Teaching Controversial Issues as Part of Education for Democratic Intercultural Citizenship: The Case of the Netherlands

• In Event: Activist Pedagogy, Critical-Democratic Citizenship, and Shared Education in Divided Societies: International Perspectives and Next Practices

Abstract

Democracy implies that students have to learn to deal with controversial issues. For teachers, it is difficult to teach issues that are considered controversial in society, or by some participants in schools, like students, parents, other teachers and principals. It is particularly difficult when there are opposing groups and perspectives in the classroom itself. Controversial issues are at stake in many subjects, but especially in subjects, like history, social studies and religious studies. However, more technical subjects, like biology, are also full of controversial issues. Controversial issues are topics over which people can disagree, and this disagreement is because of different articulations of moral values (Hess, 2009) – articulations that are often expressions of different political, cultural or religious frameworks. Controversial issues are at stake in strongly divided societies, but also in nations that are at first look more homogenous, like the Netherlands.

In this paper, we analyze how teachers work, and can work, with controversial issues so they can support critical-democratic citizenship development. We use the results of a qualitative study on how teachers deal with controversial issues, in which we interviewed 10 teachers of history and biology in Dutch secondary education. We interviewed teachers in public education and in religious schools. In the Netherlands, two-thirds of the schools are religious, but they are fully financed by the government and they are required to follow the national curriculum, except concerning religious studies. However, the religious oriented curriculum debates transcend the subject of religious studies. Because of the strong influence of Christian political parties and school boards, the Dutch government is careful when it comes to creating curriculum policy, in which religious aspects can be involved. They try to carefully avoid controversial issues.

Whether topics are considered crucial or not by teachers depends partly on the identity of the school and of the student population. The school’s identity is particularly relevant in traditional Christian schools. The student population becomes relevant when there are students, in the classrooms, who hold religious fundamentalist ideas (mostly Christian or Muslim), or come from non-Western countries that were either former Dutch colonies or from the Middle East. However, in order to become a critical-democratic citizen, all students should learn to work with controversial issues.

The study clearly shows that discussing controversial issues, from different perspectives and with respect for diversity and pluralism, should be the normal practice in school. In line with Mouffe (2018), we argue for an agonistic classroom that takes controversies seriously and helps students work with them. In such a dynamic value community, there is a better chance that when topics become highly controversial, the dialogue can continue. The learning processes should not only be more dialogical, but also more reflective. This implies not only analyzing logical reasoning, but also analyzing the moral values that are at stake. Education for democratic intercultural citizenship that addresses controversial issues should be reflective, dialogical and democratic.

Author

• Wiel M. Veugelers, University of Humanistic Studies Utrecht