whose rights are they? social justice, hre discourse, and the politics of knowledge issn 2535-5406 reviewer acknowledgements the editors would like to thank the following colleagues for the time and careful attention given to manuscripts they reviewed for volume 1 of hrer. rebecca adami university of stockholm, sweden paul bracey university of northampton, uk kjersti brathagen university of south-eastern norway, norway cecilia decara danish institute for human rights, denmark judith dunkerly-bean old dominion university, usa viola b. georgi university of hildesheim, germany carole hahn emory university, usa brynja halldórsdóttir university of iceland, iceland lisa hartley curtin university, australia lee jerome middlesex university, uk claudia lenz norwegian school of theology, norway hadi strømmon lile østfold university college, norway anja mihr center on governance though human rights, germany virginia morrow university of oxford, uk 107 thomas nygren uppsala university, sweden barbara oomen roosevelt university college, the netherlands anatoli rapoport purdue university, usa farzana shain keele university, uk hugh starkey university college london, uk sharon stein university of british columbia, canada volume 1, no 2 (2018) date of publication: 08-11-2018 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3033 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews queer pedagogies: lgbtq education, democracy and human rights camicia, s. p. (2016). critical democratic education and lgbtq inclusive curriculum: opportunities and constraints. new york: routledge. 101 pp., £35.25 (hardback) isbn: 978-0-414-70992-7; £16 (ebook) isbn: 978-1-315-88525-4 reviewed by anna carlile goldsmiths, university of london, uk anna carlile: a.carlile@gold.ac.uk http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3033 mailto:a.carlile@gold.ac.uk hrer book and media reviews 66 book and media reviews queer pedagogies: lgbtq education, democracy and human rights doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3033 camicia, s. p. (2016). critical democratic education and lgbtq inclusive curriculum: opportunities and constraints. new york: routledge. 101 pp., £35.25 (hardback) isbn: 978-0-414-70992-7; £16 (ebook) isbn: 978-1-315-88525-4 reviewed by anna carlile goldsmiths, university of london, uk a.carlile@gold.ac.uk this book emerges at a crucial moment in both democracy and in the work of lgbtq inclusion in education, both in the us and in the uk. trust in politicians and the media is very low in 2018, and ‘identity politics’ is often derided by those in power as shaky ground for the discussion of human and civil rights. this is of course precisely because those in power tend to claim their identity as the norm. as camicia (2016) explains, the ‘…functioning of norms keeps non-dominant identities from being recognised because the dominant lens is one of deficit when in actuality the deficit rests in institutions, structures and societies’ (p.16). taking queerness as anything other than the norm, camicia (2016) manages to interweave two clear and valuable concepts in one book. firstly, he offers a detailed and practical comparative case study of two very different states (utah and california) and their approaches to lgbtq inclusion in schools. and secondly, he uses an lgbtq-inclusive curriculum as an exemplification for the development of a better informed, empathetic, and more critical democracy through the process of formal education. the first chapter lays out the importance of considering the structures underpinning inclusion and curriculum in thinking about education for democracy. camicia (2016) makes this point by outlining how ‘an exclusionary curriculum demonstrates the quality and will of an undemocratic community to all students’ (p.8). chapters 2 and 5 bracket the data chapters by addressing the theory behind the approach, with the former making a good case for the implementation of democratic education through queer theoretical approaches in public schools, and the latter revisiting the negative impacts of a lack of visibility and the importance of recognition and inclusion in such an endeavour. the third and fourth chapters look at data collected by the author on lgbtq education in utah and california. schools in utah are operating within a system dominated by patriarchy and religion, where students only recently endured a protracted courtroom battle to be allowed to meet at school in gay-straight alliances (gsas). books featuring same-sex parented families have been banned, and teachers find it very difficult to be out as lgbtq at school. in comparison, california’s legislative history is 40 years ahead of utah’s. gsas started in california; lgbtq students enjoy a range of protections and supports; and the state has established an indisputably inclusive curriculum. however, camicia (2016) is careful to explain that the two states do not represent a dystopia/utopia dichotomy. there are differences http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3033 mailto:a.carlile@gold.ac.uk hrer book and media reviews 67 in rural areas and urban centres in both states; salt lake city in utah is much more inclusive in many ways than rural california, and some teachers in urban californian schools are unable to address lgbtq education against a backdrop of compromised personal safety. educators from both states have had to confront restrictions and opportunities in developing deep advocacy skills and drawing on a strategy of ‘braiding’ intersectional lgbtq and democratic educational content throughout their curricula. what the data demonstrates is the difference between policy and implementation in education, and the resilience and creativity of educators and students who are committed to democracy and advocacy. the epilogue outlines the author’s autoethnographic account of his experience growing up as a gender non-normative child and adolescent, a closeted married man, and an out, gay academic. camicia (2016) leverages this account partly to make visible his own positioning, and partly to demonstrate the use of autoethnography as a useful tool for both teachers and students engaged in education for democracy. in doing so, he demonstrates that a curriculum that provides counter-narratives and gives value to subjectivities can ‘facilitate examination of “common-sense” knowledge as it is implicated in inequitable power relations’ (p.85). he shows that this mode of thinking is situated, contextualised, and intersectional. ultimately, the chapter concludes a book dedicated to demonstrating that listening to diverse people’s stories can function as a key antidote to stereotyping and to the metadiscourses running through politics and the media that claim to speak for everyone but somehow omit the voice of experience. the author thus draws on complex theory and philosophy and illustrates it in accessible, pragmatic ways which will appeal to both academic researchers and to school professionals. for example, he quotes habermas’s idea that a theory of rights must recognise the validity of people’s contextual subjectivities, explaining: ‘(t)his recognition is necessarily a complicated conversation … but without these conversations, schools are bound to maintain and construct social inequalities’ (p. 13). citing judith butler, he makes a clear case for the idea that although categories have been important for lgbtq rights, they also function to exclude. to accept intersectionality, then, is to accept the impossibility of categories. the book makes it clear that alliances are more important which is why lgbtq education is for everyone interested in democracy, and not just for lgbtq teachers and students. volume 3, no 1 (2020) date of publication: 10-02-2020 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3574 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews from failed citizenship to functioning citizenship: a challenging agenda for human rights education kingston, l. n. (2019). fully human: personhood, citizenship and rights. oxford: oup. 312pp. £41.99 (hardcover) isbn 978-0-19-091826-2. reviewed by hugh starkey ucl institute of education, uk. hugh starkey: h.starkey@ucl.ac.uk http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3574 mailto:h.starkey@ucl.ac.uk hrer book and media reviews 92 book and media reviews from failed citizenship to functioning citizenship: a challenging agenda for human rights education doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3574 issn 2535-5406 kingston, l. n. (2019). fully human: personhood, citizenship and rights. oxford: oup. 312pp. £41.99 (hardcover) isbn 978-0-19-091826-2 reviewed by hugh starkey ucl institute of education, uk. h.starkey@ucl.ac.uk human rights declarations and instruments assert that human beings are part of a ‘human family’ where inalienable rights and entitlement to be treated with dignity are birth rights, and not linked to nationality, ethnicity, religion or social status. however, in practice such guarantees depend on access to citizenship. whilst citizenship is a concept much broader than nationality, with which is often conflated, it is nonetheless the case that, as james banks (2017) has argued, many inhabitants within affluent and democratic countries experience ‘failed citizenship’. that is to say that they are deprived of agency and of the social and economic structures that enable and protect a dignified and fulfilled life. the promise of justice and peace, the raison d’être of human rights, is effectively broken. lindsey kingston examines the realities of various categories of people who are frequently unable to secure their rights and their dignity. these include increasing numbers of stateless people as well as those displaced by war, ethnic cleansing and natural disasters brought about by climate change. her analysis also includes other migrants, nomadic peoples, indigenous nations, and citizens in the united states who still struggle for the most basic rights and dignity. the philosophical, ethical and moral question of an individual’s status as human being, or person, is addressed in the context of the social and political concepts of citizenship and rights. the result is an argument about what it means, as the title of the book suggests, to be fully human, since anything less than full recognition of a person’s humanity fails to guarantee access to human rights. citizenship should no longer be seen in terms of opposition to noncitizenship, but rather in terms of its efficacity. failed citizenship can be overcome, kingston argues, if political attention is paid to ensuring ‘functioning citizenship’. kingston’s readable and challenging book is constructed in four parts and nine chapters. in part 1 she examines the changing value and meaning of citizenship as it is politically constructed through a discourse of membership and worthiness. part 2 looks at migration and arrivals who become noncitizens within nation states. issues include statelessness, forced displacement and the creation of liminal spaces as a result of unregulated migration. the third part looks at failed citizenship for established groups within nation states, such as nomadic peoples, indigenous communities and what she calls second-class citizens. the final two chapters propose http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3574 hrer book and media reviews 93 solutions aimed at making the issue more salient. the first approach represents personhood and the conclusion argues for ‘functioning citizenship’. the observation of the ways in which denial of civic status to indigenous people in thailand led to their extreme exploitation, including trafficking, was the starting point for kingston’s impressive intellectual journey and scholarly enquiries. if being stateless effectively disqualified people from the protection of human rights, how come the human rights community of un organisations, academics, lawyers and activists did not address the issue? this book is perhaps the start of a campaign to put the issue of defining personhood and promoting functioning citizenship firmly on the academic agenda, with the intention that it should also figure highly on political agendas. kingston argues that the root of the problem of statelessness is nationalistic or nativist constructions of hierarchies of personhood. the act of ascribing identities of foreignness, illegality and noncitizenship perpetuates inequalities and renders some persons more worthy than others for protection and political membership. in other words, these discourses and regulations cause some individuals to be accepted as more fully human than others. another useful concept with potential for adaptation as an activity or framework in human rights education (hre) is the attention to rights to place and purpose. in this sense place refers to a feeling of belonging whilst purpose is about achieving a sense of dignity. right to purpose is similar to nussbaum and sen’s capability approach (nussbaum, 2006), though kingston avoids this comparison. she shows how numerous articles of the universal declaration address place and belonging. these include article 9 outlawing exile; freedom of movement within a state (13); right to leave and return (13); asylum (14); nationality (15). other articles address purpose, including: marriage and family (16); property (17); freedom of thought and religion (18); freedom of expression (19); assembly and association (20); and others, including education (26). the central section of the book exemplifies, in considerable detail, ways and contexts in which people are deprived of their rights to be fully human. it includes many examples of resistance and solidarity. it is in the concluding chapters that reference is made to hre as part of a strategy to address the impacts of statelessness and noncitizenship. kingston advocates expanding hre, noting that it has achieved a ‘newfound respect’ over the past thirty years. to contribute to overcoming the assaults on human dignity documented in the book, she sees hre as capable of uncovering hierarchies of personhood; fostering advocacy and making people aware of their rights and of the resources to claim them. i think that this is a very important book that whilst being an impressive piece of scholarship, is also accessible to readers from undergraduate level up. it should certainly find its way onto the reading lists of many university courses, including education. that said, the work of translating this analysis into the conceptualisation and the content of hre courses will be the responsibility of education practitioners such as the readers of this journal. ensuring access for all to functional citizenship requires awareness within majority communities of the effects of officially sanctioned hostile environments on fellow inhabitants and their families. it also requires acts of solidarity and a willingness to name and confront dehumanising discourses. this is not a new agenda for hre, but it is one that is still underdeveloped. hrer book and media reviews 94 references banks, j. a. (2017). failed citizenship and transformative civic education. educational researcher, 46(7), 366-377. https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189x17726741 nussbaum, m. (2006). education and democratic citizenship: capabilities and quality education. journal of human development and capabilities, 7(3), 385 395. https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189x17726741 issn 2535-5406 reviewer acknowledgements the editors would like to thank the following colleagues for the time and careful attention given to manuscripts they reviewed for volume 2 of hrer. bassel akar notre dame university, lebanon schirin amir-moazami freie universität berlin, germany bronagh byrne queen's university belfast, uk wanda cassidy simon fraser university, canada keith c. barton indiana university, usa judith dunkerly-bean old dominion university, usa michelle bellino university of michigan, usa frederique brossard boerhaug nla university college, norway steven camicia utah state university kenan çayir istanbul bilgi university, turkey sevda clark university of oslo, norway suzanne egan university college dublin, ireland stener ekern, university of oslo, norway william robert fernekes rutgers, the state university of new jersey, usa hrer acknowledgements 104 jonas gamborg lillebø volda university college, norway michael b. greene rutgers university, usa brynja elisabeth halldórsdóttir university of iceland, iceland jenni helakorpi university of helsinki, finland line jenssen university of south-eastern norway, norway lee jerome middlesex university, uk yuka kitayama osaka university, japan ryan knowles utah state university, usa kazuhiro kusahara hiroshima university, japan brett l. levy university at albany, usa jane lo florida state university, usa tristan mccowan university college london, uk anja mihr humboldt-viadrina governance platform, germany jefferson r. plantilla asia-pacific human rights information center (hurights osaka), japan anatoli rapoport purdue university, usa sandra reitz german institute for human rights, germany hrer book and media reviews 101 robin richardson insted consultancy, uk francisco rios western washington university, usa j seroto university of south africa, south africa vedrana spajiḉ-vrkaṧ university of zagreb, croatia hugh starkey university college london, uk christian stokke university of south-eastern norway, norway alison e.c. struthers university of warwick, uk elisabeth teige volda university college, norway nigel patrick thomas university of central lancashire, uk elisabeth tudball monash university, australia ådne valen-sendstad university of south-eastern norway, norway jennifer van krieken robson university of east london, uk joan woodhouse university of leicester, uk volume 2, no 2 (2019) date of publication: 04-11-2019 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3548 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews lost in translation? on vernacularisation and localisation of human rights destrooper, t. and merry, s.a. (eds.) (2018). human rights transformation in practice. philadelphia: university of pennsylvania press. 296 pp, isbn 978-0-81225057-2, usd 69.95 (hardcover). reviewed by frank elbers university of bucharest, romania. frank elbers: frank.elbers@icub.unibuc.ro http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3548 mailto:frank.elbers@icub.unibuc.ro hrer book and media reviews 88 book and media reviews lost in translation? on vernacularisation and localisation of human rights doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3548 issn 2535-5406 destrooper, t. and merry, s.a. (eds.) (2018). human rights transformation in practice. philadelphia: university of pennsylvania press. 296 pp., usd 69.95 (hardcover) isbn 978-0-8122-5057-2. reviewed by frank elbers university of bucharest, romania. frank.elbers@icub.unibuc.ro how international human rights norms are ‘translated’ or ‘vernacularised’ into local practice has become a topic of serious academic debate and research in the past 15 years or so. groundbreaking research by merry, gready & vandenhole, and de feyter et al, among others, has sparked further research into this field of study. this volume, edited by tine destrooper (flemish peace institute) and sally engle merry (new york university), is an important contribution to this debate. in the introductory chapter (‘on travel, translation and transformation’), tine destrooper lays out the conceptual framework. the contributors define the process by which actors around the globe engage and interact with human rights norms at the transnational level and how, in turn, this affects the ‘travel, translation and transformation’ of human rights (p.3). this assumes an actor-centred approach, as applied by legal pluralism and critical legal studies. the authors’ ambition is to go beyond the conceptualisation of ‘localisation’ in merely theoretical and analytical terms and to couple it with an empirical basis through detailed cases studies. by coupling theory with empirical studies of localisation, they focus on two analytically distinct processes: ‘on the one hand, the movement of ideas, and on the other hand, the way in which this movement triggers changes in the framing, substance, and meaning of the norm under consideration’ (p. 5). the ‘travel, translation and transformation’ framework assumes that norms do not only move uni-directionally or in a top-down direction, from the international to the national level. anyone engaged in human rights work knows that international human rights norms are not created in a vacuum by human rights and legal experts and diplomats in geneva or new york. they are mostly the result of domestic practices that address human rights violations in specific national or regional contexts. the desire to prevent such local abuse results in international standardsetting. in this respect, the international-national juxtaposition is a false one. the ‘travel, translation and transformation’ framework also emphasises the importance of power dynamics when human rights standards are developed and implemented in different contexts. the volume includes interesting and well-documented chapters: transitional justice and the role of the international criminal court and its field offices in the central african republic and congo drc (‘the escher-human rights escalator: technologies of the local’ by vasuki nesiah); how local human rights claims reach http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3548 mailto:frank.elbers@icub.unibuc.ro hrer book and media reviews 89 the un human rights council (‘accommodating local human rights practice at the human rights council’ by arne vandenbogaerde); human rights-based approaches in development work (‘human rights-based approaches to development: the local, travel, and transformation’ by wouter vandenhole); human rights, collective rights and extractive industries in ecuador (‘lost through translation: political dialectics of eco-social and collective rights in ecuador’ by johannes waldmüller); social movement agendas and legal claims (‘upstreaming or streamlining? translating social movement agendas into legal claims in nepal and the dominican republic’ by samuel martínez); torture and inhuman and degrading treatment in vietnam (‘new visibilities: challenging torture and impunity in vietnam’ by ken maclean). the three most interesting chapters of human rights transformation in practice are the two case studies on china and the chapter by tine destrooper, ‘localization “light”: the travel and transformation of non-empowering human rights norms’. unlike most of the other contributors, who only look for explicit references to human rights norms and treaties, destrooper asks whether struggles that do not explicitly reference the human rights framework are still human rights struggles – this is an important question for human rights educators. in ‘rural-urban migration and education in china: unravelling responses to injurious experiences’, ellen desmet distinguishes between ‘general, more implicit rights awareness’, (e.g. recognising the discrimination of migrants) and ‘the ability to give a description of specific legal concepts’. her research shows that although parents in china, for a range of political and cultural reasons, do not explicitly refer to human rights, they still regularly make ‘claims’. she applies useful criteria for such claims: 1) the use of human rights-related language; 2) the identification of a duty-holder; 3) an insistence on accountability from the duty-holder. based on their experience with the international ngo, asia catalyst, activists sara davis and charmain mohamed (‘global rights, local risk: community advocacy on right to health in china’) describe how global right-to-health advocacy for people living with hiv has created space for human rights activism, even when national-level mobilisation is restricted, through deeply localised advocacy in which activists engage with domestic policies and mechanisms. their chapter demonstrates most clearly how human rights travel and are translated and transformed. we are shown how activists mobilise rightsholders, form alliances, challenge authorities and accommodate them when necessary, transform their advocacy agenda, and realise change grounded in a local sense of justice and international human rights standards. human rights transformation in practice is useful for both the academic and ngo communities. instructors will find in it a valuable teaching tool for graduate students who are versed in (international) human rights standards and human rights debates and hence can critically engage with the analytical framework and wealth of information and case studies in this volume. researchers interested in how international human rights standards ‘translate’ in national or local contexts will find the volume an inspiration and will be able to build on the various theoretical and empirical approaches applied by the authors. for ngos the book is a call to be more critical when engaged in human rights advocacy or education. although there is not a single reference to human rights education in this book, the case studies make clear that simply ‘transferring’ knowledge and norms about international human rights standards is frequently ineffective if local contexts, traditions and conceptions of justice are not taken into account. lost in translation? on vernacularisation and localisation of human rights new research-based insights for human rights education volume 1, no 2 (2018) doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2872 date of publication: 17-09-2018 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews new research-based insights for human rights education bajaj, monisha (ed.) (2017) human rights education: theory, research, praxis. philadelphia, pennsylvania: university of pennsylvania press. 366 pp., us $49.95 (paperback) isbn: 9780812249026; usd $49.95(ebook) isbn: 9780812293890 reviewed by mei-ying tang university of taipei, taiwan mying@utaipei.edu.tw hrer book and media reviews 69 book and media reviews new research-based insights for human rights education doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2872 bajaj, monisha (ed.) (2017) human rights education: theory, research, praxis. philadelphia, pennsylvania: university of pennsylvania press. 366 pp., us $49.95 (paperback) isbn: 9780812249026; usd $49.95(ebook) isbn: 9780812293890 reviewed by mei-ying tang university of taipei, taiwan mying@utaipei.edu.tw since the founding of the united nations and the adoption of the universal declaration of human rights in 1948, human rights education (hre) has blossomed into a global movement, whose mission is to promote education about human rights and education for human rights through the process of teaching and learning. however, hre has consistently faced challenges, both in theory and in practice, and many questions have been raised by those engaged in implementing hre. how has hre been perceived and how has it evolved? is there a universally applicable form of hre that can be followed in different parts of the world? how do educators apply and localize concepts of hre in diverse contexts? monisha bajaj has edited human rights education: theory, research, and praxis. her book provides essential material and resources for scholars, practitioners, activists, and policymakers who wish to engage with this dynamic field, especially in response to the rising tides of neo-fascism, economic exploitation, and the many forms of violence and discrimination in a changing and turbulent world. bajaj’s compilation of studies by leaders and researchers in hre has three parts: theoretical and conceptual foundations of human rights education, global research in human rights education, and transformative human rights education praxis. these three sections consist of 12 chapters, which interrelate and reinforce each other: this provides a comprehensive mapping of hre from theoretical perspectives, research across the globe and practice in diverse contexts. the collection of essays in this book provides a solid foundation for people interested in engaging with this fast-emerging field, as well as presenting research-based insights into how hre has been practiced over the last decades, the current state of complexity, and future challenges. in the first section, the text provides conceptual perspectives on the rise of hre as a global phenomenon, the significance of emotion and sentimentality in hre, the evolution of hre models for empowering various learners toward empowerment, and hre’s legal standing as defined in international law. based on theoretical foundations, the chapters in the second part examine research from different regions, including iraqi kurdistan, india, london, and senegal. although these case studies may not give a complete picture of hre practice, they point out the major challenges, complexities, and limitations facing hre, especially in regions where it may be regarded as potentially disruptive or even opposed to existing educational and political systems. the third section highlights transformative hre praxis, embedded in and responsive to the cultural and historical contexts of the http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2872 mailto:mying@utaipei.edu.tw hrer book and media reviews 70 communities engaged in hre programs. the chapters in this section explore tensions and struggles in conceptualizing education for human rights, and there are examples of how marginalized groups and communities employ hre concepts of social justice and peace-building for purposes of resistance and empowerment. echoing through many of the articles in this volume, transformative hre praxis offers a broader yet holistic understanding of human rights knowledge, attitudes and actions for human rights activism and social change. the blend of theory and research with compelling accounts of transformative praxis makes human rights education: theory, research, and praxis a comprehensive and cohesive body of work. however, inspiring as this collection may be, there is no model of hre that can fit all contexts. as nancy flowers points out in the afterword, “whence: the evolution of human rights education”, educators around the globe need to have solid foundations and carry out the full spectrum of human rights education, while facing the challenges ahead. these challenges include: institutional integration into educational systems; insufficient teacher training; the culture of the school community; confusion with other educational topics, such as moral education, multicultural education and citizenship; and long-term commitments to implementing and sustaining hre. one would imagine that such issues, and research related to them, might be included in subsequent editions. a critique of the current situation and proposals for alternative ways forward are essential, as hre is recognized as an emerging field of study and its practitioners gain influence in educational policymaking. the chapters of human rights education: theory, research, and praxis address the diversity and complexity of approaches and perspectives. there are exemplifications of various programs under the banner of hre posited by different authors, while the definition of human rights education is based on the international standards set forward by the united nations. there will be an inevitable, ongoing struggle to gain universality for hre, while the hierarchical nature of the government institutions that sponsor hre often increases tensions between local contexts and international standards. this book would have been strengthened if there had been a more detailed examination of how to adapt particular models to local idiosyncrasies. it would also be valuable if there were an examination of how to employ appropriate methods and strategies for designing, implementing and developing reliable means of evaluation, or benchmarks, by which progress in hre could be assessed. and it is essential that practitioners be provided with reflections on how one hre program or experience might be relevant to other ones, and how they can address the tensions and difficulties in carrying out hre. as hre becomes widely accepted as a global force for educational and social transformation, its job is to not only to pursue equal access to education for all. hre also embodies three interlinked and interdependent components: education about rights, through and for human rights. this collection of essays stresses transformative hre praxis, and prioritises education for human rights. this emphasis may leave readers expecting more examples that show how to develop action plans that identify goals, strategies and responsibilities. readers might also expect examples of advocacy skills for human rights engagement and educational transformation, such as the skills involved in winning community support and negotiating with authorities. human rights education: theory, research, and praxis provides an opportunity for researchers, practitioners, and administrators to reflect on their own hrer book and media reviews 71 practice and helps readers to reimagine a common future for cherishing diversity, praising human dignity and promoting human rights. this is essential if an adequate hre is to be achieved. volume 2, no 1 (2019) date of publication: 04-02-2019 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3143 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews problem-posing hre: a revolutionary tool for social change and human development cislaghi, beniamino. (2018). human rights and community-led development: lessons from tostan. edinburgh: university press. 287 pp. us$ 85.60 (hardcover): isbn: 9781474419796; us$ 107.26 (ebook) isbn: 978147441981. reviewed by gabriela mezzanotti university of south-eastern norway, norway. g. mezzanotti: gabriela.mezzanotti@usn.no http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3143 mailto:gabriela.mezzanotti@usn.no hrer book and media reviews 99 book and media reviews problem-posing hre: a revolutionary tool for social change and human development doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3143 issn: 2535-5406 cislaghi, beniamino. (2018). human rights and community-led development: lessons from tostan. edinburgh: university press. 287 pp. us$ 85.60 (hardcover): isbn: 9781474419796; us$ 107.26 (ebook) isbn: 978147441981. reviewed by gabriela mezzanotti university of south-eastern norway gabriela.mezzanotti@usn.no this book examines key concepts related to human rights education (hre) and development in africa. it challenges the assumptions of universal concepts of human rights, development, the westernization of human rights and aid. there is an obvious relevance to this approach, given that the aims and the manner of international aid are subject to intense debate not only in academia, but amongst practitioners throughout the world. criticism of “top down projects” and their apparent disregard for local values and their role in human development are frequently linked to hidden structures of power and colonialist ideals. ben cislaghi offers a practical model of human development, drawing on the approaches of sen, nussbaum, and appadurai. expanding cross-cultural development theory, the author envisages local people at the centre of the development process, leading and holding ultimate accountability for outcomes. there is also an understanding of education as an essential part of human development. for this purpose, the book is based on research that analyses the work of an ngo called tostan, which, since 1984, has been working with human rights from a perspective of community empowerment in west african countries. such work has focused on the existing local cultural values of rural communities and has been conducted by staff members who have largely come from the same countries where they have worked. the book aims to fill a gap in hre literature by presenting rigorous ethnographic research focused on the causal pathways around hre that lead to social change. this well-organized book has three parts. part i offers reflections on rethinking development practices, and this section includes the potential challenges of hre in development initiatives, as well as the concept of modernization at work. this discussion focuses on tostan’s work with the fulɓe ethnic group in senegal. cislaghi suggests a third and alternative point of view to the dichotomy that considers human rights as either a result of a global awakening or as a western product. such an alternative view accepts the applicability of human rights to nonwestern communities when their members are given the means to translate human rights into the terms of their own social values and norms. hre plays a key role in this process, given that it provides practitioners with a model to help people develop local understandings of international human rights. after reviewing historical aspects of hre, cislaghi defends the view that hre should be a liberating process, http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3143 mailto:gabriela.mezzanotti@usn.no hrer book and media reviews 100 rather than fostering a “cultural human rights dictatorship”. the author adopts paulo freire’s concepts to suggest that hre should allow students to view, understand and criticize human rights from the perspective of their local reality. such an approach is based on two foundations: it allows an understanding of the power relations involved in the educational process, and it allows subjects to analyse social problems that matter to them and find moral-political solutions that can result in social change. the author suggests a human development framework for hre, which should be centred in the development of freedoms and capabilities as the main goals of human development. hre can assist local communities to decide by themselves the direction of their own development through social construction of the status quo. cislaghi uses the above framework as a model to analyse social change dynamics linked to hre classes and the human development of the members of the fulɓe . the author provides brief and relevant information about human rights and related issues in senegal, such as gender distribution of the population, the country’s ethnic diversity and how human rights legislation is incorporated into senegalese law. gender inequality is a major issue for both senegal and its many ethnic groups, including the fulɓe. other social practices that are inconsistent with human rights are also explored, such as female genital mutilation, child labour and child/forced marriage. tostan’s community empowerment programme covers several human rights-related topics, and it encourages participants to be critical and to participate actively. these hre activities are based on participants’ individual experiences and include group discussions, songs and poetry, role play, and theatre. part i ends with a description of fulɓe social practices and beliefs. in part ii, cislaghi gives an account of the tostan hre programme in action. the author describes the village before the programme and the outcomes of hre activities. he describes the west african village’s social system and the invisible power structures that undermine women’s access to decision-making processes and therefore hinder their development opportunities. child and forced marriage, as well as child labour, are other social practices that are considered inconsistent with human rights. the author then extensively describes the tostan hre programme, and how it focuses on getting participants to proactively engage in activities and consider their local experiences. cislaghi highlights the positive aspect of having educators that are members of the same local community. participants are male and female, although women are frequently signed up by their husbands without even knowing about the existence of the programme in the village. classes are interactive and democratic and held in the participants’ mother tongue. the author describes the several changes observed in the village that result from the tostan programme. participants showed greater self-awareness and gender equality aspirations. other human rights inconsistencies previously observed seemed to have been reflected upon. in part iii, cislaghi offers a model for indirect development practitioners, by referring to how hre has led to social change processes in the village. by linking the main concepts and theories addressed in the book, the author concludes that the pedagogy used by tostan, coupled with the subject of the programme (human rights), has resulted in a number of outcomes: participants have achieved community empowerment and the ability to avoid repeating past practices; social change has been driven through enhanced and shared perceptions of their own realities, from a human rights perspective. hrer book and media reviews 101 as a human rights teacher and practitioner, i find cislaghi’s (2018) book an inspiring work. the author’s critical view of hre as a development tool that neither conceives the subject (human rights) as an “imposed given” by westernized power structures nor as a “one size fits all” solution is probably the highlight of this book. paulo freire’s pedagogical theory is one of the main bridges that covers the academic gap from the dichotomy between the most common views of human rights either being conceived, as the author puts it, as a global awakening or as a western product. whether in law, sociology, education, or international development, this book encourages us to support hre as a development tool that enables non-western communities to make sense of human rights from the standpoint of their own values, needs and experiences. problem-posing hre: a revolutionary tool for social change and human development human rights education: a vehicle for negotiating the challenges posed by global migration? volume 1, no 1 (2018) date of publication: 23-06-2018 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2498 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews human rights education: a vehicle for negotiating the challenges posed by global migration? banks, j.a. (ed.) (2017) citizenship education and global migration: implications for theory, research, and teaching washington, dc: american educational research association. 528 pp., us$ $45.00 (paperback) isbn 978-0-935302-64-6; usd $90.00 (hardcover) isbn: 978-0-935302-63-9; us4 65.00 (ebook) isbn: 978-0-935302-653. reviewed by suzanne egan university college dublin, ireland suzanne egan (suzanne.egan@ucd.ie) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2498 mailto:suzanne.egan@ucd.ie hrer book and media reviews 90 book and media reviews human rights education: a vehicle for negotiating the challenges posed by global migration? doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2498 issn 2535-5406 banks, j.a. (ed.) (2017) citizenship education and global migration: implications for theory, research, and teaching washington, dc: american educational research association. 528 pp., us$ $45.00 (paperback) isbn 978-0-935302-64-6; usd $90.00 (hardcover) isbn: 978-0-935302-63-9; us4 65.00 (ebook) isbn: 978-0-935302-653. reviewed by suzanne egan university college dublin, ireland suzanne.egan@ucd.ie in this seminal collection, renowned multicultural education scholar james banks brings together key findings and perspectives of scholars and educators from eighteen nations across the globe on theory, research and practice in multicultural education and citizenship in an age of global migration and diversity. this collection builds on insights gleaned some 15 years earlier on the growing challenges of balancing national unity with diversity in multi-cultural states, insights that were published in diversity and citizenship education: global perspectives (banks, 2004). the precise focus of this new book is to consider how citizenship education in schools can facilitate the structural inclusion of immigrant students from diverse ethnic, cultural, racial, religious and linguistic groups into their nation states. ‘structural inclusion’ is defined by banks in the preface to the collection as ‘…a set of attitudes and beliefs among students that are characterized by a feeling of political efficacy, political empowerment, and a belief that they can influence political and economic decisions that affect their lives by participating in the political system of their nation’. given the unprecedented levels of migration in the intervening years and the now well-documented evidence of structural exclusion and marginalisation of minoritised groups in nation-states around the world, the book’s ambition is a timely addition to the previous volume and a compelling one for exploring possibilities on how to adapt to a pressing global reality. the book is carefully organised into seven parts, helpfully summarized by banks in the introductory chapter to guide the reader. part 1 introduces crosscutting issues, concepts as well as meta-ideas for how citizenship education could be progressed in the contextual reality of global migration. thus, castles describes in chapter 1 the key issues arising from international migration: emerging trends (such as the growth of forced migration, migration by women and temporary migration); the dilemmas faced by migrants in terms of discrimination, xenophobia, denial of full citizenship rights and limited educational opportunities; the difficulties for communities in coping with the unexpected advent of multiculturalism. in castles’ view, the development in many states of models of multicultural education to meet the educational challenges posed offers a clear advance on assimilationist and http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2498 mailto:suzanne.egan@ucd.ie hrer book and media reviews 91 exclusionary forms of schooling; nonetheless, he flags some of the unhelpful assumptions and practical problems encountered in multicultural education, and these problems are fleshed out by contributors who provide examples from local settings. in chapter 2, bashir moves beyond finessing the ideal of multicultural education within individual nation states to the idea of reconfiguring democratic citizenship and civic education along regional lines. starkey, in chapter 3, goes further by advocating the concept of education for ‘cosmopolitan citizenship’, based on global human rights instruments, as a means of enabling educators to embrace unity and diversity within national contexts. these various themes and ideas are discussed and amplified by contributors in parts 2-6 of the book, who detail the historical evolution of citizenship and educational policy and the current practice of citizenship education in local contexts. again, banks has carefully arranged these contributions into chapters focusing on experiences in industrialised, democratic nations (the us, canada and south africa) and in nations that share many historical, cultural and geographical characteristics in particular regions: europe (england, norway, germany and france); asia (china, south korea and singapore); the middle east (lebanon, jordan, the united arab emirates, kuwait, turkey and israel); and latin america (mexico and brazil). collectively, these chapters provide a comprehensive overview of the many ways in which citizenship education has been conceptualised, shaped and controlled by nation states and the corresponding implications for migrants. many chapters, for example, clearly reveal how the manner in which ‘citizenship’ itself is legally constructed and framed in public discourses (‘active’, ‘passive’ ‘national’, ‘global, ‘cosmopolitan’) is inextricably linked to education policies and practices (akar, in theoretical terms chapter 14; eskner and cheena, in regard to germany chapter 8; and al-nakib, in regard to kuwait chapter 15). others record how policies of secularisation, securitisation, neoliberalism and meritocracy have inevitable negative effects on educational policy and the experience of minoritised students (osler, in regard to england and norway chapter 7; bozec, in regard to france chapter 9; and ismail in regard to singapore chapter 12). while contributors offer a range of creative recommendations for curriculum and policy reform to address these deficits, one of the particular strengths of the book is the way in which numerous contributions illuminate, through practical examples, how individual educators in many of these countries have sought to meet the alienating effects of official citizenship discourses and exclusionary policies so as to facilitate cultural recognition and empowerment among their students. by meticulously detailing the perspectives and techniques used by experienced teachers to foster a sense of structural inclusion and political efficacy, the book thus fulfils one of its central aims in a way that will be of particular interest and utility to educators and practitioners worldwide. in a volume this size, spanning so many jurisdictions, there is necessarily a broad swathe of context-specific information, theoretical perspectives, insights and emphases. so much so that it might be easy for the reader to lose track or struggle to identify common threads emerging from the book as a whole. banks appears to have anticipated this potential difficulty by book-ending the collection with a thoughtprovoking foreword written by will kymlicka and an equally provocative concluding chapter by walter parker. each discern a striking ‘take-away’ theme of the book in the emphasis placed by many of the contributors on human rights education (hre) as a vehicle for negotiating the challenges raised by global migration. while acknowledging the potential strengths of hre, both kymlicka and parker warn of its hrer book and media reviews 92 shortcomings as a panacea to solve all problems. kymlicka doubts whether hre can ever realistically supersede ideas of membership and belonging, while parker points to powerful critiques of hre – its ‘ties to western colonialism, its faux neutrality, its individualism, its hollow appropriation by governments…’ that can serve to undermine its legitimacy in practice. although these critiques are familiar territory for hre scholars, this collection does make its own fascinating contribution, in helping to progress the conversation between scholars and practitioners of diverse backgrounds on the appropriate interplay between multicultural citizenship and human rights education in the context of citizenship education. james banks is to be congratulated once again for his skill and perspicacity in bringing together such a wide body of expertise to produce a work of enormous value to educators, policymakers and scholars of numerous disciplines. human rights education: a vehicle for negotiating the challenges posed by global migration? addressing religion and human rights volume 1, no 1 (2018) date of publication: 23-06-2018 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2565 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews addressing religion and human rights sjöborg, a., ziebertz, h-g., eds. (2017). religion, education and human rights: theoretical and empirical perspectives. heidelberg: springer international publishing. 212 pp. eur 89.99 (hardcover: isbn: 9783319540689; eur 74.96 (ebook) isbn: 9783319540696 reviewed by lena lybæk university of south-eastern norway, norway. lena lybæk (lena.lybaek@usn.no) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2565 hrer book and media reviews 93 book and media reviews addressing religion and human rights doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2565 issn 2535-5406 sjöborg, a., ziebertz, h-g., eds. (2017). religion, education and human rights: theoretical and empirical perspectives. heidelberg: springer international publishing. 212 pp. eur 89.99 (hardcover: isbn: 9783319540689; eur 74.96 (ebook) isbn: 9783319540696 reviewed by lena lybæk university of south-eastern norway lena.lybaek@usn.no this first volume in the springer series ‘religion and human rights’ is a loosely connected collection of articles dealing with various empirical studies of education and religion, or religious education, and human rights. it is edited by hans-georg ziebertz and anders sjöborg. ziebertz is a catholic theologian and professor of religious education at the catholic theological faculty of the university of würzburg, germany. sjöborg is professor of sociology of religion and dean of the theological faculty at uppsala university. both have an interest in young people, religion and religious education. they are connected through the international research project on religion and human rights, coordinated by ziebertz. three of this volume’s contributions draw upon data from this research project. we are promised a collection of essays dedicated to the ‘interconnectedness between religion, education and human rights from an international perspective using an interdisciplinary approach.’ this description is true, in so far as the book includes several case studies from various countries (hence international) written by political scientists, legal scholars, teacher educators, sociologists and theologians/professors of religious education (hence interdisciplinary). the volume is not, however, unified by one approach, or centered on one specific theme or issue. its themes and contents vary: from religious education in schools, via human rights in education, to young people’s attitudes towards human rights, and, finally, to human rights education/teaching human rights. methods and theoretical frameworks vary from chapter to chapter. after an introductory chapter written by the editors, the first three chapters are case studies discussing aspects of religious education in poland, belarus and finland, respectively. other articles/chapters focus on human rights in education related specifically to issues of religion, religious freedom and religious coercion. these are discussed with examples from estonia, norway and sweden. two chapters, authored and co-authored by ziebertz himself, are dedicated to quantitative and comparative studies of young people’s attitudes towards human rights, and consequences for human rights education. finally, the teaching of human rights is discussed in two chapters. despite the lack of a common perspective, the essays can roughly be described as dealing with, on the one hand, the place (and understanding) of religion in school/education, and, on the other, with human rights education and how it should be conducted. http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2565 mailto:lena.lybaek@usn.no hrer book and media reviews 94 in the chapters they have authored, ziebertz and sjöborg adopt a normative perspective on religious education/human rights education. they take for granted the universality of human rights across cultural and religious divides (p.p. 7; 116117; 135 and elsewhere). however, they also argue that religious education must focus on developing and teaching human rights principles by drawing on the innate perspectives of the religions themselves. (p 8.) while most of the other articles and chapters are more broadly concerned with the relation between religion and education in various north and east european contexts and possible human rights perspectives, paula gerber’s focus, in her contribution, is on human rights education in school curricula, with examples drawn mostly from australia and new zealand, with some references to the uk and ireland. her essay seems to be something of an addendum. also somewhat puzzling is the relationship between the majority of the studies in this volume, and chapters 9 and 10, which ziebertz authors/co-authors. these chapters are the longest, most detailed ones. they present quantitative data on young people’s attitudes and understandings of human rights. in both cases, educational aspects seem to be added as an afterthought in order to fit the format of the book. chapter 9 is introduced by a discussion on the question of the relation between islam/christianity and human rights, followed by a comparative analysis of how young german christians and muslims ‘structure’ human rights. conclusions are drawn about how the two groups differ in valuing human rights, based on a survey in which students were asked to rate specific statements related to various families of rights. chapter 10 presents an international comparative study seeking to refute earlier research that identified personality as a decisive influence on attitudes to human rights. instead, the authors seek to establish geographical location and sociocultural environment as the major factors influencing these attitudes. in both chapters, conclusions are drawn from the specific study as to what human rights education should be, what it should include, and how it should be taught. in both cases, however, the theme and research questions guiding the data collection have very different focuses. in these two chapters, the use of the empirical data is problematic. the material does not reveal the content and form of human rights education the students might have had access to previously, nor their concrete social and political situations; the students’ backgrounds might well guide their understandings of human rights, as formulated in the survey they are asked to respond to. while single contributions from the volume might find their readers, the significance and usefulness of an anthology of this kind is limited. the focuses of the different contributions of this collection differ significantly, and theoretical discussions are not pursued in any depth. the insider perspective and the normative stance of the editors is evident in the introductory chapter, when they claim that ‘a key concept is the dignity of every person, given by the likeness of god, who determined for people to have freedom and to live in charity with his/her neighbour.’ (p.8) this insider perspective is neither discussed nor placed in its particular academic context. the book is not presented as being written from a christian perspective, nor is this context mentioned elsewhere in the volume. this makes the intent, aim and motivation of the publication obscure and difficult to assess. addressing religion and human rights human rights education: a project for our common future volume 1, no 2 (2018) date of publication: 20-12-2018 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer. /hrer.3088 issn 2535-5406 editorial embodying human rights in formal education: an ongoing challenge audrey osler university of south-eastern norway, norway university of leeds, uk. a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.%20/hrer.3088 human rights education review 01 editorial embodying human rights in formal education: an ongoing challenge doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3088 issn 2535-5406 audrey osler university of south-eastern norway, norway university of leeds, uk. a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk this second edition of human rights education review went into production as the international community celebrated the 70th anniversary of the universal declaration of human rights (udhr) (un, 1948) on 10 december 2018. this landmark document, which underpins all subsequent human rights law, remains an inspiration to countless educators and scholar-activists struggling to realise freedom, equality and dignity for learners at all stages of life from early years settings, schools, through to colleges and universities, as well as in various non-formal and community settings. across the globe, many groups continue to draw on the udhr in struggles for justice. contemporary examples include the black lives matter movement, originating among african americans a campaign against systemic racism and police violence in the us (https://blacklivesmatter.com). black lives matter has inspired parallel initiatives and resistance to state violence and state racism in other jurisdictions, enabling a broader global conversation about racist injustice. other struggles, including those for women’s rights and lgbtq rights, have also frequently been articulated as human rights struggles. at the same time, other movements for freedom, equality and dignity have shown ambivalence about the possibilities of a human rights framework, because the very humanity of those engaged in resisting oppression has been denied by those exercising power and authority. i was reminded of this earlier in the year while spending a short period as a visiting scholar at monash university, australia. during my stay, i visited the first peoples gallery at melbourne museum. the gallery introduces the visitor to the diverse languages, cultures and traditions of victoria’s first peoples, said to represent the longest continuous culture in the history of the world. the exhibition includes a section on the difficult and violent history of european colonisation. it explores the ongoing impact and consequences of colonisation on aboriginal and torres strait islander adults and children through the narratives and voices of those living in victoria (https://museumsvictoria.com.au /website/bunjilaka/visiting/first-peoples/). from 1910, many indigenous children were forcibly removed from their families as a result of various government policies. although australia was a founding member of the united nations and played a significant role in the drafting of the udhr, these government policies were pursued until 1970, long after the udhr was adopted. the children, known as the stolen generations, often lacked knowledge of their true families and identities. the stories of individuals caught up in such government-induced violence are inevitably harrowing. these policies continue to impact on individuals and communities in many profound ways (https://www.creativespirits.info/aboriginalculture/politics/a-guide-to-australiasstolen-generations). https://blacklivesmatter.com/ https://www.creativespirits.info/aboriginalculture/politics/a-guide-to-australias-stolen-generations https://www.creativespirits.info/aboriginalculture/politics/a-guide-to-australias-stolen-generations human rights education review 02 effectively, aboriginal and torres strait islander children, women and men have been denied human rights because their very humanity was called into question. yet the overall message of the first peoples gallery is not one of passivity in the face of ill-treatment. it illustrates qualities of resilience and various forms of resistance to oppression. for example, a photographic exhibition entitled ‘because of her, we can’ highlights the leadership of a number of aboriginal and torres strait islander women in twentieth century struggles to achieve recognition, equality and freedom for their communities, struggles which are ongoing (https://www.naidoc.org.au/news/2018-national-naidoc-theme-announced). effectively, the women featured in this exhibition, such as fannie cochrane-smith, gladys nicholls, flo kennedy and essie coffey, have challenged, and continue to challenge, the authorities to live up to the ideals of human rights they claim to hold. in this edition of hrer, the focus is firmly on schools. each of the articles addresses human rights education (hre) in formal settings, in spaces where there are often tensions between the duty of the state to guarantee rights, including the right to human rights education, and the power of the state to deny those same rights. they explore both the promises of human rights though education and the ways in which such promises have yet to be realised. laura lundy and gabriela martínez sainz examine violations of children’s human rights; they focus on school access, the curriculum, testing and assessment, discipline, and respect for children’s views. drawing on a wide range of examples from diverse national contexts, including bulgaria, canada, cameroon, the czech republic, croatia, denmark, fiji, france, germany, japan, new zealand, south africa, trinidad and tobago, the uk and the usa, they consider how children’s rights are frequently, and sometimes routinely, violated at school. effectively, the nation-state that has a duty to guarantee children’s human rights is violating them. laura lundy and gabriela martínez sainz argue that within human rights education ‘we need to engage with the dark side of human rights breaches as well as the positive, aspirational vision that a human rights framework offers’ if children are to be equipped with the skills and knowledge to challenge and prevent such abuses. they argue that this is a prerequisite for a genuinely transformative education. this requires that adults engaged in children’s education, including school administrators and teachers, are ‘legally literate’. in other words, they need a sound understanding and education in both domestic law and international human rights law. in her paper examining norwegian education policy, kristin gregers eriksen examines some of the tensions that exist in the ways in which norwegian national identity is constructed both generally, and in relation to indigenous sami citizens. she considers the ideals of an inclusive practice presented in policy and contrasts this with what she identifies as a lack of knowledge and understanding of sami culture and identities among policy-makers and educators. just as lundy and martínez sainz argue that an effective human rights education needs to engage with breaches of human rights, she discusses the question of what non-indigenous norwegian students learn about the oppression of the sami. she emphasises the responsibility of the norwegian state in addressing this question within the school curriculum as a key element of effective education for human rights. acknowledging the favourable position of norwegian sami citizens as a group, in relation to that of indigenous people in many other jurisdictions, she nevertheless cautions against the simple narrative of a norwegian success story, advocating a more nuanced approach. eriksen suggests that a focus on norway’s success not only risks disguising ongoing https://www.naidoc.org.au/news/2018-national-naidoc-theme-announced human rights education review 03 epistemic violence and tacit exclusion; it also contributes to an inadequate human rights education for the country’s mainstream population. effectively, eriksen’s scholarship encourages educators to consider tensions that indigeneity raises about universalism and recognition in education for inclusive citizenship and human rights. lee jerome focuses on the ideals of hre and on what he terms the ‘optimistic’ vision that it offers. he critically examines the role of the teacher, drawing on a broad range of international research. while acknowledging the ways in which schools routinely reproduce inequality, he invites teachers and teacher educators to critically interrogate their own actions and beliefs. jerome identifies and discusses four different teacher responses to the challenge of teaching for human rights and social justice in schools. the ‘ignorant teacher’ lacks the specific interdisciplinary curriculum knowledge about human rights. secondly, there is the teacher who acts as an obstacle to hre, because s/he chooses to prioritise other concerns. the third response is that of the conservative teacher who avoids a hre agenda, perhaps because it threatens the teacher’s own conceptions of adult-child relationships, or because an agenda addressing current societal inequalities and transformation is contrary to his or her own world view. finally, there is the ‘hypocritical teacher’, who claims to be engaging in a transformatory approach while following a significantly different path. jerome contrasts these four positions with that of the ‘heroic teacher’ who champions hre, in large part because of particular life experiences and a political commitment to justice. jerome’s analysis may prove a powerful tool in enabling new teachers to reflect on their own positionality. set alongside the legal obligations that teachers have in relation to hre, those responsible for teacher education are challenged to look afresh at curriculum, pedagogy and, perhaps most importantly, the purposes of human rights education. set together, these papers present not only diverse perspectives, but also new challenges to all responsible for hre in schools, including policy-makers, teacher educators, and teachers themselves. references united nations (un) (1948). universal declaration of human rights. general assembly resolution general assembly resolution 217 a). 10 december. http://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/ http://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/ a model linking history education and human rights education volume 1, no 2 (2018) doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2795 date of publication: 20-08-2018 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews a model linking history education and human rights education lucke, m. tibbitts, f. engel, e. fenner, l (ed) (2016). change: handbook for history learning and human rights education for educators in formal, non-formal and higher education. schwalbach: wochenschau verlag. 205 pp., € 19, 80 isbn 978-37344-0390-3 (print); € 15, 99 isbn 978-3-7344-0391-0 (pdf). reviewed by paul bracey university of northampton, uk. paul.bracey@northampton.ac.uk http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2795 mailto:paul.bracey@northampton.ac.uk hrer book and media reviews 73 book and media reviews a model linking history education and human rights education doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2795 lucke, m. tibbitts, f. engel, e. fenner, l (ed) (2016). change: handbook for history learning and human rights education for educators in formal, non-formal and higher education. schwalbach: wochenschau verlag. 205 pp., € 19, 80 isbn 978-37344-0390-3 (print); € 15, 99 isbn 978-3-7344-0391-0 (pdf). reviewed by paul bracey university of northampton, uk. paul.bracey@northampton.ac.uk the change handbook provides a model for designing or adapting a synthesis of history learning and human rights education in different educational contexts across national borders. it is based on a joint project undertaken in 2014-16 by freie universitat berlin human rights education associates and right now human rights consultancy and training. the handbook draws upon more than 250 examples of research from some 160 institutions. the publication which has emerged from this is intended to provide guidance to a wide range of organisations, all of which are encouraged to look beyond national borders for inspiration. from the outset, it is important to appreciate that combining the study of history and human rights education can be contentious, especially if it is associated with historical determinism or a failure to see historical situations in their own terms. this problem does not arise in this study, which provides a meaningful and well-considered link between past, present and future, based on a detailed consideration of the characteristics of both history and human rights education. the book is divided into two parts. the first of these relates to its underlying concepts and begins with an exploration of the educational contexts where history learning and human rights education have been combined: e.g., higher education and teacher training; school; museums and memorial sites; and non-formal education. benefits, challenges and strategies are outlined. research into existing projects related to history and human rights education indicates that the majority either link the contents of history and human rights education or use additive or parallel approaches. there is limited evidence of any combined approaches. the authors find that a focus on either history or human rights could lead to misusing the agenda of the other subject discipline. for example, there is a risk that human rights education programmes can use history just as a pool of violations in order to highlight how urgent it is to act today. the authors have developed a model called 'change', a combination of history and human rights education which attempts to do justice to both disciplines. outcomes for history involve helping learners to develop their own narratives of the past, as well as being able to deconstruct those of others. this is a multi-perspective approach to the past, which respects both alterity and historicity. human rights education examines mindsets, values, behaviour and actions. it challenges existing injustices and works towards tangible change. the most useful benefit associated with this intersection of learning is related to the way in which it stimulates a http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2795 mailto:paul.bracey@northampton.ac.uk hrer book and media reviews 74 consciousness of change. the authors argue that this has two dimensions: the first of these is to historically narrate change in the past to provide an understanding of the political dimensions of society; the second strengthens the competence to make changes in the present, changes that are based on an awareness of human rights. the authors also argue for an inclusive approach to history learning which includes human rights principles, including a critique of power, visualisation of the forgotten, and universal empowerment. although the handbook focuses on the 20th century, particularly national socialism and the holocaust, with some reference to colonialism and de-colonialism, it argues that different histories can be looked at which relate to human rights, with particular reference to race, gender and class. the second part of the book deals with educational practice that combines history and human rights education. this begins with practical tools for implementing and evaluating this approach to learning, including an emphasis on involving learners in this process. there is also an extensive resource list which includes references to literature, handbooks, materials and organisations. this is followed by chapters which address the needs of secondary school education, higher education and teacher training, education at museums and memorial sites, and non formal education. each of these chapters comprehensively deals with the requirements of its constituent audience. there are overlaps between these sectors, such as the fact that schools use museums and some non-formal activities such as study trips or extra-curricular activities. however, the value of this reference to different sectors is that it provides a holistic approach to dealing with issues which society needs to address. the authors provide a very effective model, which can serve in reviewing existing provision and developing new courses which relate history to human rights education. this is exemplified in the secondary school chapter, which identifies organisational themes related to power and governance, discrimination, citizenship and exclusion, violence and society, human rights and the international justice system. the focus of the book is the 20th century and the development of human rights structures, organisations and principles. this period provides a context for considering human rights issues such as the holocaust and more recent genocides. this study focuses on events associated with the emergence of human rights during the past century which are relevant to the needs of children of secondary age and beyond. in future it would be useful for this to be extended to include studies of themes such as migration and/or religious persecution which can be exemplified through reference to events and contexts in the distant past. it would be helpful to see the current study supplemented by future publications which exemplify this with respect to migrant groups and/or religious persecution and conflict, as well as a consideration of the ways in which its underlying principles can be applied to the primary education sector (5-11). this said, the study provides a convincing and useful framework for both students and practitioners in addressing human rights issues and bridging the divide between the academic discipline of history and contemporary needs. volume 3, no 2 (2020) date of publication: 18-08-2020 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3835 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews catastrophic migration and its impact on the education of children and youth on the move suarez-orozco m.m. (2019). humanitarianism and mass migration. confronting the world crisis. oakland, california: university of california press, ross institute. 416pp., us$ 32,95 (paperback) isbn: 9780520297142; $85 (hardcover) isbn9780520297128; $32.95 (ebook) isbn: 9780520969629. reviewed by anna trylinska polish academy of science, institute of law studies, poland. anna trylinska: trylinska.anna@gmail.com http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3835 mailto:trylinska.anna@gmail.com hrer book and media reviews 92 book and media reviews catastrophic migration and its impact on the education of children and youth on the move doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3835 issn 2535-5406 suarez-orozco m.m. (2019). humanitarianism and mass migration. confronting the world crisis. oakland, california: university of california press, ross institute. 416pp., us$ 32,95 (paperback) isbn: 9780520297142; $85 (hardcover) isbn9780520297128; $32.95 (ebook) isbn: 9780520969629. reviewed by anna trylinska polish academy of science, institute of law studies, poland. trylinska.anna@gmail.com migrations are multidimensional phenomena and not easy to explain. they have psychological, cultural, economic, demographic, legal and political aspects. migration movements have intensified and taken on a global character in the last decade. migrations, especially forced ones, are a huge challenge in the modern world (martin, 2016). due to conflict and climate change, more and more people will embark on dangerous journeys to save their own and their families’ lives. the crises of recent years mainly european from 2015, and the rohingya crisis of 2017 show that states must learn to welcome and integrate people and respond to their special needs for protection. this volume focuses on the concept of catastrophic migration and its impact, with a particular emphasis on the children of refugees and migrants. editor suarezorozco criticises the archaic policy frameworks that deal with new forms of forced migration (due to climate change or crime). he points out that most refugees are internally displaced or located close to their borders. they live in extremely poor conditions and are often left in limbo. he correctly notes that conflicts in countries such as syria, afghanistan and iraq have lasted longer than the first and second world wars. he reminds us that host countries forget about refugee children’s developmental needs. this volume consists of four parts and sixteen chapters. the first part, ‘the new cartography of mass migration’, presents two new reasons why people need to seek protection – climate change and crime. the second part, ‘frames on children and youth on the move’, is about the mass migration of children and young people, which has increased in recent years. in part three, ‘catastrophic migrant lives at the margins’, we learn about the fate of millions of refugees who can neither go back to their home countries nor reach a country which can protect them. the fourth and longest part, ‘the work of education in the transitions of immigrant and refugee youth’, examines the role of education in the lives of children and youth on the move. it is extremely important to recognize the increasing risk of the radicalization of immigrants by fundamentalist ideologies. http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3835 mailto:trylinska.anna@gmail.com hrer book and media reviews 93 this publication is full of valuable expertise. almost half of it takes up educational issues. education is extremely important for refugee and migrant children (albakri and shibli, 2019; culberston and constant, 2015). suarez-orozco points out that the danger of fundamentalist radicalization will be greater if there is inadequate education. the book introduces two interesting concepts. the first of these is presented by banks in chapter 11 – ‘civic education for noncitizen and citizen students: a conceptual framework’. banks proposes the concept of ‘failed citizenship’, which describes how children of refugees and immigrants focus more on their own needs, group identities and structural inclusion than the shared goals of the nation state. his chapter describes two elements of a framework for civic education for non-citizens: multicultural citizenship education, and human rights cosmopolitan education. the second concept is developed by pedro noguera, in chapter 14. this is the concept of the ‘crisis of connection’, seen in the international response to the refugee crisis. noguera and crul provide in-depth analyses of the education systems of countries with huge numbers of migrants or refugees, such as usa, germany, sweden and turkey. noguera argues that american schools are unprepared for refugee students. the situation seems to be similar in europe, where schools also face challenges (koehler and schneider, 2019). banks and noguera strongly recommend that hre of the mainstream population should promote more empathy and civic activity, and develop critical thinking and decision-making. banks suggests a transformation from mainstream to transformative knowledge; this will allow students to gain the information, values and skills needed to confront inequality in their communities and to create democratic, multicultural societies. maurice crul, in chapter 13, recommends instruments that should be used to provide equal opportunities for refugee children to succeed in school. in the next chapter, sarah dryden-peterson describes separated schools and the social exclusion of child refugees. she presents a model of integration into the education system and the everyday practice of separate classes and schools. the authors in this fourth part of the book present current challenges and warn against the harmful practice of educational separation. refugee or migrant children should be seen as human beings with their own backgrounds and stories. in my opinion, this is an interesting and important book. the authors directly or indirectly refer to hre, above all by pointing out the role of education in shaping respect for the dignity of other people, and the ability to create and participate in social groups. i think this is a difficult task because refugee children come from countries that do not respect human rights, and such concepts are often abstractions. they try to protect themselves against violations, but are not always aware of them. while they recognize torture or the death penalty are wrong, they do not always consider that sexual abuse, slave labour or female genital mutilation are violations as well. the editor introduces the new concept of catastrophic migration. this volume presents new reasons for seeking protection: climate change and crime. this publication has a thorough account of the situation of children and youth refugees and immigrants on the move, with a particular focus on education and its role in social integration. unfortunately, i am afraid that the book’s title does not fully reflect its contents. half of it is about the education of children and youth on the move. if this were to be reflected in the title, people interested in this topic would be more likely to read it. this publication should find its way onto the reading list of policy makers responsible for the integration of refugees and immigrants, ngo’s and educational hrer book and media reviews 94 professionals, including teachers. the book contains extensive recommendations regarding the education of children and youth on the move, and there is no doubt that it can be a perfect manual. the authors of the different chapters are very wellknown experts in this field and their detailed analyses of the most frequently encountered challenges and proposed solutions can be extremely useful for those working to integrate migrants and refugees through education. references albakri, t.z., shibli r. (2019). how to improve sustainability: the critical role of education for syrian refugees. development in practice, 29(5), pp. 662-669. https://doi.org/10.1080/09614524.2019.1612323 culberston s., constant l., (2015). education of syrian refugee children: managing the crisis in turkey, lebanon, and jordan. rand corporation, pp. 65–72. retrieved from https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/research_reports/rr800/ rr859/rand_rr859.pdf koehler, c., schneider, j. (2019). young refugees in education: the particular challenges of school systems in europe. comparative migration studies, 7(28), pp. 1-20. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40878-019-0129-3 martin s.f. (2016). the global refugee crisis. georgetown journal of international affairs, 17(1), pp. 5-11. https://doi.org/10.1353/gia.2016.0000 https://doi.org/10.1080/09614524.2019.1612323 https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/research_reports/rr800/rr859/rand_rr859.pdf https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/research_reports/rr800/rr859/rand_rr859.pdf https://doi.org/10.1186/s40878-019-0129-3 https://doi.org/10.1353/gia.2016.0000 whose rights are they? social justice, hre discourse, and the politics of knowledge volume 2, no 1 (2019) date of publication: 04-02-2019 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3032 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews power, pedagogy and practice in human rights education: questions of social justice zembylas, m. and keet, a. (eds.) (2018) critical human rights, citizenship, and democracy education. entanglements and regenerations. london: bloomsbury. 240pp, isbn 978-1-350-04562-0, usd $79.30 (hardcover). reviewed by claire cassidy university of strathclyde, uk. c. cassidy: claire.cassidy@strath.ac.uk mailto:claire.cassidy@strath.ac.uk hrer book and media reviews 103 book and media reviews power, pedagogy and practice in human rights education: questions of social justice doi: : http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3032 issn 2535-5406 zembylas, m. and keet, a. (eds.) (2018). critical human rights, citizenship, and democracy education. entanglements and regenerations. london: bloomsbury. 240pp, isbn 978-1-350-04562-0, usd $79.30 (hardcover). reviewed by claire cassidy university of strathclyde claire.cassidy@strath.ac.uk to begin at the end, lis lange, in her afterword, states that ‘human rights run the risk of becoming a small ideological component of neoliberal democracies or, worse, becoming complicit with injustice’ unless we ‘substantially engage’ with the causes of ‘social upheavals’ in the world and the diminution of associated rights. this, the conclusion to a book that is part of a series designed to contribute to ‘a platform for genuinely socially committed critical educators to express their ideas in a systematic manner’, is a grand ambition, and one to which zembylas and keet’s collection positively contributes. their book demonstrates that, as hughes, loader and nelson (chapter 8) make plain, ‘education is not neutral’; that it is, in fact, a political act. to this end, zembylas and keet bring together twenty-one scholars to engage critically with human rights, citizenship and democracy education. the authors are drawn from a range of disciplines; these include education, law, philosophy, and politics. importantly, they are also an international team, offering perspectives from canada, cyprus, england, india, the netherlands northern ireland, pakistan, south africa, sweden, and the usa. both the range of disciplines and the spectrum of countries represented are important in the endeavour proposed by the editors; to offer ‘a humble contribution toward’ raising questions pertaining to human rights, citizenship and democracy education. what they propose is correct; the task of pursuing a ‘critical project’, as they describe it, is necessary, and this volume goes some way to identifying key concepts and assumptions within policy, practice and academic literature. the book is in two parts, with the constituent chapters designed to address a list of core questions provided by keet and zembylas in their introduction. they are right to admit that the subsequent chapters do not answer all of the questions posed, but they successfully highlight tensions and challenges, and sometimes propose solutions to the questions and issues highlighted. chapters 2 to 7 form the first part of the book, a section that has a more obvious theoretical thrust than the second. part two, chapters 8 to 13, offers the reader case studies focusing on particular examples where human rights, democracy and citizenship education are central. it is worth noting that the contexts on which the chapters focus provide examples or refer to sites of education beyond the classroom, with a small number focusing on school education. this is helpful in ensuring that the reader does not see education as http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3032 hrer book and media reviews 104 focused on the promotion of ‘socially just educational praxes’ with school-aged children. one of the strengths of the book is that the authors of each chapter take pains to define their terms. given the range of technical terms, or words used freely and loosely, in everyday – or even academic – discourse, this is an important and supportive element of the book. in chapter 2 keet discusses critical theory and critical theories and how a ‘critical pedagogical posture’ is required to address the ‘annihilating influence of neoliberalism’s stealth revolution’ (p.28). the rise of the neoliberal agenda runs through several of the chapters, but it is in chapter 3 that zembylas directs us to the need to decolonise human rights and human rights curriculum and pedagogy, requiring, he would assert, ‘important shifts of consciousness’ (p.47). carrying on the theme of colonization, in some way, is coysh in the fourth chapter, where she highlights issues pertaining to power and the nature of a pervasive and dominant discourse that demands to be challenged. she provokes the reader to reflect by proposing that ‘hre discourse is targeted at sections of society that are often the most powerless’ (p.62) and that we need to be cautious of ‘reproducing existing social relations’ through the human rights education discourse we employ. the theme of power is emphasized in chapter 5 by adami, who encourages us to look to narratives other than those that dominate. she advocates that narratives should ‘create broader understandings of the structures in which these [human rights] abuses occur, exposing vulnerability of human interrelatedness and the weakness of borders, societies, and jurisdictional protection’ (p.75). an hermeneutical approach to pedagogy is advanced by al-daraweesh and snauwaert in chapter 6. the notion of deliberative democracy is central to their argument that human rights education is a morally-driven endeavour that requires ‘ethical-political discourse’ (p.94). chapter 6 leads neatly to tibbitts’ chapter 7, where she explores the thorny problem of universalism in relation to human rights education. she offers a ‘hybrid solution’, one where debate and ‘fruitful disagreements’ (p.115) are encouraged. chapter 8 begins the second section of the book. it is in this chapter that hughes, loader and nelson take the reader to northern ireland to explore intergroup contact theory. they highlight the tensions between the need to promote harmony while exploring differences when working with groups in conflict with one another. bajaj, in chapter 9, explores how children in india’s government schools regularly have their rights violated. however, throughout the chapter she considers possible ways to reimagine schooling through curricular and pedagogical innovations. in exploring the ‘process of dehumanization’ (p.158), khoja-moolji and hakimali merchant in chapter 10, ‘point to alternative knowledge systems and modes of living where different conceptualizations of justice, human and empowerment prevail’ (p.158). in order to ‘disrupt the hegemony of discourse on human rights’ (p.168) they look to islam and provide examples of ‘alternate framings of justice and dignity’ (p.169) from their work in pakistan. crossing continents, to south africa, ahmed, in chapter 11, shares his empirical research, evidencing that those who advocate for and support human rights education may find their personal values at odds with the work they do. chapter 12, authored by covell and howe, presents the rights, respect and responsibility initiative from hampshire, england. they assert that such an approach is ‘an example of how schools can, and arguably should, provide human rights education’ (p.191). they demonstrate that with rights situated centrally in the life of the school, children can become protectors and promoters of the rights of hrer book and media reviews 105 others. this notion of transformation is also advanced in chapter 13. here, spreen, monaghan and hillary query what human rights education might comprise and how a transformative human rights education might ‘address the challenges of the historical moment’ (p.209). they are interested in how ‘changes in students’ consciousness (intellectual and emotional)’ might support them to effect change. the need to develop a ‘critical consciousness’ is key, they say, in considering ‘diverse perspectives’ (p.220) evident in today’s turbulent and troubled society. this consciousness is required if ‘a more just, equitable, tolerant, and open society’ (p.221) is to be built. overall, this is an interesting volume. the questions it presents are challenging, but necessary. if there is any criticism, it is that the notions of ‘education’ and ‘pedagogy’ require some further unpacking, most likely because human rights education, citizenship education and democracy education became conflated or used interchangeably and synonymously throughout the book and the political dimension of pedagogy is perhaps under-played. this is something that may not sit comfortably with some readers. however, given the rise of the neo-liberal agenda and that farright politics seem to be gaining traction, as seen in recent international elections, the political within education cannot be ignored. education is not neutral. indeed, it could not be more political in terms of what is done, why it is done, by whom it is undertaken, and whose interests are served in the process. within the broad notion of education as political, human rights, democracy and citizenship education is indubitably political, and the authors might have addressed this more fully or explicitly. it is important that people are not taught what to think, but how to think. educators who are committed to social justice and are able to support learners to raise – and address – political questions of how we can and should live together are required. the notion of the activist teacher is not new, but as certain groups and their narratives become increasingly marginalised, the questions posed in this book are necessary, though not sufficient. one volume cannot surface all the questions that demand answers and associated action, but this book is a good place to begin. the various chapters speak to one another, though not explicitly. they complement one another with clear threads that run throughout the text and offer the reader food for thought – and, hopefully, action. power, pedagogy and practice in human rights education: questions of social justice volume 3, no 2 (2020) date of publication: 18-08-2020 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3936 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews a critical conversation about human rights and disciplinarity cargas, s. (2020). human rights education: forging an academic discipline. philadelphia, pa: university of pennsylvania press. 224 pp., us$ 69,95 (hardcover) isbn-9780812251791. reviewed by kristina eberbach columbia university, usa. kristina eberbach: kre2104@columbia.edu http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3936 mailto:kre2104@columbia.edu hrer book and media reviews 88 book and media reviews a critical conversation about human rights and disciplinarity doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3936 issn 2535-5406 cargas, s. (2020). human rights education: forging an academic discipline. philadelphia, pa: university of pennsylvania press. 224 pp., us$ 69,95 (hardcover) isbn-9780812251791. reviewed by kristina eberbach columbia university, usa. kre2104@columbia.edu human rights education: forging an academic discipline by sarita cargas offers a thought-provoking perspective for multiple global audiences, including those interested in human rights education (hre) and academics teaching human rights but lacking familiarity with hre literature. the text argues that human rights constitutes a discrete discipline and offers strategies for implementing hre within higher education, focusing on education about, through, and for human rights and offering practical pedagogical suggestions. while the reader may wish for expanded treatment in some areas, the text stimulates a much needed conversation about the role of—and need for—hre within higher education. in chapter 1, cargas introduces hre and provides a compelling argument for why hre merits greater attention. chapter 2 surveys tertiary hre programs globally to identify patterns and ‘forge the path for systemic hre’ (27). in particular, cargas examines the extent to which programmes address three elements articulated in the un declaration on human rights education and training (united nations, 2011): education about, through, and for human rights, (18-21, 40). she finds that ba programmes show a notable degree of variance. for example, there is no single course required by more than one programme in the us and a wide-range of courses without ‘human rights’ in the title fulfil elective requirements. (29, 35). importantly, cargas finds that most programmes ignore pedagogical approaches, teacher attitudes, and activism (40-41). however, these conclusions are largely based on a review of programme websites and further conversations with programme leaders would be beneficial. notwithstanding programmatic variability, cargas does find signs of emerging consensus in three areas. there is a recognition that human rights is ‘defined by the human rights regime’, that the ‘language of human rights is applicable to many kinds of problems’, and that ‘there is a pattern of universities in different countries focusing on human rights issues that are particular to their nation’ (40). she further argues that if human rights programmes were to ‘consistently incorporate the knowledge content from the existing consensus, supplement with recommendations from international documents, and root that in a critical pedagogy, hre will mature into the more radical and effective academic program it should be’ (26). http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3936 mailto:kre2104@columbia.edu hrer book and media reviews 89 in chapter 3, cargas expands on disciplinarity and human rights, asserting that in addition to ‘considerable agreement’ on foundational knowledge, human rights literature ‘argues that the curriculum must include an exploration of values, attitudes, and tools for action. no other field of study accomplishes this full agenda’ (46). she proposes four criteria of a discipline: a shared narrative of identity and community; common vocabulary and concepts; key questions for inquiry and a shared set of problems; and inquiry methods and interpretation strategies that determine what constitutes evidence (58, drawing from buker, 2003). cargas’ argument here is well-reasoned, but will likely benefit from an expanded treatment of these criteria, as well as comparison with other definitions of what constitutes a discipline. anticipating criticism, cargas counters the argument that human rights is too interdisciplinary to be considered a discrete discipline and also addresses several ways in which she finds a multidisciplinary approach to hre often problematic in practice. she concludes that recognizing human rights as a discipline is not only demonstrably warranted; it will also lead to more and better hre within higher education (68). in chapter 4, cargas identifies categories of advice for education through human rights based on several international documents (flowers, 2000; united nations, 2011, 2012; osce, 2012): teaching critical thinking; centering students’ rights; living the values of equality and nondiscrimination in the classroom; and, encouraging active learning (69). she suggests three methods for pursuing them. first, she calls for the explicit teaching of critical thinking, which would provide ‘a radical critical education in human rights’, partly because it would involve ‘decentering authority, questioning hegemonic knowledge, becoming inclusive, and transforming people’ (70). second, observing that the cited documents do not primarily target higher education, cargas draws on social justice education for implementation guidelines (see, for example, hackman, 2005; marshall and klein, 2009; 80-83). third, cargas calls for active learning approaches, focusing on discussion. chapter 5 examines education for human rights. cargas asserts there is consensus that hre ‘should affect attitudes and values, and promoting normative values is not antithetical to critical thinking and a critical pedagogy of human rights’ (91). however, she does note the importance of basing one’s teaching on normative principles, particularly those backed by custom and law (91). since the most strident objection to cargas’ argument is likely to come from academics who would contest the idea of teaching norms and values, a more extended discussion of this argument would have been helpful. in addition, while the chapter does contain practical and useful recommendations for teaching for human rights, additional treatment would be useful, including greater reference to advice for dealing with unique challenges in the human rights classroom and more attention to skills beyond those of advocacy. in chapter 6, cargas proposes student learning outcomes for nine core courses that could inform the requirements of a human rights programme and then discusses how an educator might incorporate education about, through and for human rights when designing individual courses. the author concludes by returning to her core argument: as a community of scholars of hre, we have everything necessary to create a unique, academically sound discipline of human rights based in critical hrer book and media reviews 90 pedagogy. we have the need, the right historical moment, and a solid foundation in extant programs, courses, books, and journals indicating that we meet disciplinary criteria requiring a strong community of scholars and a common vocabulary and set of concepts (136). but, she acknowledges that more is needed—more hre faculty, more new coursespecific books, and more faculty willing to incorporate human rights into their courses (138). this provocative exploration of hre within higher education is an important contribution to the field, identifying strengths to build on as well as unmet needs. academics should take seriously her argument that effective hre promises systematic improvement as it cultivates a rights-aware and rights-respecting environment and nurtures graduates more prepared to meet human rights challenges (137). references buker, e. (2003). is women’s studies a disciplinary or an interdisciplinary field of inquiry? nwsa journal 15(1), 73-93. https://doi.org/10.2307/4316945 flowers, n. (2000). the human rights education handbook: effective practices for learning, action, and change. minneapolis: human rights resource center. hackman, h. (2005). five essential components for social justice education. equity & excellence in education 38(2), 103-109. https://doi.org/10.1080/10665680590935034 marshall, j. and a. klein. (2009). lessons in social action: equipping and inspiring students to improve their world. social studies 100(5), 218-221. https://doi.org/10.1080/00377990903221962 organization for security and co-operation in europe (osce). (2012) guidelines on human rights education for secondary school systems. retrieved from http://www.osce.org/odihr/93969 united nations human rights office of the high commissioner. (2012). world programme for human rights education second phase of action. retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/documents/publications/wphre_phase_2_en.pdf united nations human rights office of the high commissioner. (2011). united nations declaration on human rights education and training. article 2, para 2. retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/compilation/page s/unitednationsdeclarationonhumanrightseducationandtraining(2011).a spx https://doi.org/10.2307/4316945 https://doi.org/10.1080/10665680590935034 https://doi.org/10.1080/00377990903221962 http://www.osce.org/odihr/93969 https://www.ohchr.org/documents/publications/wphre_phase_2_en.pdf https://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/compilation/pages/unitednationsdeclarationonhumanrightseducationandtraining(2011).aspx https://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/compilation/pages/unitednationsdeclarationonhumanrightseducationandtraining(2011).aspx https://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/compilation/pages/unitednationsdeclarationonhumanrightseducationandtraining(2011).aspx volume 2, no 2 (2019) date of publication: 07-10-2019 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3407 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews making women human: uncovering the contribution of women to the universal declaration of human rights adami, r. (2019). women and the universal declaration of human rights. oxon: routledge. 161 pp., £115 (hardcover) isbn-13:978-1-138-34535-5-90000. reviewed by lynsey mitchell abertay university, uk. lynsey mitchell: l.mitchell@abertay.ac.uk http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3407 mailto:l.mitchell@abertay.ac.uk hrer book and media reviews 85 book and media reviews making women human: uncovering the contribution of women to the universal declaration of human rights doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3407 issn 2535-5406 adami, r. (2019). women and the universal declaration of human rights. oxon: routledge. 161 pp., £115 (hardcover) isbn-13:978-1-138-34535-5-90000. reviewed by lynsey mitchell abertay university, uk. l.mitchell@abertay.ac.uk this book offers both a historical and critical account of the signing of the universal declaration of human rights (udhr) and the work leading up to this at the creation of the united nations (un). the book sets out its position in the literature as a counter narrative to earlier research, which it notes has ‘generally emphasised the contribution of the western and male delegates who participated in the process’ (p. 1). it therefore offers a fresh account of the birth of the modern international human rights regime, focussing on the substantial contributions of the women delegates who contributed to the final text of the united nations charter and the udhr. it charts the strategies and ideologies of the various women who were successful in ensuring the declaration reflected the language of ‘human rights rather than the rights of man’ (p. 2). in doing so, this book adds further understanding and insight into the birth of the united nations’ human rights mechanisms. each chapter of the book focusses on the deliberation and preparatory meetings where the drafting of key un texts was discussed and agreed. not only does the text offer further insight into the debates that led to the adoption of the final texts, but it also complements existing works by highlighting and exploring the role of the female delegates and amplifying their contributions. the initial chapters (chapters 13) begin at the san francisco conference and focus on the text of the un charter. the book then has chapters dedicated to the establishment of the commission on human rights and the commission on the status of women (chapters 4-7), which explore the debates around whether women’s specific needs and rights could be guaranteed in the main texts and enforcement mechanisms, or whether additional women’s bodies were necessary. these chapters provide helpful insight into the compromises that led to the eventual adoption of a specific commission on the status of women and bring alive the perennial debate over whether women need a separate human rights regime, or whether women’s rights are protected by the generic texts. the book then turns to the debates on rights in the private realm, and in the later chapters (chapters 8-10) considers the socialist movements and its contribution and the establishment of the general assembly. the book ends by noting the call from female delegates for ordinary women to be more represented at the united nations and the hope that women would soon hold positions in equal numbers to men. the text thus ends with a note of reflection on the achievement and http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3407 hrer book and media reviews 86 hopes of the women delegates and how they envisaged the future but invites the reader to reflect on the contemporary reality, noting that many of the issues raised by these women remain true today. men continue to outnumber women in the un, and there has been much scholarly engagement and critique of how, even though women were given visibility in the text of the human rights instruments, the human rights system is centred around an idealised subject who is male. by providing a biography of the various female delegates, the book weaves a complex picture of the different backgrounds and ideologies that each of these women represented. the book makes clear that, as is often the case today, the women did not necessarily agree on how to incorporate gender into the texts, and indeed some of the delegates did not see themselves as representatives of women’s issues, but instead as representatives who happened to be women. for example, it narrates the disagreement between eleanor roosevelt (elected chair of the full commission on human rights and us representative) and indian representative hansa mehta, who argued that proposed language for the udhr such as ‘all men’ (pp. 67, 92) could be interpreted as excluding women. it also describes the debate as to whether the udhr should be legally binding, or a declaration, or both. several chapters focus on the work done by individual women and the commission on the status of women to eventually force the commission on human rights to adopt the gender-neutral language of ‘human beings’ and explicitly refer to both men and women in the text. this book therefore offers a welcome alternative account of the inception of the udhr. it provides a valuable contribution and will be of interest to human rights scholars as well as legal historians and those with a wider interest in the united nations and gender. although focussed on, and drawing heavily from, the source material of the preparatory meetings, this book brings to life the various characters who worked tirelessly to bring, sometimes radical, understandings of how universal human rights could be protected. this book provides ample real-life examples of the continuing debates in human rights, such as the universalism versus relativism debate, the generalist rights versus specific rights debate, and the legally binding versus aspirational mechanisms of promoting and protecting human rights debate. while aimed predominately at researchers, this book offers an accessible and helpful account of the creation of the un human rights mechanism, demonstrating the compromises reached that have been instrumental in both the successes and failures of this system. it will assist human rights educators in universities to bring alive the universal declaration of human rights and potentially invigorate student discussion around issues such as women’s visibility and gender inclusive language. this text will also prove useful to those providing generalist education and information on international human rights due to its accessibility and reinvigoration of the story of the birth of un human rights. making women human: uncovering the contribution of women to the universal declaration of human rights volume 2, no 1 (2019) date of publication: 05-09-2019 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3320 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews imagining europe: narratives of identity and belonging ross, a. (2019). finding political identities: young people in a changing europe. london: palgrave macmillan. 366 pp., €83.19 (hardcover) isbn 978-3-31990874-8; €67.82 (ebook) isbn 978-3-319-90875-5. reviewed by fionnuala waldron dublin city university, ireland. f. waldron: fionnuala.waldron@dcu.ie http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3320 mailto:fionnuala.waldron@dcu.ie hrer book and media reviews 95 book and media reviews imagining europe: narratives of identity and belonging doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3320 issn 2535-5406 ross, a. (2019). finding political identities: young people in a changing europe. london: palgrave macmillan. 366 pp., €83.19 (hardcover) isbn 978-3-319-90874-8; €67.82 (ebook) isbn 978-3-319-90875-5. reviewed by fionnuala waldron dublin city university fionnuala.waldron@dcu.ie given the current climate of uncertainty over brexit and the rise of populism more generally across europe, this well-timed and insightful publication by alistair ross could not be more apposite in its focus. based on fieldwork conducted between 2011 and 2016, the study draws on key theories and research relating to identity, human rights and citizenship to interrogate how young europeans are constructing their political identities. using a process of deliberative discussion, the author conducted 324 group discussions in 29 countries, engaging with 2,000 young people between the ages of 11 and 18 years over the course of the study. while the author provides a persuasive argument for not including greece, ireland and the united kingdom in the study, their absence seems like a missed opportunity to garner young people’s views at a key moment on the cusp of historical change. nonetheless, the breadth of the study allows ross to capture the impact of many of the political, social and demographic changes that have occurred across europe in recent decades, including boundary changes and the rapid expansion of the eu. in addition to explanatory notes and appendices, the study is presented in seven chapters. chapter 1 provides a comprehensive account of its organisation and methodological approach and lays out the theoretical base of the research, examining key concepts such as identity, nation, citizenship and the idea of europe. building on existing conceptualisations of identity as socially constructed and fluid, ross emphasises the contingent and situated nature of the young people’s narratives and skillfully uses an initial foray into the data to illustrate the complexity of the interactions and the resulting layers of identifications and affiliations. in terms of his findings, ross lays out his key themes in the following six chapters, with chapters 2 and 3 addressing the cultural, communal and civic values which young people draw on to construct their narratives of identity in the context of a diverse, multicultural europe. chapter 4 examines the resources which young people harness in those constructions, including local knowledge, engagement with a range of media, and social interactions with family and, to a lesser extent, friendship groups and schools. in chapter 5, ross brings a range of locational lenses to bear on the data, revealing commonalities and fissures in young people’s thinking across these spaces. chapter 6 examines the idea of nested identities and levels of attachment across contexts, from the local to the global. positing the idea of the kaleidoscope as an explanatory metaphor, the final chapter explores the processes used by participants to construct http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3320 mailto:fionnuala.waldron@dcu.ie hrer book and media reviews 96 their multiple identities, drawing on shifting patterns of contextual resources, and flexible levels of identification to imagine affiliations beyond the nation or state. probably because of the openness of its methodology and the size of its database, this is, in many ways, an unwieldy study, with crosscutting themes and intersecting lenses creating a certain messiness; indeed, the author describes the study as ‘intentionally noisy’ (p. 37, original emphasis). while it would be easy to get lost in the richness and complexity of the detail, there are a number of key findings that deserve particular attention. this study challenges the commonly held view that young people are not interested in politics and constructs its participants as politically aware, critically reflective and engaged in political action. at the heart of the study is the idea of europe as embodying, in the words of one young participant, a ‘conscience in common’ where shared values define the relationship between and within states (p. 70). sensitive to the dangers of right-wing nationalism, the young people turn towards an imagined european community premised on the shared values of peace, solidarity, rights, equality and personal freedoms. many identify the eu’s initial response to refugees in 2015 as a source of pride and evidence of european humanity and solidarity, while concerns about minority rights, anti-racism and gender equality are commonly expressed. overall, while there are regional differences and nuances, the dominant response to diversity is one of openness to other cultures, recognition of the rights of minorities and of the importance of addressing racism and discrimination; perspectives which, in the views of the young participants, draw a clear line between their generation and that of their parents and grandparents. not everyone agrees, however. a minority express views consistent with more right wing ideologies and concepts of citizenship and of rights that are exclusionary in their application. views are also tempered by regional and national socio-historical contexts, as well as by the more general persistence of older stereotypes and prejudices. roma, in particular, are subjected to the ‘ultimate othering’ as outsiders with little control over how they are represented (p. 113). given the pervasive nature and historical longevity of anti-roma and traveller prejudice across europe this is, unfortunately, not surprising, and the small number of participants who express an understanding of roma as rights holders underlines the need for a renewed emphasis on anti-bias and anti-racist education within the human rights framework (hutchinson, chihade and puiu, 2018; kende, hadarics and lášticová, 2017). we should be concerned about the apparent irrelevance of citizenship education across europe to young people’s political education and the perceived reluctance of teachers to provide spaces for political discussion. consistent with findings elsewhere, this failure to provide young people with authentic educational spaces where issues of values, politics and identity can be interrogated and discussed needs urgent action (ho, mcavoy, hess and gibbs, 2017; zembylas, 2016). in conclusion, this study deserves to be read by all interested in education, politics and the future of european democracy and highlights the importance of paying attention to the views of young people. given young people’s emerging leadership in global climate action, the findings give room for cautious optimism that this generation of young europeans will transcend difference and self-interest to act in solidarity for a shared future. as one participant in the study says, “if we don’t support each other, how can we change the world?” (p. 91). hrer book and media reviews 97 references ho, l. c., mcavoy, p., hess, d., & gibbs, b. (2017). teaching and learning about controversial issues and topics in the social studies: a review of the research. in m. m. manfra & c. m. bolick (eds.), the wiley handbook of social studies research (pp. 321-335). chichester: wiley blackwell. hutchison, p., chihade, r., & puiu, a. a. (2018). predictors of “the last acceptable racism”: group threats and public attitudes toward gypsies and travellers. journal of applied social psychology, 48(5), 237-247. https://doi.org/10.1111/jasp.12508 kende, a., hadarics, m., & lášticová, b. (2017). anti-roma attitudes as expressions of dominant social norms in eastern europe. international journal of intercultural relations, 60, 12-27. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijintrel.2017.06.002 zembylas, m. (2016). teacher resistance to engage with ‘alternative’ perspectives of difficult histories: the limits and prospects of affective disruption. discourse: studies in the cultural politics of education, 38(5), 659-675. https://doi.org/10.1080/01596306.2015.1132680 https://doi.org/10.1111/jasp.12508 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijintrel.2017.06.002 https://doi.org/10.1080/01596306.2015.1132680 imagining europe: narratives of identity and belonging human rights education’s curriculum problem volume 2, no 1 (2019) date of publication: 05-09-2019 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3506 issn 2535-5406 editorial addressing the ‘why’, ‘what’ and ‘how’ of human rights education audrey osler university of south-eastern norway, norway university of leeds, uk. audrey osler: a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3506 mailto:a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk human rights education review – volume 2(1) 2 editorial addressing the ‘why’, ‘what’ and ‘how’ of human rights education doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3506 issn 2535-5406 audrey osler university of south-eastern norway, norway university of leeds, uk. a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk as human rights education review progresses into its second year, we publish four diverse empirical studies, with two papers examining the key question: why teach for human rights? most commonly, initial answers to this question include ‘because we wish to prevent human rights violations’; ‘because we want to work towards a just and peaceful world’; and ‘we need to protect the vulnerable’. in the first paper in this volume, knut vesterdal takes the case of norway and invites his readers to consider the question from the perspective of the state. by implication, he is encouraging them to reflect more broadly on why nation-states elect to promote education and awareness of human rights, and to consider which rights they emphasise and which they neglect. this focus on the underlying purposes of stateled, human rights education (hre) is important for several reasons. first and foremost, the nation-state is a duty-bearer, responsible for guaranteeing our rights. this is a fundamental aspect of the international human rights framework. the nation-state, both through the creation of a rights-supporting socio-political climate, and through the development of agencies and system of laws and law enforcement, has an obligation to guarantee and uphold the rights of all who reside within its borders. the nation-state, through its various agencies, acts as duty-bearer, responsible for guaranteeing our rights. yet, at the same time, it is frequently the nation-state that denies or violates these same rights. this creates tensions for the nation-state, with dissenting citizens making the task of governance more complex, even while they may be strengthening democratic practices. human rights educators need to consider: what encourages a nation-state to engage in human rights education, other than the expectation it will uphold both its moral and its binding obligations? are there other drivers or incentives when a state engages in, or promotes, hre? and how does state-led hre differ from that of non-governmental actors? in his paper, vesterdal suggests that ‘hre is an essential component in constructing the image of a human rights-friendly norwegian identity … intended not only to develop human rights-friendly communities, but also to produce national identity, as well as to gain access to negotiating tables in international relations’. through his analysis of norwegian education policy documents, he makes the case that hre is an element of ‘state branding’ in the international arena. continuing the exploration of hre in norway, beate goldschmidt-gjerløw looks at the ‘why’ of child rights education from a different angle, that of enabling students to distinguish between appropriate and inappropriate sexual behaviour and thereby reduce the risk of child sexual abuse, including both adult sexual exploitation of children and rape among peers. despite the official emphasis given to tackling http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3506 mailto:a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk a. osler 3 child sexual abuse through education, gjerløw’s study finds that social science teachers, who are tasked with implementing policy, avoid the topic of sexual abuse in part because they fear re-traumatising victims of abuse, but more particularly because of a strong cultural taboo. this taboo serves as an obstacle for talking about the sexual abuse that has taken place and is thus an obstacle to child rights education. arguing that ‘silence does no-one any favours’ and recognising that teachers need support in addressing this aspect of the curriculum, gjerløw proposes strategies for teachers in challenging the cultural taboo, moving beyond the use of textbooks to draw on literary fiction. she concludes that knowledge about rights and about what constitutes abuse is important but insufficient. a cultural change requires a pedagogical approach that promotes empathy. effectively, the paper recognises that teachers need to reconsider both the ‘why’ and the ‘how’ of child rights education, in order to fulfil their responsibilities to students. human rights education from this perspective is about challenging and addressing injustice, including sexual injustice. as gjerløw argues: ‘sexual injustice cannot be silenced in educational institutions if we are to foster healthy, respectful, and democratic citizens who protect not only their own human worth and human rights, but also those of others’. lotta brantefors, in her study of teaching and learning in two swedish classrooms, focuses on the ‘what’ of hre, drawing on the theoretical lens of the didaktik tradition. she is interested in how the teachers in her study interpret official curriculum guidelines and select specific curriculum knowledge or content. equally, she is interested in students’ understandings of what they are learning. she finds that while teaching content and students’ learning outcomes are generally well-aligned, there is a conflation of hre with democracy education, and an emphasis on participation rights. she observes that while ‘there is a strong connection between human rights and fundamental democratic values, the relationship between the two is not clear to the teachers or the pupils’. this impacts on the ‘what’ of hre and on curriculum content. a conceptual conflation between human rights and democracy, impacting on education, has also been observed in norway (osler, 2016b) where children’s participation rights may be prioritized over other elements of hre. the teachers in brantefors’ study see hre as being about learning to live together, acting or interacting. rights denials or violations are largely portrayed, by teachers and students, as happening to other people elsewhere. students are taught about the disadvantaged life conditions of others. contextualising her findings, brantefors observes that: ‘transformative and critical ideas about human rights education are practically absent in sweden’. the final paper in this volume, authored by fiona mcgaughey, lisa hartley, susan banki, paul duffil, matthew stubbs, phil orchard, simon rice, laurie berg and paghona peggy kerdo, is concerned with pedagogy, the ‘how’ of hre. the research team examines how simulations in vocationally-focused courses in higher education may enhance human rights skills development. the team developed ‘a range of social justice simulations across seven australian universities and surveyed students to ascertain whether they perceived that specific skill development had been achieved’. the aim of the study was to develop experiential learning processes that enable both deep learning and enhanced skills, bridging the ‘learning-doing’ gap. students report on their growing awareness of a complex nature of human rights cases, and the wide range of actors involved, with a number reporting a greater understanding of how to engage with such actors through using lobbying, negotiation and other communication skills. several recognised the benefits of learning from each other, human rights education review – volume 2(1) 4 and some were inspired to look to a career in social justice, while others learned to look more critically at the human rights situation in australia. students also valued the confidence they gained in practising previously acquired skills, recognising that the skills were applicable in a wide range of contexts. it would seem that participating in this research project, which required considerable reflexivity on the part of students, may itself have enhanced student learning. in volume 1(1) of hrer, walter parker (2018, p.5) argued that ‘the hre curriculum remains scattered, ill-defined, and too variable to be robust’ and that ‘curriculum development is what hre requires right now if it is to move forward to institutional stability in schools’. parker is concerned primarily with the ‘what’ of hre and, while he acknowledges political barriers to its successful implementation in the united states, he is also concerned about what he perceives as a broader lack of consensus among hre advocates as to its meaning. in the nordic region the politics of hre is somewhat different from that in the united states, as vesterdal makes clear in this volume. nevertheless, while respect for human rights is closely linked to national identity, hre may still, in many cases, have a weak status in schools (decara, 2013; osler, 2016a; vesterdal 2016). this suggests that the relationship between the ‘why’ of hre and curriculum knowledge, what is taught or not taught in schools, may be more complex than is sometimes acknowledged. perhaps a key learning outcome or ‘why’ of hre is students’ development of a critical understanding of their own (local or national) context, as illustrated by mcgaughey and her colleagues in this volume. while the programme developed by mcgaughey’s team was for students in tertiary/higher education, such a critical understanding is equally important for younger students or they risk developing a sense of superiority or complacency over others. these papers highlight a variety of meanings and purposes attached to hre. nevertheless, the ‘why’, ‘what’ and ’how’ of hre are closely interconnected, and by bringing these four papers together in this volume, i hope that hrer may offer fresh insights into their relationship, thereby strengthening hre scholarship. references decara, c. (2013). mapping of human rights education in danish schools. copenhagen: danish institute of human rights. osler, a. (2016a). human rights and schooling: an ethical framework for teaching for social justice. new york, ny: teachers college press. osler, a. (2016b). national narratives, conflict and consensus: challenges for human rights educators in established democracies. in lenz c., brattland s., & kvande l. (eds.) crossing borders: combining human rights education and historical learning. berlin: lit verlag. parker, w. (2018). human rights education’s curriculum problem. human rights education review, 1(1), 05–24. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2450 vesterdal, k. (2016). the roles of human rights education in norway. a qualitative study of purposes and approaches in policy and in upper secondary schools. (ph.d. dissertation, norwegian university of science and technology). trondheim: ntnu. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2450 editorial addressing the ‘why’, ‘what’ and ‘how’ of human rights education a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk references volume 3, no 1 (2020) date of publication: 06-04-2020 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3606 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews joy as a pedagogical tool for critical human rights education. simmons, w.p. (2019). joyful human rights. philadelphia: pennsylvania: university of pennsylvania press. 304 pp., us$75.00 (hardcover) isbn 9780812251012 reviewed by gabriela martínez sainz university college dublin, ireland. gabriela martínez sainz: gabriela.martinezsainz@ucd.ie http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3606 mailto:gabriela.martinezsainz@ucd.ie hrer book and media reviews 100 book and media reviews joy as a pedagogical tool for critical human rights education. doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3606 issn 2535-5406 simmons, w.p. (2019). joyful human rights. philadelphia: pennsylvania: university of pennsylvania press. 304pp., us$75.00 (hardcover) isbn: 9780812251012 reviewed by gabriela martínez sainz university college dublin, ireland. gabriela.martinezsainz@ucd.ie for several years now, researchers and practitioners alike have advocated for a critical human rights education (hre), emphasising the opportunities such an approach brings to the teaching and learning of rights, while at the same time warning about the severe consequences a lack of critical analysis can create (bajaj, cislaghi, & mackie, 2016; keet, 2015; osler, 2015; zembylas, 2015). a critical hre has a number of aspects: it acknowledges the limitations of rights; it helps individuals to recognise dominant discourses, oppressive structures, systemic inequalities and marginalized voices; and it encourages a critical examination of the historical, contextual and social issues related to human rights abuses and violations while engaging in dialogues that bring multiple experiences, perspectives and voices into the discussion. there are multiple proposals on how to engage in such a critical hre; e.g. focusing on empathy (zembylas 2015), contextualising participants’ lived experiences (bajaj et al, 2016; martinez sainz 2018), or decolonising concepts and strategies in this field (osler, 2015; zembylas & keet, 2019). the notion of joy is not usually present in proposals for a critical hre, although after reading william paul simmons’ book, i would argue there is a strong case for its inclusion; joy can serve as a provocative framework for researchers and practitioners to re-think assumptions, challenge common practices and question the aims of hre. in ‘joyful human rights’, simmons proposes a new approach to analysing, discussing and–ultimately–understanding human rights. this approach is based on the concept of joy. the book, thus, serves as an invitation for educators and researchers to rethink how human rights are commonly taught – mostly with a focus on tragedies, abuses and violations – and why a shift in the narrative towards joy can be beneficial. the book is divided into two sections. in the first one, simmons identifies the absence of joy in the dominant discourses of human rights, maps the historical and philosophical roots of this absence and develops the theoretical foundations of his proposal from a phenomenology of joy that is based on lacan’s psychoanalytic postulates about joy and suffering, audre lorde’s notion of the erotic, and contemporary postulates of affect theory. he builds his arguments upon the ideas of jouissane, erotics and transgressive affect to explain what joy is, what it implies, and how it is experienced by individuals and groups. in the second part of the book, simmons focuses on whom he considers the major human rights actors – victims, http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3606 mailto:gabriela.martinezsainz@ucd.ie hrer book and media reviews 101 perpetrators and activists – and elaborates on how members of these groups experience joy. he does this in order to challenge the conclusions commonly drawn from their experiences and to discuss the importance of new perspectives and nuances in the discourse of rights. using joy as an analytical tool to examine human rights violations and triumphs allows simmons to make important connections between the individual and social experiences of actors and their relationships with key concepts such as voice, agency, recognition and empowerment. for this analysis, simmons systematically uses historical examples and material from different media (movies, documentary films and photographs), as well as biographies and personal narratives of activists, perpetrators and survivors of human rights abuses. the author makes a noteworthy effort to have diverse experiences and voices represented in his proposed examples, and this is one of the book’s main strengths. the book allows the reader to consider paradigmatic cases for the discussion of human rights, such as the holocaust or the civil rights movement, from a new perspective. however, it also invites us to learn from less known tragedies, activists and martyrs. furthermore, the interplay between historical and contemporary examples strengthens simmons’ arguments. neither is he afraid of discussing extremely controversial topics, such as joyful martyrdom. he examines the historical origins of martyrdom storytelling as a form of human rights advocacy and activism, and provides a subsequent analysis of contemporary martyrs in the middle east. there are clear advantages in a book for researchers and practitioners interested in a variety of themes in the field of human rights, from those looking into the lived experiences of individuals and groups in the light of abuses, survival and human rights ‘wins’ to those interested in the historical origins of the dominant discourses and narratives. however, the theoretical section of the book and the concepts the author uses to ground his phenomenology of joy might come across as convoluted for some readers and for scholars from disciplines outside social theory. although it is an advantage for readers to have prior knowledge or a specific interest in this field, the author does a good job of systematically providing information on his core concepts, and this allows the less familiar reader to follow his arguments. overall, simmons’s book succeeds in opening up a more critical discussion of rights by posing challenging questions and objections. one of his key questions is whether the solemnity around human rights abuses – and therefore the lack of joy as an important concept in the dominant narrative – causes more harm than good by inhibiting critical examination and uncomfortable discussion? for educators and practitioners, this book could serve as a catalyst to think about joy, comedy and humour as pedagogical tools for a more critical hre. the final chapter about human rights winners is one of the sections that best exemplifies this. simmons presents multiple accounts of individuals that present themselves as not merely victims or survivors of human rights abuses, but primarily as whole individuals full of possibilities, as human rights winners. these accounts explain how individuals can reclaim their personhood through joy, and demonstrate the powerful possibilities for teaching and learning about rights that emerge from a framework of joy. simmons’ proposal is a relevant invitation for those working in hre to imagine ways in which joy can help to shift the dominant narratives of rights. in this sense, this book is a well-timed and relevant contribution to human rights education. hrer book and media reviews 102 references bajaj, m., cislaghi, b., & mackie, g. (eds.). (2016). advancing transformative human rights education. appendix d to the report of the global citizenship commission. cambridge: open book publishers. canlas, m., argenal, a., & bajaj, m. (2015). teaching human rights from below: towards solidarity, resistance and social justice. radical teacher, 103, 38-46. https://doi.org/10.5195/rt.2015.226 keet, a. (2015). it is time : critical human rights education in an age of counterhegemonic distrust. education as change, 19(3), 46–64. https://doi.org/10.1080/16823206.2015.1085621 zembylas, m., & keet, a. (2019). critical human rights education. advancing socialjustice-oriented educational praxes. cham: springer. martínez sainz, g. (2018). the challenges of teaching children their rights in a violent context. in martínez sainz g., & ilie, s. (eds.), international perspectives on practice and research into children’s rights (pp. 83–110). mexico: centre for human rights studies. osler, a. (2015). human rights education, postcolonial scholarship, and action for social justice. theory & research in social education, 43(2), 244–274. https://doi.org/10.1080/00933104.2015.1034393 zembylas, m. (2015). toward a critical-sentimental orientation in human rights education. educational philosophy and theory, 48(11), 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1080/00131857.2015.1118612 https://doi.org/10.5195/rt.2015.226 https://doi.org/10.1080/16823206.2015.1085621 https://doi.org/10.1080/00933104.2015.1034393 https://doi.org/10.1080/00131857.2015.1118612 volume 3, no 1 (2020) date of publication: 06-04-2020 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3645 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews the ‘special framing of hindsight’: teaching the unthinkable in hre polgar, m. (2018). holocaust and human rights education: good choices and sociological perspectives. uk, north america, japan, india, malaysia, china: emerald publishing. 145pp., €78.99 (print – hardcover) isbn 978-1-78754-499-4; (online) isbn 978-1-78754-498-7; (epub) isbn 978-1-978-1-78756000-0. reviewed by gillian klein ucl institute of education, uk. gillian klein: g.klein@ucl.ac.uk http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3645 mailto:g.klein@ucl.ac.uk hrer book and media reviews 96 book and media reviews the ‘special framing of hindsight’: teaching the unthinkable in hre doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3645 issn 2535-5406 polgar, m. (2018). holocaust and human rights education: good choices and sociological perspectives. uk, north america, japan, india, malaysia, china: emerald publishing. 145pp., (print – hardcover) isbn 978-1-78754-499-4; (online) isbn 978-1-78754-498-7; (epub) isbn 978-1-978-1-78756000-0. reviewed by gillian klein ucl institute of education, uk. g.klein@ucl.ac.uk among the many reasons for teaching the holocaust as part of human rights education, three aspects are uniquely compelling. firstly, the holocaust was a spectacularly evil dereliction of human rights, the scale of the slaughter far in excess of any comparable genocide. secondly, the consequences were far-reaching, both geographically and historically. thirdly, the nazis systematically orchestrated their mission to eliminate all the jews of europe, along with others they considered undesirable. it is this last aspect that provides such a horrifying model of the consequences for people whose human rights are eroded and then stripped away. in this book, michael polgar sets out the incremental steps the nazis followed: denial of rights was the first of four stages in the nazi war against jewish europeans. once identified (on documents and clothing), jews were banned from government service and professional life. a racialized definition of jewish identity, based on genealogy and not religious faith or practice, was legally established to ensure administrative distinctions were possible. intermarriages were forbidden in 1935. as german power and jurisdiction expanded, so too did the scale of human rights abuses. (p. 4) thus did the nazis reduce their chosen targets to vermin, unworthy of life: jews; roma and sinti; jehovah’s witnesses; lgbt people; individuals considered physically or mentally impaired. all became helpless and defenceless, but also beyond or undeserving of the help or protection of others. why then does dr polgar spend a good part of the book arguing why we should teach the holocaust in hre? is it because in his extensive references, he has found only one study (bromley and russell, 2010) whose title directly links the two (although many flag up citizenship and global education)? or has being the selfdeclared son and grandson of holocaust survivors made him unnecessarily defensive? he himself says that hindsight has given him a ‘special framing… we have learned to see our family’s grim experience as part of history’ (p. xi), and that his reasons for teaching the holocaust are ‘prevention’ and ‘reparation.’ many survivors tell remarkably similar stories about quickly discovering that no one wanted to hear about their experiences, and consequently remaining silent for decades afterwards. http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3645 mailto:g.klein@ucl.ac.uk hrer book and media reviews 97 polgar notes that it was only in 1972 that the holocaust first appeared on a school curriculum – predictably in germany, where it is still mandatory. once polgar moves on to what to teach about and how to teach it, his humanity and insight illuminate the book. chapter 3 offers five modes or perspectives for how to teach what he calls this ‘industrialized violence’: learning about the holocaust; learning from the holocaust; education about the holocaust; education for human rights; and education about human rights. he then combines two of his educational modes, suggesting that ‘history is more “real” when we see or visit holocaust settings’ (p. 38). chapter 4 is concerned with humanising the victims of the killings. polgar urges that their lives, cultures and contributions as german citizens should be taught about in holocaust education, that the teaching be contextualized and ageappropriate. students should first see the jews as they had been: part of the fabric of life in germany, living in the community and following many professions and occupations. interestingly, polgar identifies the holocaust as the driver for the international laws that were passed in the 1940s to define genocide as a crime. the chapter positioning holocaust education in the context of multicultural education and cultural studies asks many questions about getting holocaust education onto the us curriculum. for example: ‘can we expand our curricula without sparking less constructive arguments, especially over migration and national inclusion, which irritate many pundits and aggravate mean-spirited public debates?’ (p. 79). more questions follow, but they remain unanswered. i began to wonder whether polgar sees the subject of the holocaust as having to compete for space in the curriculum with other topics of inclusion and social justice. he even discusses the possibility of teaching through nazi propaganda. he is on safer ground when warning about the cultural misrepresentation that is caused by holocaust denial – importantly, as denial is not yet a criminal offence in the us, as it is in 15 european countries. the author returns in chapter 6 to the how of teaching through the perspectives of those who were victimised, even though their voices are painful to hear, and discusses the significant roles played by bystanders, and by the upstanders – the righteous. this section, as well as the preface and the closing chapter, is among the strongest in the book. in the last chapter polgar reviews many teaching resources – literature, museums and websites – that are now available ‘where once there was only anguished silence’ (p.112). he usefully evaluates unesco’s global and comparative studies, several museums in the us, and others in europe that are accessible online, such as the ‘location museums’ sited near death camps. he tries to look beyond the us, citing cesarani, cowan, gilbert and kushner, but i searched in vain for trudi levi, eva schloss or any other british survivors who not only published their stories but continued giving talks in schools and colleges well into their eighties. it is fitting, however, that one of the last resources polgar features is that provided by the descendants of survivors group, whose members are, like the author himself, taking up the baton. michael polgar is extremely well informed, but he can stray from his immediate point, despite all his structuring and sub-headings; and the index is not always helpful. his sensitivity is admirable but there is a tentativeness that is not apparent in the school presentations or publications of the survivors i know. for readers looking for further guidance on teaching about the holocaust, i would propose hrer book and media reviews 98 supple’s (1998) from prejudice to genocide: learning about the holocaust, a resource that is adept in avoiding the pitfalls polgar warns against. the anne frank house in amsterdam also suggests ways in which learning about the holocaust can be linked constructively to contemporary questions, including antisemitism, islamophobia, racism, homophobia and inclusive citizenship (https://www.annefrank.org/en/education/). perhaps, as we move further from the nazi era and therefore need to learn about the holocaust in the context of presentday injustices, this is the way we can expect it to be taught as part of human rights education in the twenty-first century. references bromley, p. & russell, s.g. (2010). the holocaust as history and human rights: a cross-national analysis of holocaust education in social science textbooks, 1970-2008. prospects: quarterly review of comparative education, 40(1), pp. 153-173. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11125-010-9139-5 supple, c. (1998). from prejudice to genocide: learning about the holocaust. (3rd edition). stoke-on-trent, uk: trentham. https://www.annefrank.org/en/education/ https://doi.org/10.1007/s11125-010-9139-5 volume 3, no 2 (2020) date of publication: 18-08-2020 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3897 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews turkey’s citizenship education: a battlefield between secularism and islamism sen, a. and starkey, h. (2019). citizenship education in turkey: from militantsecular to islamic nationalism. london: lexington books. 146 pp. $85.00 (hardback) isbn: 978-1-4985-9468-4; $80.50 (ebook) isbn: 978-1-4985-9469-1. reviewed by kenan çayır istanbul bilgi university, turkey. kenan çayır: kenan.cayir@bilgi.edu.tr http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3897 mailto:kenan.cayir@bilgi.edu.tr hrer book and media reviews 84 book and media reviews turkey’s citizenship education: a battlefield between secularism and islamism doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3897 issn 2535-5406 sen, a. and starkey, h. (2019). citizenship education in turkey: from militantsecular to islamic nationalism. london: lexington books. 146 pp. $85.00 (hardback) isbn: 978-1-4985-9468-4; $80.50 (ebook) isbn: 978-1-4985-9469-1. reviewed by kenan çayır istanbul bilgi university, turkey. kenan.cayir@bilgi.edu.tr citizenship education has been a central school subject from the beginning of the turkish republic (1923), the chief goal being to create a homogenous turkish society out of the multi-ethnic ottoman empire. the main aim of the highly centralized formal education system in general, and citizenship education in particular, has been to transform (mostly religious) rural peasants into (secular, western style) citizens. citizenship education has, thus, been a field of contestation between different ideological powers throughout turkish history. abdulkerim sen and hugh starkey’s citizenship education in turkey: from militant-secular to islamic nationalism examines citizenship courses and discourses in the context of the ideological transformation of turkey from 1995 to 2012. this is an important period of turkish history, as it witnessed an ideological power shift from militant-secular nationalism to islamic nationalism. by framing the development of citizenship education and curriculum reforms as a case study, the authors make a valuable contribution to making sense of the interplay between the external and internal power struggles that have shaped contemporary turkey. the book is based on analyses of textbooks, interviews, documents and archives. the authors consider their dataset as ‘the discursive embodiment of power relations in the wider society’ (p. 11) and analyze it with a critical discourse methodology. they present their arguments in accessible language. the book consists of seven well-organized and well-written chapters. following the introduction of the subject in chapter 1, chapter 2 discusses four major citizenship theories or theoretical approaches: universalist citizenship education, multiculturalist citizenship education, democratic citizenship education, and critical citizenship education. the authors analyze the turkish case from the basis of a conceptual differentiation between what they call the old nationalist version (traditional civic education) and the contemporary liberal-internationalist model (citizenship education). chapter 3 provides the historical backgrounds of the rise of militant-secularism and islamic nationalism, and these two tendencies are covered in chapters 4 and 5. chapter 6 presents how the changing balance of power between secularist and islamist circles during turkey’s european union accession process has influenced the citizenship curriculum reform. chapter 7 is reserved for concluding remarks and an update on developments since 2012. http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3897 mailto:kenan.cayir@bilgi.edu.tr hrer book and media reviews 85 throughout the book, the authors mainly explore three aspects of citizenship education reform in turkey: (1) the external and internal drivers of the curriculum, (2) changes and continuities in the citizenship education curriculum, and (3) mechanisms of curriculum development. i think that one of the greatest strengths of the book is its multi-layered analysis of the interplay between external and internal drivers of citizenship education in turkey. the citizenship curriculum has been shaped in the context of international developments such as the united nations decade for human rights education (which led to turkey’s incorporation of citizenship and human rights education courses in 1995) and the recognition of turkey as a candidate to the eu in 1999 (which resulted in the introduction of citizenship and democracy education in 2010). during these processes, the ministry of national education (mone) collaborated with several international bodies, such as the council of europe (coe). several studies of citizenship education point out the democratizing role of international agencies, as they promote a liberalinternationalist model of citizenship education on the basis of eu norms. however, the authors’ close analysis of the documents and textbooks shows that this has not been the case in turkey. they skillfully demonstrate how the power struggle between different actors in the mone (the coe officials, proponents of the coe’s internationalist model, secular nationalists, islamist nationalists) was influential in curriculum reform. the analysis of citizenship and human rights education textbooks, for instance, demonstrates how international bodies’ sponsorship in curriculum reforms was subverted in order to promote a militaristic nationalist content, under the name of human rights education (p. 103). likewise, the curriculum reform in 2010 resulted in the infiltration of religious content into citizenship education when the akp consolidated its power. thus, as the authors note, ‘the nation state ideology disseminated by citizenship education changed from secular to religious nationalism but the mechanism conveying monolithic official ideology has persisted up to the present with no significant change’ (p. 102). the authors demonstrate the limited impact of international bodies and the decisive role of local/national dynamics in the formation of the curriculum. in reaching this final argument, the authors argue that the akp’s engagement with the coe’s model of democratic citizenship education was just ‘a strategy to terminate the ideological hegemony of secular nationalism in education’ (p.91). i think this argument carries the danger of falling into the trap of an essentialist position. it is a fact that the eu process enabled the religious nationalists to infiltrate their islamic agenda into citizenship education. yet the akp also introduced several reforms, such as the inclusion of alevis in textbooks and elective kurdish courses, until it took a nationalistic turn after 2016. arguably these initiatives were based on an anachronistic islamic multiculturalist imagery that harked back to the ottoman period (kaya 2013 and 2015). these initiatives could also be framed in terms of what terence turner calls ‘difference multiculturalism’ (turner 1993). the authors could have discussed islamic versions of multiculturalism and engaged in a dialogue with multicultural and critical multicultural citizenship education in international literature (al-haj and mielke 2007). this would have elaborated their discussion of the akp period. in sum, the book is a worthy contribution to the literature on citizenship education and it lays out solid arguments and insights for future research. by presenting differing perspectives, the book gives a glimpse into the complex power relations between internal and external agencies and positions in the case of turkey. hrer book and media reviews 86 as the authors note ‘…international education projects having the potential to interfere with the nation-state ideology needs strong political support and detailed planning and preparation in advance’ (p. s 81), as well as the participation of marginalized groups in the curriculum development process. i find this suggestion highly valuable for scholars of citizenship and human rights education and international agencies aiming to promote a democratic model. references al-haj, m. and mielke, r. (2007). education, multiculturalism and empowerment of minorities-an overview. in m. al-haj and r. mielke (eds.), cultural diversity and the empowerment of minorities. new york: berghahn books. kaya, a. (2013). multiculturalism and minorities in turkey. in r. taras (ed.), challenging multiculturalism: european models of diversity. edinburg: edinburg university press. kaya, a. (2015). islamization of turkey under the akp rule: empowering family, faith and charity. south european society and politics, 20(1), pp. 47-69. https://doi.org/10.1080/13608746.2014.979031 turner, t. (1993). anthropology and multiculturalism: what is anthropology that multiculturalists should be mindful for? cultural anthropology, 8(4), pp. 411-429. https://doi.org/10.1525/can.1993.8.4.02a00010 https://doi.org/10.1080/13608746.2014.979031 https://doi.org/10.1525/can.1993.8.4.02a00010 human rights education: a project for our common future volume 1, no 1 (2018) date of publication: 23-06-2018 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2805 issn 2535-5406 editorial human rights education: a project for our common future audrey osler editor-in-chief university of south-eastern norway, norway university of leeds, uk. a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2805 human rights education review 01 editorial human rights education: a project for our common future doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2805 issn 2535-5406 audrey osler editor-in-chief university of south-eastern norway, norway university of leeds, uk. a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk it is with great pleasure, and a considerable sense of anticipation, that the university of south-eastern norway is launching human rights education review. the university is building a body of expertise both in the fields of human rights and human rights education within and beyond the faculty of humanities, sports and educational science. it therefore seems particularly appropriate that human rights education should be the focus of the usn’s first open access scholarly journal. increasingly, scholars across the globe are seeking ways of sharing their research without the restrictive access generally imposed by the paywalls of scholarly journals. open access journals give us this freedom. paywalls not only work against the advancement of knowledge but may also serve to act against key human rights principles. we are therefore proud to host human rights education review as an open-access forum for debate and scholarship that is both critical and engaged. in 2010, i joined the team at the university of south-eastern norway to develop our international msc programme in human rights and multiculturalism. to date, we have seen around 100 students from all parts of the globe pass through our programme, which remains unique within europe in combining human rights teaching and learning, and multicultural perspectives within an interdisciplinary framework. a number of doctoral candidates are also working on human rightsbased research themes at usn and so it is perhaps only natural that our faculty should elect to support hrer as the university’s first open access, peer-reviewed scholarly journal. we hope that hrer will become a first port-of-call for scholars, students, and all those engaged in human rights education research and human rights-based teaching and learning. human rights education review aims to provide a forum for research and critical scholarship on human rights and diversity in education. the journal is dedicated to a critical examination of human rights education theory, philosophy, policy and praxis. hrer provides opportunities for scholars to contribute to debates and critical thinking in the expanding field of human rights education and addresses these fields as they relate to citizenship, identity and belonging. human rights education review seeks to fill a gap by providing a forum for scholarship that enables a critical analysis of human rights education. societal diversity generally enhances democratic practices (banks et al., 2005; parker, 2003) and, i contend, strengthens understandings of human rights. by promoting research that addresses both human rights and diversity in education, the aim is to shed new light on core political, economic and societal challenges facing teachers and learners. as the impact of globalization is felt at local, national, and international levels, so various actors, including those engaged in education policy and praxis, need to http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2805 human rights education review 02 respond to challenges posed by conflicts, economic disparities, migration and global inequalities. the increase in violence, racism, extremism, discrimination and intolerance demands an educational response. the roots of human rights education can be traced back over many centuries through efforts to promote human dignity, justice and freedom, and it is noteworthy that the modern human rights project envisioned education at its core. those who drafted the 1948 universal declaration of human rights (udhr) (un, 1948) recognised education as central to the realisation of justice and peace, and this vision has been encapsulated in subsequent human rights instruments. while the right to education articulated in article 26 of the udhr is broadly recognised, the right to human rights education which is also encapsulated in this article remains less familiar, even among education scholars. over the years, efforts to promote key human rights principles through education and awareness-raising projects have continued across the globe at grassroots level, as well as in schools and universities, often in response to authoritarian regimes. the field of work has expanded greatly from when i was first introduced to the concept of human rights education at a council of europe teachers’ seminar in denmark in 1986. the need for human rights education in the early decades of the twenty-first century is more widely recognised than in the more optimistic decades at the end of the twentieth century (ó cuanacháin, 2010). yet schooling has also frequently been used to undermine human solidarity and foster conflict and violence (harber, 2004). in the second decade of the twentyfirst century, parallels are being drawn between the current global political climate and that of the period preceding world war two, when authoritarian states sought to promote ethno-nationalism, conflict and hatred through education. struggles for justice remain diverse in their approaches, styles and orientation. likewise, education for human rights, justice and peace takes many forms. human rights education review welcomes contributions from a variety of disciplinary perspectives. the composition of our international editorial board, with scholars from africa, australasia, north america, latin america, and europe, reflects our aspiration to build theory and praxis from a global knowledge base. our inaugural issue this first issue of hrer brings together four invited peer-reviewed articles, together with a review article and two further book reviews. in calling for these four contributions, we were conscious of the need to strengthen and extend the field of human rights education, by mixing established scholars with new voices and provoking friendly challenges to human rights educators from those working in related fields. in the first paper in volume 1(1), walter c. parker offers one such challenge. focusing on the united states, he claims that human rights education curricula are ‘at best opaque and at worst under-developed’. he argues for a greater emphasis on powerful, disciplinary knowledge in schools that will extend students’ experiences and enable hre to realise its social justice mission and emancipatory promise. marta bivand erdal and mette strømsø report on research that sets out to explore students’ understandings of national belonging. their respondents are upper secondary school students in oslo, norway, where 33 per cent of the population are either immigrants or the children of immigrants. their paper seeks to explore the relationship between young people’s right to participate and the possibilities and human rights education review 03 limitations of schools that are engaged in a project of nation-building. they consider the implicit and explicit ways in which students and teachers engage in the production and reproduction of the nation. they identify concrete ways in which children’s human rights might be extended through the co-construction of national belonging in classrooms characterised by diversity, through processes that might eventually contribute to a more inclusive society and more inclusive conception of citizenship. in our third article in this edition of hrer, alicia muñoz ramírez reports on a very recent struggle between advocates for the development of democratic citizenship education and human rights education in twenty-first century spain and their opponents, led by neoconservative actors within the hierarchy of the spanish catholic church and society. the latter group eventually succeeded in removing education for citizenship and human rights from the spanish school curriculum. the relevance of this article extends way beyond spain, reflecting similar tensions and struggles in contemporary european societies and in nations much further afield. indeed, the spanish case also highlights elements of a much longer struggle, since 1789, between the power of institutional religion and secular rationality. in the final peer-reviewed article in this edition, sonja grover makes the case for a stronger focus on law within human rights education in schools. acknowledging current attempts to further child participation, she argues that education for civic engagement is insufficient. she proposes the study of child-led public litigation cases within the school curriculum, arguing that such study might more effectively support children in advancing their rights through the courts. she takes one such child-led case, addressing environmental protection, to illustrate her argument. human rights education is now recognised as a legitimate field of research. the four papers presented here illustrate diverse approaches to hre scholarship and research. they offer a critique of current practices and suggest alternative ways forward. the editors of hrer trust they may offer readers starting points for dialogue on education for justice in troubled times. together they highlight ways forward in reimagining our common future. acknowledgements the establishment of a new journal requires a great deal of dedication, hard work and support. the editors, ingrid reite christensen, audrey osler and ådne valensendstad, would like to thank the university of south-eastern norway’s (usn) library service and particularly frode bakken for support and guidance as we set out together on this learning journey at usn. we also acknowledge the valuable advice and technical support of trude eikebrokk and her team at oslo metropolitan university. we are grateful for the support and long-term commitment to this project shown by arild hovland, dean of the faculty of humanities, sports and educational science and tone strøm, head of the department of culture, religion and social studies at usn. importantly, we continue to draw on the advice, encouragement, and practical support of members of our wonderful international advisory board. david glass has provided us with invaluable behind-the-scenes professional support, as have a large number of anonymous reviewers. most importantly, our colleague and associate editor, gabriela mezzanotti, has been a hard-working anchor in this project, linking editors, copy editor, international board members, and many other colleagues to provide us with the most efficient, professional, courteous, and always human rights education review 04 smiling service. we look forward to the next stage of the journey and to marking the formal launch seminar of the journal on 26 september 2018 in drammen. references banks, j. a., mcgee banks, c. a., cortes, c. e., hahn, c. l., merryfield, m. m., moodley, k. a. …parker, w. c. (2005). democracy and diversity: principles and concepts for educating citizens in a global age. seattle, wa: university of washington, center for multicultural education. harber, c. (2004). schooling as violence: how schools harm pupils and societies. new york, ny: routledgefalmer. ó cuanacháin, c. (2010). preface, in osler, a. & starkey, h. teachers and human rights education. stoke-on-trent, uk: trentham, pp. xi – xiii. parker, w.c. (2003). teaching democracy: unity and diversity in public life. new york, ny: teachers college press. united nations (1948). universal declaration of human rights. retrieved 21.06.2018 from http://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/ http://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/ human rights education: a project for our common future human rights education: a project for our common future our inaugural issue acknowledgements human rights education’s curriculum problem volume 2, no 2 (2019) date of publication: 04-11-2019 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3570 issn 2535-5406 editorial networking to promote and transform human rights education audrey osler university of south-eastern norway, norway & university of leeds, uk. bjørn aksel flatås university of south-eastern norway, norway. sev ozdowski western sydney university, australia. audrey osler: a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk bjørn aksel flatås: bjorn.flatas@usn.no sev ozdowski: sevozdo@gmail.com http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3570 mailto:a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk mailto:bjorn.flatas@usn.no mailto:sevozdo@gmail.com human rights education review – volume 2(2) 2 editorial networking to promote and transform human rights education doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3570 issn 2535-5406 audrey osler university of south-eastern norway, norway & university of leeds, uk. bjørn aksel flatås university of south-eastern norway, norway. sev ozdowski western sydney university, australia. a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk bjorn.flatas@usn.no sevozdo@gmail.com we launched human rights education review in 2018 as part of a strategic initiative to strengthen human rights education (hre) teaching and research within higher education. while hre has taken place in faculties of law for many years, and while there has long been a range of journals in the field of human rights, at the time we planned the initiative there was no specialist journal that provided a home for interdisciplinary research at the intersection of human rights and education. today hrer is one of two new journals in this fast-developing field. we see hrer as not only providing a platform for research but also as a means by which hre researchers can network. as we celebrate the publication of volume 2 of the journal, we are also delighted to announce that the university of south-eastern norway (usn) is a leading partner, with university college london, institute of education, in a second initiative to support human rights education research. earlier this year, one of us, audrey osler, put forward a bid, with hugh starkey, a member of hrer’s international editorial advisory board, to the world education research association (wera) for an international research network (irn) in hre. the wera irn involves many of our editorial board members and other colleagues across the globe. our first task is to build an open access database of hre research, a project we are working on with usn librarians, to ensure that the database remains up-to-date and sustainable. hre is now firmly established in the academy. however, its roots are found not only in different countries’ law schools, but also in intergovernmental and nongovernmental organisations. this special edition of hrer comes directly from the 9th international conference on human rights education (ichre) at the university of western sydney and is a collaboration between hrer and the founding director of the annual ichre, sev ozdowski. the ichre is special; it is not an exclusively academic conference, but instead brings together human rights scholars and educators and participants who represent a wide range of non-governmental and inter-governmental organisations working in the field of human rights education. the ichre acknowledges that a clear linkage exists between the enforcement of human rights law and public opinion. it also acknowledges that promotion of human rights culture at the community level is of special importance, as human http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3570 mailto:a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk mailto:bjorn.flatas@usn.no mailto:sevozdo@gmail.com a. osler, b.a. flatås & s. ozdowski 3 rights standards are universal and apply to all peoples regardless of their culture, religion, gender or any other characteristic. the conferences also reflect a concern that many contemporary state actors are not doing enough to advance human rights culture. on the contrary, there seems to be a decline in investment in hre with national and international curricula, pedagogy and best practices in design and delivery falling behind. to enhance human rights culture and influence governmental human rights practices, it is necessary to win the hearts and minds of our fellow citizens. human rights must not only a matter of the letter of the law; they must be an expected standard of community behaviour. when international human rights standards are known to and internalised by local communities, they can become effective agents of change. in developing these conferences, sev ozdowski has put a focus on grass roots involvement, human diversity and the role played by concepts such as democracy, justice, and equality in the management of this diversity. the conferences aim to fundamentally reduce the disconnect between the abstract ideals of human rights treaties and principles, acknowledged at the level of the state, and the application of these ideals to everyday life at the community level. the ichre was established in 2010. the first conference was held in sydney, australia. since then, conferences have been held in south africa, poland, taiwan, usa, the netherlands, chile and canada. over the decade ichres were able to link international human rights standards with human rights defenders in local communities and contribute to the united nations effort to advance human rights education world-wide. in fact, the movement has grown stronger over the past decade and the conferences now bring together participants from all over the world. this year we will be celebrating a milestone in the social movement for human rights education with the 10th ichre being held in kathmandu, nepal in december 2019. the 9th ichre conference, unleashing the full potential of civil society, was held in sydney in 2018 and attracted some 500 participants. the conference celebrated the 70th anniversary of the universal declaration of human rights (un, 1948) and the 25th anniversary of the vienna declaration (ohchr, 1993), which highlighted the value of human rights education. the 2018 sydney ichre focused on the contributions made by human rights education in furthering democracy and the rule of law, as well as the promotion of intercultural dialogue, social harmony and justice. it recommended measures to strengthen human rights education for people everywhere. the resulting sydney declaration (western sydney university, undated) stressed that human rights are about empowerment; that all people’s voices are important; and that human rights education is not about preserving the status quo but about advancing towards a just and better society. a wide range of lively and engaging papers was presented at the sydney conference, and we have selected four submissions by conference presenters for this special edition of hrer. huong thi minh ngo presents hrer’s first paper from vietnam, discussing opportunities and constraints in addressing hre within vietnamese universities, specifically in the context of a one-party state where academic freedom is limited. she notes that the vietnamese government, having ratified a number of key international human rights instruments in the 1980s and having proclaimed moi doi (economic renovation) and introduced economic policies that promote global human rights education review – volume 2(2) 4 economic integration, is now approving human rights degree programmes. these new courses include both internationally agreed standards and the specific rights of vietnamese citizens. the paper reveals a number of strategies used by scholars to open up discussion of human rights within the universities, notably through the exploitation of internationalisation processes in which universities are engaging globally. effectively, they have created small spaces in which hre can occur within higher education, despite on-going restrictions on academic freedom. what is striking is the attention that this paper gives to unesco’s standards relating to the status of higher education teachers and researchers (unesco, 1974, 1997, 2017), standards that are less frequently referred to in established democracies where academic freedom has often been, until quite recently, taken for granted. these, standards, and other internationally agreed ones, are key instruments on which we can all draw, in an era where political authoritarianism appears to be gaining ground globally. we observe that academic freedom is increasingly debated and reviewed in a number of long-established democracies (karran & mallinson, 2019; williams, 2016). genevieve hall’s research takes us outside of the academy to consider how young activists engage in human rights learning. she examines factors that influence and motivate young adults to become activists, noting that they tend to explain their altruism and commitment by referencing family experiences rather than their schooling. nevertheless, peer education seems to be significant and it is through joining non-governmental organisations that human rights and political engagement develop. carmen huser’s paper discusses children’s participation rights, as outlined in the convention on the rights of the child (crc) (un, 1989). she recognises the crc as foundational for rights education and discusses how it can support children’s decision-making on matters concerning their own lives. her research explores 4-5year-olds’ perspectives on play in australian early childhood education settings and discusses ethical and methodological considerations informed by a children’s rightsbased epistemology, arguing that children are competent to reflect on and exercise their participation rights. her findings and discussion highlight ethical aspects of children’s choices to participate in research, including conditional assent, dissent, and their impact on research processes. the paper provides a welcome insight into the ways in which children choose to participate and proposes reflective questions for realising children’s participation rights. the paper concludes with implications for research that acknowledge children’s demonstration of their participation rights in a physical, creative, and social-emotional space. lynda-ann blanchard and mike nix introduce us to research as storytelling; they explore the possibilities and challenges of a ‘radical pedagogy’ through stories. the stories come from student voices taken from an international collaborative study entitled investigating diversity, human rights and civil society in japan and australia. they start with a pedagogical focus on students’ active learning about human rights, asking ‘what is human rights education?’ their study points towards a pedagogy wherein the conception of human rights education is dialogic, in which knowledge about human rights and diversity is negotiated, and where active learning requires active unlearning. blanchard and nix argue for a pedagogy with the potential to create conditions for more ethical relations between mainstream and marginalised groups. they aim to address otherness in human rights research. theirs a. osler, b.a. flatås & s. ozdowski 5 is a project that values relationship-building between academic institutions, civil society and community groups, and individuals. in putting together this special edition of hrer in collaboration with the 9th international conference on human rights education, we have extended the journal’s reach and opened a dialogue with researchers in vietnam and australia. the papers from huong thi minh ngo and from lynda-ann blanchard and mike nix highlight the very different contexts in which higher education takes place, where the terms ‘radical’ and ‘innovative’ may describe very different practices in different socio-political situations. when we set these accounts of hre practices in higher education alongside genevieve hall’s research into human rights learning in ngos, we are reminded not only of hre’s diverse roots but also that the possibilities for transformative human rights learning when learners take greater control over learning processes. these three papers address the experiences of adult learners, and present research on adult learners. carmen huser’s research, by illustrating the possibilities of engaging young children in research processes, raises ethical questions not only for researchers working with this age group, but also for anyone who wants to challenge asymmetrical power relations in teaching and research. references karran, t. & mallinson, l. (2019). academic freedom and world-class universities: a virtuous circle? higher education policy, 32(3), 397-417. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41307-018-0087-7 office of the high commissioner for human rights (1993). vienna declaration and programme of action. adopted by the world conference on human rights in vienna, 25 june. https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/vienna.aspx united nations (1948, december 10). universal declaration of human rights. general assembly resolution 217 a. https://www.un.org/en/universaldeclaration-human-rights/ unesco (1974, november). recommendation on the status of scientific researchers. retrieved 01.10.2019 from http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.phpurl_id=13131&url_do=do_topic&url_section=201.html unesco (1997, november 11). recommendation concerning the status of higher education teaching personnel. retrieved 01.10.2019 from http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.phpurl_id=13144&url_do=do_topic&url_section=201.html unesco (2017). recommendation on the status of scientific researchers. retrieved 01.10.2019 from https://en.unesco.org/themes/ethics-science-andtechnology/recommendation_science western sydney university. (undated). sydney declaration on human rights education. retrieved 31.10.2019 from https://www.westernsydney.edu.au/equity_diversity/equity_and_diversity/confer ences/international_human_rights_education_conferences https://doi.org/10.1057/s41307-018-0087-7 https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/vienna.aspx https://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/ https://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/ http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.php-url_id=13131&url_do=do_topic&url_section=201.html http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.php-url_id=13131&url_do=do_topic&url_section=201.html http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.php-url_id=13144&url_do=do_topic&url_section=201.html http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.php-url_id=13144&url_do=do_topic&url_section=201.html https://en.unesco.org/themes/ethics-science-and-technology/recommendation_science https://en.unesco.org/themes/ethics-science-and-technology/recommendation_science https://www.westernsydney.edu.au/equity_diversity/equity_and_diversity/conferences/international_human_rights_education_conferences https://www.westernsydney.edu.au/equity_diversity/equity_and_diversity/conferences/international_human_rights_education_conferences human rights education review – volume 2(2) 6 williams, j. (2016). from academic freedom to academic justice. in academic freedom in an age of conformity: confronting the fear of knowledge (pp. 175-94). london, uk: palgrave macmillan. editorial networking to promote and transform human rights education a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk bjorn.flatas@usn.no sevozdo@gmail.com references volume 3, no 1 (2020) date of publication 23-06-2020 doi:http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3921 issn 2535-5406 editorial human rights education, covid19 and the politics of hope audrey osler university of south-eastern norway, norway & university of leeds, uk. christian stokke university of south-eastern norway, norway. audrey osler: a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk christian stokke: christian.stokke@usn.no http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3921 mailto:a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk mailto:christian.stokke@usn.no human rights education review – volume 3(1) 2 editorial human rights education, covid19 and the politics of hope doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3921 issn 2535-5406 audrey osler university of southeastern norway, norway & university of leeds, uk. christian stokke university of southeastern norway, norway. a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk christian.stokke@usn.no this volume of human rights education review has been edited while living under lockdown, with europe for many weeks at the epicentre of the coronavirus pandemic. as members of the editorial team responded to the new challenges we (and many of our readers) faced, such as balancing home working with home schooling, indefinite separation from friends and family members, and having to search for basic foodstuffs, we have had time to reflect on many of the rights and freedoms we often take for granted. our editorial meetings have been more frequent, and topics of conversation have extended beyond the journal to include discussion of the ways various governments have responded to the crisis, and, in some cases, taken advantage of the emergency to strengthen their own powers. this is an important moment to reflect on the aims and approaches in educating for human rights. as we put this volume together, the black lives matter protests are catching the attention of the world’s media. protests were sparked by video footage of the death of george floyd, an african american, who was arrested and handcuffed, before being held to the ground by a white police officer kneeling on his neck. floyd’s death in minneapolis, minnesota on 25 may 2020 has led to protests across the us and the rest of the world against police brutality and structural racism. these protests, in large part by young people, not only express solidarity with african american citizens but are also part of a wider call for racial justice across nations and for concrete steps to overcome centuries-old inequalities that persist into the present. these inequalities have been exacerbated and illustrated by racial disparities in the death toll of the pandemic: the coronavirus has killed black and latino people in new york at twice the rate of white people (mays & newman, 2020), and black and asian people in britain at twice the rate of whites (mueller, 2020). the pandemic is having a disproportionate economic impact on the poorest people in rich nations. more than 40 million people in the united states (one in four workers) have registered for unemployment benefits since the pandemic took hold in mid-march (cohen, 2020). at the same time, it threatens the lives and livelihoods of those in lower income countries that lack adequate health services. in the uk, where there is long-standing evidence of health inequalities by ethnicity (nazroo, 2011), and where health workers of colour have faced an especially heavy death toll in the pandemic 1 , there have been angry but largely peaceful protests across the country. in what many see as a symbolic step in the antiracist struggle, black lives matter protestors in bristol tore down a statue of 17th century slave trader edward colston2, and threw it into the harbour (bbc news, 2020). http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3921 a. osler & c. stokke 3 despite past and present injustices, what is perhaps surprising about the black lives matter protests is that despite the deep hurt, anger and awareness of past struggles, there is a sense of hope shared by many protesters and their supporters that this time their efforts will be effective. this sense of hope has been powerfully expressed by many young people (new york times, 2020). while hope alone, in the face of injustice, is insufficient to enable change, it may go a long way to sustain those who are struggling for justice. as us activist and filmmaker bree newsome bass3 eloquently argues, there are key moments in human history when people effect change through protest: there are times when the law itself is unjust and we cannot wait on the elected officials, on the very people who are perpetuating the injustice and that’s why we resort to civil disobedience and protest to challenge what we consider to be unjust law. symbolic actions carry great power, but they need to be matched by the hard and continuous work of what newsome bass calls ‘making it real’. she concludes: ’i’m hoping it will end in transformation… that we really set about the work of making a human rights-based democracy a reality’ (channel 4 news, 2020). a key part of this ongoing yet urgent work is education. human rights education (hre) is a long-term and continuous work of ‘making it real’ and realising justice in our neighbourhoods, nations and world. hre can contribute to a politics of hope. educators and activists seek to inspire hope by increasing knowledge and awareness of human rights. educators can also promote hope by equipping their students with the experiences, skills and attitudes to stand up for their rights and the rights of our fellow humanity. they can prepare them to be effective citizens, prepared to show solidarity with those whose rights are denied and to engage in struggles for justice. in this sense, hre is not neutral but concerned with enabling citizens to adhere to a ‘principle [that] recognizes our responsibilities to others across difference, at local national and global scales’ (osler, 2016, p. 29). so, what is required is not a lesson on black lives matter, but a curriculum and a school that clearly demonstrates this, consistently and continually. only then will schools be fulfilling their obligation, under the convention on the rights of the child (united nations, 1989), to guarantee students’ right to an intercultural education (grover, 2007; osler & pandur, 2019). the four articles in this volume illustrate ways in which individuals and school systems, governments and cultural organisations are contributing to a culture of human rights, and ways in which they need to change to enable that culture. they address diverse settings in europe and brazil. carole hahn opens with ‘human rights teaching: snapshots from four countries’, a comparative, qualitative study of practices in selected schools and classrooms in denmark, germany, the netherlands and the uk. the research confirms research elsewhere in europe, and reported in this journal (e.g. vesterdal, 2019), of a tendency to teach about violations of rights in the global south but to emphasise constitutional guarantees of rights at home. she found that opportunities to practice skills to defend rights at various scales from the local to the global were more limited. interestingly, given that hahn sought to include students from migrant backgrounds, there did not appear to be significant opportunities to explore how, regardless of legal or constitutional guarantees, certain groups of citizens may encounter challenges in realising equality under the human rights education review – volume 3(1) 4 law, or ways of securing justice for all. hahn observed that students appeared to experience respect for their human rights within the community of the school, through decision-making processes and classroom practices. in his paper, ‘learning to belong: an analysis of germany’s migrant orientation programme from an hre perspective’, nicholas stone critically analyses whether this programme for refugees is consistent with human rights education principles. stone considers the possible intended and unintended messages the german migrant orientation programme may convey. he analyses potential tensions between the integration programme’s explicit aim to teach national values to immigrants, and the role of human rights education in empowering migrants to challenge discrimination and majority bias. he further considers how state-run orientation programmes might in future be made more empowering to participants. in the third article addressing a european context, stefan kucharczyk and helen hanna turn to much younger learners. their paper, ‘balancing teacher power and children’s rights: rethinking the use of picturebooks in multicultural primary schools in england’, adopts an auto-ethnographic approach, to investigate their own teaching practices and the ways in which children empathise and identify with characters in picture books. they discuss the professional responsibilities of the teacher in giving direction to learning processes and the tensions between these responsibilities and those of respecting children’s freedom of thought and freedom of expression. in their analysis, kucharczyk and hanna draw connections between children’s rights, multicultural education and concepts from critical literacy theory. in the fourth and final article in this volume, ‘art, human rights activism and a pedagogy of sensibility: the são paulo human rights short films festivalentretodos’, eduardo bittar explores the intersection between art and human rights community awareness. bittar presents an empirical study of human rights film festivals in são paulo, brazil, where there has been political resistance to advances in human rights culture. from this empirical context, he moves to a philosophical exploration of the relationship between art, emancipation, citizenship and human rights education. he concludes that what he terms a pedagogy of sensibility can contribute to public education in human rights education, as part of municipal policy. we trust this volume will generate debate about human rights education in its various forms and about the relationship between education, art and activism. finally, we wish to take this opportunity to thank our colleague managing editor dr marta stachurska-kounta who has played a key role in the development of hrer over the past two years. not only has marta proved to be an outstanding managing editor but she has also taken on a range of other roles, including standing in as editor and, more recently, as book and media reviews editor, when colleagues have been on leave. although marta is leaving the university of south-eastern norway this month, we are pleased to report that hrer is not losing her expertise. we are pleased to welcome her to the international editorial advisory board. a. osler & c. stokke 5 notes 1 of 106 cases of health and social care worker deaths from coronavirus, traced by clinicians up until 22 april 2020, 63 per cent were from black and ethnic minority backgrounds. people from these backgrounds form just 21 per cent of the workforce (cook, kursumovic & lennane, 2020). 2 the statue had become highly controversial in recent decades but a petition to remove it had been disregarded. 3 in 2015 bree newsome engaged in an act of civil disobedience by scaling the 30 foot flagpole in the grounds of the south carolina state house to bring down the confederate flag (a symbol of division and racism), an act for which she was arrested and imprisoned. human rights education review – volume 3(1) 6 references bbc news. (2020, june 8). george floyd death: protesters tear down slave trader statue. retrieved from https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-52954305 channel 4 news. (2020, june 8). ‘churchill took stand against fascism but was also a great proponent of colonialism’film-maker and activist bree newsome bass. interview by presenter matt frei. channel 4 news. retrieved from https://www.channel4.com/news/churchill-took-stand-against-fascismbut-was-also-great-proponent-of-colonialism-film-maker-and-activist-breenewsome-bass cohen, p. (2020, may 28). ‘still catching up’: jobless numbers may not tell full story. new york times. retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/28/business/economy/coronavirusunemployment-claims.html cook, t., kursumovic, e. & lennane, s. (2020, april 22). exclusive: deaths of nhs staff from covid-19 analysed. hsj. retrieved from https://www.hsj.co.uk/exclusive-deaths-of-nhs-staff-from-covid-19analysed/7027471.article grover, s. (2007). children’s right to be educated for tolerance: minority right and inclusion. education and the law, 19(1), 59-70. https://doi.org/10.1080/09539960701231272 mays, j.c. & newman, a. (2020, april 8). virus is twice as deadly for black and latino people than whites in n.y.c. new york times. retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/08/nyregion/coronavirus-racedeaths.html mueller, b. (2020, may 7). coronavirus killing black britons at twice the rate of whites. new york times. retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/07/world/europe/coronavirus-ukblack-britons.html nazroo, j.y. (2003). the structuring of ethnic inequalities in health: economic position, racial discrimination, and racism. american journal of public health, 93(2), 277-284. https://doi.org/10.2105/ajph.93.2.277 new york times. (2020, june 4). what students are saying about the george floyd protests. retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/04/learning/what-students-aresaying-about-the-george-floyd-protests.html osler, a. (2016). human rights and schooling: an ethical framework for teaching for social justice. new york, ny: teachers college press. osler, a. & pandur, i.h. (2019). the right to intercultural education: students’ perspectives on schooling and opportunities for reconciliation through multicultural engagement in bosnia and herzegovina. intercultural education, 30(6), 658-679. https://doi.org/10.1080/14675986.2019.1626576 united nations (1989). convention on the rights of the child. retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-52954305 https://www.channel4.com/news/churchill-took-stand-against-fascism-but-was-also-great-proponent-of-colonialism-film-maker-and-activist-bree-newsome-bass https://www.channel4.com/news/churchill-took-stand-against-fascism-but-was-also-great-proponent-of-colonialism-film-maker-and-activist-bree-newsome-bass https://www.channel4.com/news/churchill-took-stand-against-fascism-but-was-also-great-proponent-of-colonialism-film-maker-and-activist-bree-newsome-bass https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/28/business/economy/coronavirus-unemployment-claims.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/28/business/economy/coronavirus-unemployment-claims.html https://www.hsj.co.uk/exclusive-deaths-of-nhs-staff-from-covid-19-analysed/7027471.article https://www.hsj.co.uk/exclusive-deaths-of-nhs-staff-from-covid-19-analysed/7027471.article https://doi.org/10.1080/09539960701231272 https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/08/nyregion/coronavirus-race-deaths.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/08/nyregion/coronavirus-race-deaths.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/07/world/europe/coronavirus-uk-black-britons.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/07/world/europe/coronavirus-uk-black-britons.html https://doi.org/10.2105/ajph.93.2.277 https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/04/learning/what-students-are-saying-about-the-george-floyd-protests.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/04/learning/what-students-are-saying-about-the-george-floyd-protests.html https://doi.org/10.1080/14675986.2019.1626576 https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx a. osler & c. stokke 7 vesterdal, k. (2019). championing human rights close to home and far away: human rights education in light of national identity construction and foreign policy in norway. human rights education review, 2(1), 5-24. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2907 https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2907 whose rights are they? social justice, hre discourse, and the politics of knowledge volume 1, no 1 (2018) date of publication: 23-06-2018 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2495 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews whose rights are they? social justice, hre discourse, and the politics of knowledge osler, a. (2016). human rights and schooling: an ethical framework for teaching for social justice. new york, ny: teachers college press. 177 pp., us$39.95 (paperback) isbn-13: 978-0-8077-5676-8; us$ 88.00 (hardcover) isbn: 9780807756775; $40.95 (ebook) isbn: 9780807773925. coysh, j. (2017). human rights education and the politics of knowledge. new york, ny: routledge. 201 pp., us$145.00 (hardback) isbn-13: 978-1138779112; us$ 49.46 (ebook) isbn-10: 978-1315769493. reviewed by matthew j. hayden, drake university, usa. petra lange, valley high school, usa. http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2495 hrer book and media reviews 84 book and media reviews whose rights are they? social justice, hre discourse, and the politics of knowledge doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2495 issn 2535-5406 osler, a. (2016). human rights and schooling: an ethical framework for teaching for social justice. new york, ny: teachers college press. 177 pp., us$39.95 (paperback) isbn-13: 978-0-8077-5676-8; us$ 88.00 (hardcover) isbn: 9780807756775; $40.95 (ebook) isbn: 9780807773925. coysh, j. (2017). human rights education and the politics of knowledge. new york, ny: routledge. 201 pp., us$145.00 (hardback) isbn-13: 978-1138779112; us$ 49.46 (ebook) isbn-10: 978-1315769493. reviewed by matthew j. hayden drake university, usa. matthew.hayden@drake.edu petra lange valley high school, usa. petra.lange@drake.edu whether you peg the inception of human rights education (hre) with the universal declaration of human rights in 1948, the unesco associated schools program in 1953, or the beginning of the un decade for human rights education in 1995, as a formalized construct hre is not very old. it is, however, old enough to have a history and inheritance of ideas that can be transformed or critiqued. audrey osler has attempted the former and joanne coysh the latter in recent books that offer teachers, teacher-educators, and scholars new ways to think about hre and its practices. osler rethinks the practice of hre for social justice within contemporary conceptions of human rights and cosmopolitan citizenship, while coysh asks us to critically reexamine what we think we know about hre and the dominant discourse that produces it. the authors share a concern about the ways in which hre is conceived and delivered and, although they have different lenses, they share the same ultimate goal: a world in which human rights are realized and distributed globally. audrey osler’s human rights and schooling: an ethical framework for teaching for social justice blends human rights education and social justice pedagogy, with the aim of supporting teacher educators and secondary instructors interested in framing their work around equity and inclusion. osler provides educators with resources, instructional strategies, and reflective tools; these can be used to supplement the curriculum by linking its content to human rights. alternately, her framework could be used to entirely restructure a course, making it possible for human rights to become the backbone of coursework. throughout the text, she communicates the urgency of examining human rights as they pertain to education, in an effort to bridge the chasm that often exists when comparing local and global rights issues. by illustrating the connection between civil rights and human rights, using the universal declaration of human rights (udhr) and the un convention on the rights of the http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2495 mailto:matthew.hayden@drake.edu hrer book and media reviews 85 child (crc) as her foundations, osler demonstrates how a cosmopolitan perspective strengthens local social justice work in education. osler frequently asserts that schools have a responsibility to educate teachers and students about human rights, using examples from iraq, norway, china, england, south korea, and the united states. the stories from each of these countries demonstrate how marginalized people, even in respectively prosperous nations, still struggle for education rights. osler explains that a focus on human rights in education is not only a matter of equal access to education for all students. she also emphasizes the importance of teaching about human rights so that students can advocate them for themselves, their communities, and others in countries they have not yet visited. osler is consistent about the need for hre to also include education through and for human rights, but hre about human rights seems to take a more primary role, or at least it is a prerequisite for the others. this emphasis can leave one hoping for more ideas about how to build advocacy skills. to provide a vision for this work in the classroom, osler illustrates a pedagogical pathway to connect individual students to local civil rights issues, and then to global human rights issues. for example, she suggests that students connect the analysis of narratives from people who suffer human rights violations in other countries with their own, personal written narratives. this will aid students to identify the significance of the rights they might already enjoy, and also help them to understand how important it is to support the rights of others. osler claims that writing narratives enables students to make connections between their daily lived experiences and a more idealized vision of human rights. this connection between local and global analyses of rights serves as a lesson in living in an interconnected world and provides the opportunity to uncover rights violations that might exist in local neighborhoods. the juxtaposition of stories originating from different examples of injustice around the world illuminates the vital relationship between education and action and motivates students to examine steps to respond to acts of discrimination and bigotry. while osler uses several relevant instructional strategies to illustrate the paramount work of human rights education, the instructional approach where students ’examined ethical dilemmas and imperfect solutions faced by historical figures struggling for justice, allowing them to consider the (unintended) consequences of decision making’ (p. 47) creates the opportunity to study social justice content while also exploring and evaluating the responsibility to participate in social justice movements. however, this example also raises a problem often cited in research into moral education: on the one hand, classroom dilemmas can help us understand our own thinking and what the stakes are, but, on the other hand, it is not always possible to know when we are actually faced with a dilemma in our lived lives; many of them are just a part of our day. perhaps a first step would be to help students develop the skills to recognize those dilemmas when they arise. osler connects global issues to local problems. this approach opens up opportunities for students, teachers, or administrators to reflect on their own practices, and workshop-ready checklists and appendices are provided. for instance, osler’s inclusion of tomasevski’s ’the 4 as of the right to education’ provides a lens through which schools can be evaluated on their success in providing adequate opportunities for education. her survey, ’does your school environment give everyone a chance to enjoy their rights?’ may help to pinpoint areas that need attention in order to overcome violations of students’ and teachers’ rights, and directly connects these rights to the articles in the un convention on the rights of hrer book and media reviews 86 the child. these resources are not definitively diagnostic, but may help teachers discover points of entry for dialogue with their students in relation to their students’ local circumstances. while this book is useful for educators in the field of social sciences and history, literature and language arts instructors could find her work insightful, too, particularly in the analysis of the power structures that are embedded in human rights accords. these are documents that serve not only the disenfranchised but also nation-states that advance their own agendas. her emphasis on the analysis of rhetoric to examine the positions of both speaker and audience lends itself to the critical thinking necessary in social justice education. osler’s arguments would have been strengthened had these power structures been examined in more detail, and they could have served as an example for educators of international baccalaureate middle years or diploma programmes who might benefit from using this text as a starting place for interdisciplinary work, or even as content in a theory of knowledge course. the multifarious applications of this text are what make it a valuable contribution to the field of social justice education. osler’s work situates hre around local and national social justice movements that can be strengthened with the international support of human rights, but through its cosmopolitan framework such hre also creates opportunities to empower students to advocate for the rights of friends, family, and strangers. in joanne coysh’s critique of human rights education, human rights education and the politics of knowledge, the primary institutions (i.e. the united nations, unesco) and distributors (ngos) of hre are accused of producing and distributing a narrowly constructed hegemonic discourse that serves to reproduce its knowledge through predetermined facts of human rights that are then consumed by target populations in a way that preserves the discourse and the knowledge it contains. this narrow construction ensures the survival of hre knowledge creators and distributors, but does not always benefit the consumers of hre. coysh devotes the first half of the text to a survey of contemporary hre as instantiated by both global institutions and hre practitioners, focusing primarily on the dominant discourses therein. coysh then devotes the second half of her book to explicating the role that discourse plays in real-world contexts. coysh’s critique is decidedly postmodern and follows foucault’s critique that institutions control discourses to regulate and control society, not only through words and text, but in social practice and interaction. as a result, in hre the focus is on the practices and conditions of hre instead of institutions and theories that produce it. additional theoretical support is drawn from gramsci and freire (among others) and applied to hre in relatively familiar ways: international institutions such as the united nations and human rights ngos define and determine hre knowledge and practices and apply them to target populations (usually poor and marginalized) that fit the parameters of funder priorities; these target populations are required to hrer book and media reviews 87 engage in hre by utilizing relevant local contexts that can be understood through the use of the institutionally-determined hre language. the book provides a number of examples of this process; for example, a targeted population’s local, contextual knowledge and understandings of human rights will be replaced by the prevailing definitions and knowledge of the dominant hre discourse. coysh highlights three problems with the global model of hre: human rights are presented as self-evident, relevant, and applicable; institutional knowledge of human rights is positioned as neutral, universal, and non-hegemonic; and hre is disconnected from history, culture, or community and presented as factual truth. as a result, hre discourses reproduce social structures and hierarchies instead of reconstructing social relations. for instance, coysh states that common debates about universalism v. culture are a distraction from dealing with issues of how power produces knowledge and how knowledge produces power. coysh then offers a framework by and through which to view the field of hre. this has four distinct orientations: technical, interpretive, critical, and counterhegemonic. after describing the characteristics and manifestations of each, coysh shows how the technical orientation, and the specific discourse it maintains, dominates hre. the primary characteristics of the technical orientation are not too dissimilar from those of positivist perspectives: knowledge is objective and neutral and thus transcends social realities; knowledge is limited to pre-existing concepts and facts that can be operationalized to retain their meanings in application; and this knowledge is grounded by its universality. a consequence of this orientation is that human rights are understood and presented as facts, facts presumed to be true, and as such, are ready-made for what coysh calls ’hre as transmission’. readers familiar with freire and the ‘banking’ model of education, especially educators working from a constructivist perspective, will quickly apprehend coysh’s thrust here and can anticipate the problems to be found in an education of transmission. coysh argues that local participants in hre are not able to construct their human rights knowledge, but are instead asked to internalize the definitions and meanings imparted to them, and then they must translate their contexts into that language, thus undermining their own knowledge and narrowly constraining the possibilities of their education for human rights. coysh’s strongest critique is directed towards the technical orientation, and she analyses this dominant (technical) discourse in hre, as found in international texts, language, practice, and mechanisms of human rights. all of these flow from the human rights definitions and standards that are articulated in un documents and communicated through ngos. hre is distributed by these ngos through a process coysh calls ’cultural translation’, wherein hre is framed through an interpretive set of core ideas of hr, adapted to the local structures in the local context; the target population is redefined in terms of that reconstructed context. while we found this argument persuasive, we were disappointed that the critique was not more consistently extended to the other three orientations. given the intuitive and familiar forms of the argument against the technical orientation, greater reference to the other orientations would have offered both a better balance and a more robust, comprehensive critique. for instance, we found ourselve paging back to the explanantions of the critical orientation while reading the final chapters, since many of the characteristics of that orientation find expression in coysh’s transformative praxis. more explicit attention to the critical orientation would have better prepared the reader for the key role it plays in her conception of transformative praxis. hrer book and media reviews 88 coysh analyzes the production, distribution, and consumption of hre and concludes that while hre has been viewed as a means to empowerment, it usually involves bringing people into the hre context as ’subjects’ and framing local contexts in terms of the dominant discourse. this reinforces the technical orientation of hre, reproducing its ‘relevance’ in ongoing and future contexts. for example, the populations most frequently targeted for hre are often poor and rural, lacking access to basic services, and strongly adhering to cultural traditions and beliefs. the assumption is that these people do not know their human rights and need hre. the knowledge of ordinary local people is discounted ’until…it is translated into the language of human rights’ (p. 155). thus, the language of empowerment through hre merely becomes a way to relocate disadvantaged persons within the predominant hierarchies and social order in which they live. coysh argues that a more critical approach to hre is required in order to engage with the poor and marginalized as equal knowledge-holders instead of as beneficiaries. coysh does recognize that for many targeted populations, being able to reference un documents as sources of legitimacy for specific human rights can offer both a quicker path to justification and a ‘validated authority’ for it. however, we believe coysh gives this perspective too little credit as an option for marginalized populations. the extent to which a marginalized population must ‘play the game’ of the hegemonic power is arguable and it is not clear in coysh’s argument whether such realities ‘on the ground’ are ever justification enough for co-opting the dominant global hre discourse in legitimate and substantive service of local concerns. coysh concludes the book with suggestions for the future development of hre; namely, that hre be conceived as transformative praxis wherein hre discourse is reframed to involve dialogue without agenda or purpose in order to understand the meaning of what others say, rather than to advance or win an argument. such a form of discourse would, coysh argues, allow people to reassert local forms of knowledge and reclaim their right to define their rights. coysh’s critique finds fertile purchase as a companion text to osler’s. osler provides a rich, comprehensive, and ambitious plan for social justice through hre, one thoroughly embedded in and anchored to the dominant hre discourse that is the concern of coysh. for example, when osler connects civil rights and human rights by referring to the udhr and the crc , she draws a straight line from those international governing institutions and practices to hre development and distribution. that osler uses hre (and its attendant dominant discourse) to then situate social justice education underscores coysh’s point that local contexts are required to translate themselves into the dominant discourse rather than vice versa. coysh’s postmodern critique and osler’s cosmopolitan philosophical grounding provide an instant and identifiable opposition: their theoretical positions stand in stark contrast, though their aims are similar. more significantly, osler’s cosmopolitan perspective situates the individual as a cosmopolitan citizen on a planet of nation-states. she outlines the key concepts of the udhr as she describes the cosmopolitan citizen, and universality plays a significant role. for osler, a cosmopolitan citizen is a producer, distributor, and consumer of human rights for all, and a shared conception of human rights is required to educate that citizen. her path is clear: unite all under a shared conception in order for that conception to become the reality that is sought. while it is unclear whether or not coysh would attempt to block osler’s vision, she would most certainly hrer book and media reviews 89 problematize the conception of a ’shared conception’ as flawed, incomplete, and (probably) irrelevant in many specific locations and contexts. instead, à la freire, coysh would most likely support a global network of rights interlocutors or facilitators, engaging local populations in dialogue with each other, defining and contextualizing their needs and desires in their languages and words vis-à-vis generative themes, and operationalizing them for their contexts. the primary challenge for the reader of these two books is to decide whose recommendations make the most sense for their purposes or contexts. both provide a prescription of sorts: osler through hre for human rights and coysh through transformative praxis; and both recognize that this process is political. for example, osler suggests using contemporary examples of educational disparities or flows of stateless or displaced persons to help students come to understand the role their actions or inactions play in supporting or abridging the rights of others. coysh envisions a rich, local dialog among freely acting persons deliberating together to propose solutions to problems in their lives that they would then enact. the former uses existing conceptions of human rights and the means and levers to achieve them, while the latter uses local knowledge and experiences to decide which rights are needed and how to achieve them. this difference illuminates each author’s preferred mechanisms as well as their (desired) sources of hre knowledge. in many ways the choice can also come down to one’s philosophical position on the possibility of globally-realized human rights for all. should one use the pre-existing and centralized conceptions of hre as the dominant discourse in order to effect change, however limited, in the systems we have? or is it time to reject that dominant discourse, in order to create more organic means to the same end? whose rights are they? social justice, hre discourse, and the politics of knowledge issn 2535-5406 145 reviewer acknowledgements the editors would like to thank the following colleagues for the time and careful attention given to manuscripts they reviewed for volume 3 of hrer. anamika university of delhi, india bassel akar notre dame university, lebanon theresa alviar-martin kennesaw state university, usa kathy bickmore university of toronto, canada alison clark university of south-eastern norway, norway barbara comber university of south australia, australia margaret smith crocco columbia university, usa ian davies university of york, uk yvonne donders university of amsterdam, the netherlands kjersti draugedalen university of south-eastern norway, norway ally dunhill independent scholar, uk judith dunkerly-bean old dominion university, usa stener ekern, university of oslo, norway nancy flowers human rights educators, usa hrer acknowledgements 146 biljana culibrk fredriksen university of south-eastern norway, norway tony gallagher queen's university belfast, uk javier garcia oliva university of manchester, uk ian hamilton equitas, canada clive harber university of birmingham, uk lisa hartley curtin university, australia carmen huser charles sturt university, australia jonas gamborg lillebø volda university college, norway laura lundy queen's university belfast, uk line jenssen university of south-eastern norway, norway agreement lahti jotia university of botswana, botswana patrick kermit norwegian university of science and technology, norway julia köhler-olsen oslo metropolitan university, norway patricia kubow indiana university bloomington, usa kjartan skogly kversøy oslo metropolitan university, norway claudia lenz norwegian school of theology, religion and society, norway hrer book and media reviews 147 anja mihr humboldt-viadrina governance platform, germany laura quaynor johns hopkins university, usa bodil rasmusson university of lund, sweden francisco rios western washington university, usa lucy royal-dawson ulster university, united kingdom kirsti rudelius-palmer university of minnesota, usa carol robinson edge hill university, uk garnett russell columbia university, usa josefine scherling viktor frankl hochshule, austria farzana shain goldsmiths, university of london, uk sandra sirota university of connecticut, usa marta stachurska-kounta university of agder, norway hugh starkey university college london, uk shirley steinberg university of calgary, canada sonia tascon university of western sydney, australia leon tikly university of bristol, uk hrer acknowledgements 148 audun toft university of south-eastern norway, norway katherine weare university of southampton, uk elsie whittington manchester metropolitan university, uk yuwei xu university college london, uk volume 4, no 1 (2021) date of publication: 28-01-21 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4057 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews realising effective human rights education and safeguarding the young struthers, a. e. c. (2020). teaching human rights in primary schools: overcoming the barriers to effective practice. routledge, london & new york. 244 pp., us$112.98125.18 (hardcover) isbn-13: 978-1138706606; us$ 9.21-48.95 (kindle) isbn10:1138706604 reviewed by kjersti draugedalen tønsberg municipality and university of south-eastern norway, norway. kjersti draugedalen: kjersti.draugedalen@tonsberg.kommune.no http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4057 mailto:kjersti.draugedalen@tonsberg.kommune.no hrer book and media reviews 138 book and media reviews realising effective human rights education and safeguarding the young doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4057 issn 2535-5406 struthers, a. e. c. (2020). teaching human rights in primary schools: overcoming the barriers to effective practice. routledge, london & new york. 244 pp., us$112.98125.18 (hardcover) isbn-13: 978-1138706606; us$ 9.21-48.95 (kindle) isbn10:1138706604 reviewed by kjersti draugedalen tønsberg municipality and university of south-eastern norway, norway. kjersti.draugedalen@tonsberg.kommune.no teaching human rights in primary schools, written by alison struthers, is in many ways a comprehensive introduction to the field of human rights education (hre) and its tripartite components; education about, through and for human rights. struthers starts off by providing an extensive and holistic understanding of the urgency of such education through a detailed overview of the international legal framework and commitments, as well as international and regional soft law initiatives that together make up the theoretical foundation for hre. the author proceeds to contextualise these international obligations by using the case study of one country, systematically analysing england’s past and present developments of formulated education policies in light of the international commitments the country has signed up to. struthers does this in order to detect whether hre features in policy documents related to education. thereafter, she introduces her own research on primary school teachers in england, presenting her findings in the terms of hre’s tripartite structure. through three consecutive chapters, struthers presents teachers’ perspectives on their teaching about, through and for human rights education, and identifies in each chapter the specific barriers to effective practice of hre. finally, the author provides concrete recommendations for improving hre practice in primary schools, as well as pointing out the systemic and structural premises which need to be in place for a transformation of the education system. thus, the book offers a unique overview of the true purpose of human rights education in relation to children and young people, and provides compelling theoretical and empirical evidence for a transformation of primary education. the thorough presentation of the tripartite structure of hre, and how it should be implemented, offers teachers a solid and bold rationale for a executing a more critical education which can empower learners with the knowledge, attitudes and competence to actively take part in shaping their schools, and societies. as pointed out by struthers’ informants, teachers need to be supported by systemic structures that give legitimacy to a more learner-focused classroom for change to take place. this book will contribute to this legitimacy by offering teachers support and inspiration in creating a more socially just classroom practice. effective hre can also play an important part in safeguarding children and young people. http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4057 hrer book and media reviews 139 struthers makes the point that teachers often avoid teaching controversial topics because they are afraid of exposing children to harsh realities, and that they often use developmental theories when arguing that children are not mature enough to discuss abstract and complex issues. this type of rationale is sometimes also used as an explanation for not teaching young children about violence and abuse. a similar pattern is detected with teachers’ convictions about participation and pupil voice, and the degree to which it is practiced struthers reveals that teachers are afraid of losing control and of dissent. the author notes that teachers’ understandings of human rights are often influenced by the media and popular culture’s polarising portrayals and not by proper sources. as a consequence, their reservations prevent them from teaching about human rights and taking a stand against injustice. these are indeed serious revelations that ought to be a concern for governing bodies and policy makers who are responsible for the actual direction and mandate of education, both in england and elsewhere. as noted by struthers, the findings from england may not be unique for that country and may have transfer value to other european nations. recent accounts from a country like norway certainly indicates similar worrying patterns with regard to the actual realisation of human rights education (lile, 2019). when it comes to teachers’ fears of exposing pupils to the harsh reality outside, children are in fact often more exposed to it than adults like to envision. for example, a recent report from young people in norway (berggrav, 2020), revealed that children and adolescents are easily exposed to pornography and other disturbing images via technology. the young informants also reported that trusted adults who can give them knowledge, as well as helping them navigate online, are usually missing in action. similarly, in another report (hafstad & augusti, 2020) many children and young people reveal that they grow up in abusive family contexts and/or are exposed to violence and abuse. these childhood contexts and experiences are prevalent in all countries across the world, and the rise of sexual abuse against children and young people has therefore been defined by the world health organization (2017) as a major public health problem and a grave violation of human rights. in this perspective, schools are the most important social arenas to counteract the magnitude of this problem, and hre offers an approach that embodies the safeguarding of pupils through its focus on human rights. the importance of empowerment and human dignity are underlined as key components of hre, and struthers emphasises that teachers are crucial role models in creating a classroom where all pupils can be empowered to act against lived injustice. such an education includes safeguarding children from harm, and at the same time equipping them with the voice to speak up about violations. as the book maintains, children are indeed capable of discussing quite complex and controversial issues, and need to be exposed to this practice from an early age. in my work as a teacher and researcher in norway i often meet teachers and other professionals who express the necessity of holistic philosophies and theoretical frameworks that promote a more child-centred approach. a sound theoretical frame of reference can function as a validation of the practice in question, especially when the practice is perceived by some as controversial. this book offers such rigorous support through a comprehensive framework of a child-centred approach with theoretical underpinnings and empirical evidence, and can therefore be an important contribution to a potential paradigm shift in the education system. teaching human hrer book and media reviews 140 rights in primary schools is, in other words, a book i recommend to any professional who is working with children and young people. references berggrav, s. (2020). «et skada bilde av hvordan sex er» ungdoms perspektiver på porno[«a damaged picture of how sex is» young people’s perspectives on pornography]. oslo: redd barna. retrieved from https://www.reddbarna.no/nyheter/et-tastetrykk-unna-porno hafstad, g.s., & augusti, e.m. (eds.). (2019). ungdoms erfaringer med vold og overgrep i oppveksten: en nasjonal undersøkelse av ungdom i alderen 12 til 16 år [young peoples’ experiences with violence and abuse in their upbringing: a national survey among young people from 12 to 16 years of age]. oslo: nasjonalt kunnskapssenter om vold og traumatisk stress. (rapport 4/2019). lile, h.s. (2019). the realisation of human rights education in norway. nordic journal of human rights, 37(2), 143-161. doi:10.1080/18918131.2019.1674007 world health organization. (2017, october 19). responding to children and adolescents who have been sexually abused. retrieved from https://www.who.int/reproductivehealth/topics/violence/clinicalresponse-csa/en/ https://www.reddbarna.no/nyheter/et-tastetrykk-unna-porno https://www.who.int/reproductivehealth/topics/violence/clinical-response-csa/en/ https://www.who.int/reproductivehealth/topics/violence/clinical-response-csa/en/ volume 4, no 1 (2021) date of publication: 28-01-21 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4064 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews ‘human beings’ or ‘human becomings’: exploring the child’s right to development peleg, n. (2019). the child’s right to development. cambridge: cambridge university press. 262pp, us$106.69 (hardcover) isbn: 9781107094529. reviewed by marissa a. gutierrez-vicario art and resistance through education, usa. human rights educators, usa. city college of new york, usa. marissa gutierrez-vicario: marissa@artejustice.org http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4064 mailto:marissa@artejustice.org hrer book and media reviews 142 book and media reviews ‘human beings’ or ‘human becomings’: exploring the child’s right to development doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4064 issn 2535-5406 peleg, n. (2019). the child’s right to development. cambridge: cambridge university press. 262pp, us$106.69 (hardcover) isbn: 9781107094529. reviewed by marissa gutierrez-vicario art and resistance through education, usa. human rights educators, usa. city college of new york, usa. marissa@artejustice.org after years of thorough research and scholarship on children’s rights, the right to development, and analyses of the united nations (un) convention on the rights of the child (crc), dr noam peleg has produced the child’s right to development. in his own words, this book offers a ‘detailed new framework for analysis of the child’s right to development’ (21). this work, which is useful for those practitioners working to uphold the rights of children either in government or in the non-governmental and civil society sectors, makes three contributions. firstly, it gives a detailed overview of current frameworks on children’s rights, discussing the tension embedded in the dichotomy of children viewed as ‘human beings’ versus ‘human becomings’, and the value and shortcomings of these frameworks. secondly, through a careful analysis of children’s rights scholarship and a historical overview of the un committee on the rights of the child’s own interpretation of children’s rights (25), peleg discusses the shortcomings of not having a clear definition of the child’s ‘right to development’, and how this has impacted the drafting of significant human rights documents, including the crc. lastly, peleg suggests a solution to the aforementioned challenges: this is essentially a hybrid of the ‘human beings’ and ‘becomings’ frameworks. peleg firstly outlines his methods and motives for analysing the right to development, as it intersects with children’s rights. he does this through his exploration of the crc and the procedural journey of the committee and its drafters. the intent of the crc, as of much scholarship and child’s right’s law, is to protect child development (15). however, while there have been recent shifts, this right to development has not ultimately translated into the concept of a child as an ‘active agent in her own development’ (203). this concept contains the potential of a ‘free child’ eventually becoming a ‘free adult’ (203), and truly allows a full upholding of children’s rights. in chapter 1, peleg discusses the ‘socio-legal background that led to the creation of children’s unique right to development’ (211). there is a discussion of the human becomings approach, which places an overall value on what children will become in the future and puts an emphasis on what is perceived as their ‘incompleteness’. scholars like korczak, peleg states, argue against this concept of a http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4064 mailto:marissa@artejustice.org hrer book and media reviews 143 child being seen ‘through the lens of the future’ and as a ‘future citizen’ (28), as opposed to their potential value and contributions to the present. here, peleg also discusses the failings of the universal declaration of human rights (udhr), alongside criticisms of early iterations of the crc, which examined children through the lens of welfare (41), and saw them ‘only in the context of traditional domains of childhood’ (42), and mere ‘recipients of treatment’ (32). children were not seen as human beings with actual rights, including the right to self-determination which allows them to make their own decisions and have control over their own futures (52). chapter 2, as peleg mentions, ‘explores the drafting history of the convention of the rights of the child’ (15), in an effort to understand how the child’s right to development was interpreted and included within it (212). overall, peleg argues while the drafters of the crc clearly discussed the need to protect children’s development and what this meant as a human right (91), the actual ‘question of what child development means was rarely raised’ (15, emphasis added). moreover, the concept of human becoming was referred to throughout the drafting process; through a focus on child survival versus agency (88), the notion of children as weak and needing protection (82), and the recognition that growth is inextricably linked to the successful ‘transformation of the child into an adult’ (83). across all of this exploration of the process of the crc, peleg argues that while the drafters focused heavily on protecting the child’s future, they neglected to respect child agency (90). one key reason for this, a major point reemphasized through the book, is that while the right to development and child development were frequently mentioned, there was very little discussion of the actual definitions of these concepts (91). this ambiguity is highly problematic, as the field of children’s rights involves a variety of different, sometimes interconnected, disciplines and practitioners. peleg moves forward in chapter 3 to argue that this lack of a ‘workable definition of this right’ (16) is what allows parties to the crc to develop local understandings of it (140), and this enables them to ‘ignore their commitment to protecting and promoting this right’ (94). here, peleg discusses how violations to other rights within the crc, specifically the right to non-discrimination, impede upon the child’s right to development (102). furthermore, the committee’s effort to uphold the child’s right to development is severely minimized, as there is still ambiguity around the actual term ‘child development’ (140). furthermore, across the crc there is no connection to children and the right to freedom of expression (141), disabling them from genuine participation, and thus inhibiting their right to overall development (142). in chapter 4, peleg introduces the capability approach. in his previous works he has noted that this has not traditionally been utilized in the children’s rights discourse (peleg, 524) and has been seen as irrelevant. he responds to the view that children lack the ‘capacity to choose’ (163), arguing that this undermines the entire approach (163). according to peleg, it is the capability approach, which allows for children’s agency in developing their capabilities (144), that transcends the concept of ‘beings’ versus ‘becomings’ by enabling ‘children to fulfill their potential and pursue lives worth living in the future’ (168). it is through the capability approach, and through participation and choice that children can truly have agency throughout the development process and its outcomes (167). lastly, in chapter 5, noting this problematic lack of a clear definition, alongside the argument that children’s rights scholars and decision-makers hrer book and media reviews 144 frequently do not acknowledge children’s agency, peleg proposes a hybrid framework that recognizes both ‘human beings’ and ‘human becomings’. throughout these key arguments, peleg acknowledges that children and childhood are not monolithic and that children deserve the opportunity to have agency and participate in the various decision-making processes that will affect their present and future lives. he acknowledges that a child is both a human being and a human becoming (195) and that the right to development is not merely centred on growth into an adult, but on becoming an ‘active agent’ in one’s own development (203). it is, in fact, this hybrid which will move the rights field one step closer to a clearer interpretation (213) of the right to development. it can encompass and connect the myriad of different disciplines, while acknowledging the intersectional nature of one’s experiences (203), and reimagining children as active participants with true agency. in my own practice as a human rights educator, peleg’s work left an indelible mark on me and my work as the founder of a youth-centred non-governmental organization. soon after having read the child’s right to development, i received an interview request from a group of young people (children under the age of 18) for a school project they were working on. when asked why i chose to work with young people, i immediately considered some lessons from peleg’s book. the child’s right to development was a reminder that i choose to work with young people because they are at the intersection of being and becoming. no adults can carry this distinction; it is something that uniquely belongs to children. peleg’s work is a reminder that as human rights practitioners and educators we must continue to build a child-centred pedagogy, one which intentionally strives to amplify the voices of the young rather than regarding what they say as an afterthought. undoubtedly, this requires work, but it is how we truly reimagine spaces that uphold child rights and child agency. references peleg, n. (2013). reconceptualising the child’s right to development: children and the capability approach. international journal of children’s rights (12). retrieved from https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3033458 https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3033458 championing human rights close to home and far away: human rights education in light of national identity construction and foreign policy in norway volume 3, no 2 (2020) date of publication 27-10-2020 doi:http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4030 issn 2535-5406 editorial extending our understandings of human rights education audrey osler university of south-eastern norway, norway & university of leeds, uk. bjørn aksel flatås university of south-eastern norway, norway. christian stokke university of south-eastern norway, norway. audrey osler: a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4030 mailto:a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk human rights education review – volume 3(2) 2 editorial extending our understandings of human rights education doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4030 issn 2535-5406 audrey osler university of southeastern norway, norway & university of leeds, uk. a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk bjørn aksel flatås university of south-eastern norway, norway. christian stokke university of southeastern norway, norway. as editors of human rights education review, we get to see a range of writing addressing human rights education from a wide range of perspectives and experiences, from different disciplinary traditions and from different regions of the globe. probably, none of us could have really anticipated the future shape and content of the journal at its formal launch in 2018, although our editor-in-chief set an ambitious target: ‘to be a top international journal but with a special nordic flavour’ (usn news, 2018). as we publish the second edition of volume three, we are proud to report that, to date, hrer has included articles and reviews from 18 different jurisdictions: 23 of our authors are based in eight different european countries, eight in the americas, and a similar number in australasia (including japan, taiwan and vietnam). this volume sees two new developments. first, we include our first paper from what is for hrer a new region, sub-saharan africa. second, we introduce a new feature, an opinion piece. we remain, first and foremost, a peer-reviewed journal, interested in publishing original and leading-edge scholarly work. we have, however, included leading chilean human rights scholar abraham magendzo’s reflections on the implications of the covid-19 pandemic for human rights educators, anticipating that his timely thoughts will provoke debate and discussion among both scholars and practitioners of human rights education (hre). we are grateful to our colleague kristi rudelius-palmer, from the university of minnesota, for bringing this work to our attention. the first article in this edition extends our understanding of hre in a number of ways. in ‘the challenges of teaching for human rights in nigeria: knowledge, pedagogy and activism’, adaobiagu obiagu and okechukwu o. nwaubani invite us to consider why, in a country that has an active record in signing and ratifying human rights treaties, where the constitution guarantees fundamental human rights, and where the school curriculum provides for the teaching of human rights principles and concepts across a number of school subjects, everyday respect for rights is poor. their quantitative and qualitative analysis of data from a survey of social studies teachers in enugu state, nigeria uncovers among these teachers a poor knowledge of human rights content, a poor knowledge of participatory pedagogies, and a reluctance to engage in activism. the authors contend that effective human rights educators must necessarily be activists. they suggest that prevailing societal patriarchal attitudes combine with other factors to dissuade a predominantly female teaching force from effecting change. the implication seems to be that the realisation of human rights will only be achieved when, alongside support for teachers and http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4030 a. osler, b.a. flatås & c. stokke 3 teacher educators to upgrade their knowledge and skills, teachers are empowered to recognise, highlight and challenge gender injustices in their schools and communities. beate goldschmidt-gjerløw and irene trysnes’ article is entitled ‘#metoo in school: teachers’ and young learners’ lived experience of verbal sexual harassment as a pedagogical opportunity’. the authors discuss the pedagogical potential of using teachers’ and young learners’ experiences of such harassment, and consider the implications for human rights pedagogy. combining a case and survey with the theoretical framework of hre and the concepts of intersectionality and recognition, the article addresses the challenges and strengths of drawing upon negative experiences of ‘lived injustice’ in class, arguing that such experiences can serve as a resource for hre and for increasing students’ legal literacy. in their conclusion the authors call for a more systematic pedagogical approach to harmful sexual behaviour, wherein education can play a key role in ensuring citizens’ dignity and recognition of rights. in her paper, ‘children’s rights in swedish teacher education’, åsa olsson explores the status of children’s rights in swedish teacher education, on the occasion of the country’s incorporation of the un convention on the rights of the child (crc) into domestic legislation in 2020. reporting on the findings of a quantitative study among swedish teacher educators, and on syllabi and course plans, she finds that while teacher educators consider child rights important, there is little concrete guidance on what students should know about human rights and how to apply them. the author concludes that swedish universities provide future teachers with knowledge of child rights, but fall short of encouraging them to apply these in their professional practice. in highlighting the swedish case, olsson’s article serves to remind us how the gradual incorporation of the crc into domestic law in nations around the globe needs to be matched by opportunities for teachers, teacher educators and other professionals working in children’s services to strengthen legal literacy within their professional education programmes. basic legal literacy is not just a question of extending the knowledge base of teachers and others working in children’s services. it must also include the application of this knowledge as a central aspect of their professional repertoire of skills. in ‘the covid-19 pandemic: a challenge and an opportunity for human rights educators’, abraham magendzo, with audrey osler, urges educators to engage in a dialogue with each other, and with students about the human rights implications of the crisis and of the decisions which governments around the world are making. magendzo brings together international treaties and instruments to support teachers in this process. while in a crisis political leaders may be tempted to put aside human rights principles, osler reminds us why this would be a mistake, and argues that since the modern human rights project was a response to crisis, it is eminently suitable for addressing the current crisis. magendzo concludes with a series of concrete questions designed to initiate discussion. today, as in 2018, when the first volume of hrer was launched, two of the special pleasures of editing the journal are to work with a supportive and engaged international editorial advisory board, and to support each author in producing their very best writing. it is exciting to see an article develop in response to constructive peer review, and to observe established and fledgling scholars each make a new and original contribution to the fast-developing field of human rights education. we thank ieab members and our wider panel of reviewers for their continuing support. human rights education review – volume 3(2) 4 references usn news. (2018). usn’s first scholarly journal is here. retrieved from https://www.usn.no/english/news/news-archive/usn-s-first-scholarly-journal-ishere https://www.usn.no/english/news/news-archive/usn-s-first-scholarly-journal-is-here https://www.usn.no/english/news/news-archive/usn-s-first-scholarly-journal-is-here volume 4, no 2 (2021) date of publication: 12-05-2021 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4252 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews a human rights sampler quataert, j.h., & l. wildenthal. (eds.) (2020). the routledge history of human rights. london and new york: routledge. 688 pp., gbp£190.00 (hardback) isbn: 9781138784338; gbp£35.99 (ebook) isbn: 9780429324376. reviewed by robert pyne st. norbert college, usa robert pyne: robert.pyne@snc.edu mailto:robert.pyne@snc.edu hrer book and media reviews 106 book and media reviews a human rights sampler doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4252 issn 2535-5406 quataert, j.h., & l. wildenthal. (eds.) (2020). the routledge history of human rights. london and new york: routledge. 688 pp., gbp£190.00 (hardback) isbn: 9781138784338; gbp£35.99 (ebook) isbn: 9780429324376. reviewed by robert pyne st. norbert college, usa. robert.pyne@snc.edu editors jean h. quataert and lora wildenthal describe the routledge history of human rights as ‘an open-ended and contingent history of human rights’ ( p. 1). both accomplished historians, quataert and wildenthal do not regard this volume as a definitive account, or even a consistent narrative. rather, it is a collection of essays on ‘an array of human rights themes’, providing ‘a sampling of the state of the field in human rights history’ (p. 1). designed for use primarily as an ebook, allowing faculty adopters to assign, or readers to purchase, any combination of chapters, the volume surely achieves these modest goals. however, the net effect is not unlike the published proceedings of an academic conference. the reader is treated to many excellent papers, grouped topically and chronologically, and each one reflects the exhaustive research of a fine scholar on an appropriately narrow topic. importantly, the contributions are both geographically and thematically diverse. however, the final product is not as comprehensive as its title and length might suggest. the editors write: our collection emphasizes non-linear versions of history, law, and the voices of globally dispersed activists. … [i]t is important to us not to foreclose the significance of particular episodes by folding them into a larger narrative that could reinscribe familiar understandings and power relations, or imply inevitability. (p. 1) they self-consciously avoid ‘narratives of seemingly inevitable progress’ and ‘turns of phrase that imply that human rights are passed like a torch from generation to generation, that is, remain stable in content over time and place’ (p. 1). nobody would seriously advocate for such a static understanding of human rights discourse, but whatever imagined foil is here opposed, the editors provide little explanation of the narrative framework they seek to deconstruct. most of the contributors see their essays correcting what they perceive to be a common point of view (e.g., the revisionist history of samuel moyn, 2012, 2019), or filling some lacuna in contemporary scholarship. however, more nuanced and synthetic histories of human rights, such as those by jack donnelly (e.g., 2013) and micheline ishay (2006), are, for the most part, not taken into consideration in this volume. mailto:robert.pyne@snc.edu hrer book and media reviews 107 the editors offer assurance that the essays are ‘comprehensible to those encountering the subject matter for the first time’ (p. 1), but that gives the reader too much credit in many cases. these essays are not written for beginning students, at least not at the undergraduate level. still, those who draw from the routledge history while framing their own classroom discussions of human rights will find many excellent pieces from which to choose. some of the standouts include benjamin e. brockman-hawe’s chapter on 19th century commissions of inquiry in the balkans, mairi s. macdonald’s work on human rights advocacy in the congo, and marie sandell’s essay on transnational women’s activism between the world wars. rachel a. george’s contribution on islam and the ratification of un human rights treaties is thorough, carefully nuanced, and rich in practical implications, as is the paper by eileen boris and jill jensen on the international labour organization and women’s rights. pitman b. potter’s chapter provides an excellent overview on the state of human rights in the people’s republic of china, and afiya shehrbano zia describes human rights progress in pakistan through the lens of asma jahangir’s work as an activist and attorney. other readers will no doubt highlight different chapters, and that is one of the strengths of this volume. with its breadth of topics and customizable electronic format, the text is highly adaptable. but why this text, and why these essays, rather than others? the editors do not claim that these selections are particularly special, providing only a ‘sampling of the state of the field’, but what might readers be expected to glean from this sample? the volume demonstrates that human rights scholarship continues to thrive within a wide variety of academic disciplines, though, as sarita cargas (2019) has argued, human rights is arguably emerging as a discipline of its own. the book also contains remarkable geographic range, which may be one of the best arguments for using it in the classroom, at least as a supplemental text, and recommending it to those studying human rights. quataert and wildenthal have assembled a diverse group of scholars whose work may be unknown to many of us in spite of their evident academic qualifications. they write with historical specificity, highlighting non-western sources and struggles, and providing perspectives on human rights history that many of us would not otherwise easily encounter. at a time when both students and faculty are eager to include these kinds of sources in an anti-racist academic curriculum— all the more appropriate in the study of human rights—the routledge history of human rights makes a substantial contribution. however, by assuming that readers are already familiar with more established narratives and self-consciously omitting classic texts, this volume will disappoint on its own. it will best be paired with other readings, like ishay’s human rights reader (2007) (also published by routledge) for a more comprehensive approach. references donnelly, j. (2013). universal human rights in theory and practice (3rd ed). ithaca, ny: cornell university press. https://doi.org/10.7591/9780801467493 ishay, m. (2007). human rights reader: major political essays, speeches and documents from ancient times to the present (2nd ed). london: routledge https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203941003 https://doi.org/10.7591/9780801467493 https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203941003 hrer book and media reviews 108 ishay, m. (2008). the history of human rights: from ancient times to the globalization era (2nd edition). berkeley, ca: university of california press. https://doi.org/10.1525/9780520934917 moyn, s. (2012). the last utopia: human rights in history. cambridge, ma: harvard university press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctvjk2vkf moyn, s. (2019). not enough: human rights in an unequal world. cambridge, ma: harvard university press. https://doi.org/10.4159/9780674984806 https://doi.org/10.1525/9780520934917 https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctvjk2vkf https://doi.org/10.4159/9780674984806 volume 4, no 2 (2021) date of publication: 12-05-2021 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4279 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews can you apply international education rights law to citizenship education in divided societies? hanna, h. (2019). young people’s rights in the citizenship education classroom. cham, switzerland: palgrave macmillan. 267 pp., gbp£69.99 (hardback) isbn: 9783-030-21146-2; gbp39.99 (ebook) isbn: 978-3-030-21147-9 reviewed by lynn davies university of birmingham, uk lynn davies: l.davies@bham.ac.uk mailto:l.davies@bham.ac.uk hrer book and media reviews 110 book and media reviews can you apply international education rights law to citizenship education in divided societies? doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4279 issn 2535-5406 hanna, h. (2019). young people’s rights in the citizenship education classroom. cham, switzerland: palgrave macmillan. 