Highlights: - Teachers initially treated relational pedagogy and multiperspectivity separately in their discussions. - Teachers increasingly articulated them as interconnected, relational pedagogy enabling multiperspectivity. - Demonstrates how teachers describe relational work as shaping classroom climate and participation. - Shows how teachers develop concrete strategies for addressing multiple perspectives in classroom practice. Purpose: This study explores how social studies teachers understand and relate multiperspectivity and relational pedagogy when teaching content perceived as sensitive or controversial. Design/methodology/approach: The study draws on a two-year participatory research circle with teachers. Data from workshop discussions were analysed thematically, focusing on how teachers’ understandings developed over time. Findings: The findings show a shift from treating the approaches as separate to understanding relational pedagogy as a key condition for working with multiperspectivity. Trust-based relationships were perceived as enabling student participation and engagement with multiple perspectives. Analytically, this relationship can be understood as the coordination of social and symbolic milieus, making joint action around complex content possible. Research limitations/implications: The context-specific sample limits generalizability. The findings are based on teachers’ perspectives and do not include direct observations of classroom practice or independent measures of student learning. Future research should examine diverse settings and student experiences. Practical implications: The study conceptualises teaching complex content as requiring the coordination of relational and epistemic dimensions of classroom practice.
Highlights: - Proposes an analytical framework of critical mediatised peace education competencies. - Analyses material designed by 9th-grade students for 6th graders about global challenges. - Contests the ‘digital natives’ myth. - Affirms how empathic understanding is needed to complement critical thinking. Purpose: The paper focuses on educational challenges related to global challenges from the perspectives of critical peace and media education. In the concurrent media-induced information space, we consider the latter to be integral to achieving the goals of the former. Design/methodology/approach: The paper gives insight into a participatory study with secondary school students in Tampere, Finland, who were invited to design lessons on global challenges for primary school students. The analysis explores how the participants perceived global challenges as a topic to be included in primary school education. Specifically, we have analysed the views of 9th-grade students as they empathically ‘feel into’ the world of the 6th graders. Findings: We identified competencies of critical, social action and creative communication skills in the works of the students. Research limitations/implications: The results implicate the need for more emancipatory, participatory methods in future research. Practical implications: We argue that education on global challenges should emphasise marginalised perspectives, critical media education, and participatory educational practices to cultivate genuine empathic understanding.
Highlights: – Class, territory, and digital visuality intersect to shape contemporary youth citizenship. – Adult-controlled structures delegitimise youth agency through tokenistic participation. – Marginalised youth employ visual-digital practices that strategically oscillate between visibility and invisibility to either seek political recognition or counter state surveillance. – Multiple selves across social media platforms become instrumental in identity performance and formation. – Youth contest territorial stigmatisation through visual documentation and place-making in-between offline and online. Purpose: This article examines how young people in contexts of educational and territorial periphery engage politically, challenging deficit narratives that portray marginalised youth as apathetic. It analyses participation through the intersecting lenses of class, territory, and digital visuality. Design/methodology/approach: We employ the method of snap-along ethnography, which is designed to capture the offline-online concomitance in young people’s lives. This ethnographic study was developed in a Second Chance School in Portugal, where we traced youth political practices across institutional, community, and visual-digital domains, examining four dialectical tensions: agency vs adultism, control vs resistance, belonging vs exclusion, and recognition vs invisibility. Findings: Institutionally, young people mobilise through petitions and assemblies but encounter tokenism and adult dismissal of critical voices. In their communities, they transform stigmatised neighbourhoods through place-making, document police surveillance as a form of counter-resistance, and build transterritorial solidarities through protest participation. Digitally, they strategically curate multiple identities to navigate visibility while contesting territorial stigma. Visual-digital practices constitute political subjectivity and produce citizenship in meaningful and diverse ways that are easily obscured by normative lenses and methods.
Highlights: – Teaching social studies to younger children calls for new approaches in didactics of democratic education – The core of democracy can be presented for children as dialogue and disagreement – Dialogue and disagreement are theoretically embodied by deliberative and agonistic notions of democracy – Pedagogical philosophizing with children may incorporate aspects of both deliberative and agonistic approach in democratic education – Pedagogical philosophizing in a community of philosophical inquiry is a feasible social studies teaching approach to be developed further with the help of theoretical elaboration and empirical research Purpose: The article advances discussions on the didactics of democratic education in social studies, examining the potential of pedagogical philosophizing (PePhi) with children using community of philosophical inquiry (CoPI) practices. Design/methodology/approach: This is a theoretical study in which we analyze and discuss whether PePhi/CoPI can pedagogically combine aspects of the deliberative and agonistic theories of democracy that emphasize the importance of dialogue and disagreement respectively. Findings: We argue that PePhi/CoPI can combine elements from both competing democratic theories and serve democratic education with children. The theories can contribute to the development of this pedagogical practice, despite their polarized differences in political philosophy. Research limitations: The purpose of this research is to analyze and develop didactics from a theoretical perspective. To map the demands and limitations of this approach, empirical research on its implementation in social studies is also required. Practical implications: We suggest that pedagogical philosophizing with children is a theoretically feasible approach in democratic education and social studies, also in teaching children before teenage years. It is an established field of pedagogy, and it can incorporate core ideas of deliberative and agonistic notions of democracy.
