedonia/FYROM, Bulgaria, Romania and Yu- goslavia (Serbia and Montenegro), and this understanding is based on the geography of the still uncontested Balkan peninsula. I will focus on the particular case of the Bosporus International Network as an intercultural program. General Overview of the Balkans The Balkan countries ventured into democracy and entered the market economy in late 1980s and early 1990s with the collapse of different communist regimes, thus forming the crest of the process that Samuel Huntington referred to as “the third wave of democrati- zation.” The required radical shift from a centrally planned economy and authoritarian state to a democratic political system and com- petitive market was a step upward and forward, involving an unprec- edented break with the past in all spheres of political, social and economic life. The hesitance of most Balkan states and the very chal- AN INTERCULTURAL PROGRAM FROM A BALKAN PERSPECTIVE / EMILIA ILIEVA 171 lenging internal and external circumstances doomed the Balkans to an uneasy transition. Shortly summarized, the Balkan countries (ex- cept Greece) are still attempting to rise out of the transitional quag- mire. An Intercultural Program Bosporus International Network is a network of five indepen- dent and registered NGOs in Germany, Bulgaria, Romania, Greece and Turkey and four local groups in Albania, Macedonia/FYROM, Slovenia and Hungary that share the same name, goals and aims. The name of the network comes from the Bosporus channel that links Europe and Asia, and serves as a link between two seas, and as a “bridge” over two continents and two religions. Thus, the goal of the network can best be described as “building bridges” between cul- tures. As the policy paper says: “the network is committed to pro- mote mutual understanding, to break down stereotypes and develop the common European idea…” Some historical background In the early 1990s, a group of young students of political science from Bonn University, Germany, met with some students from Istanbul University, Turkey, and out of mutual curiousity about their cultures decided to try to organize various bilateral seminars between German and Turkish students. The enthusiasm of this group of people gave birth to the establishment of two NGOs— one in Germany and one in Turkey, which organized several bilat- eral projects each year over a period of seven years. In their willing- ness to share this activity with a broader target group and following the logical process of organizational development, in 1998, the Bosporus Gesselshaft e.v. organized the first multilateral project involving seven countries. The success of that project committed three more countries—Bulgaria, Romania and Greece—to under- take the same effort of intercultural learning as a way of overcoming 172 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING existing stereotypes and prejudices. The present network has been established in the last four years and is committed to promoting cross-cultural exchange programs for young people (18-30 years old). For detailed information on the activities, as well as past and ongoing projects, there is a regularly updated Web page that can serve as the best information source (www.bosporus.org). The format of the intercultural programs The process has been tested in various projects and has proven to be successful. It has two main goals: 1) intellectual exchange of information and ideas, and 2) cultural experience. The programs usually start with an internal seminar (2-3 days) where the participants present papers on the main topic of the pro- gram. The topics themselves are based on suggestions of participants in previous projects, thus ensuring decisively needs-oriented programs. The presentation panels are divided into discussion fora where in an open setting, everyone is free to express ideas and/or feelings, trust- ing that “truth is born out of heated debates.” Afterwards, the pro- gram is complemented by visits to different institutions and meet- ings with experts, professionals and/or active politicians, familiar with the theme of the seminar. The participants have the time to mutu- ally enrich their knowledge during the internal seminar and to broaden their information by listening to professional interpretations. The cultural part of the program is achieved by visiting at least two different cities in the “host” country and is complemented by some cultural activities during the free time of the participants such as visits to museums and historical places. Moreover, in one of the cities, the participants have private ac- commodations hosted by students, so they may gain first-hand ex- perience of the daily life in the “host” country. Perspectives for the future’ With the establishment of local groups of young people in dif- ferent countries, the hope is that it will open the way for a broader AN INTERCULTURAL PROGRAM FROM A BALKAN PERSPECTIVE / EMILIA ILIEVA 173 network of youth organizations. While the format of the programs has proved to be efficient during the past ten years, the leaders of Bosporus International are trying to organize the first training courses on youth awareness. At the same time, the growing number of Bosporus alumni are urging the organizers to think in the direction of organizing expert’s study visits on the Balkans and developing some kind of activity that will have as a target group people over 30. In fact, Bosporus International is growing together with its founders. Conclusion The case presented above has its roots in the Balkan reality. As we have seen, the attention of the intercultural programs is on pro- moting tolerance and reducing prejudice, involving crosscultural pro- grams and inter-ethnic