Cognitive aspect of education for democracy

Cognitive Democracy

In this essay, we outline a cognitive approach to democracy. Specifically, we argue that democracy has unique benefits as a form of collective problem solving in that it potentially allows people with highly diverse perspectives to come together in order collectively to solve problems. Democracy can do this better than either markets and hierarchies, because it brings these diverse perceptions ...

Reading Democracy and Education

What is John Dewey’s Democracy and Education? In a literal sense, it is a study of education and its relation to the individual and society. Moreover, Dewey tells us, it is a philosophical rather than historical, sociological, or political inquiry. His original title for the work was An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education. That was the heading he had in view when he signed a contract to...

Deliberative Democracy and Education

From Education to Democracy?

The conventional wisdom, since at least the writings of John Dewey (1916), views high levels of educational attainment as a prerequisite for democracy. Education is argued to promote democracy both because it enables a “culture of democracy” to develop and because it leads to greater prosperity, which is also thought to cause political development. The most celebrated version of this argument i...

Education for democracy, dialogue and peace

In this era of globalization, higher education is under pressure to respond to market demand of the knowledge economy if it has to remain relevant. This contrasts with sustained demand for intellectual leadership in social and political challenges characterized new forms of violence that call for relevant response from the academia. My contribution will briefly introduce the conventional wisdom...