Highlights: - Explores a historical and civic controversy surrounding Linnaeus’s place in the history of scientific racism through a large-scale classroom intervention in upper secondary history education. - Students show an improved capacity for historical contextualisation. - Students show a better understanding of the ways in which controversial historiographies implicate present and future. - Outcomes suggest that this intervention can help foster a multiperspectival understanding concerning legacies of scientific racism among students. Purpose: Prompted by the public debate during the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020, which challenged Linnaeus’s legacy, this paper examines how Swedish students make sense of Carl Linnaeus’s classification of humans and his alleged role in the history of scientific racism. The purpose is to explore how educational interventions can foster historical understanding and multiperspectival engagement with contested historical figures and controversial issues. Design/methodology/approach: The study is organised around a classroom intervention across 11 classrooms. Using qualitative pre- and post-tests, we analysed how students’ knowledge and attitudes developed through activities designed to cultivate a historiographic gaze on Linnaeus’s work and legacy. Findings: The intervention enhanced students’ knowledge of natural classification and scientific racism, as well as their capacity for historical contextualization. More students came to view Linnaeus as a racist, though this shift did not increase support for removing his monuments. Practical implications: Findings demonstrate that classroom activities addressing contested historical legacies can foster critical historical thinking without polarising student attitudes, offering perspectives on how we may address sensitive or controversial issues in history education.
Highlights: – Lowering the voting age to 16 generally enhances civic and political engagement. – Civic education and institutional support are crucial to long-term democratic participation. – Political hesitancy reflects electoral and ideological calculations. – Reforms require robust civic education to sustain democracy Purpose: This paper reviews empirical evidence on whether lowering the voting age to 16 enhances civic and political engagement and examines the factors mediating its effects. Design/methodology/approach: Following PRISMA-P guidelines, 3,694 records from Web of Science and Scopus were screened. Eleven empirical studies (2015–2025) met the inclusion criteria, focusing on young people’s political perceptions, attitudes, and behaviours. Findings: Most studies indicate that enfranchising 16- and 17-year-olds promotes civic and political engagement, particularly when accompanied by civic education and institutional support. Early political socialisation and school-based opportunities emerge as key mediators, suggesting that political maturity depends more on educational context than on age. The review also discusses political hesitancy in implementing voting-age reform, often linked to electoral strategy and ideological concerns. Research limitations/implications: The review primarily focuses on English-language, European studies. Longitudinal and cross-national research is necessary to evaluate the long-term and educational effects on youth engagement. Practical implications: Voting-age reforms must be coupled with robust civic education policies to ensure informed and sustainable democratic participation.