267 pp., gbp£69.99 (hardback) isbn: 9783-030-21146-2; gbp39.99 (ebook) isbn: 978-3-030-21147-9 reviewed by lynn davies university of birmingham, uk l.davies@bham.ac.uk comparative studies of education in divided societies have a long history, particularly those that compare countries such as israel and northern ireland. helen hanna’s contribution is to set research from this field within a framework of international education rights law as it applies to citizenship education. this has led her to the development of a framework of the ‘2as’ to scrutinise a curriculum – is it ‘acceptable’ and is it ‘adaptable’? there are three key themes that emerge from this qualitative research on citizenship/civic education in the two countries: minority group representation, dealing with difference, and preparation for life (even though hanna finds that they can not always be located precisely within the 2as structure and an interpretative framework of rights). questions immediately arise: ‘acceptable’ and ‘relevant’ to whom? and should everyone in a divided society learn the same curriculum? these are perhaps age-old questions, but hanna provides some interesting glosses on them. one key warning is that we should avoid essentialising seemingly homogenous groups (such as ‘arabs’). but an equally key concept is ‘finding oneself in the story’ – going beyond the story of one’s own ethnonational community to the story of two, sometimes conflicting communities. this raises the issues of how curriculum is determined, and the representation of different groups and identities in policy development. this will be a valuable text for students of citizenship education and education rights. it is not about the teaching of human rights within the citizenship education curriculum, but about applying rights obligations to decisions about the content and pedagogy of learning about one’s society. this is useful work. it still reads like the phd thesis it once was. nothing wrong with that, and we’ve all done it. the benefits are very detailed and careful literature reviews and rigorous research. the obvious downside is that the qualitative research was conducted in 2010/11 and much of the literature is from around that period or well before. there have been strenuous attempts to update, but we find slippages that talk about ‘recent’ studies from 2010. the ‘most recent’ iea study of civic education was not made in 2001. saying that english language studies on citizenship education have been largely confined to the ‘global north’ ignores recent work in countries such as hong kong, south africa, australia and new zealand. but there are useful updates on the political hrer book and media reviews 111 situation in israel and northern ireland and mentions of current international concerns, such as decolonising curriculum. and the crucial debate does not date. in a divided society is a school an ‘oasis’ in the middle of a conflict-affected context (as in the northern ireland school?) or an ‘anti-oasis’ where the civics class is the one place where (some) young people can discuss difference openly (as in the israeli school)? questions of free speech, safe spaces for discussion, dealing with the past, and teacher ‘non-bias’ remain central concerns for our time. is ‘preparing for life’ about passing the citizenship exams or participating in future political spheres? hanna does not always answer these questions but the book provides some viable frameworks for interrogating the impact on young people of a political arena such as citizenship education. volume 4, no 1 (2021) date of publication: 29-01-21 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4139 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews child impact analysis: a way of addressing children’s rights in practice lundin karphammar, m. (2019). implementering av barnkonventionen – med hjärta och hjärna (implementing the united nations convention on the rights of the child – with our hearts and minds). lund, studentlitteratur. 165pp., 320 sek (paperback) isbn978-91-44-12068-3. reviewed by nina thelander karlstad university, sweden. nina thelander: nina.thelander@kau.se mailto:nina.thelander@kau.se hrer book and media reviews 134 book and media reviews child impact analysis: a way of addressing children’s rights in practice doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4139 issn 2535-5406 lundin karphammar, m. (2019). implementering av barnkonventionen – med hjärta och hjärna. (implementing the united nations convention on the rights of the child – with our hearts and minds) lund, studentlitteratur. 165pp., 320 sek (paperback) isbn978-91-44-12068-3. reviewed by nina thelander department of educational studies, karlstad university, sweden. nina.thelander@kau.se as with other human rights documents, the effort to transform the united nations (un) convention on the rights of the child into practice is very challenging. among other things, it requires a process of translation (i’anson, quennerstedt & robinson, 2017) into various national political contexts to adapt its directives and rules to educational systems. in the implementation of these rights, all forms of education are important (tibbitts, 2017), and so is the fact that children’s rights education not only concerns knowledge of rights but also involves putting rights into practice in relation to and together with other people (quennerstedt, tellberg, brantefors & thelander, 2019). this book deals with how the un convention on the rights of the child can be implemented and realised in organisations such as preschool, school and social care services that work with children and young people in sweden. the book is written in swedish. in sweden, municipal autonomy is far-reaching, which means that the obligation to implement directives and policies lies at the local/municipal level. this makes the municipality and its administration key actors in implementing children’s rights in education and social care settings. however, how and to what extent efforts are made in the municipalities differs. based on her own experiences of long-standing implementation initiatives in various organisations, and with a focus on education, lundin karphammar identifies two essential aspects in implementing children’s rights in a municipality: a basic knowledge of the convention; and an efficient management structure, together with strategies that enjoy legitimacy in the organisation. these are the components proven most likely to ensure successful implementation. regarding basic knowledge of the convention, the author underlines that this involves more than knowledge of the articles. it is equally important to create an understanding of the views and perspectives of children. this is inherent in the convention and constitutes the spirit and approach that is expected to guide adults in realising children’s rights. together, knowledge and understanding generate the basic competence required to assess what is in the best interest of the child in different contexts. in short, implementing the convention involves both our hearts and our intellects, and is a process based on human rights insights. besides mailto:nina.thelander@kau.se hrer book and media reviews 135 emphasising the importance of human rights education (hre), the author provides material and planning as a basis for teaching a course. the book comprises twelve chapters, with three clear themes. the first theme includes basic knowledge of the historical background, the convention and its view and perspectives on children. the second theme focuses on implementation and the use of various methods and tools. based on experiences of implementation in a municipality, the method of child impact analysis is introduced and presented in terms of how it can be applied in municipal organisations and administrations. the third theme develops the initial introduction to the basic principles of the convention and the view of the child, which is presented in relation to legislation and the general principles of the un’s committee on the rights of the child, which in various ways are indicative interpretations of the convention. in the last two chapters, the author discusses how children as right holders are affected now that the convention is law in sweden. the book deals with the swedish situation in which, as mentioned, municipal autonomy provides a special context in relation to how the convention can be implemented, when compared with other countries. at the same time, this work will be very valuable to anyone working with children and young people: it provides a basic knowledge of children’s rights as well as a detailed survey of the development of the swedish legislative process, from the ratification of the convention to it becoming law. several examples illustrate the importance of cooperation between various institutions and functions that are commonly in contact with children and young people. in addition, the book is full of clear descriptions and instructions regarding implementation measures. one such measure is child impact analysis, which features prominently in putting the convention into practice. child impact analysis is defined as part of a decision process which in advance evaluates the possible consequences a decision can have for the child; it ensures that the child’s views are considered through the whole process. the aim of the method is to highlight the child’s best interests and, by extension, improve children’s and young people’s lives. lundin karphammar generously shares her own examples and experiences of different organisations, and shows how different interests and needs were in conflict and how this was addressed. examples from the daily preschool and school activities illustrate how child impact analysis displayed the interests and views of different actors on an issue, and thus helped to provide a basis on which decisions were made. other examples presented relate to issues on which the interests of teachers/school, guardians and children pointed in different directions, and how this was resolved. it is above all through the examples that readers understand how and why child impact analysis can be a tool in their own work. from my point of view, the method of child impact analysis is an effective instrument to highlight children’s views and therefore it should be considered by hre scholars in matters involving children and young people. in sum, the author provides a hands-on manual with many examples of how the convention can be practised in daily educational activities to strengthen children’s rights. the strength of the book is its holistic perspective, which takes into account all municipal services relating to children and young people. however, more references to previous research in recent years would have been useful. finally, it is noteworthy that although the author does not specifically refer to hre, the topic of the book definitely belongs in the hre research field. hrer book and media reviews 136 references i’anson, j., quennerstedt, a., & robinson, c. (2017). the international economy of children’s rights: issues in translation. the international journal of children's rights, 25(1), pp. 50-67. https://doi.org/10.1163/15718182-02501004 quennerstedt, a., tellberg, b., brantefors, l., & thelander, n. (2019). teaching children’s human rights in early childhood education and school: educational aims, content and processes. reports in education 21. örebro university. sweden. retrieved from https://www.oru.se/contentassets/a9223a988167438cb1dd78e959ba2ac a/teaching-childrens-human-rights-in-early-childhood-education-andschool.-educational-aims-content-and-processes-eng.pdf tibbitts, f. (2017). evolution of human rights education models. in m. bajaj (ed.), human rights education: theory, research, praxis. (pp. 69–95). philadelphia: university of pennsylvania press. https://doi.org/10.1163/15718182-02501004 https://www.oru.se/contentassets/a9223a988167438cb1dd78e959ba2aca/teaching-childrens-human-rights-in-early-childhood-education-and-school.-educational-aims-content-and-processes-eng.pdf https://www.oru.se/contentassets/a9223a988167438cb1dd78e959ba2aca/teaching-childrens-human-rights-in-early-childhood-education-and-school.-educational-aims-content-and-processes-eng.pdf https://www.oru.se/contentassets/a9223a988167438cb1dd78e959ba2aca/teaching-childrens-human-rights-in-early-childhood-education-and-school.-educational-aims-content-and-processes-eng.pdf volume 4, no 2 (2021) date of publication: 12-05-2021 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4344 issn 2535-5406 book and media reviews the conceptualisation of democratic citizenship education in non-western societies kovalchuk, s. & rapoport, a. (2019). democratic citizenship education in nonwestern contexts. implications for theory and research. routledge, london & new york. 144pp., us$48.95 (paperback) isbn 9780367727307; $160.00 (hardcover) isbn 9780367264499; $53.05 (ebook) isbn 9780429293313. reviewed by razak kwame dwomoh purdue university, usa razak kwame dwomoh: rdwomoh@purdue.edu mailto:rdwomoh@purdue.edu hrer book and media reviews 113 book and media reviews the conceptualisation of democratic citizenship education in non-western societies doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4344 issn 2535-5406 kovalchuk, s. & rapoport, a. (2019). democratic citizenship education in nonwestern contexts. implications for theory and research. routledge, london & new york. 144pp., us$48.95 (paperback) isbn 9780367727307; $160.00 (hardcover) isbn 9780367264499; $53.05 (ebook) isbn 9780429293313. reviewed by razak kwame dwomoh purdue university, usa rdwomoh@purdue.edu scholars posit that when non-western societies (kovalchuk and rapoport call them post-authoritarian, post-colonial, and post-socialist societies) transition into democracies, their own knowledge, traditions, and histories are often considered hindrances to democratic progress. this spiralling tendency to replace local knowledge and values with western ones is a cause for concern (p. 3). according to kovalchuk and rapoport, when it comes to citizenship and citizenship education ‘an uncritical reliance on such frameworks (western) can result in inaccurate, oversimplified and distorted understanding of phenomena investigated in nonwestern contexts’ (p. 2). democratic citizenship education in non-western contexts. implications for theory and research, edited by serhiy kovalchuk and anatoli rapoport, details an oft-neglected aspect of citizenship education. this study amplifies the voice of indigenous knowledge and culture of the global south, and serves as a comprehensive guide for examining and addressing the theories of citizenship education in non-western societies in order to bridge the ‘dominance’ gap of western theoretical frameworks in the global south. kovalchuk and rapoport challenge the extent to which western theoretical citizenship education frameworks, and the ways in which they are used, are applicable in non-western contexts. the book’s eight chapters present and develop theorisation, and embrace differing perspectives of citizenship education. there are studies from guatemala, colombia, south africa, west africa, lebanon, israel, and kosovo, from scholars in the field of comparative and international citizenship education. gauging experiences from these nonwestern societies contributes significantly to the narrative of democratic citizenship education and makes this book a robust resource for advancing knowledge on democratic citizenship in non-western contexts for scholars, researchers, and educators in comparative and international citizenship education. kovalchuk and rapoport discuss the upsurge of studies on citizenship education, yet there is only a minimal discussion on the ‘theorization of citizenship education research’ and their ‘applicability to non-western societies of western theoretical paradigms that dominate citizenship education’ (p. 1). the overarching concepts of ‘western’ and ‘non-western’ are explicated by kovalchuk and rapoport mailto:rdwomoh@purdue.edu hrer book and media reviews 114 in two ways. in the context of this book, the term ‘non-western’ is used to represent ‘post-authoritarian, post-colonial, and post-socialist societies of the global south and east’ (p. 2). this explication helps the reader to identify situations where the authors make references to western europe and the global north, or post-colonial societies and the global south. this sets the precedent which fosters the understandings of this book. kovalchuk and rapoport outline the three specific domains of theoretical lenses for researching citizenship education in non-western contexts: (1) those that mechanically apply western theoretical frameworks to non-western contexts and do not attend to the specifics of the context, particularly during the data analysis (2) those that deploy western theoretical frameworks but consider the realities of nonwestern contexts during the data analysis and challenge and extend such frameworks; (3) those that draw on context-specific, indigenous concepts of citizenship and citizenship education (p. 3) kovalchuk and rapoport highlight a number of key concerns: the limited discussions on the theorisation of citizenship education research; the limited applicability of the theorisation of citizenship education research to non-western societies; scholars’ assertions about the limitations of using western conceptual lenses to interpret the realities of non-western societies; and the tendency for transitioning non-western societies to remain recipients of citizenship education theories rather than contributing to them (p. 1). in addressing these issues, comparative education researchers suggest that western-generated theories and concepts should not be generalised. there also needs to be a prioritisation and inclusion of the local dialect and local traditions into research studies done in nonwestern countries. this will enable researchers to better understand local realities, rather than viewing them as anachronistic and archaic (sobe, iveta, alla & kovalchuk, 2017). prioritising indigenous knowledge will foster ‘culturally relevant theoretical frameworks and avoid the marginalisation of local knowledge and traditions’ (p. 3). in fostering social understanding, civic engagement, and active participation in social discussions among young learners, we should check for covert apathy (dwomoh, 2020). we should also be aware of the implications simulations can have for students who are asked to role-play a historical figure (bickford & dwomoh, 2020) in a democratic citizenship project. in my practice as a social studies educator and researcher (with an interest in the impact of postcolonial theory on social studies and history curricula in africa, the comparative aspects of educational reforms in the u.s. and african countries, and how multicultural citizenship and global citizenship are conceptualised, rationalised, and thought about in different educational systems), kovalchuk and rapoport’s work provides indispensable and valuable information that addresses democratic citizenship education in non-western contexts. the authors simplify terminologies in every cultural context to facilitate a smooth reading and transitions between chapters that i can use in the classroom. one such terminology is ubuntu; this means ‘a being that is constantly in the process of becoming’ (p. 15). this concept is also seen as a ‘path to guide national development’ in the south african context (p. 18). the ‘adinkra symbols’ of the akan in ghana, west africa (pp. 27-28) and the ‘mande charter of 1222’ from present-day mali (pp. 29-30) both advance the ideals of citizenship, democracy, cooperation, and power. such knowledge does not only foster democratic citizenship education but also global citizenship education in a broader dialogue. this book undoubtedly is a great resource for scholars, hrer book and media reviews 115 researchers, and practitioners in comparative and international citizenship education. references bickford, j. h. & dwomoh, r. k. (2020). trade books’ evolving historical representation of john fitzgerald kennedy. the journal of social studies research. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jssr.2020.11.002 dwomoh, r. (2020). fostering an interactive social studies classroom instruction during a pandemic: experience, practice, and advice. journal of international social studies, 10 (2), 141-150. sobe, n. w., iveta s., alla k., & kovalchuk s. (2017). (re)imagining utopias. in i. silova, n.w. sobe, a. korzh & s. kovalchuk (eds.), reimagining utopias: theory and method for educational research in post-socialist contexts, pp 301-315. rotterdam: sense https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-6351-011-0_18 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jssr.2020.11.002 https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-6351-011-0_18 majority rights and minority responsibilities: young people’s negotiations with human rights issn: 2535-5406 vol 4, no 3 (2021) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4372 date of publication 29-10-2021 © 2021 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org book and media reviews the influence of the socio-cultural context on young children’s civic learning and action phillips, l.g., j. ritchie, l. dynevor, j. lambert, & k. moroney. (2020). young children’s community building in action: embodied, emplaced and relational citizenship. london and new york: routledge. 208 pp., gbp£120 (hardback) isbn: 9781138369658; gbp£31.49 (ebook) isbn: 9780429428531 reviewed by annabel trapp childs rights consultant, the netherlands, mail@annabeltrapp.net there is growing recognition and understanding about the active contributions older children can make within their civic space, but how children participate during their earliest years receives less attention. young children’s community building in action provides a valuable and critically reflective perspective in this area, with a rich ethnographic study of the active role children, aged between 3 -5, play in shaping their worlds. the work is set within the contexts of an aboriginal community in australia and a māori community in new zealand. the research demonstrates that young civic action is shaped by the indigenous values of these communities, with their intrinsic connections to the natural environment and their emphasis on co-existence and prioritisation of children. this view contrasts with historic western exclusionary notions of childhood and citizenship where children are seen to inhabit the private spaces of play, school and the home, rather than being considered active participants in society with full access to their civil, political and social rights. http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4372 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:mail@annabeltrapp.net hrer book and media reviews 119 the authors argue that the colonialisation of australia and new zealand irreversibly damaged indigenous discourses of children and childhood, denying children equal recognition and treatment as a result of being both indigenous and children. this included many children being forced to relinquish their identity and language as a result of colonial schooling designed to discipline them and make them ‘civilised.’ the authors persuasively demonstrate that whether ‘unconscious or blatantly deliberate’, the colonial legacy and subsequent discourses of progressivism, counter-colonialism, neoliberalism, and racism continue to marginalise indigenous children, concealing their histories and denying their citizenship enactment. at odds with the values of the indigenous world, colonialisation has had profound and ongoing implications for the inclusion of indigenous children as citizens and opportunities for their civic participation. to ‘re-visibilise’ indigenous children and their communities’ values, the authors draw on participatory methodologies to investigate how young children’s civic learning and action in early childhood settings are shaped by their communities and wider natural environment. once the researchers had built a strong level of trust with members of the community, they collaborated with children and teachers, empowering them to take a leading role in the research process. in addition to taking fieldnotes, data-gathering methods included taking audio and video recordings, and supporting children to photograph what they didn’t like or wanted to change at their early learning centres. they then discussed the recordings with community members, including the young children who had participated. philips et al. bring a refreshingly informed and critical perspective to their research, including an honest reflection on how their histories as teachers and researchers might influence impartiality, and how their original research design was categorised ‘according to whitefella constructs’. their methodology attempts to prevent re-colonisation: children are empowered to take a central role in the research process, and the researchers are responsive when listening, waiting and being open to what emerges during the research process. in doing so, they reduce the implicit power imbalances between children and adults that are too often inherent in research with children, and provide children with the space to actively participate in the research design and data collection processes. children’s civil and political rights are explicitly guaranteed by international law in the united nations convention on the rights of the child (crc), adopted in 1989. in keeping with the responsibility that states have under the crc to ensure children are subjects of their own rights, there is an increasing recognition that children are capable of influencing decisions affecting them, in accordance with their evolving capacities. however, children in their earliest years are largely excluded from the growing awareness and research on the active role they play in shaping their own lives and the lives of those around them. they are often considered too young and incapable of being active participants in society. young children’s community hrer book and media reviews 120 building in action provides strong evidence that young children actively demonstrate civic learning and action. this study is therefore a useful contribution that enriches our growing understanding of children’s participation. young children’s community building in action broadens our understanding of how sociocultural histories influence discourses on children and children and addresses a significant gap in exploring young children’s civic learning and action. it has two central arguments: a) the civic teaching and learning that begins in early childhood education is likely to result in informed globally active citizens; b) the indigenous principles of living and working with others are valuable for approaches for early childhood development (edc) in all contexts. these arguments make the book a useful resource for any practitioner, researcher or student of early childhood education and care, in addition to child rights practitioners and policy makers who are influential in creating spaces for children to be seen and heard. volume 2, no 2 (2019) date received: 31-03-2019 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3322 date accepted: 10-09-2019 issn 2535-5406 ‘i want to share this video with you today.’ children’s participation rights in childhood research. carmen huser charles sturt university, australia. abstract: the convention on the rights of the child foregrounds the right to participate. contributing to decision-making on matters concerning children’s lives is fundamental to rights education. this paper discusses ethical and methodological considerations of children’s rights-based epistemology, arguing that children are competent to reflect upon and exercise their participation rights. the present study explores 4/5-year-old children’s perspectives on play in an australian early childhood education service. it aims to identify ethical spaces in research involving children. the findings address children’s participation choices; including conditional assent, dissent, and their influence on the research. these outcomes are important because a) little is known about the ways children choose to participate, and b) they raise questions about the realisation of children’s participation rights. this paper concludes by examining the implications for research that acknowledges children’s demonstration of their participation rights in physical, creative, and social-emotional spaces. keywords: children’s rights, participation, assent, reflection c.huser: chuser@csu.edu.au mailto:chuser@csu.edu.au human rights education review – volume 2(2) 46 ‘i want to share this video with you today.’ children’s participation rights in childhood research. doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3322 issn 2535-5406 carmen huser chuser@csu.edu.au charles sturt university, australia abstract: the convention on the rights of the child foregrounds the right to participate. contributing to decision-making on matters concerning children’s lives is fundamental to rights education. this paper discusses ethical and methodological considerations of children’s rights-based epistemology, arguing that children are competent to reflect upon and exercise their participation rights. the present study explores 4/5-year-old children’s perspectives on play in an australian early childhood education service. it aims to identify ethical spaces in research involving children. the findings address children’s participation choices; including conditional assent, dissent, and their influence on the research. these outcomes are important because a) little is known about the ways children choose to participate, and b) they raise questions about the realisation of children’s participation rights. this paper concludes by examining the implications for research that acknowledges children’s demonstration of their participation rights in physical, creative, and social-emotional spaces. keywords: children’s rights, participation, assent, reflection introduction the universal declaration of human rights (udhr) (united nations [un], 1948) encompasses the rights of every human, including children. however, children have additional, specific rights enshrined in the un’s (1989) convention on the rights of the child (crc); these acknowledge their vulnerable status. results from the australian human rights commission’s (2013) report on children’s rights revealed that more than 60 per cent of the children and young people who participated in the survey were unaware of their rights. this finding calls for further action in educating children and young people about their rights as humans and citizens. children, like all other people, hold the right to education, including being educated about and in human rights, as articulated in article 26, udhr (un, 1948) and in article 29, crc (un, 1989). research that involves children has made efforts to embed rights, inform children about their rights (mostly in reference to the crc), and conceptualise them in children’s rights-based research frameworks (beazley, bessell, ennew, & waterson, 2009; lundy, 2007; lundy, mcevoy, & byrne, 2011). such frameworks contribute to contemporary efforts to realise human rights, particularly children’s rights, in research where adult researchers have traditionally had more powerful roles. while ethical frameworks acknowledge rights arising from the udhr, such as human dignity, the crc is ‘the first and most complete international instrument to assert a full range of rights for children.’ this has convinced more and more researchers that ‘ethical research involving children mailto:chuser@csu.edu.au c. huser 47 should recognise children’s entitlement to fundamental human rights, alongside those particular rights relevant to their status as children’ (graham, powell, & truscott, 2016, p. 87). the study presented here is anchored in children’s rightsbased research and has relevance for human rights education (hre). the paper addresses the need for researcher reflexivity, if children’s rights in the interactional research context are to be realised. the findings provide insights into to how children demonstrate their awareness of having rights when they participate in research. rights awareness has been identified as one of ‘six educational categories of teaching and learning children’s human rights’ and can be seen as a foundation for continuous hre (brantefors & quennerstedt, 2016, p. 6). this paper presents results from my doctoral study, which explored 4/5year-old children’s perspectives on play (huser, 2018). it focuses on results that generate new knowledge of children’s participation in research. involving children in research and researching children’s perspectives makes high demands on ethical practice and requires the creation of ‘ethical spaces for children’ (palaiologou, 2014, p. 692). hence, in addition to ethical standards that conform to the national statement on ethical conduct in research involving humans (nhmrc, 2007) and ethical key domains (harms and benefits; informed consent; privacy and confidentiality; and payment and compensation) [graham et al., 2016], one of the study’s research questions asked: ‘what characterises ethical spaces for researching with children?’ (huser, 2018, p. 114). the ways in which children participated provided departure points for considering their perspectives. exploring how they experienced their participation in my study has contributed to the sparse amount of studies of how children express assent and dissent or choose to participate (birbeck & drummond, 2015; dockett, einarsdóttir & perry, 2012). literature review and theoretical background the epistemological pillars of my study are based in childhood studies: recognition of children’s agency, competences and rights, and childhood as a social construction (james & prout, 1997; mayall, 2002). while these principles are challenging ones, they enable us to research children’s perspectives (christensen & james, 2008; harcourt, perry, & waller, 2011). childhood studies combines concepts from the sociology of childhood (corsaro, 1997; james & james, 2004) and children’s rights; there is an acknowledgment of existing hierarchies where children have been positioned as subordinate to adults, with adults often in control of children’s freedom (james, 2009). childhood studies has explicitly addressed children’s right to express their views freely – stated in article 12 of the crc (un, 1989). the un committee (2009) has paid great attention to article 12 and recognised it, together with the right to non-discrimination, the right to life and development, and the primary consideration of the child’s best interests, as one of the four general principles of the crc. this recognition ‘highlights the fact that this article establishes not only a right in itself, but should also be considered in the interpretation and implementation of all other rights’ (para. 2). the right of freedom of expression with respect to children’s choices prompts us to consider how to educate children about their rights and how we may enable children to realise these rights in research contexts. children need to be informed and make decisions about their participation rights. the study aimed to provide children with participatory and agentic experiences. this aim is consonant with the human rights education review – volume 2(2) 48 six educational categories of early childhood hre; involvement, agency, awareness, citizenship, respect for rights, and social change (brantefors & quennerstedt, 2016). there is a focus on the right to participation in children’s rights-based research. despite any understandings that might have been gained, there has been criticism of such studies of children below school-age. it has been pointed out that while children have been acknowledged as rights holders, educating them about their rights has been neglected (brantefors & quennerstedt, 2016; quennerstedt, 2016). article 12 underlines that children’s rights are not to be reduced to protection and provision rights based on their ‘vulnerability’ and ‘dependency on adults’ (un committee, 2009, para. 18). however, there has been much discussion around the implementation of article 12 (lundy et al., 2011); it remains a problematic, complex and delicate issue that has largely relied on adults’ epistemological beliefs and views of the child. childhood studies has promoted and partially realised children’s rights, through participatory research that has considered the most suitable ways to design rights-based approaches where children can express their views (beazley et al., 2009; groundwater-smith, dockett, & bottrell, 2015; lansdown, 2010; lundy et al., 2011). approaches include the introduction of assent procedures for children (harcourt & conroy, 2011), as well as acknowledging children’s diverse representations of their experiences and views (lansdown, 2010). despite parental consent being the only legal requirement for children’s participation in many countries (dockett & perry, 2010), researchers have stressed the necessity to also seek children’s ‘active agreement’ (thomas & o’kane, 1998, p. 339, emphasis in original). harcourt and conroy (2011), conducting research with 3/5-year-old children on their childhood experiences in australia, created an assent ritual: children signed with their name and wrote ‘ok’ on a piece of paper at the beginning of each interaction with the researcher. procedures, including seeking assent orally or by using child assent forms which they can ‘sign’ in their preferred ways at the start of a study, are important. however, there is a ‘provisional’ aspect to children’s assent (dockett, perry, & kearney, 2013). children might be challenged to estimate time periods between their first contact with researchers and the finalisation of a study. hence, agreement at the start gives no indication of whether they want to be involved for the whole period (dockett & perry, 2010). the study’s procedures acknowledged this through continuously reconfirming that children still wished to participate. some researchers have looked closely at the richness of children’s communication, including bodily and facial expressions and play actions, to gain insight into their perspectives (lansdown, 2010; pálmadóttir & einarsdóttir, 2015). an icelandic study explored the communication of 1/3-year-old children in their play, noticing how they engaged in meaning-making through bodily expressions (pálmadóttir & einarsdóttir, 2015). whilst children have demonstrated their competence to express their understandings verbally, there can also be some challenges. for example, a boy in an australian study struggled to find the words to describe his activity (theobald et al., 2015), and children in a german study told the researcher that they did not know what to say about their play (nentwig-gesemann, 2010). in fact, they shared their perspectives about their play through playing a game of pokémon cards. such results raise questions about methodological decisions to include preverbal children or children who prefer nonverbal expression. videorecording has provided technical benefits in collecting data, as the video-camera captures not only what children contribute verbally, but also records their actions. c. huser 49 children’s research participation has been approached either through adapting methods that are commonly used in research with adults, or through developing specific methods (groundwater-smith et al., 2015). the latter approach has brought a rapid development in ‘child-friendly’ methods, as well as discussion of methodological concerns (christensen & prout, 2002; palaiologou, 2014). these methods have sometimes been criticised for their meaningless application, and oversimplification of complex ethical and methodological decision-making issues (palaiologou, 2014). child-friendly methods have arisen from the perspective that children and adults have different expertises and competencies, and hence research methods need to be tailored for children. at best, these methods are designed to enable every child to participate in the recognition of their right to freedom of expression (beazley et al., 2009); at worst, the methods stem from ageand development-based maturity models (christensen & prout, 2002) that deny children’s competence. drawing, painting and play have become prominent in research with children because of their familiarity and the diverse ways in which they promote expression. in addition, language and facial expressions are also considered as forms of expression that respond to the un committee’s (2009) stated requirements for implementing article 12. however, child-friendly techniques fail to address the argument that full recognition of the competent child implies that there is no need for special methods. even more importantly, they ignore and fail to challenge power hierarchies based on children’s marginal social status and their powerlessness in adult-led environments (punch, 2002). genuine rights-based participatory research applies appropriate methods for any participating person (punch, 2002), responds to children’s wishes for equal opportunities to be researched properly (hill, 2006), and gives children the same respect as adults (dockett, einarsdóttir & perry, 2011). sound and just research uses methods that are appropriate and ethically and thoughtfully chosen. christensen and prout (2002) provide a ‘collectively available set of ethical values’ (p. 492) with the principle of ‘ethical symmetry.’ my study applied this principle; i asked the children if they wished to participate and fully informed them about their right to participation, even though they had not reached the age of legal consent (dockett et al., 2013). this practice acknowledges the first steps towards hre for children; through children experiencing agency (brantefors & quennerstedt, 2016) and by being able to make decisions, exercise choice, and renegotiate their participation (groundwater-smith et al., 2015). there have been a number of efforts to create conditions for children’s participation in research (lansdown, 2010), as well as attempts to consider the ethical challenges specific to research involving children (christensen & prout, 2002; graham et al., 2016). there have also been attempts to design methodologies that encourage active participation. however, in spite of all of this work, little is known about how children choose to participate (beazley et al., 2009; birbeck & drummond, 2015; dockett et al., 2012; graham et al., 2016). palaiologou (2014) proposes ‘creating ethical spaces for children’ (p. 692) in order to meet the requirements of ethical practice. one aim of my study was to identify ethical spaces and describe what these can look like from children’s perspectives. the findings show that the children made decisions and created their own conditions for assent, as well as initiating processes to express their ideas in creative, nonverbal ways, such as through play. these outcomes are important because they provide departure points for reflecting on and human rights education review – volume 2(2) 50 realising children’s participation rights in research. i conclude by making recommendations that might empower children and overcome power imbalances. this paper contributes to transdisciplinary debates on the rights of our youngest citizens; this has implications for the promotion of children’s rights in research, but can also inform hre. setting and sample the study was undertaken with a group of 4/5-year-old children at a childcare centre in australia. i opted for only one research site, basing this decision on my belief in the importance of establishing strong relationships with participants, particularly with young children. the sample was not pre-specified but rather grew during my time at the site. the intention was to undertake the study with some eight children; however, many of the other children in the room participated in a range of ways. altogether, 17 children were involved, and a further nine were invited by their participating peers to join them. all participating children were four years old at the beginning of the study. i visited the centre 2-3 days per week over a period of eight months; this allowed sufficient time for familiarisation and relationship-building before gathering data. children’s voluntary participation was a crucial ethical requirement. i sought their informed assent, rather than only obtaining parental permission. giving informed assent had a formal procedure, and there was an ongoing process in seeking children’s assent for each interaction. i read to them from a booklet i had designed for this study that explained the study content and methods. this step informed children about their right to join or to say ‘no.’ the children signed their own assent booklet by writing their names in it or drawing themselves. they could also indicate assent by circling an emoticon that portrayed what they felt about taking part. the time invested in relationship-building during familiarisation was very important for the ongoing assent procedures. it enabled me to put children’s reactions into context, interpret them authentically and become attuned to them (dockett et al., 2012). for example, even if children had given assent through circling the emoticon and said ‘yes’ when asked before i filmed their play, their body language might indicate that they did not really want to be filmed. data generation the research was conducted using a qualitative constructivist grounded theory design for data generation and analysis. this allowed data to emerge in interaction between the researcher and the participants. data were generated and analysed in a simultaneous, cyclical process, aiming to ‘construct theories “grounded” in the data themselves’ (charmaz, 2006, p. 2). at the same time, research questions and relevant literature provided points of departure (charmaz, 2006). in my study, data were generated through group conversations with video stimuli. i took video-recordings of children in their play (‘play-videos’) and then showed them the play-videos. after a group of children had been video-recorded i invited them to watch their play-video and to participate in group conversations with me and their playmates. explorations of children’s perspectives on play, group discussions, video-recordings and video-stimulated reflections have provided opportunities for children to share their views (nentwig-gesemann, 2010; pálmadóttir & einarsdóttir, 2015; theobald, 2012). videos can act ‘as a catalyst for children to reflect’ (james, bearne, & alexander, 2004, p. 117), and the play-videos c. huser 51 stimulated a small group of children to talk about their play experiences. on a few occasions, i took photographs instead of video-records. this was sometimes necessary in order to overcome technical challenges, or to respond flexibly to changes in the educators’ daily routines. most children were eager to discuss the play-videos. however, there were several occasions where children declined – verbally or nonverbally. in addition to using the booklet explaining the research processes and asking for children’s permission in the beginning, i continued to seek their assent and wait for their approval. only with the children’s agreement did i video-record their play, show their play-videos to groups of children and ask them questions about their play-videos. the provisional, ongoing assent procedures required me to reflect carefully. an unwillingness to participate might be expressed by silence, and not telling me to turn off the camera does not necessarily indicate assent (broadhead & burt, 2012). group size, length of time and frequency of conversations varied in relation to the children’s attention, assent and interest. the conversations were audiorecorded for voice quality, which made transcription easier, and video-recorded to capture children’s nonverbal expressions. the latter consideration reflects my position on children as rights holders: implementation of article 12 requires recognition of and respect for nonverbal forms of communication such as play, body language, facial expression, or drawing and painting, through which very young children make choices, express preferences and demonstrate understanding of their environment. (lansdown, 2010, p. 12) with regard to ethical principles of confidentiality and privacy and the right to privacy stated in article 16 (un, 1989), the visual data were transcribed for future dissemination. methodologically, it was recognised that children feel comfortable in small groups and when they are engaged with friends; these conditions provide a stage for sharing and extending ideas spontaneously (corsaro, 1997). this setting created space for the children to co-construct meaning explicitly with their peers, and there was a balance to the generational dominance of the adult researcher (heinzel, kränzl-nagl & mierendorff, 2012). however, the presence of peers who were playing close by was challenging. group conversations often took place in the same space as where other children and their educators operated. sometimes the other children were curious and approached the group who were watching their play-videos. the group stayed in the sight of the educators, in order to protect participating children and myself, the researcher. however, this meant that my research activities occurred in the same location as the daily activities of the centre, and this interfered with the children’s opportunity to enjoy privacy when engaging with their play-videos. in seven conversations, a group of children watched a set of play-videos. these included videos in which they themselves appeared, as well as videos of their peers. the first showings functioned purely to gain children’s assent to share the videos with others. however, sometimes discussions developed form these initial viewings. in addition, some boys asked to re-watch one of their play-videos, with the conversation being recorded, and some girls wanted to watch the video-record of their conversation. two boys gave me permission to audio-record the evolving conversation about their reflections on their assent booklets. all conversations were human rights education review – volume 2(2) 52 transcribed, including descriptions of children’s nonverbal expressions. in sum, the data consisted of 32 group conversations, totaling approximately 360 minutes of recorded conversation time. data analysis analysis of data followed a two-phase grounded theory technique; this consisted of an initial coding phase and a subsequent focused coding phase (charmaz, 2006). throughout coding, constant comparative methods gave analytical comparisons of the whole data set to find similarities and differences in children’s contributions. focused coding required reciprocal examination of the data to ensure the codes were analytically strong. themes emerged from the data children’s research participation choices; children’s strategies of giving assent; children’s awareness of and reflections about participation rights; the processes by which children chose to participate. apart from the inductively emerging themes, another departure point and structural tool to interpret the data was the notion of ethical spaces (palaiologou, 2014). analysis stayed consistent with constructivist grounded theory methods, since interpretation was grounded in both data and in pre-existing knowledge (charmaz, 2006). to assist in organising and conducting the data analysis, i used the computerassisted qualitative data analysis software nvivo 10 (qsr international pty. ltd., 2012). findings the children varied in the ways they responded to my invitations to be filmed or photographed, join conversations, and share their play-videos and perspectives on play. they often simply agreed – through responding with ‘yes’ or nodding. however, there were times when a conditional assent was given, dissent was expressed or a child-initiated interaction occurred. it was in these moments that the children demonstrated they were aware of their participation rights or that they were reflecting on them. children’s chosen forms of participation demonstrated them exercising and considering their participation right – often through nonverbal expressions. some processes reflected how children connected with their peers during the group conversations. participation processes, such as performing, provided much insight into children’s choices of participation and their expressive creativity. in the following, i present examples of children’s choices that bring time and space, creativity and relationships to the forefront. i will discuss how these provide spaces for reflection and how they can potentially overcome barriers to realising children’s rights in research. children’s conditions to participating – time and space there was a formal procedure for seeking children’s informed assent at the beginning of data collection, and i invited children to indicate their decision in their individual child assent booklet. in some cases, children thought about how they felt about joining the study. they could record this by circling an emoticon. two boys considered circling both emoticons, the ‘thumbs up’ and the ‘thumbs down.’ one of the boys, louis, left his decision open (figure 1) and did not indicate either emoticon – a sign of his continuing negotiation about his participation. both boys also discussed the ‘unsure’ emoticon, stressing that their participation was subject to constant change and could be re-negotiated. one girl decided to circle the ‘unsure’ c. huser 53 emoticon (figure 2). this emoticon was originally used as a symbol to show the children they could ask questions in case they had not understood anything about their involvement in the study. however, the children interpreted the emoticon as the one they should circle to demonstrate they had not yet decided. figure 1: louis's provisional consent. figure 2: sienna's assent: being unsure. seeking children’s assent and ensuring they could make active, aware choices were basic aspirations of my ethical practice. when children linked their assent to a condition it was clear that they were exercising and reflecting on their participation right. some children expressed their assent by responding with ‘yes’ when i invited human rights education review – volume 2(2) 54 them to participate, while some nodded. others went further and took the initiative, asking to ‘have another chat’ or to ‘tell everybody about my photo now,’ as two girls wished. another example demonstrated a child’s decisions. ethan’s reactions were situational, and this shows that children can change their opinion. i: would you like to share some of your videos with other children? ethan ((stands up)): you can share all of the videos. thank you. in this situation, ethan told me that i could share all of the videos. on another day he clarified: ‘i want to share this video with you today.’ ethan understands that he determines the conditions, that he has control and is able to limit his assent. assenting does not mean giving me unrestricted, universal access. it is provisional for that day and for that particular video. other children set different conditions, such as firstly telling peers about the play before showing a video. just like ethan’s decision to time-limit his assent without withdrawing completely, other children decided to opt in and out after joining a group conversation. they sometimes decided to leave the conversation, while at other times they returned and re-engaged. half of those children who left a situation asked or at least notified me about their wish to withdraw. sometimes children asked for my permission to leave, despite my having explained that they could withdraw at any time. however, some children demonstrated their agency, such as elsa who announced ‘i want to go outside now. i go outside,’ leaving without waiting for my response. some children did not leave the space, but disengaged from the conversation for periods of time. for example, scarlett and sophia started a game of chase. they stayed close to the group, and eventually went back to chatting with the other children. children’s creative participation choices the children contributed to the data in a number of ways, such as through gesture, bodily performance and play. for example, a group of boys talked about play that involved construction material. the boys had made mobilo transformers. while louis explained each step, he showed me the actual transformations with his selfconstructed toy: louis: i’ll show you. you put the arms up ((changes the mobilo)), you put the legs up ((changes the mobilo)), and then it can transform into a bird. ((changes the mobilo, then holds up his figure in front of his eyes)) louis’s verbal explanations were repetitive but he varied the nonverbal information he gave through ‘showing and telling.’ louis not only described the steps that it took to create a bird. he also used ‘building for an audience’ as a participation strategy, engaging with his audience – in this case, his peers and me. louis also used his body to demonstrate the transformation, synchronising his actions with verbal descriptions: louis: we put the legs on ((stands up)), we put the arms on ((stretches his arms)), and the heads on ((puts his hands on the head)), and the legs on ((gliding his hands down his legs)). c. huser 55 this example shows that louis made sense of his participation by using his body. the importance of bodily performance was also apparent when two boys discussed a game they had invented. their performance had the purpose of explaining play actions to me. ethan and leo chose to show me how to play the game, rather than clarifying its rules and actions. ethan: skidding. this was the skid one. i: skid one? ethan: yeah, i’ll show you. leo: watch this, ethan. ethan. ethan: i take my shoes off, ok? ((the boys both stand up. they run a few steps and fall sideways on the floor, while their legs slide in the direction of movement, and skid forwards.)) leo: this is how you do the skids. i’ll show you. you do the skid. we just run – ethan: we run. leo: we run. ((running)) ethan: so you do this. you do this. i: can i take the video to record this? ethan: yeah, so you can see. ((pause)) double super skid. ((leans forward with one fist pointing in the direction of movement, then runs and skids)) ((they laugh.)) leo: like this, like this. you do this. ((runs, lets himself fall and rolls on the floor)) it seemed that it was easier to show their actions and just play, instead of describing the game to me. the children were able to demonstrate their play expertise, and it was very likely that playing made their participation more enjoyable. this also raised questions of whether such actions had created a space where they felt confident to engage with me and the study. children’s participation choices and relationships the children’s engagement with the study occurred in a social space, not only with me as the researcher but with their peers. these relationships were crucial when it came to making decisions about participation, such as who had the right to watch a play-video, and whose right it was to refuse to share videos. in one example, ethan noticed that he had already seen the play-video, and had agreed to share it with others. chloe had not seen the video. i agreed with ethan, explaining that they had watched the video with a different group of children – those he had been playing with. chloe and sophia started to reflect not only on the assent procedure but on everyone’s right to participation: every child who was in the video had the right to watch it. chloe: haven’t seen it, have i? ethan: i’m telling you, we already saw it in this room. ((pointing to the floor)) i: that’s true, ethan. chloe: there are other children who need to see it, ethan. sophia: yeah, we try to find ro. rose needs to be in this one. ((points at the screen)) rose does. i can see rose here. human rights education review – volume 2(2) 56 in the following months, the children demonstrated their growing awareness of giving assent through watching a video first before sharing with others. sophia, in particular, showed interest in this. at one time she spotted chloe in a play-video and told me to ‘pause this [video] and i go and get chloe.’ in contrast to the above example, the children used their right to exclude others. a child who had not been recorded could be sent away by those who had been. ethan made use of his right to watch his video first before sharing it, and referred to an ownership that louis could not claim: ‘this is not your video. louis. is it alright if you go away?’ another right, the right to privacy, is closely linked to this example. having ownership and the right to privacy was a positive, empowering experience for the participating children, but there were moments where this power could be used to exclude others. while privacy issues made this completely legitimate, we need to think about the emotional impact of such exclusion. in one scenario, i later reflected whether i had contributed to olinda’s exclusion. olinda: is there another one? with sophia and jessi? i: yeah, there is another one of sophia and jessica. you won’t be in that video. jessica: and it depends if we want her to be in it, isn’t it? sophia: yeah. ((sophia and jessica lean over the audio recorder, heads together)) jessica: and we don’t want her to be in it. sophia: yeah we don’t want to be in it. ok? jessica: yeah. the three girls had just watched a video of their shared play experience, and olinda wanted to know if there were more videos to come. i wanted to simply explain that the next video would only include sophia and jessica, but possibly gave these two girls a feeling of power. jessica noticed that olinda’s participation was now dependent on her and sophia’s decision. discussion this paper only gives snapshots of the overall study and the ways in which the children participated. however, it gives insight into how children exercise rights, from their perspective. the belief that children are competent rights holders was central to the research design. the findings show how children champion their right to participation, given that respect and consideration are given to their conditions and expressive forms of participating. the study also highlights the crucial role that relationships play. there is much to learn from ethical and methodological reflections about children’s engagement. assent is a concept that needs to be understood within the situational limits of time and place. while researchers have emphasised voluntariness as an ethical principle for participation, practices for seeking children’s assent also need to be provisional and renegotiable (harcourt & conroy, 2011; dockett et al., 2012). children might wish to take part at the time they are asked, but this is no indication that they want to be involved in the whole project (dockett & perry, 2010). there is also the option of being unsure (dockett et al., 2012), which needs to be continuously borne in mind. and attention must be paid to children’s signals about assent and the situation they find themselves in, such as ethan’s comments about the video i had taken. c. huser 57 other children might use nonverbal expressions rather than express themselves verbally. body language gives important information about children’s decisions (pálmadóttir & einarsdóttir, 2015). on some occasions, the children opted in and out of group conversations, walked around, played or had side conversations with a peer. while some children often opted out and left conversations autonomously, making use of their right to withdraw, others asked for permission. was this because they felt an obligation towards me or were they used to a degree of adult control of their activities (mayall, 2002)? i noticed that the children waited for their educators to give permission to leave an activity. power relationships are not uncommon in educational contexts. the importance of trust and an awareness of power imbalances remain continuing issues in research with children (dockett et al., 2012). actions such as walking away or starting a game of chase require physical locations that are ‘easily accessible spaces, where children can engage for a little or long time’ (dockett, einarsdóttir & perry, 2009, p. 294). such spaces accommodate children’s need to have the freedom of opting in and out and if such physical freedom is provided, it is possible to enable withdrawal, which includes ‘a right and one that they need not exercise if they had better things to do’ (hill, 2006, p. 78). on some occasions, playing could be interpreted as a strategy that children used to opt out. at other times, children played in order to share ideas. while some children opted out of the group conversation by starting to play, others used play in order to participate and contribute to the conversation. children’s bodies are central to many of their strategies for creating meaning and sharing understandings (pálmadóttir & einarsdóttir, 2015). playing a game for an audience provided data about children’s experiences potentially more than what children tell in words (nentwig-gesemann, 2010). ethan and leo’s choice of demonstrating the skidding game was testimony to their agency as much as their expertise about the game. this showed two things: firstly, the children were using their right to freedom of expression; secondly, they were capable of making decisions about how they wanted to participate. however, such bodily performances also highlight the importance of the adult responsibility to take all of the children’s creative expressions into account. crc’s article 12 emphasizes that we must consider research activities that respond to children’s diverse expressive forms (lansdown, 2010; lundy, 2007). louis’s use of his whole body to underline his verbal explanation of building his transformer is another example of children’s bodies being a medium for expressing meaning (pálmadóttir & einarsdóttir, 2015). ethical research practice must carefully balance the right to privacy and the right to protection (dockett & perry, 2015). children’s right to privacy is a fundamental component of the crc (un, 1989). the children in this study acted on their right to privacy in a number of ways, such as when they made choices about with whom they shared their play-videos, or when they told or showed me, nonverbally, that i was not allowed to video-record their play. sharing was an issue of privacy, but also of power. the literature on ethics has addressed power mainly in relation to adult-child power imbalances (alderson, 2008). however, children are not always powerless (bradbury-jones & taylor, 2015), and power imbalances within a group of children can lead to some being silenced by their dominant peers. holland, renold, ross, and hillman (2010) ‘conceptualize “power” as dynamic and relational, shifting away from the dichotomous view of power where the researcher always already embodies “power” human rights education review – volume 2(2) 58 and the research participant always already embodies “powerlessness”’ (p. 363). when this issue came up it was often in the context of children’s privacy rights; exclusion was about protecting their data. on some occasions, however, i wondered if children used this right to place themselves in a powerful position. i decided to trust that the children respected each other’s rights, as much as i respected their right to make decisions about with whom they shared their videos. privacy can also raise ethical dilemmas for the researcher when intruding on the children’s private spaces or ‘secrets’ (beazley et al., 2009; palaiologou, 2014). conclusion young children’s demonstrations of how they act on and wish to exercise their right to express their views freely can contribute immensely to children’s hre. following the un declaration on human rights education and training, article 2.2 (un, 2011), hre incorporates three components: education about, through and for human rights (osler & solhaug, 2018). in my study, i informed the children that they had the right to be heard and the right to privacy when sharing their play-videos. the ethical and methodological practices of the study centred on respecting this. i aimed to listen carefully and provide safe spaces for the children to choose how to participate. the children’s participatory experiences were interpreted and analysed by using palaiologou’s (2014) notion of ethical spaces. i conclude by presenting three identified spaces which can conceptualise ways of promoting children’s right to participation. this right plays a crucial role in enabling the further exercise of human rights ‘because participation rights enable students to claim other rights and speak out when these rights are being infringed’ (osler & solhaug, 2018, p. 287). researchers need to pay very careful attention in implementing a child-rights approach; they must create spaces where children feel safe to express their views (lundy et al., 2011). safe spaces that allow children to feel comfortable about presenting their perspectives challenge dominant adult understandings (waller, 2006). my analysis concludes that children are capable of exercising their rights when suitable contexts of time and location are provided, and that this needs to be considered when research is conducted. this is why i identified physical space as an aspect of ethical research practice. children’s diverse range of ways of participating affords a creative space. children interact with adult researchers, but also with their peers. these relationships convey emotional and social meaning to children (waller, 2006) and the social-emotional space takes this into consideration. the three ethical spaces (huser, 2018) – physical, creative, and socialemotional – provide an extension to lundy’s (2007) rights-based model of children’s participation that includes ‘space’ and ‘voice’ among the four key principles through which to approach article 12 (un, 1989). theoretically, the three spaces can be viewed separately, but in practice they overlap. each space contributes to strengthening children’s rights in every interaction. the physical space includes the context of a situation; time and location. children demonstrated throughout this study that they made decisions physically, for example on how close they wanted to be to me. they also considered timeframes as a condition of assent. in line with lundy’s (2007) model, a safe, inclusive space enables children to express their views through using their preferred ways of expression. children’s diverse forms of participation also needed to be considered. they shared their views on play creatively. the creative space respects children’s diverse assent and dissent practices and their capabilities in participating in their chosen modes (lansdown, 2010). the c. huser 59 social-emotional space acknowledges relationships, the emotional impact of trust within social interactions, and power relations. questions to be posed about the physical space can include:  what possibilities do children have to give assent within a time-frame they set for themselves? can children decide when and where to participate?  how can procedures to seek children’s assent ensure that children can give permission to the researcher for each interaction?  how can children physically self-regulate their proximity to the researcher?  how can children dissent physically? does the space allow children to opt in and out? can they wander off? is space for play available? can they leave the room by themselves? questions about the creative space pay attention to:  what enables children to make decisions about how to participate?  how can children express their views? are nonverbal expressions recognized?  do children use expressive forms unfamiliar to the researcher, and how can these be respected and encouraged?  do we recognize and respect children’s ways of positioning themselves as powerful partners in the generation of knowledge, for example through their enactments? the social-emotional space raises the following questions:  how are children’s positions as rights holders ensured so they can act on their right to participation?  what power imbalances are in place, and how can they be addressed, and challenged?  what efforts are made to develop, continue and maintain relationships and reciprocal trust?  how can peers support each other while respecting the privacy of individuals? although this set of reflective questions is far from exhaustive, they might help to provide recommendations to existing ethical frameworks and guidelines (e.g. graham et al., 2016), and contribute to ongoing ethical considerations in research, and hre with young children. acknowledgements i wish to thank the children for sharing their knowledge with me and extend my gratitude to the families and educators for giving their permission. i wish to express my gratitude to my supervisors emeritus professors sue dockett and bob perry for their support and sharing their immense knowledge and experience of ethical research with children. human rights education review – volume 2(2) 60 references alderson, p. 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(2015). participatory rights-based research: learning from young children's perspectives in research that affects their lives. in o.n. saracho (ed.), handbook of research methods in early childhood education: review of research methodologies (vol. ii, pp. 675-710). charlotte, nc: information age publishing. dockett, s., perry, b., & kearney, e. (2013). promoting children’s informed assent in research participation. international journal of qualitative studies in education, 26(7), 802-828. https://doi.org/10.1080/09518398.2012.666289 graham, a., powell, m. a., & truscott, j. (2016). exploring the nexus between participatory methods and ethics in early childhood research. australasian journal of early childhood, 41(1), 82-89. https://doi.org/10.1177/183693911604100111 groundwater-smith, s., dockett, s., & bottrell, d. (2015). participatory research with children and young people. london: sage publications ltd. harcourt, d., & conroy, h. (2011). informed consent. processes and procedures in seeking research partnerships with young children. in d. harcourt, b. perry, & t. waller (eds.), researching young children's perspectives: debating the ethics and dilemmas of educational research with children (pp. 38-59). london: routledge. harcourt, d., perry, b., & waller, t. (eds.). (2011). researching young children's perspectives: debating the ethics and dilemmas of educational research with children. london: routledge. heinzel, f., kränzl-nagl, r., & mierendorff, j. (2012). sozialwissenschaftliche kindheitsforschung – annäherungen an einen komplexen forschungsbereich [social science childhood research approaching a complex research area]. theo-web. zeitschrift für religionspädagogik, 11(1), 9-37. hill, m. (2006). children's voices on ways of having a voice children's and young people's perspectives on methods used in research and consultation. childhood, 13(1), 69-89. https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568206059972 holland, s., renold, e., ross, n.j., & hillman, a. (2010). power, agency and participatory agendas: a critical exploration of young people's engagement in participative qualitative research. childhood, 17(3), 360-375. https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568210369310 huser, c. (2018). children’s perspectives of play and their research participation (doctoral thesis). charles sturt university, australia. retrieved from https://researchoutput.csu.edu.au/en/publications/childrensperspectives-of-play-and-their-research-participation james, a. (2009). agency. in j. qvortrup, w.a. corsaro, & m.-s. honig (eds.), the https://doi.org/10.1080/09669760.2012.715405 https://doi.org/10.1007/s12187-010-9084-0 https://doi.org/10.1007/s12187-010-9084-0 https://doi.org/10.1080/09518398.2012.666289 https://doi.org/10.1177/183693911604100111 https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568206059972 https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568210369310 https://researchoutput.csu.edu.au/en/publications/childrens-perspectives-of-play-and-their-research-participation https://researchoutput.csu.edu.au/en/publications/childrens-perspectives-of-play-and-their-research-participation human rights education review – volume 2(2) 62 palgrave handbook of childhood studies (pp. 34-45). houndmills, basingstoke: palgrave macmillan uk. james, k., bearne, e., & alexander, e. (2004). ‘doggy’s dead’: reflecting on a teacher research study about young children’s sociodramatic play. teacher development, 8(2), 165-179. https://doi.org/10.1080/13664530400200230 james, a., & james, a. l. 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(2011). working with young children as coresearchers: an approach informed by the united nations convention on the rights of the child. early education and development, 22(6), 714-736. https://doi.org/10.1080/10409289.2011.596463 mayall, b. (2002). towards a sociology for childhood: thinking from children's lives. buckingham: open university press. national health and medical research council. (2007). national statement on ethical conduct in human research. retrieved from https://www.nhmrc.gov.au/guidelines-publications/e72 nentwig-gesemann, i. (2010). regelgeleitete, habituelle und aktionistische spielpraxis. die analyse von kinderspielkultur mit hilfe videogestützter gruppendiskussionen. in r. bohnsack, a. przyborski, & b. schäffer (eds.), das gruppendiskussionsverfahren in der forschungspraxis. opladen: verlag barbara budrich. osler, a., & solhaug, t. 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(2015). video observations of children's perspectives on their lived experiences: challenges in the relations between the researcher and children. european early childhood education research journal, 24(5), 721-733. https://doi.org/10.1080/1350293x.2015.1062662 https://doi.org/10.1080/13664530400200230 https://doi.org/10.1080/01411920701657033 https://doi.org/10.1080/10409289.2011.596463 https://www.nhmrc.gov.au/guidelines-publications/e72 https://doi.org/10.1177/1745499918777289 https://doi.org/10.1080/03004430.2013.809341 https://doi.org/10.1080/1350293x.2015.1062662 c. huser 63 punch, s. (2002). research with children the same or different from research with adults? childhood, 9(3), 321-341. https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568202009003005 quennerstedt, a. (2016). young children's enactments of human rights in early childhood education. international journal of early years education, 24(1), 5-18. https://doi.org/10.1080/09669760.2015.1096238 qsr international pty ltd. (2012). nvivo qualitative data analysis software (version 10). qsr international. theobald, m. (2012). video-stimulated accounts: young children accounting for interactional matters in front of peers. journal of early childhood research, 10(1), 32-50. https://doi.org/10.1177/1476718x11402445 theobald, m., danby, s., einarsdóttir, j., bourne, j., jones, d., ross, s., . . . carter-jones, c. (2015). children's perspectives of play and learning for educational practice. education sciences, 5(4), 345-362. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci5040345 thomas, n., & o' kane, c. (1998). the ethics of participatory research with children. children & society, 12(5), 336-348. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.10990860.1998.tb00090.x united nations. (1948). universal declaration of human rights. retrieved 2 august 2019 from http://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/ united nations. (1989). convention on the rights of the child. retrieved 2 august 2019 from http://www.unicef.org/crc/crc united nations. (2011). united nations declaration on human rights education and training. final adoption by the general assembly, 19 december 2011. retrieved 2 august 2019 from http://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/pages/undhreduc ationtraining.aspx united nations committee on the rights of the child (crc). (2009). general comment no. 12: the right of the child to be heard. crc/c/gc/12. retrieved 31 october 2019 from https://www.refworld.org/docid/4ae562c52.html waller, t. (2006). “don't come too close to my octopus tree”: recording and evaluating young children's perspectives on outdoor learning. children, youth and environments, 16(2), 75-104. https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568202009003005 https://doi.org/10.1080/09669760.2015.1096238 https://doi.org/10.1177/1476718x11402445 https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci5040345 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1099-0860.1998.tb00090.x https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1099-0860.1998.tb00090.x http://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/ http://www.unicef.org/crc/crc http://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/pages/undhreducationtraining.aspx http://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/pages/undhreducationtraining.aspx https://www.refworld.org/docid/4ae562c52.html ‘i want to share this video with you today.’ children’s participation rights in childhood research. introduction literature review and theoretical background setting and sample data generation data analysis findings children’s conditions to participating – time and space children’s creative participation choices children’s participation choices and relationships discussion conclusion acknowledgements rights education and children’s collective self-advocacy through public interest litigation volume 1, no 1 (2018) doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2691 date received: 09-042018 date accepted: 02-05-2018 peer-reviewed article issn 2535-5406 rights education and children’s collective self-advocacy through public interest litigation sonja grover lakehead university, canada. abstract: if human rights education of schoolchildren addresses advocacy at all, it is mostly or exclusively in terms of civic participation, which perhaps includes civil protest. this approach implicitly discourages young people from considering engaging with the courts as an additional or alternative vehicle in seeking a remedy for violations of their fundamental human rights. human rights education is incomplete when it fails to address the child’s right to legal standing in the effort to seek justice; for instance, as part of a child collective that is significantly adversely and directly impacted by particular government actions. exemplars of children acquiring legal standing and pursuing their rights through the courts can serve as a useful educational tool in raising awareness of the potential for child public interest advocacy through the courts. one such exemplar, the youth-led class action environmental protection case juliana et al. v the united states et al., is discussed. keywords: participation, activism, rights, litigation, children, climate sonja grover: sonja.grover@lakeheadu.ca http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2691 s. grover 65 rights education and children’s collective self-advocacy through public interest litigation doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2691 issn 2535-5406 sonja grover sonja.grover@lakeheadu.ca lakehead university, canada. abstract: if human rights education of schoolchildren addresses advocacy at all, it is mostly or exclusively in terms of civic participation, which perhaps includes civil protest. this approach implicitly discourages young people from considering engaging with the courts as an additional or alternative vehicle in seeking a remedy for violations of their fundamental human rights. human rights education is incomplete when it fails to address the child’s right to legal standing in an effort to seek justice; for instance, as part of a child collective that is significantly adversely and directly impacted by particular government actions. exemplars of children acquiring legal standing and pursuing their rights through the courts can serve as a useful educational tool in raising awareness of the potential for child public interest advocacy through the courts. one such exemplar, the youth-led class action environmental protection case juliana et al. v the united states et al., is discussed. keywords: participation, activism, rights, litigation, children, climate i. introduction: educating children on legal advocacy in furthering their best interests this paper seeks to make the case that human rights education for children does not fully support the notion of children’s agency if discussion of child participation almost exclusively focuses on various forms of civic engagement, without properly addressing the issue of children advancing their rights through the courts through civil litigation. sections one and two of the paper present the author’s view on the potential of child-led public interest litigation in advancing children’s rights and how and why educating children about this topic has a relevance to the crc right to education and, specifically, the right to participation. in sections three and four a specific landmark child-led climate change case is discussed; the juliana et al vs. the united states et al. case. the juliana case is but one example of an international case which, if presented in child-friendly terms, could provide material for the curriculum of a human rights education program that teaches children about collective child self-advocacy through the courts. it is not the intention of this paper thus to address the ways in which human rights education deals with the entire broad range of crc child rights nor to discuss the innumerable diverse ways in which child participation rights may be expressed and honored in different contexts.1 it is recognized in the convention on the rights of the child (crc) that the right to education includes, among other things, the right to receive an education directed to ‘the development of respect for human rights and fundamental http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2691 human rights education review – volume 1(1) 66 freedoms, and for the principles enshrined in the charter of the united nations’ (convention on the rights of the child (crc, 1990, article 29 b). the convention also stipulates that such an education affirm the child’s need to live in peace, tolerance and friendship with all peoples and acknowledge gender equality (crc, 1990, article 29 d). there is also an imperative to respect the natural environment (crc, 1990, article 29 e). it is here suggested, however, that human rights education for children, in particular in respect to their participation rights, often falls short, even in democratic states. children are generally not educated about domestic potential civil judicial, quasi-judicial and administrative avenues for remedying specific, systemic violations of their rights. however, pursuing legal action may be a viable option, especially in a democratic state, and such an option may not, in the particular circumstance, pose any foreseeable risk to the child litigants and any adult allies: on the contrary, it is likely to be in children’s long-term best interests. this is not to suggest that the courts and other legal avenues in democratic states are particularly responsive to employing, in part at least, a children’s human rights frame in considering the social and legislative contexts that negatively impact children. nor is it to suggest that highly vulnerable groups, including children and others, can access and achieve justice in civil cases through the courts without, in most instances, a struggle. in fact, this author has recently contributed to a work intended to better inform the judiciary and counsel about the value of a children’s human rights legal analysis in child-relevant court cases (grover, 2017). however, if children are to enjoy the benefits of living in a constitutional democracy that provides the rule of law, it is important that they know about the court option in seeking a civil remedy for violation of their human rights, and that they be inspired to use it when appropriate. this is not to argue that justice will inevitably be delivered in every case. it is to suggest rather that the struggle for that justice, through the courts and other legal mechanisms, is vital if children’s fundamental human rights are to be respected and honored and the status quo, which often reflects systemic child rights violations, is to be effectively highlighted and challenged. it is also the case that if children are to be authentically educated on human rights by “living” their democracy, it may be necessary for them to exercise their independent legal rights and inherent legal personality through civil litigation. the author, at the same time, fully acknowledges that children’s participation and protection rights can be advanced through child and youth civic action and civil protest, and that there is considerable academic literature about such action (see lundy, l orr, k., emerson, l., lundy, l., royal-dawson, l. and jiminez , e., 2016; for a discussion on levels of engagement with societal issues and educating the young for the common good, see westheimer, j, 2015). consider, for instance, a 2018 example of civil protest, led by the student survivors of a mass gun shooting at their high school in parkland, florida that left 14 students and three staff dead. herculean leadership efforts were made by the young parkland survivors, who mobilized other child survivors of school shootings and gang violence, as well as large numbers of the general public across the united states. these efforts created an effective lobby for certain gun control measures. the gun control social movement initiated by the parkland students also gave a prominent voice to children of color significantly affected by gun violence, such as the african-american child population of chicago. s. grover 67 …rather than reject parkland students because they are more privileged, we welcome their passion and praise them for their message of unity and inclusion of others, whose lives are arguably more threatened and less secure (editorial board iowa state dailey april 2, 2018). the anti-gun violence civil protests included two other actions: a national school walkout for 17 minutes to mark and honor the 17 killed in the parkland florida incident (iowa state dailey, april 2, 2018); and a march on the florida legislature to demand legislation which would provide tighter gun controls and include mental health resources for persons who posed a safety risk. as a result, the state of florida passed its first piece of gun control legislation in 20 years (wright and the associated press, 2018). not unexpectedly, the national rifle association has filed a federal lawsuit in an effort to strike down the legislation “the nra is arguing that the new [florida] law violates citizens' rights to bear arms, protected under the second amendment of the us constitution” (wright and the associated press, 2018). this author would argue that there is a need for counsel to represent the children of the marjory stoneman douglas high school, parkland, florida mass school shooting, as well as other schoolchildren across the united states, in order to obtain amicus curiae status in this case. this is in order that these children can also have legal standing in the case, and have a direct voice in presenting arguments relating to their professed constitutional interest in securing a ban on assault weapons in private hands in the united states, as well as various other essential gun control measures. in the second half of this paper, a legal case involving u.s. child complainants is discussed. in this case, children are recognized as a class who are advancing their best interests and those of future generations in the u.s. courts. such case exemplars can be valuable pedagogical tools for young people’s human rights educators. it is contended that human rights education should include educating children on a range of opportunities for self-advocacy, including collective child advocacy through the courts. the case that is discussed is juliana et al. v the united states et al. (september 10, 2015); a youth-led class action about children’s right to a healthy environment that is safe from the devastating effects of climate change. this paper, however, discusses the juliana case in order to focus on the possibility of children’s self-advocacy through collective public interest litigation; the focus is not on children’s interest in environmental protection per se. the trial date in the federal court for the juliana case is set for october 29, 2018. there is little doubt that there will be appeals from both sides, so the procedural history may be a long one. it may seem odd to select a u.s. constitutional case as a case exemplar of children as a class pursuing public interest litigation to advance child rights. it can be added that the u.s., though a signatory to the convention on the rights of the child since 1995, has not yet ratified the treaty. it should be recognized, however, that there is no necessary correlation between ratification of the crc and substantive progress through the courts in vindicating children’s constitutional rights (pare, 2017). furthermore, it should be recalled that certain precedentsetting u.s. supreme court decisions have affirmed important selected child human rights as constitutionally protected, such as the right of student free speech in public human rights education review – volume 1(1) 68 schools, if the expression of the right to protest does not materially disrupt the functions of the school (tinker v. des moines independent community school district, 1969). in the tinker case, in december 1965, young people wore black armbands to school to silently protest the u.s.’s continued involvement in the vietnam war, and to support a christmas truce proposed by u.s. senator robert f. kennedy. the children were suspended from school as they refused to remove their armbands and were told they could only return if they no longer wore them. the students returned without the armbands in the new year, at the end of the preplanned protest period. the u.s. supreme court majority in the case famously held that “it can hardly be argued that either students or teachers shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.” (tinker v. des moines independent community school district, 1969, majority opinion, para 506). the majority in tinker further found that: these petitioners …neither interrupted school activities nor sought to intrude in the school affairs or the lives of others. they caused discussion outside of the classrooms, but no interference with work and no disorder. in the circumstances, our constitution does not permit officials of the state to deny their form of expression (tinker v. des moines independent community school district, 1969, majority opinion, para 514). interestingly, 49 years after the tinker decision, some u.s. school districts planned to suspend students or otherwise penalize them for walking out of school and staying out for a period of 17 minutes as part of a nation-wide peaceful youth protest against gun violence, after the parkland school shooting. some other school districts sought to dictate the contours of deemed “acceptable’ student protest as something other than a 17 minute walkout: washoe county school district in nevada, for instance, barred the walkout and suggested other forms of student civic engagement to protest gun violence, such as “tying ribbons on the school fences or observing moments of silence" (andone, d., 2018). clearly, young people’s peaceful efforts to advocate in their own best interests are often constrained by adults in authority; this constraint is largely based on the status of the protestors as children. the juliana case is an important example of public litigation that serves the best interests of children as a class. it also serves the public more broadly, addresses the question of intergenerational justice and speaks to the valuable advocacy efforts of children on central societal issues. while the specific case discussed here is american, there are examples of child-led climate change cases in other countries: e.g. in the philippines where a 1992 children’s case was instrumental in stimulating the passage of legislation protecting remaining rainforests (gibbons, e.d., 2014, at p. 28, see also ganguly, 2017). there have been other successful cases brought by child plaintiffs on other environmental issues. one example was a class action concerning lead contamination of water in flint, michigan; this contamination had a disproportionately adverse affect on children and other highly vulnerable groups (higgins, 2018). it is clear that there is global concern about environmental issues affecting children and, internationally, there are instances of children being supported to exercise their agency through collective litigation.2 s. grover 69 ii. children’s article 12 crc participation rights and access to a civil remedy for systemic human rights violations it is here suggested that the existence of article 12 of the crc (1990) has, in practice, rarely led to sufficient attention being given to children’s right to more active participation in the courts and in quasi-judicial processes, participation that would enable them to seek domestic civil remedies for human rights violations they have suffered. despite their innate expertise on matters of right and wrong, we have observed that children’s capacity to understand, participate in and contribute to “legal” issues is often underestimated, and that there is reticence on the part of many adults to allow children to participate in the legal arena. the united nations convention on the rights of the child (uncrc), to which canada is party, guarantees the right of children to be heard in judicial and administrative proceedings that affect them—yet there remains a woeful lack of legislation and policy to ensure that the rights of children to participate are upheld in a meaningful way (king, wattam and blackstock, 2016). one barrier to children asserting their rights through the domestic courts is that rights education for children has not focussed on self-advocacy through the legal mechanisms that can challenge systemic social injustice affecting children. the emphasis has instead been on raising a general awareness of rights: the perception that rights education is seen as political provides a strong rationale for the minimal uptake of embedding children’s rights education in curricula. actions of inequality and injustice enacted by states can be questioned and challenged, potentially placing schools in opposition to the state, and hence we witness states excluding children’s rights in curricula regardless of multiple international imperatives … those schools that do employ rights education focus on content rather than advocacy …. what tibbitts refers to as a values and awareness approach to hre, whereas advocacy work follows a transformative approach…(phillips, 2016, p. 10, emphasis added) let us, for a moment, look more closely at the specific wording of crc article 12 (crc, 1990) and why it might be that the text has encouraged such a restrictive view of child participation, insofar as actual child self-advocacy of legal rights is concerned. crc article 12 refers to the child expressing his or her views, those views being weighed by the decision-making body, according to the child’s age and maturity. generally, article 12 of the crc is understood as standing for the proposition that children are entitled, as of right, to have the opportunity in various human rights education review – volume 1(1) 70 arenas, including the legal one, to be heard on matters that might significantly affect them. however, human rights education has rarely engaged with the strongest interpretation of article 12, the interpretation that also includes the right of the individual child or a child collective to advance his/her (their) legitimate interests as complainant(s)/litigant(s) in seeking a civil remedy through a judicial or quasijudicial process for state infringement of his/her (their) human rights. yet, as the children’s rights international network (crin) notes: access to justice is a human right, but it is also what makes other rights a reality. for children’s rights to be more than a promise, there must be a way for those rights to be enforced. access to justice for children means that children, or their appropriate advocates where applicable, must be able to use and trust the legal system to protect their human rights’ (children’s rights international network, 2016, p.5, emphasis added). however, the focus in interpretations of crc article 12 has been on children, outside of any judicial or quasi-judicial mechanism, simply voicing their considered opinions and providing input on a number of political and civic issues that might impact them. in the civil legal context the emphasis has been on children ‘being heard’ as witnesses, giving testimony and perhaps articulating preferences and points of view. children have not been seen as litigation parties or intervenors with a legal standing. listening to children’s voices and collaborating with child activists in school and community decision-making and projects to improve social justice and the quality of life of children and other vulnerable populations is, of course, in itself highly valuable (see cuevas-parra, p., stephenson, p., harris, s. & tao joiner, t., 2017; scottish children’s parliament, 2018). however, at the same time, children’s access to and active participation in judicial and quasi-judicial mechanisms to seek civil remedies, especially for continuing violations of their fundamental human rights, is necessary if they are to be fully socially integrated as persons with agency, legal personality and human dignity. in the author’s view, child rights education has not adequately addressed the matter of children’s potential participation in domestic or international judicial or quasi-judicial mechanisms in order to vindicate their human rights. a more robust interpretation of the notion of the child ‘being heard’ in the legal context must include a consideration of the individual child or child collective as litigant in efforts to advance his/her (their) basic human rights. there is significant work to be done if children are to be given adequate access to judicial and quasi-judicial processes at the national and international levels. at the national level, we can note that there are few countries in the world that give persons under the age of 18 direct access to the courts without a representative acting as a litigation guardian that is “where there are no age restrictions on children bringing cases on their own behalf, with the courts deciding on matters of representation if deemed to be in the child’s best interests” (child rights international network, november 2015, p.7). furthermore, in only 14 nation states is there a requirement in law that parents or other litigation guardians act in the best interests of the child in any legal action (child rights international network (crin) november 2015, p. 8). thus the child’s inherent legal personality is, in effect, in many instances, undermined. there is a need, therefore, s. grover 71 for vigorous advocacy efforts to improve children’s access to national judicial and other mechanisms that are empowered to provide a civil remedy to children for child human rights violations. it is important that children’s rights education takes up the issue of the barriers that stand in the way of children receiving, through judicial or quasi-judicial mechanisms, civil remedies for child rights violations. child-led activism should also be supported. the children’s rights international network has, based on extensive research, set out a number of recommendations that would greatly improve children’s access to the courts and other mechanisms that could provide a civil remedy for rights violations, including an assurance that: children of any age have standing to initiate legal proceedings in their own name without a representative, and have the option to appoint a representative of their choosing if they so wish…various forms of collective action are permitted, without any limitations, which do not require individual child victims to be involved, including opt out class actions and proceedings brought to enforce the rights of a group or class of children… (crin, 2016, p.1) a 2015 unicef survey of 26 countries on the implementation of child rights education articulated that children’s rights education means: ‘educating children about their rights (i.e. teaching them about the un convention on the rights of the child); educating children through their rights (i.e. respecting their rights in the processes of schooling); educating children for rights (i.e. empowering them to take action for rights)’ (jerome, emerson, lundy and orr, 2015, p. 74, appendix 2). what is clear from the aforementioned crin (2015) global report on children’s access to justice is that some progress has been made especially in some relatively conflict-free, stable countries in educating children about their rights and in respecting their rights, especially in the school setting. however, it is equally clear that there has not been adequate progress, even in relatively peaceful states, in teaching children about the possibility of advancing their rights through available judicial or quasi-judicial mechanisms. neither is there much evidence of supporting children to do so, especially when it comes to seeking civil accountability for systemic violations of child group rights. in this respect, children’s rights education is far from realizing its potential as a vehicle for empowering children to contribute to reshaping their futures. education is much more than an entry to the job market. it has the power to shape a sustainable future and better world. education policies should promote peace, mutual respect and environmental care. (united nations secretary-general, ban ki-moon, cited in jerome, l., emerson, l., lundy, l. & orr, k., 2015, p. 10, emphasis added) human rights education review – volume 1(1) 72 the argument here is that a children’s rights education that truly and fully supports children’s efforts to “shape a sustainable future and a better world’ (united nations secretary-general, ban ki-moon, cited in jerome, l., emerson, l., lundy, l. & orr, k., 2015, p. 10) requires two things: firstly, education about child rights issues that are ripe for child advocacy through legal action; and, secondly, opportunities for children to participate in what crin has termed strategic child rights case litigation, as well as in other strategies involving legal advocacy (crin, 2018). crin has developed a guide to various forms of legal advocacy for children’s rights that can be adapted to form part of the curriculum, as well as other material for child rights education (crin, 2017). in addition, crin has highlighted the need for children’s human rights defenders to ‘ensure children know how to assert their rights’ (crin, 2016, p.3); this can be partly addressed through the education system and a children’s rights curriculum that is integrated with the regular curriculum. let us now turn to an example of strategic child rights litigation. this involves a landmark child-led class action case directed to safeguarding the environment juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. https://www.ourchildrenstrust.org/us/federal-lawsuit/. such a case exemplar, in which children as a class are litigants, can serve as a useful human rights educational tool for a number of reasons: it can raise awareness of the potential for child public interest advocacy through the courts; it can facilitate children’s understanding of legal mechanisms through which civil remedies for systemic child human rights abuses can be sought; it can inspire and empower young people to exercise their legal personalities and assert their legal rights in their own best interests and, potentially, the interests of future generations of young people. iii. child rights education: juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. as a curriculum case exemplar of collective child-led legal action let us now look at how a child rights case can be used as resource material in a children’s rights education curriculum. we will consider juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. this case has valuable pedagogical potential, for several reasons: (i) it can raise children’s awareness of their own agency; it shows children seizing the opportunity to lead on a key human rights issue, and is thus an example of collective child legal action directed to furthering children’s best interests; (ii) it can raise public awareness of child rights issues (i.e. the disproportionate adverse effect of climate change on children); (iii) it can enhance public appreciation and understanding of the scope of child participation rights, which include children’s right to fully participate in civil legal actions in search of remedies for human rights violations. the juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. case (2015) concerns (i) the effects of climate change, particularly on children, and (ii) the failure of the u.s. federal government to take adequate measures to protect the environment, and hence its failure to protect the best interests of today’s and tomorrow’s u.s. children. the american government has failed to ensure the children of the future a healthy physical environment and climate in which to survive and thrive. this child-led legal case, which addresses climate change, is of particular interest for many reasons. these include the fact that some of the arguments made were articulated in terms of a child rights perspective. this perspective is especially apposite, since children are particularly vulnerable to the short and long-term adverse impacts of climate https://www.ourchildrenstrust.org/us/federal-lawsuit/ https://www.ourchildrenstrust.org/us/federal-lawsuit/ s. grover 73 change. children’s health and safety can be threatened and their schooling disrupted. globally, the impacts of climate change on children are even more severe in poorer countries (e.g. see ahdoot, s. and pacheco, s.e., 2015, children in a changing climate (ccc) coalition (2016) and the unicef annual report (2016)). juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. is a child-led class action law suit brought by 21 young people (https://www.ourchildrenstrust.org/meet-theyouthplaintiffs/). in their first amended complaint, the child plaintiffs argued that the united states has known for many years that global warming due to co2 pollution is in large part attributable to the burning of fossil fuels. however, this practice persists, creating alarming levels of such pollution (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2015, para 1). the child plaintiffs contended that ultimately this practice of burning fossil fuels in such amounts as to pollute the atmosphere “would destabilize the climate system on which present and future generations of [the]…nation [the u.s.] depend for their wellbeing and survival… with the damage persisting for millennia” (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2015, para 1). the complaint also made specific reference to projects harmful to the environment because of their large co2 emissions, such as the jordan cove liquefied natural gas project terminal in coos bay, oregon, approved by the u.s. department of energy (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2015, para 1). the child plaintiffs alleged that certain of their inalienable rights under the u.s. constitution had been and were continuing to be violated by the u.s. federal government’s alleged failure to protect the environment from undue levels of carbon dioxide emissions, through its relatively unbridled support of the fossil fuel industry. specifically, the children argued that their constitutional right not to be deprived of life, liberty or property without the benefit of due process had been infringed. this argument was based on the damage to their health and to their environment caused by unsafe co2 levels. this pollution was a result of the u.s. federal government’s policy of allowing the fossil fuel industry to operate so as to significantly endanger the health of the environment. the essential fact was that they, as children, had no significant influence on the government’s handling of this matter (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2015, para 278). the children also maintained that their property rights were affected and unconstitutionally infringed, in that climate change was affecting sea levels and this endangered the land on which they currently made their homes (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2015, para 287). they argued for a specific level of co2 emissions, one that scientists judge consistent with the maintenance of a safe, habitable environment “plaintiffs assert that a reduction of global co2 concentrations to less than 350 parts per million is possible, but action must be taken immediately to prevent further ocean acidification and ocean warming” (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2016 at p. 2). interestingly, the children also argued that the federal government had, in exercising sovereign control of the level of co2 emissions, assumed responsibility for ensuring that children’s constitutional rights to life, liberty and property should not be endangered. however, the government had failed to carry out its duty to protect the welfare of the child plaintiffs and that of future generations through its disregard for the effects of co2 emissions on the environment: human rights education review – volume 1(1) 74 in assuming control of our nation’s atmosphere, air space, the federal domain, fossil fuels, and climate system, defendants have imposed severe limitations on plaintiffs’ freedom to act on their own behalf to secure a stable climate system and, therefore, have a special relationship with plaintiffs, and a concomitant duty of care to ensure their reasonable safety. by their affirmative acts resulting in dangerous interference with a stable climate system, defendants have abrogated their duty of care to protect plaintiffs’ fundamental rights to life, liberty, and property. in their custodial role, defendants have failed to protect plaintiffs’ needs with respect to the climate system in violation of the fifth amendment (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2015, para 286, emphasis added). of course, the child plaintiffs’ contention was correct. there were “severe limitations” on their “freedom to act on their own behalf to secure a stable climate system”, since they had no direct or significant role in decisions about the fossil fuel industry, and whether or not any protective measures regarding the climate and the environment would be implemented by the u.s. federal government (in terms of more stringently regulating the industry and/or transitioning to renewable energy sources) (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2015, para 286). at the same time, the legal case brought against the federal government was in itself an action by the children to “act on their own behalf to secure a stable climate system” (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2015, para 286). the children contended that their constitutional right to and interest in life, liberty and property could not be outweighed by the interests of the fossil fuel industry (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2015, para 289). the child plaintiffs also argued that their right to equal protection of the law, embedded in the due process clause of the fifth amendment of the u.s. constitution, was also violated. the u.s. federal government had failed to protect the environment and hence safeguard the child plaintiffs and future generations from the effects of climate change, a magnitude of change that had not existed in the past to pose a significant threat to previous generations. the affirmative aggregate acts of defendants in the areas of fossil fuel production and consumption have caused and are causing irreversible climate change. as a result, the harm caused by defendants has denied plaintiffs the same protection of fundamental rights afforded to prior and present generations of adult citizens. the imposition of this disability on plaintiffs serves only to disrespect and subordinate them (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2015, para 292, emphasis added). in court, the children also advanced the proposition that, in the context of the case, they should be considered a distinct class of vulnerable persons entitled to special protection under the law. this was because they, as children, had no political power they could exercise by voting to influence government policy towards the fossil fuel industry. they were powerless to ensure for themselves a safe environment and protection from the disastrous effects of climate change: s. grover 75 plaintiffs are separate suspect classes in need of extraordinary protection from the political process pursuant to the principles of equal protection. …defendants have a long history of deliberately discriminating against children and future generations in exerting their sovereign authority over our nation’s air space and federal fossil fuel resources for the economic benefit of present generations of adults. plaintiffs are an insular minority with no voting rights and little, if any, political power or influence over defendants and their actions concerning fossil fuels (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2015, first amended complaint, para 294, emphasis added). the children also argued that the u.s. federal government, by allowing the u.s. fossil fuel industry to pollute the atmosphere to the extent that it does, violates the public trust by failing in its duty to protect the natural environment, as it is required to do in the public interest (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2015, first amended complaint, para 307-310). clearly, the juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. (2015) landmark childled collective legal action (attempting to secure a safe environment for current and future generations of children) is a case exemplar that can serve as a powerful vehicle for educating children not only about their fundamental human rights (i.e. their right to life, good development, health and safety), but also about their inherent right to access mechanisms for achieving justice in the form of a civil remedy for any significant violation of their particular human rights, as children (an especially vulnerable group), and, more generally, as ‘persons’ before and under the law. iv. conclusion collective child-led legal actions such as juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. (2015) are highly relevant case exemplars for child human rights education. case law material can be part of the curriculum, if it is made ‘child-friendly’ and adapted for younger and older pupils. such class action lawsuits by and for children demonstrate young people’s engagement with social justice issues and how they exercise their participation rights in the legal arena, often in conjunction with adult allies (as with juliana et al. vs. the united states et al., 2015, where collective legal action was made possible through the american ngo ‘our children’s trust’). educating children about such collective legal actions is essential in highlighting systemic violations of children’s human rights by government and in illustrating children’s agency as rational actors. the children in juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. (2015, para 296) argued that the courts were, in practice, the only domestic vehicle through which they could realistically seek redress for the effects of climate change. that is, redress for the harm they contend is being done to their well-being and the wellbeing of future generations if the u.s. federal government continues to allow the fossil fuel industry to pollute the atmosphere and create a co2 level that exceeds the limit scientific experts judge conducive to a sustainable, healthy environment: human rights education review – volume 1(1) 76 plaintiffs have no avenues of redress other than this court, as plaintiffs cannot challenge or alter the acts of defendants concerning fossil fuels. plaintiffs will disproportionately experience the irreversible and catastrophic impacts of an atmosphere and oceans containing dangerous levels of co2 and a dangerous destabilized national climate system. the adults living in our country today will not experience the full scope of catastrophic harms that will be experienced by plaintiffs (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al., 2015, para 296 emphasis added). the child plaintiffs in the juliana et al. vs. the united states et al., 2015 case (juliana) have garnered support from many members of the scientific community and the general public who are deeply concerned about the adverse impact of the current rate and nature of climate change. notwithstanding this, however, the child plaintiffs in juliana rightly emphasized that since they were too young to vote, they relied on the courts for protection as a vulnerable class in the context of climate change (see grover, 2011 on the politics of voting age): as plaintiffs include citizens presently below the voting age and future generations, this court should determine they must be treated as protected classes, and federal laws and actions that disproportionately discriminate against and endanger them must be invalidated (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2015, para 297, emphasis added). climate change and permissible levels of air pollution by the fossil fuel industry have been formulated and advanced by government as issues of social policy, political choice and government regulation rather than as basic human rights issues. this view has become so ingrained that there is some acceptance of the fact that the economic interests of certain industries have overridden the broader, longterm public interest, rooted in core democratic values. it is only now, at this late stage, that more collective legal actions are being taken to vigorously challenge government actions that significantly harm the environment and compromise human rights. the juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2015 case is one example of a child-led effort to do something about this. in this connection, it is interesting to note that in juliana et al. vs. the united states et al., part of the argument of the defendants was that the child plaintiffs had purportedly raised “non-justiciable political questions, and they fail[ed] to state a constitutional claim” (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2016 , p. 4). the district court judge, however, disagreed that the children had raised ‘nonjusticiable’ political questions: the debate about climate change and its impact has been before various political bodies for some time now. plaintiffs give this debate justiciability by asserting harms that befall or will befall them personally and to a greater extent than older segments of society (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2016, p. 8, emphasis added). s. grover 77 the court need not dictate any regulations, only direct the epa [environmental protection agency] to adopt standards that prevent the alleged constitutional harm to the youth and future generation plaintiffs, should plaintiffs prevail in demonstrating such is possible (juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. 2016, p. 14) the child plaintiffs in juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. (2015) have thus successfully advanced climate change as a human rights issue, rather than one that can be reduced to social policy and discretionary government choice. their action was ruled to be one that can be decided in the courts. the case will now proceed to be heard in detail on its merits in a federal court. furthermore, the child plaintiffs have successfully articulated the issue of the inordinately high levels of co2 emission and its devastating effects on the natural environment as a children’s rights issue. the lower u.s. federal courts accepted the proposition that the child plaintiffs and future generations are and will be the people most affected by global warming. the child plaintiff group in juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. (2015) was ethnically diverse; it included indigenous children and children of other ancestries. all of the named child plaintiffs had been personally impacted by climate change in significant ways and these details were presented to the court in the amended complaint. the court was also informed that many of the child plaintiffs had a longstanding interest in climate issues and a record of environmental activism prior to their involvement in the juliana case (juliana et al vs. the united states , first amended complaint, u.s. district court of oregon, 2015, pp. 6-36 ). this testifies to the shared and unifying purpose that children of various cultures, class backgrounds and ancestries can have in advancing their interests as children and as human rights defenders in their own right through collective legal action in the courts. such child-led legal cases are instructive tools in child rights education for a number of reasons: (i) they highlight children as agents of positive social change; (ii) they teach about the crc rights involved in the particular case; (iii) most significantly, they encourage children whose human rights have been violated, especially when there is widespread systemic infringement, to exercise their participation rights by engaging in self-advocacy through the courts (in addition to participating in civic actions such as petition campaigns or peaceful civil protest). it is also relevant to note that the lead attorney in the juliana case reported it was important to her that: the kids all volunteered to participate -and that this was really their movement, not hers. i've [referring to herself; the lead attorney] spoken to most of the child plaintiffs in the federal case, and it's clear to me that they want to be involved in this case. some had to convince their parents to let them sue obama and the federal government [now the lawsuit continues against the trump administration]. many were already environmental activists before they heard about this lawsuit. and they're better versed in climate policy than most adults you'll meet (sutter, j.d., 2016). ultimately, the juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. case may be determined by the u.s. supreme court. it may be that the u.s. supreme court will human rights education review – volume 1(1) 78 consider that children present and future are a special class of “collective victims” of the effects of climate change, disproportionately affected by it. as such, the court may decide that children are entitled to special protection and remedial action (i.e. a massive reduction in co2 emissions) that would lead to an environmental recovery which would help to ensure their survival and prospects in a healthy natural environment in the future. such collective action in the courts, as opposed to mostly or exclusively relying on civic engagement initiatives, may help to bring about an enhanced perception of children as fully active members of the community. there may then be also a greater appreciation for the significant transformational contribution children potentially can make in advancing respect for human rights. as mentioned earlier, there have been successful international examples of collectives of children acting through civil litigation to vindicate their basic human right to a clean environment. the same strategy can be part of a repertoire that can be applied to other child human rights issues. children and young people all over the world are entitled to be educated about child-led public interest civil litigation action, and their own efforts should be supported. we must never lose sight of the fact that children’s education rights include the right to “… preparation…for responsible life in a free society.” (crc, article 29 (d)). s. grover 79 notes _______________________________ 1 note that the crc complaint mechanism, the optional protocol to the convention on the rights of the child on a communications procedure (crc-op3; the third crc optional protocol, 2014), does not in fact allow for collective child complaints against a state party for violations of the crc or one or both of the accompanying first two protocols (grover, 2015). however, at the same time: ‘childled organizations or groups fall within the [un] definition of “competent bodies” that can provide expert advice on the actual implementation of the convention’ (committee on the rights of the child, 2014). the latter fact, however, does not obviate the need to provide for children’s participation in the crc-op3 mechanism not only as individuals or small groups where each individual member is identified, but also as part of various child collectives attempting to advance the human rights of the particular collective that filed the complaint. 2 class action child litigation can also be a useful strategy in attempting to improve government services for children, so that government agencies involved better safeguard children’s human rights (i.e. see mcmullen, e., 2017). human rights education review – volume 1 (1) 80 references ahdoot, s. and pacheco, s.e. 