Civic Education in Times of Political Apathy

• In Event: Is “Political Apathy” a Danger for Our Future Democracy? Possibilities for Better Educational Practices

Abstract

The aim of civic education consist the preparation of young people to undertake their roles as citizens. Contrary to this educational objective, many countries are concerned about the low participation of their citizens in civic life and the apparent lack of interest and involvement among young people in public and political life – thus about the success of civic education at school. In reference of the IEA-Study ICCS (International Civic and Citizenship Study) on eight grade students in 38 countries (N=140.650) it can indeed be assumed that in many countries the numer of “apathetic” and “absent” citizens increases in comparison with “spectators” and especially “gladiators” as termed by Milbrath (1974). The findings reveal that students in most countries (a) are not very interested or not interested at all in political and social issues (31 of 38 countries), (b) have a low sense of political efficacy (34), (c) expect certainly or probably not to participate in political activities as adults (37), (d) discuss political and social issues monthly at most (most of them hardly or never) (38), and (e) do not participate in different civic activities outside school (as in youth organizations affiliated with a political party or union, environmental organization, human rights organization, a voluntary group doing something to help the community etc.; ICCS average for all activities is clearly below 50 percent).
In this paper we pose the question what these results mean in reference to the sense of responsibility with respect to a society and country. What does it mean if action orientation is low on one hand, trust in political institutions and civic knowledge quite high on the other hand as for instance in Switzerland? Or on the contrary, what does it mean if action orientation (at least in the international comparison) and political interest are quite high on one hand, perception of equal rights in society and civic knowledge is low on the other hand as in Thailand? In a first step we illustrate such “maps” of countries exemplarily. Following this we discuss the meaning of these profiles with respect to democracy. We extend the Milbrath (1974) dictum on which the Greek arena consisted not only of three sorts of persons, but of four types, namely a) the actors, b) the spectators, c) the ones who were not allowed to participate and d) the apathic who never cared about what happens in their community and society and never venture their opinions. There are different reasons for political apathy. First there is the counterfactual reason that people trusting the government, the parliament, the police, the courts etc. do belief that “up there” business is conducted properly; it doesn’t need my participation and citizens do not have to control politicians – as it seems to be the case in Switzerland. Second there is a learned political helplessness that comes in countries with a kind of “pseudo-democratic” climate especially. Finally we discuss these results on a political developmental frame eliciting the fact of different levels of political understanding.



 

Authors

• Fritz K. Oser, University of Fribourg

• Horst Biedermann, University of Flensburg