Highlights: - Political party visits prompt students to interpret and evaluate their openness to politics. - Students’ experiences are shaped by classroom climate, group dynamics, and personal relevance. - Authentic dialogue and balanced representation increase students’ trust in politics. - Poorly structured visits may reinforce cynicism and political disengagement. Purpose: This article examines how upper secondary students in Sweden experience political party visits to school, and how these encounters can be understood in relation to democratic learning. Design/methodology/approach: Based on seven focus group interviews across three schools with varying exposure to party visits, the study adopts an inductive thematic analysis to explore how students experience and make sense of these encounters. Findings: Students experienced the visits as social encounters rather than lessons, assessing politics as a practice. Engagement was shaped by relational dynamics and visit design, with well-prepared and balanced encounters fostering credibility and interest, while poorly planned visits had the opposite effect. Research limitations/implications: Due to a relatively small sample, caution is warranted when generalising the findings. Future studies should examine broader contexts and use complementary methods. Practical implications: Schools should ensure equitable access, prepare students, and create respectful settings to maximise the educational value of party visits
Highlights: – The first systematic ICCS-2022–based mapping of Türkiye’s 2024 Social Studies curriculum. – Detailed and auditable coding of the text to ICCS’s dimensions and 12 sub-dimensions. – Strong emphasis on knowledge and reasoning, limited representation of attitudes and participation. – A more “personally responsible” citizen profile than participatory/justice-oriented models. – Actionable policy/practice proposals: action civics, authentic participation tasks, and assessment rubrics. Purpose: This study addresses the gap created by Türkiye’s non-participation in International Civic and Citizenship Education Study (ICCS) cycles by determining the extent to which the 2024 Social Studies curriculum aligns with the ICCS 2022 Assessment Framework across the content, cognitive, attitudes, and engagement dimensions. It interprets alignment/misalignment patterns through the lenses of critical, democratic, and global citizenship and the theme of national ideological continuity. Design/methodology/approach: A qualitative documentary analysis and qualitative textual analysis of the Social Studies curriculum for grades 4–7 was conducted. The was systematically coded to ICCS’s 12 sub-dimensions. Findings: The curriculum prioritises cognitive and content dimensions—especially reasoning and applying—while attitudes and engagement are comparatively underrepresented. Research limitations/implications: Findings are limited to 2024 curriculum, the school grades 4–7 and the ICCS framework. Classroom enactment, teacher choices, and students’ lived experiences were not observed. Practical implications: Mapping Türkiye’s Social Studies curriculum to ICCS reveals strength on cognitive and content dimensions and weakness on attitudes/engagement dimension, indicating the need to more visibly integrate transformative democratic citizenship into the curriculum (e.g., action civics, authentic participation tasks, assessment rubrics that capture participation dispositions and value-based decision-making).
Highlights: - Schools and teachers in Iceland enjoy considerable autonomy in their work. - The National Curriculum Guides advocate for democratic education and social objectives. - The National Curriculum Guides do not prescribe specific content to be taught. - Teaching practices appear to be more teacher-centred, despite teachers’ intentions to the contrary. Purpose: The article aims to provide an overview of the status of Social Studies within the Icelandic educational system. Design/methodology/approach: As research on the teaching of social studies in Iceland remains limited, this article draws on a range of studies and policy documents to compile as comprehensive and authentic an account as possible at this time. Findings: Schools and teachers in Iceland enjoy considerable autonomy in their work, as the National Curriculum Guides do not prescribe specific content. These guides emphasise democratic education and broader social objectives. Nevertheless, despite teachers’ intentions to the contrary, teaching practices tend to remain teacher-centred and relatively uniform. Practical implications: The report identifies opportunities for improvement in both teacher education and school practices, in line with national education policy
Highlights: - Study on environmental education and sustainable development within the field of social science education. - Partnerships between formal and non-formal settings to support transformative and sociocritical education. - Qualitative study involving 23 participants from France and Canada (Québec). - Analysis reveals eleven conditions conducive to partnership. - Recommendations for key people who could be helpful in developing a partnership. Purpose: Current programs of study in France and Québec promote the integration of environmental education and sustainable development (EESD). This study aims to identify what conditions are suitable for establishing a partnership between settings in order to support a transformative and sociocritical EESD. Design/methodology/approach: This qualitative study involved a total of 23 participants from formal and non-formal settings. Each participant took part in a semi-structured interview. Four themes emerged from the thematic analysis: a) definition, b) benefits, c) terms, and d) obstacles and facilitators of partnership. Findings: The analysis identified eleven conditions conducive to successful partnership. Research limitations/implications: The participants included in the study showed a strong interest in issues related to EESD. Therefore, not all opinions are represented. Our research team is currently investigating the collaborative dynamics of specific partnerships between settings. Practical implications: This study highlights the role of key people in developing partnerships between formal and non-formal educational settings.
Edited by Hermann Josef Abs, Tim Engartner, Reinhold Hedtke, Monika Oberle, Marie Heijens, Simon Niklas Hellmich, Valeriia Hulkovych, Lucy Huschle, and Stella Wasenitz. Bonn: Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung, 2025, pp. 594, ISBN 978-3-7425-1134-8. Purpose: This book review discusses Pilotmonitor politische Bildung, a comprehensive edited volume that introduces a data-based monitoring framework for civic and political education in Germany. Content: The review highlights the book’s systematic development of indicators across schools, higher education, teacher training, and extracurricular learning. It emphasizes both the methodological rigor of the project and its innovative cross-sectoral perspective. Contribution: The volume is praised as a timely and ambitious milestone for evidence-based educational policy and research, while also pointing to limitations that suggest avenues for further development and international comparison.