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https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/03/10/nra-sues-floridastate-passesgun-control-legislation-wake-parkland/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/03/10/nra-sues-florida-state-passes-gun-control-legislation-wake-parkland/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/03/10/nra-sues-florida-state-passes-gun-control-legislation-wake-parkland/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/03/10/nra-sues-florida-state-passes-gun-control-legislation-wake-parkland/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/03/10/nra-sues-florida-state-passes-gun-control-legislation-wake-parkland/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/03/10/nra-sues-florida-state-passes-gun-control-legislation-wake-parkland/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/03/10/nra-sues-florida-state-passes-gun-control-legislation-wake-parkland/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/03/10/nra-sues-florida-state-passes-gun-control-legislation-wake-parkland/ 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https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/03/10/nra-sues-florida-state-passes-gun-control-legislation-wake-parkland/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/03/10/nra-sues-florida-state-passes-gun-control-legislation-wake-parkland/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/03/10/nra-sues-florida-state-passes-gun-control-legislation-wake-parkland/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/03/10/nra-sues-florida-state-passes-gun-control-legislation-wake-parkland/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/03/10/nra-sues-florida-state-passes-gun-control-legislation-wake-parkland/ rights education and children’s collective self-advocacy through public interest litigation rights education and children’s collective self-advocacy through public interest litigation i. introduction: educating children on legal advocacy in furthering their best interests ii. children’s article 12 crc participation rights and access to a civil remedy for systemic human rights violations iii. child rights education: juliana et al. vs. the united states et al. as a curriculum case exemplar of collective child-led legal action iv. conclusion references volume 4, no 1 (2021) date of publication 10-03-2021 doi:http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4260 issn 2535-5406 editorial building a global human rights education research community audrey osler university of south-eastern norway, norway & university of leeds, uk. hugh starkey university college london, uk. christian stokke university of south-eastern norway, norway. bjørn aksel flatås university of south-eastern norway, norway. audrey osler: a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk mailto:a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk human rights education review – volume 4(1) 2 editorial building a global human rights education research community doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4260 issn 2535-5406 audrey osler hugh starkey christian stokke bjørn aksel flatås a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk university of southeastern norway, norway & university of leeds, uk. university college london, uk. university of south-eastern norway, norway. university of southeastern norway, norway. in this edition of hrer, we highlight new efforts to develop a sustainable community of global human rights education research. human rights education (hre) developed in many forms as a field of practice in the second half of the twentieth century, promoted by non-governmental organisations, various un initiatives and other intergovernmental organisations, such as the council of europe. the first purpose of hre was to promote human rights as a ‘common language of humanity’, as expressed by united nations secretary-general kofi annan (un, 1998). the un secretarygeneral’s address, made nearly 50 years after the universal declaration of human rights (un, 1948), celebrated the lives of human rights leaders mahatma gandhi and dr martin luther king, jnr., for whom a guiding principle of struggle was nonviolence. broadly speaking, hre is concerned with enabling engaged citizens across the globe to understand and embrace the principles of human dignity and equality, and to accept responsibility, not only for the rights of those close to hand, but to defend the rights of all people everywhere. as such, the human rights project and that of human rights education can be characterised as a cosmopolitan endeavour (appiah, 2006; nussbaum, 1996; osler & starkey, 2003; 2005). in the first phase of explicit hre scholarship in the 1980s and 1990s, the focus moved beyond law schools to address informal education (baxi, 1997), school education (torney-purta, 1984; shafer, 1987; tarrow, 1987 & 1992; cunningham 1991; starkey, 1991; lynch et al., 1992; osler & starkey, 1994; alderson, 1999; shiman, 1999), and professional training (lister, 1991; osler, 1994 & 2000). there was a strong element of advocacy and awareness-raising, and early scholarly recognition of human rights education as a human right (osler & starkey, (2018 [1996]; ó cuanacháin, 2010). while hre has an established base in university law schools in many regions of the globe, it is only in the 21st century that there has been an expansion of empirical research into human rights education in pre-school, primary and secondary school settings, as well as in informal environments. there has been a focus on both established democracies and conflict-ridden regions. this interest is reflected in the growing number of doctoral studies published, from the first decade of the 21st century onwards (for example, carter, 1999; carolan, 2000; ó cuanacháin, 2004; http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4260 a. osler, h. starkey, c. stokke & b.a. flatås 3 hudson, 2006; al-nakib, 2012; struthers, 2015; abu moghli, 2016; mejias, 2012; vesterdal, 2016; hall, 2018). while a significant number of these studies addresses citizenship and social studies education, others address activism as learning, school leadership and culture, or focus specifically on child rights. today, hre is developing in a variety of forms, some of which might be characterised as transformative in intent (osler, 2016). to strengthen and develop this fast-growing field, we applied to the world educational research network (wera) to support an international research network (irn) on human rights education. this was established in spring 2019, with many members of the hrer international editorial board as core members, and was launched in london in june 2019. the coordinators are audrey osler (usn, norway) and hugh starkey (ucl institute of education, uk). the two pillars of the network are human rights education review and the international conference on education and democratic citizenship (icedc), based at ucl. like our academic colleagues across the globe, we have sought to find new ways of working during the pandemic and so in 2021 we launched a wera irn hre webinar series. the irn is open to all researchers whose work addresses human rights education, while the webinars are open to researchers at all career stages, to ngos, and others interested in or responsible for hre in different settings, ranging from local authorities to intergovernmental organisations. to date, we have attracted participants from north and latin america, from across europe and from a range of african and asian nations. webinar series 1 runs from january to june 2021 and further details can be found in hrer announcements. we aim to create an opportunity for supportive but critical debate of key questions in the field of hre and enable an exchange of views between researchers and practitioners. although many of our planned activities have been postponed due to the pandemic, members of the hrer core editorial team (flatås, osler, stachurskakounta, stokke) prepared papers for a special panel at the 2020 nera conference in turku, finland on ‘the future of hre in the nordic region’, where gunilla holm (helsinki university) acted as respondent. this special issue of hrer draws on six selected papers intended for presentation at the 2020 icedc in london, which was designed as a special contribution to the wera irn but unfortunately cancelled. responding to walter parker’s challenge to human rights educators in volume 1(1) of hrer, lee jerome, anna liddle and helen young’s article ‘talking about rights without talking about rights: on the absence of knowledge in classroom discussions’ reports on research in three secondary schools in england where students were engaged in deliberative discussion of controversial issues. the authors examine the need to be more explicit about what knowledge might sit at the heart of a curriculum for hre. from their analysis, the authors share four insights: there is a need to be more explicit about what constitutes human rights knowledge; hre requires the development of political understanding, which moves beyond individual empathy; educators need to value the process of deliberative discussions and avoid a push for conclusive answers; and students need support to draw on knowledge from a range of disciplines. in a study that focuses on two unicef programmes, megan devonald and her co-authors focus on the actual contribution and potential of hre to support adolescent refugees in non-formal humanitarian contexts. their mixed-method study concludes that in general terms the programme targeting syrian refugees in jordan fosters active citizenship, life skills and empowerment, although the authors human rights education review – volume 4(1) 4 note that concerns about girls’ safety prevent them from accessing some elements of the initiative. by contrast, the programme for rohingya refugees in bangladesh fails to provide meaningful hre for a variety of reasons, related in part to the refugees’ inability to leave the camp and an unwillingness by either the host or home country to allow refugees access to the curricula of their respective authorities. the authors conclude that teachers in humanitarian programmes need thorough training to ensure a proper integration of human rights education relevant to students’ immediate and medium-term needs. francesca zanatta addresses teacher education, exploring the potential of a child rights’ programme to contribute to transformative human development. her focus of analysis is a relationships and sex education module that draws on queer theory and critical pedagogy. based on data from focus groups with students, the author finds constructive tensions and potential conflicts between future teachers’ personal values, professional roles, and the course framework. she concludes that intersectional children’s rights education offers a unique opportunity for students to question existing knowledge, engage with the political, and navigate ethical dilemmas. vanessa hughes draws on an ethnographic case study of a london secondary school english as a second language classroom to consider the experiences of teachers and newly arrived migrant children. hughes uncovers how students and teachers find themselves at the intersection of conflicting government policies. specifically, uk immigration policy agendas that treat refugees and migrants with suspicion and actively promote a hostile environment undermine children’s right to a non-discriminatory and accessible education in keeping with its obligations under the un convention on the rights of the child and the european convention on human rights. the author concludes that teachers perform an important role in providing a safe educational space for the integration of refugee children. in a second article addressing uk policy, hans svennevig, lee jerome and alex elwick critically examine policy approaches for countering violent extremism (cve) in education, raising issues of wider relevance to cve programmes in other national contexts. the authors review the uk government website educate against hate, and seek to evaluate the extent to which it is consistent with human rights principles. they argue that the advice, guidance and resources are variable in quality and often inconsistent. they further suggest that the materials ignore or undermine children’s rights, treating children as potential victims with little agency, and perpetuating discriminatory stereotypes. the authors propose an alternative approach for cve that is consistent with the principles of education for democratic citizenship and human rights education, an approach that acknowledges young people’s agency and ensures proper representation of different cultural and ethnic groups. importantly, they argue that we address extremism in a more nuanced manner, one that recognises and permits educational autonomy. the final paper in this edition is a study by anatoli rapoport, exploring the potential synergies and the complementarity of hre and global citizenship education (gce) within the united states. rapoport examines the standards (content and skills) published by individual states across the united states, which set the framework for textbook production and curriculum development in the teaching of social studies. rapoport is interested in whether the standards make an explicit link between the two concepts. as an advocate for gce, he considers whether and how a human rights a. osler, h. starkey, c. stokke & b.a. flatås 5 discourse may enable broader acceptance of global citizenship, particularly in conservative environments. we hope you will this enjoy this special issue and that you find these varied articles a stimulus to further research and scholarship in hre. references abu moghli, m. (2016). the struggle to reclaim human rights education in palestinian authority schools in the occupied west bank (phd thesis, university college london). retrieved from https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1532837/ alderson, p. (1999). human rights and democracy in schools do they mean more than “picking up litter and not killing whales”? international journal of children's rights, 7, 185-205. al-nakib, r. (2012). dialogic universalism and human rights education: a case study from kuwait (phd thesis, university of london). retrieved from https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10020669/ appiah, k.a. (2006). cosmopolitanism: ethics in a world of strangers. london: allen lane (penguin). baxi, u. (1997). human rights education: the promise of the third millennium? in g. j. andreopoulos & r. p. claude (eds.), human rights education for the twentyfirst century. philadelphia: university of pennsylvania press, pp. 142–154. carolan, s.a.j. (2000). parent, teacher and child perceptions of human rights education: a primary school study (unpublished phd thesis). university of birmingham. carter, c.l. (1999). human rights in secondary education: relationships and identities within an all-boys school (unpublished phd thesis). university of birmingham. cunningham, j. (1991). the human rights secondary school. in h. starkey (ed.), the challenge of human rights education. london: cassell, pp. 90-104. hall, g. (2018). being, belonging and becoming as a human rights activist. (phd thesis). monash university, melbourne. hudson, a. (2006). implementing citizenship education in a secondary school community (phd thesis, university of leeds). retrieved from http://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/293/ lister, i. (1991). the challenge of human rights for education. in h. starkey (ed.), the challenge of human rights education. london: cassell, pp. 142–154. lynch, j., modgil, c., & modgil, s. (1992). cultural diversity and the schools (vol. 4). human rights, education and global responsibilities. london: falmer. mejias, s.a. (2012). ngos and human rights education in the neoliberal age: a case study of an ngo-secondary school partnership in london (phd thesis, university of london). retrieved from https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10020701/ https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1532837/ https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10020669/ http://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/293/ http://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/293/ http://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/293/ https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10020701/ human rights education review – volume 4(1) 6 nussbaum, m. (1996). patriotism and cosmopolitanism. in m. nussbaum & j. cohen (eds.), for love of country: debating the limits of patriotism. boston: beacon press. ó cuanacháin, c. (2004). human rights education in an irish primary school (unpublished phd thesis). university of leicester. ó cuanacháin, c. (2010). foreword, in osler, a. & starkey. teachers and human rights education. stoke-on-trent: trentham books. osler, a. (1994).the un convention on the rights of the child: some implications for teacher education, educational review, 46(2), 141-150. https://doi.org/10.1080/0013191940460204 osler, a. (2000). children’s rights, responsibilities, and understandings of school discipline. research papers in education, 15 (1), 49-67. https://doi.org/10.1080/02671520036294310.1080/026715200362943 osler, a. (2016). human rights and schooling: an ethical framework for teaching for social justice. new york, ny: teachers college press. osler, a. & starkey, h. (1994). fundamental issues in teacher education for human rights: a european perspective. journal of moral education, 23(3), 349-359. https://doi.org/10.1080/0305724940230311 osler, a., & starkey, h. (2003). learning for cosmopolitan citizenship: theoretical debates and young people's experiences. educational review, 55(3), 243– 254. https://doi.org/10.1080/0013191032000118901 osler, a., & starkey, h. (2005). changing citizenship: democracy and inclusion in education. maidenhead: open university press. osler, a., & starkey, h. (2018 [1996]). teacher education and human rights. london: routledge revivals. shafer, s. (1987). human rights education in schools. in n. tarrow (ed.), human rights and education. oxford: pergamon. shiman, d. (1999). teaching human rights. university of denver: center for teaching international relations. starkey, h. (ed.) (1991). the challenge of human rights education. london: cassell. struthers, a.e.c. (2015). educating about, through and for human rights in english primary schools: a failure of education policy, classroom practice or teacher attitudes? (phd thesis, university of warwick). retrieved from http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/79548/ tarrow, n. (ed.) (1987). human rights and education. oxford: pergamon. tarrow, n. (1992). human rights education: alternative conceptions. in j. lynch, c. modgil, & s. modgil (eds.), cultural diversity and the schools (vol. 4), pp. 2150. london: falmer. torney-purta, j. (1984). human rights. in n. graves, j. dunlop, & j. torney-purta (eds.), teaching for international understanding, peace and human rights (pp. 59-84). paris: unesco. https://doi.org/10.1080/0013191940460204 https://doi.org/10.1080/02671520036294310.1080/026715200362943 https://doi.org/10.1080/0305724940230311 https://doi.org/10.1080/0013191032000118901 http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/79548/ a. osler, h. starkey, c. stokke & b.a. flatås 7 vesterdal, k. (2016). the roles of human rights education in norway. a qualitative study of purposes and approaches in policy and in upper secondary schools (phd thesis). norwegian university of science and technology, trondheim. united nations. (1998, january 30). human rights common language of humanity, secretary-general says in message launching season of non-violence. sg.sm/6450. retrieved from https://www.un.org/press/en/1998/19980130.sgsm6450.html https://www.un.org/press/en/1998/19980130.sgsm6450.html volume 1, no 2 (2018) date received: 06-08-2018 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2852 date accepted: 02-12-2018 peer-reviewed article issn 2535-5406 the indigenous sami citizen and norwegian national identity: tensions in curriculum discourses kristin gregers eriksen university of south-eastern norway, norway. abstract: the paper explores citizenship positions for the sami as citizen in the overarching policy document for the norwegian school. informed by the perspective that policy documents hold discursive productivity in the foucauldian sense, this document is regarded as vital for locating normative cultural ideals. the analysis points to three discourses: indigeneity, multiculturalism and the common norwegian cultural heritage perspective. although the analysis suggests that there is a variety of possible citizenship identity positions, tensions are located in their ontological and epistemological claims regarding what it means to be sami. the paper argues that indigenous perspectives might both challenge and complement current ideas of citizenship and human rights education. notably, indigeneity accentuates the tension between universalism and recognition in human rights education. the paper also points to how the curriculum has great ambitions about the possibilities of inclusive practice within an educational system that lacks sufficient competence on sami culture. keywords: citizenship, discourse, indigenous, sami, human rights education. kristin.eriksen@usn.no human rights education review – volume 1(2) 26 the indigenous sami citizen and norwegian national identity: tensions in curriculum discourses doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2852 issn 2535-5406 kristin gregers eriksen kristin.eriksen@usn.no university of south-eastern norway, norway. abstract: the paper explores citizenship positions for the sami as citizen in the overarching policy document for the norwegian school. informed by the perspective that policy documents hold discursive productivity in the foucauldian sense, this document is regarded vital for locating normative cultural ideals. the analysis points to three discourses: indigeneity, multiculturalism and the common norwegian cultural heritage perspective. although the analysis suggests that there is a variety of possible citizenship identity positions, tensions are located in their ontological and epistemological claims regarding what it means to be sami. the paper argues that indigenous perspectives might both challenge and complement current ideas of citizenship and human rights education. notably, indigeneity accentuates the tension between universalism and recognition in human rights education. the paper also points to how the curriculum has great ambitions for the possibilities of inclusive practice within an educational system that lacks sufficient competence on sami culture. keywords: citizenship, discourse, indigenous, sami, human rights education introduction the aim of this paper is to discuss different citizenship positions for the sami as citizen in the main foundational policy document for common norwegian and sami schools. as the recently accepted regulation, the overarching curriculum (o-17), makes clear, ‘protecting the minority is a vital principle in a democratic state and society. a democratic society also shields indigenous peoples and minorities’ (norwegian directory for education and training [udir], 2017, p. 9). the educational system is one of society’s most pervasive institutions, discursively reproducing ideas of national identity and citizenship (van dijk, 1993). in the norwegian context, schools were one of the main vehicles for a brutal assimilationist policy directed at the indigenous sami and other minorities during the 19th and 20th centuries. the formal recognition of indigenous peoples in educational policy is a turnaround. however, there is a clear risk that such intentions remain merely symbolic (gjerpe, 2017). much research points to a norwegian school system still strongly invested in monoculturalism and whiteness (biseth, 2012; røthing, 2015; svendsen, 2014). what is more, fostering citizenship through education is not merely a matter of juridical recognition; the informal construction of identity is vital (erdal & strømsø, 2018). this is further actualized by the inherent paradox with the central role of human rights in citizenship education between universality and recognition (osler, 2015, 2016). in this paper, i ask http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2852 k.g. eriksen 27 what citizenship positions are located in the overarching curriculum for the sami as citizen? my perspective is that major curriculum documents hold power and discursive productivity in the foucauldian sense; they are vital for locating normative cultural discourses about the ideal citizen. this is not to say that policy is deterministic, and translation from policy to practice happens through complex processes of appropriation by social actors. when aspiring to understand the formation of citizenship identity, structural positionality is nonetheless a central consideration. this entails on the one hand how the individual is positioned as citizen-subject through discourse, but also how the individual constitutes her citizenship identity by and through the terms and circumstances accessible (dahlstedt, fejes, olson, rahm & sandberg, 2017). in this paper, i explore the contributions of educational policy in the construction of imagined national communities and citizenship. as anderson (1991) observed, the community of a nation is a social construction. nations are ‘subject to and the product of existing power hierarchies but, simultaneously, they are inherently dynamic, co-produced by ordinary people in their everyday lives’ (erdal & strømsø, 2018, p. 29). this study addresses the vital topic of how educational discourse positions and conceptualizes minorities in general, albeit with a clear sensitivity for the particularities of the sami as indigenous people. in the first sections, i present the historical and juridical background for the situation of the sami in norway, with special attention to the education system. i then account for the conceptual framework of understandings of citizenship, identity and the role of human rights. in the following section, the main principles of the mode of critical discourse analysis (cda), as well as the material, are presented. positioned within a critical epistemology, i reject any positivist view that the study represents objective ‘findings’ of social reality, and thus the results and discussions are presented as inseparable entities. in the concluding section i point out how indigenous perspectives both challenge and complement conventional perspectives on education for citizenship and human rights, and reflect on how the policy document holds quite ambitious goals for mainstreaming sami culture in education. background: the sami and the norwegian educational system the sami are the indigenous people of northwestern europe, and the ancestral homeland of sápmi/sábme/saepmie covers parts of northern norway, sweden, finland and northwestern russia. as a category, the sami encompass several different groups with distinct self-identities. as the norwegian state does not register information about the ethnicity of its residents, there is no official number of the amount of the population identifying as sami. the official approach to this topic is geographical, and ten norwegian municipalities, with approximately 55,000 inhabitants, are defined as ‘sami management areas’. as gjerpe (2018, p. 6) points out, the sami have, historically, had continuous contact with the non-sami, and are thus not a ‘treaty people’ such as indigenous peoples in aotearoa/new zealand, usa or canada. norwegian minority policy is partly based on the structure put forward by kymlicka on differentiation of citizenship rights within liberal democracies (1995). the sami hold particular rights regarding their collective and formal status as indigenous peoples in norway. in accordance with this, the official curriculum in human rights education review – volume 1(2) 28 norway has since 1997 appeared in two parallel and equal versions; the norwegian and the sami (udir, 2013a, 2013b). in line with the united nations convention of the rights of the child [crc] article 29 b), c) and d), the goals of education do not only entail that education shall be directed to development of the child’s cultural identity, but shall also prepare everyone to live in tolerance and to respect the different groups in the country (united nations [un], 1989). this is also reflected in the un declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples [undrip], which states that indigenous perspectives ‘shall be appropriately reflected in education and public information’ (un, 2007, article 15). in norway, the importance of human rights education is stated in the curriculum as well as in the norwegian constitution, declaring: ‘the education shall safeguard the individual's abilities and needs, and promote respect for democracy, the rule of law and human rights’ (the constitution, 1814 [2014], §109). lile (2011) argues that knowledge about the oppression of the sami and their fight for human rights is vital for all pupils in norway. it is crucial to make the distinction between knowledge about cultural and indigenous groups and their cultures, and the responsibility of education for ‘strengthening the respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms’ (un, 1966, article 13). this resonates with the emphasis in human rights education on teaching for, not only about human rights (osler, 2016, p. 40). mere inclusion of knowledge about different cultures can sometimes do more harm than good in terms of reproducing epistemic violence (eriksen, 2018). the formal recognition of sami culture as part of a common norwegian national identity is ridden with challenges, not least because of the complex relationship between indigenous groups and nation states. the norwegian school system from the outset played a central role in nation-building and democratic patriotism in a culturally homogenous imagined community (telhaug & mediaas, 2003). the construction of the norwegian imagined community also draws on a history of aggressive assimilationist policies towards the sami (erdal & strømsø, 2018, p. 28), and is deeply embedded in an ideal of unity through homogeneity and sameness. several researchers have suggested that this discourse is still very much present through the externalization of current racism within educational discourse (osler & lindquist, 2018; svendsen, 2014). on a global scale, there were powerful movements of revitalization and resistance among minority groups after world war ii; these movements were active in attempts to have multiple histories and cultures reflected in mainstream education (banks, 2008). this was also the case in norway, where the longstanding mobilization to recognise the sami led to an emerging multicultural pedagogy (engen, 2014). during the norwegianification politics of the 19th and 20th centuries, the sami had gradually lost influence in areas where they had been living for thousands of years. sami languages were strongly discouraged in school and laws that undermined traditional sami ways of living were passed. social-darwinist and racist theories were applied in arguments that posited the inferiority of sami culture (niemi, 2017). in recent decades, educational policy has been central to efforts by the norwegian government to better the situation for sami language and culture (olsen, sollid & johansen, 2017). these efforts have followed two interrelated but somewhat different avenues. firstly, several schools within the sami management areas are sami schools, providing all teaching in sami languages. this represents a strategy of indigeneity, enabling distinct schools based on sami cultures. this also accentuates the juridical difference between the sami and other minorities. although the crc k.g. eriksen 29 applies the term ‘persons of indigenous origin’, ‘indigenous peoples’ is commonly accepted in norwegian law and official discourse. being the object of much debate in the un, the term ‘peoples’ refers to the indigenous as distinct groups or nations, and thus denotes stronger claims for self-determination (lile, 2012). secondly, sami culture is to be integrated in all subjects in school in both norwegian and sami schools, representing a mainstreaming tendency (engen, 2014). studies of norwegian state education suggest that pupils in non-sami schools learn little about sami history and culture, and that the sami are commonly presented in stereotypical ways (lile, 2011; mortensen-buan, 2016). while the existence of a sami curriculum has made it possible to distinguish between norwegian and sami schools, the inclusion of sami culture and history in the norwegian school might have been downplayed (gjerpe, 2017). this is problematic, not least because in an increasingly urbanized society, most children with sami affiliations probably attend mainstream schools. conceptual framework: citizenship education, rights and the subject the extensive rights and formal visibility of the sami throughout the curriculum elucidate how the situation for the sami in norway is, to some extent, seen internationally as a success story. the sami are among the highest educated indigenous peoples, and sami individuals mainly staff sami institutions (stordahl, 2008). surveys indicate that the norwegian sami have relatively high trust in existing democratic bodies, as well as high levels of formal participation (selle, semb, strømsnes & nordbø, 2015). however, this focus on formal citizenship status is related to a thin concept of citizenship, or citizenship-as-legal-status (kymlicka & norman, 1994). in this paper, it is the normative contents of citizenship-as-desirableactivity, or thick citizenship, that is in focus. within this, cultural aspects related to social positioning, identity and belonging are core. belonging is about feeling at home and secure, but also about being recognized (wood & waite, 2011). thus, the relationship between citizenship and education concerns not only the development of formal democratic knowledge, but also empowerment through possibilities for subjectification of the individual (biesta, 2009, 2014). in this regard, the position of the sami appears more ambiguous. today, there is not only talk about revitalizing sami culture but also about processes of cumulative discrimination and decolonization (vars, 2017). studies of current living conditions indicate that as many as one third of the sami in norway still experience discrimination related to ethnic identity, including structural and indirect discrimination (hansen, minton, friborg & sørlie, 2016). a singular focus on formal and thin aspects of citizenship might fail to take into account more tacit exclusion and epistemic violence. early discourses on citizenship emerged within the framework of nationalism as political doctrine in the 1800s (dahlstedt et al., 2017). the hegemony of this concept led to minorities positioning themselves or being positioned as the other, and this was often accompanied by a homogenous cultural understanding of the nation-state. a core idea of this dominant liberal assimilationist view has been that it increases equality for all when it expands from the civil and political into the social sphere. in the norwegian context, this ideology has been manifested through a self-image of ‘norwegian exceptionalism’, where norway is seen as a champion of democracy, anti-racism and human rights (eriksen, 2018; gullestad, 2004; vesterdal, 2016). within this discursive construction, national values and human rights are commonly proclaimed as the same thing (osler & lybaek, 2014). however, banks human rights education review – volume 1(2) 30 (2008) emphasizes that in postcolonial contexts the conception of citizenship should be expanded to include group rights, in order to resist prevailing processes of marginalization and racialization. this actualizes the inherent tension between human rights as a universal project, and recognition and equal protection as spelled out in the universal declaration of human rights (udhr) articles 6 and 7 (un, 1948). legal recognition is insufficient, and there might be considerable gaps between rhetoric and lived realities (osler, 2016). postand decolonial frameworks inform us about how colonization is an ongoing process of violent epistemic expansion (andreotti, 2011, p. 62). the modern human rights project is also embedded in a modern epistemology that might function to standardize culture and regulate the colonized other (spivak, 1999). this is also accentuated by the paradoxical role of the nation-state as safeguarder of human rights. as arendt (1968) highlighted through her seminal expression ‘the right to have rights’, national citizenship is the enabler of legal entitlements in spite of the claim of human rights as moral entitlements possessed by all individuals through their humanity. although this is a question of legal status, the idea can also be understood in epistemological terms, related to who are allowed recognition as full citizen subjects through discourses and power structures. nakata (2006) here talks of the possibility of creating a recognizably indigenous space that is, nonetheless, pluralistic. bhabha (2003) captures this role of recognition and pluralism through the idea of ‘the right to narrate’, which allows learners to place themselves within collective histories. in this, a common tendency to reification of diversity must be replaced with hybridity, to avoid essentialism (bhabha, 1990). research methods and material the analytical approach in this paper is multidisciplinary, applying insights from critical pedagogy (kincheloe, maclaren & steinberg, 2011), postand decolonial studies (andreotti, 2011; bhabha, 2003), and indigenous studies (nakata, 2006; gjerpe, 2017; smith, 2010). the boundaries between these perspectives are not clear-cut. in the groundbreaking book decolonizing methodologies, linda tuhiway smith declares that indigenous methodology is ‘about centring our concepts and worldviews and then coming to know and understand theory and research from our own perspectives and for our own purposes’ (smith, 2010, p. 39). scholars of critical pedagogy, postand decolonialism share, with indigenous methodology, an acknowledgement that research is always positional, situational and must be committed to fight unjust power relations. within indigenous methodology, such a perspective might also take on an extended form as epistemic privilege or even ontological exclusivism. this entails that that indigenous lifeworlds are ‘unknowable’ from a western epistemological standpoint (oskal, 2008). in a broader sense, indigenous research includes various approaches to understanding, empowering and decolonizing the position of indigenous peoples. such approaches need not be restricted to indigenous individuals, but are united by the ethical notion that such research should always ensure that it is respectful, ethical, correct, sympathetic and beneficial seen from an indigenous point of view (porsanger, 2004). in this regard, it is imperative to state my background as non-indigenous and what might be described by the somewhat dubious term ‘majority-norwegian’. my concern about these issues is informed by the will to participate in continuously destabilizing systemic and epistemological inequity through anti-racist education. k.g. eriksen 31 the paper does not imply that power and dominance are imposed on individuals through discourse, and a broader analysis of socio-cognitive processes of negotiation and resistance would be needed for a fully-fledged analysis (van dijk, 1993). in a study of citizenship and subject positions in education, the experienced curriculum perceived by pupils is also vital (goodlad, 1979), but this is outside the scope of this paper. although the focus is on the limiting function of the discourses embedded in policy text, the paper also aims to locate fields of opportunities for resistance and change. the analysis was guided by principles from critical discourse analysis (cda), paying specific attention to conceptualization through language use. the analytical questions applied were inspired by and based on fairclough’s (2001) practical guide to cda (see table 1 below). table 1. analytical questions  what classification schemes are applied?  how is agency allocated?  does the text presume particular subject positions? if so, which?  are there ideologically significant meaning relations between words (synonymy, antonymy, hyponymy)?  which topical connections are made, and what logic do they follow?  how do the texts conceptualize the sami and saminess? in norway, the curriculum is recognized as part of national law, and o-17 is a precept to, and thus legally sanctioned by, the education act. in norway, the curriculum has since 1974 had a ‘general part’, now renamed an ‘overarching part’. the new o-17 was commissioned by the government and passed on 1 september, 2017. it underwent a thorough political process before being passed as a national law in parliament, and so signals a public as well as a political consensus. thus it is above all a regulation with extensive symbolic value, as it expresses the main ambitions of the norwegian state with regard to education. it is a public expression of official policy, and contributes to the state-led construction of truth regimes (ball 1994). a revision of this curriculum document thus signals a political change (olsen & andreassen, 2018). the political passing of this new document was the first step in a currently ongoing major curriculum reform in norway. in legal terms, all subject curricula must be in line with o-17. although there exist separate curricula for the sami and norwegian schools, o-17 is a shared principal document. in the analysis, i identified core concepts related to citizenship and the sami, and, in line with cda, i paid attention to topical connections and how the terms were conceptualized through language use (see table 2 below). human rights education review – volume 1(2) 32 term occurrence topical connections democracy 29 values, practices, governance sami 21 language, the sami school, culture, cultural heritage, indigenous identity 13 individual identity, self image rights 12 human rights, minorities, sami diversity 11 community, unity, living together cultural heritage 8 christianity, humanism, sami, history norwegian 5 language, cultural heritage, society citizenship 4 democracy, rights and duties discussion: indigeneity, multiculturalism and common cultural heritage the new o-17 positions itself in a long tradition of emphasizing education for democracy in norwegian common education; in fact, it strengthens this emphasis by highlighting democracy and citizenship as one of the main focus areas for all educational practice. although in some subjects there is more weight placed on citizenship education than others, the particularity of the norwegian and nordic traditions is how democratic citizenship is regarded as part of the overall mandate to secure a broader human education (huang et al., 2017). in this, the role of education in fostering democratic citizenship is interrelated to larger processes of identity and subjectivity. throughout o-17, there is a logical interconnection between ‘belonging’, ‘identity’ and ‘diversity’ in conceptualizing the democratic citizen. the text indisputably includes paternalistic statements such as: ‘knowledge of our history and culture is important for developing identity and belonging for the pupil in society’ (udir, 2017, p. 6). however, it is repeatedly stated that belonging is dependent upon recognizing society as fundamentally pluralistic, and acknowledging individual differences: k.g. eriksen 33 schools should be sensitive to the diversity of pupils and facilitate experience of belonging in school and society for all. everyone might experience feeling different. that is why we depend upon diversity being recognized and valued (udir, 2017, p. 6). such a perspective takes into account the insight from hannah arendt (1968) that true democracy depends upon recognizing diversity as the normal condition. it also seemingly softens the methodological nationalism that has been a tenacious feature of norwegian citizenship education. however, there are clear anomalies in this conceptualization of diversity. the choice of wording reflects a tendency in norwegian educational policy of applying the depoliticized ‘diversity’ rather than ‘multiculturalism’, which was more frequently used in earlier documents. according to burner, nodeland & aamaas (2018), the term diversity is often viewed as positive and harmless. however, this ‘celebration of diversity’ might also serve to veil processes of racialization and othering, and ‘diversity’ is commonly reserved for matters pertaining to immigration. in o-17, diversity is highly individualized as part of our personal identities, and it is almost exclusively followed by statements of community and unity, such as the following one: ‘all pupils should be able to develop their identity in a diverse community’ (udir, 2017, p. 6). difference is hardly associated with this, while ‘unity’ is the main connotation. this idea of diversity is not related to any idea of a collective or group identity, such as being part of an indigenous group, but rather represents the idea of diverse individuals living together in a society based on a set of core values. together with diversity, democracy also appears as an uncontroversial concept, and is the term that occurs most frequently in the document. as jore (2018) points out, the idea of being a champion of an exceptional democratic constitution is integral to norwegian national identity. in o-17, democracy is conceptually connected with values and ‘cultural heritage’. values are partly presented as ‘our values’, and at one point identified as related to humanism and christianity: ‘the christian and humanist heritage and tradition is an important part of the common cultural heritage of the country and has played a vital role in the development of our democracy’ (udir, 2017, p. 6). thus, on the one hand, democracy is presented as something universal and, on the other, is closely connected to the specific norwegian national identity and history. this asserts a relationship between individual identity and citizenship formation and the acquisition of inherited norms and behaviours (osler & lybæk, 2014). however, although the idea of a shared cultural heritage as key to social cohesion in the nation state is still very much present, a more political conception of citizenship with some sensitivity towards the role of rights is also found: ‘a democratic society rests upon how the whole population hold equal rights and opportunities to participate in processes of decision making’ (udir, 2017, p. 9). this emphasis on rights within the conception of democratic practice and citizenship represents something new in o-17. the strategy of indigenization is highly visible in the overarching framework document. in all paragraphs where the sami are mentioned, the concept indigenous is also present, reflecting the strong interconnections between the development of an international juridical framework for indigenous peoples, and the legal status for the sami in norway (gjerpe, 2017). the conceptualization of saminess as such is thus intimately connected with indigeneity. this indigenization might enable a human rights education review – volume 1(2) 34 recognizably indigenous space that works to culturally affirm indigenous people and practices (nakata, 2006). the initial parts of o-17 affirm the existence of the sami school by defining it thoroughly as all education that uses the sami curriculum and is located within sami management areas. in the statement of general values for education, one third of the paragraph is devoted to the sami school, asserting that this education should be based on sami values and culture, language and society. it furthermore describes the core content quite explicitly: in sami schools, it is important to have an all-sami perspective and an indigenous perspective, and emphasize material and immaterial cultural heritage as traditional knowledge, duodji1 and family relations (udir, 2017, p. 5). this paragraph has highly interesting implications for citizenship and national identity. as it makes an intimate connection between saminess and the sami school, it aligns with the concept of recognizing different peoples within the nation-state (kymlicka, 1995). to be sami is to be a part of the sami peoples or nation, which is fundamentally different from being a cultural or ethnic minority within the nationstate. the concept of peoples is the foundation of much indigenous politics and legal frameworks internationally; it also provides the foundation for the existence of the sami parliament in norway. on the one hand, it shifts power-relations, but it also challenges the norwegian democratic system (selle et al., 2015). conceptualizing the sami school also holds implications for who can be recognized as a ‘sami pupil’. gjerpe (2017) points out that a tendency to dichotomize the sami and norwegian schools might reserve saminess for pupils within sami schools, which is problematic since probably more sami pupils in norway receive their education outside sami management areas than within. while o-17 circumvents the absence or national silence that might be said to have permeated both curricula and textbooks throughout the 20th century (folkenborg, 2008; olsen, 2017), it also points to a quite specific concept of saminess. olsen (2010, p. 169) argues that the ideology of indigeneity might for some create an image of saminess that is not matched by the cultural competence and everyday life of all sami. however, according to gjerpe (2018, p. 11), although the essentialising of cultural characteristics can create problematic dichotomies between the indigenous and the west, or the traditional and the modern, it must also be understood as a political coping mechanism. strategic essentialism has also proven effective in obtaining recognition and formal rights. gert biesta expounds the idea of democracy and pluralism in pedagogical terms, through his notion of citizenship education as subjectification. he contends that education should produce citizens with certain traits or identities. the only thing education can aspire to is making possible experiences of democratic agency here and now. in order for this to happen, all individuals must be allowed to ‘come into being’ as unique subjects in a world that is inherently pluralistic (biesta, 2009, 2014). in this, there is no distinction between being a democratic citizen and the experience of being recognized as a subject. in relation to the nation, this resonates well with a concept of nationality connected to belonging and recognition (erdal & strømsø, 2018). however, this act of subjectification is mostly described on a philosophical level, and may well be complemented by indigenous perspectives on education. indigenous research sheds light on how recognizing cultural differences and experiencing subjectivity in real life situations is always imbued with power k.g. eriksen 35 structures and cultural hegemony (kuokkonen, 2008) that lead to othering. not everyone accesses subjectification on equal terms. in indigenous perspectives on education, reclaiming ownership of knowledge is a key concern (pihama, 2016; porsanger, 2004). this includes both emphasizing the epistemological or even ontological particularity of indigenous cultures, as well as decolonization of hegemonic knowledge and institutions. the position of the sami as citizen might also be conceptualized through the more conventional discourse on diversity and multiculturalism, which is concerned with identity as hybrid and dynamic: ‘the theoretical and empirical work of multicultural scholars indicates that identity is multiple, changing, overlapping, and contextual, rather than fixed and static’ (banks, 2008, p. 133). it is possible to locate the sami citizen, within this field of identifications, as a multicultural, norwegian citizen with a sami cultural identity. although identity throughout the curriculum document is claimed to be anchored in history, culture and tradition (udir, 2017, p. 6), the overall concept of citizenship identity throughout the document has more affinity with a pluralistic and political understanding. social coherence is here connected with participation. to belong is to take part in the diverse democratic community, and diversity is a resource for society at large. human rights are set out as the foundation of a democratic society (udir, 2017, p. 5), although they are still intimately connected with the idea of ‘common norwegian values’ and ‘humanist and christian heritage and tradition’ as well as ‘different religions and worldviews’ (udir, 2017, p. 5). rights are also positioned in relation to minorities and indigenous peoples in particular (udir; 2017, p. 9). this is commensurable with classic understandings of liberal multiculturalism, where different ethnic or cultural groups should be able to participate fully in the national civic culture while retaining elements of their own culture. the dominant culture of the nation-state should incorporate aspects of minorities` experiences, cultures and languages, ensuring civic equality (gutmann, 2004). this view also opens for the possibility that national identity and citizenship might not always overlap. the cultural stereotypes of being norwegian and being sami are, in this perspective, not mutually exclusive positions. this is reflected in the initial text where ownership of the overall education act is defined as both norwegian and sami: ‘the values in the education act are also sami values’ (udir, 2017, p. 6). although they enable a flexibility in identities, a challenge with multicultural perspectives is that they might be blind to more unstated processes of epistemic hegemony. as bhabha (1990) notes, cultural relativism manages cultural difference in relation to a normative centre, thus reinforcing a hegemonic culture. indigenous perspectives might help reveal this, by pointing to the historically asymmetrical power-relations shaping the positionality of indigenous peoples that sometimes become invisible in the multicultural nexus. in the role of school in fostering citizenship identity, such power might be operationalized as epistemic violence. majority epistemology thus becomes dominant, to the extent that it influences strategies of identity with minorities (gramsci, 1971). assimilationist policies were ‘effective’ in norway to the extent of displacement and almost erasure of the sami episteme (kuokkonen, 2008). in this perspective, a focus on recognizing individual difference and plurality must take into account the structural aspects of positions such as the indigenous. researchers on indigenous education have pointed out that education must not only be concerned with the right of the indigenous to education on their own terms; there should also be mainstream knowledge about indigenous peoples and human rights education review – volume 1(2) 36 minorities in the majority population (olsen et al., 2017). it is often stated that the right of minority children to enjoy and practice their own culture is affirmed through the crc article 29. less focus is usually put on the fact that education should prepare all pupils for: responsible life in a free society, in the spirit of understanding, peace, tolerance, equality of sexes, and friendship among all peoples, ethnic, national and religious groups and persons of indigenous origin (un, 1989, article 29 d)). hence, it is possible to argue that if the school system does not provide adequate knowledge about sami culture and history; this is a violation of the right to human rights education for all. this point has also been thoroughly made with regard to the right of all children to multicultural education as such, this right is not restricted to minority children (osler, 2016). in line with this, o-17 states that all pupils must ‘gain insight into the sami indigenous peoples` history, culture, society and rights’ and that they should ‘learn about plurality and variation within sami culture’ (udir, 2017, p. 6). this also entails recognizing that all sami and norwegians are natives of the norwegian nation-state. on the other hand, it is striking that o-17 simply speaks of knowledge and insight. paragraph 1d in article 29 of crc must also be read in relation to paragraph 1b, which states the importance of developing respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms (un, 1989). thus o-17 can also be said to represent a depoliticised approach to the role of indigenous rights, and might serve to veil the workings of marginalization and power structures. the emphasis is on all pupils’ right to knowledge rather than the right of the sami for their rights to be respected. this also accentuates the importance of the principle of universality of human rights to be sensitive to unequal access to recognition. as the norwegian nation-state was built upon land inhabited by the sami and deeply embedded within sami culture and self-understanding, it impossible to talk about the norwegian nation-state without including the sami. such a view is reflected in the shared cultural heritage perspective : ‘the sami cultural heritage is part of the cultural heritage in norway. our common cultural heritage has developed through history’ (udir, 2017, p. 6). the idea of shared cultural heritage and placing the sami cultural heritage within the understanding of norwegian culture is inclusive in a mainstreaming perspective, but it is also ambitious. it demands that majority teachers have a high degree of cultural competence. in addition, it is positioned within the majority perspective, and this inclusion can also be seen as a way of communicating an asymmetrical relationship (olsen & andreassen, 2017). research from aotearoa/new zealand has pointed to the risk of mainstreaming becoming ‘whitestreaming’, due to the majority lacking adequate knowledge (olsen et al., 2017). another version of this perspective is the notion of ‘the perfect stranger’. through perceived notions of universality and meritocracy, whiteness becomes the norm, and constructs the indigenous as the cultural other. denial of the role that whiteness plays in shaping majority teachers` lives, as well as the claim that they know little or nothing about indigenous peoples and cultures, provides a barrier to engagement with ‘difficult knowledges’ (higgins, madden & korteweg, 2015). changing stereotypes and working against oppression requires disruptive knowledge, not simply more knowledge (kumashiro, 2002). this entails examining not only how some are othered in society, but also how some positions are privileged. in this k.g. eriksen 37 regard, a highly interesting vision in curriculum document is the following: ‘all participants in the school community must develop awareness about minority and majority perspectives’ (udir, 2017, p. 9). however, in line with the descriptions of human rights and human rights education in both crc article 29 b) and cescr article 13, it is nonetheless problematic that o-17 simply applies the term awareness. concluding reflections and implications this paper has located normative discourses on ideas about sami, norwegian and sami-norwegian citizenship identity in the most central policy document for the public school system for years to come. the new overarching curriculum follows a process of acknowledgment and institutionalization of sami education. hence, o-17 from one perspective amounts to a significant achievement in the area of indigenous perspectives on education, knowledge and epistemology. a stronger emphasis on rights and a more political conceptualization of citizenship in o-17, compared to earlier curricula, appears promising. the document also, to some extent, unties the obstinately held relationship between national identity and citizenship that has prevailed in the norwegian educational system. thus, it renders possible different positions on managing a sami and norwegian identity within the norwegian nationstate. however hopeful and promising, several concerns are still raised concerning the nexus of education, citizenship and identity when studying the document. while the document opens for a variety of discursive positions for citizenship identity, it does not escape the danger of telling a single story. where mentioned explicitly, saminess is quite unequivocally connected to indigeneity and the sami school. strategic essentialism related to ethno-nationalist mobilization has been vital to the sami peoples` fight for recognition (stordahl, 2001). although the indigenous rights discourse has constituted dichotomist categories with primordialist connotations, claiming essentialist difference has been as much a strategic utterance as ontological position (gaski, 2008). identity groups may try to impose images on individuals, but also enhance individual freedom by helping individuals attain goals that can only be achieved through group action (banks, 2008). the possible flipside of this is a ranking of saminess, and issues of who can experience subjectification as sami. the intensity, quality and content of a sami identity as well as the connection to indigeneity might be very diverse among sami individuals in norway (selle et al., 2015). there is a risk that a quite particular understanding of saminess and the sami school in the curriculum document might neglect sami pupils who do not attend sami schools. another aspect of this is that if sami culture and history is understood as mostly related to the sami curriculum, the responsibility for telling sami history is placed on the sami community (gjerpe, 2017; osler, 2016). as shown in the discussion above, indigenous perspectives might be complementary to traditional multicultural and democratic perspectives on pluralism. they shed light on how democratic processes perceived to be just do not always recognize or support all perspectives on equal terms. in addition, focusing on diversity might serve to depoliticize power dimensions related to the hegemony of the majority culture. in this perspective, it is vital not to reserve the indigenous perspective for the sami school. an exclusivist indigenous position might reify the us/them opposition and carry it through as a necessary condition for learning. this paradox can be approached through the vision of the ‘right to narrate’ (bhabha, 2003), and the importance of the inclusion of the particular stories within the collective. in indigenous studies, this narrative space has been conceptualized as the human rights education review – volume 1(2) 38 ‘cultural interface’. nakata (2006) argues that indigenous peoples must accept the reality that the great mediator between indigenous and non-indigenous knowledge is the ontology of the western knowledge system. the focus should be on the cultural interface, which is: a place of contradiction and tension, constant negotiation, which is the everyday lifeworld of many indigenous people. we may learn to accept ambiguity and contradiction as part of being indigenous (nakata, 2006, p. 272). importantly, this cultural interface implies that the collective indigenous narratives consist of multiple narratives rather than a single one, and this implies multiple subject positions in relation to the categories indigenous or nonindigenous (olsen, 2018). indigenous studies is not just the study of indigenous histories, cultures and issues, but also the study of how they have been studied, circumscribed and represented. this must, however, also include a sensitivity to current power structures providing access to recognition on unequal terms, and thus a focus on the responsibility of the majority to respect the rights of the indigenous. this is complementary to the concept of subjectification, which is concerned with providing agency for the individual to seek independence from the current societal order (biesta, 2009; 2014). it also accentuates the importance of recognizing not only the particularity of indigenous standpoints and identities, but also the construction of privileged ones. as a finishing remark, it should be noted that although the goals in o-17 are optimistically progressive, they are also highly ambitious in terms of resources, competence and the political will to follow through. stating that all pupils should gain insight into the diversity of sami culture is a bold declaration in an educational system that so far provides mostly superficial or problematic knowledge of this area, if any. the visibility of sami culture and indigenous perspectives is an important and powerful symbolic message (gjerpe, 2017), but there is a real risk that it remains restricted to merely that. a substantial effort towards increased focus and competence among schools, teachers and learning materials is required. as the construction and negotiation of citizenship and national identities might happen in cultural interfaces, there is a need for shedding more light on the actual and complex processes taking place in these spheres. this is related to the empirical question of what kind of citizenship identities and understandings are emerging among pupils` lived experiences, or the experienced curriculum. an interesting avenue for further inquiry would be to look more deeply into the understanding of saminess between both sami and non-sami pupils, not least outside the sami school. this must also be accompanied by a strong sensibility to the subtle forms of prevailing colonialism taking place through more tacit knowledge communicated in school. such tenacious processes might easily become overlooked in the visionary endeavour of formulating overarching values for education. notes k.g. eriksen 39 1 term denoting a range of traditional sami handicrafts. human rights education review – volume 1(2) 40 references andreotti, 2011. actionable postcolonial theory in education. new york: palgrave macmillan. arendt, h. 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[knowledge about sami relations as integral part of teacher education]. acta didactica, 11(2), article 5. http://dx.doi.org/10.5617/adno.4353. oskal, n. (2008). the question of methodology in indigenous research: a philosophical exposition. in h. minde, h. gaski, s. jentoft & g. midré (eds.), indigenous peoples: self-determination, knowledge, indigeneity (pp. 331-346). delft: eburon. osler, a. (2015). human rights education, postcolonial scholarship, and action for social justice, theory & research in social education, 43:2, 244-274. https://doi.org/10.1080/00933104.2015.1034393 osler, a. (2016). human rights and schooling. new york, ny: teacher college press. osler, a. & lindquist, h. (2018). rase og etnisitet, to begreper vi må snakke mer om. [race and ethnicity, two terms we have to speak more about]. norsk pedagogisk tidsskrift, 102(1), 26-37. universitetsforlaget. https://doi.org/10.18261/issn.1504-2987-2018-01-04 osler, a. & lybæk, l. (2014). educating ‘the new norwegian we’: an examination of national and cosmopolitan education policy discourses in the context of extremism and islamophobia. oxford review of education, 40(5), 543-566. https://doi.org/10.1080/03054985.2014.946896 pihama, l. 2016. positioning ourselves within kaupapa māori research. in: j. hutchings and j. lee-morgan (eds.), decolonisation in aotearoa: education, research and practice. pp. 101-113. wellington: nzcer press. porsanger, j. 2004. an essay on indigenous methodologies. nordlit 15, 105–120. https://doi.org/10.7557/13.1910 røthing, å. (2015). rasisme som tema i norsk skole: analyser av læreplaner og lærebøker og perspektiver på undervisning [racism as topic in the https://doi.org/10.1080/08038740.2018.1493534 https://doi.org/10.1007/s40841-017-0085-0 https://doi.org/10.7577/fleks.2248 http://dx.doi.org/10.5617/adno.4353 https://doi.org/10.1080/00933104.2015.1034393 https://doi.org/10.18261/issn.1504-2987-2018-01-04 https://doi.org/10.1080/03054985.2014.946896 https://doi.org/10.7557/13.1910 human rights education review – volume 1(2) 44 norwegian school: analyses of textbooks and curriculum, and perspectives on teaching]. norsk pedagogisk tidsskrift, 2, 72-83. selle, p., semb, a.j., strømsnes, k. & nordå, å.d. (2015). den samiske medborgeren. [the sami citizen]. oslo: cappelen damm akademisk. smith, l. t. (2010). decolonizing methodologies. research and indigenous peoples. london/new york: zed books. solstad, k. j., bongo, m. a., eriksen, l., germeten, s., kramvig, b., lyngsnes, k., & nygaard, v. (2009). samisk opplæring under lk06-samisk: analyse av læreplan og tidlige tiltak for implementering [sami education under lk06 sami: analysis of the curriculum and former implementation], vol. 3/2009. bodø: nordlandsforskning. spivak, g. c. (1999). a critique of postcolonial reasons: towards a history of the vanishing present. cambridge: harvard university press. stordahl, v. (2001). samene. fra «lavtstaaende race» til «urbefolkning». [the sami. from lowstanding race to indigenous population.] in t.h. eriksen, (ed.), flerkulturell forståelse [multicultural understanding]. oslo: universitetsforlaget. svendsen, s.h.b. (2014). learning racism in the absence of race. european journal of women`s studies, 21(1). https://doi.org/10.1177/1350506813507717 the constitution (1814 [2014]). the constitution of the kingdom of norway (for2018-06-01-788). retrieved from https://lovdata.no/dokument/nle/lov/1814-05-17 telhaug, a. o., & mediaas, o. a. 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(1993). elite discourse and racism. newbury park, ca: sage. https://doi.org/10.4135/9781483326184 vars, s. (2017). samene i norge: fra fornorsking til forsoning? [norwegian sami. from norwegianization to reconciliation]. in n. brandal, c. a. døving, & i. thorson plesner (eds.), nasjonale minoriteter og urfolk i norsk politikk fra 1900 til 2016, pp. 177–198. oslo, norway: cappelen damm akademisk. vesterdal, knut. (2016) the roles of human rights education in norway. a qualitative study of purposes and approaches in policy and in upper secondary schools. trondheim: norwegian university of science and technology. isbn 978-82326-1620-6. wood, n. & l. waite (2011). scales of belonging. emotion, space and society 4, 201202. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.emospa.2011.06.005 https://www.un.org/development/desa/indigenouspeoples/declaration-on-the-rights-of-indigenous-peoples.html https://www.un.org/development/desa/indigenouspeoples/declaration-on-the-rights-of-indigenous-peoples.html https://doi.org/10.4135/9781483326184 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.emospa.2011.06.005 children’s rights, participatory research and the co-construction of national belonging volume 1, no 1 (2018) doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2610 date received: 31-012018 date accepted: 22-03-2018 peer-reviewed article issn 2535-5406 children’s rights, participatory research and the co-construction of national belonging marta bivand erdal and mette strømsø peace research institute oslo, norway abstract: this article contributes to the debate on human rights education in diverse societies. it is concerned with the relationship between participation and the coconstruction of national belonging. our data consists of 289 pupil texts and 33 focus group discussions in 6 upper secondary schools in norway. the role of the school in nation-building is well-known, often emphasizing policy documents or curricula. however, it is in the interaction between pupils and their teachers that the production and re-production of the nation occurs. participatory exercises in our focus groups functioned as pedagogical interventions, helping pupils to reflect on how they understand, discuss and co-construct national belonging. we find that the potential for co-construction of national belonging, through pedagogical interventions, depends on who is acknowledged as a legitimate participant. notwithstanding power hierarchies, it can be argued that group discussions are concrete ways to help young people in diverse classrooms co-construct national belonging. keywords: youth – participation – school – national belonging – diversity marta bivand erdal: marta@prio.no mette strømsø: metstr@prio.org http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2610 m.b.erdal and m. strømsø 25 children’s rights, participatory research and the co-construction of national belonging doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2610 issn 2535-5406 marta bivand erdal and mette strømsø marta@prio.no metstr@prio.org peace research institute oslo, norway abstract: this article contributes to the debate on human rights education in diverse societies. it is concerned with the relationship between participation and the coconstruction of national belonging. our data consists of 289 pupil texts and 33 focus group discussions in 6 upper secondary schools in norway. the role of the school in nation-building is well-known, often emphasizing policy documents or curricula. however, it is in the interaction between pupils and their teachers that the production and re-production of the nation occurs. participatory exercises in our focus groups functioned as pedagogical interventions, helping pupils to reflect on how they understand, discuss and co-construct national belonging. we find that the potential for co-construction of national belonging, through pedagogical interventions, depends on who is acknowledged as a legitimate participant. notwithstanding power hierarchies, it can be argued that group discussions are concrete ways to help young people in diverse classrooms co-construct national belonging. keywords: youth – participation – school – national belonging – diversity introduction this article contributes to the current debate on human rights education in increasingly diverse societies. it does so by focusing on the right to participation, as expressed in article 12 of the convention on the rights of the child (crc)1 (lundy 2007, osler and solhaug 2018). the participation of young people in articulating national belonging, including any contestations or assertions linked to this concept, is of critical importance in increasingly diverse societies (antonsich 2015, botterill et al. 2017, staeheli and hammett 2013). through this involvement, young people can contribute to co-constructing national belonging. this is because belonging – whether formal, in the sense of legal status (citizenship), or informal, in the sense of feeling that you belong and are allowed to belong is inherently necessary for human beings to prosper (bond 2006, wood and waite 2011, skey 2014). we argue that participatory techniques that actively involve young people in pedagogical interventions in schools have the capacity to foster an inclusive co-construction of national belonging in classrooms characterized by diversity (meissner and vertovec 2014, martiniello 2014). beyond this, the legal-normative framework of human rights education and children’s rights obliges schools to play an active role in processes of the co-construction of national belonging among young people, within the structural opportunities and constraints of national and local contexts (osler and http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2610 mailto:marta@prio.no mailto:metstr@prio.org human rights education review – volume 1(1) 26 solhaug 2018). this article contributes to the debate about which concrete participatory tools can foster the co-production of national belonging in diverse classrooms; it recognizes experienced and perceived power-hierarchies, racial or otherwise, in norway and beyond. on the one hand, the need for social cohesion in societies with migrationrelated diversity is high on european policy agendas. this is based on the concern that greater differences might pose future risks (kymlicka 2015, wiggen 2012). on the other hand, it is well-known that migrants and children of migrants born and raised in new home countries experience challenges in being recognised as legitimate, equal members of such societies. this rejection often takes the form of ethnic, racial or religious discrimination (gullestad 2004, osler and solhaug 2018, erdal et al 2017). these two dimensions echo insights from academic explorations of belonging, which stress the relational dimension of belonging, whereby selfidentification is not independent of categorization by others (antonsich 2010). put simply, your feeling of belonging is partly dependent on whether you are given the space to feel that you do – that you are accepted by those around you as someone who belongs. this duality in belonging – the individual and the collective – is often described in terms of ‘sense of belonging’ and ‘the politics of belonging’ (antonsich 2010, yuval-davis 2006). in this article, we argue that there is potential in – and a need for the use of – participatory and dialogical tools in today’s classrooms, tools that address aspects of living together in diversity. these can usefully be framed in terms of human rights education. we draw on young people’s right to participate, not least in educational settings (lundy 2007, osler 2016), as a human right, as it is defined in the crc. this right can be realized through group discussions. we argue that young people can be productively engaged in the work of co-constructing national belonging (botterill et al. 2017). in societies characterized by migration-related diversity, the need to produce and re-produce narratives of collective, national belonging is particularly pressing (antonsich and matejskova 2015a, antonsich and matejskova 2015b, knott 2017, meissner 2015). the role of the school as a nation-building institution is recognised (mavroudi and holt 2015, staeheli and hammett 2013), and its relation to questions of national identity has often been examined by looking at curricula, policy documents or text books (osler and lybaek 2014). however, it is increasingly acknowledged that it is in the interaction between pupils, in teachers’ meetings with pupils, and the oral and written exchanges that happen in classrooms, that the actual production and re-production of the nation occurs (dusi, steinbach and messetti 2012, mavroudi and holt 2015, osler 2011). therefore, there is a critical need to examine pedagogical interventions that use participatory techniques and are inspired by principles of dialogue. how can they offer practical classroom solutions, and how may they sufficiently address legitimate theoretical and ethical concerns (westrheim, and hagatun 2015)? thus, in this article we ask: how can participatory group discussions help young people to take part in the co-construction of national belonging? the article builds on a larger data set consisting of 289 pupil-written texts, systematic background information about the participating pupils, and 33 focus group discussions with the same pupils, from 6 norwegian upper secondary schools. the data was collected as part of a research project on national identity in the light of increasing ethnic and religious diversity2. in this article we focus specifically on m.b.erdal and m. strømsø 27 the focus group data, and within this, on selected participatory exercises which were used3. inspired by the notion of superdiversity (meissner and vertovec 2014, vertovec 2007), or the diversification of diversity (martiniello 2014), which foregrounds the multiplicity of identities, we approached all pupils as (potentially) norwegian, leaving the power of defining their place in the nation up to themselves. the rationale was to not reproduce one particular notion of nationhood by applying our own, potentially prejudiced, understandings of who are to be considered, or consider themselves, ‘nationals’. our recruitment strategy reflects our normative position; namely, that we see the potential of schools as arenas for everyday encounters for the co-production of the plural nation (antonsich and matejskova 2015a, erdal and strømsø 2016). the focus group methodology discussed in this article was picked up by a norwegian government-funded initiative, ‘democratic preparedness against racism, anti-semitism and un-democratic attitudes’, which works with lower and upper secondary schools (13-16 and 16-19-year olds) and provides concrete tools and a one-year program where principals, teachers and pupils actively work together4. in the next section we discuss our conceptual framework. firstly, we set out the approach we take to co-constructing national belonging. secondly, we examine how participatory focus group discussions can enable participation. thirdly, we discuss how our approach and methods connect with a human rights education framework; we draw especially on the crc article 12 on the right to participate, and the role of education, following the undhr article 26 (2), in promoting ‘understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religious groups’. the next section describes the methods we employ and our data. we then give details of the focus group methodology we adopt and the participatory exercises. it is on this that we build our analysis and argument. we then present some of the material from the focus group discussions. two points clearly emerge: firstly, pupils recognise that all people should have ‘the right to national belonging’ somewhere and in some way; secondly, pupils appreciate the experience of being part of a ‘community of disagreement’ (iversen 2014, ezzati and erdal 2017). this material is then discussed in relation to our research question, and we conclude by reflecting on the relevance of our findings for the wider community, schools, and classroom teaching practice nation-building and education in norway before moving on to our conceptual framework, a brief note on the norwegian context. the educational system in norway, as in most countries, plays a pivotal role in national reproduction (osler and lybæk 2014). it consists of 10 years’ compulsory, free primary education, followed by free and voluntary upper secondary education (16-19 years), with programmes preparing pupils for either higher education or vocational working life. ‘norwegianness’, much as nationalism elsewhere, is seen as defined by citizenship, ancestry and culture (eriksen 2013, lynnebakke and fangen 2011, vassenden 2010). the norwegian national and education context is marked by two characteristics that might distinguish it from other european countries where recent immigration has brought about greater classroom diversity. firstly, norwegian nationalism is characterized by its specific history; norway gained independence in 1905, following centuries of union, first with denmark (till 1814), and then with sweden. norway’s constitution from 1814 was human rights education review – volume 1(1) 28 thus a step in the direction of independence. it is a nationalism characterized by a largely peaceful struggle for national independence. it is marked by a drive to construct unity through sameness. secondly, however, this national construction has also drawn on a history which in the 20th century involved aggressive assimilationist policies towards national minorities, including the sami population (erdal et al 2017). this history of assimilationist policies of national minorities is largely silenced in contemporary national narratives and in discussions on migration-related diversity in today’s norway. this results in a somewhat fragmented approach to questions about the national ‘we’ and the legitimate criteria for national inclusion. the norwegian population has significantly diversified – albeit not from a homogenous ethnic and religious starting point – in recent years, and now 14% of the population are immigrants (born abroad), and 3% are the children of two foreign-born parents 5 . the demographic make-up of different cities and municipalities varies, and whilst migration-related diversity is present throughout the country, oslo stands out: 33% of the population are immigrants or the children of immigrants. this places oslo alongside other european cities marked by diversity and super-diversity (martiniello 2014, vertovec 2007). in this context, it is worth noting that norway is one of the countries in europe where the relationship between “citizen” and “national” is unresolved, in both legal and colloquial terms (erdal and sagmo 2017). furthermore, there is no doubt that the chief reason for this dissonance is related to race: images of norwegianness continue to be connected with whiteness, while the composition of norwegian-born, norwegian citizens of norway continues to diversify, in racial terms (bangstad 2015, mcintosh 2015, svendsen 2014). meanwhile, the norwegian educational system is only to a very limited extent capable of dealing with the changing realities of who the contemporary national ‘we’ are. this has implications for the roles taken on (or not taken on) in co-constructing national belonging (osler and lindquist 2018). conceptual framework national belonging as co-constructed we adopt a processual and dynamic understanding of nationalism which, following rogers brubaker, has two aspects: “nationness”, the informal, contingent events that ‘happen’; and “nationhood”, the formal cultural and political institutional arrangements. these two aspects make up the dynamic and the changeable collectives known as “nations” (brubaker 1994). nations become tangible and real in everyday experience, and are simultaneously imagined and constructed, as intangible entities, in the interplay of nationness and nationhood (brubaker 1994, 2009). a bottom-up approach to nations, as they emerge in everyday life, takes seriously both ethnic and civic dimensions, which are often intertwined in individuals’ perceptions about – as well as experiences of – the nation (erdal et al 2017, millard 2014). here we adopt wood and waite’s understanding of belonging: ‘a dynamic emotional attachment that relates people to the material and social worlds that they inhabit and experience. it is about feeling “at home” and “secure”, but it is equally about being recognized and understood’ (2011: 201). this understanding is anchored in the context of everyday nationhood (fox and milleridriss 2008, fox 2017, knott 2017). whilst many studies of nations have been concerned with their origins, more recent work has focused on their changeable natures. important elements in these m.b.erdal and m. strømsø 29 discussions centre on the relationship between top-down nation-building efforts, and bottom-up nationness, as it is lived in the everyday lives of nationals (antonsich 2015, fox and miller-idriss 2008). drawing on this body of work, we question the idea that suggests the nation-state is somehow inherently exclusionary, whereas, for instance, cities are inherently more open and inclusive. and we also question the suggestion, often made by academics, that cosmopolitanism is a useful binary to nationalism (antonsich and matejskova 2015b, rossetto 2015). whilst acknowledging the weight of colonial history and racial and religious discrimination, we propose that nations are emergent phenomena, which have the potential to be asserted and contested. they are subject to and the product of existing power hierarchies but, simultaneously, they are inherently dynamic. we thus argue, building on the emergent body of work on relationships between nation and diversity (complexity), that nations are ‘imagined communities’, co-produced by ordinary people in their everyday lives (antonsich et al. 2016, kaufmann 2017). this is of the essence in the case of societies characterized by migrationrelated diversity, such as norway. the question of how to foster unity and social cohesion in the school forces us to ask who is a national, and what is a nation. we subscribe to the broader human rights education premise, following article 26 (2) in the undhr, that education should foster a sense of shared humanity. however, we also propose that this can be compatible with the more traditional nation-building function of the school as a nation-state institution if the nation is considered as a social group with boundaries that can be and are negotiated over time (antonsich and matejskova 2015a, antonsich et al. 2016). we acknowledge that nationhood is, perhaps more often than not in today’s european schools, taught in ways that suggest a static, historical, and, by implication, exclusionary image of the nation. however, it is possible for young people to participate in the co-construction of national belonging. if such participation is based on their own sense of perceived and experienced nationness, a different image may emerge. group discussions, participatory research and young people’s participation focus groups are a data collection mode: they consist of a group discussion, ideally with 6-8 participants, which is ‘focused’ (puchta and potter 2004). the aim is to capture interpersonal, collective, and reflective processes, where it is not the individual per se, but rather the group’s joint interactions and conversations which produce the data to be analyzed. focus groups hold a unique potential in participatory terms, a potential that has been mobilized in development research and practice (e.g. ‘participatory rural appraisal’), but also in ‘participatory action research’ (cahill 2007). while participatory methods include other modes of data collection, it can be argued that focus groups provide the best environment for using collective and reflective participatory data collection tools. focus groups have been employed in research with young people over the past decade, including in schools. in this context, the right of young people to have a say in how research is conducted has been emphasized (bagnoli and clark 2010). their participation is understood in terms closely related to the idea expressed in the crc article 12, where it is stressed that participation involves an acknowledgment6 of a child or young person’s capability to form his or her own views, space for expression of those views, and a setting which hears the views being expressed. focus groups, we argue, are a unique arena for young people to participate, if they are human rights education review – volume 1(1) 30 organized to facilitate participation and there is a recognition of the power hierarchies inherent in the school setting (cahill 2007). school power hierarchies share some of the features of wider social hierarchies. however, there may be specific iterations, whether in relation to peer influence or the role(s) of the teacher. we may see this, for instance, in matters of religion or race, and the ways in which they are spoken about (or not spoken about). however, group discussions, involving participatory exercises, hold the potential to limit the effects of prevailing power hierarchies, to create a level playing field, if only temporarily, by following set rules-of-the-game, and adopting dialogical principles. such principles, inspired by the ancient greek tradition of socrates and plato, can today provide the basis for conversations that can foster shared understanding. human rights education and young people co-constructing national belonging fostering participation, as both an expression of and a means to the empowerment of young people, is a central ideal of human rights education. facilitated and wellprepared focus group discussions can be an important pedagogical intervention in realizing such ambitions. however, it is not always easy to organize this type of activity: classes are too big; and there is insufficient time, especially the time needed to build the kind of trust needed for peer-to-peer exchanges to be honest and mutually tolerant. given that we know that the method often matters as much, or more, than the message, when it comes to questions of diversity in school settings (brown 2004), it seems worthwhile to pursue the pedagogical potential of group discussions. following lundy (2007), young people’s right to participation (article 12 crc) contains the concept of ‘pupil voice’. however, for this to be meaningful, pupils must have access to audiences, to spaces of participation, and their participation should have a tangible impact on their life-worlds. if we link the right to participation in school to the right to education (article 26 (2) undhr) and ‘the full development of the human personality’, it is pertinent to ask how schools are fulfilling their obligation in societies of migration-related diversity. the role which education, should play in promoting ‘understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religious groups’ is clearly articulated in the undhr article 26 (2). at the same time, across europe, there are diverging views on the definition of the nation and its boundaries, be they racial, religious, or otherwise. one the one hand, there is a recognition that definitions are fluid. on the other hand, there is a search for more cemented definitions, quite aggressively asserted in the guise of values-based citizenship education programs (osler 2009). human rights education often draws on resources and ideas developed under the rubric of multicultural education, with reference to cultural diversity and an anchoring in universal human rights (osler 2016)7. meanwhile, formal and informal dimensions of belonging are not so simple to disentangle. formal and informal dimensions of national belonging are often mutually constitutive, e.g. as seen in the unhcr’s #ibelong campaigns8 that address the problem of statelessness. arguably, if belonging is denied at the informal level there are severe implications, and it is here that the issue of young people co-constructing national belonging is relevant from a human rights education perspective. therefore, we argue that whilst the undhr article 15 (1) on the right to have a nationality is clearly about formal rights (citizenship and protection against statelessness), questions of the informal com.b.erdal and m. strømsø 31 construction of national belonging cannot be ignored. this especially applies to human rights education in societies where there is migration-related diversity; these societies cannot ignore the fundamental interplay between formal citizenship status and informal national belonging (and recognition). linking the conception of nation and national belonging, as discussed above, with group discussions where young people participate, we argue that there is a potential for the co-construction of national belonging in the school arena. we do not contest the fact that, for a number of reasons, schools often fail to realize this potential. however, if there is a willingness to engage with nationness as something emerging from the lived experience of pupils, we argue that participatory group discussions can be an arena where a co-construction of national belonging can take place. data and methods our data comes from a three-pronged strategy: the systematic collection of background information from all participants; school essays written by the pupils themselves; and focus groups where 6-8 pupils from the same class are engaged in discussion. our research participants are pupils in norwegian upper secondary schools who are (potentially) norwegian, though we leave the power of definition to them (brubaker and cooper 2000). we have not sought to compartmentalize respondents in terms of ascribed categories. however, we acknowledge the salience of, for example, race in the context of discussions on national belonging in norway9. table 1 details our data: table 1: data overview: texts, focus groups and teachers’ responses across schools (academic and vocational). human rights education review – volume 1(1) 32 our sample of pupils is slightly more diverse than the national average, largely due to the fact that there were two schools in oslo and two in bergen, where proportions of immigrants and children of immigrants are higher. among our research participants, 2/3 have two parents born in norway and 1/3 do not. 23% have two foreign-born parents, and 12% have one foreign-born and one norwegianborn parent. in the group who have two foreign-born parents, 15% have parents born in two different countries, neither of which is norway. among those who have one foreign-born parent, and one norwegian-born parent, in a majority of cases parents are mixed couples (one immigrant, one not), while in a minority of cases the norwegian-born parent is a child of migrants (i.e. one immigrant, one ‘second generation’) (erdal and strømsø 2016; erdal 2018). this data shows the emerging superdiversity of norwegian society, a development we also see in the 34 different countries of birth listed for our pupils and their parents. however, when we consider place of birth and citizenship, it is noteworthy that 90% of pupils in this study were born in norway, while 96% have norwegian citizenship (6% have dual citizenship), and only 4% do not hold norwegian citizenship. this, arguably, underscores the need to revisit the co-construction of national belonging, in light of the growing migrationrelated diversity of european populations. we met pupils twice. on the first occasion we introduced our research project and invited them to draw upon their own experiences in an essay: “what does it mean to be norwegian in 2015”. the pupils wrote the essay at school and at home, before we returned a few weeks later to conduct the focus groups. we also collected background information on gender, place of birth, citizenship(s), self-identified nationality, as well as parents’ place of birth, citizenship(s), education and work. as far as the focus group discussions were concerned, an important ethical consideration was how to ensure a necessary level of trust and confidentiality the pupils would later run into each other in the school corridors10. for some pupils, norwegian nationhood was a taken-for-granted identity, while for others it was something more contested or ambivalent. for some it was a source of patriotism (inclusive or excluding), while others did not feel a part of it. for pupils to openly discuss their perceptions and experiences, they needed to be sure that what they said in the research setting was safe. the focus groups comprised the third stage in our data collection, and it was our second visit to the schools. this was the end of a project which, for most pupils, had lasted 3-7 weeks from our initial visit. this was a point where the significance of process in working with young people on topics of national belonging and their own roles in (potentially) co-producing national belonging became evident. the processual nature of our research and the participatory methods employed in the focus groups secured trust and created a space where prevailing power hierarchies could be challenged. this was especially evident in the participatory exercise where pupils engaged in dialogue, and worked as a group. this activity explicitly levelled the playing field. group discussions a pedagogical intervention facilitating the right to participation in this article we ask: how can participatory group discussions help young people to take part in the co-construction of national belonging? below we present our focus group methodology. this draws extensively on participatory research tools, and results in a pedagogical intervention which can foster understanding and reflexivity m.b.erdal and m. strømsø 33 on how national belonging is understood, talked about, and co-constructed in present-day norway. in the introductory sessions, each focus group facilitator set out the rules: all views and experiences must be heard, and exchanges should remain respectful and stay within the group. the first exercise was an ice-breaker, giving each participant a voice. we asked: do you consider yourself a norwegian? why and how? is this important to you? if so, when is it important to you? pupils were firstly asked to make individual notes and then share them by taking turns around the table. they were then invited to discuss the similarities and differences of the responses. this was followed by a participatory exercise on dimensions of norwegianness. the facilitator placed a string circle on the table. this circle demarcated the ‘boundaries’ of what characteristics and actions might or might not be considered norwegian. it was purposefully made imperfect (see photo 1), so as to signal its contingency. a total of 25 dimensions, covering 7 broad themes, were provided (see table 2, below) one by one, on coloured cards, and the pupils discussed how to place them in the circle (as explained below). table 2: 25 dimensions, covering 7 broad themes, potentially connected with being seen as (or not), and feeling (or not) as part of the norwegian nation. these dimensions were drawn from the literature on everyday nationhood and nationalism, and from a close reading of the public debate on norwegian identity. can speak norwegian is christian speaks norwegian at home ‘ethnic norwegian’ is not religious speaks a different language than norwegian at home is born in norway ‘not ethnic norwegian’ other religion has parents who were born in norway ‘sami’ skin colour none of the parents were born in norway hangs up the norwegian flag on birthdays clothing one of the parents was born in norway holds norwegian citizenship celebrates the 17 may (constitution day) behaviour none of the grandparents were born in norway holds norwegian and another citizenship votes in elections (national and municipal) takes walks in the woods or mountains does not hold norwegian citizenship contributes to society human rights education review – volume 1(1) 34 the 25 cards, divided into 7 themes, were, one by one, placed by the pupil who read them on the desk. they could be placed in a number of positions: outside the boundary (circle of thread), signifying something being (seen as) incompatible with being norwegian; on the boundary itself (on or under the thread), if the group were unsure or disagreed with each other; just within the boundary (circle of thread) if compatible but not (seen as) key to being norwegian; further into the center, if what was on the card was seen as key to ‘being norwegian’. the group then discussed whether they agreed, and why/why not. they then adjusted the position of the card to show the collective view. there was not always agreement, but acceptable solutions were found (see photo 1). photo 1: example from one of the focus groups: pupils discuss the placement of dimensions of norwegianness, within and outside an imperfect boundary (red thread circle). the point was not the position of the card, but the group discussion about its placement. the physical action of placing the card usually led to reactions and negotiations. the only point of agreement, shared by all 33 groups, was that speaking norwegian should be placed right in the centre; there was very little discussion about this, signalling both the salience of language and its taken-for-grantedness. this exercise took up far more time than the other activities. we had planned for this, but it took longer than we had expected, in all of the groups, as discussions took on their own dynamic. the third exercise focused on the dilemmas of living together in diverse societies. the facilitator read out statements on a number of issues: the right of girls (or their parents) to demand gender-separated swimming classes in school; policewomen being able to wear the hijab (this has been debated but not permitted m.b.erdal and m. strømsø 35 in norway); the balance between freedom of expression and religious freedom. this task was constructed to allow for the groups’ different time dynamics; in some groups the full list of dilemmas was discussed, whilst in others some dilemmas were left out. the dilemma about freedom of speech was included in all groups, for consistency across the data set. because of the group discussion format, and the fact that the topics sometimes exposed personal experiences and reflections, or opinions that might be perceived as more or less ‘politically correct’ or acceptable to classmates, it was necessary to build in a closing component. we asked pupils to reflect individually on their participation in the project. what did they think of having to reflect on norwegianness in their texts? how did they experience the process of thinking and re-thinking, and participating in the focus groups, doing tasks which created provocation or confirmation, and sometimes contributed to increased uncertainty, or confusion. we then asked pupils – one by one around the table to share their key “take-aways”. they mostly emphasized aspects of their own thinking which had been adjusted, changed, or become more or less important. some mentioned being surprised by the multiplicity involved in questions of national identity, something they had previously been unaware of. many reflected on their engagement with questions about nationality and who is/is not included, as well as how this is experienced and the associated power dynamics. the project helped them to gain more nuanced and dynamic perceptions of these issues. the focus groups thus helped to create greater understanding and tolerance among pupils (cf. article 26 (2) undhr), as well as opening up ways of approaching the national. this, arguably, was a direct effect of the dialogic tools employed to facilitate participation in the focus groups, which themselves contributed to realizing pupils’ right to participate (cf. article 12 crc). task 2 had an open, participatory approach that stimulated dialogue and encouraged some level of agreement, or agreement to disagree. on the other hand, task 3 had a more confrontational, categorical approach, often to politicized and mediatized questions. these two tasks brought home to us that method is just as important as content. (brown 2004). the right to national belonging while the right to nationality (cf. undhr article 15 (1)) refers to citizenship, and the right to not be stateless, we argue that the right to nationality, or the right to national belonging, as we have chosen to call it, can – and should – be central in discussions about the nation, diversity and national belonging. this is relevant for young people, and hence for the role of the school in societies characterized by migration-related diversity. if young people are denied a recognition of belonging, it has a severe impact, and works against the chances of them being able to co-construct national belonging. among the pupils in our research, 90% were born in norway, and 96% were norwegian citizens; at the same time, 1/3 had one or two parents born abroad. in such a context – what is national belonging? what demarcates its boundaries? and who has the power to define those boundaries? as the discussion below shows, for young people the question of defining national belonging is about participation. more specifically, it about their own voice; who hears them and how does that, in terms of nationality, define them? this extract is drawn from exercise two, with the 25 dimensions that cover seven themes. we are here focusing on the role of language for national belonging: human rights education review – volume 1(1) 36 boy 1 starts exercise by reading out: ‘can speak norwegian’ facilitator: so, you’re placing it close to the centre? boy 1: ‘speaks norwegian at home’ and ‘speaks another language than norwegian at home’ facilitator: could you please explain why you have placed the cards like this, so the rest of you can see if you agree or not? boy 1: why i think, well, you have to be able to communicate, at least, to say that you belong somewhere, in a way, so i would say that to speak norwegian is really, really, important facilitator: and the other two, you’ve placed them slightly off the centre? boy 1: yes, it is a little private, for me it doesn’t, you know, it doesn’t matter what you speak at home. facilitator: right boy 1: it’s about how you relate to others and to what extent you can communicate… facilitator: great, so what about the rest of you, any thoughts on where to place these cards? boy 2: yes, the language, i agree that language is really important, so that if you, that you have to be able to speak norwegian, and it isn’t always like that, in norway there are so many who don’t bother to learn norwegian, you know, who come from the outside and can speak english, because there are so many people who know english in norway, the level is quite high, but i don’t know, you know to define this maybe it is important to actually be able to speak norwegian, but you can also define yourself as norwegian even if you don’t understand norwegian, you don’t have to speak it, but if you understand it… boy 3: you’ve got to have communication, you can’t come, you can’t not understand, or at least i feel like, that if you don’t understand norwegian, and if you don’t speak norwegian or anything, then it’s maybe hard to define yourself as norwegian, then, i don’t know… girl 1: i thought about.., that, last summer i was in turkey, and then i was a tourist, i wasn’t turkish because, i don’t know turkish, and then you lose that cultural thing, you lose a bit, the communication, and you feel the clear divide between those who are turkish and those who aren’t. i feel like it can be a bit like that, if you’re a tourist in norway. and if you live in norway, the difference is, in a way, that when you want to take part in norwegian culture, then you will also learn about what is norwegian, to an extent, and then you don’t get that clear divide between those who are norwegian and those… and then what you speak at home, it is a private matter, it’s more about your own identity again, your individual identity, and your parents, mother or father or both… girl 2: i also thought about the two other cards, ‘speaks norwegian at home’ and ‘speaks another language than norwegian at home’, even if i live under the same roof as someone who doesn’t want to be norwegian, that shouldn’t have negative implications for me, who m.b.erdal and m. strømsø 37 actually wants to be norwegian, so for me, i don’t think those should matter boy: what’s interesting about language is also that if you move to a new country, and learn a new language at the age of 40, then it is harder to learn the language completely perfectly, in a way, but if your children grow up there, they will most likely, yes then they are, well they speak completely perfectly then. i don’t know how to explain it, so i agree that it’s irrelevant, it’s not so important whether you speak another language at home, or know other languages, or both… the above extract demonstrates the dynamics of this exercise. personal life experiences are drawn on and pupils reflect on language, belonging and their relationship (or lack of it) with the national community. firstly, language – as communication – is crucial for belonging, in a relational sense. secondly, language is more than communication, for it is also associated with culture, with being an insider (or not). thirdly, there is a dynamism and contextuality to the pupils’ reflections; languages can be learnt, and your position in the particular context matters. finally, there is a sense that individuals’ right to national belonging matters to young people, who may not be content with being defined by their parents’ place of birth. but also, that their national belonging, ‘wanting to be norwegian’ in this case, does not preclude simultaneously also valuing their (national) belonging elsewhere, in parents’ countries of birth. this point is also underscored by the statement that any child moving with his/her parents to live in another country would learn another language, perfectly. whilst this does not predicate their national belonging, it opens the possibility for a changeable and dynamic conception of national belonging, which gives space for the agency of young people growing up in such circumstances. participatory group discussions, such as the above, may provide an arena for young people to participate in reflections and discussions about nation and diversity. space is provided for young people’s participation on their own terms; there is not only an acknowledgement of voice, but also a recognition of the importance of audiences and the implications of young people’s voice and their participation (lundy 2007). here, there was space for co-constructing national belonging, a space that encompassed varied personal experiences of nation, diversity, languages, and national belonging. a community of disagreement group discussions facilitate the participation of young people in the co-construction of national belonging. however, they are not friction-free and neither should they be. the space which the group discussion format produces, with the dynamism of participatory tasks, was one where a sense of shared fate, of collective national belonging, including elements of patriotism, was evident. there was room for disagreement, even about the nature and boundaries of the national. such a space might be described as a ‘community of disagreement’ (iversen 2014) where consensus is not required. it is a democratic interaction in which there are different combinations of comprise and consensus, of contestation and agreement (ezzati and erdal 2017). human rights education review – volume 1(1) 38 when asking pupils to summarize their experiences, at the end of each group discussion, we found that our research had initiated processes, for both the individual and his/her interplay with the collective. however, this did not necessarily lead to change, or consensus on national belonging: i think that being norwegian depends on how you define yourself (…) but if you feel norwegian but aren’t ethnic norwegian, and live in norway, i feel that i cannot see you as norwegian, even though you have that feeling. this pupil’s reflection emphasized personal feelings and physical appearance. in the norwegian context, ‘ethnic norwegian’, refers to white norwegians with no family history of migration. here the fact that the pupil says, ‘i cannot see you as norwegian’ reflects the visual dimension of ‘ethnic norwegian’ (erdal et al 2017). a conflict over who is/is not to be seen as a national emerges. this also makes apparent the boundaries of the nation, and the different positions of power in defining who is a national. for a small proportion of the pupils, this was the end-point of our research process, and some of them had the sense that despite other pupil’s feelings of norwegianness, they could not be seen as nationals, for reasons of race and ancestry. others reflected on new insights about what it means to be norwegian: i had written three sentences and ended up deleting all the points i was sure i would include, and it was good fun to reflect upon what makes me and not my neighbour norwegian (…) things i haven’t thought about before and just taken for granted, and suddenly they aren’t that important anymore. here change is happening, and there is an openness to plural approaches to nationhood, an acceptance of dynamism and diversity. through individual reflection (essays) and group interaction (focus groups), a space for participation was created, and understandings and tolerance towards ideas about racial, religious and national boundaries were fostered. a quote from an exchange between the facilitator and a participant summarized how he saw the discussion as a reflection of norwegian society: participant: this debate, i think we handled it in a good way. we have different opinions, but we kept to the point. what is good about norway is the way we don’t make it personal, targeting individuals. i don’t know how to explain it, but i think this was a good example of how we debate in norway. facilitator: that there is space for different opinions? participant: yes, exactly that. a key finding from our study was that there was a clear ‘community of disagreement’, even about the boundaries of the nation. pupils had clear ideas and opinions about what was norwegian or not, and the various degrees of importance that might be ascribed to various dimensions of norwegianness. however, in most of the focus groups there was also a willingness to engage with each other’s perceptions m.b.erdal and m. strømsø 39 and experiences, and this helped to articulate a plural conception of the nation (erdal and strømsø 2016). in the final round of group discussions, some pupils also reflected on the ways they had discussed nation, nationalism and boundaries of norwegianness, and how this might (or might not) relate to broader social debates: ‘it’s easy to agree when we talk about these issues in a small group, at school and in a text, but it’s something else when we’re out in society, then you will obviously have different attitudes’ the pupil referred as much to her ‘different attitudes’ as to the fact that there will be a range of different attitudes in society. this shows that group discussions with one’s classmates are seen as (relatively) safe spaces, no matter how much disagreement there might be. there is a clear sense that classmates share a common fate. this security is not seen as existing in the wider society, due to (assumed) generational differences, and the mediatized politicization and polarization of the debate about nation and diversity (bangstad 2015, gullestad 2004). conclusion let us return to the question posed at the outset: how can participatory group discussions help young people to take part in the co-construction of national belonging? we argue that group discussions with participatory activities can help young people take part in the co-construction of national belonging. the participatory group discussions draw upon pupils’ resources and there is an acknowledgement of pupils’ capability to form views about the circumstances of their own life-worlds and express those views. this process is in accordance with the terms of the crc article 12. this approach is of critical importance, given the diversity of today’s european schools; it can help to realize young people’s right to participate in the coconstruction of national belonging. we do, however, recognize some challenges. firstly, these pertain to the ways in which the concepts of nation and nationalism have already been approached: by pupils and teachers; by the school; and by the curriculum and education policy. the ways in which nation and nationalism have been traditionally approached are not easy to reconcile with a processual and dynamic understanding of the nation, which was the starting point for our group discussions. secondly, there are practical obstacles to the extent to which small group discussions that allow dialogue-based reflection and exchange are possible in schools. however, we believe that a human rights education approach offers a framework of opportunity. our experience from this research process supports the findings of studies on cultural diversity awareness in schools (brown 2004): method may matter more than message. our processual approach accommodated both the individual and the collective: the written texts provided pupils with an opportunity to formulate their own thoughts, while the group discussions provided a space where these thoughts were shared with their peers, producing discussion, disagreement, and reflection. this type of pedagogical intervention has the potential to allow young people to genuinely participate. following the arguments of lundy (2007), this entails not only giving voice, but allowing young people’s voices to matter, in their own life-worlds and beyond. the potential for a co-construction of national belonging in the school, in norway and elsewhere, depends on how national belonging is understood, and who human rights education review – volume 1(1) 40 are seen as relevant and legitimate participants in such a co-construction. in the increasingly diverse societies of europe, the matter of young people’s right to nationality, their right to belong both formally and informally, needs to be constructively addressed. we believe there is a potential in pursuing a human rights education agenda that is cognizant of the (demographic) realities that have led to the diversity we find in today’s european schools (mavroudi and holt 2015, antonsich and matejskova 2015a). the participatory techniques we employed in group discussions in the norwegian upper secondary school highlight ‘the right to national belonging’ and ‘the community of disagreement’. these pedagogical techniques show how teachers can concretely engage with the important, but slippery, themes of race, ethnicity, unity and diversity, as part of the process of co-constructing national belonging in the classroom. m.b.erdal and m. strømsø 41 notes 1 crc article 12: 1) states parties shall assure to the child who is capable of forming his or her own views the right to express those views freely in all matters affecting the child, the views of the child being given due weight in accordance with the age and maturity of the child; 2) for this purpose, the child shall in particular be provided the opportunity to be heard in any judicial and administrative proceedings affecting the child, either directly, or through a representative or an appropriate body, in a manner consistent with the procedural rules of national law. 2 ‘negotiating the nation: implications of ethnic and religious diversity for national identity’ (www.prio.org/nation) 3 other findings are discussed elsewhere (erdal et al 2017; erdal 2018). 4 the focus group methodology discussed here is provided as one of the tools which can be employed as a pedagogical intervention that fosters understanding and tolerance, specifically in relation to identity, diversity and national belonging: http://dembra.no/opplegg/norskhet-i-flertall/ 5 www.ssb.no/innvandring (statistics norway, accessed 25 april 2018) 6 our emphasis, throughout this section. 7 http://www.ohchr.org/documents/professionalinterest/statelessness.pdf 8 http://www.unhcr.org/ibelong/ 9 it suffices here to note that different, more or less exclusionary conceptions of nationhood were found among pupils both with and without a family migration history. however, a majority across the board subscribed to an understanding of national belonging as something closely related to the individual’s own sense of identity and belonging, and to the geographical location of their lives and life worlds (e.g., where you were born, and raised, went to school, where your friends, parents, siblings live). 10 informed consent was obtained from pupils; a small number of pupils elected to not participate in the research project while the rest of the class went ahead. for pupils under 18, information was shared with parents and guardians. all but one of their teachers wanted to use the pupils’ texts in their ordinary teaching and in term assessment. pupils were allowed to choose whether or not their texts would be part of the research project. it is worth emphasizing that when teachers graded texts they looked at the pupils’ ability to formulate an argument, rather than any views expressed. nevertheless, when we analysed pupil texts we were aware that pupils knew it was not only the researchers, but also their teachers who would be reading them. this may have affected what pupils wrote, in terms of what they perceive to be ‘acceptable opinions’. retrospectively, and across the material, there appears to be little evidence of self-censorship. the posture adopted has been a reflective one. http://www.prio.org/nation http://dembra.no/opplegg/norskhet-i-flertall/ http://www.ssb.no/innvandring human rights education review – volume 1(1) 42 references antonsich, m. 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(2006). belonging and the politics of belonging. patterns of prejudice, 40, 197-214. https://doi.org/10.1080/00313220600769331 https://doi.org/10.1080/01419870.2015.980295 https://doi.org/10.1177/1468796813484724 https://doi.org/10.1080/00131910802684813 https://doi.org/10.1080/00220272.2010.503245 https://doi.org/10.18261/issn.1504-2987-2018-01-04 https://doi.org/10.18261/issn.1504-2987-2018-01-04 https://doi.org/10.1080/03054985.2014.946896 https://doi.org/10.4135/9781849209168 https://doi.org/10.11143/45271 https://doi.org/10.1080/13603116.2017.1357768 https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-923x.12094 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.polgeo.2012.11.003 https://doi.org/10.1177/1350506813507717 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-8129.2009.00438.x https://doi.org/10.1080/01419870701599465 https://doi.org/10.1080/07393148.2012.729744 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.emospa.2011.06.005 https://doi.org/10.1080/00313220600769331 m.b.erdal and m. strømsø 45 children’s rights, participatory research and the co-construction of national belonging introduction nation-building and education in norway conceptual framework national belonging as co-constructed group discussions, participatory research and young people’s participation human rights education and young people co-constructing national belonging data and methods group discussions a pedagogical intervention facilitating the right to participation the right to national belonging a community of disagreement conclusion references volume 4, no 2 (2021) date of publication 12-05-2021 doi:http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4457 issn 2535-5406 editorial prerequisites and outcomes of human rights education audrey osler university of south-eastern norway, norway & university of leeds, uk christian stokke university of south-eastern norway, norway audrey osler: a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.44571 mailto:a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk a. osler & c. stokke 2 editorial prerequisites and outcomes of human rights education doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4457 issn 2535-5406 audrey osler university of southeastern norway, norway & university of leeds, uk christian stokke university of southeastern norway, norway a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk the first two decades of the 21st century have seen a growth in research into human rights education (hre), yet relatively few researchers have examined the right to an inclusive and equitable education as a prerequisite for it. the right to education underpins the united nation’s 2030 sustainable development agenda, setting an ambitious action plan for the un, its member states, and civil society. the ambition of sustainable development goal 4 (sdg4) is to provide inclusive and equitable quality education at primary and secondary levels by 2030 and promote ‘lifelong learning opportunities for all’ (united nations department of economic and social affairs, 2015). in relation to hre, sdg4.7 broadly outlines the focus of quality education: [to] ensure that all learners acquire the knowledge and skills needed to promote sustainable development, including, among others, through education for sustainable development and sustainable lifestyles, human rights, gender equality, promotion of a culture of peace and non-violence, global citizenship and appreciation of cultural diversity and of culture’s contribution to sustainable development. (un department of economic and social affairs, 2015, sg4.7) in this rights-based agenda, the focus of education is defined in similar terms to the aims of education spelt out in the convention on the rights of the child (crc) (un,1989), to which member states have already made a binding legal commitment. the right to education is an enabling right (mccowan, 2010), fundamental to the realisation of other rights. unesco (n.d) further categorises the right to education, as presented in sg4, as empowering of learners. in the first two articles in this volume, shabnam moinipour examines the child’s right to education in the islamic republic of iran, drawing on the 4-a framework developed by former special rapporteur of the un high commission for human rights on education, katarina tomaševski (2001). the 4-a framework enables an analysis of the degree to which educational provision is available, accessible, acceptable and adaptable. in her first article, moinipour discusses iran’s response to its obligation to make education available and accessible, and observes how the state reinforces existing gender inequalities, discriminates against religious minorities, and fails to properly address the educational rights of learners with disabilities. moinipour observes how iran’s reservations to the crc undermine the convention’s effectiveness as a tool for addressing social justice. her review of the acceptability and adaptability of education, discussed in the second article, identifies the need for substantial reform to realise education’s potential in addressing the http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4457 a. osler & c. stokke 3 needs of the most economically and socially marginalised children and enabling them to fully participate in society. previous articles in this journal, notably parker (2018) and jerome et al. (2021), have examined the importance of a sound knowledge-base for effective hre, arguing that greater attention needs to be given to this element of teaching and learning. in a discussion of decolonial human rights education, anne becker also reflects on the hre knowledge base. she considers some possibilities for reshaping conversations on human rights, examining the principles, assumptions and epistemologies on which scholars frequently draw. she calls for an urgent exploration of pluriversal knowledges of human rights. she questions the eurocentric assumptions and principles which, she asserts, frequently serve as a premise for hre. central to her argument is a call to problematise the human of human rights. the fourth article in this volume addresses teacher education in finland. tuija kasa, matti rautiainen, mia malama and arto kallioniemi report on a smallscale study of the perspectives of student teachers, and specifically their learning about democracy and human rights. student teachers believe that democracy and human rights education (dhre) needs to be explicit and part of their professional education. although the finnish national curriculum explicitly addresses dhre, there is a lack of implementation and explicit teacher education in this field. the authors suggest that this is due to finnish exceptionalism, whereby it is assumed that democracy and human rights are self-evident. nevertheless, for the student teachers in this study, dhre is not self-evident, and they seek explicit support in this area. there are parallels here with recent research in iceland (gollifer, 2021). although democracy and human rights are one of six curriculum pillars in the 2011 icelandic national curriculum guides, there is insufficient attention given to curriculum implementation, and little explicit human rights education in teacher education, leaving individual teachers concerned with promoting social justice to define human rights in a myriad of ways. both the finnish study and that of gollifer emphasise the responsibility of teacher education in sustaining a human rights culture. research from norway (osler & skarra, 2021, in press) also suggests a gap between policy formulation and teacher support in relation to hre. the norwegian study also found that hre was implicit and dependent on teachers’ individual perceptions of human rights. together, these studies suggest that the finnish exceptionalism identified by kasa and her colleagues might be extended and redefined as a nordic exceptionalism. the fifth and final article in this edition of hrer also addresses the outcomes of hre, specifically challenging negative attitudes towards asylum seekers among australian children. lisa hartley, caroline fleay, anne pedersen, alison cook and alenka jeram evaluate a red cross programme for prejudice reduction in four primary schools in western australia. using questionnaires, the study compared students' pre-intervention attitudes with shortand long-term attitudinal changes. the authors found that the intervention succeeded in developing schoolchildren's positive identification and increased empathy with asylum seekers and refugees. a. osler & c. stokke 4 references gollifer, s.e. (2021). human rights education in iceland: learning about transformative pedagogies from upper secondary school teachers’ stories (unpublished doctoral dissertation). university of iceland, faculty of education and diversity. jerome, l., liddle, a., & young, h. (2021). talking about rights without talking about rights: on the absence of knowledge in classroom discussions. human rights education review, 4(1), 8–26. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3979 mccowan, t. (2010). reframing the universal right to education. comparative education, 46:4, 509-525. https://doi.org/10.1080/03050068.2010.519482 osler, a. & skarra, j. a. (2021, in press). the rhetoric and reality of human rights education: policy frameworks and teacher perspectives. multicultural education review, 13. parker, w. c. (2018). human rights education’s curriculum problem. human rights education review, 1(1), 5–24. