Educating European citizenship: Elucidating assumptions about teaching civic competence

Abstract

In recent years, the idea of the contribution of education to citizenship has been reinitiated. The purpose of this paper is to investigate constructions of citizenship as they are articulated in European policy documents on teacher education. It is indicated that the normative form of active citizenship is put into play through the individual and her or his actions, which is centred on learning. Drawing on Foucault’s analytic approach to problematization and Foucauldian methods of analysing policy problematizations of a certain problem, this study draws attention to the discourse of active citizenship and technologies of accountability that are utilized to shape teaching civic learning. It is suggested that citizenship is constructed as a learning problem, which motivates young people in school to reflect on their skills and competences. It is also from these capacities that their attitudes towards cultural diversity are assumed to be developed. Thus, in the formation of citizenship, emphasis is laid on the individual’s capacity for learning, which is also mobilized in narratives of the construction of Europe.