Highlights: - Competence-based EfD frameworks prioritise cognition over emotional–reflective learning. - The Reference Framework of Competences for Democratic Culture (RFCDC) shows vision–tools mismatch: holistic aims vs. operational descriptors. - Emotions reduced to regulation; reflection to rational self-assessment. - We propose revisions embedding affective–reflective learning in competences. - EfD + TL: emotion and reflection key to competences and democratic agency. Purpose: Education for Democracy (EfD) is framed through competence-based approaches like the Council of Europe’s Reference Framework of Competences for Democratic Culture (RFCDC). We examine how emotion and reflection—central to transformative learning (TL) and democratic competences—are represented within the framework. Design/methodology/approach: We conducted a semantic and qualitative collocation analysis of RFCDC Volumes 1–3, focusing on emotion- and reflection-related terms, triangulated across the competence model, descriptors, and implementation guidance. Findings: While Volume 1 promotes holistic learning, operative elements narrow emotions to regulation and behaviour control, and reduce reflection to rational self-assessment. This creates a mismatch, revealing that cognitive and measurable outcomes dominate at the expense of transformative, embodied learning. Research limitations/implications: As an interpretative corpus study, implicit references may remain underrepresented. Findings highlight the need to revise competence frameworks to embed affective–reflective dimensions more systematically. Practical implications: Revising frameworks to embed emotion and reflection is essential to support democratic education that prepares adaptable, ethically grounded citizens able to thrive in uncertain contexts.
Highlights: - Students oscillate between utopia and dystopia when imagining the future concerning equality. - Meaning-making is shaped by history education, social media and contemporary political events. - Students construct equality as both threatened and threatening. - Students position themselves as more open and progressive than older generations. - Students express limited personal agency, attributing real power to “others.” Purpose: This article investigates how Swedish upper secondary school students envision future societies, with a particular focus on gender, sexuality, and equality, through the lens of history education. Design/methodology/approach: The study draws on qualitative interviews with students in upper secondary school. A poststructuralist theoretical framework, inspired by Butler and Foucault, guides the analysis of how discourses are negotiated and reproduced in classroom practices. Findings: The analysis reveals tensions and ambivalence regarding the future. The narratives reflect the complex interplay between historical and present societal norms, as well as students’ future imaginaries. This article contributes to understanding how history education shapes young people’s views of the future. Research implications: The study highlights a critical challenge: many students feel powerless in shaping the future, attributing agency to external forces. This accentuates the need for educational approaches that empower youth as agents of change.
Highlights: - Assessment conversations in a 9th-grade social studies class were analysed. - Students’ contributions were sorted to identify the dominant level of knowledge. - Objective facts and disconnected information prevailed in the conversations. Purpose: This study explores the extent to which critical thinking is present in assessment conversations in social studies. Design/methodology/approach: The study builds on data from a Norwegian social studies class in the 9th grade (13–14-year-olds). Students performed student-led assessment conversations in groups of four. The students’ contributions were sorted into the absolutist, multiplist and evaluativist categories to identify what level of knowledge was dominant in their conversations. Critical thinking is only possible in the evaluative category. Findings: Absolutist content prevailed in all conversations, meaning that the students, by and large, focused on objective facts and sharing disconnected information. Research limitations/implications: The students’ prioritisation of absolutist content in their conversations could resemble a strong objectivist tradition in the field of social studies. Practical implications: Discussions based on open questions and cause-and-effect thinking should be rehearsed with students to develop their critical thinking skills
Highlights – Educators act as gatekeepers of pluralism, shaping democratic citizenship education. – Agonistic pedagogy sees pluralistic conflicts as opportunities for experiential democratic learning. Purpose: This article explores the concept of agonistic pluralism, its role in education, and educators’ pivotal position as gatekeepers of pluralism. It investigates why some educators embrace pluralism with broader boundaries while others impose stricter ones. Design/methodology/approach: Semi-structured interviews with 13 educational experts were analysed using reflexive thematic analysis to uncover traces of agonistic pedagogy in citizenship education in Lithuania. Findings: Educators, as gatekeepers of pluralism, shape democratic citizenship education by setting boundaries that either restrict or enable experiential democratic learning. Broader boundaries enable dialogue, critical thinking, and the ability to see others as adversaries rather than enemies, while strict boundaries, driven by fear or neutrality, hinder these opportunities. Research limitations/implications: The study focuses on expert perspectives in Lithuania, excluding student input and direct observations and limiting generalizability. Practical implications: Professional development, collaborative cultures, and leadership support can help educators adopt broader boundaries.