seminars. The real importance of this ex- ample lies in the fact that it represents the so-called “bottom-up” approach and has a real impact on the citizens, which after all, is the most valuable for any transition to democracy. Training Teachers for Teaching Citizenship Education r Svetlana Poznyak* Is School a Democratic Institution by Nature? When we put this question to the participants of thetraining seminars for teaching citizenship education in Ukraine, we expect them to look at school and think of those features of schooling that promote democracy and facilitate teaching democ- racy in the classroom and those that hinder it. At the beginning, teachers are almost unanimous that there is too little democracy in school, that it is an authoritarian institution with a strong hierarchi- cal structure, and leaves very little choice both for teachers and stu- dents. But after a while they realize that, at the same time, school has a lot of democratic features, and they eagerly comment on the list of the ways schools promote democracy (Osler and Starkey 1994): • Create conditions for good communication • Students actively learn to live together *Coordinator, Education for Democracy in Ukraine Project. 176 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING • Provide appropriate supervision • Include moral, ethical, social education • Provide multicultural and global perspectives within the cur- riculum • Provide individual opportunities to develop talents • Establish school councils which include pupils, parents, teach- ers and non-teaching staff • Establish parent-teacher associations • Students organise activities • Develop community and international links • All, including students, have equal access to information • There is no discrimination by gender or group While accepting the above mentioned arguments theoretically, very few see them in practice in everyday school life. This skeptical attitude is aggravated by the current political and economic situa- tion in the country, and the low salaries that affect teacher’s status in school, in particular and in the country, in general. No wonder that the first feature of a democratic school climate for teachers (if you ask them to think about it) is proper economic conditions and adequate remuneration of work. But if you manage to overcome the initial reluctance to talk about democracy in school, you can have teachers enthusiastically develop the checklist for a democratic school climate for students, teachers and parents. This easy exercise helps them realize that democracy in school, as well as democracy in gen- eral, is not a static structure, but a complicated process of working together, seeking solutions and compromises, and questioning re- ality to make it acceptable and secure for the diversity of our needs and interests. TRAINING TEACHERS FOR TEACHING CITIZENSHIP EDUCATION / SVETLANA POZNYAK 177 Why is Citizenship Education an Important Issue in Ukraine? For more than a decade, Ukraine has been going through diffi- cult and conflicting transformation processes in economics, politics and national culture. Despite its undisputable achievements, the process of democratization turned out to be much harder and less attractive than expected. The adoption of the new democratic constitution of Ukraine (1996), which secured the main institutions and principles of democ- racy, is only one step on the way to democratization. Ukraine needs to establish democratic political practices, and apply democratic prin- ciples to all spheres of societal life. Citizens need civic competence, legal knowledge and political skills, understanding and recognition of democratic principles of life, and the priority of human rights. (Frame- work for Education for Democracy in Ukraine, 2000). This is what citizenship education is aiming at, and it is getting more and more important in Ukraine, especially in light of the alarming decrease of confidence in democratic institutions (parliament, government, po- litical parties)1, social isolation and low participation in social and po- litical life due to the poverty of the population. As a result of the exclu- sion of people from the economic sphere and social isolation, citizens have practically no influence on the decision-making process. Lack of mechanisms of control and pressure on the authorities means an unde- veloped civic society. Thus, the main problem is that Ukrainians are unable to organize themselves to protect their rights (Kyselyova 2000). Under these conditions, citizenship education is becoming a means of improving socialization, overcoming political, social and economic apathy, and strengthening civil society. What is Citizenship Education in Schools Like? As a society in transition, Ukraine has started developing a new system of democratic citizenship education in schools. Although rich 178 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING and varied experiences in this area have been accumulated by the established democracies, it cannot automatically be transferred to Ukrainian educational practice. Ukrainian pedagogy is based on the national tradition in citizenship education. Having gone through the three-stage period of 1) studying national heritage and interna- tional experience, 2) adapting it to Ukraine’s current situation, and 3) filling it with new content and methodology, in the past few years, the country has undertaken certain steps to introduce the system of democratic citizenship education in school. The issue of citizenship education has been raised in a number of conceptual and normative documents: the Framework for Civic, National and Patriotic Educa- tion, the National Doctrine for the Development of Education, Draft Concept