The Adults Are Not Alright: Theorizing Adult Democratic Education

• In Event: Sustaining and Protecting Democracy

Abstract

This paper aims to broaden our theorizing about democratic education. I argue that we cannot meet our current democratic crisis—or engage effectively in the creative task that is democracy—without paying more attention to the democratic learning of adults through a broadened approach to education that encompasses far more than just formal schooling. Toward this end, I position the “capabilities approach” (CA) as a theoretical framework for developing an idea of adult democratic education. In particular, I point to three ways in which CA can be valuable to our theorizing of adult democratic education and point up some of the ways that democratic societies can—and must—promote what I call citizens’ “capability to participate in adult democratic education.”

Author

• Tony DeCesare, Saint Xavier University Chicago
  Presenting Author