Highlights: - Transformative learning fosters reflection on values and democratic attitudes. - Citizenship projects combined engagement, reflection, and critical thinking. - Teachers guided projects on gender, sustainability, and anti-fascism. - Roles shifted between facilitator, moderator, and puppeteer. - Teachers avoided grading values, assessing skills and knowledge instead. - Assessing transformative learning remains ethically challenging. Purpose: This article explores methodologies used by educators in citizenship education, examining how they perceive their roles when balancing skills and values, and how they approach assessment. It also investigates how transformative learning theory (Mezirow, 1978; Taylor, 2009) is reflected in practice and how outcomes are assessed. Design/methodology/approach: A case study based on three semi-structured interviews with teachers from different European countries, focusing on classroom and assessment practices. Findings: The study highlights opportunities and challenges in transformative approaches, especially in relation to formative assessment. Key features identified include personal engagement, critical dialogue, varied teacher roles, and integration of cognitive and affective learning. Teachers avoid directly assessing values, instead prioritising skills, knowledge, and engagement. Research limitations/implications: Further research should examine effective formative strategies in citizenship education. Practical implications: Teachers need training in formative assessment.
Highlights: - Democratic knowledge and perspectives correlate with misinformation discernment (MD). - Higher education in all academic orientations correlates positively with MD. - Low dogmatism and low fact-resistance correlate positively with MD. - Self-rated information literacy aligns with objective performance in MD. - Disciplinary differences are associated with different democratic ideals. Purpose: This study examines how educational orientation, actively open-minded thinking (AOT), and democratic ideals relate to misinformation discernment in an era of misleading media content. Methodology: Using an online survey, nationally representative adults (n=3060) and university students (n=1097) completed measures assessing misinformation discernment, AOT, democratic ideals, and information literacy. Findings: Higher education improves misinformation discernment, though no differences emerged across academic disciplines. AOT, especially low dogmatism and fact resistance, strongly predicts misinformation resilience. Democratic ideals, emphasising representation and expertise, enhance discernment, while participatory ideals show weaker links. Self-rated information literacy correlates with better discernment, yet advanced techniques like lateral reading and reverse image search remain rare. Political orientation influences outcomes, with Green-voting individuals performing better and right-wing Sweden Democrats performing worse. Implications: The findings emphasise the need to integrate critical thinking, democratic education, and digital fact-checking skills into curricula across disciplines, actively promoting AOT and fostering nuanced democratic perspectives.
Highlights: - Identifies three combinations of civic identity and civic engagement among students. - Discusses the complexity of the relationship between civic identity and engagement. - Asking questions about the presumed bi-directionality of civic identity and engagement. - Discusses how social science teachers can use civic education to promote civic identity. Purpose: Depoliticisation of youth risks marginalising them from political participation. When youths are labelled as politically disinterested and democratically disengaged, they may view themselves as powerless. We investigate how Social Science teachers can utilise diverse expressions relating to democracy and political issues in the classroom to stimulate the growth of youth’s civic identity and counteract experiences of depoliticisation. Design/methodology/approach: The article is based on interviews with Year 9 students in four Norwegian lower-secondary school. By utilising the four theoretical perspectives on identity formation identified by Verhoeven et al. (2019), we explore how students develop or reject civic identities. Findings: We identify three separate categories of civic identity and engagement, with each posing specific challenges to Social Science teachers responsible for civic education. Research limitations/implications: The study is limited by its size, and with only Norwegian data. However, it should give some direction for further research on how civic education may influence the relationship between civic identity and engagement. Practical implications: The study is limited by its size, and with only Norwegian data. However, it should give some direction for further research on how civic education may influence the relationship between civic identity and engagement.
Highlights: – Civic visual literacy is partly model generic, partly model specific, and partly content dependent – A central aspect of civic visual literacy is moving beyond the model itself – Entirety, expansion, and agency are three key aspects that students need to discern Purpose: The aim is to specify the meaning of visual literacy within the context of social science education (SSE). Design/methodology/approach: Data consist of 94 recorded small-group discussions from four learning studies in SSE aimed at qualifying students’ reasoning about societal systems and issues. Phenomenography was used to identify key aspects that students needed to discern if they were to develop qualified reading of flowcharts and scatterplots. Findings: Civic visual literacy should be understood as partly model generic, partly model specific, and partly dependent on the content visualised. Entirety, expansion, and agency are aspects that students must discern if they are to develop a more qualified civic visual literacy and thus be able to reason about societal systems and issues in a qualified way, using visual representations as a tool. Research limitations/implications: Four models were used. Future studies should investigate the extent to which the results hold in relation to different subject content and model types. Practical implications: Entirety, expansion, and agency must function as focal points in SSE teaching when visual representations are used.