Paper on the 12-Year school system in Ukraine. The latter, formulating general objectives and educational contents of manda- tory secondary education, puts special emphasis on the pupils’ life and social competence, and citizenship education, making it a stra- tegic goal of the 12-year schooling. The legal basis for democratic citizenship education at school is pro- vided by the Law on General Secondary Education (1999), which states that general secondary education aims at the development of a well-rounded personality based on general human values and scien- tific principles, multiculturalism, secular character of education, sys- tematized and integrated approach, principles of humanism, democ- racy, civic conscience, respect for nations and peoples in the interests of an individual, family, society, and state. Among the tasks of general secondary education one can find: • education of a citizen of Ukraine (comes first); and • teaching students to respect the Constitution of Ukraine, rights and freedoms of a person and citizen, legal responsibility for one’s actions, awareness of one’s human duties as an individual and citizen. The school management has the legal mandate to promote and facilitate the development of school and student self-government. TRAINING TEACHERS FOR TEACHING CITIZENSHIP EDUCATION / SVETLANA POZNYAK 179 The legal basis for education for democracy in Ukrainian schools and the unanimity of Ukrainian educators in understanding the ne- cessity of institutionalization of citizenship education do not mean that a clear vision with regard to its content and its place in the formal school curriculum, has been achieved. How Do Ukrainian Schools Provide for Citizenship Education? The Ukrainian schooling system is unified: the goal of second- ary school is to guarantee that every student will acquire a sufficient level of knowledge to be able to continue education to the higher level. At the same time, schools are allowed to realize the common goal through different types of secondary educational institutions and different pedagogic systems and technologies. The curriculum is divided between core (mandatory subjects for all the schools of the country) and optional parts, and includes a number of the subjects in Ukrainian studies like Ukrainian language and literature, history of Ukraine, geography of Ukraine, Ukrainian culture, and others. The national aspect, also emphasized in other subjects, is the most developed component of citizenship education (and is quite a dis- putable one). Apart from that, there are other subjects and elective courses in the school curriculum supported by other forms of citi- zenship education: • Curricular provisions (mandatory subjects: I and Ukraine [pri- mary school], Fundamentals of Law, Social Studies (second- ary school); elective courses: Human Rights, Street Law, Civic Education); • Extra curricular activities (projects, clubs, excursions); • School and student self-government; • Partnership with local authorities, NGOs (focused on project implementation and development of teaching materials in citi- zenship education). 180 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING Except for the mandatory subjects, the above mentioned forms of citizenship education vary from school to school in terms of its organization and effectiveness. There are common challenges schools face that require decisions at the national level, and which are not unique if we look at studies on civic education in other countries. We mention here the four most important ones: • Developing a clear definition of citizenship education and approaches to teaching and learning it; • Securing its position and status in the curriculum; • Developing a system of teacher training both at the university and at in-service teacher training level; • Improving the quality and range of teaching materials and resources. Undoubtedly, the decision on the first two issues is crucial, and will boost the solution of the other two. One can say that the story above is too long for an introduction into the state of citizenship education in Ukrainian schools for a pa- per dealing with teacher training. The reason is that this material, albeit more expanded and presented in an interactive way, is also part of the teacher training course for teaching citizenship educa- tion. The course was developed within the Education for Democracy in Ukraine Project (EU-US Transatlantic Civil Society Initiative), which has been operational in Ukraine for more that two years now, and whose experience and practices we are presenting. The central goal of the project, which combined the efforts of Ukrainian scientists, university lecturers and in-service teacher train- ers, teachers and NGO representatives, and foreign experts, is to fa- cilitate the introduction of citizenship education in secondary schools of Ukraine. The more specific objectives of the project are: • to facilitate the development of the national policy on educa- tion for democracy at the secondary school level (realized in the development of the Framework for Education for Democ- TRAINING TEACHERS FOR TEACHING CITIZENSHIP EDUCATION / SVETLANA POZNYAK 181 racy in Ukrainian School); • to develop a curriculum for citizenship education in grades 9- 11(realized in the citizenship education course syllabus for grades 9-11); • to develop teaching materials and define the methodology for teaching democracy in school (realized in the publication of the textbooks in citizenship education for grades 9-11 and the teacher’s guide); • to develop and run teacher training courses for teaching citi- zenship education; and • to set up a network for communication, dissemination of ma- terials and advocacy of education for democracy (realized in organizing citizenship education resource centers and an as- sociation of citizenship education teachers). How Does the Education for Democracy in the Ukraine Project Provide for Teacher Training? Having realized the first three objectives, the project has fo- cused its efforts and activities at teacher training and is doing so not only through teacher training per se but also through other project tools and resources subjected to that aim. Thus, the project provi- sions for teacher training are: 1) Training of teachers, teacher trainers, school administrators through project seminars, incorporation of training for teach- ing citizenship education in the state in-service teacher train- ing institutions curriculum, and incorporation of training for teaching citizenship education in the pedagogical univer- sities curriculum. 