What Kind of Citizen? What Kind of Democracy? Citizenship Education and the Scottish Curriculum for Excellence

The Scottish Curriculum for Excellence lists ‘responsible citizenship’ as one of the four capacities which it envisages that all children and young people should develop. By understanding citizenship as a capacity and by seeing it as a concern that should permeate the whole curriculum, the Scottish approach to education for citizenship is distinctly different from approaches developed in many other countries around the world. This paper provides a critical analysis of key-documents in the development of the Scottish approach over the past decade. It argues that the Scottish approach is characterised by a focus on individuals and their capacities, by a broad conception of the domain of citizenship, and by an emphasis on activity and community. The analysis not only reveals something about the particular choices implied in the Scottish approach but also hints at some of the more problematic sides of education for citizenship in Scotland, most notably the risk that citizenship focuses too much on the social and too little on the political dimensions of what it means to be a citizen in a pluralist democracy. INTRODUCTION The Scottish Curriculum for Excellence lists ‘responsible citizenship’ as one of the four capacities which it envisages that all children and young people should develop. ‘Our aspiration,’ as it was put in the foreword by the then Minister and Deputy Minister for Education and Young People to the 2004 Curriculum for Excellence document, ‘is to enable all children to develop their capacities as successful learners, confident individuals, responsible citizens and effective contributors to society’ (Scottish Executive 2004: 3). Curriculum for Excellence provides the overall framework for this ambition by enlisting the values, outlining the purposes and articulating the principles for curriculum design that should inform all education from the age of 3 to the age of 18. In the document responsible citizens are depicted as individuals who have ‘respect for others’ and a ‘commitment to participate responsibly in political, economic, social and cultural life’ and who are able to ‘develop knowledge and understanding of the world and Scotland’s place in it; understand different beliefs and cultures; make informed choices and decisions; evaluate environmental, scientific and technological issues; [and] develop informed, ethical views of complex issues’ (ibid: 12). Scotland has not been unique in its attempt to put citizenship on the educational agenda. Compared to other countries around the world, including the other UK nations such as England where citizenship was incorporated in the National Curriculum from its inception in 1988 onwards and became a statutory subject for secondary schools in 2002 (see Biesta & Lawy 2006), Scotland can actually be said to be rather late (cf. Andrews & Mycock 2007). There are, however, aspects of the Scottish trajectory and approach which are rather distinctive – particularly the fact that Scotland has not chosen to make citizenship education into a separate curriculum subject and the fact that Curriculum for Excellence depicts citizenship as a ‘capacity’ – and these warrant further exploration. This can not only help us to better understand the specific character of the approach taken within Scottish education for citizenship but can also shed light on the strengths and weaknesses of this particular approach.