The Neoliberal Erasure of Citizenship Education for the Public Good

• In Event: Education as a Public Good: Debates Across History

Abstract

By the end of the twentieth century, neoliberalism had effectively erased citizenship education as a fundamental goal of public education. In this paper I investigate how this happened by tracking a changing rationality in educational policy making and public discourse. Spanning the twentieth century, I analyze fifteen major federal education policy statements and the public discourses they produced. This century-long historical analysis produces clear evidence that citizenship education slowly disappeared as a neoliberal rationality gained a foothold and eventually supplanted democratic goals by 2001 with the enactment of No Child Left Behind (NCLB). I conclude with a challenge to reclaim citizenship education as the means to subvert neoliberalism and save democracy.

Author

• Kathryn L. Wegner, Carleton College