2) Creation and support of the citizenship education resource centers and information points. 3) Publication of the project newsletter. 182 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING 4)Maintaining the project Web site, www.edu-emocracy.org.ua. 5) Supporting the Union of Social Studies and Civic Education Teachers. 6) Developing the network of educators for democracy. In terms of the strategy, content and methodology of the train- ing and resources the project provides, they are defined according to the main objective of citizenship education: “education of a citizen that is willing, able and equipped to have an influence in public life and with the critical capacities to weigh evidence before speaking and acting…” (Crick 2000). Hence, democratic citizenship education can be considered in three strands (Kerr 1999): • Education about citizenship/democracy • Education through citizenship/democracy • Education for citizenship/democracy The same three strands are applicable to teacher training, and define its aims, principles and content. Aims of teacher training for citizenship education • To equip teachers with the knowledge of philosophy, content and methodology of citizenship education, and the necessary skills for its implementation in the educational process; • To involve teachers in active, participative experiences in the education process at different levels to encourage a democratic perspective in their teaching in schools; • To equip teachers with a set of tools (knowledge and under- standing, skills and dispositions) which will enable them to develop professional reflection and responsibility for creating conditions for successful citizenship education. • To develop and improve course modules and materials, which can be used in teacher training courses throughout the coun- try; TRAINING TEACHERS FOR TEACHING CITIZENSHIP EDUCATION / SVETLANA POZNYAK 183 • To identify, support and disseminate good practices in educa- tion for citizenship. Pedagogic Principles Osler and Starkey (1996) examined the relevance of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child to the teaching and learning process in school and came to the conclusion that it has wide-rang- ing implications for its organization, content and methodology. The authors identify a number of principles suggested by the Conven- tion, which should be applied to the education process in school. We suggest applying the same principles to teachers’ training: Dignity and security. Teachers’ right to dignity should not be forgotten. Participation. Teachers should have an opportunity to exercise choice and responsibility in decisions which affect them, for example in the planning and organization of their work. Identity and inclusivity. This means valuing diversity in the group of teachers. Freedom. This requires teacher trainers to permit maximum free- dom of expression and conscience, to promote expression and decision-making skills. Access to information. Teachers should have access to informa- tion and ideas from national and international sources. Training Content In view of the above mentioned objectives and principles of teacher training for citizenship education, general approach to teacher training in the country, and international experience in citizenship education (Voskresenskaya & Frumin 2000), we suggest that the content of the training shall include the following components: 184 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING 1) Conceptual basis of citizenship education (goals, concept of citizen, principles, content, models, teaching methodology, international experience); 2) Theoretical training in fundamentals of political science, so- ciology, economics, cultural anthropology to equip teachers with knowledge and understanding of the key issues for citi- zenship education such as democracy, human rights, politi- cal participation, elections, etc. As an example, we can have a look at the themes of the citizen- ship education courses developed by the project team. Bearing in mind the fact that these courses will be taught by history or geogra- phy teachers it is obvious that they need to obtain more profound knowledge of issues under consideration which their educational back- ground does not provide for. Theme 9 grade • Introduction • Rights and duties • Stereotypes • Conflicts • Family / School / Peers • Crime 10 grade • Political institutions and processes • Civil society • Democracy. Elections • Mass media 11 grade • Market economy • Social security • Multiculturalism • Ukraine and the world 3) Psychological and pedagogical training (in communication, interaction, conflict resolution, etc.); 4) Methods and classroom techniques for teaching citizenship education; and TRAINING TEACHERS FOR TEACHING CITIZENSHIP EDUCATION / SVETLANA POZNYAK 185 5) Theory and practice of democratic school organization and management. In conclusion, it is important to emphasize that training teachers to teach citizenship education is not just giving them certain knowl- edge of citizenship education, social sciences, psychology and meth- odology. It is the involvement of teachers in communication, interac- tion, critical thinking and all forms of participation in the teaching and learning process to enable them to develop a democratic perspec- tive in their own teaching and in their ability to do so, assume respon- sibility for it. In other words, if we expect teachers to empower stu- dents with knowledge, skills and attitudes for democratic citizenship and encourage their participation, we should give teachers a chance to exercise their right to learn and experience it themselves. Endnote 1 According to the results of a survey conducted by the fund ‘Demo- cratic Initiatives’ in 2000, the gap between the citizens and the state was: only 3 percent of women and 4 percent of men trusted political parties, only 7 percent of women and 8 percent of men trusted the parliament, and 70 percent of the population felt that they were ‘unclaimed’ by the society. References Crick, B. 2000. Essays on Citizenship. London: Continuum. Kerr, D. 1999. “Citizenship education in the curriculum: an interna- tional review,” The School Field, 3/4, Autumn/Winter. Kyselyova, O. 2000. “Bidnist v Ukraini,” Political Thought, 3, pp. 29-33. Osler, A. and Starkey, H. 1994. “Fundamental issues in teacher educa- tion for human rights: a European perspective,” Journal of Moral Education, 23, 3, pp. 349-59. Osler, A. and Starkey, H. 1996. Teacher Education and Human Rights. London: David Fulton Publishers. Voskresenskaya, N., Frumin, I. 2000. Hrazhdnskoye Obrazovaniye. A Manual for Educators. Council of Europe. r Selected Reference Materials* Arnot, M., Dillabough, J., eds. 2000. Challenging Democracy: International Perspectives on Gender, Education and Citizenship. London: Routledge Farmer. Arredondo, V. 2001. “La participación ciudadana: paradigma social del futuro,” in Revista Interamericana de Educación de Adultos, no. espe- cial. México, D.F. Augier, P. 1994. Le Citoyen Souverain: Education pour la Démocratie. Paris: UNESCO. Bélanger, Paul. 1995. “Desafiando as fronteiras da educaçao democrática,” in Educaçao e Sociedade, vol. 16, no. 53. Sao Paulo, Brazil, p. 621- 633. _________. 2001. “Education for democratic citizenship: Methods, prac- tices and strategies,” Conference organized jointly by the Council of Europe, UNESCO and the European Commission, Warsaw, 4-8 Dec., 1999: final report. Strasbourg, France: Council of Europe Publishing. Beetham, D., Boyle, K. 1995. Introducing Democracy: 80 Questions and An- swers. Paris: UNESCO. Benn, R. 2000. “The genesis of active citizenship in the learning soci- ety,” in Studies in the Education of Adults, vol. 32, no. 2. Leicester, UK., p. 241-256. *Selection of relevant titles that are available in the Documentation Centre of the UNESCO Institute for Education; compiled by Julia Schumacher and Lisa Krolak. 188 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING Birzea, C. 1996. Education for Democratic Citizenship: Consultation Meeting. Strasbourg, France: Council of Europe. Bron, M., Malewski, M., eds. 1994. “Adult education and democratic citizenship: Papers,” European Society for Research on the Educa- tion of Adults Conference,” Wroclaw: Wroclaw University Press. Bron, A., Field, J., Kurantowicz, E., eds. 1998. Adult Education and Demo- cratic Citizenship II: Papers. Krakow, Poland: Impuls Publisher. Bron, M., Field, J., eds. Adult Education and Democratic Citizenship III. Wroclaw, Poland: Lower Silesian University College of Education. Brown, S.F., ed. 2000. 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Literacy for Citizenship: Gender and Grassroots Dy- namics in Brazil. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. Symonides, J. ed. 1998. Human Rights: New Dimensions and Challenges; Manual on Human Rights. Paris: UNESCO Publishing; Aldershot, UK: Ashgate. Tandon, R. 2000. “Civil society, adult learning and action in India,” in Convergence, vol. 33, nos. 1-2. Toronto, Ont. Tobias, R. 2000. “The boundaries of adult education for active citizen- ship: institutional and community contexts,” in International Journal of Lifelong Education, vol. 19, no. 5. London. Usher, R., Bryant, I., Johnston, R. 1997. Adult Education and the Postmodern Challenge: Learning Beyond the Limits. London: Routledge. UNESCO. 2001. Educating for Citizenship. Paris: UNESCO; Brussels: Education International; Paris: Presse en ligne. Warren, C., ed. 1998. Democracy is Born in Conversations: Re-creating N.F.S. 190 CITIZENSHIP, DEMOCRACY AND LIFELONG LEARNING Grundtvig for Lifelong Learners around the World. New York, NY: Cir- cumstantial Productions Publishing. Citizenship, Democracy and Lifelong Learning is an out- come of an international seminar organized by the UNESCO Institute for Education (UIE) in partner- ship with the Faculty of Education of the University of Hamburg in June, 2002. As part of the 50th Anni- versary celebration of UIE, the seminar “ Strengthen- ing Democracy and Critical Citizenship through Life- long Learning” was an opportunity to revisit the theme of the first-ever seminar organized by UIE in 1952. This publication contains a selection of papers repre- senting key issues that were addressed during the seminar. It does not claim to contain an exhaustive discussion on citizenship, democracy and lifelong learn- ing but it aims to highlight questions that are not of- ten raised. With this publication, UIE hopes to contribute to a deeper understanding of the relationship between de- mocracy and education in the context of lifelong learn- ing.