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2450 tomaševski, k. (2001). human rights obligations: making education available, accessible, acceptable and adaptable. right to education primers, 3. lund: raoul wallenberg institute. retrieved from https://www.right-to-education.org/resource/primer-no-3-human-rights obligations-making-education-available-accessible-acceptable-and united nations. (1989). convention on the rights of the child. adopted and opened for signature, ratification and accession by general assembly resolution 44/25 20 november. retrieved from http://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx united nations department of economic and social affairs. (2015). transforming our world: the 2030 agenda for sustainable development. retrieved from https://sdgs.un.org/2030agenda united nations educational, scientific and cultural organization. (n.d). right to education. retrieved from https://en.unesco.org/themes/right-to-education https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3979 https://doi.org/10.1080/03050068.2010.519482 https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2450 https://www.right-to-education.org/resource/primer-no-3-human-rights-%09obligations-making-education-available-accessible-acceptable-and https://www.right-to-education.org/resource/primer-no-3-human-rights-%09obligations-making-education-available-accessible-acceptable-and about:blank https://sdgs.un.org/2030agenda https://en.unesco.org/themes/right-to-education https://en.unesco.org/themes/right-to-education volume 4, no 2 (2021) date received: 12-07-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3951 date accepted: 11-02-2021 issn 2535-5406 ‘it put me in their shoes’: challenging negative attitudes towards asylum seekers among australian children lisa hartley curtin university, australia caroline fleay curtin university, australia anne pedersen curtin university, australia alison cook australian red cross alenka jeram western australian council of social service abstract: this paper evaluates a short school-based intervention run by australian red cross, designed to reduce children’s prejudice towards asylum seekers. a total of 121 children aged between 10 to 12 in four schools in perth, western australia, completed questionnaires at time 1 (pre-intervention), time 2 (immediately after the intervention), and time 3 (8-9 months after the intervention). the intervention used a mixture of approaches: providing information, encouraging empathy, making positive social norms more explicit, and fostering imagined contact with asylum seekers. the intervention content was also reinforced by teachers throughout the school year. the study found that the intervention was effective in increasing the children’s positivity towards asylum seekers, reducing prejudiced attitudes, and increasing intentions to interact with asylum seekers. it also found that the intervention increased the children’s accuracy in defining ‘asylum seeker’ and ‘refugee’. these results occurred both in the short-and long-term, although there was some regression over time. key words: asylum seekers, refugees, children, anti-racism, prejudice reduction, attitudinal change human rights education review – volume 4(2) 86 ‘it put me in their shoes’: challenging negative attitudes towards asylum seekers among australian children doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3951 issn 2535-5406 lisa hartley anne pedersen caroline fleay alison cook alenka jeram lisa.hartley@curtin.edu.au curtin university, australia curtin university, australia curtin university, australia australian red cross western australian council of social service abstract: this paper evaluates a short school-based intervention run by australian red cross, designed to reduce children’s prejudice towards asylum seekers. a total of 121 children aged between 10 to 12 in four schools in perth, western australia, completed questionnaires at time 1 (pre-intervention), time 2 (immediately after the intervention), and time 3 (8-9 months after the intervention). the intervention used a mixture of approaches: providing information, encouraging empathy, making positive social norms more explicit, and fostering imagined contact with asylum seekers. the intervention content was also reinforced by teachers throughout the school year. the study found that the intervention was effective in increasing the children’s positivity towards asylum seekers, reducing prejudiced attitudes, and increasing intentions to interact with asylum seekers. it also found that the intervention increased the children’s accuracy in defining ‘asylum seeker’ and ‘refugee’. these results occurred both in the short-and long-term, although there was some regression over time. keywords: asylum seekers, refugees, children, anti-racism, prejudice reduction, attitudinal change introduction at the end of 2019, there were over 26 million refugees and 4.2 million people seeking asylum worldwide (united nations high commissioner for refugees [unhcr], 2019). according to article 1a of the 1951 united nations convention relating to the status of refugees and its 1967 protocol: a refugee is any person who… owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his/her nationality and is unable, or owing to such fear, unwilling to avail himself/herself of the protection of that country. (unhcr, 1951) mailto:lisa.hartley@curtin.edu.au l. hartley, a. pedersen, c. fleay, a. cook & a. jeram 87 an asylum seeker is someone who has sought protection as a refugee, but whose claim for refugee protection has not yet been finalised. while the vast majority of the world’s refugees and asylum seekers reside in countries in the global south (unhcr, 2019), their arrival in countries of the global north has become increasingly politicised. refugees and asylum seekers are often met with intolerance, distrust, and contempt by political leaders and communities of these refugee-hosting states (verkuyten, 2004). a growing number of studies has found high levels of negative attitudes towards refugees in countries such as the united states (vollhardt, nair, & tropp 2016; study 2), israel (canetti, snider, pedersen, & hall 2016; tartakovsky & walsh, 2016), and the united kingdom (pehrson, brown, & zagefka 2009). this research demonstrates several strong perceptions of refugees that may drive reactions to them; however, there is also evidence that some cohorts of people from refugee backgrounds, particularly asylum seekers, may be viewed in particularly negative terms. in australia, where the current study was conducted, research using community surveys consistently finds high levels of negative attitudes towards asylum seekers (see anderson & ferguson, 2018). research also finds that community members feel significantly higher levels of prejudice, anger, and fear towards asylum seekers who arrive without a valid visa by boat when compared with refugees who are resettled in australia via the country’s official resettlement programme (hartley & pedersen, 2015). in this regard, much research has focused on unpacking the factors that underpin such negative reactions in both the australian context (see anderson & ferguson, 2018 for a metanalysis) and internationally (see cowling, anderson & ferguson, 2019 for a metanalysis). this research raises important questions as to whether people’s attitudes towards asylum seekers can be changed in a positive direction. given that prejudice towards outgroups starts at an early age (e.g., aboud, tredoux, tropp, brown, niens, & noor, 2012) and that prejudiced attitudes have been linked to experiences of racial discrimination (habtegiorgis, paradies, & dunn, 2014), this question becomes even more pertinent in relation to children. in this article, we explore whether children’s attitudes towards asylum seekers might be changed more positively via a short prejudicereduction intervention undertaken in a school setting in australia. in particular, we undertook an evaluation of an intervention designed by practitioners at the australian red cross, entitled the in search of safety programme; this is being used widely in schools in australia as a means of reducing prejudice towards asylum seekers. in terms of positionality, hartley, fleay and pedersen are human rights academics and asylum seeker advocates who were contracted by australian red cross employees cooke and jeram to evaluate the efficacy of the programme in challenging children’s attitudes towards asylum seekers in australia. to develop an evaluation survey, hartley, fleay, and pedersen conducted a literature review of evaluation tools used with children and effective ways of measuring attitude change (see below for more detail about the programme). given the programme was designed by the australian red cross, the evaluation was not theory driven, but practice/evidence-based driven. in this regard, we found the prejudice-reduction framework proposed by pedersen, walker, paradies, and guerin (2011) particularly helpful in framing our evaluation. based on an extensive evaluation of the relevant literature on how to effectively implement prejudice-reduction interventions, the framework proposes a number of different mechanisms and techniques that should be considered when human rights education review – volume 4(2) 88 conducting such interventions. pedersen et al. (2011) argue that effective interventions need to use multiple methods to create attitude change: these include providing accurate information, respectfully involving the audience, encouraging empathy, making positive social norms (e.g., anti-racist attitudes) explicit as these can legitimise attitudes, and fostering contact (real or imagined) with ‘outgroup’ members. prejudice-reduction interventions in school settings there is a dearth of literature that theorises or evaluates how to effectively implement prejudice-reduction interventions (for a review, see pedersen et al., 2011). while definitions of prejudice may vary slightly in these studies, for the purposes of this article we use the term ‘prejudice’ to refer to ‘negative evaluations of people on the basis of their group membership’ (aboud et al., 2012, p. 311). the focus in this article is also on education; that is, on a short-term individual-based prejudice-reduction intervention for children. although beyond the scope of this article, it is important to note that there are structural elements of prejudice which play a role in creating and sustaining prejudice and are considered elsewhere (see bonilla-silva, 1997). in terms of the literature focusing on children, some research suggests that prejudice-reduction interventions can be useful in creating attitudinal change and that different strategies can be useful. in the first instance, interventions that focus on facilitating contact between different groups of people (known as intergroup contact) appear to have some success. for example, interventions promoting intergroup contact in the form of a cooperative puzzle between urban residents and rural migrant children in china reduced negative attitudes towards the other group (gu, nielsen, shachat, smyth, & peng, 2015). imagining contact with a member of an outgroup has also been found to increase the likelihood that british children would approach an asylum seeker (turner, west, & christie, 2013) and refugees (cameron, rutland, douch, & brown, 2006), that italian children would approach an immigrant peer (vezzali, stathi, & giovannini, 2012), and that white children would approach a child from an ethnic out‐group (stathi, cameron, hartley, & bradford, 2014). this research highlights the influential role that both imagined and actual intergroup contact can have on children’s attitudes and behavioural intentions towards outgroups. other research has found that story‐telling interventions depicting positive intergroup relationships between majority and minority children can improve some intergroup attitudes (aronson et al., 2016). similarly, vezzali et al. (2012) found that by simply reading a book about intercultural topics, italian adolescents showed improved intergroup attitudes towards immigrants, a reduction in stereotyping, and an increased desire to engage in future contact. both intergroup (real and imagined) contact and story-telling based strategies are based on the premise that encouraging children to feel empathy towards an outgroup will make them feel more positive towards outgroup members. other prejudice-reduction interventions adopt a more cognitive, informational-based approach which focuses on the provision of correct information about an outgroup with the aim of changing attitudes. it has been proposed that for such strategies to have a sustainable effect, a number of minimum requirements must be met: the information and message must be received and paid attention to; the experience must be positive; and the information and message must be l. hartley, a. pedersen, c. fleay, a. cook & a. jeram 89 understood correctly, retained and internalised (farley, 2005). while this approach appears to be particularly ineffectual with people whose prejudiced attitudes are deeply entrenched, it may be useful for people who might not have strongly established attitudes, such as children (peucker, 2011). it is important to note prejudice-reduction interventions do not always show positive effects for all participants and effectiveness varies over time. for example, turner and brown (2008) evaluated a programme designed to improve school children's attitudes toward refugees where the children received 4 weekly lessons, two of which focused on understanding what a refugee is and the other two on how it would feel to be forcibly displaced. although the programme increased positive attitudes toward refugees at the beginning, those effects wore off over time. in another study, structured internet interactions have been found to create positive intergroup relations between muslim and christian adolescents in australia; however, although ingroup bias was reduced for the muslim children over a 12month period this was not the case with the christian group (white, abu-rayya, bliuc, & faulkner, 2015). white, abu-rayya and weitzel (2014) found that knowledge about outgroup members increased two weeks after an intervention; however, this effect was not found 12 months later. it is also useful to report on metanalyses on school-based prejudice-reduction interventions. mcgregor (1993) found that role playing reduced racism. aboud et al. (2012) found that 50% of the interventions used in their meta-analysis produced non-significant results: 40% were positive and 10% were negative. beelmann and heinemann (2014) found low-moderate positive intervention effects, although it depended upon the participants’ social status: there were larger effects for majoritygroup members (also see feddes, noack, & rutland, 2009; white et al., 2014). thus, it would seem that prejudice-reduction interventions in school settings, using methods such as intergroup contact, story-telling, and information-cognitive strategies, can be effective in a number of contexts and target groups. however, the strength of any changes after an intervention is likely to be low or moderate. whether positive results are found also depends upon whether the target group is from a majority or minority group (it is more likely that positive effects will be seen with majority group members). interventions targeting prejudice towards asylum seekers in the australian setting as outlined, there is a small number of studies that have evaluated the effectiveness of interventions that target the attitudes of majority group children towards asylum seekers (turner et al., 2013) and refugees (cameron et al., 2006; turner & brown, 2008). some research has investigated the effect of prejudice-reduction interventions with australian adults regarding asylum seekers (e.g., pedersen, paradies, hartley, & dunn, 2011; hartley, pedersen, & dandy, 2012). however, to our knowledge there is no published research on interventions aimed at reducing australian children’s prejudice towards asylum-seekers. given that one’s context and location has been found to impact on the ways in which attitudes are formed and expressed (e.g. pedersen, watt, & griffiths, 2007), addressing this gap in the literature is important. to our knowledge, there are very few published studies which evaluate interventions designed by practitioners; most of those described above were designed by researchers and involve using a specific task (e.g., imagined intergroup human rights education review – volume 4(2) 90 contact) to achieve a particular outcome (e.g., reduced scores on a prejudice scale) (for an exception see turner & brown, 2008). by contrast, interventions designed by practitioners usually employ a diverse range of methods to foster attitudinal change, which makes it difficult to design and implement evaluations. in this case, it also makes it difficult to unpack any particular ‘mechanism’ unpinning changes that may occur as a result of the intervention. given this, the fact that the in search of safety programme employs a range of strategies, and there is little control over how the practitioner actually implements the programme, it is important to have a wide array of measures that might be better able to capture any attitudinal change among the children. in the following section, we provide an overview of the programme evaluated in the current study and the rationale behind it. we will also outline the study’s design and research aims and explain how we evaluated its impact. ‘in search of safety’ programme overview the in search of safety programme, run by the australian red cross, consists of three components: (i) a presentation, (ii) a game, and (iii) a dvd (note, in some of the other sessions of the programme, a talk by a person from a refugee background is included as a replacement for the dvd, but in this evaluation study only a dvd was used). the programme took approximately 1.5 hours to deliver in one day, and was led by a facilitator from the australian red cross. in the presentation, the facilitator gave the children an overview of human rights, information about the situation of asylum seekers in australia, and definitions of asylum seekers and refugees that addressed notions that asylum seekers were illegal immigrants and other related myths. the game consisted of the facilitator putting the children in a hypothetical situation of being an asylum seeker; they were asked to imagine that soldiers were coming to harm them and their family in 15 minutes, so they needed to pack six items and decide which six people they would take with them. with regard to the dvd, the children watched seeking refuge, a british dvd featuring children’s voices narrating the experiences of a number of asylum-seeker children. however, one class did not see the video and another class only saw part of it, due to the extended time taken in the presentation component of the programme in these sessions. in terms of pedersen et al.’s (2011) framework, we note a number of mechanisms employed in this intervention: the provision of information and knowledge, the encouraging of empathy (through the dvd and the game), the making of positive social norms explicit (through the teacher reinforcing what was learned in the intervention), and the provision of imagined contact with asylum seekers (through the dvd and the game). research design and aims the research employed a quasi-experimental design that involved asking the children and teachers to complete a questionnaire at time 1 (immediately before the programme), time 2 (immediately after the programme), and time 3 (8-9 months after the programme). following greene’s (2006) mixed-method framework, quantitative and qualitative data were collected to provide an in-depth understanding of the findings and the effectiveness of the programme over these three time periods. there were two primary research questions. 1. the first involved quantitative data. it examined whether there were statistically significant differences between time 1, time 2, and time l. hartley, a. pedersen, c. fleay, a. cook & a. jeram 91 3 for (a) the single question about how positive a student felt towards asylum seekers, (b) an attitude scale measuring prejudice towards asylum seekers, and (c) behavioural intention scales regarding the student’s likelihood of interacting with an asylum seeker in three different settings. 2. the second research question involved qualitative data. it asked whether there were differences in accuracy with respect to the children’s definitions of refugee and asylum seekers at times 1, 2, and 3. we used nvivo11 to synthesise the most relevant themes. there were also two minor research aims involving data taken from the teachers that acted as a backdrop to the two research questions regarding the children. i. the first was a qualitative question at time 2, asking teachers how they found the in search of safety programme. ii. the second question was also a qualitative one, this time at time 3. it asked whether the issue of asylum seekers had been discussed with the children over the preceding eight months. if it had been, they were asked in what way. methods participants the children were aged from 10 to 12, and from four schools in perth, western australia. there were 142 children who participated at time 1, 136 who participated at time 2, and 125 who participated at time 3. we were interested in the children (n = 121 children) who participated at all three times. from this point onwards, only the data of this latter group of children is analysed. there were 121 children from four different schools (school 1 = 38 children; school 2 = 21 children; school 3 = 28 children; school 4 = 34 children). there were more boys than girls (boys = 65 children; girls = 54 children; did not disclose = two children). at time 1, the children were aged between 10 and 12 (10 years = 29 children; 11 years = 88 children; 12 years = two children; did not disclose = two children). at time 2, the children were again aged between 10 and 12 (10 years = 30 children; 11 years = 88 children; 12 years = 2 children; did not disclose = one student). at time 3, the children were aged between 11 and 12 (11 years = 74 children; 12 years = 45 children; did not disclose = two children). there were eight teachers who participated at time 2 and seven teachers who participated at time 3. given that the questions for the teachers at times 1 and 2 differed, and the numbers were so small, we used all teacher data. procedure after approval from the curtin university human research ethics committee and piloting of the questionnaire, all children were given information and consent forms by their teachers to be taken home for their parents to consider their participation. on the day of the intervention, only students who provided a signed parental consent form were given a survey to complete. those who did not have a signed consent form were asked to sit quietly while others completed the surveys at three times (immediately before and after the programme, and 8-9 months later). to minimise the possibility of the teacher’s presence influencing the children’s response to the human rights education review – volume 4(2) 92 survey all questionnaires were circulated and collected by hartley and fleay, who were not related to the school in any way. all student and teacher responses were anonymous. with regard to the children, their data were linked by way of a nonidentifying code that they themselves created. measures: children the following questions were asked in the questionnaire at times 1, 2, and 3. qualitative questions first, the children were asked: ‘please describe what you know or understand about asylum seekers’. they were then asked: ‘please describe what you know or understand about refugees’. there were three categories used in this analysis: correct, half correct, and incorrect the same coding was used at times 1, 2, and 3. we awarded a correct response when words like ‘safe’ or ‘flee’ were used and there was no mention of ‘legality’ (the incorrectness of such a notion had been stressed in the presentation). because of the age of the children, we tried not to get too caught up in technicalities. for example, an incorrect response about asylum seekers was ‘asylum seekers are from another country and they are tourists’ (student 18). a half-correct response was ‘i know that asylum seekers are migrants that are seeking for [sic] safety. they are travelling illegally’ (student 37). a correct response was ‘asylum seekers are people who are threatened by something and is searchin(g) [sic] for safety’ (student 66). positivity we used an attitude thermometer that had successfully been employed to measure adult prejudice against asylum seekers (e.g., pedersen et al., 2011) and amended it so that it was more suitable for children. specifically, we asked: ‘please rate how positive you feel about asylum seekers by circling a number from 1 to 7 to show your thoughts.’ the children could respond from 1 (not at all positive) to 4 (neutral) to 7 (extremely positive). attitudes we used five items adapted from the turner and brown (2008) attitude scale. the prefacing question asked: ‘please rate how much you agree or disagree with each of the following sentences by circling a number from 1 to 7 to show your thoughts’ (the midpoint being ‘unsure’). we used a 7-point likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 4 (unsure) to 7 (strongly agree). the questions were: ‘it must be scary for asylum seekers when they arrive in a new country’; ‘we should be nice to asylum seekers and help them settle in’; ‘based on what i know about asylum seekers, i like them’; ‘i would like to have asylum seekers in my class’; and ‘i would like to play a game with asylum seekers in the playground’. high scores indicated more positive attitudes towards asylum seekers. behavioural intention we used three items adapted from vezzali et al. (2012). the prefacing question asked: ‘next, we would like you to imagine you are at a park meeting someone who is an asylum seeker. he/she is the same age as you. thinking about this, please answer the following questions by circling a number from 1 to 7 to show your l. hartley, a. pedersen, c. fleay, a. cook & a. jeram 93 thoughts’. the first question asked: ‘how happy are you to meet him/her?’ we used a 7-point likert scale ranging from 1 (very unhappy ) to 4 (unsure) to 7 (very happy ). the second and third questions asked: ‘would you hang out with him/her at the park?’ and ‘would you play a game with him/her at the park?’. both used a 7point likert scale ranging from 1 (not at all) to 4 (unsure) to 7 (very much). high scores indicated stronger intentions to interact with an asylum seeker. measures: teachers at time 2, teachers were asked the qualitative question: ‘what are your impressions of the in search of safety programme?’ at time 3, teachers were asked the qualitative question: ‘did you discuss the issue of asylum seekers with the children over the last 8 months? if yes, in what way?’ possible responses were 0 (no), 1 (unsure) or 2 (yes). results research question 1: using quantitative data, were there changes in positivity, attitude, and behavioural intention at times 1, 2, and 3? the reliability of the scales was satisfactory, as far as data for the children who completed all three questionnaires was concerned. for the attitude scale, item 1 at times 1, 2, and 3 (‘it must be scary for asylum seekers when they arrive in a new country’) lowered reliability, which meant that this item did not appear to measure prejudiced attitudes in the same way as the other items. because of this, the item was removed, giving cronbach alphas of .87 at time 1, .86 at time 2, and .85 at time 3. with the behavioural intention scale, no questions were removed to increase reliability, giving cronbach alphas of .93 at time 1, .93 at time 2, and .87 at time 3. as can be seen in table 1, for positivity, attitudes, and behavioural intentions, all scores were above the midpoint (that is, 4). there was an increase in the single positivity item, the attitude scale, and the behavioural intention scale from time 1 to time 2, and a slight decrease in scores at time 3 (but not as low as time 1). using three repeated measure anovas, we investigated whether the average scores changed across different times. using a greenhouse-geisser correction, the mean scores for the positivity items were statistically significant f(1.89, 226.81) = 68.04, p < .001 with post hoc tests revealing that there was a significant difference between times 1 and 2 (p < .001), between times 1 and 3 (p < .001), and between times 2 and 3 (p < .001). in other words, the intervention elicited a statistically significant increase in positivity over time, even though mean scores dropped significantly from time 2 to time 3 (see table 1). using a greenhouse-geisser correction, the mean scores for the attitude scales were statistically significant(1.86, 223.17) = 58.98, p < .001, with post hoc tests revealing that there was a significant difference between times 1 and 2 (p < .001), between times 1 and 3 (p < .001), and between times 2 and 3 (p < .001). in other words, the intervention elicited a statistically significant increase in positive attitudes towards asylum seekers over time, even though scores dropped significantly from time 2 to time 3. using a greenhouse-geisser correction, the mean scores for the behavioural intention scales were statistically significant f(1.70, 203.09) = 30.88, p < .001, with post-hoc tests revealing that there was a significant difference between times 1 and 2 (p < .001) and between times 1 and 3 (p < .001). there was no significant difference between times 2 and 3 (p = .550). in other words, the intervention elicited a human rights education review – volume 4(2) 94 statistically significant increase in behavioural intentions to interact with asylum seekers over time. even though mean scores dropped from time 2 to time 3, this drop was not significant. table 1. descriptive characteristics and repeated measures anovas (time 1, 2, and 3) variables m/sd t1 m/sd t2 m/sd t3 significant differences between times 1, 2, and 3 positivity 4.0(1.6) 5.8(1.3) 5.1(1.3) increase between t1 and t2 decrease between t2 and t3 attitude scale 4.4(1.4) 5.8(1.1) 5.4(1.1) increase between t1 and t2 decrease between t2 and t3 behavioural intention scale 4.8(1.6) 5.8(1.3) 5.6(1.3) increase between t1 and t2 no decrease between t2 and t3 research question 2: were there differences in accuracy with respect to the children’s definitions of asylum seekers and refugees at times 1, 2, and 3? asylum seekers at time 1, most of the children did not know how to define an asylum seeker correctly, left the question blank, or were incoherent in their responses (n = 86; 71%). the next most prevalent category was the children who were correct (n = 24; 20%), followed by children who were half-correct (n = 11; 9%). at time 2, most of the children knew how to define an asylum seeker (n = 93; 77%). the second most prevalent category was those who did not know how to define an asylum seeker or left the question blank (n = 19; 16%), followed by those who were half-correct (n = 9; 7%). at time 3, over half of the children knew how to define an asylum seeker (n = 68; 56%). the second most prevalent category was children who did not know how to define an asylum seeker or left the question blank (n = 32; 26%), followed by children who were half-correct (n = 21; 17%). see figure 2 for a graphical representation of these figures. refugees as was the case with the asylum seeker question, many children did not know how to define a refugee at time 1. at time 1, over half the children did not know how to define a refugee (n = 70; 58%). the next most prevalent category was the children who were correct (n = 40; 33.1%), followed by children who were half-correct (n = 11; 9%). at time 2, almost four-fifths of the children knew how to define a refugee (n = 79; 65%). the second most prevalent category was children who did not know how to define a refugee or left the question blank (n = 30; 25%), followed by children who were half-correct (n = 12; 10%). at time 3, just under half of the children knew how to define a refugee (n = 55; 46%). the second most prevalent category was l. hartley, a. pedersen, c. fleay, a. cook & a. jeram 95 children who did not know how to define a refugee or left the question blank (n = 44; 36%), followed by children who were half-correct (n = 22; 18%). see figure 2 for a graphical representation of these figures. as can be seen by figures 1 and 2, some of the children’s memories of these definitions became less accurate over time. however, the responses were still more accurate at times 2 and 3 compared to time 1. figure 1. accuracy of definitions of an asylum seeker at times 1, 2, and 3 figure 2. accuracy of definitions of a refugee at times 1, 2, and 3 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 time 1 time 2 time 3 correct half-correct incorrect 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 time 1 time 2 time 3 correct half-correct incorrect human rights education review – volume 4(2) 96 teachers’ data at time 2, most of the teachers reported finding the programme useful (86%). however, one teacher (14%) indicated some ambivalence. furthermore, all teachers who were surveyed indicated at time 2 that they intended to discuss the content of the programme with the children in the future, and all teachers who were surveyed 8-9 months later (time 3) reported that they had. the asylum seeker issue was integrated into other units of study such as literacy, history, migration/immigration, and the humanities and social sciences curriculum. discussion the aim of this study was to investigate whether a short school-based prejudicereduction intervention would have a positive effect on children’s attitudes towards people seeking asylum in australia. our results suggest that children who participated in the in search of safety programme held more positive attitudes towards asylum seekers, and this change lasted over a period of 8-9 months, when time 3 testing took place. while these effects regressed over time, scores at time 3 were still significantly higher than at time 1. because the teachers’ data act as a backdrop to the children’s data, we outline the two minor research questions first. first, most teachers reported finding the programme useful. for example, teacher 2 stated: ‘the children responded well. they posed questions and were reflective at the end of the movies’. teacher 4 stated: ‘a very important programme for young people that presents complete focus [sic] in an easy-to-understand way’. however, teacher 5 said: ‘suitable for age – but slow’ indicating both positive and negative aspects of the programme. second, all teachers surveyed reported 8-9 months later that they had incorporated the asylum-seeker issue into a variety of other units (the most prevalent being migration/immigration). thus, overall, the teachers who were surveyed were satisfied with the programme and integrated asylum seeker issues into their teaching over the next 8-9 months. when we focus on the impact of the intervention on the children’s positivity, attitudes, behavioural intentions, and knowledge about asylum seekers and refugees, we see that scores regarding the positivity item and the attitude scale dropped significantly from time 2 to time 3. however, the children reported significantly more positive feelings and attitudes towards asylum seekers directly after their participation in the programme, as well as 8-9 months later. furthermore, they were significantly more likely to intend to interact with an asylum seeker at the end of the programme (although there was a small drop in mean scores on the behavioural intention scale from time 2 to time 3, they did not drop significantly). the results of the evaluation suggest the intervention was successful, which supports some previous research. for example, past studies have found that prejudice-reduction interventions can increase attitudes and/or positivity when using a combination of empathy and cognitive-informational strategies (e.g. cameron et al., 2006), increase behavioural intentions to interact with an outgroup member (e.g. stathi et al., 2014; vezzali et al., 2012), and increase knowledge about an outgroup (white & abu-rayya, 2012). however, our findings do not support other research findings which suggest that while interventions lead to more positivity afterwards, these effects do not last over time (e.g. turner & brown, 2008). in our study, although there were drops at time 3, significant improvement from time 1 was still evident. this may be due to teachers discussing the issue of asylum seekers with the children in the 8-9 months after the intervention. while we are unable to l. hartley, a. pedersen, c. fleay, a. cook & a. jeram 97 comment definitively on this, as we did not measure this in our survey, the role of teachers’ fostering open-discussion about race-related issues has been found to be a critical factor in reducing racism in schools (spencer, 1998). in the current study, the fact that the teachers integrated what had been learnt in the intervention into their teaching programme over the following months is likely to have been an important component in shifting attitudes in a more positive direction. one reason for the potential importance of continued classroom discussions is that prejudice and discrimination is known to thrive in environments in which they are perceived to be the norm, but perish when the existing social norms do not allow it (pedersen et al., 2011; sechrist & stangor, 2001). there was an increase in knowledge about the definitions of asylum seeker and refugee immediately following the programme. while there was a decline in this knowledge gain 8-9 months later, children still reported an increase in knowledge at time 3 compared with the knowledge they had at time 1. for example, student no 37 stated before the programme: ‘i don’t know what a [sic] asylum seeker is’. immediately after the programme, it was remarked that asylum seekers were ‘people running from their homeland from war or other things. but they may not be able to have safety and be sent back’. 8-9 months later, we read that: ‘asylum seekers are people that leave their country and go to another place far away to be safer’. the same pattern was found with the definitions of ‘refugee’. before the programme, we have comments such as those made by student no 26: ‘i do not know much about them’. immediately after the programme, we read that ‘a refugee is someone who once was an asylum seeker but has been living somewhere [sic] safe for a long time’. eight-9 months later, the comment is made that: ‘i know that they move or evacuate from their home when something really bad happens. so they come to a different country like australian [sic] for safety’. as noted previously, some leeway was given to the children with their responses. this was because of their age – it was not expected that children of this age would have complex understandings about asylum seekers and refugees. indeed, many australian adults do not have a good understanding of the issue, even though they are given correct information. for example, despite participants being given a clear description of a refugee at the beginning of a questionnaire in a study on refugees in the australian community, many participants confused the categories of ‘refugee’ and ‘asylum seeker’, so that a qualitative category was established with the title: ‘confused refugee with immigrant or asylum seeker’ (turoy-smith, kane, & pedersen, 2013). furthermore, the fact that only one fifth of the children in the current study could correctly define ‘asylum seeker’ prior to the programme raises the question of who they were thinking about when they rated their attitudes and behaviours towards asylum seekers at time 1. nevertheless, what is important is that whoever they were thinking about beforehand was later thought of in more positive terms. it is also important to highlight that all aspects of the programme were rated as very important by the children. for example, with regard to the game, student 43 said that ‘it put me in their shoes and it showed me how terrifying it is’. further, student no 6 said: ‘it told a true story so i could understand how it would feel’. this suggests that the role of story-telling in the game and the dvd in eliciting empathy may be a useful strategy to foster understanding towards asylum seekers (aboud et al. 2012). the idea that aspects of the intervention helped the students identify with asylum seekers supports previous research which finds that people will be more human rights education review – volume 4(2) 98 favourably disposed towards and concerned about other people when they learn to see they are closer and more similar to themselves (aronson et al. 2016). the intervention strategies that focused on showing what it would be like to seek asylum arguably enabled students to identify with asylum seekers and their plight. with regard to the information provision, student 8 said ‘i didn't know too much about asylum seekers but the presentation was full of information so it helped me learn more’. while it is difficult to pinpoint the specific role that the provision of information played in increasing the scores on our evaluation survey, this does suggest that for some children information was an important factor, as highlighted by peucker (2011). as noted previously, the teachers’ discussion of the issue throughout the next 8-9 months is also likely to have been important. our evaluation supports theory on how to run a prejudice-reduction strategy (pedersen et al., 2011). in particular, it is argued by pedersen et al. (2011) that effective prejudice-reduction strategies need to use multiple methods and techniques, as was the case in the current study. these included the provision of accurate information (i.e., knowledge), the encouraging of empathy (through the use of the game and watching the dvd), the making of positive social norms explicit as these can legitimise attitudes (i.e., the fact that the teachers reinforced pro-refugee sentiment throughout the school year), and the provision of real or imagined intergroup with the target group which could involve either guest presentations or appropriate dvds. finally, pedersen et al. (2011) suggest that interventions be evaluated. this is important because it is possible for interventions to backfire (see trevors, muis, pekrun, sinatra, & winne, 2016) or simply have no effect (described in aboud et al. 2012). limitations and future research despite the interesting results, it is important to reflect on the potential limitations of the current study. a shortcoming may be that part of the intervention relied on the provision of correct information. peucker (2011) makes the valid point that strategies focusing on providing correct information are often ineffective when negative attitudes towards the target group are entrenched because they are resistant to persuasive communication. they argue that information provision is more likely to be effective for people with mildly prejudiced attitudes, or even positive attitudes towards diversity and outgroups. in our study, scores on the positivity, attitudes, and behavioural intentions towards asylum seekers at time 1 were all above the midpoint, suggesting that, on average, the children had somewhat positive inclinations towards asylum seekers before the intervention. this suggests that using cognitive-informational strategies may be useful in solidifying this positivity. another consideration with informational-based strategies is the ability to create structural change. pedersen et al. (2011) argue that for social change to occur, the structural elements of oppression must be examined as well as individual attitudes. as noted above, there is serious structural discrimination against asylum seekers; for example, they are subjected to a range of punitive polices in australia, including indefinite detention. that said, we believe that australia needs top-down and bottom-up change; that is, changes to the structure that affects asylum seekers and refugees as well as to individual attitudes and actions. as argued by duckitt (2001) and paradies (2005), we need to look at cognitive (e.g., how we categorise), individual (e.g., stereotypes), interpersonal (e.g. social influencing such as persuasion l. hartley, a. pedersen, c. fleay, a. cook & a. jeram 99 and intergroup contact), and societal (e.g. government policies) levels of racism (also see jensen, cismaru, lavack, & cismaru, 2010). we hope that, in the long term, personal attitudes and actions might affect social structures. one place to start is the school system. we also need to consider whether the results of the intervention will last, given the negative societal norms surrounding asylum seekers. our study shows that while prejudice-reduction scores did decrease over time, they were still more positive than they were initially. the teachers’ continuing use of the topic throughout the school year was no doubt helpful in maintaining positive attitudes. only future research can inform us how long these changes will last, and indeed whether they last at all without the teachers’ input. we note that we did not test the actual behaviour of the children but their attitudes and intended behaviour. future research could investigate the relationship between intended behaviour and actual behaviour. while we acknowledge that the in search of safety programme is an individualistic intervention that does not seek to address the structural and discriminatory factors facing people seeking asylum, we concur with others that oppression involves multiple layers (e.g. bronfenbrenner, 1979). we argue that for oppression against asylum seekers to be dismantled, it is necessary to tackle oppression at many levels: both individual and systemic. furthermore, on an individualistic level, a change in children’s attitudes to a more positive one would be helpful to refugee children that they come in contact with. as occurs in many real-life situations, it is also important to note that there was no control group, which makes it difficult to exactly locate any particular mechanisms or method underpinning the changes we found. (see paluck & green, 2009). for example, were changes to the prejudice scale a result of watching the dvd, viewing the presentation, participating in the game, or a combination of these? future research looking to experimentally manipulate these conditions could follow up on these questions. that said, such ‘real-world research’ is a very important contribution. indeed, as paluck and green (2009) note, we should be sceptical of interventions conducted only within laboratory settings. to our knowledge, there are few published studies which evaluate interventions designed by practitioners in the field (see turner & brown, 2008). similarly, there are few interventions that test participants three times (e.g. white & abu-rayya, 2012): the current study did this, using reliable and valid instruments. overall conclusions regarding the student questionnaire data, both the qualitative and quantitative results indicated that the programme was effective in increasing the children’s positivity, attitudes, and intended behaviour towards asylum seekers in the short term and long term. there was also a positive change in children’s knowledge of how to define a refugee and asylum seeker both in the short-term and long-term. however, given the decrease in scores from time 2 to time 3, it would be helpful for teachers to remind children of these definitions when bringing up the issue in future classes. as white et al. (2014) also found, knowledge acquisition does not always last. regarding the teacher data, the time 3 results indicate that the teachers generally felt very positive about the in search of safety programme although some reported negative issues (e.g., that there was not enough time). given that all of the teachers surveyed at time 3 had discussed the issue of asylum seekers with their human rights education review – volume 4(2) 100 children in the 8-9 months following the intervention, we would argue this contributed to the positive results of the student data over the long term. this study indicates that school-based interventions using a mixture of approaches to fostering attitude change—providing information, encouraging empathy, making positive social norms more explicit, fostering imagined contact with asylum seekers, and reinforcing the intervention content by teachers throughout the school year—can positively influence children’s attitudes towards asylum seekers. l. hartley, a. pedersen, c. fleay, a. cook & a. jeram 101 references aboud, f. e., tredoux, c., tropp, l. r., brown, c. s., niens, u., noor, n. m. 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2535-5406 ‘finally an academic approach that prepares you for the real world’: simulations for human rights skills development in higher education fiona mcgaughey, university of western australia lisa hartley, curtin university susan banki, university of sydney paul duffil, rikkyo university matthew stubbs, university of adelaide phil orchard, university of wollongong simon rice, university of sydney laurie berg, university of technology sydney paghona peggy kerdo, kerdo legal abstract: effectively addressing violations of human rights requires dealing with complex, multi-spatial problems involving actors at local, national and international levels. it also calls for a diverse range of inter-disciplinary skills. how can tertiary educators prepare students for such work? this study evaluates the coordinated implementation of human rights simulations at seven australian universities. based on quantitative and qualitative survey data from 252 students, we find they report that human rights simulation exercises develop their skills. in particular, students report that they feel better able to analyse and productively respond to human rights violations, and that they have a greater awareness of the inter-disciplinary skills required to do so. overall, this study finds that simulations are a valid, scalable, classroom-based work integrated learning experience that can be adapted for students at undergraduate and postgraduate level, across a range of disciplines and in both face-to-face and online classes. keywords: simulations, human rights education, skills, work integrated learning, tertiary education http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3093 f. mcgaughey et al. 71 ‘finally an academic approach that prepares you for the real world’: simulations for human rights skills development in higher education doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3093 issn 2535-5406 fiona mcgaughey, university of western australia, australia lisa hartley, curtin university, australia susan banki, university of sydney, australia paul duffil, rikkyo university, japan matthew stubbs, university of adelaide, australia phil orchard, university of wollongong, australia simon rice, university of sydney, australia laurie berg, university of technology sydney, australia paghona peggy kerdo, kerdo legal, australia fiona.mcgaughey@uwa.edu.au lisa.hartley@curtin.edu.au susan.banki@sydney.edu.au duffill@rikkyo.ac.jp matthew.stubbs@adelaide.edu.au orchardp@uow.edu.au simon.rice@sydney.edu.au laurie.berg@uts.edu.au peggyk@migration-lawyers.net.au abstract: effectively addressing violations of human rights requires dealing with complex, multi-spatial problems involving actors at local, national and international levels. it also calls for a diverse range of inter-disciplinary skills. how can tertiary educators prepare students for such work? this study evaluates the coordinated implementation of human rights simulations at seven australian universities. based on quantitative and qualitative survey data from 252 students, we find they report that human rights simulation exercises develop their skills. in particular, students report that they feel better able to analyse and productively respond to human rights violations, and that they have a greater awareness of the inter-disciplinary skills required to do so. overall, this study finds that simulations are a valid, scalable, classroom-based work integrated learning experience that can be adapted for students at undergraduate and postgraduate level, across a range of disciplines and in both face-to-face and online classes. keywords: simulations, human rights education, skills, work integrated learning, tertiary education 1. introduction teaching in vocational fields at tertiary level aims to develop students’ skills, in order to prepare them for the workplace. this is certainly the case in human rights and social justice teaching. the applied contexts in which skills are developed also provide a rich environment for deep inquiry into the substantive issues of a course. experiential learning and work-integrated-learning (wil), with these concurrent educational outcomes of enhanced skills and deeper learning, are common in cognate http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3093 mailto:fiona.mcgaughey@uwa.edu.au mailto:lisa.hartley@curtin.edu.au mailto:susan.banki@sydney.edu.au mailto:duffill@rikkyo.ac.jp mailto:matthew.stubbs@adelaide.edu.au mailto:orchardp@uow.edu.au mailto:simon.rice@sydney.edu.au mailto:laurie.berg@uts.edu.au mailto:peggyk@migration-lawyers.net.au human rights education review – volume 2(1) 72 fields such as social work and law, which often include field work, practicums, clinics, and simulated activities. however, for education in social justice and human rights, the broad range of domestic and international employment options, and the complexity of advocacy responses to human rights violations, requires a diverse and interdisciplinary set of skills. internships and other wil opportunities that engage students directly with industry can be useful but, from an institutional perspective, can be a logistical challenge and may omit the opportunity for guided reflection on student learning. students also require some classroom-based preparation before engaging with complex human rights violations. this presents a challenge for educators who must grapple with how to offer experiential learning that offers both deeper learning and enhanced skills. this study aimed to find a solution to this challenge. it developed a range of social justice simulations across seven australian universities and surveyed students to ascertain whether they perceived that specific skill development had been achieved. we also sought their general feedback on the simulation exercises in order to inform our future pedagogy. our intent was to establish whether, as classroombased activities, the simulations offer both an active, experiential learning technique for students, and a scalable and logistically manageable wil solution for universities. in this article, we begin in section two by providing the context of the study; we discuss the skills required for human rights work and outline what the existing literature says about simulations in tertiary teaching. section three then outlines the method we used to collect the evaluation data and section four describes each of the seven case studies. the case studies have been made available, together with teaching resources (banki et al., 2016a, 2016b) that can be used by other academics in tertiary human rights courses. in section five, we synthesise the empirical results and discuss our broader findings, before offering our conclusions in section six, which includes lessons learnt and opportunities for further development and research. 2. human rights skills and simulations in approaching this study, we reflected on the skills that are important for students who may enter the world of work as human rights professionals. although human rights education and work is sometimes seen to be dominated by lawyers, there is now a keen interest in fostering human rights skills across disciplines, and, concomitantly, in adopting an interdisciplinary approach to tackling human rights issues. ife (2012) and briskman and ife (2018) have championed the essential role to be played by social workers and community workers in human rights protection, gready (2008) has analysed rights-based approaches to development, and miller (2010) suggests that the language of rights has been taken up in many non-legal sectors including public relations, fundraising and communications. therefore, we selected a range of courses within which to trial our simulations, broadly spanning domestic law, international law, international relations, and the humanities. identifying human rights skills of relevance to these diverse academic disciplines is complex. in any case, skills required for human rights work may be subjective. coysh argues that both human rights and education are multifaceted and, as such, the way that human rights are conceptualised will determine the types of educational practice and processes engaged in (2014, p. 89). for this project, we particularly built on the previous work of banki et al. (2013), which establishes the following key principles for tertiary human rights education: it should develop skills f. mcgaughey et al. 73 that complement legal approaches; it should provide students with the tools to grasp both the root causes and the multi-spatial nature of human rights violations and associated systems of remedies; and it should involve collaborative opportunities for skills practice. this approach resonates with previous scholarship on human rights skills. for example, o’flaherty and ulrich’s research with human rights field officers found that the officers identified their roles and functions as: ‘monitoring the human rights situation, reporting human rights abuses, assisting local actors through capacity building and partnerships, and providing assistance and human rights-based advice to other international actors’ (2010, p.15). o’flaherty and ulrich note that human rights officers may well locate their primary knowledge base in another discipline, but argue that every professional in the field ‘needs at least a basic understanding of all subject categories of human rights law and, in particular, of treaty provisions for the protection of economic, social, cultural, civil, and political rights’ (2010, p. 12). furthermore, they stress the importance of localising formal knowledge within the local societal norms, politics, gender roles and socioeconomic situation (o’flaherty and ulrich, 2010, p.14). coysh also concludes that although human rights education should be learned in terms of different contexts, cultures and peoples, these particular and specific instances must not be isolated from the global social, political and economic forces that shape and influence them (coysh, 2014, p.114). the result of our analysis of previous scholarship, our own research, and our combined experience as both educators and practitioners, led to a synthesis of these findings into the survey questions in table 2. these questions encapsulate the essential core skills: understanding the complex nature of the legal, institutional, social and cultural dimensions of rights violations; and understanding the multispatial nature of rights violations. there were a number of other skills areas: analysing and productively responding to the interests and motivations of the actors involved; having an awareness of relevant evidence and practical data; and understanding the role of awareness raising. finally, being able to effectively communicate about human rights issues, and developing group work and collaboration skills, were also identified as core skills. it has been established that simulation exercises can bridge the ‘knowingdoing gap’ (banki et al., 2013) and that they can combine academic learning and civic action as a ‘valued hybrid: knowledgeable action’ (parker & lo, 2016, p. 227). for this project, classroom-based simulation exercises were chosen as a way of developing these interdisciplinary skills. simulations are complex role plays, increasingly used as pedagogical tools at the tertiary level (usherwood, 2014) in order to provide an authentic learning environment in the classroom. the intent is to develop ‘workreadiness’ in students through skills development (see for example crossley-frolick, 2010; taylor, 2012), and to do so using active learning techniques. the quote from a student, used in the title of this article – ‘finally an academic approach that prepares you for the real world’ – resonates with literature that has identified skills development for human rights advocacy as a gap in human rights courses (mcelwee, hall, liechty, & garber, 2009). banki et al. (2013, p. 318) have joined a number of educators who have begun to ‘bridge the “knowing-doing” gap’ by using simulation exercises. furthermore, hartley and mcgaughey (2018) have found that simulations are a worthwhile pedagogical tool for both face-to-face and online human rights teaching at tertiary level, contributing to deeper learning and skills development. human rights education review – volume 2(1) 74 other previous studies on simulations have also indicated that they can contribute to skills development. for example, with regard to teaching international relations, simpson and kaussler (2009) found that simulations contribute to the development of key communication and analytical skills. there has also been a long history of model un simulations, which can provide students with key vocational skills (obendorf & randerson, 2013). similarly, for law students, moot courts are a well-established simulation exercise to develop oral and written skills, ‘to be successful not only in cases brought before their home courts, but in front of international tribunals and other organs’ (grossman, martin, rodriǵuez pinzón, 2008). many previous studies, however, are unlike the current study; they have looked at simulation exercises focused on only one vocational area (e.g. law) or on a more narrow set of skills and tend not to function on multiple spatial levels. there has been criticism of the move towards skills development. griffin (2014) argues that, when balancing theory and practice in the postgraduate international human rights law curriculum, the pendulum must swing towards teaching international law and theory. across tertiary education in general, daniels and brooker (2014) argue that this trend has resulted in a problematic shift of emphasis from the student experience to the work-readiness of the graduate, meaning that the educational focus is on students’ future identity as an employee rather than on their current identity as a student. we were aware of this potential risk and reflect on it in the discussion section. since we did prioritise skills development, the simulation exercises were based on principles of active learning whereby, in addition to the presentation of knowledge, students’ opportunities for practice and particularly production are stressed. this approach, known as ‘ppp’ has been outlined by researchers such as crookes and chaudron (1991), brown (2001) and gavilán galindo (2008), within the fields of intercultural communication and communicative language teaching. it has been applied widely in these fields and also been used, more recently, in social justice simulation pedagogy (duffill, 2018; duffill, lambourne, faire, & manirakiza, 2018; banki et al., 2013). within the ppp model, during presentation the teacher presents the target knowledge, skills or content to students. in practice, this target content is typically divided into smaller chunks and practiced in low-context, low-pressure simulated situations where students have time to prepare and carefully practice and receive feedback from the teacher. production ‘creates realistic situations in the learning environment where students are free to experiment with the application of their knowledge’ (banki et al., 2013, p. 323). during production, students re-integrate elements of the target content through realistic activities carried out in real time. production allows for creative experimentation and integration of past learning and personal interests with the new content. production activities also typically promote collaboration and team work between students who may have different approaches to learning and the content; each simulation case reported in this paper culminated in a group role play an example of this aspect of production. the ppp approach has not escaped criticism, particularly of reductive, rigid, purist interpretations of the theory that have seemed to reduce teaching and learning to a linear three-step process (criado, 2013; ellis & shintani, 2014). however, the approach does not require adherence to a linear three-stage process, and different stages can be deliberately re-cycled to enhance student learning, respond to students’ emergent learning needs, adapt to different learning contexts, and allow greater f. mcgaughey et al. 75 flexibility in learning activities (brereton, lesley, schaefer & young, 2018; criado, 2013; ellis & shintani, 2014, pp. 120-121; hurling, 2012). following production, each simulation case study reported on here concluded with review and reflection activities, which could be termed the probe stage, forming the 4ps model (duffill, 2018; duffill et al., 2018). in probe activities students are encouraged to critically reflect on their own learning -both process and outcome and to consolidate what they have learnt. probe exercises can help students link their experience in the production activity back to theory and concepts introduced earlier in the course, thereby bridging theory and practice. rust and froud argue that of all of the graduate attributes, the critical one for sustainable employment is critical self-awareness and personal literacy (rust & froud, 2011). debriefing was an essential component of each simulation, giving students the opportunity to step out of their roleplay roles and reflect critically on their learning experiences. a criticism of simulation-based pedagogy and associated scholarship is that the efficacy of simulation exercises is ‘generally untested in any rigorous fashion’ (krain & lantis, 2006, p. 400). therefore, robust, empirical data on their efficacy is essential. specifically in regard to social justice, an earlier study within one university (banki et al., 2013) provided preliminary evidence for the positive impact of social justice simulations on skills development but recommended more empirical data. our study is the first comprehensive analysis of student perceptions on the use of simulation exercises and their contribution to their learning and skills development in human rights tertiary education. it has a broad scope: seven universities are involved, with survey data from 252 students enrolled in law and humanities courses, at both postgraduate and undergraduate level. this provides a robust dataset. in analysing this data, we reflect on the benefits, limitations, and utility of using simulation exercises to bridge the ‘knowing-doing gap’ (banki et al., 2013, p. 318). 3. method procedure face-to-face students were generally given a paper and pen version of the survey tool by each unit coordinator directly after they participated in the simulation, while online students were sent the survey instrument electronically (students in case study g – see section 4 -undertook a face-to-face activity but completed their survey online). students were provided with brief information about the survey and then completed a consent form and the survey. only those who consented to participate completed the survey. ethics approval was sought and granted (university of sydney human research ethics approval 2013/1082). survey the survey had questions relating to skills for responding to rights violations, as well as open-ended questions about the simulation. each of these will be discussed below. the extent to which skills were developed through participating in the simulation was measured by nine questions constructed specifically for this study. the questions can be found in table 2. students rated the questions on a 5-point likert scale (1 = strongly disagree and 5 = strongly agree, where 6 = not applicable). in addition to these nine questions, students completed five open-ended questions relating to their experience of the simulation: ‘what aspects of the simulation did you find most useful to learning?’; ‘what exercises were particularly useful, or not useful human rights education review – volume 2(1) 76 to building your skills?’; ‘please comment on your personal experience of the group work and on the utility of the group work component of the simulation’; ‘in what ways would you suggest the simulation could be improved?’; and ‘if a friend asked you to sum up your impressions of participating in the simulation, what would you tell them?’ one open-ended question asked how participation in the simulation contributed to the students’ personal and professional development and a final openended question asked students to provide any other comments about the simulation. a constructivist approach was used to thematically analyse the responses to the open-ended questions, using nvivo qualitative data analysis software. students’ actual skills attainment specifically due to the simulation was not assessed; the data is entirely reliant on self-reporting and one limitation of this is response bias (lavrakas, 2008). however, fielding argues that once methodological, measurement and selection biases are accommodated, self-report data is essentially robust (fielding, 2006). participants all students enrolled in each of the classes were required to participate in the simulation exercise, as it was incorporated into the curriculum and assessment tasks. the classes were both undergraduate and postgraduate and ranged in size, but most classes had around 30 students; one had 76 and another had 379. participation in the survey was voluntary and of a total of 636 students, 252 students completed it. 142 filled in the online survey tool and 110 filled in the paper survey tool. thus there was a 39.6226 per cent participation rate in the evaluation. 172 participants were female (68.2539 per cent), 74 male, and six did not respond to the gender question. a total of 56 postgraduate students and 196 undergraduate students responded. the average age of the participants was 24.044 years. 18 of the students were international students, the rest (229) were domestic students. 4. the simulation case studies the simulations engaged a range of disciplines, recreating the multi-spatial nature of human rights violations and the diversity of local and global actors involved and relationships between them (see for example keck & sikkink, 1998; merry, 2006; simmons, 2009). each simulation was based on a case study of a specific human rights issue: disability rights, indigenous rights, women’s rights, sovereignty claims, responses to mass atrocities, migrant rights, and refugee rights. the simulations were designed to develop the core human rights skills we discuss in section 2 above; however, this had to be balanced with meeting the particular learning outcomes for each course. this resulted in bespoke case studies which allowed us to test whether a range of different simulation exercises could successfully develop the same core set of skills. as well as seeking the same core skills development as an outcome, a number of shared techniques were integrated into the case studies. each case study began with a ‘trigger’ – a specific event requiring responses from a range of actors – and culminated in a group role play that simulated a key event or events in the case study. drawing on a range of activities that are central to social justice action (banki et al., 2016a, 2016b), the simulation required students to work in groups and engage in various exercises. the exercises varied slightly, depending on the specifics of each case study, but commonly used activities included: f. mcgaughey et al. 77  brainstorming data, which involved thinking critically about the role of information in understanding and addressing human rights issues. this exercise is followed by identifying, analysing and applying data to the issue;  tactical mapping, which involved visually plotting the actors and relationships that comprise a specific situation;  fishbowl interviews, which involved thinking about, preparing for, and practising interviews in order to develop skills in strategic thinking and information analysis;  media communication exercises such as press conferences and press releases, which involved considering how to frame arguments effectively and present information to target audiences;  litigation tactics, which involved using the courts as a transparent and impartial mechanism for accountability; and finally,  role play, all simulations included a role play – it was the culminating exercise of a human rights simulation and gave students the chance to put into practice the principles and skills that they had learned. the role plays generally revolved around a meeting or series of meetings where all of the actors and student groups were present and required interaction to negotiate, advocate, debate or lobby. these activities are based on principles that recognise the performative aspect of simulated learning and the need for a degree of structure in simulations. (banki et al., 2016a, 2016b). we provide here a brief description of each case study. educators interested in adopting the simulations for their own teaching can use the case studies and exercise manual published for this purpose (banki et al., 2016a, 2016b). case study university topic year level cohort size extent of simulation a university of sydney selfdetermination in west papua postgraduate 30 two 3-hour classes plus one full day b australian national university (anu) northern territory emergency response upper undergraduate elective 31 60-90 minutes activity each week for eight weeks c curtin university women’s rights in australia postgraduate 35 (9 face-toface, 26 online) face-to-face: 1hour classes over two weeks plus one 3hour session online: one 75 minute session d university of technology sydney offshore processing of asylum seekers upper undergraduate elective 22 two full days human rights education review – volume 2(1) 78 e la trobe university dog-whistle politics and asylum seekers upper undergraduate elective 35 90 minutes per week for 12 weeks plus two 4-hour sessions f university of queensland responding to mass atrocities 2nd year undergraduate elective 76 three 1-hour tutorials g university of adelaide vision-impaired voting in south australia 1st year undergraduate compulsory 379 one 2-hour lecture plus one 1-hour tutorial table 1: case studies at a glance a) peacemakers and warriors: self-determination in west papua, indonesia1 this simulation was undertaken in a postgraduate unit entitled the dynamics of human rights violations, with 30 students. the simulation used the real situation of a papuan university student killed by the indonesian military as a trigger to elicit responses from local, national, regional, and international activists and advocates. students, playing the roles of these stakeholders, prepared for and formulated responses at a simulated meeting of the association of southeast asian nations (asean) intergovernmental commission on human rights (aichr). the simulation aimed to develop students’ knowledge of the current situation in west papua and their awareness of sociological principles as applied to social movement theory. b) human rights law and the ‘northern territory emergency response’2 this simulation was undertaken by 31 students in an undergraduate unit entitled human rights law in australia. it analysed the human rights implications of the various measures of social control that were introduced in the northern territory by the commonwealth government as the ‘northern territory emergency response’ (‘nter’). it used the real situation of various indigenous groups as a trigger to elicit responses from students playing the roles of those affected groups. students prepared for and formulated submissions to a simulated independent panel convened to review the nter. several exercises, including tactical mapping, mobilising, and litigation tactics, aimed to raise student awareness of the nature of human rights and the problems associated with their embodiment in law. it also enabled students to engage with the legal, procedural, and institutional means available for protecting and promoting human rights in australia and the relationship between australia and the united nations human rights machinery. c) women’s rights in australia: a united nations’ treaty body simulation3 this simulation was undertaken in a postgraduate unit entitled ‘human rights instruments and institutions’, and 35 students nine face-to-face and 26 online – participated. it focused on issues of violence against women and indigenous women’s rights and used as a case study the review of australia by the united nations committee on the elimination of discrimination against women (‘cedaw committee’) as a trigger to elicit responses from ngos and australian government delegations. students, playing the roles of these stakeholders, prepared for and f. mcgaughey et al. 79 formulated responses at a simulated session of the un committee on cedaw in geneva. exercises such as tactical mapping, analysing data sources and press release were used both in-class (for students attending face-to-face classes) and online (for external/distance students) so that students could apply the international human rights system to promote human rights. d) offshore processing of asylum seekers: a multilateral human rights negotiation4 this simulation was undertaken in an undergraduate elective unit entitled ‘refugee law and practice’, and 22 face-to-face students participated. it was about the human rights implications of australia’s processing of asylum seekers in a detention centre on manus island in papua new guinea. in the context of that real situation, it used an invented asylum seeker’s plight as the trigger to elicit responses from a range of actors, including government representatives, corporate detention contractors, and human rights advocates. students, playing the roles of these stakeholders, prepared for and formulated responses to several disputes between these actors at a simulated broad-ranging multilateral negotiation. through several exercises, including tactical mapping, a press conference, and negotiation, students engaged with the interaction between domestic policies and international human rights law and had to devise, articulate, and integrate legal and non-legal strategies to achieve an outcome. e) bridging the gap: teaching about the impact of dog-whistle politics on the implementation of law and the effect on asylum seekers and immigrants5 this simulation was run alongside an undergraduate unit entitled ‘clinical legal education’ that assists disadvantaged people with their immigration issues. this course studies immigration law in depth in the classroom and runs immigration cases in the clinic. the purpose of the simulation was to give the 35 enrolled students a deeper understanding of the issues and influences involved in a complex policy situation the formulation and implementation of immigration law. the simulation used as a trigger a current amendment before the federal senate committee for legal and constitutional affairs, namely the abolition of the complementary protection system, proposed by the migration amendment (regaining control over australia's protection obligations) bill 2013 (cth). students played the roles of state and non-state actors and used exercises such as tactical mapping and role play. f) responding to mass atrocities: the role of the united nations security council6 this simulation was undertaken in an undergraduate unit entitled ‘human security and the responsibility to protect’, and 76 students participated. the simulation concerned the international community’s response to allegations of mass atrocities, using the fictional case study of a country – ‘zanda’ – emerging from civil war. the government was accused of engaging in mass atrocities, and the united nations security council (the council) placed zanda on its agenda. the council debate served as a trigger to elicit responses from four groups: the zandian government; the zandian opposition and local civil society; international ngos; and member states on the council itself. students, playing roles in each of these four groups, prepared strategies and negotiated with other groups to influence the council on whether it should proceed with a resolution on zanda and, if so, the language and outcomes to be included. using exercises such as tactical mapping and negotiations, students human rights education review – volume 2(1) 80 developed an understanding of mass atrocities and the mechanisms through which the international community can respond to them. g) is justice blind? vision-impaired voting in south australia7 this simulation was undertaken in an undergraduate compulsory first-year law course entitled ‘principles of public law’, with 379 students. the simulation, about disability rights, used a dramatisation of the real situation of a blind person in south australia being denied a secret ballot as a trigger to elicit responses from government and ngo actors at international, national, and state levels. students, playing the roles of human rights watch, the australian human rights commission, blind citizens australia and the government of south australia, prepared for and formulated responses which they delivered in the form of posters and oral presentations at a simulated voting accessibility forum. the simulation used exercises such as tactical mapping and role play to develop students’ understandings of human rights law and social justice issues in the real world. it introduced them to some of the practical considerations and advocacy skills that are necessary in order to translate human rights law into social justice outcomes. 5. findings and discussion this section reports on both the quantitative and qualitative data. these have been combined, as the qualitative data gathered from student text responses to the survey provides further insights into the quantitative findings. some specific themes emerged from the analysis of the qualitative survey data; these are discussed below. there was consistency in the themes, despite the fact that there were differences in the simulation exercises used, the cohort (undergraduate / postgraduate), mode of delivery, teaching staff, subject area, class size and so forth. when reporting on the qualitative data we provide limited information about the specific respondent(s), for a range of reasons. human research ethics approval required us to ensure the anonymity of students and to de-identify any responses. this means that because some class sizes were small it is not possible to link quotes to specific cohorts without risking identification. in any event, since we have adopted a thematic analysis report, individual quotes used for illustrative purposes are not unique to any one course. for all quantitative questions, combining the survey data from all of the case studies, students rated the simulations above the mid-point (3) on a scale of 1-5 on all nine evaluation questions, as shown in table 2 below. this indicates that a wide variety of types of simulation activity for social justice and human rights used with various student cohorts made a contribution to student learning and skills development. skills for responding to rights violations m(sd) 1) i have a better understanding of the complex nature of the legal, institutional, social and cultural dimensions of rights violations 4.22(0.85) 2) i have a greater awareness of the multi-spatial nature of rights violations (that is, that rights violations can be considered at local, national, and international levels) 4.23(0.79) f. mcgaughey et al. 81 3) i am better able to analyse and productively respond to the different interests and motivations of various actors associated with rights violations 4.17(0.80) 4) i have a greater awareness of the sorts of evidence and practical data that are necessary to make a convincing case that a particular rights violation requires action 4.05(0.96) 5) i am better able to understand the role public awareness raising plays in responding to rights violations 4.14(0.87) 6) i have improved my ability to effectively communicate about human rights/social justice issues 4.03(0.97) 7) i am more aware of the skills that will help me address the complex real-world problems associated with rights violations. 4.21(0.86) 8) being involved in a practical simulation helped me gain skills relating to human rights and other social justice issues that i could not gain in a conventional academic classroom 4.15(1.01) 9) the group work component of the simulation helped me develop skills of collaboration 3.81(1.16) table 2. mean (m) and standard deviation (sd) for all the quantitative items. notes: all scales ranged from 1-5. i. theme one: the complex and multi-spatial nature of human rights violations agreement was strongest in relation to an understanding of the complex nature of the legal, institutional, social and cultural dimensions of rights violations and the multi-spatial nature of rights violations (i.e., that rights violations can be considered at local, national, and international levels) (questions 1 and 2). this type of understanding is arguably the most challenging with which to engage in the classroom; we might rather expect it to emerge from internships or other types of wil. that students were positive in their responses to these questions suggests that the simulation exercises succeeded in creating an authentic learning environment in which to begin to bridge the knowing-doing gap. this was also a strong theme emerging from the qualitative data (based on frequency in nvivo coding). students were struck by the awareness they developed of the various actors or stakeholders their agendas, motivations, the relationships between them. for example: ‘made me consider more groups of people and their values’. this sometimes aligned with their awareness of how to engage with such actors through lobbying, negotiation and other communication skills. several students referred to the benefits of watching, listening and learning from others in the dynamic environment created through the simulation. the conscientisation (freire, 1970) experienced by some students seemed to galvanise them towards a career in social justice: made me reflect on the reality that comes with working with human rights and also on which areas i really want to do for a job. an important result for some students was that they became more aware of the limitations of social justice work and international and domestic human rights law. some described this as a ‘cynicism’ they had developed, and a few felt less inclined to human rights education review – volume 2(1) 82 pursue social justice-related employment, or employment in an international organisation or government: simulation taught me to be cynical about human rights in australia and as such i don’t feel like i can really find a career that effects meaningful change, especially given conflicting stakeholder priorities. it left me feeling quite cynical about change within the un security council. it taught me how resistant bureaucracy is to radical change and how working in bureaucracy would not be conducive to my action-orientated personality. the awareness of others’ roles, motivations and developing skills to work with them also links to another theme discussed below – that of group work. working collaboratively and group was particularly useful – not just our individual groups but as a group as a whole (sic). it assisted me in localising the complexities of civil society relationships. some students reflected that the simulation had given them more insight into employment options. for some, it had helped them make decisions about their future career or they felt better equipped to embark on a career as a result, for example: made me more engaged and hopeful for career prospects in this area. made it seem like an achievable goal. a role working with cedaw would be a dream job. it was exciting to imagine. ii. theme two: analysing and responding to human rights violations and acquiring skills table 2 shows, critically for our purposes, that students also responded positively regarding the impact of the simulations on their ability to analyse and respond to human rights violations. they strongly agreed that the simulations enabled them to acquire skills they could not have gained in a traditional classroom (questions 7 and 8). creating a wil environment that contributes to the acquisition of skills is a primary driver for the use of simulation exercises. although still positive, there was a slightly weaker student response to two parts of the survey: ‘i have a greater awareness of the sorts of evidence and practical data that are necessary to make a convincing case that a particular rights violation requires action’ (question 4); and ‘i have improved my ability to effectively communicate about human rights/social justice issues’ (question 6). these are areas for improvement in future simulations. skills development and the practical and/or useful nature of the simulation exercise was the second most common theme in the qualitative survey data. many students found the simulation exercise overall to be ‘practical’, ‘useful’, or they commented that they had felt engaged in a realistic scenario. within this theme, there were a number of specific subthemes. some of these emerged throughout the qualitative data while others were responses to specific questions: ‘what aspects of the simulation did you find most useful to your learning?’ and ‘what exercises were f. mcgaughey et al. 83 particularly useful or not useful to building your skills?’. when reflecting on their learning and skills acquisition, the most common type of activity that students mentioned as beneficial was formal interaction in the form of presentations or meetings: for example, presenting at a regional level to asean, at an international level to a un committee, or a domestic level to a panel on the northern territory emergency response. the learning and skills development included improving presentation and work readiness skills, and developing a more realistic understanding of how such mechanisms work. for example: conference presentations are new to me, and public speaking is not my strongest point so this was particularly useful for building my skills. the positive feedback i received also boosted my confidence and motivation to undertake exercises like this again! it gave me an appreciation of how much work goes on behind the scenes to achieve awareness of key human rights issues, and the reporting processes with un treaty bodies. prior to this i considered these review processes somewhat intimidating and perhaps too bureaucratic. now equipped with a better understanding of the processes i am confident i will be able to participate proficiently in actual treaty body reviews in the future. related to the presentation activities, there were also frequent references to the benefit of having to respond to questions. many students felt that this developed their responsiveness, flexibility and communication skills. when asked ‘what aspects of the simulation did you find most useful to your learning?’ there were several comments like these: being put on the spot. having to improvise responses based on existing knowledge. public speaking and being able to think and articulate rationale and reasoning on my feet. hearing the concerns from the panel and expanding ideas in response. we posit that these are skills that students use to develop their extracurricular lives even before they leave campus, as they engage in communications with peers and educators to offer suggestions or make changes at policy and social levels. other specific activities that were quite commonly cited in the responses in terms of skills development were lobbying, interviewing and tactical mapping. in particular, students offered several comments that suggested that their learning was tied not only to future work plans, but also to important ‘soft skills’ such as communication, understanding the nature of power, and negotiation skills. i learnt how there are more efficient way of getting messages across to those who are in power. i understand now why peace negotiations take so long to achieve anything, because it is a lot more complex than just deciding to end the violence and human rights education review – volume 2(1) 84 sign a peace agreement. it requires a lot of back and forth negotiation... it really made me rethink how i looked at political decision-making and international conflict negotiations. it helped more professional development, because normally in the class room i don't get to test more negotiation skills or use the knowledge from the course in a life-like situation. the simulation affirmed that i want to work in the nongovernment sector. it was useful to practice negotiation skills, which i think are broadly applicable. academic skills development also featured in the feedback, with several students referring to the development of their researching and writing skills through the simulation exercise. iii. theme three: group work one area of notably weaker student response in the survey was in relation to the question ‘the group work component of the simulation helped me develop skills of collaboration’ (question 9). group work was an integral part of all the simulations; it is an integral part of human rights advocacy in the real world and so key to creating simulation exercises for teaching social justice (banki et al., 2013, p. 332). despite its academic benefits for students, there are challenges associated with group work (lavy, 2017; nilson, 2016, pp. 179-189). student resistance to group work is common in higher education, so these figures are not surprising – the response in our data remains positive, but notably less so, and the standard deviation is greater for this question than any other in our survey. in the qualitative data, group work was the third most common theme and in fact, overall, positive comments about group work were more prevalent than negative comments. this is interesting as banki et al. (2013) found the qualitative feedback on group work to have been ‘about evenly split’ (p. 331). many students when asked ‘what aspects of the simulation did you find most useful to your learning?’ mentioned group work. for example: i enjoyed the lobbying task and collaborative aspects. working as a group and bouncing ideas off each other was very useful. students were asked in the survey ‘please comment on your personal experience of the group work and on the utility of the group work component of the simulation’. again, responses were mixed, although quite positive overall; for example: loved working in a group – it both developed skills i forgot i had and slightly alleviated the stress of addressing the simulation alone. it was great to work with the same group… to know the group and go in-depth with ideas and discussion. other students did not have such a positive experience of group work, stating that it was ‘challenging’, ‘did not work’, ‘unnecessary’ and that some group members did not contribute or take the exercise seriously, a particular concern in assessment tasks. f. mcgaughey et al. 85 examples include: my personal experience was not positive. i think it’s unfair that all group members are awarded the same mark, as some group members did not participate... i did essentially the whole thing as no other group member wanted to put in the effort for something worth 5%. some of the most negative comments about group work came from students in the large undergraduate class (university of adelaide), and the students involved in the online simulation (curtin university), suggesting that some teaching environments are more conducive to group work than others. students involved in the online simulation, for example, highlighted frustration arising from a lack of engagement by other group members in that they were not responding to other member’s posts in their online group platform or contributing their thoughts and ideas. solutions to this may include having more active participation by teaching staff in the online group work, particularly in the early stages (see hartley and mcgaughey, 2018, for more discussion on the challenges and possible solutions for online group work). the large undergraduate class undertook a relatively short simulation in a cohort of first-year students probably relatively unaccustomed to university group work. it may be that greater emphasis on building group work skills and a more extended simulation experience would address some of these concerns. finally, some students acknowledged that group work can be challenging but is essential nonetheless – ‘group work is part of most professional working environments, so understand the importance’. iv. theme four: overall reflections in addition to the main findings from the survey instrument and the themes from the qualitative data in the three previous sections, an overview can be provided through an analysis of responses to two questions that garnered their overall reflections on the simulation exercise. these were: ‘if a friend asked you to sum up your impressions of participating in the simulation what would you tell them?’ and ‘finally, do you have any other comments about the simulation?’. the majority of students who responded to these questions gave positive responses. as discussed above in section 5ii, many students reported finding the exercises very useful or practical. many commented on what a wonderful opportunity or experience it had been and how rewarding it was, and there were quite frequent references to having fun or, as one student said, ‘almost fun!’. we might dismiss such comments as not relevant to our central research question of whether simulations can help with the development of skills required for human rights advocacy. however, educators intuitively know that happy and engaged students learn better. this is also supported by scholarship. ziv (1988) found that students enrolled in a class where educators who created a fun environment by using humour received approximately 10 per cent higher marks in their exam than students in a non-fun control group. horan, martin, and weber (2012) argue that positive emotions help students ‘feel empowered, motivated, attend class and study – all approach behaviours that should manifest themselves in increased cognitive and affective learning’ (p. 212). human rights education review – volume 2(1) 86 as well as enjoying the experience, many students commented that it was challenging or stressful but, generally, this brought about a positive outcome. for example: i would tell them that it was really fun and challenging, i haven't done anything like that in uni before getting to play a role, being in a team and getting to use things we learnt from the course and use our negotiation skills in a hypothetical situation that reflects real-life conflict. one of the most rewarding exercises i’ve done in an academic setting. overwhelming, challenging, scary! but a good way to learn. students were asked ‘in what ways would you suggest the simulation be improved?’, and made suggestions for improvement in response to other questions in the survey. from these responses we have learnt how to refine future iterations of the simulation to enhance its pedagogical value. some comments related generally to preparation for, and logistics of, the simulation. for example, several students identified the need for clearer instructions in the simulation activities, feeling at times that what was expected of them was unclear. other students expressed specific frustrations, for example with the timing of the simulation right before exams in one case, or with the logistics of participating in the online simulation. some students felt that they would have benefitted from more in-depth knowledge on the subject area in order to be able to participate as effectively as possible; for example, one student suggested: having completed an actual ‘research’ assignment before undertaking the simulation would have been useful to develop the knowledge base needed to complete simulation. a number of students commented on assessment. some students reported a lack of assessment tasks associated with the simulation and/or the disproportionate amount of time and work required for the simulation. some case studies assessed the simulation activities in their entirety, others assessed aspects of it and some used it as formative rather than substantive assessment. several students mentioned needing more time to prepare, or the simulation exercises being too rushed, for example: ‘i would liken it to the olympic 100m race: incredibly enjoyable, but not near long enough’. the issue of the time commitment for simulations has also been considered by researchers. it has been noted that simulations can be time consuming but also that there can be a risk that they do not make a proportionate contribution to student learning (o’toole & absalom, 2003). the question of assessment has also been considered in the literature, and the full potential of future simulations may be realised if assessment is incorporated into their overall design (raymond & usherwood, 2013, p. 164). with regard to the trend of a shift away from the student experience to the work-readiness of the graduate (identified by daniels & brooker (2014) above), our findings reject the binary that insists on one approach skills development for future employment versus analytic and social development for current student identity. instead they point to an approach that achieves both. our research shows that f. mcgaughey et al. 87 students value not only the ‘hard’ skills they develop for future careers (such as knowledge about how human rights instruments might be deployed in international meetings), but also the ‘soft’ skills that they use during class, outside of class, and in the future. furthermore, students expressed a high level of satisfaction and enjoyment from the simulations in their qualitative survey comments. this indication of a positive student experience suggests that student experience is not necessarily compromised by skills development for work-readiness, as identified by daniels & brooker (2014). finally, we have to report that a small minority of students were dissatisfied with their simulation exercises; one stated ‘i never fill out these surveys but my hate for that activity was so strong i had to’. as well as some comments about group work (discussed in the previous section), a few students commented that they felt that simulation was pointless or they did not learn anything from it. as noted in the previous section, although comments remained overwhelmingly positive, some cohorts (e.g. large classes and online students) expressed more negative feedback than others. the feedback provided by students in response to the question ‘in what ways would you suggest the simulation be improved?’ is being used to refine the simulation exercises so that they are useful and positive classroom experiences for as many students as possible. 6. conclusion based on quantitative and qualitative survey data from 252 students across seven australian universities, this study found that human rights simulation exercises were reported by students to have contributed to skills development. in particular, students reported having a better understanding of the complex nature of the legal, institutional, social and cultural dimensions of rights violations, and a greater awareness of the multi-spatial nature of rights violations. students also reflected on their increased ability to analyse and respond to violations and on the practical and useful skills they had attained through the simulations. the simulations were successful active learning techniques and were positively received by students, with student enjoyment also likely to support skills development. as well as developing skills, it was clear that the simulations also helped students to be better informed about their career choices. the weakest responses were in relation to the group work component of the simulation and qualitative data suggests that group work was more problematic for some cohorts than for others specifically, large classes and online classes. universities are increasingly prioritising wil, with universities australia having adopted a national strategy on work integrated learning in university education (2015). overall, this study finds that simulations are a valid, scalable, classroom-based wil experience that can be adapted for students at undergraduate and postgraduate level, across a range of disciplines and in both face-to-face and online classes. our data also points to opportunities for further research. a limitation of the current study is that students’ actual skills attainment specifically due to the simulation was not assessed and that self-reporting was used. future studies could include assessment of actual skills attainment. also, human rights simulations may have other benefits not assessed in the current study. in particular, the question of student well-being should be a key consideration for human rights educators, considering the importance of emotional resilience in social justice activism human rights education review – volume 2(1) 88 (abarbanel, 2012). in fact, student well-being is a matter for all university educators, given the high prevalence and severity of psychological distress among student populations (bore, pittolo, kirby, dluzewska, & marlin, 2016). according to selfdetermination theory (ryan & deci, 2000), regular experiences of three feelings competence, autonomy, and relatedness foster student wellbeing. as simulation exercises help with skills development (competence) and are largely driven by the student groups (autonomy), it is likely that simulations will promote student wellbeing. the final feeling – relatedness involves a sense of group belonging and close relationships (baik et al., 2017). where students work with their peers on a number of group work exercises over a period of time, it is likely that this aspect of simulations also fosters student wellbeing. this hypothesis warrants further exploration. different class sizes and educational contexts would allow further differentiated research into this, and other related areas. to conclude, simulation exercises are a valuable learning and teaching tool in the suite of wil offerings in tertiary education. they prepare students for human rights advocacy in the real world, and thus help to bridge the knowing-doing gap. f. mcgaughey et al. 89 notes 1 developed by susan banki. 2 developed by simon rice. 3 developed by fiona mcgaughey and lisa hartley, with input from mary anne kenny and anna copeland. 4 developed by laurie berg. 5 developed by paghona peggy kerdo. 6 developed by phil orchard. 7 developed by matthew stubbs. human rights education review – volume 2(1) 90 references abarbanel, a. 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(1988). teaching and learning with humor: experiment and replication. journal of experimental education, 57(1), 5-15. https://doi.org/10.1080/00220973.1988.10806492 https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066x.55.1.68 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1528-3585.2009.00386.x https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1528-3585.2009.00386.x https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1528-3585.2012.00477.x http://cdn1.acen.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/national-wil-strategy-in-university-education-032015.pdf http://cdn1.acen.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/national-wil-strategy-in-university-education-032015.pdf https://doi.org/10.1080/00220973.1988.10806492 ‘finally an academic approach that prepares you for the real world’: simulations for human rights skills development in higher education 1. introduction 2. human rights skills and simulations 3. method procedure survey participants 4. the simulation case studies 5. findings and discussion 6. conclusion notes references the role of law and legal knowledge for a transformative human rights education: addressing violations of children’s rights in formal education date received: 11-012018 date of publication: 17-09-2018 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2560 date accepted: 20-08-2018 peer-reviewed article issn 2535-5406 the role of law and legal knowledge for a transformative human rights education: addressing violations of children’s rights in formal education laura lundy queen’s university belfast, uk gabriela martínez sainz centre for human rights studies, mexico. abstract: human rights education (hre) emphasises the significance of children learning about, through and for human rights through their lived experiences. such experiential learning, however, is often limited to instances of enjoyment of rights and disregards experiences of injustice, exclusion or discrimination. by neglecting the ‘negative’ experiences, including breaches of their human rights, hre fails in one of its fundamental aims: empowering individuals to exercise their rights and to respect and uphold the rights of others. drawing on a range of legal sources, this article identifies a number of violations of the human rights of children in schools, categorised under five themes: access to school; the curriculum; testing and assessment; discipline; and respect for children’s views. it argues that for hre to achieve its core purpose, it must enable children to identify and challenge breaches of rights in school and elsewhere. to do so, knowledge of law, both domestic and international, has a fundamental role to play. keywords: legal literacy; human rights literacy; children’s rights education; critical human rights education; human rights violations; human rights practices laura lundy: l.lundy@qub.ac.uk gabriela martínez sainz: gms@cedhmx.org mailto:l.lundy@qub.ac.uk mailto:gms@cedhmx.org l.lundy & g. martínez sainz 5 the role of law and legal knowledge for a transformative human rights education: addressing violations of children’s rights in formal education doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2560 issn 2535-5406 laura lundy queen’s university belfast, uk gabriela martínez sainz centre for human rights studies, mexico. l.lundy@qub.ac.uk gms@cedhmx.org abstract: human rights education (hre) emphasises the significance of children learning about, through and for human rights through their lived experiences. such experiential learning, however, is often limited to instances of enjoyment of rights and disregards experiences of injustice, exclusion or discrimination. by neglecting the ‘negative’ experiences, including breaches of their human rights, hre fails in one of its fundamental aims: empowering individuals to exercise their rights and to respect and uphold the rights of others. drawing on a range of legal sources, this article identifies a number of violations of the human rights of children in schools, categorised under five themes: access to school; the curriculum; testing and assessment; discipline; and respect for children’s views. it argues that for hre to achieve its core purpose, it must enable children to identify and challenge breaches of rights in school and elsewhere. to do so, knowledge of law, both domestic and international, has a fundamental role to play. keywords: legal literacy; human rights literacy; children’s rights education; critical human rights education; human rights violations; human rights practices introduction the united nations convention on the rights of the child (‘the uncrc’ or ‘the convention’) provides the most comprehensive statement of children’s rights to, in and through education (verhellen, 1993). article 29, in particular, provides an unfailingly positive, aspirational vision of the education to which all children are entitled, one that enables them to develop to their fullest ability, learn respect for human rights, tolerance and acceptance of difference, and respect for the natural environment (lundy et al, 2016). the un committee on the rights of the child (‘the committee’) has said that art. 29 of the convention: ‘… insists upon the need for education to be child-centred, childfriendly and empowering, and highlights the need for educational processes to be based upon the very principles it enunciates. the education to which every child has a right is one designed to provide the child with life skills, to strengthen the child’s capacity to enjoy the full range of human rights and to promote a culture which is infused by appropriate human rights values. the goal is to empower the child by developing his or her skills, learning and other capacities, human dignity, self-esteem and self-confidence’. (un, 2001, para. 2) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2560 mailto:l.lundy@qub.ac.uk mailto:gms@cedhmx.org human rights education review – volume 1(2) 6 this image of positive, child-centred education could be lifted from numerous school mission statements, and many schools and teachers are committed to delivering an education that aims to provide something as close to this vision as possible. human rights education (hre) programmes and materials around the world also reinforce this educational vision by advocating it as a way to build a universal culture of respect for human rights, and to promote sustainable development and social justice (un, 2005, p. 12). however, there is also little question that in every single country, every single day, there are children whose educational experience falls far short of this internationally agreed blueprint. as an example, a case in south africa was brought to court when approximately 3% of children in one province were not supplied with free school textbooks, unlike their more affluent, urban-dwelling peers. the inequality and discrimination that ensued, affecting a predominantly poor, rural and black community, was challenged by better education for all (befa), an ngo representing the schools, the students and their families. the government’s defence to this legal challenge was that there were insufficient resources to guarantee access to textbooks for all and that the children could copy their lessons by hand from the blackboard or work from photocopies. the supreme court of appeal in south africa thought differently, observing that: why should they suffer the indignity of having to borrow from neighbouring schools or copy from a blackboard, which cannot, in any event, be used to write the totality of the content of the relevant part of the textbook? why should poverty stricken schools and learners have to be put to the expense of having to photocopy from the books of other schools? why should some learners be able to work from textbooks at home and others not? there can be no doubt that those without textbooks are being unlawfully discriminated against (minister of basic education v. basic education for all, 2015, para. 49). the children, who were manifestly disadvantaged by the lack of textbooks, experienced first-hand violations of their human rights. however, someone involved in this case (perhaps a child, a parent or a teacher) had received sufficient legal education to not only be able to identify this injustice but to classify it as discrimination and seek support to challenge it in the domestic courts. moreover, the vindication of the children’s right to equality in education, and the expression of this in a legal precedent, offers the children and adults involved a further practical lesson in, through and for human rights. breaches of children’s rights in schools are happening every day across the world. so too are challenges, legal and otherwise, to these violations. the premise of this article is that for hre to be truly transformative and achieve its main aim, it must address –rather than neglect– such breaches and violations. hre must incorporate ‘negative’ lived experiences of injustice, exclusion or discrimination as a way to build children’s capacity and develop the legal knowledge and skills that will enable them to identify and challenge breaches of their own rights and the rights of others. we suggest that there is as much, if not more, to be learnt from ongoing violations of human rights obligations in schools, and the responses (or lack of them) to the violation of children’s rights as there is from positive descriptions of the scope and l.lundy & g. martínez sainz 7 characteristics of an education that respects human/child rights. we take our inspiration, in part, from the work of professor katarina tomasevski, a formidable human rights defender and the first united nations special rapporteur on the right to education. she identified the need for a greater focus on the daily realities of children in the schools that they attend, arguing that a lack of attention to ongoing abuses of rights in schools undermines the efforts of hre: without a clear vision of the inter-relationship between the right to education and rights in education, promoting human rights education or human rights through education remains impossible. what happens in schools is seldom examined through the human rights lense (sic) the most important reason being that the notion of rights in education is new. evidence of abuses of education and in education is not systematically collected and remains largely unknown and facilitates the perpetuation of abuses (tomasevski 2001, p.43). if hre research and practice concentrates on what an education that respects human rights should be, rather than examining what is really happening in many children’s lives, it forgoes important learning opportunities for children and has less of a capacity to advance human rights in schools. in view of this, this article focuses on aspects of what we currently know about what should not happen in schools, as opposed to what should. through an analysis of legal sources and previous literature, it provides an overview of some of the ongoing breaches of children’s rights in schools. this is followed by a discussion of the role of law and legal knowledge as a means to transform children’s lived experiences within and beyond schools into learning opportunities for hre. finally, it concludes with a broader discussion of the role of legal scholarship in the research and practice of hre. breaches of children’s rights in education this section identifies some of the core violations of children’s rights to and in education within schools. it is not intended – and nor is it possible here – to provide an exhaustive account of all human rights violations in schools. the section that follows provides a ‘pen-portrait’ of the scale and scope of human rights breaches in formal education, highlighting the fact that in most areas of education children’s human rights can be violated, and that these violations can be the result of both systemic injustices as well as the actions of individual state actors. we draw on a number of legal sources: these include the concluding observations and general comments of the committee on the rights of the child, and legal cases where the actions of schools and teachers have been challenged in national and international courts. the latter, in particular, are often neglected in human rights education scholarship (with the landmark case of brown v board of education in 1954 as a notable exception), even though they are crucial to understanding the relationship between human rights and education. these legal challenges provide unique insights into actions and omissions that were deemed so unacceptable to the rights-holders that they (or others) were prompted to seek public redress. each subsection opens with a provision of the uncrc (how things should be – the relevant human right) before identifying what a breach of that provision looks like in practice (how things are for some children – the breach). what follows is an analysis and synthesis of these human rights education review – volume 1(2) 8 breaches, under the following five themes: access to education; curriculum; testing and assessment; discipline; and respect for children’s views. access to education states parties shall respect and ensure the rights set forth in the present convention to each child within their jurisdiction without discrimination of any kind, irrespective of the child's or his or her parent's or legal guardian's race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national, ethnic or social origin, property, disability, birth or other status (article 2, uncrc). article 2 of the uncrc, the non-discrimination principle, is not a stand-alone right. it cuts across all other provisions of the convention, including article 28, which requires access to full and compulsory primary education and the expansion of secondary and vocational education. even though the numbers of children attending school globally have steadily increased in the wake of the millennium development goals (unterhalter, 2014), it is estimated that there are still around 264 million children out of school and the increase in the numbers of children attending school appears to have plateaued (unesco, 2017). although the sustainable development goals have placed an additional focus on quality and equality in the education that children receive, these rights are far from being universally implemented. even in countries that have achieved universal primary and secondary enrolment, there are always certain groups of children who do not fully attend school. these are often girls, children with disabilities, and national minorities (lundy, 2012). the reasons that certain children do not or cannot attend, or do not stay in school, are varied. however, they are often connected to poverty and broader forms of social exclusion. the educational experiences of roma children in europe serve as a key example of this and the committee frequently identifies them as a group that is unjustly excluded (lundy, 2012). exclusion and the breach of the right to access to education come in a number of guises, one of which is the hidden or additional costs of supposedly ‘free’ education. for example, in ponomaryovi v. bulgaria (2011), the european court of human rights decided that a requirement for russian nationals who did not have bulgarian residence permits to pay additional fees in order for their children to access education was discriminatory. it observed that: ‘under article 28 of the united nations convention on the rights of the child, the state had the duty to assist children in their drive to become fully fledged members of society. by erecting insuperable obstacles to the completion of their secondary education, the state was preventing them from developing in that way.’ (ponomaryovi v. bulgaria, 2011, para. 46). another reason why many migrant children are excluded is that they lack registration documents. this can mean that they miss out on education completely (todres, 2003) or end up in inferior private arrangements with adverse consequences for equality (chen and feng, 2013). the committee emphasizes, in its concluding observations, the barrier that the lack of registration documents creates. for example, it recently expressed a concern in relation to cameroon about: ‘the l.lundy & g. martínez sainz 9 disproportionate impact on indigenous, refugee and asylum-seeking children and children living in remote areas of the requirement to produce a birth certificate to qualify for the secondary school entrance exam’ (un, 2017, para. 38(e)). other forms of exclusion that jeopardise the right to access to education occur at the point of entry, with seemingly objective admissions criteria resulting in discriminatory outcomes. places at schools are social goods and the distribution of these through admissions policies can result in certain groups of children being excluded, directly or indirectly (west, 2006). research in new zealand and elsewhere has demonstrated that the drawing of geographical boundaries operates against the most disadvantaged pupils (lubienski et al, 2013). academic selection tests and secondary school criteria that prioritise children on the basis of good attendance at a primary school are also questionable since the latter can disadvantage children who have long term illnesses, whose families are nomadic or who are just poor, given the long-established link between poor attendance at primary school and lower socio-economic status. moreover, an obvious form of exclusion occurs when a child is expelled or temporarily suspended from school as a result of disciplinary mechanisms. research suggests that these exclusions fall disproportionately on children with special educational needs and children from certain ethnic backgrounds (morris and perry, 2016). discrimination and segregation are practices that occur within schools that breach the rights of children to a child-friendly and empowering education. in one case in the united states1, antoine et al v. winner school district (2007), ten native american families claimed that the schools in their district discriminated against native american students in disciplining them, were hostile towards native american families, and took statements from students involved in disciplinary matters that were later used to prosecute them in juvenile and criminal courts. the case was settled and a set of measures implemented to counteract the indirectly discriminatory effects. the committee on the rights of the child has also been prompt to identify similar patterns of indirect discrimination, recommending for example that the united kingdom take measures to reduce disparities in the number of black and ethnic minority children excluded from school (un, 2016). finally, another form of exclusion occurs when children are taught alone or in separate classes. segregation of groups of children, such as children with disabilities or children from certain ethnic groups, is, however, problematic from a human rights perspective (lundy, 2012). in 2010, the european court of human rights considered that the education of roma children in separate classes was a breach of their right to non-discrimination in education, in spite of croatia’s argument that it was justified because the children did not speak croatian (oršuš and others v. croatia application (2010)). curriculum “(a) the development of the child’s personality, talents and mental and physical abilities to their fullest potential; (b) the development of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, and for the principles enshrined in the charter of the united nations; (c) the development of respect for the child’s parents, his or her own cultural identity, language and values, for the national values of the human rights education review – volume 1(2) 10 country in which the child is living, the country from which he or she may originate, and for civilizations different from his or her own; (d) the preparation of the child for responsible life in a free society, in the spirit of understanding, peace, tolerance, equality of sexes, and friendship among all peoples, ethnic, national and religious groups and persons of indigenous origin; (e) the development of respect for the natural environment.” (article 29(1), uncrc). article 29(1) defines the aims of education in ambitious, even idealistic, terms. it obliges states to provide an education that develops every child to his/her fullest potential, and to teach respect for human rights, cultural identity and the environment. much of this echoes what is said about the right to education in article 13 of the international covenant on social, economic and cultural rights (1966) and there is little here that most educators would disagree with. articles 29(1)(c) and (d) expand the aims of education to include an education that deepens respect for the child’s own ethnicity, cultural and national identity as well as respect for difference and the promotion of tolerance and gender equality. it is difficult to imagine any country outwardly disagreeing with this vision of education – the world’s governments did not when they ratified it with very few reservations (see lundy et. al., 2016). and yet, monitoring of the uncrc often highlights how some countries fall short of the curricular standards; for instance, those whose actual stated aims of education are considered to discriminate against girls. another breach of children’s rights in relation to the aims of education advanced in schools can be found in a curriculum that promotes intolerance towards other cultures, an intolerance that is expressed in the resulting teaching materials and practices. educational curricula, being the prime opportunity for a government to promote its own national identity, are often directly or indirectly xenophobic; texts written to promote a particular dominant ideology or group convey messages of intolerance or racial superiority as part of the so-called ‘hidden curriculum.’ examples can be found in textbooks that only offer images of certain ethnicities and exclude others, or materials that explicitly disseminate and reinforce negative stereotypes (apple & christian-smith, 2017), unless these are employed to encourage critical reflection. for instance, in monteiro v. the tempe union high school district (1998), a court did not uphold a request by parents to remove certain texts, including mark twain’s huckleberry finn, which used offensive terms to describe african americans, on the basis that these texts provide a significant opportunity to discuss and critique discriminatory attitudes. similarly, in spite of the requirement to promote respect for parents in article 29, educational curricula can also contain teachings and messages relevant to the promotion of tolerance, equality and children’s rights with which some parents disagree. the challenge then is to balance the rights of the child to an effective and fulfilling education with the views of the parents, as well as taking account of the child’s concerns and the general public interest (lundy, 2005). for instance, sometimes the child’s right to have certain information should outweigh the parents’ right to withdraw them from certain parts of the curriculum. this happened in the danish sex education case in 1976, in which the european court of human rights considered it appropriate for a state to have a system of compulsory sex education l.lundy & g. martínez sainz 11 that provided information critically, objectively and pluralistically to children, despite parents’ objections. complying with parents’ legitimate requests for exemptions from the curriculum presents a challenge for schools and educators and has the potential to constitute a breach of children’s rights, since the human rights option of choice, such as the withdrawal of the child from the lesson, has the risk of leaving children isolated and stigmatised (mawhinney, 2012). in a canadian case, t. v hamilton-wentworth district school board (2016), a greek orthodox parent wanted a child withdrawn from all lessons where there were ‘false teachings’ (identified as issues such as witchcraft and homosexuality). the court declined the request for withdrawal, observing that isolation was antithetical to the competing legislative mandate and values favouring inclusivity, equality and multiculturalism. it considered that the parents’ and child’s freedom of conscience should not take precedence over the other charter values raised by the case, including the school board’s duty of neutrality and equality, and the multicultural nature of canadian society (t. v hamilton-wentworth district school board (2016)). in other instances, particularly in countries that have state-funded faithbased education, a breach of children’s human rights will occur where the state is considered to be pursuing a form of indoctrination. however, the european court of human rights (in the case of dojan and others v germany, 2011) considered it legitimate for germany to have a compulsory schooling system ‘aimed at educating responsible and emancipated citizens capable of participating in the democratic processes of a pluralistic society – in particular, with a view to integrating minorities and avoiding the formation of religiously or ideologically motivated “parallel societies” ‘. likewise, in board of education, island trees union free school district no. 26 et al. v. pico (1982) a local board of education in the united states ordered that certain books, which it deemed ‘anti-american, anti-christian, anti-sem[i]tic, and just plain filthy,’ be removed from high school and junior high libraries. the court argued that students not only had a right to speak but also to access information, and the right to access information makes school libraries and access to materials in them important for realizing this right. testing and assessment in all actions concerning children, whether undertaken by public or private social welfare institutions, courts of law, administrative authorities or legislative bodies, the best interests of the child shall be a primary consideration (article 3, uncrc). tests and assessment have been largely neglected as a human rights issue, in spite of the fact that they have an important role to play in enabling learning (elwood and 2010). nevertheless, when they are asked, children do recognise their value and also the impact that tests and assessment have on their educational experience and overall well-being (elwood, 2012). breaches to children’s rights can occur at different levels: national policies on educational assessment; school policies and guidelines for testing and evaluating children’s learning; teachers’ practices, for example in setting. tomasevski (2006) has suggested that the challenge in many education systems is that testing systems do not always have the child’s best interests at their core: rather human rights education review – volume 1(2) 12 they can be used to select between children rather than for the purposes of assessing and recognising learning. she observes that: ‘the basic feature of every education system is that it selects the few who make it to the pinnacle of the education pyramid and excludes the many who start at the bottom but do [not] make it all the way up … failures are necessary because each step upwards the education pyramid accommodates fewer people. to avoid becoming a failure, small people whom we call children have to adapt to what is required of them to move up.’ tomasevski (2006, p. 103). the focus on tests as ways of selecting who gets to the next stage can have a distorting effect on the education provided and the children’s overall learning experience. so, while the problem in some countries is a lack of access to education and proper accreditation of learning, in others education has become so prized that children are put under exorbitant pressure to perform well in public examinations, often very high-stakes ones, with the result that the tests themselves both distort the curriculum and children’s thinking skills (berliner, 2011). schools are turned into ‘exam factories’, with adverse consequences for children’s mental health and access to leisure. the committee on the rights of the child has criticised countries where this is happening. for example, it has expressed concern that in japan, the ‘highly competitive school environment may contribute to bullying, mental disorders, truancy, drop-out and suicides among children of school-going age’ and recommended that the japanese government review its school and academic system with a view to combining academic excellence with a child-centred approach. (un, 2010, para. 71-72). secondly, tests should not discriminate against certain groups of children. tests and their assessment are vulnerable to direct and indirect discrimination, and we should be aware of this danger. teacher grading can be subject to bias, with research indicating that teachers may award lower scores to girls (elwood, 2005) and to children from certain ethnic backgrounds. the tests themselves can also be constructed in ways that discriminate indirectly. in the landmark case of dh v czech republic (2006) the european court of human rights found that seemingly objective ‘intelligence’ tests which were used to determine which children were allocated to special schools for children with learning disabilities, were culturally biased and discriminated against roma children. the effect of the tests was that 50 per cent of roma children attended special schools and 50 per cent of children in special schools were roma, even though the roma are a small proportion of the overall czech population. whether the problem lies with the test, the tester or both, the human rights imperative is to test in a way that does not unfairly discriminate against certain children. discipline (d) states parties shall take all appropriate measures to ensure that school discipline is administered in a manner consistent with the child's human dignity and in conformity with the present convention (article 28(1), uncrc). l.lundy & g. martínez sainz 13 school disciplinary policies have long been a source of contention. across the world, legislation and courts give schools and teachers authority to punish children for behaviour which their parents do not object to, and this inevitably generates resentment and conflict (global initiative to end all corporal punishment for children, 2017). one of the areas where human rights issues abound is in the area of school uniform policy, with cases often founded on arguments related to freedom of expression or religious freedom (lundy, 2005). there have been many claims of discrimination in relation to the wearing of religious symbols with some countries, such as france, taking a strictly secular approach and others, such as the uk, allowing students to wear religious dress and then finding themselves challenged about the boundaries and limitations of their approach (lundy, 2005). however, even states that have taken a secular approach need to find ways of accommodating freedom of conscience. in singh v. france (2012), the human rights committee found that the state had not provided compelling evidence that the wearing of the keski (a small turban) by a sikh pupil posed a threat to the rights and freedoms of other pupils. the committee also found that the permanent expulsion of mr. singh from public school was disproportionate to the stated aims, namely the need to respect the religious freedom and the physical safety of pupils in state schools. likewise, in sumayyah mohammed v. moraine and another (1995), the high court of trinidad and tobago found that the refusal to let a female pupil wear her jilbab was discriminatory and unreasonable. states are afforded a high degree of freedom as to their uniform policies. however, they have to show good reason to justify any restrictions on freedom of conscience or expression. the second area that leaves scope for human rights abuse is the nature of the actual punishment itself. education must also be provided in a way that respects the strict limits on discipline reflected in article 28 (2) and promotes non-violence in school. it is clear from a human rights perspective that schools should never use physical punishment and most countries have banned it in law. however, it is apparent that many continue to use it in practice (malak et. al., 2015; sawhney, 2018). the committee is absolutely clear that the use of corporal punishment does not respect the inherent dignity of the child. its list of things that a school should not do, because they are ‘invariably degrading’, is as follows: “smacking”, “slapping”, “spanking” children, with the hand or with an implement –a whip, stick, belt, shoe, wooden spoon, etc. … kicking, shaking or throwing children, scratching, pinching, biting, pulling hair or boxing ears, caning, forcing children to stay in uncomfortable positions, burning, scalding, or forced ingestion’. (un, 2008, para.24) corporal punishment is not the only type of punishment that can amount to a breach of children’s human rights in schools. for example, in the case of the chief executive officer for education v. gibbons (2013) a teacher in fiji ordered a 10-yearold boy to strip to his underwear in front of the class because he had been talking when asked to stay quiet. the court said: i further hold that the child felt shameful and that he was attacked physically and mentally. his dignity was interfered with. he felt how he felt because he realised that the treatment that he received was human rights education review – volume 1(2) 14 not at all proper but degrading. it is further inhumane to treat a child with an intention to embarrass the child. i hold that there was a breach of article 37(a) of the crc. (chief executive officer for education v. gibbons, 2013, para. 59) respect for children’s views states parties shall assure to the child who is capable of forming his or her own views the right to express those views freely in all matters affecting the child, the views of the child being given due weight in accordance with the age and maturity of the child. for this purpose, the child shall in particular be provided the opportunity to be heard in any judicial and administrative proceedings affecting the child, either directly, or through a representative or an appropriate body, in a manner consistent with the procedural rules of national law (article 12, uncrc). this article is one of the most cited and least understood of the provisions of the uncrc. its import is often lost in abbreviated formulations such as ‘the voice of the child’; such an expression fails to capture the full extent of the obligation. (lundy, 2007). it provides children with an additional right that adults do not have in human rights law the right to have their views given due weight. the right exists in recognition of the power imbalance between children and adult decision-makers and thus children’s restricted opportunities for self-determination. it is also a crucial provision, ‘the cornerstone’ of the convention (freeman, 2000). it makes possible the realisation of other rights; it is a ‘passport’ to the realisation of those rights. if we ignore children’s views on their education, we undermine the more general realisation of their rights in school (lundy, 2007; osler, 2010). in much of the related educational research, the focus is on collective participation in decision-making and, in particular, the role and value of school councils. while there are many genuine attempts to create spaces for democratic participation in schools, research indicates that these fora are not always representative (wyness, 2009) and that children are frustrated when the school council is just a small number of students discussing a restricted set of issues and nothing is changed (alderson, 2000). lewars has observed the consequences of a tokenistic student voice: '… disaffected, cynical students; ineffectual processes; and a genuine lack of many of the potential benefits of successful participation’ (2009, 271). children’s right to participate in decision-making that affects them as individuals receives much less attention, in spite of its arguably greater significance (cantwell, 2011). every day, decisions are made for children without their input – they are excluded and ignored in clear breach of their international human rights (harris, 2009). children with disabilities experience a double disadvantage here, in spite of an extended version of the right to be heard one that omits any reference to capacity, as set out in the un convention on the rights of persons with disabilities (byrne, 2012). the decisions from which children are excluded are many and various. they include decisions about the school they get to attend, the subjects they study, the examinations they sit, the special educational provision they receive and the disciplinary measures to which they are subjected. the latter two are particularly significant in the light of the often-neglected second paragraph of article 12 (i.e. the l.lundy & g. martínez sainz 15 child’s right to be heard in judicial and administrative proceedings). moreover, even when the most crucial decisions about their education are being taken (e.g. expulsion), children can be denied an independent right to be heard until they are 18 and thus no longer children (harris, 2009). schools and educational administrators continue to deny children an opportunity to be heard and to influence these crucial decisions, a fact that strikes at the heart of a rights-respecting education (lundy et. al., 2016). the role of law and legal knowledge the discourse around children’s rights is often a rosy one, focused on positive images of protecting children from harm, enabling their development and empowering them. sloth nielsen (1996) has described this as a ‘chicken-soup’ approach to children’s rights, suggesting that children’s rights are commonly presented as uncontentious while, in reality, just like other human rights, they are sources of conflict and tension. this approach to children’s rights is found in several hre models and programmes, including the world programme for human rights education (2005-ongoing), to which 51 countries now subscribe. in this programme, the emphasis is placed on children learning human rights not only from content transmission but also from experience: it is stated that hr should be ‘practised at all levels of the school system’ (para. 16) through the curriculum, educational process, pedagogical methods and learning environments. yet, the capacity to identify and handle human rights abuses in schools is given less attention within hre curricula than the development of knowledge of the principles of universality, indivisibility, and interdependence or the theories underlying hre. furthermore, the knowledge of legal mechanisms proposed does not take into consideration or address as a relevant starting point the reality of human rights breaches and violations, in general, and those affecting children within schools, in particular (un, 2005). the ‘chicken-soup’ approach to children’s rights is not only present in programmes and policies, but also in the implementation process and widespread hre practices. human rights educators working with children may emphasise the ethical and moral aspects of children’s rights over the legal components, presenting these rights as ‘ethical values’ or a ‘lifestyle’, rather than legal entitlements that should have concrete legal consequences. in fact, despite the existence of legally binding instruments, such as the uncrc, it is common for educators to present rights as something ‘much more than a law’ (hammond, 2016; karaman kepenekci, 2005; martínez sainz, 2018a). however, adherence to a body of safe human rights ‘values’ can dissipate as soon as it emerges that children’s rights clash with the rights of others (such as their parents) or cost money or promote their self-autonomy (lundy, 2007). yet, it is a reality that such clashes and breaches are both the raison d’etre and the undeniable messy reality of human rights. certainly, international human rights standards are intended to promote positive approaches to the treatment of children – these childcentred definitions emphasise respect, dignity, equality and tolerance. equally, and arguably more importantly, they exist to expose breaches of those standards and to enable states to be held to account for their actions. human rights standards define the limits of tolerable behaviour by the government and its agents towards citizens (including children) but in doing so, expose the intolerable and unacceptable (shue, 2006). human rights education review – volume 1(2) 16 the committee and others emphasise the learning that comes from seeing human rights valued and embodied in the children’s lived experiences in schools: ‘children should also learn about human rights by seeing human rights standards implemented in practice, whether at home, in school, or within the community. human rights education should be a comprehensive, life-long process, and start with the reflection of human rights values in the daily life and experiences of children’ (un, 2001, para 15). however, as discussed above, many children’s school lives do not provide them with a real opportunity to witness these values and, indeed, the ideal of the so-called 3 ‘ps’ of children’s rights – provision, protection, participation (for a critique of these, see quennerstedt, 2010). their ‘lived experiences’ of injustice, exclusion or discrimination should not be disregarded as less valuable for the overall purpose of learning about their rights. on the contrary, these should be addressed as key opportunities for children to develop the legal knowledge required to identify, handle, and act on violations and breaches of their rights within and beyond school. rather than enjoying educational provision, many children are excluded unjustly, often on the basis of their gender, race, and disability or just by virtue of being poor. rather than providing protection, for many children school is a place where they are beaten, abused, bullied or attacked. and instead of participating, children are often ignored, silenced, censored and restricted. thus, if we are to fully understand what an education that respects human rights is and how hre can effectively ‘promote the inclusion and practice of human rights in the primary and secondary school systems’ (un, 2005, para. 21), we need to engage with the dark side of human rights breaches as well as the positive, aspirational vision that a human rights framework offers. the most egregious breaches of children’s rights in education receive steady attention, since they are often the focus of successful funding campaigns by international charities attempting to deliver education in the context of war, forced migration and extreme poverty. however, in schools more generally, it appears less acceptable to identify and label injustices and inequities as breaches of children’s human rights. the reason why there is such discomfort here merits further research but it is undoubtedly connected, at least in part, to concerns about teacher authority and the perceived risks of empowering schoolchildren (howe and covell, 2005; lundy, 2007; struthers, 2016). rather, it seems that safer, positive concepts such as democracy, tolerance, and respect for diversity are the acceptable face of human rights in many instances. yet, part of the significance of hre is precisely that it takes into consideration challenges and barriers for the enjoyment of rights as well as the empowerment –through knowledge and skills– to exercise them. human rights law and legal knowledge is essential for such empowerment and for the fulfilment of one of the main aims of hre, stated in the united nations declaration on human rights education and training (2012): to contribute ‘to the prevention of human rights violations and abuses and to the combating and eradication of all forms of discrimination, racism, stereotyping and incitement to hatred, and the harmful attitudes and prejudices that underlie them’ (article 4, un, 2012). legal literacy for a transformative hre a key distinction of transformative hre, in comparison with other approaches to teaching and learning about, through and for rights, is that it ‘exposes learners to gaps between rights and actual realities, and provokes group dialogue on the concrete actions necessary to close these gaps’ (bajaj et al, 2016). the aim is to bring l.lundy & g. martínez sainz 17 rights to life, address their violations and foster their protection and promotion through individual and collective action. thus, the legal knowledge required to achieve this aim goes beyond an awareness of the local and international instruments of human rights. a truly transformative hre approach requires a legal literacy from individuals and communities, so that they are capable of understanding the law and its relevant instruments, as well as the possible legal pathways to take. only legallyliterate individuals and communities will have the capacity to transform breaches and violations of rights – including children’s rights in education – into actionable principles for their protection. legal knowledge has a transformative power within hre, not only as a first step to reach further levels of commitment and engagement towards rights, but as a transversal element. thus, in these inaugural issues of the human rights education review, it is worth asking why legal literacy is often disregarded within hre. taking into consideration the many and various breaches of children’s rights within schools outlined earlier, legal literacy for children should be considered an essential and central element for an effective and transformative implementation of hre. injustice, discrimination and exclusion are already part of children’s lived experiences; thus, rather than neglecting the breaches of children’s rights, hre should use them as learning opportunities to teach children about law. children must become legally literate and develop the legal knowledge and skills necessary to identify breaches of rights, recognise them as such and, where appropriate, seek legal means to enforce them. we would respectfully suggest that there is still a chasm of understanding between legal scholarship and hre – one that needs to be bridged if we are to advance theory and practice in both. on the one hand, there seems to be a lack of discussion of the legal scholarship and jurisprudence of children’s rights within hre literature –both theoretical and empirical studies. some leading hre scholars have acknowledged the significant value of law as ‘part of the struggle for justice’ dismissing the suggestion that legal approaches are unhelpful or a ‘diversion’ (osler, 2010, p. 121), or stated that ‘international standards such as the udhr provide ‘a language for naming discriminations and abuses of human dignity’ (starkey, 2010, p. 39). however, even transformative models for hre (bajaj et al, 2016; tibbitts, 2017) do not always credit the law, legally binding instruments such as the uncrc, and legal literacy as necessary conditions for the transformative, emancipatory and critical learning required for the prevention and elimination of human rights violations. on the other hand, few academic human rights lawyers research hre (for exceptions see the work of struthers (2016) and coysh (2017)). for legal scholars, a major focus of study is whether human rights, particularly social and economic rights such as education, have been effectively translated into domestic law and rendered justiciable (e.g. whelan and donnelly, 2007) or how education rights are being implemented in practice (e.g. lundy, 2012). those who study or promote hre have a range of choices; they can situate their understanding of human rights in a broader field of moral or political philosophy or they can focus on international human rights law or, indeed, they can draw on both. however, if international human rights law is in the mix (as it usually is), then human rights educators and scholars need to engage with it. legal literacy becomes necessary not only for children but also for educators, academics and practitioners in order to understand, accurately refer to and use legal instruments. such literacy will also enable them to distinguish between important human rights human rights education review – volume 1(2) 18 facts including, for example, the difference between the incorporation of rights in law and their implementation in practice. legally literate hre would also promote awareness of a primary purpose of these international standards, which is to achieve state accountability for the way governments treat their citizens and to enable rights-holders, including children, to claim their rights and use the legal standards, where appropriate, as a basis to seek redress for wrongs. it is widely accepted that it is insufficient to teach children to memorise a set of articles in an international treaty. however, hre that concentrates on learning about values such as democracy, tolerance and equality while leaving rights-holders unable to identify a breach of their own rights and when and how to challenge instances when the state’s actions fall short of its legal commitments is, frankly, equally unacceptable. the importance of acknowledging children’s lived experiences – including breaches of their rights – in hre practice has been demonstrated (martínez sainz, 2018b). however narratives of injustice, discrimination and exclusion only get you so far in securing children’s rights; these narratives highlight and identify the problem but do not necessarily mean that children can identify an actual violation of their rights, let alone know what legal actions they can take to secure them. children have a right to know what their schools and others should not be doing to them, as well as what they should, and human rights education is one place to help to ensure that this occurs. in summary, we suggest that informing and enabling children to challenge breaches of their rights in schools should be an essential part of a transformative human rights education. yet, we acknowledge that a major part of the reason why it occurs so infrequently in practice is connected to a legitimate fear that this will be disruptive to education itself. in this sense, the implications of emphasising the potential of law for addressing human rights violations are not neutral; on the contrary, the approach is radical and will inevitably entail some degree of risk, even to the very rights for which children are attempting to seek redress. however, that is arguably the point giving children the legal knowledge and tools to address breaches and violations of their rights wherever they arise is not just a right itself but a seemingly undervalued way of educating them in human rights for transformation. conclusion martin luther king famously said that, in the struggle for justice, it is not law or education, it is law and education. so too in relation to hre. we need to ‘harness both the normative and enforcing capacity of law and the persuasive potential of education’ (mcevoy and lundy (2007), 513). human rights educators, practitioners, and scholars often point out that there can be no enjoyment of rights without rightsholders having knowledge of them. in a similar vein, one of the first things that lawyers learn is the principle ‘ubi jus ibi remedium’ (‘for every wrong, the law provides a remedy’ or, sometimes, ‘no rights without redress’). lawyers, both academics and practitioners, are trained to look for injustices and to call on agreed bodies of norms to understand where these occur and how to base their claims for justice and change. the gaze of the lawyer and the legal academic is mainly on the negative – when things go wrong. yet children are taught about human rights without necessarily learning what counts as a breach of those rights in the very context in which they are learning. they may be acquiring important knowledge, skills and values that they can use to attempt to effect change in their own lives and lives of others, but it can be questioned whether an education that does that without l.lundy & g. martínez sainz 19 equipping them with precise legal knowledge that enables them to identify and challenge violations truly counts as hre. in any event, their human rights learning is undoubtedly impoverished. until recently, unicef published a popular guide to the uncrc called ‘the little book of rights and responsibilities’. the booklet implied that the enjoyment of certain rights was contingent upon children behaving in certain ways and was thus problematic from a human rights legal perspective. however, echoes of this type of misunderstanding of the nature of human rights persist (howe and covell, 2010). a good replacement would be a book called the ‘little book of rights, wrongs and what to do about them’. this would, for example, tell children that they have a right to be safe in school –and certainly a responsibility to respect the rights of others– but that they have the capacity to do something when it does not happen. it would point out that this means that they should not be beaten, bullied or humiliated by their teachers or classmates and, if this were to happen, what they could do in order to make sure it stops. that would be a truly transformative hre, capable of preventing human rights violations and eradicating all forms of discrimination and empowering individuals and communities at once. an increased focus on legal literacy for children so they can effectively learn what counts as a human rights wrong would be timely. the un committee on the rights of the child has chosen to focus on the topic of child human rights defenders in its 2018 day of general discussion . human rights defenders are currently a major focus of interest in the international human rights community; and enabling and protecting them is a pressing issue in a global context of shrinking democratic space (orr et. al., 2016). however, children are rarely referred to as human rights defenders or even activists. instead, the lexicon is dominated by references to civic engagement and action. this may do children a disservice. children are human rights-holders, human rights victims and human rights defenders, with malala yousafzai as an exceptional yet by no means unique example. right across the globe, children are observing and experiencing manifest injustices in their own lives and the lives of others in schools and elsewhere and are working, often in some danger, for change (orr et. al., 2016). if human rights and hre are to be effective, rightsholders, including children, must be enabled in schools and through their lived experiences in formal education to see, classify and respond to violations for what they are – breaches of their legally guaranteed international human rights. human rights education review – volume 1(2) 20 notes __________________________ 1 note that the united states has failed to ratify the un convention on the rights of the child, despite signing it in 1995. l.lundy & g. martínez sainz 21 references apple, m., & christian-smith, l. 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(2005). plan of action for the first phase (2005-2009) of the world programme for human rights education. (new york, united nations). verhellen, e. (1993). children's rights and education: a three-track legally binding imperative. school psychology international, 14(3), 199-208. https://doi.org/10.1177/0143034393143002 west, a. (2006). school choice, equity and social justice: the case for more control. british journal of educational studies, 54(1), 15-33. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8527.2006.00334.x whelan, daniel j., and jack donnelly, (2007). "the west, economic and social rights, and the global human rights regime: setting the record straight." human rights quarterly: 908-949. https://doi.org/10.1353/hrq.2007.0050 wyness, m. (2009). children representing children: participation and the problem of diversity in uk youth councils. childhood, 16(4), 535-552. https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568209344274 https://doi.org/10.1080/19452829.2014.880673 https://doi.org/10.1177/0143034393143002 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8527.2006.00334.x https://doi.org/10.1353/hrq.2007.0050 https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568209344274 volume 3, no 2 (2020) date received: 27-03-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3804 date accepted: 12-10-2020 issn 2535-5406 the challenges of teaching for human rights in nigeria: knowledge, pedagogy and activism adaobiagu obiagu university of nigeria, nigeria. okechukwu nwaubani university of nigeria, nigeria. abstract: human rights promotion continues to elude nigeria, despite the many human rights instruments ratified and the various human rights initiatives taken. the key question behind this paper is: why is human rights behaviour poor and human rights violations high despite numerous measures to address these issues? to examine this, the study investigates teachers’ awareness of curriculum contents and pedagogies for cultivating human rights, drawing on a survey of 170 social studies teachers in enugu state. we find challenges to teaching for human rights, including teachers’ poor knowledge of human rights content; a lack of awareness of human rights pedagogies; a reluctance to engage in activism; and little engagement with participatory pedagogies. we explain these challenges with reference to conservative teacher education, entrenched patriarchal values, a strong nationalistic-oriented curriculum, and authoritarian school structures. we recommend transforming nigerian social studies teacher education programmes and policies to enable social justice and human rights. keywords: human rights, human rights education, social studies education, curriculum, teacher education, nigeria corresponding author: adaobiagu obiagu: adaobiagu.obiagu@unn.edu.ng http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3804 mailto:adaobiagu.obiagu@unn.edu.ng a.obiagu & o.nwaubani 6 the challenges of teaching for human rights in nigeria: knowledge, pedagogy and activism doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3804 issn 2535-5406 adaobiagu obiagu university of nigeria, nigeria. adaobiagu.obiagu@unn.edu.ng okechukwu nwaubani university of nigeria, nigeria. abstract: human rights promotion continues to elude nigeria, despite the many human rights instruments ratified and the various human rights initiatives taken. the key question behind this paper is: why is human rights behaviour poor and human rights violations high despite numerous measures to address these issues? to examine this, the study investigates teachers’ awareness of curriculum contents and pedagogies for cultivating human rights, drawing on a survey of 170 social studies teachers in enugu state. we find challenges to teaching for human rights, including teachers’ poor knowledge of human rights content; a lack of awareness of human rights pedagogies; a reluctance to engage in activism; and little engagement with participatory pedagogies. we explain these challenges with reference to conservative teacher education, entrenched patriarchal values, a strong nationalistic-oriented curriculum, and authoritarian school structures. we recommend transforming nigerian social studies teacher education programmes and policies to enable social justice and human rights. keywords: human rights, human rights education, social studies education, curriculum, teacher education, nigeria introduction human rights are basic human entitlements founded on the dignity of human persons and the inherent human right to life and freedoms. these rights (not necessarily guaranteed in the extant laws of a state) do not infringe on the rights of others or national or global security, broadly defined. human rights are also ‘derived from human struggles’ for justice (osler, 2015). nigeria, an ethnically diverse emerging democratic nation, has ratified many international human rights instruments, developed agencies for the protection of human rights, and introduced many of these rights provisions into domestic law. nevertheless, there remain huge inconsistencies between the everyday lived realities of most citizens and their formal rights entitlements. in nigeria, and across sub-saharan african countries, the degree of human rights abuses and violations is alarming, with some groups being particularly affected (onwuazombe, 2017). existing data show that nigeria’s human rights record is regressive (national human rights commission, 2016, pp. 119-139). post-war and post-military-rule nigeria is replete with varying forms of human rights violations resulting from internal conflicts, direct violence and terrorism (campbell, 2018); structural violence, mailto:adaobiagu.obiagu@unn.edu.ng human rights education review volume 3(2) 7 including an unjust patriarchal culture; unjust eviction of people from their homes; unlawful killings and violations of citizens’ rights by government security agents; and government engagement in and toleration of violations of religious freedom and terrorism (amnesty international, 2018; united states commission on international religious freedom, 2020; akinkuotu, aluko, & oyewale, 2020). furthermore, rights are undermined by interpersonal violence underpinned by structural violence such as criminality, child labour and domestic violence (nnadi, 2012). notably, people from low socioeconomic backgrounds suffer more injustice and human rights violations. for example, poor people in africa are twice as likely to be extorted than their rich counterparts (transparency international, 2019) and children from rich homes are more likely to complete secondary education (unesco, 2020). however, human rights activism is low in nigeria, due to repression from authoritarian governments, which has caused citizens to retreat from protesting human rights violations (obiagu & ajaps, 2019). long-term experience of and resiliency to human rights violations in nigeria has made it difficult for citizens to even recognise them as inhumane. given the inadequacy of domestic human rights laws, a human rights education (hre) model, grounded on the universal declaration of human rights (un, 1948), has been introduced in nigeria to promote pro-human rights behaviours. hre, according to the united nations (2011) in the declaration of human rights education and training (undhret), is: all educational training, information, awareness-raising and learning activities aimed at promoting universal respect for and observation of all human rights and fundamental freedoms and thus contributing inter alia to the prevention of human rights violations and abuses by providing persons with knowledge, skills and understanding and developing their attitudes and behaviours, to empower them to contribution to the building and promotion of a universal culture for human rights [emphasis added]. (un, 2011, article 2(1)) article 2(2) of undhret, notes three components of hre: education about (political, civil, socioeconomic and cultural) rights, through rights, and for rights. education about human rights involves ‘providing knowledge and understanding of human rights norms and principles, the values for their promotion, and the mechanism for their protection’; education through human rights includes ‘learning and teaching in a way that respects the rights of both educators and learners’; and education for human rights includes ‘empowering persons to enjoy and exercise their rights and to respect and uphold the rights of others’ (un, 2011). as discussed below, the human rights content of various school subjects in nigeria covers some of the topics anticipated to promote the realisation of these undhret goals. despite this, students-just like some adults–exhibit anti-social behaviours, such as bullying, which are against human rights norms, (olumide, adams, & amodu, 2016). why then is human rights behaviour poor and human rights violations high despite the number of human rights instruments and the presence of human rights education available in the country? based on an assumption that the problem is partly due to the implementation of the human rights curriculum and the ways in which schools model or fail to model these rights, we composed an 18-item questionnaire on instructional readiness for hre implementation. our respondents were 170 teachers engaged in a.obiagu & o.nwaubani 8 teaching social studies, since some human rights content is infused into social studies. based on our findings, we make suggestions for effective human rights education in nigeria. in the next section, we present the nature, purpose and contents of hre in nigeria. human rights education in nigeria in nigeria, hre is limited and it is not a discrete subject. human rights issues are to be found scattered across subjects such as social studies, civic education, government, health education, christian religious studies, islamic studies, and english language teaching, at different levels of the education system. this is a consequence of the interdisciplinary nature of human rights and the situation is not dissimilar from that in other countries (see for example, parker, 2018). our focus is on hre at pre-higher education level. the introduction of hre can be linked to the introduction of a senior secondary social studies programme (that was never implemented) and an elective subject, government. these were developed post-1969, following the restructuring of nigeria’s education system to a 6-3-3-4 education system1 (nigerian educational and research development council [nerdc], 1985) on the recommendations of the 1969 national curriculum conference (ncc). the recommendations were geared towards restructuring and decolonising education (fafunwa, 1995). with nigeria’s restructuring of its educational system in 2000, to a 9-3-4 system2, following the review and re-adoption of the unesco education for all initiative, school curricula were reviewed and new subjects introduced with contents that reflect the millennium development goals (mdgs) (federal republic of nigeria, 2014; nerdc, 2018a, 2018b). these contents, rooted in human rights principles, became part of compulsory education. this marked the establishment of compulsory hre (mainly in social studies and civic education curricula) in nigeria, an initiative that extends the curriculum beyond the original emphasis on civic responsibilities to incorporate the concept of human rights. purpose the purpose of hre in nigeria is rooted in key educational goals reflected in various recommendations of the 1969 nigerian national curriculum as reported by adaralegbe (1972, recommendations 3, 4, 7, 18, 48). these goals promote selfrealisation, better human relationships, national values, effective citizenship, civic responsibility, social and political awakening, and privileges and responsibilities. these goals, especially self-realisation, national values, national consciousness and national unity, are reiterated in different national policy on education (npe) statements (federal republic of nigeria, 2014). these purposes of hre reflect some of the hre goals highlighted in undhret and represented as hre for values or for co-existence focused on interpersonal and intergroup relationships (bajaj, 2011, p. 498-490). even though education is also seen as an instrument for social change and the realisation of a free, democratic, just and egalitarian society (federal republic of nigeria, 2014), national consciousness, values and unity are given greater emphasis in the npe and in social education curricula. yet, as osler (2015) notes, proclaiming national values and human rights as one and the same thing could lead to a process of othering. however, the colonial legacy, the legacy of the 1967-1970 nigerian civil war, and ongoing post-independence ethnic divisions are reasons why nigerian education gives such emphasis to national unity, national values, and national consciousness. this is largely because grievances arising from the civil war have not human rights education review volume 3(2) 9 been addressed (most post-war nations engaged in peace and reconciliation activities that deal with emotional scars and grievances) but live on in the psyche of many nigerians. this emphasis is intended to promote value re-orientation, poverty eradication, human rights, and peace and dialogue (nerdc, 2018a, 2018b) among culturally diverse nigerians, and create an enabling environment for human rights promotion and self-realisation. contents the above purposes are reflected in the human rights themes and content emphasised in nigeria. these include more direct human rights principles (expressed in universal and/or national terms) that have been introduced into civic education and social studies curricula since 2007: rights and duties of citizens, the rule of law, the constitution, democracy, pillars of democracy, protection of rights, the rule of law, supremacy of the constitution, separation of powers, and so on. (nerdc, 2018a, 2018b). systemic human rights issues such as social injustice, gender discrimination, harmful traditional practices (female genital rituals and widowhood practices), electoral malpractice, social conflict, ethnocentrism, poverty, hiv/aids, and human trafficking have been included in social studies curricula since 2007 (nerdc, 2018a, 2018b). surprisingly, child labour and abuse are missing from the pre-higher school curriculum, despite such practices having been prohibited in nigerian law. this could be due to a fear of causing tensions at home between elders and children since these practices are rampant and frequently seen as necessary to child-rearing. values that underpin human rights, such as respect, kindness, honesty, tolerance, discipline, courage, cooperation, contentment, integrity, unity, and justice, are mainly covered in the civic education curriculum while mechanisms for protecting human rights (such as peaceful co-existence, conflict management and resolution, understanding culture and cultural diversity, unity in diversity) are mainly covered in the social studies curriculum. in some cases, these contents are repeated in the two subjects (see nerdc, 2018a, 2018b). hre that empowers learners to claim their rights in the context of deeply rooted inequalities and human rights violations (osler & yahya, 2013), protect human rights, and take action against systemic injustice is also contained in senior classes’ civics and government curricula where issues relating to pressure groups, strikes, udhr advocacy via both online and offline platforms, and petitions are taught. obviously, these topics are focused on nigeria’s peculiarities and needs. they consider and incorporate nigeria's cultural differences, although there is a focus on the dominant cultures. they also take into account learners’ ages and educational stages. however, the contents are not chronologically organised so that one piece of knowledge precedes or connects with others. this appears to be is a problem in the hre curricula of virtually all countries (parker, 2018). however, using these contents to realise the goals of hre in nigeria and those defined in undhret requires that human rights educators master criteria and content for the effective teaching of human rights. what are the criteria for effective hre implementation? in this section, drawing on propositions in extant hre literature, we highlight four criteria necessary for the effective practice of hre and realisation of its goals. these four criteria are: knowledge of human rights and hre purpose and content; a.obiagu & o.nwaubani 10 understanding and experience of human rights issues; familiarity with hre pedagogical debates, including hre evaluation techniques; and commitment to a caring ethics and relationships. adoption of these criteria, although here associated with the pre-higher education curriculum, applies to hre in general. these criteria are individually discussed below. knowledge of human rights studies in scotland and ireland show that teachers have an insufficient knowledge of human rights instruments and protection mechanisms (e.g. bemis, 2013; waldron et al., 2011), and that teachers and educators have a limited knowledge and understanding of the united nations world programme for human rights education (e.g. bemis, 2013). knowledge (content) is indispensable in classroom teaching (deng, 2018), while an identification with the purpose of schooling is important for effective practice. given the criticality of knowledge and a sense of educational purpose in promoting the effective teaching of hre, the teacher does not just need to know about human rights. s/he must be aware of the purpose of hre and ‘critiques’, as suggested by keet (2015). teachers should also be familiar with human rights instruments and institutions. additionally, a sound knowledge of children’s rights in education is needed. this includes a respect for children’s views, non-discriminatory curriculum contents, and human rights-based and non-violent school disciplinary policies and measures (lundy & martínez sainz, 2018). a knowledge of human rights (including human rights instruments and laws), human rights critiques (for example, eurocentric, hegemonic, abolitionist), and the purpose of hre can help the teacher in discarding discriminatory and authoritarian beliefs and adopting an inclusive, transformative and critical practice. relating this to the human rights contents of social studies, the teacher’s unbiased understanding of why some ‘cultural practices’ or ‘traditions’ such as female genital mutilation and widowhood practices are classified as barbaric or repugnant to natural justice might be discussed (for example, are they opposed on eurocentric or humanist grounds). opportunities to consider such questions might then inform teachers’ approaches to such topics. understanding and experience of human rights issues teaching about, through and for human rights requires knowledge of (and deep reflection on) general and peculiar rights issues that might bedevil a locality, nation, region or the world (for example, extra-judicial killings, child labour, gender-based violence, racism). knowledge and deep reflection about direct or indirect lived experience of human rights issues/violations through observing and working to liberate victims is necessary if a powerful hre is to be implemented. teachers’ knowledge of human rights issues in educational contexts (for example, discriminatory enrolment, curriculum and pedagogy, a culture of violence and silencing, corporal punishment) is crucial. this is because ‘hre locates itself within struggles [for rights and against injustice and tyranny], beginning with the personal but often linking up to wider social change processes’ (tibbitts, 2018, p. 68). this is supported by findings that show rights activists draw their motivations from their individual or family experiences of human rights issues (hall, 2019), and that ‘those with more experience of participating in social movements may well teach in more democratic ways and consider a wider variety of actors and acts within their consideration of active citizenship and action for human rights’ (jerome, 2018, p. 57). human rights education review volume 3(2) 11 knowledge of this criterion is particularly important given that the context within which hre is practiced is crucial to realising human rights goals: a culture of human rights must be present and promoted in the hre environment (osler & yahya, 2013). this could also create a greater appreciation of the pains and hopes involved in human rights issues and develop a reflective empathy. familiarity with hre pedagogy and pedagogical debates parker (2018, p. 12) has observed the need for hre epistemological theory (what is meant by human rights knowledge) and pedagogical theory (how to organise that knowledge for learning) that take into consideration learners’ ages and stages. debates on what pedagogies should be employed for hre suggest that a number of practices are imperative: transformational or emancipatory pedagogy (bajaj, 2011); the critical and reparative hermeneutical approach (al-daraweesh & snauwaert, 2013; bajaj, 2011; zembylas et al., 2017); and narrative approaches (osler, 2015; osler & zhu, 2011). drawing on freire’s (1974) theory of critical pedagogy, which assumes the purpose of education to be the development of critical consciousness, a critical hre pedagogy empowers learners to respect, protect and promote rights, and to resist and combat inequalities and other factors that fuel human rights abuses. similarly, a transformational approach assumes that the learner has had personal experiences of human rights violations and thus could be more motivated to promote human rights (tibbitts, 2018). the critical hermeneutical approach is particularly useful in addressing contradictions between universal and local human rights values and practices (zembylas et al., 2017; al-daraweesh & snauwaert, 2013). these pedagogies are seen as indispensable in implementing education for human rights. developing a critical pedagogy is, however, a challenging process for educators since they are required to confront the nature, limits and scope of human rights while persuading learners of their importance and significance (martínez sainz, 2018). for effective hre, teachers need to understand this range of pedagogies. this is important because of the emotional sensitivities of some topics and the possible change in power dynamics and conflicts or tensions within the classroom, school, family and wider society that can result from the critical empowerment of learners. effectively, there are structural and institutional constraints (zembylas et al., 2017; martínez sainz, 2018). hre pedagogical knowledge also includes knowledge of hre evaluative methods, such as moral dilemma questions and projective test methods. these evaluation techniques involve creating stories (and reaching a judgement) about an assumed or real character (lilienfeld, wood, & garb, 2000). such an activity, where learners create stories about human rights issues or critique characters in stories of human rights violations, can reveal their human rights dispositions. knowledge of these dispositions will equip teachers with insights on how to strategise or devise classroom practices that can overcome the general problem of hre curricula and textbooks, namely an over-emphasis on knowledge and a neglect of human rights dispositions and behaviours (osler & yahya, 2013), and resolve students’ conflicting perspectives on human rights. commitment to a caring ethics understanding human rights and human rights issues is not enough: knowledge of the issues has to be combined with the practice of care. noddings (1995) has outlined three aspects of care: caring for self; caring for intimate others; and caring for strangers and global others. she advocates that curricula are selected with caring in a.obiagu & o.nwaubani 12 mind, as this can contribute to creating more caring children. a close analysis of the subtopics of the broader theme of values in the human rights contents of the nigerian curriculum reveals the theme of care. caring relations involve a dialogic relationship between the carer (teacher) and cared-for (student), whereby the carer places a greater emphasis on the expressed needs of the cared-for. these needs are deduced from their thoughts, ideas, questions, and responses (noddings, 1995, 2012). caring fits well with democratic practices in the classroom: giving every child equal treatment, considering their unique needs, strengths and weaknesses; providing learners with opportunities to participate in human rights in a way that emphasises cooperation and empathy across age ranges and between grades; and tolerating and empowering learners’ views and dissenting voices (noddings, 2005; collins, hess, & lowery, 2019). importantly, consciousness of sociocultural orientations, such as patriarchy and fanaticism, and how these might undermine caring, is critical to the assimilation of human rights principles. study context to our knowledge, no previous research has explored hre in nigeria, especially the challenges to its implementation at various levels. ifegbesan, lawal, and rampedi (2017) have analysed the nigerian college of education social studies curriculum in order to locate how it promotes the sustainable development goals, which are founded on human rights principles. they conclude that such contents are limited. however, it is important to understand teachers’ readiness in implementing the human rights content of the curriculum. given the high rate of human rights violations in nigeria, including enugu state, the specific context of this study, (where child abuse, hate speech, gender violence, violent attacks on religious leaders, unemployment, and so on, are widespread, and where corruption and favouritism deny citizens’ access to public goods and an adequate standard of living), our survey sets out to explore the level of readiness of teachers to implement hre. the teachers investigated teach social studies at primary and secondary school levels: sometimes a teacher may teach both social studies and civic education or combine the teaching of the subjects in the students’ timetable. we hypothesise that the preparedness of teachers to teach for human rights is low and is dependent on their educational qualifications. the study specifically addresses the following questions. 1. how aware are teachers of the contents and purpose of hre in the pre-higher education social studies curricula? 2. how aware are teachers of the pedagogical arguments surrounding the teaching of hre? 3. what instructional methods are employed by teachers in teaching human rights issues in pre-higher education? 4. what are the challenges to teachers’ employing participatory methods? methods we developed a structured questionnaire. unsolicited comments, responses beyond the items contained in the questionnaire, were also registered. seven teachers wrote on empty spaces on the questionnaire, while 17 teachers orally stated their reasons for not employing participatory methods in hre. human rights education review volume 3(2) 13 participants the participants were a random sample of 170 teachers (137 females), teaching social studies at the basic education level (see note ii) in enugu state, nigeria. the educational qualifications of these teachers were taken into account (see table 1 for participants’ profiles). fifty-seven participants (33.5%) did not have an education degree while 113 of them (66.5%) held an education qualification in education disciplines, especially arts education, social science education (including social studies education) or foundational education programmes. table 1: profile of study participants (n = 170) frequency female male total teaching level primary 100 19 119 junior secondary 37 14 51 total 137 33 170 education qualification (highest level) national certificate in education (nce) 10 3 13 bachelor of education (b.ed.) 58 5 63 b.ed. equivalent* 34 19 53 post-graduate diploma in education (pgde) 28 2 30 master in education (m.ed.) 5 2 7 m.ed. equivalent* 2 2 4 phd 0 0 total 137 33 170 note: ‘equivalent’ means non-educational degrees. measurement an 18-item questionnaire developed by the researchers and entitled ‘questionnaire on teachers’ instructional readiness for effective implementation of human rights education contents in social studies’ was used. this had three subscales (awareness of the content and purpose of hre; awareness of hre pedagogical debate; and methodology employed by teachers in teaching hre). the first cluster of the questionnaire, ‘awareness of the content and purpose of hre’ (five items), was measured on a 4-point scale (sastrongly agree = 4, a –agree = 3, d –disagree = 2, sd –strongly disagree = 1). the other two clusters, ‘awareness of hre pedagogical debate’ (six items) and ‘methodology employed by teachers in teaching hre’ (seven items), were respectively measured by dichotomous items of aware/unaware and yes/no answers. for reliable and valid results, a dichotomous response option was considered best for the last two clusters, since the respondents were considered reasonably professional in their field (krosnick & presser, 2010). the instrument was validated by three experts and trial tested on 27 social studies teachers. reliability was measured using cronbach alpha, which yielded an alpha of 0.8. this indicated a high level of internal consistency in the questionnaire items and, thus, an acceptable level of internal reliability (field, 2013). a.obiagu & o.nwaubani 14 data collection and analysis participants completed the questionnaire on one occasion. data was collected by the first author, within two weeks, after seeking and obtaining the consent of 23 (11 primary and 12 secondary) school authorities (vice principal/headperson of each school) and that of the participants. descriptive analysis of participants’ responses was performed by applying simple percentage, mean and standard deviation. the overall mean score of each item in the first cluster is 4 and a mean score less than 2.5 was marked low, while a mean score of 2.5 and above was high. for the last two clusters, scored dichotomously, percentage scores of the participants on all items of each cluster were gathered. a score below 50% was rated low and a score of 50% and above rated high. for variance analysis (hypothesis testing), the average scores of participants on the items for each tested variable (content/purpose awareness, pedagogical debate awareness, and methods employment) were used. the kruskalwallis h test was used to determine if statistical significant differences exist between groups with different levels of education. thematic analysis was used to analyse the unsolicited responses and generate codes and themes from it. findings table 2: mean and sd statistics of teachers’ awareness of basic education social studies curricular hre contents and purpose s/n items no. of teachers mean sd 1. cultural similarities and differences are human rights education contents 170 2.0 0.7 2. harmful traditional practices are human rights education content. 170 3.4 0.6 3. national values such as tolerance, honesty, etc. are human rights education contents. 170 2.7 0.7 4. human rights contents of social studies are geared towards the promotion of human rights consciousness among students. 170 3.8 0.4 5. human rights contents of social studies are geared towards the promotion of peaceful coexistence among nigerians. 170 3.3 0.7 total 170 3.1 0.6 the data in table 2 show that social studies teachers have a general awareness of the contents and purpose of hre in social studies. while they agreed more with the assertions that harmful traditional practices (for example, widowhood practices) (mean = 3.4) and national values (for example, honesty, tolerance, respect, empathy, contentedness) (mean = 2.7) are human rights content in social studies, they disagreed with the statement that cultural similarities and differences (mean = 2.0, sd = 0.7) are human rights content. they agreed strongly that the human rights content of social studies serves the purpose of promoting human rights consciousness (mean = 3.8) and peaceful coexistence (mean = 3.3) among individuals. educational qualification showed a significant statistical difference regarding the human rights education review volume 3(2) 15 degree of awareness of the content and purpose of hre (f (x2 (5) = 20.7; p < 0.01) with a mean rank score of 145.9 for m.ed., 130.8 for m.ed. equivalent holders, 99.3 for pgde holders, 79.1 for b.ed. holders, 77.5 for b.ed. equivalent holders, and 71.0 for nce holders. a dunn bonferroni test post hoc comparison, however, showed that the mean scores of teachers with m.ed. differed significantly from those of teachers with nce (p = 0.014) and b.ed. equivalents (p = 0.006). table 3: percentage representation of teachers’ awareness of human rights education pedagogical debates s/n items no. of teachers aware (%) unaware (%) 1. narrative methods have been suggested for hre 170 1.8 98.2 2. emancipatory methods have been suggested for hre 170 0 100 3. transformative methods have been suggested for hre 170 0 100 4. critical methods have been suggested for hre 170 0 100 5. participatory methods have been suggested for hre 170 77.6 22.4 6. traditional methods have been decried for hre 170 74.7 25.3 total 170 25.7 74.3 generally, social studies teachers are unaware (74.3%) of the pedagogical debates surrounding hre. table 3 shows that social studies teachers are completely unaware of narrative, emancipatory, transformative, and critical hre methods. a zero percentage of respondents was aware of the emancipatory, transformative, and critical methods strongly recommended by hre scholars (keet, 2015; zembylas et al., 2017). of the three respondents who were aware of the narrative method, two were m.ed. holders while one was a b.ed. equivalent holder. respondents are, however, generally aware that participatory methods are recommended for teaching human rights contents of social studies while traditional methods are discouraged. while respondents with an education background were largely aware of participatory and traditional methods, as indicated by frequency analysis of their responses, respondents without an education background (i.e. b.ed. equivalent) are notably unaware of participatory methods; 31 of the 53 b.ed./equivalent holders reported not being aware of participatory methods and 33 of this last group were unaware that traditional methods were considered unsuitable for hre. educational qualification had a significant statistical difference on hre pedagogical debate awareness (f (x2 (5) = 59.69; p < 0.001) with b.ed./equivalent holders recording the least mean rank of 52.1 and b.ed. holders recording the highest mean rank of 104.1, followed by pgde holders (101.4), m.ed. (99.2), m.ed./equivalent (90.1), and nce holders (86.2). dunn bonferroni test post hoc comparison, however, showed that the mean scores of teachers with a b.ed. equivalent differed significantly from those of teachers with m.ed. (p = 0.04), pgde (p < 0.001) and b.ed. (p = p < 0.001). pgde (p < 0.001) and b.ed. (p = p < 0.001). a.obiagu & o.nwaubani 16 table 4: percentage of instructional methods employed by teachers in teaching human rights contents of bessc s/n items no. of teachers employ (%) don’t employ (%) 1. i use an explanatory method for hre 170 100 0 2. i use a discussion method for hre 170 4.1 95.9 3. i use an inquiry method for hre 170 14.7 85.3 4. i use a problem-solving method for hre 170 3.5 96.5 5. i use a resource person for hre 170 0.6 99.4 6. i use computer-instruction including online resources for hre 170 8.8 91.2 7. i use role play for hre 170 4.7 95.3 total 170 19.5 80.5 table 4 shows that social studies teachers do not employ participatory or learnercentred approaches in teaching the human rights contents of social studies. over 80% of the respondents do not employ a learner-centred approach in implementing human rights content. all the teachers agreed that they use the explanatory method for teaching human rights. a majority of the participants (80.5%) do not employ learner-centred methods for teaching. educational qualifications had a significant statistical difference regarding knowledge of the content and purpose of hre (f (x2 (5) = 21.3; p < 0.01), with m.ed. holders scoring the highest mean rank of 117.2. they were followed by m.ed./equivalent holders (105.3), pgde holders (100.5), b.ed. holders (87.0), nce holders (83.9), and b.ed./equivalent holders (70.0). post hoc comparison with the dunn bonferroni test showed that the scores of b.ed./equivalent holders differed significantly statistically, with the scores of pgde holders (p =0.004) and m.ed. holders showing a significant statistical difference (p =0.019). qualitative results from the unsolicited responses of teachers who are aware of participatory methods, but do not use them for teaching, revealed four themes, some of which have been observed by hardman, abd-kadir, and smith (2008) in their examination of the challenges of employing participatory methods for teaching in nigeria. these themes are: (a) a lack of awareness of their existence and strengths: this is especially the case with teachers without an education background when they reported awareness of participatory methods. when they say that these methods are best suited for intelligent students, they show a lay understanding of what participatory methods are. for example, one teacher said methods do not matter because children who are not intelligent are ‘naturally unintelligent’ and there is nothing he can do to change the situation of ‘naturally unintelligent people’. human rights education review volume 3(2) 17 (b) a lack of funding and teaching resources: they complained of a lack of electricity, computers, projectors, standard textbooks, school bus and so on. for example, one teacher told how her plan to take her students on an excursion to a marriage registry failed because parents were unwilling to help pay for it. another said that when he resumed teaching in 2014, no civic education (which he taught before his current subject, social studies) textbook was approved. (c) large class sizes: with a large class of 35 to 50 students, teachers find it difficult to address all of their students’ needs in a 40-45 minute period. one social studies teacher, who also doubles as a civic education teacher, said it was difficult to address the many questions her students ask. (d) a crowded curriculum and timetable: schools in nigeria offer 10 to 13 compulsory subjects. each subject contains numerous topics and school lasts for 6 hours daily, with a 30-minute break. classes are sometimes combined, in order to manage time. this results in having over 80 students crowded in one class, sharing few desks. the lecture method becomes their easiest option in cases like this. discussion: the challenges of teaching for human rights in nigeria the challenges of teaching for human rights in nigeria, as revealed by the study’s findings, include inadequate knowledge, inappropriate pedagogy, non-activism and poor educational planning. these challenges could also explain an increase in antihuman rights behaviour, despite hre content. teachers’ inadequate human rights knowledge teachers show a greater knowledge of the explicit contents and purpose of human rights, but lack a knowledge of the hidden issues and systemic factors (for example, culture) associated with human rights. the results further show that many teachers are not aware that values are an aspect of human rights. again, when teachers disagree with the statement that cultural similarities and differences are an aspect of human rights, this suggests a lack of knowledge of the breadth of human rights. this shows a lack of understanding of the connection between cultural misunderstanding and ethnocentrism. and this invariably relates to intolerance, structural violence and conflictsall indices of rights violations. this indicates a limited awareness of hre. a knowledge of models of hre developed by bajaj (2011) would help to foster social studies teachers’ awareness of the relevance of teaching cultural similarities and differences in promoting pro-human rights behaviour. this understanding would help to bring about a more practical approach to teaching the topic. teachers’ limited knowledge of human rights is a consequence of poor quality teacher education. as noted by ogunyinka, okeke, & adedoyin (2015), quality assurance is low for education programmes. low scorers in the higher education entrance examination are admitted to study education in nigeria, while in-service training is haphazardly planned and administered. moreover, the social science teacher education (sste) curriculum (whose graduates largely teach social studies, government and civic education) is not yet updated to reflect changes made to the pre-higher education curriculum. as shown by ifegbesan et al. (2017), the sste curriculum does not adequately cover sdgs. human rights and citizenship content covered by undergraduate and master’s sste programmes is factual and limited to education about rights, despite research suggesting education about human rights a.obiagu & o.nwaubani 18 may be ineffective in developing rights activism (hall, 2019). again, the theoretical and philosophical assumptions of teaching human rights and citizenship are not covered under sste (obiagu, 2019, p. 12). it is difficult to say why this is so. it may be due to an over-emphasis on national consciousness, values and unity in the curriculum, and the production of an obedient and responsible citizenry. there is no direct reference to changing systemic injustice as being a goal of hre, and this has implications on how textbook authors and teachers understand and implement human rights topics. teachers may be uncritical in their instructional delivery, or emphasise knowledge and abstract principles while neglecting human rights dispositions and values, as is the case in hre discourses in kurdistan-iraq and rwanda (osler & yahya, 2013), and in nigerian cultural discourses (salmon-letelier, 2019). a lack of research (or lack of high quality research) on hre in the country that might help improve hre policy and practice is a further cause of teachers limited knowledge of hre. research grants, where available, are reportedly misappropriated by some awardees (the guardian, 2020). a lack of awareness of human rights pedagogy nigerian teachers teaching human rights contents are not aware of liberatory human rights pedagogies. like the participants in zembylas et al.’s (2017) study, who lacked necessary training on how to handle sensitive human rights issues, our participants were unaware of pedagogies for human rights practice. a lack of awareness of pedagogy could explain why teachers are unaware that culture-related topics (and largely unaware that values contents) are human rights-oriented. although hre is neither taught as an independent discipline nor as a stand-alone course in faculties and colleges of education in nigeria, it is taught as a topic in some courses covered in the social studies or political science education programmes of various education faculties and colleges. however, emancipatory and critical theories and pedagogies are not included or taught in any sste programme in nigeria. in sste classes, more attention is paid to the rights provisions of the constitution and human rights problems as contemporary issues, with no attention given to the models, critiques, and pedagogies of human rights education. again, special methods courses offered in all sste programmes, as well as those offered in general education courses, focus on cooperative, individualised, discussion, inquiry, role play and problem-solving methods. in the sste programme’s curriculum and materials there is no focus on any of the underlying critical and transformative theories and pedagogies that can awaken a consciousness of systemic and structural inequalities and violence. this has led to the failure of sste programmes to produce pragmatic and conscious social education teachers. as the study shows, even though social studies teachers know about the strengths of participatory methods in promoting learning and are aware of the limitations of only using traditional methods, they do not utilise a learner-centred approach in teaching human rights. they rely heavily on explanatory methods, which do not promote the critical thinking necessary for human rights consciousness and behaviours. this is a perennial problem in nigeria and other sub-saharan african countries, where studies have consistently shown that explanation, teacher-centred, repetition, rote learning and non-democratic methods of teaching dominate classroom practices (hardman et al., 2008; obiagu, 2019; salmon-letelier 2019). this shortcoming is blamed on the conservative and authoritarian school structure that dominates african schools (harber & sakade, 2009), as well as sociocultural human rights education review volume 3(2) 19 factors such as the expectation that younger people show a total respect for their elders. this is evidenced in teachers’ use of (and sense of entitlement for using) corporal punishment and their belief in silencing children’s engagement in decisionmaking (iroegbu, 2015). inadequate educational facilities and resources, large class sizes, and a crowded curriculum and timetable are also associated with the nonemployment of learner-centred methods by our respondents and other nigerian teachers (hardman et al., 2008). notably, corruption is an obstacle to procurement of quality educational facilities in nigeria, as educational leaders misappropriate and embezzle education funds (see alabi, 2020; samuel, 2018). a patriarchal culture may also be a reason why emancipatory methods, though not taught in sste programmes, are not promoted and adopted by teachers. this is because women, who are treated as inferior and not expected to be pushy (chigbu, 2015), dominate the nigerian teaching profession. women constitute 80.6% of our sample, and this statistic reflects the general teacher population. this is in line with the global tendency of the gradual feminisation of the teaching profession (oecd, 2017). in nigeria, however, while prospective female teachers are sexually exploited by male lecturers (bakari & leach, 2009), female lecturers are mostly politicked out of administrative positions (bakari & leach, 2007). this system mitigates against a hre approach. it is arguably difficult for inferiorised, passive and disempowered female teachers to search for knowledge or practices that challenge traditions. how can they produce empowered students if they themselves are not consciously awakened and empowered? teachers’ non-activism related to a lack of a broad repertoire of pedagogical skills is teachers’ non-activism or non-agency. as shown in the response of one of the teachers, classroom method is seen as having no implications for educational performance, since intelligence is assumed ‘natural’. this shows the teacher does not understand the purpose of education beyond test scores. this challenge can also be associated with a lack of teacher education or poor teacher training that produces teachers whose ‘beliefs are strongly orientated towards the here-and-now and […] influenced by current policy rather than by more encompassing orientations about the wider purpose and meaning of schooling’ (biesta, priestley, & robinson, 2015, p. 638). in nigeria, ‘teachers are not equipped to aim and move beyond performance objectives outlined in curriculum contents […] even though a policy document that empowers them to [… act independently] exists’ (obiagu, 2020, p. 11). given that education about human rights does not produce activism among the educated (hall, 2019) nor encourage more active teachers teach more democratically (jerome, 2018), education through and for human rights is crucial and requires activist teachers. agential teachers (including lecturers) are needed; resourceful and innovative individuals who see beyond test scores and are not overwhelmed by inadequate educational resources. poor educational planning the findings of this study further show that teachers’ educational qualifications have a statistical significance on their hre instructional preparedness and practice; nonqualified teachers lag behind while m.ed. and b.ed. holders rank highest. teachers without an education background are extremely unaware of participatory methods. this result is not surprising, since teachers without an education background a.obiagu & o.nwaubani 20 probably do not understand teaching as professional and complex, with some methodologies appropriate for some topics. they possibly share the misconception that teaching is simple and is much like the work of authority figures such as parents, lay teachers in religious schools, leaders of boy or girl scouts troops and employers (grossman, hammerness, & mcdonald, 2009). despite this, the nigerian government continues to employ unqualified teachers while many qualified ones have no job. this situation is propelled by corruption and favouritism. at the primary level, the effectiveness of teachers is additionally limited by the fact that a lack of resources means that that teachers are engaged to teach all subjects, irrespective of their limited knowledge of these subjects. conclusions this study shows a number of challenges to teaching for human rights in nigeria: inadequate human rights knowledge; a lack of pedagogical knowledge; non-activism; and poor educational planning. surmounting these challenges is important. in the education literature, the importance of knowledge – from general content knowledge to pedagogical knowledge about students, subject matter and pedagogy – is emphasised (deng, 2018). sophisticated knowledge that goes beyond common principles is required for high quality instruction to be assured (ball et al., 2008). from this lens, the effective teaching of human rights contents requires a sophisticated knowledge of (and training in) human rights, hre, and their critiques and pedagogy. hence, nigeria’s sste programmes and other courses dealing with human rights must be restructured if the criteria for effective implementation of hre discussed in the literature review are to be met. teacher educators need to upgrade their knowledge of hre and give more attention to human rights enshrined in the udhr instruments and the 1999 constitution of the federal republic of nigeria. they also need to go beyond concepts of human rights, rights provisions, contemporary rights violations and the purpose of hre and to incorporate rights critiques, hre pedagogical debates, and the responsibilities of the teacher to care into their programmes. dialogic pedagogy (and socratic questioning), a powerful pedagogic tool for increasing classroom interaction and encouraging students’ critical thinking (hardman et al., 2008), would be suitable for sub-saharan africa contexts with inadequate educational resources and large class sizes. if effective citizenship and the social change goals of nigerian education (frn, 2014) are to be realised, emancipatory, transformative and critical pedagogies need to be introduced in general teacher education programmes. these pedagogical theories and methods will challenge ill-conceived beliefs about schooling held by teachers, as well as empower them with a sense of purpose to deconstruct systemic injustice through instructional practice. they may also help educators reclaim their place in human rights discourses. studies of discrimination and abuse against nigerian women, for example, usually consider that the government, ngos, the young, men and women are necessary actors in bringing about change (chigbu, 2015). the role of educators is rarely considered, despite the fact that they are potentially strong transformative agents in social change. both teachers and children exposed to transformative education have engaged in action that may disrupt an unjust status quo. importantly, nigerian education policy needs to begin giving social change and justice as much emphasis as national consciousness, values and unity; the latter cannot be realised in the absence of social justice. human rights education review volume 3(2) 21 exposing nigerian social educators to the criteria of hre implementation discussed in this article will help them to cope with institutional challenges, such as the lack of educational resources, and awaken the spirit that a rights activist needs to havea non-activist social educator cannot produce activist students. there is a need to prepare social educators to overcome the negative form of resilience that prevents people from challenging asymmetric power relations; they must be enabled to implement education through and for human rights in their classes. as for teachers’ complaints that the curriculum is overloaded, we suggest that social education curricula be reviewed so that topics serving the same purposes can be merged. this will reduce teachers’ workloads and free-up time for learner-centred methods. there is a need for public action by government and educational bodies in providing professional development opportunities such as in-service seminars and workshops on the effective implementation of hre. more training needs to be given to primary school teachers, since they handle many subjects they are not trained to teach. educational researchers need to take individual action and advocate their findings by liaising with individual schools to organise free seminars for teachers that can enlighten them about the teaching of human rights. acknowledgements we are thankful to the participants of this study. many thanks to the editor of hrer, professor audrey osler and the three anonymous reviewers of our paper for their rich comments that helped refine our paper. notes 1 the 6-3-3-4 education system represents six years in primary education, three years of lower secondary education, three years of upper secondary education, and four years for higher education. 2 the 9-3-4 education system represents nine years compulsory basic education –primary 1 to junior secondary 3, three years senior secondary, and four years higher education. a.obiagu & o.nwaubani 22 references adaralegbe, a. 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(2017). toward a critical hermeneutical approach of human rights education: universal ideas, contextual realities and teachers’ difficulties. journal of curriculum studies, 49(4), 497–517. http://doi.org/10.1080/00220272.2016.1188156 https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000373718 http://www.hre2020.org/un-declaration-on-human-rights-education-and-training http://www.hre2020.org/un-declaration-on-human-rights-education-and-training https://www.uscirf.gov/publications/2020-annual-report http://www.fosbiz.com/sites/default/files/chrce/pdf/chrce-primary-teacher-human-rights-report.pdf http://www.fosbiz.com/sites/default/files/chrce/pdf/chrce-primary-teacher-human-rights-report.pdf http://doi.org/10.1080/00220272.2016.1188156 volume 3, no 1 (2020) date received: 07-02-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3726 date accepted: 03-06-2020 issn 2535-5406 balancing teacher power and children’s rights: rethinking the use of picturebooks in multicultural primary schools in england stefan kucharczyk articulate education, uk. helen hanna east china normal university, china. abstract: this article offers an autoethnographic reconsideration of a primary school teacher’s practice and children’s interpretation of picturebooks in multicultural primary schools in england. it considers the balance teachers strike between respecting children’s rights to freedom of thought and expression, and wielding their own power as directors of learning. it links key aspects of international human rights law on children to concepts from literacy studies and multicultural children’s literature: representation of minority groups, pictorial interpretation, critical literacy and teacher power. it brings out nuanced interpretations of the picturebook the arrival as a ‘mirror’ for learners from migrant backgrounds. this mirror may reflect children’s experiences but also offer a frosted, distorted or blank view where young learners do not empathise with characters. we argue that children’s rights within education should include freedom of thought and expression and freedom to interpret literature; teachers should reflect on their intentions when using literature, and not pose barriers to this freedom. keywords: children’s literature, freedom of expression, representation, critical literacy, interpretation, autoethnography helen hanna: drhelenhanna@outlook.com http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3726 mailto:drhelenhanna@outlook.com human rights education review – volume 3(1) 50 balancing teacher power and children’s rights: rethinking the use of picturebooks in multicultural primary schools in england. doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3726 issn 2535-5406 stefan kucharczyk helen hanna drhelenhanna@outlook.com articulate education, uk. east china normal university, china. abstract: this article offers an autoethnographic reconsideration of a primary school teacher’s practice and children’s interpretation of picturebooks in multicultural primary schools in england. it considers the balance teachers strike between respecting children’s rights to freedom of thought and expression, and wielding their own power as directors of learning. it links key aspects of international human rights law on children to concepts from literacy studies and multicultural children’s literature: representation of minority groups, pictorial interpretation, critical literacy and teacher power. it brings out nuanced interpretations of the picturebook the arrival as a ‘mirror’ for learners from migrant backgrounds. this mirror may reflect children’s experiences but also offer a frosted, distorted or blank view where young learners do not empathise with characters. we argue that children’s rights within education should include freedom of thought and expression and freedom to interpret literature; teachers should reflect on their intentions when using literature, and not pose barriers to this freedom. keywords: children’s literature, freedom of expression, representation, critical literacy, interpretation, autoethnography introduction it was professor emeritus of children’s literature, rudine sims bishop, who first described so eloquently the potential of a children’s book to be a ‘mirror’ for children, reflecting their world and themselves back to them (sims bishop, 1990). this metaphor may be applied as much to wordless picturebooks as to books containing text. recently, renewed interest in the picturebook has led to it being re-considered both as a way of representing the experiences of learners from diverse cultural and migration backgrounds and also as a pedagogical vehicle through which complex and topical issues might be made more understandable and more easily relatable, not least within the multicultural environments that we find in many english schools (arizpe, 2013; roche, 2015; pantaleo, 2020; papen, 2020). one such book is the arrival authored by shaun tan (2006). the arrival tells the story of a family in the process of leaving their home country to build a new life in a distant land. it has become popular as much for its important representation of the modern reality of migration and identity, so familiar to many migrant families, as for its beautiful and http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3726 mailto:drhelenhanna@outlook.com s. kucharczyk & h. hanna 51 engaging illustrations. indeed, these were some of the reasons why it was selected to be the focus of the primary school teacher practice explored in this article. new literacy studies have recognised the centrality of context to the understanding of literature and the notion that texts may be interpreted in different ways (lankshear & knobel, 2007). indeed, readers bring their own backgrounds to their reading of a text, interact with the text, and then take those meanings away with them after reading to re-interpret their own worlds. thus, reading can involve interpretation, reflection and interrogation, and should lead to acting on and, in paulo freire’s (1985) understanding, changing their world. indeed, dealing with issues of power and inequality, while recognising the non-neutrality of education in general and literacy in particular, is what allows this approach to be called ‘critical literacy’ (reynolds, 2007). in introducing and applying international human rights law on education and children’s rights more broadly to this world of children’s literature and teaching, an understanding can emerge that good quality education will be nondiscriminatory and respect learners’ multiple identities. furthermore, it will allow them freedom of expression and thought, and enable them to seek out information and to have their views given due weight in issues that affect them, in accordance with the convention on the rights of the child, article 2, 8, 12, 13, 14, 28 and 29 (united nations [un], 1989). however, given the wider scope for interpretation offered by a wordless picturebook, there is also the reality that such a book may be interpreted in a way that is out of synch with the teacher’s aim or ‘standpoint’ (luke, 2000). this is especially pertinent when the text has been carefully chosen by the teacher as a way to ‘mirror’ or represent marginalised children’s experiences. in this way, it may challenge the teacher’s position as the powerful gatekeeper to children’s literary and imaginative worlds and, ultimately, educational attainment. it is these two balancing acts that this article wishes to convey; between representation and critical literacy on the one hand, and between children’s rights and teacher power on the other. while much has been written about children’s rights and the right to literacy in general (janks, 2010; moretti & frandell, 2013), and there are papers that mention children’s rights as a topic in children’s literature (reynolds, 2007), little has been written that is expressly about children’s rights and the use of children’s literature, particularly from a teacher’s perspective. therefore, this article will offer autoethnographic reconsiderations by a teacher on his practice with primary school learners in a number of culturally diverse schools in england, using the metaphor of the ‘mirror’ in the context of working with the book the arrival. the framework of these reflections is that of children’s rights, and conceptual understandings of representation, pictorial interpretation, critical literacy and power. the article will now introduce key aspects of international human rights law on children. it will then consider the picturebook as a genre and ideas around pictorial interpretation and representation, and mirroring. teacher power and critical literacy will also be considered. it will then offer a brief summary of the context of the practice-based work on which this article is based before presenting the findings, which are nuanced and alternative interpretations of the arrival as a mirror, through reflections on the classroom-based activities used by the teacherauthor. the discussion that follows will return to issues of teacher power and children’s right to freedom of thought and interpretation in education when using literature, as well as representation and mirroring. the conclusion will argue that picturebooks can play a hugely significant role in children’s education and literacy. human rights education review – volume 3(1) 52 learners can also relate this type of literature to their own lives, but they must be allowed the freedom to make meaning from it in order for their rights to be fulfilled. children’s social, cultural and education rights children in england, like children across the globe, have certain rights within education. some of these rights are enshrined in international law and applied within national law and policy. governments have an obligation to ensure access to education for all children in the compulsory education age-range (tomaševski, 2001). former un special rapporteur on the right to education, katarina tomaševski (2004), views a rights-based approach to education as being founded on the following: access to free and compulsory education; equality, inclusion and nondiscrimination; and the right to quality education in terms of content and processes. the international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights [icescr] (un, 1966) states education to be a human right and requires that it be ‘directed to the full development of the human personality and the sense of its dignity’, thereby ‘strengthen[ing] the respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms’, and promoting ‘understanding, tolerance and friendship’ (article 13(1)). beiter (2006, p. 95) considers that the reference to human dignity implies that ‘education must make the individual aware of his own inherent worth and of the human rights which accrue to him on this basis’. interpretations of icescr (including general comment 13) express these rights by stating that education should be available, accessible, acceptable and adaptable to learners (tomaševski, 2001). being ‘accessible’ in this way means that the education system should be non-discriminatory, that is, accessible to all, and efforts must be made to include socially, culturally, geographically and economically marginalised individuals (friboulet, niameogo, liechti, dalbera & meyer-bisch, 2006; right to education project, 2018). like tomaševski (2004), hanna (2016a; 2017a; 2019) argues that the concept of nondiscrimination should apply to the content of the curriculum as well as pedagogy when dealing with different views and understandings in the classroom that are of particular salience in diverse and multi-ethnic societies. the united nations convention on the rights of the child [uncrc] (un, 1989) requires all signatories – including england as part of the uk – to adhere to a lengthy list of rights. these include the right of children to non-discrimination (article 2), to respect for identity (article 8), to be consulted on anything that affects them (article 12), the right to express their views and to seek information (article 13), and the right to freedom of thought (article 14). in terms of education in particular, article 28 assures the right to free primary education, and article 29(1) states that education will be directed towards goals such as the development of children ‘to their fullest potential’, respect for rights and freedoms, and respect for multiple identities, peace, tolerance, and equality (see hodgson, 1993, for a more detailed outline). ronen (2004) interprets uncrc articles on identity as requiring that each child be regarded as an ‘individualized identity’ rather than simply a part of predetermined groups, and that uncrc implicitly ‘reaffirms commitment to a dynamic child-constructed identity’ (p. 147) which acknowledges the multiplicity of culture as it is ‘uniquely experienced by the individual child’ (p. 158). hanna (2017b) takes recognition of identity a step further, claiming that this represents the child’s right to respect for his/her multiple identities as well as the active protection of these rights that should be central to pedagogy and practice in schools. this article will argue that these rights and freedoms are relevant to a s. kucharczyk & h. hanna 53 discussion of how teachers use picturebooks with culturally diverse groups of learners, particularly in terms of representation and pictorial interpretation. central to this discussion is the consideration of how to balance teacher’s power and children’s rights when engaging with literature in the classroom. these key concepts are explored in the two sections below. wordless picturebooks: pictures, interpretation and mirrors a wordless picturebook is ‘a text where the visual image carries the weight of the meaning’ (arizpe, 2013, p. 165) and so omits the written word. wordless or sparselyworded books have long been used by teachers in the primary classroom as reading books suited to emergent readers, especially as a way of developing language with the support of visual images. as lewis (2001, pp. 136-7) notes, the picturebook is ‘ideally suited to the task of absorbing, reinterpreting and re-presenting the world to an audience for whom negotiating newness is a daily task.’ over recent years, however, authors and illustrators such as anthony browne, shaun tan and armin greder can be credited with developing the genre as a medium that explores deeper, richer and sometimes darker themes, demanding emotional engagement and empathy from the reader. this genre of book is now growing in popularity amongst teachers of children in later primary years, who recognise the importance of visual literacy (arizpe & styles, 2016). scholarly interest in picturebooks has also risen, establishing them as a more accepted part of the children’s literary canon as well as a useful tool in qualitative research with children (bosch, 2017; hanna, 2018a; 2018b). it is the power of the image that appears to make the picturebook so appealing for teachers. perry nodelman (1988) illustrates how much can be drawn from a single image, and how much skill is required in making sense of it, thereby shattering the myth that picturebooks are for those who lack the understanding or wisdom that comes with age. it has been suggested that the pared-down text creates ‘textual gaps’ (iser, 1974) or ‘breathing space’ (kucharczyk, 2016), offering opportunities for multiple interpretations, thus leading to them often being viewed as accessible for readers of all abilities and contributing towards ‘a more democratic space for collaborative enquiry and exploration’ (roche, 2015, p. 79). the level of freedom of interpretation, however, is mediated to an extent by the teacher, an issue that will be considered later in this article. thus, the task for educators may appear quite straightforward, given time and material resources. teachers are convinced by the evidence that images are powerful and that they can help children develop literacy, and so they select a picturebook that offers scope for interpretation. there is also another consideration, however, and that is representation, an issue that is of particular salience when working with culturally diverse groups of children. it has long been argued in the field of multicultural children’s literature that diverse children should be represented in the books that children are offered to read. rudine sims bishop has argued that ‘multicultural literature is one of the most powerful components of a multicultural education curriculum’ and therefore ‘the choice of books to be read and discussed in the nation’s schools is of paramount importance’ (1992, p. 40). she describes literature as something that ‘transforms human experience and reflects it back to us’ (1990, p. ix), and has used a three-part metaphor to describe the potential of children’s books that was used in this study: a children’s book can be a ‘mirror’, a ‘window’ or a ‘sliding glass door’ (1990, p. ix). it is the metaphor of a book as a mirror human rights education review – volume 3(1) 54 that is explored in this article, understood as the potential of a book to reflect children and their worlds back to them (although the ‘window’ onto another world is also mentioned later). ross johnston (2011, p. 154) has also written about this mirror metaphor, arguing that children’s books are ‘rather like cultural mirrors that reflect what are widely held to be acceptable social positions.’ sims bishop emphasises the importance of multicultural literature in allowing all children to access literature that mirrors their own lives and identities; in this way, literature may allow us all to ‘see our lives and experience as part of the larger human experience’ and so reading ‘becomes a means of self-affirmation.’ if, on the other hand, children cannot see themselves in the books they read, or only see negative or passive portrayals, ‘they learn a powerful lesson about how they are devalued in the society of which they are part.’ (sims bishop, 1990, p. ix). children’s literature has attracted much recent criticism for being largely unrepresentative of the audience reading it, posing a particular problem for under-represented groups such as black, asian and minority ethnic and migrant learners. the centre for literacy in primary education’s [clpe] 2018 report on the extent of the problem is particularly disappointing, noting the lack of ethnic diversity amongst main characters in children’s fiction does not reflect cultural diversity in the uk (clpe, 2018). teacher power and critical literacy it may be argued that the ease with which readers engage with picturebooks can sometimes lead teachers to believe that they can be used in a functional way, to transmit an idea clearly and quickly, without the need for extensive explanation or contextualisation. in this case, then, the amount of power held by teachers is potentially great, and their aim in selecting books becomes crucial. luke (2000) refers to this as the teacher’s ‘attitude’ or ‘standpoint’. nodelman (1999, p. 73) suggests that picturebooks are ‘a significant means by which we integrate young children into the ideology of our culture’, and barton and hamilton (2000, p. 12) highlight how ‘people appropriate texts for their own ends’. in this way, it is people interacting with texts that imbues them with meaning. therefore, it may even be that adults (teachers) in the classroom – as experienced readers – may not be engaging in the act of ‘creating and negotiating meaning’ that pantaleo (2002, p. 81) describes as central to work that uses picturebooks with children. as adult readers, perhaps ourselves socialised into a certain approach to reading, we can fall into the trap of trying to decide on a clear narrative path without letting ourselves explore the possibilities which picturebooks with many layers can offer. this can be even more so for teachers who may have planned a journey through a book for their class in advance, before asking for the children’s interpretations. in this case, children travel through the book ‘on rails’, gazing at the other possibilities as they pass on the route predesigned by their teacher, rather than exploring it step by step together, led by their curiosities. while teacher power might seem to be significant in this context, it is important to appreciate the moral and practical quandary these decisions represent for the teacher. while they may wish to offer representation to the children, these decisions may also be taken to ensure ‘good’ educational outcomes. it is a tempting reflex for a practitioner who may have one eye on assessment data and performance targets. these reflect reactions to the mechanisms of ‘performativity’ as discussed by jean-francoise lyotard (1984) and stephen ball (2003) – the systematic erosion of teacher autonomy and the co-opting of teachers (and, to an extent, learners) into s. kucharczyk & h. hanna 55 risk-averse, standardised pedagogy. this can eclipse even the best of intentions to experiment with new approaches in literacy or confront issues of representation. this conflict between making value-based decisions for the children and professional demands can also be a destabilising and confusing factor for teachers. (kucharczyk, 2020). when it comes to teacher power, it is instructive to consider aspects of ‘critical literacy’ in the contexts of power relations and marginalised groups. reynolds (2007) considers ‘critical literacy’ to be a recognition of the non-neutrality of education in general and literacy in particular, and therefore an approach to learning that deals with issues of power and inequality. mayo (1995, p. 363) has described critical literacy as ‘a process…which ties pedagogical practices in different spheres of social life to configurations of power.’ giroux (1993, p. 367) describes critical literacy as providing ‘the conditions for subordinate groups to learn the knowledge and skills necessary for self and social empowerment.’ perhaps most influential in this arena is the work of educational philosopher paulo freire, whose name has been described as ‘synonymous with the concept of critical literacy’ (mayo, 1995, p. 363; see also luke, 2012). while much of freire’s writing explores adult education, it could be argued that his work embodies fundamental ideas of freedom in education that may equally be applied to children and young people. freire believed that readers brought to their understandings of texts their own situated understandings of the world; as he eloquently stated, ‘every act of reading words implies a previous reading of the world’ (freire, 1985, p. 18; also freire & macedo, 1987). but this is not all; readers then bring those co-constructed understandings of the text to bear on their understandings of the world, leading to ‘a subsequent rereading of the world.’ therefore, ‘reading’, in freire’s understanding, involves interpreting, reflecting on, interrogating, investigating, exploring, probing and questioning. but it also leads to ‘writing’ or ‘rewriting’: ‘transforming [the world] by means of conscious practical action.’ however, this process may be mediated by the teacher who, as a facilitator of education, may hold the potential to promote social justice through enabling the challenge of inequality and power (see north, 2006, on social justice approaches to education). as jerome (2018) has written in his review of international literature on teachers and human rights education, teachers can often be caught between being ‘heroes or hypocrites’ when trying to balance a respect for children’s rights with the constraints of conservative education systems. similarly, here, there is a balance between the power of the teacher and the rights of the learners. returning to the previous concepts of pictorial interpretation and representation, what further complicates matters for a practising teacher is having to balance the need to offer representation to under-represented children with the need to offer freedom of interpretation. this constant balancing act of multiple factors – pictorial interpretation, representation, teacher power and children’s rights – will become more apparent in the autoethnographic account of the teacher-author later in this article. the context of the practice: using the arrival as a ‘mirror’ in the classroom the findings we will discuss here are based on reflections on the practice of one of the authors (stefan kucharczyk) as a specialist literacy teacher in using the picturebook the arrival in primary schools in england over the past five years (see also hanna and kucharczyk, 2016). the other author (helen hanna) has also used the book as a research tool with migrant learners in england and south africa (hanna, human rights education review – volume 3(1) 56 2016b, 2018a, 2018b). focusing on the broad question of the extent to, and ways in which, the book offered a ‘mirror’ for the learners, both authors then brought a lens to these reflections that was underpinned by ideas of children’s rights, critical literacy and power. the authors view their analysis as located within the social constructivist and interpretivist paradigms that value the subjective understandings and experiences of individuals (in this case, primary school learners in england), and which recognize the freedom of the individual to challenge long-held assumptions (see guba & lincoln, 1989). stefan’s contribution to the analysis uses autoethnographic research methods, methods that draw on the data of the researcher’s recollections and experiences. this is an approach that crosses the boundary between the objective and the subjective to examine the researcher in context and foregrounds his/her personal narrative (zemblyas, 2003). leon anderson’s framework for ‘analytic autoethnography’ (anderson, 2006) offers guidance for ensuring criticality. while doubts over subjectivity and reliability have brought the validity of autoethnography into question (delamont, 2007), anderson argues that it is this personal voicing that gives autoethnography value. indeed, when considering teacher power, the sharing of personal narratives can reveal ‘untold stories’ (bridgens, 2007) and add further, perhaps marginalised, voices to critical debates. this is in line with the view of agarwal et al. (2009) that social justice programmes for teachers should involve self-study and self-reflection. offering some more detail now of what the workshops actually looked like may help the reader visualise some of the scenarios considered later in this article. over the last five years (2014-19) stefan has used the arrival as part of focused creative writing workshops with small groups of learners (normally 6-8 children, working together on a number of tasks relating to a specific book over six sessions of approximately two hours). this article is based on work across four primary schools in a large post-industrial city in northern england, a city with above-average levels of socio-economic deprivation. these schools, located in inner-city areas, were notable for the rich cultural and ethnic diversity of learners and their families and, to a lesser extent, the teaching staff. they were schools where families have experience of migration to, from and around the uk. all the children who took part in the creative writing workshops were aged 9-10 years old (year 5). while this was not a formal research project, ethical guidelines for research were adhered to in the reporting of stefan’s practice, notably with confidentiality in mind, and so no names or identifying features of learners or schools have been included in this article (see british education research association [bera]’s 2018 ethical guidelines). the arrival has been widely used in primary school practice as well as in a number of research projects in a number of countries (see, for example, arizpe et al. 2014; pantaleo and bomphray, 2011; rhoades, dallacqua, kersten, merry & miller, 2015). it tells the story of a family in the process of leaving their perilous homeland to build a new life in another country. we witness the family separation, the father’s journey – as he leaves to set up the new, safer life for his wife and daughter – and their eventual reunion sometime later. the story explores the emotional and cultural challenges facing a new arrival as well as the stories of other migrants who are seeking the same opportunities. stefan’s decision to use the arrival was very deliberate and motivated by a number of considerations which clearly reflected his ‘standpoint’ (luke, 2000): he hoped to use the themes of the book as a means of exploring the emotional response of the children to the book in terms of their views on migration before writing their own fictional accounts of characters travelling to s. kucharczyk & h. hanna 57 new lands. although stefan did not specify to the children that they should include autobiographical details in their writing, he did anticipate that the discussions in the writing preparation phase would inspire them to create empathic characters that other children might identify with. for stefan, tan’s theme of migration resonated with stories of his own family; these are explored later. much of the arrival has been reproduced on shaun tan’s website, and we recommend the reader to access it alongside reading this article, to bring visual understanding to our written descriptions of the scenes below, which, we admit, could not possibly do full justice to tan’s beautiful illustrations: http://www.shauntan.net/books/the-arrival.html reinterpreting the ‘mirror’: balancing children’s rights and teacher’s power as explained earlier, sims bishop (1990) described the role of the children’s book as a ‘mirror’ insofar as it can reflect children and their worlds back to them. this metaphor of a mirror was reflected in the classroom work with children in diverse and – to the author – sometimes unexpected ways. it may well be argued that as ‘migrating’ is a strong theme in the arrival, the book can provide a mirror for those readers who have also experienced migration. however, while recognising the importance of this mirroring aspect, particularly to children whose ethnic, racial or cultural identities are under-represented in literature, it also became clear in reflecting on stefan’s practice that the concept of a mirror can and should be problematised. the mirror may not always provide an exact reflection of the reader’s identity or experience in a way that the teacher hopes, or in a way that the reader likes or can connect with. stefan’s standpoint when choosing the the arrival for use in literacy workshops was determined as much by his familial connection with the story’s theme of migration and family separation as his view of the book’s potential to act as an intriguing starting point to aid the children’s development of literacy. in the 1940s, his grandfather, ryszard, had migrated from poland to england under the shadow of conflict, upheaval and family separation. arriving in a new country, adapting to a new way of life, learning a new language: these were all parts of him assuming a new identity in the same way that the man – the protagonist – experiences in the story. stefan felt that the connection between family and fiction was a powerful one and this was part of his motivation to explore this theme with children through creative writing. in other words, the arrival had served stefan as a mirror and he expected that by gazing into the same mirror, the children would respond in a similar way. as discussed previously, choosing a book to act as a mirror in this way was partly driven by the desire to make literature more representative for the children, to address the paucity of literature that represents the diversity of children’s lives. although the man in the arrival is of indeterminate ethnicity, his experiences of migration are not. for stefan, it was a conscious decision to present the learners with the metaphorical mirror that they might not had seen before. he fully expected them to look into it. in many cases, that expectation was fulfilled. the emotional anguish of the man’s daughter and her mother (his wife/partner) in the moving scene when they bid farewell to him at the train station was easily understood by all. the children found it easy to relate to the daughter’s and mother’s distress: ‘they will miss the father’, ‘they don’t want him to leave’, ‘i would miss my dad if he left for a long time.’ in the story, the man travels alone to make preparations for his family before they travel to join him. for many of the children stefan worked with, the role played http://www.shauntan.net/books/the-arrival.html human rights education review – volume 3(1) 58 by the dad was a familiar one. indeed, on reading the story, when prompted, the children could see the link between the character and an experience of someone in their family. a male relative – sometimes a dad, other times a brother, an uncle or a cousin – had travelled to another country, alone, for work or study. many of the children were recent arrivals at the school and for some of them this was recent history, their fathers having travelled to the uk just a few years previously. for others, they had to reach back into more distant family history, with some making surprising, spontaneous connections in reaction to the story: ‘ah! my nanna came from jamaica a long time ago.’ some gave examples of how their dad would travel to sudan, to pakistan, to eritrea for months at a time. the children could identify with the man writing letters to his distant family, with skype, whatsapp video calls and emails being the modern equivalent in helping families keep in touch. in most cases, children admitted they missed their dad while he was away. we might imagine that their fathers equally missed their children and recognised the significance of leaving the family behind: often the children were given presents before their dad left (and, of course, on return), similarly to how the protagonist comforts his daughter with origami creatures and, later, a pet. the children’s enthusiasm here suggested that if this was intended to soften the blow, then it worked. from the standpoint of a teacher, stefan was pleased that his aim of offering the arrival as a mirror on the children’s lives appeared to have been met. the children had seen something of themselves represented in story in a way that they had not experienced before. it was even more satisfying to see how it had surprised them, as if they had been expecting to look through a window but in fact had seen their own reflection. returning to children’s rights frameworks, it could be argued here that stefan had enabled their right to identity to be supported through such representation in the story and recognition by their teacher, as part of a nondiscriminatory education. there were also, however, differences in the children’s interpretations and understandings of the circumstances of the central family, in particular the main protagonist – the man. their reactions offer an insight into how children might use a book like this as a particular type of mirror, reflecting their world back to them in unforeseen ways, and this is a challenge to the power of the teacher in directing their learning. stefan shared with the children the experiences of his grandfather who, as a young soldier following the upheavals of the second world war, left his home in southern poland and arrived in england: a country where customs and language were strange, suspicion of foreigners high, and the food and weather terrible. by making this connection, the children’s response of recognition initially suggested to stefan that the experience of the protagonist reflected back to them the story of their families as migrants, just as it had done for him. but this was not the case for everyone. the responses of some children – whatever their racial or ethnic backgrounds, their home language, or their migration experiences might suggest – indicated that they didn’t feel the same connection. some didn’t see themselves as migrants and only thought of themselves as english, or as having a more localised identity, as simply being from the city where they now lived. this is interesting, given the educational policy drive for unified identities shown in the introduction of the subject area of ‘british values’ in schools, and the highly politicised migration context of the uk in the late 2010s. this was particularly relevant in light of anti-immigrant sentiment in the media in the context of the uk’s plans to leave to european union – ‘brexit’ – in 2020, at the time when stefan was running these workshops (see ross, 2016; hanna, s. kucharczyk & h. hanna 59 2018a, for more detail on the migration context in england and its education system). one girl suggested that she didn’t enjoy the topic stefan had chosen for the writing workshop because the story was too gloomy. indeed, it is easy to empathise with her perspective: if you don’t feel the powerful connection with the man and his family in the darkly coloured images, the arrival could be said to lack the pop and energy of more brightly illustrated, upbeat picturebooks that are often favoured by teachers. for these children, the story was just that: a story, or at best, a window onto another, more ‘gloomy’ world that they didn’t particularly wish to look through. they saw nothing in the mirror. one of the most interesting and curious scenes in the story is the parallel between the first page which illustrates the objects in the home, inviting us to make insights into their family life, and the near identical scene towards the end of the story. in the later scene, the objects are similar – a cooking pot, a child’s drawing, an origami model – but they are now changed to reflect the new world and the journey the family have taken together. in some cases, the children appeared to engage with this aspect of the story, but perhaps found the experience to be too abstract – the mirror was frosted or distorted and the parallels drawn between the old life and the new one were simply ones that led to the classic storybook happy ending. one child preferred to present the journey to the new world as a fun adventure. despite her verbal responses suggesting she had made a link between the difficult journey of the man and the migrant experiences of her grandparents from the caribbean to england in the 1950s, her written composition reflected a different response that reflected her dreams of travel and holidays. these examples of children not appearing to view the book as a mirror created a dilemma for stefan. his standpoint was one of critical literacy and his aim was to offer the opportunity to the children to both mirror and critically reflect on their identities. however, when his use of the book didn’t appear to lead to these outcomes, to what extent should he direct the children’s understanding? would it be right to use his power as a teacher to ‘impose’ an interpretation – that is to ‘correct’ the children’s misunderstandings or explain why it might be significant to them? or would this approach work against the essential freedom of the picturebook as a genre and children’s right to make up their own minds about it – their right to freedom of thought? again, this brings the dilemma of teachers into sharp relief. although they may wish to allow children creative or interpretive freedom, this is balanced by the need – perceived or real to ensure high educational outcomes, reflecting stephen ball’s fears of how performativity is reshaping how teachers work (ball, 2003, kucharczyk, 2020). in cases like this, the losers are both the teacher who fears professional consequences and the learners, who are denied agency to enter the conversation if they wish to (nias, 1996; zembylas, 2003). accountability then, or fear of it, is a factor in determining the choices made by a teacher rather than the unique circumstances and needs of the learners. these authors feel that this is a sad indictment of a narrow and perhaps unhelpful view of attainment. discussion: power, freedom and children’s rights when using literature it was suggested earlier that a picturebook such as the arrival might be regarded as a pedagogical tool both to enhance representation and to address the power differential between pupil and teacher in terms of freeing up interpretation, an aspect of critical literacy, particularly among marginalised groups. in terms of representation, it can offer a ‘mirror’ for learners from diverse cultural backgrounds human rights education review – volume 3(1) 60 and fulfil their cultural rights through education: they might see themselves in the protagonist’s experiences and, in being represented, realise that they are not alone. its author, shaun tan, has said of his book that he has received many letters ‘from migrant and refugee leaders who see their own experiences accurately reflected in its strange imagery’ (tan, 2010a, p. 6), and this seemed to be the case for some of the children mentioned above. but equally, it was also suggested that it might be used to develop critical literacy insofar as it can empower learners to make their own interpretations of the book’s story, due to its focus on images rather than words. learners may even reject the mirror; in this understanding, it is ‘critical’ because it allows a challenge to the power of the teacher. certainly, as the responses of some of the other children suggest, the so-called mirror may not always offer a clear reflection of their identities, but rather represent a frosted glass mirror or even an obscured or distorted view. as we have seen, even some recent migrants mainly thought of themselves as ‘english’ people, settled rather than migrating, and so reading about migrants was just like reading any other story. this may hint at the book offering more of a ‘window’ than a ‘mirror’, which is also part of sims bishop’s (1992) three-part analogy of a book as mirror-window-sliding glass door. it may then offer a window onto the experience of another person who has a life different from that of the reader. perhaps slightly more problematically (for a teacher), some children seemed to make an initial connection with the characters as migrants, but later appeared to distance themselves from might be termed the ‘deeper’ meaning of the story, writing about the arrival as if it were a light-hearted adventure holiday. it may be that the latter situation illustrated that the experience was too close (rather than too far) from their own experience for them to fully engage with it in the way their teacher (stefan) had hoped. sipe and mcguire (2006) have described resistance as one of six possible responses made by a reader to a story; to use their terminology, the situation above may represent ‘exclusionary’ resistance where the child cannot identity with the story or characters, or ‘engaged’ or ‘kinetic’ resistance due to the evocation or representation of a ‘painful reality’ (p. 8). other researchers (some of whom are also teachers) have also written about meeting such resistance, particularly when using the arrival (see for example, pantaleo & bomphray, 2011; rhoades, dallacqua, kersten, merry & miller, 2015). such examples created an uncomfortable dilemma for stefan as the teacher, and discomfort even when reflecting on it when writing this article at several years remove from the workshops. he had deliberately chosen the book as it connected strongly with his own family’s experience of migration two generations ago, and he expected it to connect with the experiences, stories and emotions of the children from diverse cultural backgrounds he was working with. in other words, he had aimed for representation. and yet, when children appeared to be understanding the book in a range of different ways, he was unsure to what extent he should intervene and redirect their attention and understanding. should he compel them to look in the mirror, thereby wielding his power as the director of learning? or would that reflect an insensitive approach that disrespected children’s education rights and took from them the freedom to think and express themselves and develop their imaginations. it was only on reflection, at some remove from daily classroom life after leaving full-time teaching to focus on leading such bespoke literacy workshops as described in this article, and after further study, that he came to realise just how much power he had wielded as a teacher at such times: the pressures of accountability, performativity and narrowly-understood notions of attainment weighing heavily, with seemingly less space to allow the s. kucharczyk & h. hanna 61 children to make their own interpretations. in jerome’s (2018) binary terminology, this may have led to stefan, at such times, being more of a ‘hypocrite’ than a ‘hero’ in enabling children’s rights. returning to freire, we are reminded of his wider thinking on critical literacy that goes beyond issues of teacher power: his belief that readers bring to their reading (or ‘understanding’) of texts their own situated readings (or ‘understandings’) of the world, and so a kind of mirroring happens, but not a static one (freire, 1985; freire & macedo, 1987). this understanding of reading implies a constant to-ing and fro-ing between text and the world, and constant reflection, interpretation and reinterpretation, processes that should lead to writing and rewriting in a metaphorical sense, in acting upon and transforming the social world. therefore, in this case of culturally diverse primary schools in england, allowing the learners to come to their own understandings of the arrival and, potentially, taking those interpretations and understandings forward with them into their lives outside the classroom, perhaps offers a liberating approach to critical literacy. this freedom is recognisant of giroux’s words earlier (1993, p. 367) on the potential of literacy to lead to empowerment. it perhaps reflects an image of dialogic pedagogy (mercer and dawes, 2011) where the construction of meaning is shared between teachers and learners. in this way, then, the criticality of critical literacy does not always need to come from teachers, who have with their own value-laden approaches, cultural biases and ‘standpoints’ (luke, 2000). education becomes more of a partnership, where teachers step out of their traditional role as power-wielders, directors of learning and controllers of the classroom environment (all aspects common to education systems steeped in accountability and performativity), and go beyond their comfort zones to allow the co-construction of knowledge with children as the ‘experts’ on certain topics (hanna, 2018a; 2019). education systems are often regarded as highly conservative institutions, and we would argue that this has led to a persistent understanding of children as ‘human becomings’ who are under development, rather than full and complete ‘human beings’ (prout & james, 1997). we need to move more towards the understanding that ‘[b]oth children and adults are simultaneously “human beings” and “human becomings”’ (invernizzi & williams, 2007, p. 6). this may help to avoid limiting the agency of children to understand and act when they are engaging with literature that feels relevant to them. lee and zermatten have written (in lansdowne, 2011, p. iv), that ‘experience shows that children…given the time and opportunity, demonstrate not only that they have views, experiences and perspectives to express, but that their expression can contribute positively to decisions that affect the realisation of their rights and wellbeing.’ we would argue that the practice in multicultural primary school classrooms shared in this article reflects this experience. however, if this upsetting of the traditional teacher-pupil power dynamic is not already challenging enough to achieve, teachers are still left with the responsibility of offering representation to children, particularly to those from marginalised groups who are underrepresented in children’s literature. it remains that at least for some children in stefan’s practice, they really did use the arrival as a mirror, visibly relating to and empathising with the characters as they worked out what life in a new country might mean for them. perhaps, then, it is a case of considering more carefully children’s ‘multiple identities’, as kymlicka (1995) has described it, rather than assuming that their migrant or cultural minority identity is at the forefront of their mind or something they might wish to share with others human rights education review – volume 3(1) 62 during literacy activities. returning to sims bishop (1990, p. ix) one last time, to not do this would be to neglect to give young readers the chance to see how they are part of ‘the larger human experience’ and in so doing find ‘self-affirmation’ of these multiple identities. concluding thoughts this article has presented autoethnographic reflections from a primary school teacher’s practice on the ways children interpret the picturebook the arrival (by shaun tan) in culturally diverse primary schools in england. these reflections have been made within a framework of children’s rights, and have considered a number of concepts: representation of minority groups, pictorial interpretation, critical literacy and teacher power. the article has sought to bring out nuanced and alternative interpretations of the book as a ‘mirror’ made by the learners during creative literacy workshops, focusing on how the mirror may be a clear reflection of children’s experiences as well as how it may offer a frosted, distorted or blank view. it is argued that, in such cases, children should not be coerced into a particular interpretation of a book but that their right to freedom of thought and expression should be respected, despite pressures on teachers in an education system focused on accountability, performativity and a distorted way of measuring attainment. it is further suggested that such an approach may allow the true co-construction of knowledge between teacher and learners through breaking down the power differential, in line with freirean thinking on critical literacy and learning. however, there is also a reminder that there is still a responsibility to offer representation to children from backgrounds that are underrepresented in literature, and it is argued that teachers should go beyond the immediately obvious identities of children from migrant histories and consider the multiple identities of children when choosing picturebooks to use in class. in closing, we return to the author of the arrival, and while one can never be entirely certain of an author’s intention, it is reassuring to observe that the interpretations of critical literacy and links with children’s rights to thought and expression highlighted in this article may even be in line with how shaun tan himself would view the task. tan (2010b, n.p.) highlights that the kind of illustrations he used in the book ‘leave out much more than they reveal’, creating a visual experience that is ‘intrinsically partial and fragmentary’. thus, it may be that, despite a teacher’s standpoint and intention in choosing a book such as the arrival in order to connect with migrant learners’ lives – the standpoint that stefan as a practitioner held – the experience may not provide as accurate or evocative a mirror as one might hope. and perhaps this is as it should be. children’s experiences of any book cannot be controlled entirely. ultimately, we must respect their right to choose to look into the mirror or simply read it for what it is: a book. funding helen hanna acknowledges the british academy grant number sg162248 for funding of picturebook and education research that informed some of the analysis described in this article. stefan kucharczyk’s england-based work was done independently of this, as part of his practice as a teacher and literacy consultant. s. kucharczyk & h. hanna 63 declaration of interest statement there are no conflicts of interest. human rights 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https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/cescr.aspx https://doi.org/10.1080/13540600309378 volume 4, no 2 (2021) date received: 07-09-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3989 date accepted: 11-02-2021 issn 2535-5406 decolonial human rights education: changing the terms and content of conversations on human rights anne becker stellenbosch university, republic of south africa abstract: the aim of this paper is to search for possibilities to change the terms and content of conversations on colonial/decolonial human rights education. the content of conversations consists of what we know about human rights. the terms of conversations are the principles, assumptions, and rules of knowing in human rights education. the terms and content are interrelated and continually sustain each other. decoloniality resists global coloniality of power, ontologies and epistemologies which are consequences of colonisation. it also questions the eurocentric assumptions and principles which serve as a premise for human rights and human rights education. there is an urgent need to explore pluriversal knowledges of human rights and to problematise the human of human rights. this is explored through data from roux’s research project human rights literacy: quest for meaning. some thoughts on decolonising human rights education are provided in the conclusion. key words: coloniality, decoloniality, pluriversality, human/human, human rights education anne becker: annebecker@sun.ac.za mailto:annebecker@sun.ac.za human rights education review – volume 4(2) 50 decolonial human rights education: changing the terms and content of conversations on human rights doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3989 issn 2535-5406 anne becker annebecker@sun.ac.za stellenbosch university, republic of south africa abstract: the aim of this paper is to search for possibilities to change the terms and content of conversations on colonial/decolonial human rights education. the content of conversations consists of what we know about human rights. the terms of conversations are the principles, assumptions, and rules of knowing in human rights education. the terms and content are interrelated and continually sustain each other. decoloniality resists global coloniality of power, ontologies and epistemologies which are consequences of colonisation. it also questions the eurocentric assumptions and principles which serve as a premise for human rights and human rights education. there is an urgent need to explore pluriversal knowledges of human rights and to problematise the human of human rights. this is explored through data from roux’s research project human rights literacy: quest for meaning. some thoughts on decolonising human rights education are provided in the conclusion. keywords: coloniality, decoloniality, pluriversality, human/human, human rights education introduction during 2020, the pandemic and economic recession have highlighted global inequality, poverty and grave racial injustice. they have also highlighted the need for human rights education (hahn, 2020). although human rights education has made great strides since the 1990s, there has been critique. both coysh (2014) and osler (2015a) unpack the role of asymmetrical power relations in knowledge production and dissemination in human rights education. adami (2014, p. 165) argues that the role of legal ‘experts’ in the field of human rights education has the consequence that ‘western legal “experts” hold the agency to decide the content’ of human rights education. moghli (2020) relates how her views on human rights education changed towards a more critical stance on the connection and disjunction between human rights theory and practice while conducting research in the occupied west bank. the disjuncture, keet (2015) argues, is one of the consequences of a human rights education which, more often than not, is the uncritical legitimising arm of human rights universals. although many decolonial scholars argue that the premise of the universal declaration of human rights (udhr) (united nations [un)], 1948) is euro-western, decolonisation was very much part of the conversation during its drafting. various scholars and leaders advocated for the rights of colonised peoples (mackinnon, 2019). in 1947, dubois brought the denial of human rights to minority groups in the united states of america and the world to the fore, through petitions to the newly established un and the human rights commission (hrc) (mackinnon, 2019). the mailto:annebecker@sun.ac.za a. becker 51 delegates from india not only advocated for their own right to self-determination but also for the rights of indians living in south africa. by doing so, they provided the un and the hrc with a mandate to think beyond the limits of national sovereignty when it comes to a just world and human rights (bhagavan, 2010). the drafting process of the udhr (1948) brought together diverse peoples and nations, with a diversity of worldviews, religions, and philosophies, in a diplomatic process within which the rights of all humans could be negotiated (adami, 2012). the plight of colonised peoples and minority groups remained in the conversation; in the 1974 unesco recommendation and the 1978 congress it was argued that human rights and human rights education should be connected to anticolonialism and the struggles of people towards their emancipation and freedom. this vision was, however, diluted in subsequent un documents (moghli, 2020). in fidelity to the leaders and scholars who advocated for the rights of colonised peoples during the drafting of the udhr (un, 1948), continuous critique is therefore necessary to facilitate the ‘transformative radicality of human rights education’ (keet, 2012, p. 7). keet and zembylas (2019) advocate for the decolonising of human rights education in order to facilitate renewal. however, as tuck and yang (2012, p. 2) argue, it is easy to talk casually about the need to ‘decolonise our schools, or use decolonising methods, or decolonise student thinking.’ decolonising is not easy work. when it is not used as a metaphor, it is unsettling and difficult (tuck & yang, 2012). mignolo (2018c, p. 170) posits that the main task of decoloniality and decolonising is ‘to decolonise man/human, to liberate pluriversal humanity.’ mignolo (2018c) and maldonado-torres (2007; 2017) argue that the concept of human in human rights is a colonial, euro-western and enlightenment construction which excludes the majority of the global human population. race, as an organising principle, remains a central axis of coloniality and is embedded in the udhr from 1948 (maldonado-torres, 2007; ndlovu-gatsheni, 2019). this results in what yang (2015, p. 225) refers to as ‘the edge between human and human’. decolonial thinking is a bottom-up, communal, and relational process embedded in the struggles and narratives of a pluriversal humanity. walsh and mignolo (2018) call for pluriversal decoloniality and decolonial pluriversality. answers to decolonial questions are derived from ‘a web of consensual relationships that is infused with movement through lived experiences and embodiment’ (walsh, 2018a, p. 18). the notion that human rights education is a relational and contextual practice is not new. scholars such as coysh (2014), adami (2014), zembylas (2017), and ahmed, martin and uddin (2019) have explored human rights education in terms of contextuality, relationality, plurality and uniqueness. decoloniality is also always unfinished. decolonising human rights education requires a global we who can, in fidelity to human rights education, re-imagine decolonial human rights education. this global we refers to all of humanity; it is an acknowledgment and validation of the pluriversality of knowledges and ways of being. the aim of this paper is therefore to search for possibilities to change the terms and content of conversations on colonial/decolonial human rights education in order to decolonise man/human and liberate a global pluriversal humanity. the content of conversations consists of what we know about human rights. the terms of these conversations are the ‘principles, assumptions and rules of knowing’ in human rights and human rights education (mignolo, 2018b, p. 212). content and terms are interrelated and mutually sustain each other. human rights education review – volume 4(2) 52 this paper asks: what are the possibilities for resisting coloniality by changing the terms and content of conversations in and though human rights education? this is explored through two questions from roux’s research project human rights literacy: quest for meaning 2012-2016. the project explored the ontologies and epistemologies of human rights literacies through a rhizomatic research paradigm based on grounded theory methodologies (roux & becker, 2019). although decolonial research does use grounded theory and rhizomatic work (see williams and bermeo, 2020 for a rhizomatic approach to decolonial work), this project was not a decolonial project that followed a decolonial methodology. the data from the project are used to write against coloniality. it is, in the words of mondal (2014, p. 2965), ‘writing that sets out in one way or another to resist colonialist perspective’. to start the conversation, brief explanations of decoloniality and the relation between coloniality/decoloniality and human rights education are provided. the terms and content of conversations are then explored through data. in the conclusion, possibilities of moving towards decolonial human rights education are presented. decoloniality colonialism was the colonising of the physical spaces and bodies of the colonised by the coloniser. different regions around the world tell different stories of when their local histories were disrupted by spanish, dutch, portuguese, french or british invasions (mignolo, 2018c). decolonisation is understood as the undoing of colonialism, or the process by which a colonised country gains independence (mignolo, 2018d). the success of the decolonisation movements during and after the 1960s led to the liberation of many colonies but the failure of these movements points to the fact that the logic of coloniality was left intact (ndlovu-gatsheni, 2015). coloniality refers to patterns of power, knowledge and being which emerged as a result of colonialism and are still embedded in global society. they are manifested through the euro-western ontological, epistemological, and hermeneutical principles in religion, science and philosophy, by which colonial power was created and continues to be sustained and managed (ndlovu-gatsheni, 2015). global coloniality thus outlives colonialism and decolonisation and ‘cannot be separated from euro-modernity’ (ndlovu-gatsheni, 2019, p. 210). moldonado-torres (2007, p. 243) argues that ‘as modern subjects, we breath [sic] coloniality all the time and every day.’ it defines human relations, subjectivities, identities, cultures, and knowledge. decoloniality is the resistance to hegemonic knowledge, assumptions, rules and terms which keep the logic of coloniality in place (mignolo, 2018d; ndlovugatsheni, 2015). it is a trans and inter-disciplinary concept lived through, and embedded in, continual resistance to coloniality (mignolo, 2018d) decoloniality is therefore praxis-driven. the premise of ‘decolonial thinking and doing is the praxis of living’ (mignolo, 2018d, p. 107). although decolonial praxis describes a pluriversal global, it ‘cannot be other than local’ (walsh & mignolo, 2018, p. 2). it is always contextually grounded. it searches for the otherwise in looking at pluriversal epistemologies and ontologies through local histories, subjectivities, knowledges, narratives and struggles against the colonial/modern order (walsh & mignolo, 2018). decolonial thinking happens with and from a plurality of standpoints and struggles through pluriversal and a. becker 53 interversal approaches and horizons (walsh & mignolo, 2018; ndlovu-gatsheni, 2019). pluriversal and interversal paths interrupt the totality from which the universal and global are perceived. it means that ‘what should be universal is in fact pluriversal, and not a single totality’ (mignolo, 2018a, p. 147). this does not mean that western knowledge has no role to play in human rights or human rights education. pluriversal knowledges include western knowledge. pluriversal knowledges entail an intercultural co construction of theory, reflection and praxis, seeking and acknowledging diverse understandings of the world, of being and of knowledge (walsh, 2018b). this enables an ongoing contextual, relational movement to possibilities of pluriversal otherwise modes of being, knowing, sensing and living (walsh, 2018b). decoloniality and human rights education although the decolonisation phase of human rights and resulting decolonisation movements happened during the 1960s, the decolonial pushback on human rights can be traced to the 1950s, with fanon (1952/2008) and césaire (1950/2000) (moyn, 2014; mignolo, 2011; becker, 2020). after the adoption of the udhr in 1948. césaire published his discourse on colonialism (1950) and fanon his black skin, white masks (1952/2008). for césaire (1950/2000), the udhr was a limited response to a wrongly framed question which narrowly considered nazism and anti-semitism and not the wider problem of colonialism and growing racism (maldonado-torres, 2017). adami (2016), referencing mutua (2002), points out that the conceptualisation of human rights in 1948 was premised on the atrocities of world war ii and western problems and cultural values. ingrained racism, sexism and resulting exclusions, however, predate the udhr from 1948. despite, for example, the acceptance of equality and liberty in the late 1800s, these ideals did not apply to black and indigenous peoples, slaves, women and persons who did not own property (woldeyes & offord, 2018). the crucial and fundamental question regarding different forms of being (human/human) was never addressed by the udhr (maldonado-torres, 2017). colonised subjects were excluded from the human rights texts of the 1940s (maldonado-torres, 2017; moyn, 2014). even during the 1950s, colonial powers inserted a clause in policies to ensure that human rights were not applicable in colonies (moyn, 2014). anticolonial human rights movements only started in the 1960s, when the un general assembly resolution 1514 condemned colonisation (moyn, 2014). the concept human in human rights theory is still embedded in a colonial layer of individualism and racism (maldonado-torros, 2017, p. 131). all humans might be born equal, but they do not remain so. mignolo (2011, p. 157) posits: ‘for all humans being born equal, losing their equality is a humiliating experience.’ despite disagreements and conflicts, human rights education and decolonial education can learn from each other. they both involve unsettling, unlearning and relearning, and they both disrupt the status quo. the question, however, is towards what do they unsettle, disrupt, unlearn and relearn. the contrasting answers to this question provide us with the current fault line between human rights education and decoloniality. human rights education is deliberatively designed to dislodge and shift values and behaviour towards those set out by the udhr (ahmed, martin & uddin, 2019). the decolonial project ‘is to unsettle and disobey’ the practice and praxis of human rights education review – volume 4(2) 54 coloniality which, decolonial scholars argue, is the premise of the universal assumptions of the udhr (walsh & mignolo, 2018, p. 9; keet & zembylas, 2019). before the data are presented, some methodological considerations are discussed. methodological considerations roux’s research project, human rights literacy: quest for meaning emerged from previous research projects in human rights education within intercultural and interreligious contexts. it consisted of two phases. phase one (2012–2014) commenced in april 2012 and was initiated in south african higher education contexts. the second phase (2015–2016) started in march 2015 and included international contexts. some members of the international team were involved in previous studies on multicultural or multireligious education and indicated their continued interest in the literacy project. the countries for phase two were, however, chosen in order to include countries from the global north and the global south as the aim was to explore how meaning-making of human rights crystallises in diverse contexts. as data from the previous research projects indicated a lack of knowledge of human rights in primary and secondary teaching and learning, the research team decided to focus on human rights education in teacher education at selected south african universities during the first phase. during the second phase, participants were included if they had been enrolled in a human rights education module at a tertiary institution or if their chosen professions would require them to deal with human rights issues (education, sociology, education law, law, political science, public health). the purpose was to explore how they make meaning of human rights and to ascertain their human rights literacy levels. the project was a multidisciplinary effort. the research team consisted of scholars in human rights education (south africa and israel), religion education (south africa, netherlands, israel), peace education (israel), education law (south africa), sociology (south africa and india), social sciences (germany and india), curriculum studies (south africa) and teacher training (netherlands, south africa, germany, israel). the project used mixed methods of data collection and mixed methods of data analysis (roux & becker, 2019). during the first phase an online survey (2013/n=1086) included structured multichoice questions with likert scale options (quantitative data), open-ended questions and optional comment boxes (qualitative data). focus group discussions (2013/68 focus group participants) were used to crystallise the survey data and the ontological and epistemological understandings of participants (roux & becker, 2019). the participants in the survey and focus groups were students from six different faculties of education in south africa. during the second phase a revised (international) online survey (consisting of quantitative and qualitative questions / n=351), based on the survey used in phase one, was used. universities in germany, india, israel, south africa and a teacher education college in the netherlands took part. participants in the survey and focus groups were students from faculties of education (south africa, germany, india, netherlands and israel) as well as from faculties of sociology (south africa and india), education law (south africa), and law, public health, social and political sciences in india. there were only focus group discussions (2015/39 focus group participants) in two sites (israel and netherlands), and these were facilitated by the respective a. becker 55 collaborators. the collaborators indicated that they wanted to explore the survey data in more depth. during 2015 only three south african sites could be accessed for data collection as it was during the time of the #mustfall protests at south african universities. there were therefore fewer participants. the aim in the second phase was to explore ontologies and epistemologies of human rights and human rights education in different and diverse contexts, each with its own rhythm of histories, human activities, human rights processes and human rights structures (roux & becker, 2019). it was not a comparative study. neither can data be generalised, as the sites in phase two represented diverse epistemological communities in specific place-space-time (sporre, 2019). sporre (2019) explains how theorising within and between diverse epistemological communities depends on each researcher, within his/her context, communicating, understanding and explaining data and context. the project explored how themes and human rights meaning-making crystallise differently in unique and diverse place-space-time. place is understood as being constructed by sociological facts which form in social spaces and not as geographical boundaries. meaning-making is not enabled through geographical borders but through discursive factors and their consequences (becker & roux, 2019). one of the limitations but also strengths of the project was the fact that in some of the contexts there are no formal human rights education programmes or modules—human rights form a small part of citizenship or civic education. this is a limitation as participants from the netherlands, for example, had very little knowledge of human rights and had difficulty in negotiating the answer choices. this can, however, also be viewed as a strength as it highlighted the gaps in human rights knowledge which should be addressed. in citizenship education the ‘nation-state remains a potent concept as well as a political reality’ and schools generally focus on a national perspective instead of a human rights one (osler, 2015a, p. 255; becker & roux, 2019). survey data are referenced as (s2015q22): s (survey) 2015 (date – second international phase) q22 (question number). data emanating from the first phase small focus group discussions are referenced fgd2013_s1y4m1: fgd2013 (2013 focus group discussions), indicating site 1 (s1), fourth year students (y4), first meeting (m1). data emanating from the second phase focus group discussions are referenced as fgd2015g1m2 _il: (fgd2015 =focus group discussions during second phase 2015; g1 = group number; m2 =meeting number; il =country [il = israel, nl= netherlands]). the origin story and premise of human rights in changing the terms and content of conversations on and in human rights, we should be aiming towards a pluriversal humanity and pluriversal knowledges. knowledge has a privileged position in the framework of coloniality as it is evident in both the terms and the content (mignolo, 2018a). the content consists of knowledge of human rights, and the terms are the principles, assumptions and the rules of knowing what human rights are and who the subjects of human rights are. the interrelated movement between terms and content determines both knowledge of human rights and the assumptions of who the ‘human’ in human rights is. a recognition of pluriversal knowledges of human rights involves defining, understanding and honouring multiple knowledges, epistemologies, ways of being and differing ways of viewing relationships to others, the earth and the cosmos (hardbarger, 2019). in accommodating such a broad understanding of pluriversality, human rights education review – volume 4(2) 56 williams and bermeo (2020) propose the notion of pluriversal rights education. within the broad understanding of pluriversality, the data presented and discussed in this article only represent a fraction of what pluriversality entails. the data, which are illustrative, only deal with a small aspect of knowledge of human rights and the assumptions and principles through which they are validated. validated knowledge of the origin and premise of human rights is eurocentric; it came into existence within a specific political order grounded in the liberal views of modernity and the enlightenment (zembylas, 2017). during the conceptualisation of the udhr the atrocities of world war ii, western problems and cultural values were foregrounded (adami, 2016). the euro-western premise of human rights is contested by african and decolonial scholars. ikuenobe (2018) criticises donnelly (1982), who argues that the concept of human rights is the artefact of western civilisation. ikuenbo (2018, p. 589) responds that this implies human rights are not suitable for non-western cultures, which is ‘not only presumptuous, because it involves a misunderstanding of african views of personhood and dignity, but also absurd’. in the following table, participants’ views on the premise of human rights are presented. the list of possible answer choices presented in table 1 was compiled in reference to literature on the premise of human rights and data from previous research projects. as the majority of the literature on the premise of human rights originates from the global north and previous projects featured only south african participants, representing the global south, most of the answer choices are embedded in a modern/colonial framework. this, however, presents possibilities to write against coloniality. the first four ranked answer choices from each site are highlighted. table 1. question 22: which philosophies underpin human rights? (choose a maximum of three) (s2015q22) answer choice responses (%) rsa n=124 india n=74 germany n=23 netherlands n=42 israel n=52 humanism 40.3 62.2 52.2 52.4 55.8 democracy 71.8 59.5 73.9 47.6 51.9 liberalism 10.5 40.5 34.8 19.1 28.9 socialism 24.2 37.8 21.7 26.2 40.4 neo-liberalism 1.6 18.9 0 0 13.5 capitalism 4.8 16.2 0 4.8 1.9 cosmopolitanism 16.9 10.8 4.4 0 3.9 communalism 8.9 10.8 0 16.7 7.7 a. becker 57 neo-colonialism 1.6 9.5 4.4 2.4 1.9 ubuntu 63.7 6.8 0 2.4 0 western values 12.9 6.8 21.7 19.1 23.1 i don’t know 11.3 5.4 17.4 40.5 17.3 from the table it is evident that for most of the participants, human rights are underpinned by humanism and democracy. decolonial scholars and advocates for pluriversal knowledge in human rights education argue against this prevalence of humanism and its assumptions. in india 62.2 % of participants chose humanism and 59.5% chose democracy. in germany 73.9% chose democracy and 52.2% humanism. in the netherlands 52.4% of participants chose humanism and 47.6% chose democracy. note that in the netherlands 40.5% of participants indicated that they did not know. in israel 55.8% chose humanism and 51.9% democracy. it should be noted that in south africa 71.8% of participants chose democracy and only 40.3% chose humanism. for south african participants, human rights are linked to the birth of constitutional democracy and the south african bill of rights in 1996. what is interesting is that liberalism, which is often cited as the premise of human rights in human rights discourse and literature, only featured as one of the top four choices in data from india (40.5%), germany (34.8%) and israel (28.9%). while three of the participant groups chose liberalism as one of their top four answers, socialism featured in all groups as one of the top four choices (south africa, 24.2%; india, 37.8%; germany, 21.7%; netherlands, 26.2%; israel, 40.4%). for german participants, socialism and western values were their joint fourth choice, while for south african participants, ubuntu was their second choice. western values as the premise for human rights was included as an answer choice as participants (south african) in previous projects indicated that there is an assumption that human rights are premised only on western values. ubuntu, chosen by 63.7% of south african participants as the premise of human rights, is an african philosophy and world view, focussing on community, compassion and relationality. during the 2013 focus group discussions, participants were asked to explain the origin of human rights in africa and to explain the concept of ubuntu. some excerpts are included by way of explanation (verbatim). pm1: i would say that human rights are not foreign to africa. like we have said it relates to ubuntu. it [human rights] is much more african in the sense that we do care about each other. (fgd2013s1y4m1). researcher: explain ubuntu to me pm2: i think ubuntu is all about interacting with others, with people. helping them and taking into consideration their rights and accept all cultures. (fgd2013s1y4m1). pf1: it is about compassion. (fgd2013s1y4m1). pm2: it is about helping people. sometimes you help people. next time you will need the help. (fgd2013s1y4m1). human rights education review – volume 4(2) 58 the african view of rights advocates a relational and not an individualistic approach. personhood and dignity are defined within a framework which considers the lived experiences of a person’s relations with others in the community. this contrasts with the western view, which removes the individual, her autonomy, and her rights from the community (ikuenobe, 2018). in choosing an indigenous framework as the premise of human rights, south african participants challenged and contested euro-western understandings of human rights. this opens up possibilities for a pluriversal knowledge of human rights. as ubuntu is an african worldview, it indicates the relation between understandings of human rights and place-space-time. although the udhr is read by western scholars through a western, liberal lens, ‘there could be stories in other parts of the world, revealing different contextual frames for understanding human rights values.’ (adami, 2012, p. 25). who and what is the human in human rights? maldonado-torres (2017) argues that any decolonial conversation on human rights needs to start with the decolonising of the concept of human (maldonado-torres, 2017, p. 117). the movement between terms and content, between ontology and epistemology, in the colonial framework, cements their relationship. the movement and relation between terms and content in decoloniality is therefore also important. although mignolo (2018a, p. 135) focusses on epistemology and posits that ‘ontologies are cosmologic/epistemic creations’, both fanon (1952/2008) and maldonado-torres (2017) argue that decolonising starts with the coloniality of being (ontology). decolonising for fanon (1952/2008) and williams and bermeo (2020) requires the decolonising of being and of relationality. during colonisation, vertical identities were created, using race, caste, gender and sexuality as categories of human differentiation. race, specifically, through its intersectional nature, alters the ways in which other forms of human differentiation work. it concerns the degree of humanity attributed to different identities and subjectivities. as whiteness is inscribed in the human, the lighter the skin colour the closer the individual is to full humanity. this is what yang (2015, p. 225) refers to as ‘the edge between human and human’. there is a distinction between colonial difference and ontological colonial difference. colonial difference is the consequence of colonisation and ongoing coloniality of power, knowledge and being. ontological colonial difference is the specific product of coloniality of being (maldonado-torres, 2007, p. 254). it is the existential condition of a non-being linked to race, ethnicity, gender, religion and sexuality (maldonado-torres, 2007). it is a process of degradation where ‘the meaning of human alterity [is violated] to the point where the alter ego becomes a subalter.’ (maldonado-torres, 2007, p. 257). it produces doubt as to the full humanity (human or human) of the subalter. fanon (1961/2017, p. 82) refers to this condition as being ‘sealed into [that] crushing objecthood.’ the existential condition of only being ‘human’ is crystallised by participants’ responses in the following table. the statement: all humans have inherent dignity and are therefore entitled to rights is from the preamble of the udhr (un, 1948). this statement is fully accepted in human rights rhetoric. however, it seems it might only be fully accepted on a discursive level, and this also points to the disjunction between discursive human rights theory and material reality explored by moghli (2020) and a. becker 59 keet (2015). the analysis focuses on participants’ hesitation in fully committing to all humans. the i agree somewhat and i neither agree nor disagree answer choices are highlighted. table 2. q 38 all human beings have inherent dignity and are therefore entitled to rights s2015q38 answer choice responses (%) rsa n=124 india n=74 germany n=22 netherlands n=42 israel n=52 i fully agree 67.0 88.7 72.7 35.7 54.2 i agree somewhat 27.0 7.0 18.2 40.5 29.2 i neither agree nor disagree 2.6 1.4 9.1 19.1 10.4 i disagree somewhat 2.6 0 0 4.8 2.1 i totally disagree 0.9 2.8 0 0 4.2 the given statement can be divided into two statements: all humans have inherent dignity and all humans are entitled to rights; the answer choices do not differentiate between the two possibilities. the statement and answer choices assume a link between all humans having dignity and all humans having rights. a high percentage of participants over all five sites fully agreed with the statement. although a percentage of participants hesitated to include all humans in dignity and rights, very few participants answered in the negative (i disagree somewhat and i totally disagree). participants from india overwhelmingly chose the i fully agree option (88.7%) despite the fact that india has horrific ethnic and religious violence (kumar & banerjee, 2019). all indian participants had human rights education incorporated in their curricula and they might therefore regard the statement as a discursive fact and not necessarily relate it to material reality. south african participants had human rights education incorporated in curricula in 1994 and only 67.0% of them fully agreed with the statement that all humans have dignity and rights. it does not seem as if south african participants regard this statement as a discursive or material fact, and this might be a consequence of south africa’s history of colonialism and apartheid. israel had the lowest number of participants (54.2%) who fully agreed with the statement and the highest number of participants who agreed only somewhat (29.2%). as israel is a complicated and complex society, some focus group excerpts might shed light on conflicts and complexities (verbatim). the following statement was made by a jewish israeli participant: human rights education review – volume 4(2) 60 pm2: can i make a comment about human rights in israel, human rights are associated by israelis as pro-palestine agenda usually, and people [human rights advocates] have taken the part of the palestinian aspect. people have a little bit of a…. (fgd2015g1m2 _il) researcher: resistance? pm2: resistance. when you say human rights that is the first thing that pops into my head. when you say religious rights, gender and everything that is what human rights really is…. because the human rights organisations in israel are very involved with palestinians… (fgd2015g1m2 _il) opinion polls indicate that the majority of young jewish people do not believe that palestinian citizens should enjoy equal rights (gordon, 2012). although palestinian arabs are afforded equality under the law, they suffer discrimination at every societal level. this is due to the negative assumptions and attitudes of jewish israeli society (gross & maor, 2019). in exploring the disjuncture between human rights theory and material reality in the occupied west bank, moghli (2020, p. 18) references a palestinian participant: ‘human rights are great but when it comes to palestine, they mean nothing.... you hear me.... nothing. it does not matter what methods we use to resist, we will always be dehumanised and called terrorists.’ in recent decades, the israeli labour force has been flooded with non-jewish labour migrants. perceptions and attitudes towards non-jewish workers or migrants are extremely negative in jewish israeli society (groos & maor, 2019). various israeli participants discussed their fear (and sometimes hate) of different others (because he is not my own colour or is from a different country or culture or something like that) and the dissonance and conflict resulting from it (verbatim): pm1: and the people of the neighbourhood who have lived there for years are frightened to walk at night because of the crime rate which is through the sky since these immigrants have come to their town. so, the right wing, so to speak, not political, would say kick them out, send them away, okay and the human rights are saying let’s show them compassion, we are jews, we are israelis. but there is a conflict there… (fgd2015g3m1_il) pf2: i think we fear someone because he is not my own colour or is from a different country or culture or something like that. so, i can have a fear for him. but it is not always hate or should become hate. like if he is different from me so i can come to know about his culture. here in israel you can see all kinds of people, cultures, israeli, arab, russian, and if you like, not to become friends, but you can have interaction with them so maybe the fear will disappear, and will not become hate. (fgd2015g4m1_il) from the focus group data presented it seems as if the difficulty participants had to commit to all humans having dignity and rights is due to historic assumptions, prejudice and negative attitudes to people not my own colour or [is] from a different country or culture or something like that (participant pf2: fgd2015g4m1_il). the data indicate a colonial suppression of being (see moghli, 2020 and gordon, 2012), and an existential condition of non-being linked to race, ethnicity and religion for those not included in the jewish israeli community (cf. maldonado-torres, 2007). a. becker 61 the high percentage of participants from the netherlands who chose i agree somewhat or i neither agree nor disagree might be due to the fact that they had had very little exposure to human rights education programmes (ter avest & stedenburg, 2019). the focus group discussions do, however, shed some light. participants constructed subjects of the third world [sic] as not part of the human of human rights. participants (fgd2017_nl) explained human rights as a self-evident practice in western countries and specifically in the netherlands, and argued that ‘life in the netherlands is all inclusive regarding human rights, however not selfevident in the third world’ [sic] (fgd2017_nl) (ter avest & stedenburg, 2019). osler (2015a, p. 252) posits that such processes of othering lead to notions where the non-european outsider needs to be induced into and included in ‘our’ (european) human rights culture. by inviting the other to be included in ‘our’ human rights, ‘dominant social groups reassert their territoriality’ and determine who speaks, what they should say and how it should be said (ahenakew, 2016, p. 324). such a process of degradation results in doubt as to the full humanity of the other and the possibilities for inclusion in the human rights framework. decolonial human rights education and a pluriversal humanity in the previous sections, the colonial nature of human rights education was explored. there are two points to consider: decolonising the human in human rights, and working towards pluriversal knowledge for a pluriversal humanity. becker and becker (2021) use fanon’s (1961/2017) notion of the three stages of decolonisation to explain a process of decolonial becoming-human which might be of benefit to human rights education. there is continual movement between the three phases. using fanon’s (1961/2017) work on decolonising, an onto-epistemological decolonial process which is continual, relational and always in-becoming is proposed for human rights education. decolonising is an inter-related embodied process and praxis moving continuously between decolonising both being and knowledge. the first phase in decolonising entails an acknowledgement of colonial suppression and assimilation into a culture that imposes hegemonic universal standards of being (ontology) and knowing (epistemology) (fanon, 1961/2017). lamola (2018, p. 7) argues that colonial being is ‘not merely an idea of the othering subject or a representation of a capricious colonial mind.’ it entails a continuous negation of self. lamola (2018, p. 7) unpacks this process as follows: ‘others tell and teach her who she is, pricking and shaping her self-consciousness. she is not her own.’ when historic and oppressive ontologies and epistemologies are acknowledged, critical consciousness develops and reflexive engagement with difference becomes possible. this can bring about increased agency and a feeling of being seen and heard (hardbarger, 2019). through enabling a plurality of voices speaking for themselves in classrooms, each student recognises and acknowledges self in unique difference (adami, 2014). the second phase of decolonising involves a reclaim and recall of full humanity. while the first phase focusses on acknowledging self and other in difference, the second phase focusses on recognition and relationality. this requires an acceptance of fanon’s argument (1952/2008, p. 87; becker & becker, 2021): ‘since the other was reluctant to recognise me, there was only one answer: to make myself known’. human rights education review – volume 4(2) 62 during 2020, #blacklivesmatter, which started in 2013 in the usa, grew into a global social justice and human rights movement. during 2020, global blacklivesmatter protests were aimed, as fanon (1952/2008, p.87) posits, ‘to make myself known’ and to move along the path towards being recognised as fully human. this was also evident in the #mustfall student movements of 2015-2016 in south africa. students, in recognising the ongoing coloniality in higher education in south africa, could no longer be invisible or silent (becker, 2017). human rights education could and should be a strategic partner to such movements. hahn (2020) references parker (2018), who advocates for enacted human rights education curricula which include notions of dissent, activism, respect and human dignity. attempts at claiming full humanity are, however, not new and point to decades of ongoing coloniality and decolonial resistance. during the 1960s, malcolm x (1998, p. 110) said the following: ‘in this country the black man [sic] is not only not respected as a citizen, he is not even respected as a human.’ he insisted on human rights which would imply that every human being would be granted the status of full humanity. he was also steadfast in his resolve to incorporate the udhr in the struggle against coloniality and racism (yang, 2015). the resistance to ontological coloniality of difference is a historic and ongoing struggle. claiming full humanity requires mutual recognition of all of humanity, for all of humanity. it requires a global we. nothing less than reciprocity in recognising each other’s full humanity will suffice (becker & becker, 2021). fanon posits (1952/2008, p. 169): ‘if i make the two-way movement unachievable, i keep the other withinhimself. in an extreme degree, i deprive him of being-for-self.’ legal recognition, on its own, is insufficient in this process (osler, 2015a), which demands the recognition of the full humanity of all humans, equal and dignified in their uniqueness. for human rights education to enable such recognition there needs to be a shift towards a focus on the subjects of rights in ethical narrative spaces in which they can express personal narratives, counter-narratives and explore new collective narratives (osler, 2015b). coloniality and decoloniality are embodied and dissonant experiences. cook-sather, kenealy, rippel and beyer (2018) argue for pedagogies which recognise and value diversity, centre students’ knowledge and experiences, and build deep relationships with others and with knowledges connected to their lived experiences. in developing an assignment on jacqueline woodson’s poem ‘it’ll be scary sometimes’ they created spaces for their students to listen to each other and to speak and respond in their own voices (cook-sather et al., 2018, p. 133). to resist coloniality and to speak in one’s own voice takes courage. cook-sather et al. (2018, p. 141), reported that students confessed that it was scary to speak in their own voices, to be ‘vulnerable’, ‘to share a piece of myself ‘. when lamola (2018, p. 7) laments that ‘she is not her own’, such safe narrative spaces are needed in order for her to recognise and acknowledge herself, and for others to recognise her. in these spaces, answers to decolonial questions can also be found, in a mutual ‘web of consensual relationships that is infused with movement through lived experiences and embodiment’ (walsh, 2018a, p. 18). human rights have been, since their inception, the result of many contradictory, conflicted struggles of people to realise their rights (see mackinnon, 2019; adami, 2012). in human rights education, teachers should continually narrate these historic and ongoing contradictions and conflicts (keet & zembylas, 2019). pluriversal and embodied human rights education is a bottom-up process about ‘the hopes, needs and experiences of human beings in specific situations.’ (blanchard & a. becker 63 nix, 2019, p. 66). there is an urgent need to re-phrase the history and premise of human rights by including pluriversal and interconnected (human, planetary, cosmic) sufferings, struggles and conflicts. during the final phase of decolonising, possibilities for pluriversality in and though human rights education open (fanon, 1952/2008). this phase requires a shift away from hegemonic universal ontologies and epistemologies and ways of being and knowing towards pluriversal and transversal otherwise ways of being and knowing. in this phase, options, and choices for otherwise ways of thinking, living, speaking, listening, acting and being appear (becker & becker, 2021). such pluriversal understandings of being and knowing distrupt and decentre eurocentric hegemonic assumptions and knowledges (keet & zembylas, 2019). this opens a plurality of epistemic spaces for all silenced subaltern voices and knowledges. concluding thoughts although decolonial work can be difficult and will cause dissonance, it brings about healing and restoring. globally there is a need for otherwise knowledges and conceptualisations of being human, and human rights education is crucial to this. this article has aimed to problematise colonial assumptions and possibilities for resistance in human rights education. while problematising coloniality, there is however also a need for researchers and teachers to carefully consider ‘the paradoxes and limitations of translating insights between indigenous and nonindigenous spaces’ (ahenakew, 2016, p. 337). it is hoped that, in fidelity to human rights education and in fidelity to the scholars and leaders advocating for colonial peoples during the drafting of the udhr there will be continuous careful and reflexive conversations on decolonial human rights education. there are possibilities to resist coloniality in human rights education. the colonial principles and assumptions through which the human/human is constructed should be disrupted. the data in this study furthermore indicates that there are possibilities to disrupt colonial hegemony and move towards pluriversal knowledges and understandings. this was illustrated by south african participants proposing ubuntu as the premise of human rights. such resistance open possibilities for the inclusion of decolonial otherwise histories, sufferings, struggles, conflicts, and re-awakenings in human rights knowledges. a continual and relational ontoepistemological decolonial process which is always in-becoming, could change both the terms and content of conversations in human rights education. when a plurality of voices, speaking for themselves in decolonial becoming, are enabled, decolonising of different and unique selves will lead to mutual recognition. a pluriversal humanity can then move towards understanding and honouring multiple knowledges, epistemologies, ways of being and relationships to others, the earth, and the cosmos within the place-space-time we share. human rights education review – volume 4(2) 64 references adami, r. 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(2018c). the invention of the human and the three pillars of the colonial matrix of power. in w.d. mignolo & c. e. walsh (eds.), on decoloniality (pp. 154-176). durham, n. carolina: duke university press. mignolo, w. d. (2018d). what does it mean to decolonise? in w.d. mignolo & c. e. walsh (eds.), on decoloniality (pp. 105-134). durham, n. carolina: duke university press. https://doi.org/10.1515/9780822371779-008 https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-99567-0_10 https://doi.org/10.4102/the.v3i0.55 https://doi.org/10.1177/0090591718780697 https://doi.org/10.1080/09502380601162548 https://doi.org/10.4000/rccs.6793 https://conservancy.umn.edu/handle/11299/182855 https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822371779-008 https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822371779-012 https://doi.org/10.1515/9780822371779-008 a. becker 67 moghli, a. m. 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(2019). foreword: why (re)search? and, human rights literacies. in c.roux & a. becker (eds.), human rights literacies: future directions (pp.v-x). springer international. ter avest, i., & stedenburg, e. (2019). more than education: reflections on understandings of student teachers on human rights. in c.roux & a. becker (eds.), human rights literacies: future directions (pp.153-180). springer international. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-99567-0_7 tuck, e., & yang, k. w. (2012). decolonization is not a metaphor. decolonization: indigeneity. education & society, 1(1), 1-40. united nations. (1948). universal declaration of human rights. (a/res/217(iii). retrieved from https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights https://repository.usfca.edu/ijhre/vol4/iss1/5 https://doi.org/10.9783/9780812204155 https://doi.org/10.1111/hic3.12264 https://doi.org/10.1080/00933104.2015.1034393 https://doi.org/10.1080/2005615x.2015.1048605 https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2450 https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-99567-0_5 https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-99567-0_7 https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights human rights education review – volume 4(2) 68 walsh, c. e. (2018a). the decolonial for: resurgences, shifts and movements. in w.d. mignolo & c. e. walsh (eds.), on decoloniality (pp. 15-32). durham, n. carolina: duke university press. https://doi.org/10.1515/9780822371779-003 walsh, c.e. (2018b). interculturality and decoloniality. in w.d. mignolo & c. e. walsh (eds.), on decoloniality, (pp. 57-80). durham, n. carolina: duke university press. https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822371779-004 walsh, c. e., & mignolo, w. (2018). introduction. in w.d. mignolo & c. e. walsh (eds.), on decoloniality (pp. 1-15). durham, n. carolina: duke university press. https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822371779-001 williams, h. m. a., & bermeo, m. j. (2020). a decolonial imperative: pluriversal rights education. international journal of human rights education, 4(1). retrieved from https://repository.usfca.edu/ijhre/vol4/iss1/1 woldeyes, y.g., & offord, b. (2018). decolonizing human rights education: critical pedagogy praxis in higher education. the international education journal: comparative perspectives, 17 (1), 24-36. retrieved from https://openjournals.library.sydney.edu.au/index.php/iej yang, k. w. (2015). afterword: will human rights education be decolonising? in s. r. katz & a.m. spero (eds.), bringing human rights in us classrooms. exemplary models from elementary grades to university (pp. 225-236). new york, ny: palgrave macmillan. zembylas, m. (2017). re-contextualising human rights education: some decolonial strategies and pedagogical/curricular possibilities. pedagogy, culture and society, 25(4), 1–13. https://doi.org/10.1080/14681366.2017.1281834 https://doi.org/10.1515/9780822371779-003 https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822371779-004 https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822371779-001 https://repository.usfca.edu/ijhre/vol4/iss1/1 https://openjournals.library.sydney.edu.au/index.php/iej https://doi.org/10.1080/14681366.2017.1281834 volume 3, no 2 (2020) date received: 04-02-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3720 date accepted: 31-08-2020 issn 2535-5406 #metoo in school: teachers’ and young learners’ lived experience of verbal sexual harassment as a pedagogical opportunity beate goldschmidt-gjerløw university of agder, norway. irene trysnes university of agder, norway. abstract: based on a case study of verbal sexual harassment experienced by a young female teacher and her 17-year-old student in a norwegian upper secondary school, this article addresses challenges and strengths of drawing upon negative experiences of ‘lived injustice’ in class, arguing that such experiences can serve as a resource for education about, through and for human rights. complementing this case study, we discuss a survey we have conducted among secondary school students (n=382), concerning how young learners report being sexually harassed and how often they experience that an adult intervenes in the situation. combining the theoretical framework of human rights education (hre) and the concepts of intersectionality and recognition, this article discusses the pedagogical potential of drawing upon teachers’ and young learners’ experiences of verbal sexual harassment. keywords: sexual harassment, #metoo, human rights education, recognition, intersectionality corresponding author: beate goldschmidt-gjerløw: beate.goldschmidt-gjerlow@uia.no http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3720 mailto:beate.goldschmidt-gjerlow@uia.no b. goldschmidt-gjerløw & i. trysnes 28 #metoo in school: teachers’ and young learners’ lived experience of verbal sexual harassment as a pedagogical opportunity doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3720 issn 2535-5406 beate goldschmidtgjerløw university of agder, norway. beate.goldschmidt-gjerlow@uia.no irene trysnes university of agder, norway. abstract: based on a case study of verbal sexual harassment experienced by a young female teacher and her 17-year-old student in a norwegian upper secondary school, this article addresses challenges and strengths of drawing upon negative experiences of ‘lived injustice’ in class, arguing that such experiences can serve as a resource for education about, through and for human rights. complementing this case study, we discuss a survey we have conducted among secondary school students (n=382), concerning how young learners report being sexually harassed and how often they experience that an adult intervenes in the situation. combining the theoretical framework of human rights education (hre) and the concepts of intersectionality and recognition, this article discusses the pedagogical potential of drawing upon teachers’ and young learners’ experiences of verbal sexual harassment. keywords: sexual harassment, #metoo, human rights education, recognition, intersectionality introduction the #metoo movement is part of a historical development of democratisation processes and the human struggle for recognition, because ‘the desire for the state to recognize one’s basic dignity has been at the core of democratic movements since the french revolution’ (fukuyama, 2018, p.49). when referring to the #metoo movement, fukuyama pinpoints how it was the lack of respect and feelings of being denied equal status as human beings that ignited a struggle for recognition that has involved millions of women (fukuyama, 2018). there are teachers in norway struggling for recognition of dignity and rights. this can be illustrated by a shocking recent case – a female teacher experienced being filmed underneath her skirt by one of her young male students in an upper secondary school, and her student shared the film with 19 classmates. she pressed charges, and the student was convicted, according to the norwegian penal code § 266, for violating another person’s peace through reckless behaviour. this was unprecedented in norwegian legal history (kolsrud, 2020). this female teacher is one of many who have experienced unwanted sexual attention. statistics norway has produced a report (with, 2018) on violence, threats, and harassment in different professions, based on a living conditions survey from 2016 (n=8162). according to this report, employees in the educational sector are exposed to violence, threats, and unwanted mailto:beate.goldschmidt-gjerlow@uia.no human rights education review – volume 3(2) 29 sexual attention to a relatively high extent. there are gender differences: fourteen percent of female teachers and six percent of male teachers reported having been exposed to violence, threats, or unwanted sexual attention. however, the emotional dimensions of teachers’ experience of sexual harassment in school, and how they deal with this phenomenon, has not been thoroughly explored in the research literature. this article aims to fill this knowledge gap. it is not just teachers who experience sexual harassment at school. in 2019, the time had come for a norwegian public media debate that recognised the concerns of young adolescents regarding sexual harassment in school, and how these students perceive teachers’ supposed lack of intervention when girls and boys are sexually harassed (baklund, aure & fyhn, 2019). this debate started with an opinion piece in the norwegian newspaper aftenposten ‘“cheap” and “f***able” #metoo never reached the schoolyard’. this article, written by three secondary school girls, shed light on how young girls hear condescending comments such as ‘whore’, ‘cheap’ and ‘c**t’ on an everyday basis in school (baklund, aure & fyhn, 2019). these adolescents say that teachers and other adults trivialise the situation if they report it. the debate continued with other opinion pieces on how boys experience being sexually harassed by girls (aubert, 2019) and how girls harass each other in school (andresen, 2019). the norwegian minister of education and integration at that time, jan tore sanner, publicly responded to their concerns, urging that the text written by the secondary school girls be posted in classrooms throughout the country in order to raise awareness and that ‘schools and teachers should emphasise important issues as bullying, sexual harassment, #metoo and other important matters in education’ (sanner, 2019). based on interviews with 200 adolescents nationwide, the recent report from the ombudsperson for children in norway (ocn) confirms that: adolescents violate each other’s boundaries and they are exposed to violations from adults in positions of power. they know too little about what is illegal and only understand to a small degree the consequences of what is going on. the training they receive from kindergarten to upper secondary school does not at all cover their needs. (ocn, 2018, p.5) as will be discussed in this article, adolescents also infringe adults’ sexual boundaries, which makes teaching about and countering sexual harassment in school a rather complex phenomenon. based on a case study of verbal sexual harassment experienced by a young, female teacher, ingunn, and her 17-year old student, mary, in a norwegian upper secondary school, this article discusses how 'lived injustices' in formal education (lundy & sainz, 2018) could provide pedagogical opportunities for education about, through and for human rights. ingunn is a woman who is victimised by her 17-year-old male students, who are regarded as children under the convention on the rights of the child (united nations, 1989, article 1). although she is being victimised, ingunn is also an adult, possessing the privileged power position of a teacher in relation to her own students. being an adult and a teacher situates ingunn in a remarkably different power position from that of her young student, mary. this difference will be further explored. complementing this case study, we draw upon a survey conducted among secondary students (n=382) of how often young learners report being sexually harassed and how often they experience that an adult intervenes. the research question is: how can teachers’ and young learners’ b. goldschmidt-gjerløw & i. trysnes 30 lived experience of verbal sexual harassment provide pedagogical opportunities for transformative human rights education? sexual harassment sexual harassment is forbidden, according to the norwegian equality and antidiscrimination act § 13. it is defined as ‘any form of unwanted sexual attention that aims to or is perceived as offending, frightening, hostile, condescending, humiliating or bothersome’ (equality and anti-discrimination act, 2018). elizabeth meyer (2009) pinpoints how sexual harassment is gendered and that it includes all behaviour that aims to shape and protect the boundaries for traditional gender norms, including (hetero)sexual harassment, harassment based on sexual orientation, and harassment for gender non-conformity (meyer, 2009, p.2). bendixen and kennair (2014) write that verbal harassment involves words related to genitals, the body, suggestions or demands for sexual favours, and verbal technological communication with a sexualised content; non-verbal harassment entails actions such as sexualised body movements or non-consensual sharing of sexual imagery; physical harassment involves non-consensual sexual contact such as unwanted kissing and touching of intimate body parts which is closely related to sexual abuse (bendixen & kennair, 2014). helseth and sletteland (2018, p.28-29) identify three motives for why people sexually harass others; namely, misplaced desire, sexual harassment as a subordination technique, and unintentional harassment. misplaced desire is what most people associate with sexual harassment. projecting your emotions and desires onto others may be experienced as unpleasant when it is not reciprocated, as sexual harassment starts when the reciprocity ends (sletteland & helseth, 2018, p.30). furthermore, sex can be associated with shame, but at the same time be a symbol of success, which makes it eligible as a subordination technique (sletteland & helseth, 2018, p.30). unintentional sexual harassment, in which there is no intention of flirting or hurting anyone, could be related to ‘fitting in’ to a certain social context. sexually harassing comments might be an established way of speaking in certain groups, and in order to belong to that group there might be a perceived need to adhere to such jargon. students tend to use ‘locker-room talk’ in which being one of ‘the guys’ (or ‘the girls’ for that matter) entails degrading people of the opposite gender and/or homosexuals (helseth & sletteland 2018, p.30). this could be a way of consolidating a group identity, a sense of ‘us’ and ‘them’ which is linked to ‘othering’-processes. kumashiro (2002, p.32) uses the term ‘other’ to refer to groups that are traditionally degraded or ‘othered’ in society, including female students, male students who are not perceived as stereotypically masculine, and students who are not perceived to be heterosexual. this does not only apply to students, but to teachers and other school employees as well. the lack of recognition of rights as part of transformative human rights education (hre) in this section, we discuss how the concept of recognition is anchored and given a legal framework in the universal declaration of human rights (united nations, 1948). we address audrey osler’s (2015) approach to anchoring recognition in human rights education; this links teaching for human rights to intersectionality by taking multiple axes of differentiation in order to understand experiences of justice/injustice and equality/inequality in school. to grasp how human beings’ human rights education review – volume 3(2) 31 desire for recognition and how experiences of lack of recognition could motivate struggles for social change, we draw upon axel honneth’s (1995) writings to provide the theoretical underpinnings for analysing how our key informant, ingunn, took action against being sexually harassed by her own young students. we link teaching about sexual harassment to comprehensive sexuality education (united nations educational, scientific and cultural organization [unesco], 2018) which is based on a human rights education-approach and discuss how teachers’ approaches to sexual harassment could contribute to education about, through and for human rights, especially focusing on the rights to freedom from discrimination as enshrined in the convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women (united nations, 1979) and the convention on the rights of the child (united nations, 1989). addressing sexual harassment in class is related to laura lundy and gabriela sainz’s (2018) argument of incorporating ‘lived experiences of injustice’ for a transformative hre as a way of enhancing children’s legal literacy through schooling. osler (2015, p.263) points out that the concept of recognition of dignity and rights is essential to the human rights project, according to the preamble and articles of the universal declaration of human rights (united nations, 1948). the preamble promotes ‘recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family’ (united nations, 1948, preamble); article 6 states that ‘everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law’, and article 7 ‘affirms this equal recognition extends to equality before the law and protection under the law against discrimination’ (united nations, 1948 in osler, 2015, p.263). osler pinpoints that ‘legal recognition is insufficient in human rights advocacy and hre’ and recurs to postmodern ethics (e.g. butler, 2006) in order to address ‘power struggles and asymmetrical power relations in which histories and identities are given recognition’. according to our interpretation of osler’s arguments, hre should include perspectives on the lack of recognition and breaches of rights through teaching, taking into consideration the asymmetrical power relations that are in play in each particular situation (osler, 2015). in a similar vein, and inspired by katarina tomasevski (2001), the first united nations special rapporteur on the right to education, lundy and sainz also argue the need for addressing breaches of rights in formal education and that hre must: incorporate ‘negative’ lived experiences of injustice, exclusion or discrimination as a way to build children’s capacity and develop the legal knowledge and skills that will enable them to identify and challenge breaches of their own rights and the rights of others. (lundy & sainz, 2018, p.6) lundy and sainz primarily focus on violations of children’s rights in formal education, which is related to young learners’ experiences of sexual harassment in school. they also include breaches of ‘the rights of others’, which could be related to how teachers experience sexual harassment at work. to deepen the understanding of sexual harassment we use intersectionality as an analytical perspective (crenshaw, 1989, 1994; davis, 2008; mccall, 2005). intersectionality is fruitful in understanding ‘how categories of race, class and gender are intertwined and mutually constitutive, giving centrality to questions like how race is ‘gendered’ and how gender is ‘racialized’, and how both are linked to the continuities and transformations of social class’ (davis, 2008, p.71). crenshaw’s contribution (1989) focuses on women of colour’s experience, arguing that looking b. goldschmidt-gjerløw & i. trysnes 32 at single-axis factors such as race or gender is insufficient; she suggests we should take into consideration the intersection of both race and gender. crenshaw argues that women of colour experience sexual discrimination and sexual violence differently from white women and she exemplifies this claim by pinpointing how it historically has been unthinkable that a white male be convicted for having raped a woman of colour (crenshaw, 1989, p.159). as we interpret crenshaw, she argues that the difference is to be found in the degree of legal recognition; white women’s’ experience of violence has judicially been more recognised than that of women of colour. her perspective can be extended beyond race and gender, and also take into consideration various axes of differentiation, such as age, which is a factor of great relevance in the discussion of our empirical material. her intersectional perspective contributes to capturing how sexual harassment is composed of power relations in which multiple axes of differentiation are in play. in regard to teaching for human rights, osler addresses how the concept of intersectionality (crenshaw, 1989) could ‘enable us to better interpret the complex ways learners experience justice/injustice and equality/inequality’, acknowledging multiple axes of differentiation such as economic, political, cultural and experiential (osler, 2015, p.261). multiple axes of differentiation also apply to how teachers experience justice/injustice or equality/inequality in school. this can be linked to elisabeth meyer’s (2008) discussion of the factors that influence how teachers respond to incidents of sexual harassment among young peers in school. based on qualitative interviews with teachers in canadian secondary schools, she addresses how each teacher ‘brings a set of identities and experiences to his/her teaching’: all of the participants talked about their experiences of having felt marginalized in society due to their identities as gay, bisexual, women, or people of colour. these experiences in their own schooling and professional life acted as very strong motivators to act out against discriminatory behaviour that they witnessed as teachers. (meyer, 2008, p.10) while meyer addresses how teachers’ own life experiences of being discriminated against motivate taking action against incidents of harassment among young peers, we see that this is also of relevance when discussing the motivational basis for taking action when teachers themselves experience being sexually harassed in school by their students. why would personal experience trigger a struggle for dignity, recognition and justice? to answer this question, it is fruitful to recur to honneth’s contribution regarding recognition. honneth (1995) describes how human beings develop a positive sense of self and personal identity through being recognised – being given a certain status as a subject with rights, wishes and desires – by other individuals. we develop our self-esteem, self-respect and sense of worth through the recognition we receive, or fail to receive, from others. being sexually harassed might involve feeling insulted or humiliated, which is linked to being denied recognition. when grasping how social struggles occur, honneth affirms that ‘the negative emotional reactions accompanying the experience of disrespect could represent precisely the affective motivational basis in which the struggle for recognition is anchored’ (honneth, 1995, p.135). as such, negative emotions – feelings of disrespect, discrimination and lack of recognition can motivate both teachers and young learners to counter injustice through taking action, which involves exerting agency in sexually harassing human rights education review – volume 3(2) 33 situations. however, the extent to which each individual’s struggle is recognised by others could be informed by the power position that the individual possesses. as the following case analysis indicates, a 17-year-old girl in upper secondary school does not necessarily have the same privileged power position to push back on sexual harassment and be heard as the female teacher, although both of them in theory should be protected from this kind of misbehaviour through international human rights conventions. one of the international human rights conventions of particular importance for the discussion in this article is the convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women (cedaw) (united nations, 1979). cedaw defines discrimination against women as: any distinction, exclusion or restriction made on the basis of sex which has the effect or purpose of impairing or nullifying the recognition, enjoyment or exercise by women, irrespective of their marital status, on a basis of equality of men and women, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural, civil or any other field. (united nations, 1979, article 1) cedaw specifically urges state parties to take ‘all appropriate measures to eliminate discrimination against women in the field of employment’ (united nations, 1979, article 11). according to the general recommendations adopted by the united nations committee on the elimination of discrimination against women (1992), the definition of discrimination in article 1 includes gender-based violence, which refers to ‘violence that is directed against a woman because she is a woman or that affects women disproportionately’. when referring to article 11, the committee confirms that equality in employment can be seriously compromised when women are subjected to sexual harassment in the workplace and that such misconduct is discriminatory when it, among other things, creates a hostile working environment (united nations committee on the elimination of discrimination against women, 1992 p.3). thus, when women experience sexual harassment in the workplace, it is a breach of women’s rights to freedom from discrimination as enshrined in cedaw. norway ratified this convention in 1981. the other convention of great relevance for this article is the convention on the rights of the child (uncrc) (united nations, 1989) – which norway ratified in 1991. there are several relevant articles for the discussion of the case study; namely, article 2 on children’s rights to freedom from discrimination, article 12 on children’s rights to be heard in matters that affect their lives, article 28 on the right to education, which includes the right to comprehensive sexuality education, and article 29 regarding how education should enhance sexual equality. article 29 is perhaps the most important one in the present context; it confirms that: states parties agree that the education of the child shall be directed to: d) the preparation of the child for responsible life in a free society, in the spirit of understanding, peace, tolerance, equality of sexes [emphasis added] and friendship among all peoples, ethnic, national and religious groups and persons of indigenous origin (united nations, 1989, article 29, d) b. goldschmidt-gjerløw & i. trysnes 34 countering sexual harassment when it occurs in the school setting could be considered an essential step towards ensuring sexual equality in education. however, countering sexual harassment involves taking children’s voices seriously when they report being sexually harassed, which is clearly linked to uncrc article 12 on the right to be heard in matters that affect their lives. the importance of article 12 in this regard is also pinpointed in the ocn report (2018, p.5). sexual harassment is a problem among young people and research shows that in norway 29 % of girls and 7% of boys aged 18-19 years have experienced it in various forms (mossige & stefansen 2016). furthermore, sexual harassment is often not reacted to or taken seriously (kvello, 2015; søftestad, 2018; ocn, 2018). teaching about sexual harassment is in line with unesco’s technical guidelines for comprehensive sexuality education (cse), which is ‘a curriculumbased process of teaching and learning about the cognitive, emotional, physical and social aspects of sexuality’ (unesco, 2018, p.16). an essential element of cse is to enable young learners’ understandings of their fundamental human rights, which can provide a basis for making them capable of ensuring both their own rights, and the rights of others, throughout their lives. thus, comprehensive sexuality education is linked to human rights education, which consists of education and training about, through and for human rights (united nations office of the high commissioner of human rights [ohchr] 2011, article 2). with regard to sexual harassment, education about human rights entails teaching about the right to freedom from discrimination. education through human rights would require upholding these rights in practice through intervening in all forms of sexual harassment inside and outside of the classroom, as well as inside and outside of school, when teachers become aware of such misconduct. through actively intervening in such situations of sexual harassment, the teacher might contribute to changing the behavioural pattern of learners who harass. such interventions can contribute to education for human rights, because it could enhance young students’ legal literacy regarding how to respect and recognise both their own and other people’s human worth and rights to freedom from sexual harassment. legal literacy can be understood as a set of capabilities related to ‘understanding the law and its relevant instruments, as well as the possible legal pathways to take’ (lundy & sainz, 2018, p.17). lundy and sainz argue that legal literacy is essential for hre to be transformative, as ‘only legally-literate individuals and communities will have the capacity to transform breaches and violations of rights – including children’s rights in education – into actionable principles for their protection’ (lundy & sainz, 2018, p.17). it is a paradox that teachers, who are looked upon as potential agents for strengthening children’s rights through education, at times get their own rights infringed by the children whose legal literacy they are supposed to enhance. nevertheless, such incidents can be of great pedagogical value, because it is likely that children can develop legal literacy by becoming aware of how they are citizens who possess the power to either uphold or infringe other human beings’ rights. a mixed methods approach combining a case study and a survey our key informant, ingunn, took part in a phone-survey of 64 social science teachers in 2018. this survey is part of a wider research project exploring norwegian social science teachers’ practice regarding sensitive issues related to sexuality, sexual harassment and abuse in upper secondary school (for an overview of this survey, see goldschmidt-gjerløw, 2019). although it was not originally part of the structured human rights education review – volume 3(2) 35 phone survey to map teachers’ own experiences of being sexually harassed, ingunn shared her experience of being sexually harassed by students who were taking a vocational course. goldschmidt-gjerløw found ingunn’s case intriguing because it was her own personal experience that triggered teaching about sexual harassment – it was not the curriculum or the media or other factors. goldschmidt-gjerløw conducted an additional in-depth interview with ingunn in person a few months after the phone-survey. this time the interview was semi-structured, only focusing on her experience of being sexually harassed by her students and how she dealt with this incident. two decades ago, in his much-cited book changing teachers, changing times, andy hargreaves described how teaching involves emotional dimensions, and that there is not enough knowledge about ‘the emotions and desires which motivate and moderate teachers’ work’ (hargreaves, 1994, p.141). he asserted that the research that had been done at that time stemmed from researchers’ own theoretical lenses ‘with concepts like pride, commitment, uncertainty, creativity and satisfaction’, and that researchers tended to ask interview questions or interpret data in relation to such constructs instead of focusing on how ‘teachers themselves talk about the emotional dimensions of their work’ (hargreaves, 1994, p.141). following the tracks laid down by hargreaves (1994), the case study portrays how ingunn herself talks about the emotional dimensions of her work in relation to her being sexually harassed and dealing with it in the classroom. the interview was transcribed, and we conducted an analysis of the content inspired by gorski and pothini’s (2014) seven step-process to analyse educational cases (discussed in more detail later). it is not our intention to generalise from ingunn’s case, but rather to draw upon her experience as an empirical point of departure to discuss how personal experiences of ‘lived injustices’ might influence teaching practice and serve as a resource in the classroom. the case portrays two incidents of verbal sexual harassment; a 17 -year old girl in ingunn’s class, mary, had received sexualised phone messages, and ingunn herself was exposed to questions related to sexual information by the boys in her vocational class. ingunn’s experience will be emphasised in the empirical discussion since she is the key informant and mary was no longer a school student at the time of the interview. therefore, the discussion of mary’s experience is limited, since her voice is mediated through ingunn. ingunn’s narrative of mary’s story does not provide a rich account of how mary experienced the situation yet it is of value to include her voice in the discussion, because mary’s story epitomises teachers’ lack of response when young learners are sexually harassed. to ensure anonymity, the names ingunn and mary are pseudonyms and the location of the school is not provided. paul gorski affirms that the case method, consisting of an analysis of reallife scenarios based on actual events, is fruitful for educators in order to apply theoretical ideas to professional practice (gorski 2014). gorski & pothini offer a seven-step process of ‘identifying, examining, reflecting on, and taking concrete steps to resolve challenges related to diversity and equity in schools’ (gorski & pothini, 2013; gorski 2014). this process could be a toolkit for educators faced with issues of such as racism, sexism, homophobia and class inequities; it can be used in working to bring about greater justice in learning environments. figure 1 is based on gorski and pothini (2013). b. goldschmidt-gjerløw & i. trysnes 36 figure 1: seven-step process of analysing educational case studies on diversity and social justice, based on gorski & pothini (2013). this analytical process is also useful for educational researchers when analysing teachers’ approaches to injustice in general. in the case of ingunn, it can be related to her experience of sexual harassment. inspired by some of the steps in this process, the following analysis of ingunn’s case identifies a number of issues: the sexual harassment itself; how ingunn feels about it; individual and institutional challenges and opportunities for countering sexual harassment in class; the specific action taken; and the on-the-ground outcomes according to her subjective experience. it is worth emphasizing that the second step in this analytical process includes taking into consideration how different stakeholder groups experience the situation in question. we consider students to be essential stakeholders, and in order to strengthen the student perspective in our discussion, we complement the case study by including one survey of secondary students (n=382). this survey considered how often young learners report being sexually harassed and how often they experience that an adult intervenes in the situation. this article is therefore inspired by a mixed methods approach, which we apply ‘for the broad purposes of breadth and depth of understanding’ (johnson, onwuegbuzie & turner, 2007, p.123). there are several reasons for choosing mixed methods, and greene’s concept of complementarity is an important rationale for this study (greene, 2007, pp.95 -111; creswell & clark, 2018, pp.100-103). greene considers that: step 1: find the problem posed by the case – look for stereotypes, prejudices, or assumptions step 3: imagine potential individual and institutional challenges and opportunities step 4: imagine equitable outcomes – immediate and long-term. identify specific, on-the-ground outcomes. step 5: brainstorm immediate responses to achieve desired outcomes step 6: brainstorm longer-term policy and practice adjustments for institutional change step 7: make a plan of action – how to respond in order to ensure equity for everybody involved? step 2: include varying perspectives and stakeholder groups – how are the different parties involved experiencing/dealing with the situation? human rights education review – volume 3(2) 37 results from the different methods serve to elaborate, enhance, deepen, and broaden the overall interpretations and inferences from the study. it is because most social phenomena are complex and multi-faceted that a complementarity mixed methods purpose fits many inquiry contexts. (greene, 2007, p.101) the qualitative and quantitative methods complement each other to give a wider understanding of the phenomenon of sexual harassment and teaching about it in school, and we include the voices of complementary stakeholder groups; both teachers and young learners. the digital survey we draw upon was conducted by irene trysnes and katja skjølberg in 2018 among secondary school students (n=382) in southern norway as part of a wider research project, ‘classroom studies – in social science education’. this project examined how learners experience different aspects of social science education. one part of this survey focuses on young learners’ perceptions of how often they are sexually harassed and how often they experience any intervention from adults. we use this specific part of the survey in the discussion of the case study of verbal sexual harassment to provide a context for 17-year-old mary’s experience of being sexually harassed by her peers. discussion of the case study in spring 2017, ingunn, an upper secondary teacher in her thirties, was teaching a class of 17-year-old students from a vocational study programme specialising in construction. the class only had one girl student. the boys had a pre-established group culture of harassing each other, which developed into an ‘othering’-process that first targeted the young girl, mary, and then ingunn. ingunn says that she is not as strict in her vocational study classes as in the general study class, because ‘i tolerate a bit more, joke a bit more and i’m less serious […] thus, i do not think they understood where the limit went in regard to teasing me’. when the boys went too far with comments towards each other that she characterises as ‘too much’, ingunn says she stopped it by joking rather than in a ‘harsh kind of way’. she opted to use a sense of humour, which was less emotionally demanding than confronting them. however, it did not turn out to be an effective strategy. trysnes’ survey of secondary students (n=382) finds that sexually harassing words such as ‘gay’, ‘lesbian’, ‘f****t’ and ‘whore’ are the most common abusive words young learners hear; 47% of the respondents report that they hear these words being used every day or every week (see figure 1). b. goldschmidt-gjerløw & i. trysnes 38 how often have you heard: every day every week every month more seldom never the use of abusive words such as – f***ing ‘gay’, ‘lesbian’, ‘f****t’ or ‘whore’? 18% 29% 16% 24% 13% the use of abusive words such as – f***ing ‘christian’? 3% 7% 8% 25% 57% the use of abusive words such as – f***ing ‘jew’, ‘muslim’, ‘penis’ or “n****r”? 13% 20% 15% 30% 21% that teachers have said something that you experience as racist or harassing to other students? 1% 3% 5% 33% 58% that students have said something that you experience as racist or harassing to other students? 10% 27% 14% 33% 16% table 1. overview of secondary students’ perceptions (n=382) on their experience of abusive words. according to this survey, 37% of the learners are exposed to racist or other kinds of harassing comments by other students on a daily or weekly basis. the results show that students most often hear abusive words from other students. however, 3% percent report that they hear abusive words from teachers on a weekly basis. this constitutes a clear breach of the legal educational frameworks, such as the norwegian education act §9, and we will get back to this. to explore how sexual harassment among young peers is constructed and dealt with, we will now discuss 17-year-old mary´s experience. mary had received sexualised messages on her mobile phone from some of the boys in class, asking her to ‘come over so that we can have group sex with you’. this epitomises how females are more likely to experience sexual harassment when entering non-traditional fields of study or employment (bogart & stein, 1987). when ingunn was asked how she found out, she answered: i don’t know whether she told me or if it was one of her teachers, i don’t remember. i had in the back of my mind that this was not ok, that maybe their jargon had gone too far. you cross the limit for harassment, i think, when you send a message like that. what the consequences were, i don’t know. (interview in march, 2019) for this young girl, being sexually harassed could have serious consequences for her development of a positive sense of self, self-esteem and sense of worth, resulting in her not wanting to go to school or dropping out. it could deprive her of human rights education review – volume 3(2) 39 the opportunity of exercising her right to go to school and getting an education on equal terms with the rest of the class; it could deprive her of the right to become a citizen with equal status (cornell, 1995). this sexual harassment is linked to the intersecting axes of gender, perceived heterosexuality and youth, as well as to the fact that she was the only girl in a male-dominated class. bendixen, daveronis and kennair (2018) find that being exposed to peer verbal sexual harassment is associated with lower scores on indicators of well-being and that unwanted sexual behaviour negatively affects adolescents’ mental health; an effect that is stronger for girls than boys. ingunn does not remember how she found out about these messages – whether mary herself had told her or if it was one of her other teachers. there are asymmetrical power relations in play here – teachers have a privileged power position in school (although being sexually harassed themselves might alter these power relations). ingunn and mary’s other teachers were in a position to protect her from such unwanted behaviour by recognising her experience of injustice and taking necessary measures to prevent the perpetuation of this behaviour; such action would be in tune with education through human rights (ohchr, 2011, article 2). according to meyer (2008), there can be several barriers in play that may prevent teachers from intervening when sexual harassment occurs: lack of institutional support from administrators; lack of formal education on the issue; an inconsistent response from colleagues; fear of parental backlash; and a negative community response. as such, the lack of response to mary’s experience of sexual harassment could be considered an institutional barrier to transformative human rights education. mary’s experience of being harassed without anyone taking action is not unique. according to trysnes and skjølberg’s survey (see table 2) of students in secondary school (n=382), sixty-eight percent report having experienced harassing comments from teachers or students. out of these 260 students, 38% of the respondents answer that people never or rarely intervene. this can be connected to the bystander effect and a fear of being involved in conflicts (darley and latane, 1968) and may further be related to a weak school bond (sprott, jenkins & doob, 2005). a canadian longitudinal study finds that a strong school bond plays an important role in preventing risk behaviour such as violent and non-violent offending (sprott et. al. 2005). always almost every time occasionally rarely never i have not experienced harassing comments if you have heard or experienced harassing comments from teachers or students, has anyone intervened to stop this? 7% 12% 23% 17% 9% 32% b. goldschmidt-gjerløw & i. trysnes 40 table 2. overview of students’ perceptions (n=382) on how often they experience that teachers or students intervene in sexually harassing situations in the school setting. to find the percentage of those who replied that they rarely or never experience that anyone intervenes among those who have heard such comments, we calculated 100/68*26=38. this resembles what the norwegian secondary school girls wrote about in aftenposten, when they described how teachers and other adults tend to trivialise the situation if they report being sexually harassed (baklund, aure & fyhn, 2019). the ocn report (2018) also addresses young adolescents’ concerns about not being taken seriously in this regard. adults’ failure to recognise how young learners’ experiences of sexual harassment constitutes a violation of children’s rights, and their subsequent lack of action to prevent the continuation of such harassment does not comply with international standards and national legal education frameworks. children have the right to be listened to when they are sexually harassed, a right that is enshrined both in uncrc article 2 on non-discrimination and article 12 (un, 1989). if their voices are not heard, this constitutes a severe impediment to the aim of achieving sexual equality in education (un, 1989, article 29). the general principles for norwegian education confirm that ‘education should be in concordance with the uncrc’ (ministry of education and research, 2017, p.5), and the norwegian education act §9 a-4 affirms that ‘all school employees should be aware of students’ school environment, and take action against offenses as bullying, violence, discrimination and harassment if possible’ (education act, 1998, §9a-4). however, there appears to be a great gap between theory and practice, and this points to a lack of recognition of rights. even though ingunn did not directly follow up mary’s messages, they were one of the reasons why she chose to address the verbal sexual harassment in class: ingunn: i got the comment about whether i was any good at giving blowjobs [emphasis added], and then when i knew they had been sending those kinds of messages to her [mary], i thought that… beate: something had to happen? ingunn: yes. this was the final straw for ingunn. she had to deal with emotional challenges in deciding how to resolve this incident. she was concerned about how the students’ lack of respect for her was damaging the teacher-student relationship and worried about how they would react when she confronted them with their unwanted sexual behaviour. ingunn thought that she ‘had lost that class, that things would not be ok again’. simultaneously, ingunn’s negative emotions of having experienced injustice and knowing what mary had been exposed to, became the impetus for action. this resonates with honneth’s description of how ‘the negative emotional reactions accompanying the experience of disrespect could represent precisely the affective motivational basis in which the struggle for recognition is anchored’ (honneth, 1995, p.135). as previously discussed, meyer (2008) also considers how teachers’ experience of injustice can serve as a motivator for intervention. after this inappropriate comment in class, ingunn contacted the school principal, eva. eva responded in accordance with the norwegian working environment act paragraph 4.3 by reacting immediately, asking ‘if she should go and human rights education review – volume 3(2) 41 speak to them’ as a way to ensure that ‘employees shall not be subjected to harassment or other improper conduct’ (working environment act, 2006). the school principal’s reaction was part of the institutional framework that influenced the outcome of this incident; ingunn’ s symbolic quest for recognition as a subject with rights was respectfully honoured by the principal, and eva’s action probably enabled her to fight back against the sexual harassment. if the principal had reacted otherwise, by for example excusing the boys’ behaviour and not taking her experience seriously, this could have been considered as an institutional barrier (meyer, 2008). in this case, the school management played an important role in countering injustice, and this could be considered as an institutional strength. after discussing how to approach this incident with the school principal, ingunn decided to dedicate the following social science lesson to a dialogue on sexual harassment, drawing upon her own personal experience of ‘lived injustice’. she based the lesson on her personal narrative and emotions regarding how she felt about being sexually harassed by her own students: ingunn: before class, i went up to the room and i took away all the desks and gathered the chairs in a circle, so that no one could hide behind anything. and then we had the conversation about sexual harassment. it is probably wise to teach about it, because it was as if they were illuminated [emphasis added] [by knowing] the consequences of saying such things and behaving the way they had. beate: do you remember how you started the lesson? ingunn: i just used myself as an example and told them that i was very upset. i just said it the way it was, that we had had a good time, but now the limit was reached, because that kind of comment is not ok for me and it is actually not legal [emphasis added]. (interview in march, 2019) during the lesson, she made the students take turns in commenting on her perspective of the incident, making them engage in the dialogue. by sharing her negative emotions regarding how she experienced this unwanted sexual comment, she enabled them to put themselves in her shoes. in this way, she gained recognition as a subject with rights that she wanted to be respected. it is likely that this triggered their critical reflexivity of their own behaviour, because she says ‘it was as if they had been illuminated’ when she shared her perspective on the incident. she believes that the outcome of the lesson would not have been the same if they had not had that prehistory in class, because the content was directly linked to their everyday lives at school. the outcome of confronting that class became the opposite of what she had imagined in advance, and instead of damaging their relations, ingunn says that she rather strengthened her relationship with them and that ‘they became more aware that there is a limit for what you can joke about and what you cannot’. she did not address how her rights to freedom from sexual harassment at the workplace are enshrined in the cedaw (united nations, 1979) nor did she make references to the norwegian equality and anti-discrimination act § 13 (2018), which she could have done to further strengthen her students’ legal literacy. still, she emphasised that their comment ‘is actually not legal’ during the teaching lesson, which at least appears to have made them more conscious of what they had done. ingunn reflects upon her own privileged power position of having agency to push back on sexual harassment in relation to that of mary: b. goldschmidt-gjerløw & i. trysnes 42 beate: did you feel that you ‘won them over’ by sharing your feelings? ingunn: mmmh [confirming]. but i could do that, because i am an adult and that comment was quite innocent, they had not caused me any harm. but for the 17-year-old girl who had received messages concerning group-sex, it wouldn’t have been easy for her to say something like that. ingunn did not address mary’s experience directly with the boys, and it is highly problematic that this was not dealt with. this failure is a clear breach of mary’s rights to protection from sexual discrimination as well as a breach of uncrc article 29 (united nations, 1989), concerning how education should promote sexual equality. however, our impression is that ingunn somehow sought to protect mary by using herself as an example, hoping that this could raise the boys’ awareness of appropriate and inappropriate sexual behaviour. drawing upon personal experience is not unproblematic and depends greatly on the context; if ingunn were to discuss mary’s experience of receiving sexualised phone messages in class, this should only be done in accordance with mary herself, because drawing upon her experience as a point of departure for teaching could make her feel even more vulnerable, especially if she is not consulted in advance. in mary’s case, it could be wiser for the involved student and her teacher to firstly address the matter in the school principal’s office. when ingunn was asked whether she knew if mary had graduated, she answered ‘i think she quit school’. since we have not been able to interview mary, we do not know if the sexual harassment she experienced influenced her decision to quit school. however, given the severity of her experience and the lack of protection and recognition of her rights, we believe that it is likely to have played a role. more research is needed on the potential links between experiences of sexual harassment and upper secondary school drop-out. concluding remarks the reasons behind the boys’ sexual harassment of mary and ingunn are probably to be found in a combination of several intentional or unintentional motives. these range from a misplaced sexual desire to a way of cultivating a sense of group identity and belonging ‘to the guys’ through sexualised language or by stirring up power relations in class by challenging the young female teacher’s privileged power position. one limitation of this study is that we only have ingunn´s perspective. could the harassment have been avoided if ingunn had enforced strict rules in the classroom instead of preferring joking to strictness when the boys went ‘too far’? and could it therefore be that the harassment was the result of a lack of leadership? the boys in class could be considered as marginalised youth at risk of early offending. teacher-student relations are critical for influencing students’ attitudes, especially when it is a matter of protecting at-risk teenagers from early offending (sprott et.al, 2005), and these young men could have benefitted from clear guidance from their teacher on appropriate and inappropriate sexual behaviour. then again, this reasoning could lead to a type of ‘victim-blaming’ – a situation in which the victim is blamed for being at the wrong place at the wrong time or having somehow provoked the sexual offence (skilbrei & stefansen, 2018). we have not entertained such thoughts in this discussion. as mentioned earlier, there are different types of sexual harassment. we categorise both what ingunn and mary experienced as verbal sexual harassment. for human rights education review – volume 3(2) 43 mary, the verbal sexual harassment was mediated through phone messages from the boys, which shows one technological dimension of communication with unwanted sexualised content (bendixen & kennair, 2014). we consider that verbal sexual harassment and, to a certain extent, non-verbal sexual harassment such as sexualised body language and non-consensual sharing of sexual imagery could be the subject of pedagogical intervention when young learners are exposed to and expose each other to such misbehaviour in the school setting. however, this would require that the parties involved agree to discuss the matter openly. in cases of physical sexual harassment among peers in the school setting, which is even more severe, we consider that other measures should be taken. ingunn and mary’s other teachers could have intervened when mary was sexually harassed by her classmates, but they did not. this constitutes a clear breach of the uncrc. we must take children’s voices seriously and recognise their inherent human rights if they are sexually harassed. this duty is enshrined both in article 2 on non-discrimination and article 12, on being heard in matters that affect their lives. a failure to carry out this duty is a severe impediment to the goal of achieving sexual equality in education (united nations, 1989, article 29). unfortunately, mary’s experience of not getting support to defend her rights in practice when being sexually harassed by classmates is far from unique. the norwegian media debate on #metoo in school bears witness to this, as does trysnes and skjølberg’s survey of secondary school students’ perceptions of how often anyone intervenes when they are sexually harassed. ingunn said that mary quit school, and we do not know if her experience of harassment influenced that decision. more research is needed on the potential links between experiences of sexual harassment and high school drop-out. from an intersectional perspective, our empirical material indicates that the extent to which one’s experience of sexual harassment is recognised by others as a legal offense is influenced by multiple axes of differentiation, including one’s age – when young learners, regardless of gender, experience sexual harassment, there appears to be little intervention or support for protecting their rights in practice. ingunn’s experience, on the other hand, was fully recognised by the school principal. if we compare what happened to ingunn and mary, it could be argued that mary’s experience of receiving sexualised phone messages was the more severe experience. she was 17 years old and the only girl in class, and her ordeal could have greater consequences for her human development than ingunn’s experience of being asked if she was ‘any good at giving blow-jobs’. the boys’ harassment of mary deprived her of getting an education on equal terms with the rest of the class. nevertheless, being sexually harassed at work by her students also deprived ingunn of her right to be a teacher on equal terms with the rest of her colleagues. ingunn’s case illustrates that the nature of the harassment had to become very personal before she took action. when the power relations shifted and the male student humiliated her, she was either forced to take action or to lose her authority as a teacher. this case also shows that through taking action, the teacher can contribute to social change through dialogue with students. sharing her negative emotions regarding how she experienced being sexually harassed and making clear that such misconduct is illegal, became transformative for that class. it was the honest conversation about the lack of recognition of rights and how their harassment made her feel that became the transformative human rights education for the boys. she felt that the class environment was greatly improved, and she did not experience similar incidents afterwards. ingunn does not know if the boys stopped harassing b. goldschmidt-gjerløw & i. trysnes 44 mary, but it could be that her classroom dialogue made them think twice about sending sexualised messages. the way she handled this situation pinpoints how the norms and expectations regarding the performance of gender and sexuality can be influenced through classroom dialogue. ingunn´s intervention could be considered as a way to strengthen positive school bonds which can benefit young people at risk of early offending (sprott et.al. 2005). this case is not meant as just another example of how some young boys do not know how to behave but is rather meant to illustrate the importance of countering sexual harassment through dialogue based on real-life scenarios for transformative human rights education. it shows the short-term outcome of countering sexual harassment in class, and more research is needed to investigate the longer-term consequences of addressing this issue. still, when sexual harassment occurs in school, it is useful to look at it as a pedagogical opportunity, which can potentially open up a space for critically addressing such issues. this is a constructive alternative to looking at sexual harassment in school as something inevitable and biologically determined that one cannot stop. what should schools do in terms of discipline when facing issues of sexual harassment? draugedalen (2020) discusses the fact that norwegian primary schools schools vary greatly in their response to harmful sexual behaviour and calls for a more systematic approach based on national guidelines. the ocn (2018, p.39) recommends that the norwegian directorate for education and training develop a tool for ‘schools’ preventive and systematic work for a good school environment according to the norwegian education act § 9a’, and that this tool should emphasise ‘schools’ responsibility for zero tolerance on sexual offenses’. coming back to the incident in the introductory paragraphs concerning the ‘upskirting’ of the female teacher, the student in question was suspended from school for one day. suspending the students who harassed mary and ingunn might have been one way of demonstrating the severity of sexual harassment, yet it is uncertain whether this would have had a positive impact on their sexual behaviour. pedagogical approaches such as ingunn’s very personal approach most likely ‘spoke to the heart’ of her students and is probably something they will remember for a long time, even though we do not know the long-term effect of her approach. if education is to ensure sexual equality, teaching about sexual harassment and actively countering such misconduct is crucial, both when it targets teachers as well as young learners. in this way, education can play an essential role in consolidating democratisation processes in society at large that aim to ensure human beings’ dignity and recognition of rights not only for current generations of citizens, but also for the generations of citizens to come. acknowledgements we are sincerely grateful for the contribution of ingunn and all students who took the time to take part in this study. this article is written in deep gratitude and solidarity with both teachers and young learners. this article is our contribution to making the phenomenon of sexual harassment and teaching about this issue more widely accounted for in the school setting. we would also like to express our sincere gratitude to the anonymous reviewers and the team at human rights education review. human rights education review – volume 3(2) 45 references andresen, r. 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https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx https://tbinternet.ohchr.org/treaties/cedaw/shared%20documents/1_global/int_cedaw_gec_3731_e.pdf https://tbinternet.ohchr.org/treaties/cedaw/shared%20documents/1_global/int_cedaw_gec_3731_e.pdf https://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/compilation/pages/unitednationsdeclarationonhumanrightseducationandtraining(2011).aspx https://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/compilation/pages/unitednationsdeclarationonhumanrightseducationandtraining(2011).aspx https://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/compilation/pages/unitednationsdeclarationonhumanrightseducationandtraining(2011).aspx https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000260770/pdf/260770eng.pdf.multi https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000260770/pdf/260770eng.pdf.multi volume 3, no 1 (2020) date received: 19-01-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3694 date accepted: 03-03-2020 issn 2535-5406 learning to belong? an analysis of germany’s migrant orientation programme from an hre perspective. nicholas stone university of hildesheim, germany. abstract: the german integration programme teaches language and knowledge about germany to newcomers and those with migration backgrounds. this article analyses the programme and course content from a human rights education (hre) perspective to tease out some of the inherent contradiction between teaching ‘german values’, purported to be one of the integration programme’s goals, and teaching human rights. incorporating hre principles into the programme will arguably benefit learners by avoiding some of this inherent bias as well as teaching learners to challenge societal injustice. the article explores the programme structure and goals, asking what message(s) it conveys. it delves into a content analysis of the ‘politics in a democracy’ chapter of 100 stunden deutschland, focusing on how human rights and discrimination are depicted. as a result of this analysis, recommendations are developed that suggest how the orientation course specifically and the integration programme more broadly can ensure greater consistency with hre principles. keywords: germany, human rights education, integration, immigration, orientation nicholas stone: nicholaspaulstone@gmail.com http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3694 mailto:nicholaspaulstone@gmail.com human rights education review – volume 3(1) 32 learning to belong? an analysis of germany’s migrant orientation programme from an hre perspective. doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3694 issn 2535-5406 nicholas stone nicholaspaulstone@gmail.com university of hildesheim, germany abstract: the german integration programme teaches language and knowledge about germany to newcomers and those with migration backgrounds. this article analyses the programme and course content from a human rights education (hre) perspective to tease out some of the inherent contradiction between teaching ‘german values’, purported to be one of the integration programme’s goals, and teaching human rights. incorporating hre principles into the programme will arguably benefit learners by avoiding some of this inherent bias as well as teaching learners to challenge societal injustice. the article explores the programme structure and goals, asking what message(s) it conveys. it delves into a content analysis of the ‘politics in a democracy’ chapter of 100 stunden deutschland, focusing on how human rights and discrimination are depicted. as a result of this analysis, recommendations are developed that suggest how the orientation course specifically and the integration programme more broadly can ensure greater consistency with hre principles. keywords: germany, human rights education, integration, immigration, orientation introduction numerous western european states have enacted some form of integration programme since the late 1990s, as notions of how to manage immigration were reconsidered and governments were challenged to address this complex task. in germany, the state faced pressure to manage immigration integration due to a number of migration flows, each of which had left its mark on germany society and shaped the context of the integration programme. firstly, there was the separation of the german state into east and west and the migration of ethnic germans from abroad and east germany to west germany after the second world war. poutrus notes that the end of the second world war resulted in greater ethnic homogenization in european nations, particularly in germany (2014, p. 118). the notion of german ethnicity was challenged over time, as the group from the former ussr (aussiedler) were perceived as culturally different from west germans and often spoke little or no german (marshall, 2010, p. 10). another migration flow was non-german refugees. following the second world war, west germany made strenuous efforts to establish its identity as a modern, liberal society, one which was a place of refuge for the persecuted (schönwälder & triadafilopoulos, 2006). up until the late 1980s the predominant discourse, though challenged, was that asylum seekers to germany were fleeing persecution and genuinely in need. this narrative changed, as public attitudes mailto:nicholaspaulstone@gmail.com n. stone 33 hardened over concerns about economic (‘bogus’) refugees resulted in a tightening of the asylum law in 1993 (thränhardt, 2002; keely and russell, 1994). the third factor is the legacy of the guest worker programme, which had brought in millions of foreign labourers (and their families) to fuel post-second world war economic expansion. this migration, and decades without an immigration integration policy, had produced a significant, multigenerational, noncitizenship group living in germany (schönwälder & triadafilopoulos, 2006). moreover, the mistaken belief that germany could avoid permanent migration because the guest worker programme was a temporary economic measure blinded the state to the reality that migration would impact society (chin, 2007). this came to a head in the early 2000s, and mainstream german politicians reluctantly admitted that germany was, in fact, a country of immigration. policy measures were enacted to facilitate integration into german society for immigrants and, in some cases, those with migration backgrounds (i.e. at least one grandparent who had migrated to germany) (williams, 2014). the integration programme enacted in the 2005 immigration law focuses on teaching language skills (language course) and norms and values (orientation course). it was developed partly as a response to the fears expressed by the media and some politicians that immigrants and those with migrant backgrounds had failed to integrate into german society, instead forming parallel communities (schönwälder & sӧhn, 2009). as early as in 2001, the notion of a german ‘guiding culture’ (leitkultur) was raised in heated public debates, premised on the belief that german culture should form a core tenet of the integration programme (abali, 2009). it was argued that anyone who chooses to live in germany must learn and respect inherent german values (klusmeyer, 2001). this means that the integration programmes are as much an exercise in symbolic politics as a measure to foster societal cohesion (caponio & testore, 2018). against this background, this article seeks to analyse the orientation course from a human rights education (hre) perspective. by analysing the courses from an hre perspective, one can identify how the courses are constructed to convey culturally specific versus universal norms and values, as well as if and how they empower learners to challenge the bias of the majority society. it begins by providing an overview of the integration programme, including its context, structure and goals. it critically analyses the integration programmes generally, and the term ‘integration’ specifically. it proceeds by defining hre, using the council of europe charter on education for democratic citizenship and human rights education (2010). it presents a content analysis of the ‘politics in a democracy’ chapter of 100 stunden deutschland, one of the most recent textbooks certified by the bundesamt für migration und flüchtlinge (the german federal ministry for migration and refugees). the focus of the study is how human rights and discrimination are implicit or explicitly addressed in the textbook. using content analysis, i draw on bromley’s analysis of multiculturalism and human rights to assess the textbook content’s consistency with hre. i broadly question if the orientation course content is compatible with hre, as defined in the united nations declaration on human rights education and training, where education must be about, through and for human rights (dhret; u.n., 2011). the key tenet of the orientation course is to teach national values and norms under the goal of fostering integration, while human rights, on the other hand, are universal. hre principles could be a method to model the course material in a human rights education review – volume 3(1) 34 manner to avoid prejudice, while providing the means to respect and encourage cultural diversity, promote democracy and realize social justice. what is the integration programme? the german integration programme is used by politicians as evidence that immigration is being managed and integration promoted by the state after decades of inaction towards the significant population of migrants or those with migration backgrounds. germany’s integration programme is structured into two parts: the language component consisting of 600 hours; and the orientation course, where societal values, history and the political system are taught, which has 100 hours. the orientation course originally ran for 30 hours, and was increased to 45 hours in 2007 then to 60 hours in 2011. in 2016, it was extended to 100 hours, signifying the importance placed on the newcomer’s obligation to learn german values and the heightened tensions of the refugee crisis (martin, 2016). it is worth noting that the programme is predominately focused on language acquisition (600 hours versus 100) and is tailored to learners’ needs. for instance, anyone lacking formal schooling or who is functionally illiterate may attend 300 hours of extra language study. courses are offered to people from a non-latin alphabet background and specifically to women, led by women, during kindergarten hours (bamf, 2019). while 900 hours of language study is no substitute for a primary education, it is a laudable goal to teach fundamental literacy. without it, people do not have the opportunity to realize human rights or defend the rights of others. they will struggle to achieve a life of dignity, particularly in a knowledge-based economy. unesco (2019) argues that ‘the “multiplier effect” of literacy empowers people, enables them to participate fully in society and contributes to improve livelihoods’ and that ‘literacy is also a driver for sustainable development in that it enables greater participation in the labour market; improved child and family health and nutrition; reduces poverty and expands life opportunities.’ targeting the courses to reach specific audiences can help improve the lives of families immigrating to germany. it enables them to interact with society, to meet their daily needs and to express their desires and opinions. the programmes are obligatory for certain groups, for instance ‘if you received your residence permit after 1 january 2005 and you cannot make yourself understood in german at a simple, adequate level, you must attend an integration course.’ (bamf, 2019). additionally, and with the threat of sanctions, if ‘you receive unemployment benefit ii (arbeitslosengeld ii) and the office which pays your unemployment benefit ii requires you to attend, and you have particular integration needs and the local immigration office requires you to attend’ (ibid). to note, this is not just for new migrants. the question of how and if the coercive measures would be applied in the case of non-compliance with the integration programme’s attendance requirements is still a valid one, particularly after the recent extension (joppke, 2007). when the integration programme or tests are obligatory, it means that being unable to demonstrate the language and knowledge threatens to deny family reunification, permanent residency or results in financial penalties (carerra and vankova, 2019; böcker & strick, 2011). at the end of the integration programme learners are expected to demonstrate a2 or b1 language mastery, as well as knowledge of the values, norms, legal-political system, and history, in the living in germany test. for the programme to reach a large audience, it must be affordable. the n. stone 35 language courses cost 1.95€ an hour; they are free to anyone who is on social support or of limited means, and funding for transportation is available. in addition, learners who do not qualify for the reduced costs can be reimbursed for half the fees if they successfully complete the programme within two years. the courses can also be paid in instalments to reduce the financial burden. what is integration and what is the goal of the integration programme? it is reasonable to expect a concern with norms and values would be expressed by ministries and politicians when discussing the orientation course. indeed, bamf stresses that orientation course participants will learn ‘important values in german society, e.g., freedom of worship, tolerance and equal [gender] rights’ (2019). however, referring to these specific values as important ones to be taught signifies that the target audience is perceived to lack them. there is also a risk that the reality that learners may face outside the classroom does not reflect these values. banulescu-bogdan and benton raise this issue, arguing: … values courses may celebrate equality and the rule of law, many minorities may experience discrimination or ethnic profiling by authorities; and while gender equality is held up as one of the principal reasons for restricting certain muslim cultural practices, problems such as domestic violence are in fact endemic in many native communities. (banulescu-bogdan & benton, 2017, p. 14). they assert that orientation courses should even-handedly portray society as it exists, and base this portrayal on relevant societal values, as opposed to depicting an ideal type. targeting a specific group, religion or ethnicity almost certainly has a negative effect not only on that group, but on all groups who are perceived to be different from the host society. the mandatory nature of the integration programme implies that someone is deficient in the skills and values the programme seeks to impart. it conveys the message that immigrants must share the values of the majority, discounting their experience and interpretation of those values, and this could dissuade some from feeling a bond with society. claiming a specific group holds values incompatible with that of the majority while arguing that the majority values human rights is fraught with contradictions in theory and practice. this is one of the main arguments raised by critical migration theorists regarding the use of the term ‘integration’. schinkel questions ‘who’ is integrating into ‘what’, in that integration implies some coherent entity to integrate into, i.e. society, while signifying that some people, by virtue of their (racialised) being, lack a quality that facilitates integration (schinkel, 2018). he challenges the notion of immigration integration; through the act of researching and enacting policy one divides the population into ethnic categories whereby white citizens are considered representative of the integrated community and do not appear on the ‘integration monitor’ (schinkel, 2018, p. 4). in a similar vein, abdou argues that we should understand immigration integration ‘… as a phenomenon that reveals more about those who articulate ideas about integration and decide on integration measures than it does about those who are the target of integration (i.e. the migrant “other”)’ (2019, p. 3). a consistent criticism throughout these and other works is how poorly or vaguely defined integration is and how this allows it to be used by politicians and others, despite the criticisms levied against the term. human rights education review – volume 3(1) 36 one recent example of political commentary elucidates that point. while discussing immigration integration, the centre-right christian democratic union/christian social union (cdu/csu) member of the bundestag carsten linneman (2018) claims, ‘i am personally a fan of the obligatory integration agreements according to the swiss model. here individually tailored goals will be agreed upon, their achievement continually monitored, and the evaluation linked to sanctions or rewards’ [author’s translation]. there are a number of problems with this message, including the argument that someone must be coerced to integrate through sanctions or rewards (that the state must provide in order to facilitate this process). even taking integration in this instance to mean full participation in social, economic and political life and framing it as a desirable outcome, it negates the power and inherent structural inequalities in society and defines failure to achieve integration as a deficit of the individual. it negates that someone’s culture, experience, or diversity has value in the host society. instead, their (perceived) illiberal values are viewed as hindering their integration and must be replaced by the liberal values of the majority. perhaps most troubling is the notion that continually monitoring someone for their progress in terms of integration measurements will somehow foster this integration, rather than making it abundantly clear that the individual cannot be integrated if they lack the racialised characteristics of the majority group. what is human rights education? the integration programme structure and goals provide some overview of the bias that the programme contains. it is important to reflect on how integration is defined and what is demanded of learners who are obligated to take these courses. the question is what would one expect to see if the programmes were constructed according to human rights education principles, and what are they? the council of europe charter on education for democratic citizenship and human rights education (‘the charter’) states that hre: means education, training, awareness raising, information, practices and activities which aim, by equipping learners with knowledge, skills and understanding and developing their attitudes and behaviour, to empower learners to contribute to the building and defence of a universal culture of human rights in society, with a view to the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms. (council of europe, 2010, p. 5) hre is more than teaching the definitions of human rights; it is rather a matter of empowering learners with the awareness, skills and understanding to contribute to a human rights-based society. it is meant to change attitudes and behaviour, specifically in promoting human rights and linking one’s own situation with that of the broader global community. this definition also argues that learners are to build and defend a universal culture of human rights, which necessarily implies a respect for and non-discrimination of diversity. bajaj, in her analysis of hre, asserts that though there are many interpretations, there is broad agreement on ‘… the need for hre to include goals related to cognitive (content), attitudinal or emotive (values/skills), and action-oriented components’ (bajaj, 2011, p. 485). moreover, she highlights the different contexts that drive different emphases on individual versus collective rights. though human rights are all equally valid, she posits that depending n. stone 37 on the context, including the level of economic development and the political system, there is a different focus on rights, depending on what will bring about social justice. for example, sustainable development may be the focus in latin america, while issues of discrimination against minorities may be a more pressing issue in europe. hre and education for democratic citizenship (edc) share a common goal, though there are differences in content and focus. regarding edc, the charter states that this means that education is to focus on building the attitudes, knowledge and behaviour to empower learners to exercise and defend their democratic rights. analysing edc and hre, the charter argues that: education for democratic citizenship focuses primarily on democratic rights and responsibilities and active participation, in relation to the civic, political, social, economic, legal and cultural spheres of society, while human rights education is concerned with the broader spectrum of human rights and fundamental freedoms in every aspect of people’s lives. (council of europe, 2010, p. 7) both hre and edc require learners to engage with and fulfil responsibilities linked to human and democratic rights. osler and starkey (2005) analyse how the international community is moving toward a common understanding of what those responsibilities should entail. they rightly argue that: it is relatively easy to convince individuals that they have rights, for these are strong claims that they can make in the expectation that they will receive benefits, such as protection and the provision of services. responsibilities, on the other hand, imply not receiving but giving; not individualism but a sense of the communal and the collective. therefore, learners must be able to empathize with the situation of others and to value and respect diversity. human rights are to be understood in a universal context, rather than in strictly national terms. they are global, guaranteed under the united nations’ declaration of human rights, and it creates a false understanding when they are associated only with citizenship rights. learners must also recognize human rights abuses and good practices within this broader context, and acknowledge the interconnectedness of the community, economy and society with people in far corners of the world. from this perspective, the goal of hre is to impart a sense of agency and responsibility. learners must be able to practise democracy and respect for human rights in and beyond the classroom. the classes should not restrict one’s ability to practise those rights. it is problematic that the very institutions that must teach democratic citizenship are hierarchical and structured in a way that reflects the majority bias. in fact, scholars argue that the process of incorporating human rights into national textbooks can change the activist-oriented approach through a process of ‘decoupling’ (bajaj, 2011, p. 488). these institutions may unintentionally perpetuate the same racism and implicit xenophobia seen in the broader society. transformative hre seeks to redress this problem, as it ‘… exposes gaps between rights and realities, and provokes group dialogue on the specific steps essential to closing the gaps’ (brown, 2016, p. 99). formal education may also encourage respect and deference to authority, rather than promoting learners’ rights and the responsibility to question human rights education review – volume 3(1) 38 how the actions and policies of the state may positively or negatively affect the attainment of human rights. osler’s critique of edc is that citizenship education programmes tend not to encourage learners to challenge or be critical of government, in part due to the goal of promoting patriotism and allegiance to the state (2009, p. 63). to teach democratic and human rights, it is necessary for learners to critically analyse how society is structured, and how its discourse can disadvantage minorities and perpetuate inequalities. one particular school of thought on human rights is the protest school, which seeks to rectify injustice. they argue that ‘… human rights articulate rightful claims made by or on behalf of the poor, the unprivileged, and the oppressed’ (dembour, 2010, p. 3). consequently, if human rights education loses its activist-oriented approach, it will fail to be transformative and to live up to this goal. similarly, the governance of educational institutions and the learning environment should be constructed in a way that empowers learners. to be consistent with hre, the course material should be constructed, via questions and activities, in a way that promotes human and democratic rights. this calls for participatory pedagogy and open-ended questions which enable learners to analyse an issue from multiple perspectives (bromley, 2011). hre is more effective in imparting wisdom and shaping attitudes when the materials and means of teaching are tailored to learners’ needs. providing them with the link between what happens abroad (the regional or global) and how this affects the local situation may help to develop a sense of solidarity. in a similar manner, ippoliti argues that ‘educational activities should be practical – relating human rights to learners’ real-life experience and enabling them to build on human rights principles found in their own cultural context’ (2009, in mahler et al., p. 12). hre must be acceptable, i.e. culturally appropriate to learners (brown, 2016). using multiple perspectives also reiterates that democratic and human rights can be understood in different ways, depending on context, provided they are consistent with the underlying principle. learners should be taught the relatively high-level principles of human rights, but must also be able to imagine how they are practised in daily life and in different contexts. these principles are captured in a number of internationally and regionally agreed-upon texts, such as the universal declaration of human rights, the un convention on the rights of the child, the european convention for the protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms, or the charter of fundamental rights of the european union. they provide tools to develop intercultural communication and understanding. osler argues, for instance, ‘the texts provide a set of principles against which we can critically reflect on our own culture, values, beliefs and behaviours and those of our fellow citizens’ (osler & starkey, 2005, p. 167). in sum, hre is to empower learners to fully participate in the economic, political and social levels of society and to challenge injustice and inequality. it must enable course participants to support and defend human rights from themselves and for others. it must demonstrate it respects and values diversity, ensuring the principle of non-discrimination. to be most effective, it needs to use participatory methods and link the local to the global, while remaining relevant to learners’ specific contexts. course content analysis of 100 stunden deutschland there are five textbooks approved for the orientation course. analysing 100 stunden deutschland allows some generalizations to be made about the course material on the whole. this is because the textbooks are all approved by the same authority n. stone 39 (bamf) and share a curriculum. their structure remains consistent: each starts with politics in a democracy, followed by sections on history and responsibility, and, finally, people and society (bamf, 2019). though some of the examples the books use will vary, the core topics are the same and the texts are constructed to prepare learners for the ‘life in germany’ test. this reduces the range of variation across the textbooks. in order to do the course content analysis, i use a hybrid content-discourse analysis and focus on the ‘politics in a democracy’ chapter, which is where discussions of human rights law and the constitution are predominantly found. the texts i study are written for language learners. they have simplified vocabularies and sentence structures, but i do not study this aspect. other scholars of discourse or content analysis would be interested in the grammar, syntax and constitutive parts of communication, be they spoken or written, while i am interested in the messages the texts convey. it is important to critically analyse what those messages are, how they are constructed and what this says about the sender (van dijk, 2007). i focus on two questions: 1) how does the text explicitly discuss human or fundamental rights and values? 2) how does the text discuss discrimination? regarding the second question, in the ‘politics in a democracy’ chapter the text does not explicitly use the term discrimination. it rather has a topic which describes real life events and asks if they are consistent with the constitution. many of the examples are of discrimination. the goal is to analyse the meaning behind the messages. though a message may be understood by the writer and reader, there is much that is latent: ‘thus, the message may reveal something about the characteristics or unconscious intent of the source or about the beliefs and values of a group or culture’ (singleton and straits, 2010). it is beneficial to use bromley’s analysis of multiculturalism and human rights in canadian textbooks as a foundation for that of 100 stunden deutschland. she identifies four main strategies of teaching multiculturalism and human rights: 1. framing human rights and multiculturalism as part of national identity; 2. using pedagogical approaches that promote multiple perspectives; 3. celebrating social and scientific figures and accomplishments as a main source of national pride; 4. drawing on exogenous sources to affirm state legitimacy. (bromley, 2011, p. 151) regarding the second strategy (using pedagogical approaches to promote multiple perspectives), 100 stunden deutschland (2017) states in a foreword to learners ‘all themes are presented in a way that a debate is stimulated around the content’ [author’s translation] (butler et al., p. 3). different views are illustrated in simplified language. bromley’s fourth strategy (drawing on exogenous sources to affirm state legitimacy) means the text should refer to a supranational level when discussing human rights. it is arguably expected that the orientation course textbooks will associate national identity with human rights and the rule of law, though the question is how they do so and if, as above, they focus on human rights as citizenship rights or as universal ones. the third point, regarding where and from whom germany draws its national pride, is interesting, but outside of the scope of my analysis. human rights education review – volume 3(1) 40 100 stunden deutschland allocates the largest part of the text to the politics in a democracy module (pp. 8-59), followed by the history and responsibility module (pp. 60-89) and the people and society one (pp. 90-140.) the fundamental rights in the constitution section of the first module starts with the statement ‘human dignity is inviolable’ and presents two images of people [author’s translation] (butler et al., 2017, p. 10). one depicts a person going through a garbage can on a street, hands up to the elbows in a blue container, and the other is of three people at a garbage dump, rummaging and collecting things to carry away. several statements are presented and learners are expected to match the statements to the photos and compare them in groups. the statements are: ‘no person should live among garbage, for every person is valuable! no one should be excluded from society’; ‘people are not like things. people are also more valuable than animals’; ‘if people live in garbage, this contravenes human rights and human dignity’; and finally, ‘emergency and poverty bring about resourcefulness’ [author’s translations] (ibid). there are three discussion starters on the left-hand side of the page, stating ‘the photo shows how…’, ‘you can see a person who…’, ‘the houses in the background are a contrast to…’ [author’s translations] (ibid). from a hre perspective this enables learners to compare their situations with those less fortunate. poverty and inequality are two factors that prevent the attainment of human rights and social justice. in fact, in a discussion of human rights, democracy and development, osler and starkey confront these issues, asserting that ‘such inequalities create social conditions that can spawn violent political conflicts’ while ‘poverty and inequality are barriers to citizenship and lead to instability’ (2005, p. 27). the classroom discussion could lead to a broader exploration of human rights and justice, around the talking points. however, it is unclear how extensively the topic would be analysed and there is considerable room for the teacher to drive the discussion. the second question under this topic is ‘what exactly are the fundamental rights?’ and the text presents article 1 of the german constitution (basic law). the text does not refer to exogenous sources for legitimacy, nor does it position human rights as being international, universally accepted principles guaranteed through the un (or even the eu), although it explicitly states that they are the basis of peace and justice in the world. it does not clarify that human rights apply to all people in the world, rather stating ‘the constitution applies to all germans: human rights are the basis for peace and justice in the world’ [author’s translation] (ibid). this is insufficient to qualify as hre, as it appears to situate human rights solely within the german context. the text suggests, in a learning tip on the right-hand side of the page, that leaners memorize article 1 and translate it into their mother tongue. this frames human rights as part of the national identity. the following two pages introduce learners to additional fundamental rights in the german constitution for citizens (bürgerrechte) under the heading ‘we are the basic laws’ (ibid, p. 12). this in some ways dilutes the topic of human rights, as it presents civil rights and human rights side by side, rather than as separate issues. on the right-hand side, we read ‘all germans civil rights. for foreigners, these rights do not apply. they must first become naturalised german citizens’ [author’s translation] (ibid). activity 3b asks learners to work in pairs and look at examples of human and civil rights. they are required to describe how important those rights are to them. most of the list contains human rights, with the exception of the freedom to choose one’s career. the other examples are: ‘that all people are equal before the law, that everyone is able to freely choose their religion, that all people should be treated n. stone 41 equally, that men and women have equal rights, that everyone may express their opinion freely, that no one has permission to enter someone else’s home without permission’ [author’s translations] (ibid). these are core human rights, including equality (i.e., anti-discrimination). by encouraging learners to compare with a partner how important they feel the right is, the course provides the opportunity to appreciate a different perspective. as argued by hre scholars, different societies place different focuses on rights and values and this activity would potentially elucidate this point, as learners compare personal contexts. it also expands the discussion of human rights, giving readers the impression that human rights and civil rights are valued in germany. the text continues with relevant examples of discrimination, under the heading ‘fundamental rights: entitlement and practice’ [author’s translation] (ibid). the left-hand page has five pictures, starting with a man in a wheelchair on a street. this is followed by a woman holding a fake bill with 78€ written on it; two men with their arms around each other while walking in a park, with a child holding one man’s hand; a woman wearing a headscarf and a white outfit; and lastly, a forbidden symbol with the text ‘no fat chicks’ and a caricature of a large woman behind it. learners are asked to decide if these pictures that depict ‘everyday situations’ are compatible with the constitution. the right-hand page gives examples of discrimination: jonas, who is fired from his job as a waiter due to scars he received in a car accident; katia, who discovers after six years of working in the same position as her colleague tom (performing the same tasks) that she earns 500€ less; a gay couple, holger and max, who are refused an apartment by a landlord who always finds a pretext to avoid renting to homosexuals; ahmad, who faces social prejudice when an elderly woman refuses to sit next to him as he ‘stinks of garlic’; and nadja, whose new boss demands that she take off her headscarf to work in the doctor’s office, claiming it is ‘unhygienic’ [author’s translations] (ibid, pp. 16-17). these are relevant as hre examples because they depict not just overt discrimination, but how such discrimination is perceived and practised in daily life. for example, a woman paid less than her male counterpart is discriminated against if she performs equal work, and it is also apparently discriminatory when someone denies a rental unit to a same-sex couple, even without openly admitting it. the case of holger and max is interesting because the victims have german names and they are not explicitly told that they are being denied accommodation because of their sexuality. it is, perhaps, the more accurate depiction of everyday discrimination in germany, as it is not overt but practised by using other pretexts or justifications. the text reiterates this point throughout these examples. one message this conveys is that although germany has a constitution based on human rights and this is part of the national identity, discrimination still occurs. the example of ahmad is controversial as no one has to sit next to anyone else on public transit, nor was he denied entry or a seat. it would be discriminatory if he were denied the same rights as everyone else, but this situation, i.e., where he gives off a strong odour and someone refuses to sit next to him, is not in itself discriminatory. while unfortunate and unpleasant for ahmad, this is not a human rights violation. nadja’s example is also constructed in a manner that shows how discrimination can be hidden or denied in practice. her new boss doesn’t tell her to take off her headscarf because of his opinions about her religion, rather he argues that wearing it is unhygienic, and people working in a doctor’s office must practise human rights education review – volume 3(1) 42 hygiene. learners have to discuss with their partners whether such situations conflict with the fundamental rights. this could generate classroom discussions. the integration programme and hre there are a number of levels which need to be assessed regarding the integration programme generally, the orientation course specifically and how they relate to understandings of hre. starting broadly, and taking a critical approach to integration as a concept, it is apparent that the term is controversial. it raises the question of who needs to integrate and what this requires. as stated above, the requirements of integration are unachievable, since it is a perpetual state of action and any ‘integration’ achieved is unstable because it is racialised (non-white citizens are required to integrate). it means that only the group that is required to integrate is responsible and any failures rest on their lack of will or ability to do so. the integration programme, including an orientation course, is obligatory for certain groups, targeting people with migration backgrounds and implying a deficiency of values and ignorance of norms. this conveys a message inconsistent with hre. however, if we take an agnostic approach to the integration programme, there are points which are consistent with hre. teaching literacy does not inherently qualify as hre, but without becoming literate, people may not be able to exercise their rights – human, democratic or otherwise. in this respect, it may be appropriate to assess the integration programme against the 4a teaching framework criteria: availability, accessibility, acceptability and adaptability. the integration programme is cost-effective and learners are financially subsidised to take the courses, which offer remediation and are designed for different groups. teaching basic german language literacy is unquestionably necessary and beneficial for course participants and society. that said, this language level (a2 or b1) is insufficient to transform immigrants into critical thinkers. they will still struggle to attain sufficient employment at an a2 german level, and will not be able to apply for university or hochschule (bmi, federal ministry of the interior, 2019). in this respect, there is a limit to how effective the integration programme can be, as learners will not have mastered the language. learners are only taught german with the intention of ensuring they can take part in basic aspects of economic, political and social life. for instance, bamf (2019) affirms the courses will teach participants ‘to learn to write emails and letters in german, to fill out official forms, to have telephone calls, and to apply for work positions. the topics vary, depending on which course one takes’ [author’s translation]. though this goal is certainly positive, it does not teach learners to be critical thinkers, to challenge societal hegemony and work for social justice; rather they are taught to be part of the dominant system. freire argues that the goal of literacy is not just a means to an end, i.e., being able to function in society, but should empower people to question and comprehend the world around them. specifically, he posits that ‘learning to read and write ought to be an opportunity for men to know what speaking the word really means: a human act implying reflection and action. as such it is a primordial human right and not the privilege of a few’ (freire, 1998, p. 7). he goes further, stressing that ‘to be an act of knowing, then, the adult literacy process must engage the learners in the constant problematizing of their existential situations’ (ibid, p. 12). in this sense, the a2 or b1 language level is insufficient for learners to question societal injustice, as described by freire. n. stone 43 the text provides a granular level of detail necessary to assess how compatible the orientation course is with hre. from the examples included here, it appears that some of the core aspects of hre are covered; there is relevance and definitions of human rights are included. the text is less effective when civic and human rights are discussed together. not having a distinct separation between the two leaves room for a false interpretation and may give the impression that both civic and human rights are dependent on the state, rather than human rights being endogenous to all humans. the text also fails to legitimize human rights by referring to regional or global sources, such as the eu or the un, and this detracts from its message. in other words, if human rights are explained solely in the context of the german state, it creates the impression that they are not universal, merely german. the goal of hre is also to encourage empathy, understanding and agency. human rights are explicitly discussed in a variety of contexts, including a section devoted to teaching the different ways in which discrimination can manifest itself and this, along with the open-ended nature of the activity questions, can encourage learners to appreciate human rights in different contexts. this is arguably an effective method of raising human rights and social justice issues because it uses everyday, common situations to present discrimination as an issue that affects many people. it is not one particular group that is affected by the insidious effects of discrimination and the text conveys the message that germans with and without migration backgrounds also face this. using poverty as a case example to clarify and elaborate on the inviolability of the dignity of man links the local to the global. poverty and inequality are antithetical to justice and prevent people from achieving human rights; they are issues which people may not personally experience, but are certainly aware of. challenging learners to empathize with those who suffer such indignity is both realistic and relevant. in relation to the classroom environment, the text contains questions and activities that encourage learners to analyse issues from multiple perspectives, though the overall approach seems more in line with a ‘values and awareness model’ of hre, where the focus is on teaching knowledge without a predominant focus on inspiring activism (tibbitts, 2002). the teacher plays a key role in facilitating and ensuring the classroom environment is intercultural (or otherwise) in practice. arguably, some teachers may take an approach consistent with hre, while others may focus on edc or on an approach that enforces the notion of germanness at the expense of universal norms, rights and values. conclusion this analysis provides some insight into how the integration programme is consistent with hre, but also how, in specific ways, it fails short of that standard. it uses the 100 stunden deutschland text to perform a course content analysis though, due to length restrictions, focuses solely on one of the chapters, ‘politics in a democracy’. it asks two main questions: are human rights explicitly discussed and, if so, how? and, how is discrimination addressed? it would not be difficult to include more explicit references to universal human rights or to claim legitimacy from the un or other supranational organisations. the text already focuses on the political-legal values enshrined via the german constitution. though the text frames civic and human rights as something inherent to germany, rather than being universal in nature, this could be reframed human rights education review – volume 3(1) 44 and would strengthen compatibility with hre. regarding the examples provided, they are mostly relevant and realistic, though some, particularly that of ahmad, are not clear examples of discrimination and thus human rights issues. for the programme to be consistent with hre, the classroom environment must be structured in a manner that encourages participants to become engaged not just with knowledge of human rights, but to practise them, and this depends entirely on the teacher. it needs to avoid the pitfalls of teaching facts without inspiring learners, treating them as vessels to be filled with facts, rather than sources of knowledge. it is difficult to envision this, as the structure does not lend itself to teaching critical thinking to challenge the dominant system; the goals are rather to teach a level of constitutional patriotism and allegiance to the german state. that said, the most effective way for both the text material and the environment to avoid bias while teaching norms and values is to focus on universal human rights, rather than notions of culturally specific ones. by using hre as its core orientation and encouraging participants to acquire different perspectives it could create the opportunity for participants to become not just knowledgeable about human rights, but also willing and able to promote and support them. n. stone 45 references abali, o.s. 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(2002). understanding what we do: emerging models for human rights education. international review of education, 48(3), 159-171. https://doi.org/10.1023/a:1020338300881 http://www.migrationpolicy.org/pubs/civicintegration-joppke.pdf http://www.jstor.org/stable/24357288 https://doi.org/10.1080/136918301200266211 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-eu-election/pro-europe-vote-fragments-but-limits-nationalist-gains-in-eu-election-iduskcn1sv0qq https://www.reuters.com/article/us-eu-election/pro-europe-vote-fragments-but-limits-nationalist-gains-in-eu-election-iduskcn1sv0qq https://www.reuters.com/article/us-europe-migrants-germany-integration-i-iduskcn0yg202 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-europe-migrants-germany-integration-i-iduskcn0yg202 https://doi.org/10.1177%2f0022009413505667 https://doi.org/10.1177/0042098009104575 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11578-002-0019-0 https://doi.org/10.1023/a:1020338300881 human rights education review – volume 3(1) 48 triadafilopoulos, t., & schönwälder, k. 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(2011). united nations declaration on human rights education and training. adopted by the general assembly, resolution 66/137, a/res/66/137, 19 december 2011. retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/compilation/page s/unitednationsdeclarationonhumanrightseducationandtraining(2011).a spx unesco (2019). literacy. retrieved from https://en.unesco.org/themes/literacy van dijk, t. a. (ed.) (1997). discourse as structure and process: discourse studies: a multidisciplinary introduction (vols. 1-1). london: sage publications ltd doi: 10.4135/9781446221884 wagstyl, s. (2014). germany: the immigrant influence. retrieved from financial times https://www.ft.com/content/87b900a8-db05-11e3-827300144feabdc0 williams, h. (2014). changing the national narrative: evolution in citizenship and integration in germany, 2000–10. journal of contemporary history, 49(1), 54–74. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022009413505658 all web addresses are controlled as valid by january 15, 2019. http://www.jstor.org/stable/23742736 https://doi.org/10.1186/s40878-018-0095-1 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-germany-population/migration-pushes-german-population-to-record-high-of-83-million-iduskcn1pj0pa https://www.reuters.com/article/us-germany-population/migration-pushes-german-population-to-record-high-of-83-million-iduskcn1pj0pa https://www.reuters.com/article/us-germany-population/migration-pushes-german-population-to-record-high-of-83-million-iduskcn1pj0pa https://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/compilation/pages/unitednationsdeclarationonhumanrightseducationandtraining(2011).aspx https://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/compilation/pages/unitednationsdeclarationonhumanrightseducationandtraining(2011).aspx https://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/compilation/pages/unitednationsdeclarationonhumanrightseducationandtraining(2011).aspx https://en.unesco.org/themes/literacy https://www.ft.com/content/87b900a8-db05-11e3-8273-00144feabdc0 https://www.ft.com/content/87b900a8-db05-11e3-8273-00144feabdc0 https://doi.org/10.1177/0022009413505658 volume 4, no 1 (2021) date received: 03-09-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3980 date accepted: 01-02-2021 issn 2535-5406 countering violent extremism in education: a human rights analysis hans svennevig university college london, uk. lee jerome middlesex university, uk. alex elwick university college london, uk. abstract: governments around the world have developed a range of policy approaches for countering violent extremism (cve) in education. in this article we review a united kingdom (uk) government website offering a library of resources (educate against hate), evaluating the extent to which it is consistent with human rights principles. whilst the advice, guidance and resources are varied and inconsistent, our analysis shows that children are frequently perceived as potential victims in need of protection, rather than individuals with agency, and they are rarely considered explicitly as rights holders. whilst an equalities framework is used throughout the website, this is rarely linked to human rights, and does not prevent some stereotypical views of religious minorities being promoted. the article ends with an outline of how a more explicit engagement with children’s rights might help teachers to better align cve policy with human rights education (hre) principles. key words: countering violent extremism, human rights education, children’s rights, rule of law, policy hans svennevig: h.svennevig@ucl.ac.uk mailto:h.svennevig@ucl.ac.uk human rights education review – 4(1) 92 countering violent extremism in education: a human rights analysis doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3980 issn 2535-5406 hans svennevig lee jerome alex elwick hans.svennevig@ucl.ac.uk university college london, uk. middlesex university, uk. university college london, uk. abstract: governments around the world have developed a range of policy approaches for countering violent extremism (cve) in education. in this article, we review a united kingdom (uk) government website offering a library of resources (educate against hate), evaluating the extent to which it is consistent with human rights principles. whilst the advice, guidance and resources are varied and inconsistent, our analysis shows that children are frequently perceived as potential victims in need of protection, rather than individuals with agency, and they are rarely considered explicitly as rights holders. whilst an equalities framework is used throughout the website, this is rarely linked to human rights, and does not prevent some stereotypical views of religious minorities being promoted. the article ends with an outline of how a more explicit engagement with children’s rights might help teachers to better align cve policy with human rights education (hre) principles. keywords: countering violent extremism, human rights education, children’s rights, rule of law, policy countering violent extremism, education and human rights standards since the mid-2000s, there has been a proliferation of legislation and policy, on a global scale, which seeks to counter violent extremism (cve). while such approaches often incorporate aspects of surveillance and intervention, they increasingly focus on preventative pastoral or curriculum work through education (see ragazzi, 2017). in the uk, such cve approaches have their roots in the contest (counter-terrorism) strategy, which includes four elements: to prevent vulnerable people from becoming terrorists; to pursue terrorists to reduce their capability; to protect the population; and to prepare for attacks to mitigate harm (her majesty’s government [hmg], 2018). the strand of work relating to prevention was strengthened in 2015 through the introduction of the prevent duty-which places a legal duty on teachers (and other public sector workers) to ‘have due regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism’ (hmg, 2015). as outlined by thomas in his authoritative summary, the prevent work promoted by government originally focused on community-based work with young muslims, but later moved away from this to ‘focus on individuals “at risk” of, or vulnerable to, “radicalisation”’ (thomas, 2020, p. 12). the prevent duty also defined extremism as ‘vocal or active opposition to the fundamental british values’ (fbvs), which are defined as democracy, the rule of law, mailto:hans.svennevig@ucl.ac.uk h. svennevig, l. jerome & a. elwick 93 liberty, and mutual respect and tolerance of different faiths and beliefs (hmg, 2015). the government’s department for education (dfe) requires schools to promote the fbvs to children (dfe, 2014). the need to conduct cve policy within a human rights framework is clearly established in the council of europe (coe) convention on the prevention of terrorism, which states its purpose is ‘to enhance the efforts of parties in preventing terrorism and its negative effects on the full enjoyment of human rights’ (coe, 2005, article 2). this commitment is echoed in the united nations (un) global counterterrorism strategy, which states that the un’s efforts should be directed to ‘the protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms while countering terrorism’ (un, 2006, annex, parag.2(b)). a survey of cve policies across coe member states noted concerns that cve policies may not always regard the best interests of the child as a primary consideration. it additionally noted that a range of other rights might be affected or unduly restricted: freedom of expression; freedom of thought, conscience and religion; and freedom from discrimination (ragazzi, 2017). these concerns are borne out in empirical research about the impact of cve policies in education, which indicates that in practice educators are positioned in an ethically ambiguous situation. whilst some respond in ways that promote the principles of education for democratic citizenship and human rights education (edc/hre), others feel inhibited and so may undermine students’ fundamental rights (ragazzi & walmsley, forthcoming; busher & jerome, 2020). typically, this research indicates that minoritised students, especially muslims, frequently feel as though they are singled out by such policies; they sense that their freedom of speech is curtailed, and their religious beliefs scrutinised. the un special rapporteur on counterterrorism and human rights has routinely highlighted concerns about the securitisation of education, threats to the autonomy of education, and risks to the rights of students (2019; 2020). this article focuses on a set of educational resources produced to help implement the prevent duty in schools and considers to what extent they balance cve with human rights. focusing on the uk’s approach to cve in education has wider implications, given the nature of ‘policy epidemics’ (levin 1998) that characterise the ‘borrowing’ of policy from one jurisdiction to another, and the fact that the uk is often regarded as particularly influential in this area (kundnani and hayes 2018). an example of policy enactment: the educate against hate website the evidence (ragazzi & walmsley, forthcoming; busher & jerome, 2020) suggests that the risks outlined above can be exacerbated or ameliorated at different stages in the policy implementation process. between government and international policy frameworks and teachers’ practice there is a rich policyscape (carney, 2009) in which further guidance and exemplars of practice are developed to interpret and elaborate policy (lundie, 2017). mccowan’s (2008) model of curricular transposition describes policy as leaping from statements of ideal ends (e.g. the prevent duty) to ideal means (e.g. publication of a curriculum or resources for teaching) and then to the actual experiences of teachers and students. in these leaps policy is translated from one sphere of activity to another, for example from home office legislation to guidance for school inspectors, and then to a pastoral curriculum. through these translations, different points are emphasised, and new terms (such as radicalisation and extremism) become attached to more familiar and established concepts (such as safeguarding). as ideas are detached and reattached to other agendas, the policy human rights education review – 4(1) 94 subtly shifts meaning as it moves through the policyscape (bajaj, 2012). a variety of different policy actors also work on the policy, for example, sometimes people from a police background find themselves offering educational advice to schools and a new group of prevent education officers and advisors has been recruited in england to offer expertise around cve (lundie, 2017). the fact that these people now owe their careers and professional identities to the policy positions them in a rather different relationship to it than those who see it as a distracting addition to their work, or even those who feel antagonistic towards it (ball, maguire & braun, 2013). this means it is difficult to talk about cve policy in broad, singular terms. it can be more insightful to focus on specific aspects of policy enactment, or specific locations within the policyscape. this is especially so if we want to evaluate the extent to which the policy is aligned with a human rights approach, because so much is determined by the nuanced decisions that are made in defining and implementing the policy. previous relevant studies have described the variety of cve resources available without analysing them (davies, 2018), or have analysed individual cve documents (nolan, 2016), or a selection of documents pulled together within a specific cve network (mattsson, hammarén, & odenbring, 2016). we are not aware of any studies that analyse a body of education resources curated by a government department to enact cve policy. in this article, we focus on the educate against hate (eah) website developed by the uk government, which provides ‘practical advice, support and resources to protect children from extremism and radicalisation’ (‘about’ in eah, 2020). the website was launched in 2016 (dfe, 2016) and was updated and redesigned in 2020, prior to our analysis. it includes classroom resources, training for staff, government guidance, posters and leaflets, information about reporting a concern, and a section of common questions. as such, the site represents the first stage of policy enactment, as the general prevent requirements are translated into government endorsed lessons and activities. there are four tabs, which divide up the content in different ways: one for teachers; another one for school leaders; a third for parents; and a fourth tab that leads to a blog. even allowing for the fact that some of the resources appear in several categories, this represents a substantial sample of material which translates the prevent duty into practice. method our methodology borrows from a number of studies which have analysed resources aimed at teachers. brown and her colleagues examined german and english textbooks about europe to explore how they reflected the political discourses in each country (brown, szczepek reed, ross, davies, & bengsch, 2019). ford (2019) also examined textbooks to consider how they framed and presented terrorism and extremism in british schools. ford situates his work in the broad field of discourse analysis, but essentially read the textbooks in search of key themes and recurrent ideas, as well as considering which perspectives were represented, and how narratives were constructed. an and suh (2013) studied the representation of us history in south korean textbooks. these three examples effectively bring a range of questions to frame the analysis of the resources being reviewed, and these questions reflect key issues emerging from the literature and the researchers’ own interest. this typically includes asking who is represented and how they are represented, which narratives are offered to frame people and events, and how the resources establish relationships between the elements presented. h. svennevig, l. jerome & a. elwick 95 we adopt a similar approach, although the eah website includes teaching resources (similar to textbooks) and other types of documents, such as posters, information, training sessions and blog entries. in developing the specific framework to use for our analysis we have drawn on the global review of cve policies by kundnani and hayes (2018, p. 40) who have argued that: the rule of law requires that legal processes, institutions and substantive norms are consistent with human rights, including the core principles of equality under the law, accountability before the law and fairness in the protection and vindication of rights. in working through what this means in practice, kundnani and hayes offer a checklist to evaluate the extent to which cve policies are aligned with these principles. we have adapted their checklist for this review, identifying three key questions: 1. to what extent are the resources on the website aligned with a human rights approach? here we are interested in whether and how they discuss human rights, and particularly children’s rights. more specifically, we are concerned with children’s rights to hold and express opinions and to participate in decisions as well as being protected from risks. here we are alert to the possibility that the emphasis on safeguarding may lead adults to sideline participation rights, or to treat children as objects of surveillance and intervention, rather than focus on young people’s agency (livingstone, 2017). 2. to what extent are the resources explicit in discussing equalities? specifically, we are concerned to explore the extent to which restrictions on rights and freedoms are considered in relation to the equalities act (hmg, 2010). here we note that, in addition to the prevent duty, schools already had a legal equality duty requiring them to consider how their policies and practices promoted equality, particularly with reference to a series of protected characteristics. in relation to the prevent duty we are interested in exploring the treatment of specific protected characteristics such as political and religious beliefs, sex and ethnicity. 3. to what extent do the resources respect the autonomy of the education sector? this question relates to concerns about the ‘securitization’ of education policy (busher & jerome, 2020), where the language and values of the security services and police are imposed on education. this reflects a debate in the literature about the extent to which teachers are being co-opted into a security role, or can establish a distinctive educational interpretation of the prevent agenda (panjwani, 2016). as kundnani and hayes argue, this is about protecting established professional norms, values and practices as having a distinct value in their own right, rather than assuming all public services should be re-shaped to the security agenda. our first two questions reflect the norms and principles associated with a human rights approach to education, where children have the right to education and rights within education. they have the right to be taught about their rights, through a rights-respecting process, and in a way that encourages support for human rights human rights education review – 4(1) 96 (un, 2011). the third question arises for kundnani and hayes as a way to ensure that education is not distorted by non-educational aims. the relative autonomy of education is important because as well as being a right in its own terms, education also acts as an enabling right, allowing children to understand and access their other rights (lundy & martinez sainz, 2018). in addition to the right to access education, international standards specify that such education should promote equality, respect children’s cultural identity and promote freedom and tolerance. to this end, teachers and school leaders require a degree of autonomy to adapt their provision to the needs of local communities (tomaševski, 2006). our methodological approach is rooted in critical discourse analysis and as such it is important to note that it examines the ways in which the policy is translated into documents by a variety of intermediate policy actors. these actors exercise a degree of ‘writerly’ engagement, interpreting key concepts, translating them into different contexts, and employing their own authorial imagination and creativity to some extent. of course, such engagement is also ‘readerly’ in that these actors are not entirely free to devise their own interpretations, they are also constrained by some legal requirements and definitions (see ball et al., 2013). as an example, policy actors must engage with the definition of the fbvs but they can exercise some discretion, indeed they must exercise some agency as to how this is interpreted and enacted (vincent, 2019). our focus only captures some of these interpretations written into policy advice and suggested learning resources. those persons reading them to inform their own actions similarly have the capacity to engage in a readerly and writerly role, and therefore such an analysis cannot yield insights into how children actually experience the policy. our previous work, reporting on young people’s views, emphasised that students want an educational opportunity to learn about and improve their understanding of terrorism and violent extremism, as media coverage sometimes leaves them feeling overwhelmed and confused (elwick, jerome & svennevig, 2020). this analysis aims to provide some indication about the extent to which this is achieved in the resources on offer. the practical research itself was carried out by all three authors of this paper. the eah website is divided into sections directed at intended audiences (e.g. teachers, parents, school leaders and the blog), and these sections were allocated roughly equally to individual researchers. there are 86 separate resources on the website, each of which links to a project, document or set of documents, plus 22 additional blog entries offering case studies, reviews of resources and discussions of relevant concepts. some of these 108 primary sources link to large files of additional resources (sometimes up to 30 documents for each project), which meant there were 375 individual documents or websites referred to in total. whilst we reviewed each of the 106 key resources, we only sampled a handful of the documents where there were many additional resources. for example, a link to resources from the london borough of tower hamlets included 29 lessons or assemblies. here we looked at a sample of six of the resources which seemed from the titles to engage most explicitly with cve and / or rights. analysis of the resources was based upon the three review questions adapted from kundnani and hayes (2018), as described above. a key focus in this process was the employment of a form of critical discourse analysis (e.g. fairclough, 2001) as a tool in both a deductive and iterative approach–bringing questions from our reading to these texts, coming together as a research team to compare findings, and then repeating the process. discussions as a research team involved extensive joint review of materials in order to ensure our findings were h. svennevig, l. jerome & a. elwick 97 anchored in the resources and to allow us to agree on a consistent set of themes, as detailed below. the website and its accompanying resources were all reviewed in july and august 2020. analysis a review of counter-radicalisation educational projects for the coe notes a variety of approaches, falling largely into two broad categories (ragazzi & walmsley, forthcoming). first, there are ‘casework’ programmes, focused on identifying at-risk individuals with a view to referring them to specialist agencies or intervening in some way. the prevent duty in the uk includes a casework element, and the eah website includes guidance on how to identify and report individuals. second, there is a range of ‘awareness raising’ approaches, which aim to prevent radicalisation through citizenship education, social cohesion activities and anti-discrimination teaching. our analysis indicates that there are two quite different approaches in this category. on the one hand, some resources adopt the rather general idea that promoting an alternative narrative to young people (often driven by the fbvs, but also including human rights or activism) will provide a generalised form of inoculation against radicalisation and extremism. these resources may not mention terrorism or extremism at all, and instead focus simply on the promotion of democratic principles. on the other hand, some resources take a more focused approach and explore in depth the phenomenon of terrorism and violent extremism. these may focus on case studies, including personal testimony from former violent extremists, to provide insights into the processes through which individuals are radicalised. they may focus on the broader issues of how terrorism affects others in society, how the media reports it, and how governments respond. broadly speaking we may characterise these awareness-raising approaches as taking either an individual / psychologised approach, or a more systemic / political one. 1. a human rights approach? among the numerous resources on the eah website there are very few that discuss human rights explicitly. those that do consider human rights are often problematic, for example, they may be simplistic or include restricted definitions. miriam’s vision (a resource produced by the family of miriam hyman, a london bombing victim) starts by considering tensions between the right to privacy and surveillance but it does not help young people to consider how to debate and balance these issues. he named me malala briefly mentions rights, but the focus of the resource is neither on cve nor rights but on peace and unity as part of active citizenship. similarly, democracy challenge fails to connect democracy to human rights at all. in earlier work examining a small selection of classroom resources (elwick et al., 2020) we concluded that they often fell short of providing young people with developed, critical and nuanced knowledge to help them counter extremism. we found the resources often over-simplified these complex subjects and reproduced stereotypes. an example of this is provided by fat face, a programme about extremism and prejudice. there is only a brief mention of the right to be heard and extremism is defined as 'very strong' views. it states that 'not all extremists become terrorists, some remain peaceful but there is a real risk' and that radicalisations usually only happen to vulnerable lonely people. only four resources stood out as providing clear opportunities for the discussion of human rights. reclaim radical is a student-led resource, which will be human rights education review – 4(1) 98 discussed in more detail in the final part of this analysis. it is distinctive in providing resources that respond to young people’s interests. the others make extensive use of debate and discussion to encourage engagement with, and reflection on, human rights (mike haines: global acts of unity; the deliberative classroom*; generation global). generation global, for example, moves away from debate (which can be polarising) to dialogue and explicitly models deliberation, inter-faith dialogue and self-review, considering different examples of extremism for a range of religious identities. this resource encourages students to think about how extremism can be confused with other belief systems and how governments deal with free speech and hate speech. considering the volume of educational resources on the website, it is troubling that so few express a human rights-based approach. as previously noted, the website does not only offer resources for classroom teaching; it also directly addresses school leaders and parents. one aspect of the government guidance that specifically speaks to the role of senior leaders concerns decisions about hosting speakers on school or college premises. there are some significant inconsistencies in the way these documents discuss this issue in relation to children’s rights to free speech and to access information. one document, hosting speakers on school premises, is only two pages in length but includes links to six additional documents, including guidance on teacher misconduct, which warns that staff are ‘likely to face prohibition if they deliberately allow exposure of pupils to such actions that undermine fundamental british values… by inviting individuals to speak in schools’ (p. 1). having established the prospects of being disciplined for getting this wrong, the guidance goes on to suggest that school leaders should undertake internet searches on prospective speakers, possibly make enquiries with local police to check out any concerns, and that these precautions should apply whether the speaker will be on school premises during school hours or afterwards (even where classrooms are being hired by community groups). whilst staff are reminded that their decisions should not discriminate against speakers on the grounds of any protected characteristics (in the equalities act 2010), there is no mention of any other rights that might be balanced against the risk. this creates the impression that it would be sensible to err on the side of caution, and be sceptical about controversial speakers. this interpretation seems evident in the exemplar resource published by westminster city council in their premises protocol, which only mentions rights when it reminds leaders ‘it is important that reasons for refusal very clearly do not breach the individual’s rights’ (p. 5, our emphasis). this seems at odds with the eah’s own publication prevent mythbuster (eah, undated), which states that guidance ‘specifically reminds providers of their duty to ensure freedom of speech’ (p. 4). another document, advice for independent schools, acknowledges that it is entirely reasonable for schools to redact sections of textbooks or past exam papers which do not reflect the ethos of the school (p. 15). taken together, these guidance documents seem to ignore arguments about freedom of speech; none of them mention children’s rights to access information. by contrast, another document, prevent duty in further education: guidance, foregrounds consideration of rights: every institution clearly needs to balance its legal duties in terms of both ensuring freedom of speech and also protecting student and staff welfare. (parag. 6) h. svennevig, l. jerome & a. elwick 99 this guidance makes it clear that school / college leaders should only be concerned about speakers who actively support terrorism or who risk drawing young people into terrorism. but even in such cases, the guidance notes that they may mitigate risks by organising an appropriate challenge to these opinions. the other documents tackling this issue seem to ignore the rights dimension and in doing so position adults as decision-makers and actors, and children as the objects of their safeguarding decisions. this contradictory position seems even more remarkable given that decisions about safeguarding are taken in the context of the overarching general guidance document working together to safeguard children. this document explicitly foregrounds the un convention on the rights of the child and the requirement to ‘give due regard to a child’s wishes’ in the children act (hmg, 1989) as two core principles for safeguarding policy. it also notes that children want to be helped to understand safeguarding issues and be treated as competent to participate in decisions that affect them (p. 10). however, in most of the prevent guidance reviewed here there is clear evidence that in secondary schools protection rights have been used to trump participation rights although, fundamentally, these other documents do not seriously engage with rights at all. when we turn to consider the blogs, the very first post, teaching approaches for building pupils’ resilience to extremist narratives (2017), illustrates this lack of rights focus. it uses teachers’ q&as to determine how young people can be vulnerable to extremism (promoting simplistic diagnostic checklists, discussed in more detail below) and discusses how teachers can develop pupils’ personal resilience and positive identity. from a rights perspective this could be seen as trying to improve their agency, but this is not mentioned. the blog post links to resources from the personal, social and health education (pshe) association, tony blair’s institute for global change and the association for citizenship teachers (act), which are said to help empower students and encourage them to develop a positive sense of personal identity. the resources are described as enabling students to develop a strong sense of ‘what it means to be british and what makes diversity valuable and what it might feel like to be stereotyped’. in fact, although the blog describes the act resources as being focused on equality, citizenship and british values, it makes no reference to the fact that they actually focus explicitly on human rights. this would suggest that the blog author has either ignored the rights focus, or not understood it as relevant. this reflects a problem with the language of the fbvs, which are explicit about teaching about freedom, equality and democracy, but do not frame these within the context of human rights. the only explicit mention of rights in the blogs is to the unicef rights respecting schools award (rrsa). in the blog how extra-curricular activities can help schools fulfil the prevent duty (2018), rights are framed very positively and the programme is said to ‘transform schools into places where children feel in control of their futures’ and also give ‘children the best chance to lead happy, healthy lives and to be responsible, active citizens… based on principles of equality, dignity, respect, non-discrimination and participation’. however, the rrsa programme provides general advice about human rights education, rather than relating a human rights approach explicitly to cve practices. human rights education review – 4(1) 100 2. an equalities dimension? respectful school communities is a document offering advice to school leaders on creating and sustaining a respectful school culture. the first page urges schools to involve children and parents in creating a school vision and to ground their work in the equalities act. the first case study of good practice describes how a school used the un convention on the rights of the child as the basis for their vision and values statement. the second example directly confronts sexual violence and urges schools to clarify that ‘banter’ or ‘boys being boys’ can never justify harassment or violence, and that schools must directly challenge such behaviours and discourses. the principle of equality is not directly linked to cve policy and the only place where the two policies are connected is in the prevent duty: statutory guidance, which simply notes that fulfilling the requirements of the prevent duty is ‘likely to be relevant to fulfilling other responsibilities such as the duty arising from section 149 of the equality act 2010’ (parag. 12). no further explanation is given. the main ways in which equality is explicitly addressed in relation to cve are in the prevent referrals e-learning packages and in some of the resources for teachers. firstly, the online training resources explicitly address the risk that teachers will refer young people for a security assessment based on misinformation, caused by their own lack of understanding of someone’s religious or cultural background. for example, in one video clip an experienced channel panel participant discusses a case study where a teacher raises concerns about a pakistani student going on an extended holiday to pakistan. the case study points out that without further information this is simply an issue of taking an unauthorised holiday and does not, in itself, raise concerns relating to prevent. this addresses some of the issues emerging from empirical studies of how prevent referrals may reflect unconscious bias or prejudice (busher & jerome, 2020). these resources represent a significant improvement on earlier online training courses, which reinforced some of these stereotypical assumptions (jerome, elwick & kazim 2019). by contrast, talking to your teenager about radicalisation aims to support the parents of children with autism to promote the fbvs. it repeats some of the tropes identified elsewhere around identifying radicalisation through ‘personality changes’ etc. it also includes an exercise where participants are presented with four photographs of people (one wearing a hijab, one with tattoos, etc.) and asked to choose which is the extremist. all the choices result in the same message: ‘you cannot decide if a person is an extremist just by how they look.’ this simplistic approach to thinking about prejudice and stereotyping is also evident in other material, such as the walls resources where students are advised ‘don’t be racist’. the eah website does include a range of resources that promote the principle of equality but these are generally silent on cve. in turn, the resources that promote cve are generally silent on equalities. for example, interfaith explorers, which works to build interfaith community cohesion, includes a hate crime primary lesson plan exploring the equality act and the protected characteristics of lgbt, disabilities and ethnicity, but this is entirely unconnected to extremism or terrorism. these resources are often explicit about the equalities act, but tend to be less obviously connected to terrorism or violent extremism and instead focus on promoting aspects of the fbvs, for example by tackling homophobia, islamophobia or prejudice more generally. a series of resources suggested for assemblies, which includes a number of ready to use powerpoints, provides a contrast to this general trend (tower hamlets secondary resources). some of these, for example a document called faith and hate h. svennevig, l. jerome & a. elwick 101 crime, explicitly situate the discussion within the human rights act and the right to religious freedom. the resources link islamophobia and far-right organisations, and connect to a range of local political action to defend equality in the london borough. here, students are shown how far-right extremism threatens the rights of muslims. whilst these resources may not be directly re-usable in other contexts (as they are so closely focused on the local area), they illustrate the power of explicitly connecting discussion of extremism and radicalisation to the principle of equality. this kind of focus on equalities issues is also evident in the blog. we can see this in examples such as hate crime awareness week (2019), which includes definitions, suggested actions and useful resources. however, it is clear that some equality issues are given more consideration than others, for example there is very little mention of issues other than religion, ethnicity and sexuality. in particular, religious elements related to extremism occur more than any others, especially references to islam . this is evident in the post using the right terms: holding discussions around extremism (2019), in which two terms are defined in relation to far-right extremism and five to islamist extremism. no references are made to groups outside of this binary. the blogs are frequently illustrated with photographs, but these largely portray happy white people as students or teachers. the one notable exception, stand up! education: breaking down barriers through facilitating real conversations (2017) includes a picture of two adult visitors from the charity stand up! education against discrimination and four girls from minority backgrounds. there is only one clear picture of an adolescent black boy in any of the posts and this is in we have a key role in keeping our children safe online (2018), a post concerned with keeping children safe from ‘cyberbullying, grooming and inappropriate content such as terrorist activity or hate speech’. 3. educational autonomy? it is a longstanding concern that cve policy generally, and the prevent duty in particular, threaten educational autonomy by imposing a security logic onto teachers, at the expense of an educational approach (ragazzi & walmsley, forthcoming). although the website is called educate against hate, the section aimed at parents is largely concerned with the individual safeguarding perspective and includes several separate routes for reporting concerns about one’s child to the authorities. many of these resources are repetitive and self-referential, creating the impression of more diverse resources than is the case. these include vague checklists, which parents are encouraged to use to assess whether their children are vulnerable. these typically include factors such as changing friends, changing appearance, and no longer engaging in activities they used to enjoy. such lists are widely discredited, but appear frequently here. few of these resources suggest that parents might usefully discuss concerns with schools. the language largely focuses on safeguarding and protecting vulnerable children; for example, in a top tips guide for parents the opening statement suggests that extremism is a threat to parental authority: [extremist] groups work to undermine the authority of parents by using sophisticated methods to trigger feelings of anger, injustice and shame towards a parent. human rights education review – 4(1) 102 despite these problematic features, there is also a consistent focus on talking to one’s child and an awareness that an authoritarian, controlling approach will not necessarily be helpful: trying to stop your child using the internet and mobile devices won’t keep them safe. instead, teach them to understand that just because something appears on a website doesn’t mean it’s factually correct. such approaches do seem to be more aligned with an acknowledgement of children’s own agency and rights. for example, the following advice in the top tips document recognises children should be heard: ask their opinion… take care to listen… let them talk without interrupting. the repetition of the core message to ‘work with your child’ and a focus on giving them skills to recognise false news stories also acknowledges that children need some support to develop their capabilities. this reflects, to some extent, the approach adopted by hart, biggeri and babic (2014), who argue that children’s participation rights are best promoted through sen’s capability approach, building their capacity to use rights to enhance their lives. however, this language in the eah resources is undeveloped and generally glosses over other rights, such as the right to information or the right to privacy. close parental surveillance is generally encouraged, for example, by offering the advice to ‘set up a family email address that your children can use when signing up to new games and websites online’ (childnet international: parents supporting young people). a blog post entitled school and college closures: ongoing prevent management support (2020) discusses the risk to all children from being at home during covid19 and extremists possibly taking advantage of this situation. during the first period of lockdown (in the spring of 2020), schools in the uk remained open for the children of key workers and for children deemed to be vulnerable; for example, those on education health and care plans, on a child protection list, or classified as being ‘looked after’. this blog post specifically discusses children that are the most vulnerable to radicalisation and those being given channel support, and it encourages channel panels to consider whether these students can be recommended to attend school because of their particular vulnerability. here the school is envisaged purely in terms of its safeguarding role, and recommended as a security intervention. nearly every blog piece focuses on the teacher’s security role as being essential in the fight against extremism and radicalisation. talking to children about terrorism: tips for discussing sensitive issues (2017) asserts that ‘teachers do a fantastic job of safeguarding children against many threats and dangers, even though this is not always an easy task’. on the face of it, this reflects the concerns of the critics, that the teachers’ educational role is sidelined. however, the blog continues: the importance of educational professionals in leading these difficult conversations cannot be overstated. if neither school nor home is a safe space to discuss these issues then it leaves an information gap that can be exploited by those with sometimes sinister agendas. this includes those looking to radicalise young people. h. svennevig, l. jerome & a. elwick 103 this hints that, although envisaged within a securitised frame, the role of the teacher may still be perceived as educational. in this case, the teacher’s distinctive role is filling the information gap through a variety of ‘awareness raising’ educational interventions, and thus resilience is promoted by education. kundani and hayes (2018) suggest that a genuinely educational approach to cve might also include young people in developing methods and resources to educate their peers and to develop social action (a point we return to below). this is the focus of the executive head teacher blog: preparing young people for life in modern britain (2018), where the author argues: schools have to remain optimistic about the impact of their work. the recent manchester terror attack seemed, at first, to put several years’ work at risk. after experiencing increasing levels of racism in the street, it was the students themselves who suggested creating a video for assemblies about reporting hate crime. although very few of the resources actually enact this approach, this does reinforce the perception that the prevent duty may in fact be compatible with educational autonomy. although there are resources in the eah website that undoubtedly privilege teachers’ security role, and treat schools as sites for surveillance, there are also resources that embrace the distinctive educational function of schools. these include resources which reflect the general faith that promoting the fbvs will lead to resilience, and the more specific resources that teach children how individuals might be psychologically manipulated into violent extremism, or develop their understanding of the nature of terrorism and extremism as a political phenomenon. 4. a way forward? one resource stands out as particularly laudable: reclaim radical, which includes a guidance document and three accompanying videos. on its first content page, the reclaim radical toolkit lists a number of relevant articles from the united nations convention on the rights of the child–directly foregrounding children’s rights in its approach. furthermore, the toolkit is described as being developed by a group of ‘young advisors’ in response to the terror attacks across the uk in 2017/18. this direct inclusion of young people in the development of resources stands in contrast to the top-down approach of both the majority of material on the eah website and much of the official policy and guidance around the prevent duty, which infantilises, portrays young people as vulnerable and inevitably removes agency from them. reclaim radical covers a range of forms of extremism, it does not just perpetuate media stereotypes. it incorporates activities which discuss far-right extremism, islamism, animal rights activism and the conflict in northern ireland amongst other examples. in general, the approach is more nuanced than much of what we have discussed to this point–there is a real debate around exploring educational alternatives within the resource, rather than some of the simplistic approaches seen elsewhere. first-hand accounts from individuals who were themselves radicalised have credibility, and these are accompanied by activities which provide interpretation but also give space for young people to consider whether/how they relate to them. human rights education review – 4(1) 104 by using the language of human rights and children’s rights, reclaim radical enables educators to not only focus on a safeguarding perspective but to empower young people. there are many reasons why people can be vulnerable, many ways people can be manipulated and radicalised, and many types of people and groups of people that are extreme–a wider acknowledgment of such issues is not just welcome but, we argue, entirely necessary. conclusions our methodological approach was rooted in kundnani and hayes’ checklist of goals and pitfalls for cve policies (2018), and most of the resources we analysed do not really satisfy their criteria. we do not claim that resources which aim for cve outcomes also fail to achieve edc/hre outcomes; that would be an unfair criticism. rather we make the stronger claim that the absence of a human rights approach often seems to lead to problems or weaknesses within the cve resources on their own terms. first, some resources tend to ignore the connections and thus either focus solely on aspects of edc/hre (e.g. rights respecting schools) or on aspects of cve (e.g. miriam’s vision). this means children do not have the opportunity to think about violent extremism in the context of democracy and human rights. second, some of the resources (e.g. fat face) present distorted and simplified narratives or portrayals of ‘suspect groups’ and therefore risk exacerbating prejudice. third, some of the resources fail to support educators in balancing children’s rights to protection with their rights to participation and to access knowledge (e.g. the guidance to head teachers on school speakers). fourth, some of these resources fail to acknowledge children’s own developing opinions and agency and thus talk down to young people in a rather patronising tone (e.g. teaching approaches for building pupils’ resilience). finally, some of these resources, by playing up the security role of teachers, risk undermining the distinctive educational relationships that distinguish schools from other state-funded institutions. because of these problems many of the cve resources we have reviewed fail to balance the individual’s right to free speech, the right to access a wide range of information and opinions, and the need to ensure citizens are protected from threats to their security. but, as we have also illustrated, a small number of resources demonstrate that these problems are not inevitable as they incorporate the opposite points and adopt an approach which respects children’s agency, articulates the tensions between rights, contextualises and develops a political language for understanding political violence, and dispels stereotypes (e.g. reclaim radical). our application of kundnani and hayes’ initial framework to develop this detailed critique of the eah website has enabled us to generate a more developed account of how a human rights approach to cve might be beneficial. below, we offer a number of recommendations for those who have the opportunity to develop educational resources in the future. 1. resources should explicitly engage with both cve and edc/hre so that students have an opportunity to think about the tensions between security and liberty. this will help to avoid an excessively narrow focus. 2. resources aimed at school leaders should provide guidance on how to balance children’s right to security and their other rights to information, to develop informed opinions, and to express themselves. otherwise, security concerns may lead children’s rights in education to be marginalised. h. svennevig, l. jerome & a. elwick 105 3. resources must include a better representation of minority groups and include diverse examples drawn from across cve policy. ideally, resources should offer students the opportunity to learn about different people’s experiences, and thus avoid narrow stereotypes. 4. there are political debates about the extent to which cve policies unfairly focus on minority groups; most obviously muslims, who have been the main focus of prevent work, but latterly white working class communities associated with the far right. it would be wise to encourage teachers to engage with these debates, so students can connect their learning with discussions occurring in the media and local communities. 5. the voices of young people should be incorporated, particularly in the creation of both policy and resources which interpret it. 6. resources should clearly articulate the learning intentions to ensure that the educational purpose is clear. otherwise, resources can appear to adopt a security perspective, with no obvious educational benefit. by acknowledging the agency of young people, by providing better representation of different groups, and by adopting a more nuanced approach to extremism which allows for educational autonomy we argue that it is possible for cve policy enactment to adopt a human rights approach. educational resources reviewed educate against hate website resources are identified in inconsistent ways and so here we list the titles of resource pages referred to, which are available to download from https://educateagainsthate.com/ resource pages: advice for independent schools. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/dfeguidance-schools-providing-advice-promoting-fundamental-british-valuesspiritual-moral-social-cultural-smsc-development-pupils/ childnet international: parents supporting young people. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/childnet/ democracy challenge. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/democracychallenge/ fat face. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/fat-face/ generation global. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/generation-global/ he named me malala. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/he-named-memalala/ hosting speakers on school premises. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/hosting-speakers-school-premises/ interfaith explorers. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/interfaithexplorers/ https://educateagainsthate.com/ https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/dfe-guidance-schools-providing-advice-promoting-fundamental-british-values-spiritual-moral-social-cultural-smsc-development-pupils/ https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/dfe-guidance-schools-providing-advice-promoting-fundamental-british-values-spiritual-moral-social-cultural-smsc-development-pupils/ https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/dfe-guidance-schools-providing-advice-promoting-fundamental-british-values-spiritual-moral-social-cultural-smsc-development-pupils/ https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/childnet/ https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/democracy-challenge/ https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/democracy-challenge/ https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/fat-face/ https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/generation-global/ https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/he-named-me-malala/ https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/he-named-me-malala/ https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/hosting-speakers-school-premises/ https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/interfaith-explorers/ https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/interfaith-explorers/ human rights education review – 4(1) 106 mike haines: global acts of unity. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/mikehaines-global-acts-unity/ miriam’s vision. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/miriams-vision-2/ premises protocol (westminster local authority). https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/westminster/ prevent duty in further education: guidance. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/prevent-duty-futther-education/ prevent duty: statutory guidance. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/prevent-duty/ prevent mythbuster. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/prevent-mythbuster/ prevent referrals e-learning. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/preventreferrals-e-learning/ reclaim radical. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/reclaim-radical/ respectful school communities. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/respectful-school-communities-selfreview-signposting-tool-2/ talking to your teenager about radicalisation. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/talking-teenager-radicalisation-2/ the deliberative classroom. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/thedeliberative-classroom/ top tips guide for parents. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/top-tipsguide-parents/ tower hamlets secondary resources. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/tower-hamlets-secondary-resources/ unicef–rights respecting schools award. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/unicef-rights-respecting-schoolsaward-rrsa/ walls. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/walls/ working together to safeguard children. https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/working-together-to-safeguardchildren/ https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/mike-haines-global-acts-unity/ https://educateagainsthate.com/resources/mike-haines-global-acts-unity/ 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(2019). tea and the queen: fundamental british values, schools and citizenship. bristol: policy press. *the authors have not discussed one resource (the deliberative classroom) due to associations with this resource and therefore a conflict of interest which is declared here. https://doi.org/10.1080/02607476.2016.1184463 hypocrites or heroes? thinking about the role of the teacher in human rights education volume 1, no 2 (2018) date received: 20-08-2018 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2873 date accepted: 10-12-2018 peer-reviewed article issn 2535-5406 hypocrites or heroes? thinking about the role of the teacher in human rights education lee jerome middlesex university, uk abstract: human rights education (hre) seeks to provide young people with an optimistic sense that we can work towards a more peaceful and socially just world, and that everyone can do something to contribute to securing improvement. but, whilst the academic literature and policy documents frequently position teachers as crucial to promoting human rights and social justice, the literature is also replete with examples of teachers’ conservatism, their compliance in the face of authority and their ignorance. in addition, teachers work in institutions which routinely reproduce inequality and promote a narrow individualistic form of competition. this article explores some of the international research literature relating to the role of the teacher in hre specifically, and more generally in the related fields of citizenship education and social studies, in order to offer some conceptual tools that might be used to critically interrogate practitioners’ own beliefs and actions. keywords: teachers, teacher agency, human rights education (hre), citizenship education, performativity. l.jerome@mdx.ac.uk l.jerome 47 hypocrites or heroes? thinking about the role of the teacher in human rights education doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2873 issn 2535-5406 lee jerome l.jerome@mdx.ac.uk middlesex university, uk. abstract: human rights education (hre) seeks to provide young people with an optimistic sense that we can work towards a more peaceful and socially just world, and that everyone can do something to contribute to securing improvement. but, whilst the academic literature and policy documents frequently position teachers as crucial to promoting human rights and social justice, the literature is also replete with examples of teachers’ conservatism, their compliance in the face of authority and their ignorance. in addition, teachers work in institutions which routinely reproduce inequality and promote a narrow individualistic form of competition. this article explores some of the international research literature relating to the role of the teacher in hre specifically, and more generally in the related fields of citizenship education and social studies, in order to offer some conceptual tools that might be used to critically interrogate practitioners’ own beliefs and actions. keywords: teachers, teacher agency, human rights education (hre), citizenship education, performativity. introduction in this article i draw on a range of relevant research literature to develop a heuristic classification system that will help describe the different ways in which teachers engage with and respond to human rights education (hre). this is a problem that has emerged as i have reflected on 25 years of teaching practice in schools, third sector organisations, and universities. in that time i have taught about rights in history, sociology, politics, integrated humanities, citizenship and personal and social education; and with a team of university lecturers i have worked to embed the principles of hre across an initial teacher education (ite) programme in a uk university. throughout that time i would have described myself as a human rights educator, but it has also become clear to me that my own knowledge and understanding of hre was limited, and that some of the student teachers on the course experienced difficulties understanding their role as human rights educators. in subsequent years i have had the opportunity to conduct research into how teachers and students engage with hre and citizenship education, and to lead a masters level course in children’s rights, and so in this article i seek to reflect on how that more recently gained knowledge can be used to shed light on some of the problems i, my colleagues, and our students encountered. in the first part of the article i outline what i mean by hre, and explain how and why i draw links between hre, citizenship education and other related areas. in the second part i describe some of the trends in public education that may serve to restrict teachers’ agency in relation to hre. in the main body of the article i then outline a series of types of teacher response which engage with and promote human human rights education review – volume 1(2) 48 rights to varied degrees. finally i draw together some thoughts about how this classification of teacher responses might be used by hre advocates to develop differentiated strategies for their advocacy within challenging contexts. defining terms and purposes i take as my starting point the united nations declaration on human rights education and training (undhret), article 2 of which states that hre should include: (a) education about human rights, which includes providing knowledge and understanding of human rights norms and principles, the values that underpin them and the mechanisms for their protection; (b) education through human rights, which includes learning and teaching in a way that respects the rights of both educators and learners; (c) education for human rights, which includes empowering persons to enjoy and exercise their rights and to respect and uphold the rights of others (un, 2011). this definition is particularly powerful because it addresses three key questions: (i) what is to be taught? (curriculum), (ii) how should it be taught? (pedagogy), and (iii) why should this be taught? (purpose). in practice the precise answers to these three questions may change as hre assumes rather different forms in different contexts. for example, tibbits (2017) has devised a model of three forms of hre: the first prioritises values and general awareness; the second focuses on accountability and professional development; and the third is more overtly related to activism and transformation. tibbits (2008) has also argued that hre is likely to take on different priorities depending on the national context in which it is being developed; for example, in post-conflict areas hre might focus on the importance of the role of law, in poor democracies it might be expected to focus on sustainable development, whilst in wealthy democracies it might understandably focus more on questions of discrimination and equality. in addition, bajaj (2012) argues that hre takes on slightly different forms depending on the ideological motivations of those promoting it; for example, some focus on nurturing international solidarity, some focus on mutual understanding, whilst others focus on activism. these contributions indicate that from the relatively straightforward definition of hre in the undhret, the practical models have proliferated. in its focus on developing people’s agency as rights-holders and activists, and its promotion of a politically informed understanding of the world, hre clearly resonates with citizenship education (ce). from an hre perspective ce is often criticised for being more likely to focus on the national context (and national citizenship is by definition less inclusive than universal human rights) and less likely to promote criticality in relation to government (whereas human rights is a mechanism for holding governments to account) (osler, 2009). in response, kymlicka (2017) points out that it is difficult to imagine government without the nation state (and ultimately it is to governments that we look to recognise rights in reality (osler, 2016)), and equally difficult to imagine democracy without building some shared sense of political community, and for him that means it is important to l.jerome 49 hold ce and hre in dialogue, as each addresses a weakness in the other. in addition, many of those writing about ce, and developing ce programmes, also aspire to adopt critical, transformative and inclusive models, which address issues and actions beyond the nation state (cogan and derricott, 1998). osler and starkey (2005) urge educators to move beyond narrow definitions of citizenship as nationally defined status, and instead to embrace the other dimensions of citizenship as identity/belonging and practice. on this reading, ce can also build bridges between different groups of people around the world, and provide an educational space for developing young people’s commitment to others and their capacity for contributing to positive social change. for starkey (2017), one way to bring these agendas together in practice is to recognise human rights as a struggle – a political process in which all can participate, but within which those who have the status of national citizenship may be able to undertake additional political actions, such as voting for a progressive party, or lobbying a representative. hre and ce share some core commitments to (i) developing a politically informed critical understanding of the world (including rights); (ii) promoting a pedagogy that recognises young people as active learners rather than passive recipients; and (iii) empowering young people to see themselves as active agents in the world who can help to bring about positive change. accepting that hre and ce have different emphases, this shared core provides a distinctive pedagogic challenge to teachers and so it makes sense in this article to draw on literature from each of these two areas to shed light on how teachers engage with this challenge. in addition, there is a pragmatic reason for drawing on evidence from other related areas, because hre takes on rather different forms in different contexts around the globe, including for example: social studies, civics, and service learning in the usa (jerome et al., 2015). in addition, some international organisations, such as the council of europe (2010), combine hre and ce into a single framework, albeit whilst recognising they have different emphases; others, such as unicef, now speak more specifically about child rights education (cre) (unicef pfp, 2014). in the rest of this article i will draw on some of this broad literature to reflect on the various ways in which teachers have engaged with, and responded to, these pedagogic challenges at the heart of hre. before starting to outline this variety of teacher responses, i want to briefly say something about the context of public education, and the threat this poses to hre in many countries. teachers’ (constrained) agency in challenging contexts whilst policy makers often tend to envisage teachers simplistically as ‘conduits’, who will transmit policy into the classroom, in fact they may be better perceived as ‘gatekeepers’ or ‘controllers’ (sim, 2008). on this view the teacher is a curriculum agent, whose practice ‘is intellectual, moral and inventive’ (parker, 1987 quoted in sim, 2008, p.263). this is reflected in ball et al.’s (2012) work investigating how teachers respond to policy, and how they both shape it and are shaped by it in different ways. teachers’ agency is therefore best understood as situated – within their own individual political and professional narratives; within the institutional structures where they work; and within the broader political and cultural context in which schools operate (priestley et al., 2015). in this section i outline some of the contextual factors that can be seen as potentially limiting the likelihood that teachers will endorse and promote hre. human rights education review – volume 1(2) 50 in 2014, kishore singh, the un special rapporteur on the right to education issued a report considering the growth of privatization in education. he argued that the creeping expansion of the market is ‘by definition… detrimental to education as a public good and vitiates the humanistic mission of education.’ (un, 2014, p.20). he also quoted macpherson approvingly, when he claimed that we are, ‘recast[ing] education not as a public or societal good grounded in democratic principles of justice and equal opportunity but as an individual, atomized and personalized private good’ (macpherson et al., 2014 cited in un, 2014, p.11). in addition to the negative impact on teachers, crouch (2003) has argued that the transformation of public services towards a market-oriented system in which professionals are measured by simple (and simplistic) criteria also undermines any broader notion of public service. instead, all work is treated in the same way, with the end result that values other than those related to market-emulating managerialism are side-lined. this means that schools are increasingly seen as exam factories and, although the broader goals of education may still be paid lip-service, these are pushed to the margins of school life and therefore of teaching (smithers, 2007). sahlberg argues that, in this climate, it is perfectly reasonable for teachers to simply ‘teach to the test’, as this is what is formally valued within the education system as a measure of success – both the students’ success, and the success of the teacher (sahlberg, 2010, p. 47). ball documents examples of teachers who feel increasingly alienated from their work, and frustrated that they seem to spend more time and energy focusing on aspects of the job which fall outside of the core educational relationships between them and their students. time spent complying with external demands cannot be spent devising new activities or even just talking to children, parents and colleagues. emotional energy expended on managing one’s performance for the managerial gaze shifts one’s focus away from the children. the end result is a feeling of inadequacy and inauthenticity as the superficiality of an externally defined performance dominates one’s experience (ball, 2003). whilst ball is writing about educational reform in england, he also argues that such policies are emerging around the world through policy epidemics, supported by international organisations such as the oecd (ball, 2008), and through new networks of global governance, including philanthropists, specialist policy organisations, research institutes and private providers (ball, junemann and santori, 2017). the market-emulating policies spread through such networks have been described by sahlberg (2010) as the global education reform movement (germ). these changes also mean that public service as an expression of a citizenship ethic is replaced by a market-related logic in which teachers are recast as service-providers and children (and their parents) as consumers. so there are good reasons to problematize the context within which teachers are trying to promote hre. their own professional lives, and the contexts in which education takes place, are increasingly at odds with the values and practices of hre. when the values of the market and the attendant individualization of risk and responsibility take centre stage, what can we expect of teachers and how do they respond? types of teacher response in the next section i review some of the literature on teachers and teaching in hre (and related areas) in order to explore some of the ways in which hre is thwarted, and consider why teachers do not always manage to rise successfully to the challenge. such an approach is similar to that adopted by kitson and mccully (2005) in their l.jerome 51 investigation about whether teachers engage with controversial and sensitive issues in the classroom, and what factors influence their decisions. i developed these categories both to contribute to a clearer model for thinking about the problems that arise, but also to inform the development of differentiated strategies to tackle the varied reasons why hre sometimes fails. the ignorant teacher the unhchr evaluation of the first phase of the world programme for hre noted that ‘the overall approach to teacher training seems ad hoc’ (unhchr, 2010, p.10) and bemoaned ‘the lack of systematic approaches to… the training of teachers’ in this area (unhchr, 2010, p.20). in a survey of teachers in ireland, whilst attitudes to human rights were generally positive, teachers had low levels of knowledge of human rights (waldron at al., 2011). this is a common story from international research. in scotland, for example, a majority of teachers said they had not been trained and lacked adequate knowledge (bemis, 2013), and teacher education emerged as a key recommendation in similar research in australia (burridge et al., 2013), finland (hrc, 2014) and denmark (decara, 2013). a review of teacher education across 26 countries demonstrated that none of the countries ensured teachers knew about children’s rights through their initial teacher education (jerome et al., 2015). one possible reason for this lack of knowledge might be related to the highly regulated performativity culture of many schools, especially those in england. one may note that clearly these teachers are able to qualify and perform the role of a teacher without remedying these knowledge gaps. this might indicate that the kinds of performance indicators used to judge teachers reflect concerns which are not related to the deep development of learning in hre. this certainly resonates with that strand of research which consistently decries the superficial teaching which results from the ‘teach to the test’ culture in many schools, where achievement of the metrics for accountability becomes the main and distorting focus of teaching (sahlberg, 2010). in osler’s account of research undertaken in iraqi kurdistan, one school inspector said, ‘when it comes to the subjects of human rights and democracy, i do not have very close knowledge of them,’ (osler, 2016, p.94), which at the least indicates that she is able to undertake her job, and inspect schools without having this knowledge. this was common in the 26 countries reviewed by jerome et al. (2015), where very few inspection frameworks made explicit reference to hre. in such a context, where teachers want to be seen as successful, and to work in successful schools, the absence of hre in the definitions of success, means there is no immediate incentive to tackle this ignorance, nor any mechanism to point out that there is specialist knowledge to be discovered. parker’s (2018) discussion of the knowledge base of hre reminds us that according to vygotsky we need to differentiate between everyday concepts and scientific concepts. parker argues that the scientific concepts underpinning hre will reflect the various disciplinary perspectives that have helped to define and shape human rights, including ideas drawn from law, sociology, and politics. for those who are not aware of this depth of knowledge, it is feasible to assume that their ‘everyday’ understanding of the concept serves them perfectly and they may simply import their common-sense understanding of human rights into hre. whereas one might normally expect a maths teacher to have substantial mathematical knowledge, or a history teacher to have a qualification in history, this is unlikely to be the case for hre teachers, as there are few countries where hre exists as a specialist human rights education review – volume 1(2) 52 qualification or status (jerome et al., 2015). there is evidence in the literature that this sometimes happens; for example, mahler et al. (2009, p.37) noted that officials they interviewed were ‘convinced that they had complied’ with hre, even though their policies were deeply flawed and ignored significant principles around inclusion. howe and covell (2010) reported teachers who were adamant that they needed to focus on teaching children about their responsibilities before they could start on their rights, and a student teacher argued in my own ite programme that everything related to children’s rights was ‘mostly common-sense’ (jerome, 2012a, p. 111). there are parallels in related areas, for example in england; when ce was introduced into the national curriculum, teachers regularly reported they were very confident in their subject knowledge overall, even though they had not read any of the key documents (hayward and jerome, 2010) and when asked about specific topics, such as how the economy functions, or how the eu operates, they admitted they had little knowledge of these areas (e.g. kerr et al., 2007). in recent education policy reforms for preventing violent extremism, teachers in england have similarly reported that they are confident they can safeguard children from radicalisation, whilst being unable to explain how radicalisation occurs (busher et al., 2017). the teacher as obstacle one possible solution to the problem of teacher ignorance is to connect them with existing expertise outside of school. a range of non-governmental organisations (ngos) specialise in particular aspects of hre, and have the potential to help schools overcome a number of weaknesses (potvin and benny, 2013). such provision can reach many young people with opportunities to discuss their experiences of school, outside of school (eksner and nur cheema, 2017). once they are open to the idea of working with experts in hre, teachers can be seen as collaborative agents – willing and able to work with specialists to establish educational programmes (bajaj, 2012). but, until they have been convinced to provide access, the teacher may simply be seen as an obstacle, in that they have the power to act as a gate-keeper, but they may not open the gate. covell and howe (2005) argue that teachers who do not have a strong commitment to hre can fall back on their general busy-ness as an excuse for not making space for the subject. this is echoed in schweisfurth’s (2006) study of canadian teachers, many of whom simply failed to engage with a global citizenship education initiative because they felt they were too busy. bajaj’s discussion of a case study in india points out that, at the very least, ngos wishing to develop hre programmes must have a strategy for winning over teachers, to gain access to children and schools. the link between this potential teacher obstruction and the performative-managerialist culture is perhaps in this concept of busy-ness. whilst most schools would officially embrace goals related to hre, there are clear priorities in which other measurable outcomes are favoured. it would not be surprising if teachers responding to these priorities were to perceive time spent on non-priority areas such as hre as time misspent. as teachers have to make judgements about where to focus their efforts, it is easy to see how hre might be marginalised. the conservative teacher in dealing with teacher beliefs about children’s rights, david (2002) points out that this may present a challenge to their traditional beliefs because it represents a shift from education as welfare provision to education as a right, and implies a second shift l.jerome 53 in adult roles from protection to facilitating emancipation and autonomy. empirical case studies continue to reiterate the importance of these issues. for example, a case study of hre in hong kong concluded that two major obstacles remained; the teachers’ fear for the loss of their authority and the limiting impact of their lack of subject knowledge (leung et al., 2011). in the absence of specialist knowledge which might counteract this fear, or a training intervention that might assuage these concerns (see for example gaynor, 2007; lyle, 2014), some teachers’ innate conservativism about adult-child relationships may come to the fore. for example, in ireland a survey found that teachers’ lack of specialist knowledge meant their teaching was not always related to human rights language or principles and that this was associated with a tendency to focus on a social cohesion agenda rather than empowerment, critique and inequality. teachers thus tended to adopt a conservative model rather than a transformative one, with half the reported hre events being linked to charity campaigns with a more global focus than a local one (waldron at al., 2011). similarly, jerome’s (2012b) case studies of ce demonstrated that teachers often adopted a softer communitarian sense of citizenship as ‘helping’ and ‘good neighbourliness’, and downplayed the more overtly political dimensions. some of the teacher case studies in banks’ (2017) edited collection illustrate how a very conservative educational context can lead teachers to focus on aspects of hre which are less overtly political and critical of the government; for example, mr ozgur in turkey focuses mostly on creating an inclusive multilingual classroom and developing empathy (aydin and koc-danngaci, 2017). bajaj adopts the term ‘decoupling’ (bajaj, 2012, p, 4) in this regard, which refers to situations where a programme such as hre is formally adopted, but subsequently only selectively implemented or significantly adapted. in her study, religious morality or rural public health and hygiene were used as lenses through which to interpret human rights, with the effect that these distorted what was learnt (frequently by de-politicising rights and focusing on children’s responsibilities). there are other examples where prevailing cultural values and educational traditions are seen to be incompatible with aspects of hre. for example, lee argues that hre advocates in the republic of korea refuse to use the terminology of rights at all in order to avoid the local sensitivities that might be aroused (lee, 2007), whilst in japan akuzawa (2007) and takeda (2012) argue that hre tends to be mediated through a dominant approach to moral and values education, leading to some principles such as participation being downplayed. in this context, akuzawa cites anecdotal evidence that, when asked about human rights, teachers often talk about values such as kindness, sympathy and being good to friends rather than concrete rights or conventions. this is also evident in the case study of mr ogawa’s classroom, which is based on developing empathy for others, especially those suffering from the aftermath of the fukushima nuclear disaster, and reflecting on shared identity, but which fails to engage directly with the state’s responsibilities towards residents in the affected area or with policy questions about nuclear power (kitayama and hashizaki, 2018; kitayama et al., 2017). distortions occur where rights are mediated through education for national identity or patriotism (akuzawa, 2007). similarly, there is some recent evidence that teachers tend to interpret policies for countering violent extremism through islamophobic assumptions, and thus further distort the principles of hre (leeman and wardekker, 2013; pal sian, 2015). we have already noted that teachers are not simply preparing young people as citizens and rights-holders; teachers themselves are citizens with their own human rights education review – volume 1(2) 54 political beliefs which will inevitably influence their interpretation of hre. this means some teachers will have conservative political views that are in tension with aspects of human rights, and therefore their conservative interpretations may well be more overt and conscious. this was evident in one of osler’s (2016) interviews in iraqi kurdistan, where one teacher said, ‘i don’t think hre fits with our reality… which is not ready to digest the message behind human rights norms’ (p. 97). whilst one may detect a sense of regret in this quotation, a more overt conservatism is revealed quite dramatically in bekerman and cohen’s (2017) discussion of teachers in israel, where one of their interviewees admitted, ‘i am indifferent to students saying “kill all of the arabs,” whereas i get mad when they say, “all of the politicians are corrupt”’ (p. 390). teachers may be conservative forces in at least three ways then: firstly, they may simply adopt traditional authority roles in schools and thereby limit the agency of young people; secondly, they may conform to traditional moral aspects of hre; and thirdly, they may promote conservative political interpretations of hre, because of their individual political motivations. in these ways teachers can refract the radical, political and collective nature of hre through the traditional expectations of school and society about children. one of the students in my own teacher education course lamented about the hre component of the programme, ‘i found this to be the most problematic course, one which looked more like government propaganda than any realistic look at what happens in education’ (jerome, 2012a: 110). from his perspective, we were attempting to politicise a process that was apolitical, and so he perceived that hre exacerbated his problem with what he referred to as ‘badly behaved pupils who had no interest in learning’ (ibid.) rather than offering him a solution. given that the global education reform movement (sahlberg, 2010), discussed in the second part of this article, tends to focus on compliance and individual performance and accountability, one might expect this policy context to exacerbate these conservative tendencies. the hypocritical teacher working in a conservative cultural / institutional context may lead some teachers to adopt an avowedly conservative view of hre, as discussed in the previous section, but it may also lead to another potential problem – teachers believing they are promoting a more critical and progressive form of hre, whilst falling considerably short of that goal. krappman (2006) has argued that many schools continue to assume children are inexperienced and undisciplined and so, when teachers ask students to state their view, ‘students often regard this as a mere educational trick rather than a genuine interest in [their] perspective’ (p.65). this leads to the charge of hypocrisy (yamasaki, 2002), for example where school councils are manipulated to co-opt students into new managerialist discourses and/or traditional authority structures (hunt, 2014). our first form of teacher hypocrisy then is the situation in which teachers appear to offer a democratic and rights-respecting education, but fall short because they do not really believe in children’s capacity to engage with the process, or because they fall back too readily on managerialist agendas. critics of progressive education argue that this form of hypocrisy is built into the very assumptions of the philosophy because the teacher is always ultimately wielding authority, just under the cloak of democratic participation (buckard, 2007). webb (2014) describes the tensions experienced by teachers who seek to combine l.jerome 55 ‘assertive teacher authority’ with a ‘relaxed rights-respecting adult’ role in a rights respecting school. another form of hypocrisy stems from fuzzy thinking about the role of values in education. somehow, well-intentioned teachers fall into the trap of proclaiming they leave children free to explore alternatives whilst seeking to embed values covertly into their teaching. the authors of the council of europe’s compass manual for hre claim that values clarification is one of their pedagogical tenets (brander et al., 2012: 32) and thus fail to recognise that the manual explicitly promotes the principle that all young people should value human rights – thus aligning itself more clearly with a model of values transmission. in a study of student teachers of citizenship education, there was a similar tension between their desire to promote the values of democracy through developing democratic pedagogies, but a distaste for explicitly saying that was what they were doing. similarly, many more of these student teachers felt it was appropriate for the school to somehow promote certain values, even though they were sceptical about undertaking the task of promoting values themselves (jerome and clemitshaw, 2012). mejias and starkey (2012) argue that this is not just a problem of wellmeaning teachers falling short of their aspirations. the competing priorities of exam grades and individual progress in a competitive system are not simply alternative policy prescriptions vying with hre for attention, but they often function as overarching paradigms, which may be inherently antithetical to hre. in a study of a school implementing an amnesty hre programme they concluded there were tensions between the dominant neo-liberal paradigm promoting individualised, competitive, consumer models of education, and the humanistic, collaborative, developmental education espoused within the hre model, echoing the concerns of the un special rapporteur on the right to education (discussed above). in mejias and starkey’s example, the dominant discourse prevailed and student voice was ultimately silenced quite dramatically, when school managers reasserted their authority over the children and abandoned their rights-based project. as mejias (2017) has written, ‘hre was seen by teachers and leaders as a way to encourage better behaviour and even conformity through the linking of rights to responsibilities,’ (p.191) this meant teachers felt able to withdraw students’ rights if they deemed them not to be living up their responsibilities, and so the project was ultimately undermined by ‘authoritarian management practices’ (p.190). chuah (2009) tries to argue that hypocrisy within the stifling performativity culture could be embraced as a stepping stone towards a more progressive set of values. his argument is essentially that it is better to tolerate teachers saying they value alternative educational goals even if they really do not, or know they cannot achieve them, because this at least creates an alternative way of talking about education. he also argues that teachers should adopt a more playful approach to exploring non-performative goals. both i think are problematic; the former ignores the impact such hypocrisy may have on children, and the second ignores the reality of being monitored and judged. children with teachers who cheerfully embrace a rhetoric of hre but fail to follow through are likely to feel betrayed. teachers who playfully spend time on alternative projects either detract from their performance of the officially sanctioned roles for teachers, or call these performances too obviously into question. either way it is difficult to interpret such hypocrisy as anything other than problematic. one way in which teachers may try to resolve these difficulties is to embrace exams and qualifications in aspects of hre and thus publically perform human rights education review – volume 1(2) 56 educational success through their subject, but this is also potentially problematic in that the subject becomes another element in the ‘exam factory’ and is as susceptible to the logic of ‘teaching to the test’ as any other subject. the heroic teacher the hre literature often celebrates case studies of successful practice, and this illustrates that, even in difficult contexts, teachers can work independently and collaboratively to realise hre. in banks’ (2017) collection of case studies from around the world, it is evident that many of these teachers champion hre because their own political identities have strengthened their commitment to human rights. in england, veronica connects her own experience as a british-born ghanaian woman with her role as the mother of black sons in london, and her concern for social justice as a teacher (osler, 2017). in korea, mrs lim always used her love of travel and languages in the classroom, but transformed her teaching when she experienced a political awakening around the concept of ‘fair travel’ and ethical consumption (chah et al. 2017). in lebanon, nadine recognises that the constraints of the curriculum and the testing regime make it difficult to go against the grain with more project-based hre, but with the support and encouragement of her colleagues and head teacher she continues to experiment with projects that insist on exploring the ‘big questions’ which refuse easy answers (akar, 2017). amani, a teacher in kuwait, started to explore hre by reading government-endorsed textbooks critically, to explore the gaps and tensions with her class, and then lobbied for a classroom space where she could encourage less formal student interactions, and eventually lobbied the government to request a national student council (al-nakib, 2017, 2012). mr c, a citizenship teacher in england, is a political activist who uses his experiences around the world as teaching material, and who also creates opportunities for his students to engage in campaigns (keddie, 2008). sim (2008) in her research in singapore described these process as teachers re-forming policy, through active interpretation, as opposed to narrowly conforming to policy. agberia (2016) illustrates why these examples are so exceptional and noteworthy. his study of palestinian teachers working within the ‘hegemonic narrative’ of the israeli curriculum reveals how they meet the letter of the law by teaching the required material and preparing their students to succeed in their standardised tests. but they also undertake a second role, which involves a number of strategies providing alternative narratives to supplement the official resources; drawing connections between events in the curriculum and contemporary issues and political action in their local community; both teaching the information for the test and contextualising this in wider, more critical accounts; and teaching about human rights so that students can situate their experiences within a universal framework and see potential avenues for political action. this seems to capture what is implicit in all of the examples considered in the first paragraph of this section – that these teachers are effectively doing two jobs. the first job is the one required by the education system, the one measured by performance metrics, and monitored through inspection and management. the second job is the one where hre emerges, providing students with additional knowledge, multiple perspectives and critical interpretations, and where political agency is nurtured. here teachers are required to strike a careful balance between surviving and flourishing as professionals (with a need to retain their jobs and gain respect) and pushing against the boundaries, extending their scope for action. l.jerome 57 all of these examples present hre as overtly political and other studies have confirmed that different political beliefs tend to lead teachers to construct hre rather differently. leenders and her colleagues (2008) have demonstrated in their research in the netherlands that teachers’ own beliefs about politics shape their classroom practice and myers’ (2009) research in brazil demonstrates the impact of teachers’ own political activism on their practice. for many of these teachers, teaching is seen as a political activity (myers, 2009, p.19) which influences their interpretation of the curriculum, their selection of topics for study and their pedagogical choices. this research suggests that those with more experience of participating in social movements may well teach in more democratic ways and consider a wider variety of actors and acts within their consideration of active citizenship and action for human rights. reflections these heroic teachers indicate that the performative culture may leave spaces in which teachers can explore hre and related agendas. this requires teachers to tread a careful path – they must understand the rules of the system sufficiently well to spot opportunities for re-interpretation and challenge, whilst not compromising themselves too fundamentally in the eyes of those empowered to judge and discipline them. this means we have to recognise that teachers may well be on a journey, exploring the possibilities, testing the boundaries, and building their confidence. i am not claiming that the typology outlined above describes teachers in some essentialised way; rather it describes the various positions teachers may occupy at particular times, and in relation to different aspects of hre. as an example, al-nakib’s (2017) account of amani, teaching hre in kuwait, ends by noting the curriculum has been reformed and the course which was spread out over three years has been condensed into one, radically reducing the time she has available to explore issues around the textbooks. she will do less hre as a result, but she is unlikely to stop. by contrast, bozec’s (2017) account of arnauld, teaching in france, describes a cautious teacher, starting to teach about knowledge, building his confidence to hold debates and discussions, and eventually being moved to engage directly with contemporary traumatic incidents (charlie hebdo). teacher’s agency in implementing hre may therefore depend on them building their own confidence, building trust in their students, and importantly on their political reading of the context. as it can be useful to think about children’s agency in terms of how particular situations thicken or thin their agency (robson et al., 2007), so the teachers in each of these categories might be supported to thicken their agency. for example, the ‘ignorant’ teacher may be supported by revealing the rich knowledge base that underpins hre, moving it from the ‘unknown unknown’ into the ‘known unknown’ category. just offering a course may not be effective if teachers have not yet realised they lack powerful knowledge (parker, 2018). some ‘conservative’ teachers may be assisted by learning about the small steps taken by others in similarly restrictive contexts; for example, the school inspector who told osler (2016, p.95) ‘it would be better that these subjects are taken up to the political level and enacted through law’ might be persuaded that there are small positive steps that can be taken through carefully curating existing curriculum resources, rather than waiting for national reforms (al-nakib, 2017; akar, 2017). similarly, teachers who are using the rhetoric of hre without fully achieving it, and who thus risk being seen as hypocritical, may benefit from critical friends within the profession to help them deepen their practice. human rights education review – volume 1(2) 58 by contrast, conservative teachers who are politically opposed to hre, for example the israeli teacher unprepared to challenge racism, may need to be the object of external political activism, demanding the school live up to its legal obligations. foucault’s conceptualisation of power maintains that it does not simply reside with individuals or office-holders, rather it exists within power-relations, i.e. between people. whilst some may well seek to construct a panopticon (perryman, 2006), there is always the possibility for forms of ‘insubordination and a certain essential obstinacy’ which means ‘there is no relationship of power without the means of escape or possible flight’ (foucault, 2001 cited in leask, 2011, p.63). stickney observes that every occurrence of a surveillance situation involves a negotiation between the observer and the observed teacher. confident teachers can brazen it out, re-describing radical pedagogical or curriculum interpretations in terms which are more likely to be officially sanctioned. alternatively, stickney notes teachers can simply reserve a ‘public script’ for such events, and revert to ‘hidden scripts’ when un-observed (stickney, 2012, p.657). this may feel dangerous or even dishonest, but as leask reminds us, this is an inevitable consequence of the way power circulates and constitutes ‘strategic games between liberties’ (foucault, 2000 cited in leask, 2011, p.64). in this leask argues ‘resistance… is reclaimed, and made common. resistance is by no means reserved for byronic heroes: it is for all, by all, and everywhere’ (leask, 2011, p.66). ball and olmedo (2013) go further in applying this insight to teaching and argue that our sense of identity as teachers cannot exist prior to our engagement in such power relations and that such identities are formed through what we do, rather than what we are in some essential sense. what ball and olmedo, leask and stickney all indicate is that the first step is to unsettle the dominant discourses and create a space for thinking differently. on the basis of critique and re-imagining educational practices one can search for spaces and strategies to explore alternatives, but, having developed a more political reading of one’s situation it is also important to engage with more collective forms of resistance, such as those promoted by apple (2013), who emphasises the need for individuals to work together, both to build more powerful movements for change, but also to sustain the individuals engaging in this difficult task. o’sullivan (2008) has argued that we should not be surprised that many teachers are not motivated by a radical or critical form of hre, because ultimately they have benefitted from education and are unlikely to question those values which underpin the system. as i have argued, many teachers are also likely to succumb to the dominant discourse regulating their professional lives – faced with life in the panopticon the most sensible solutions may well be to stay and play by the rules of the game or find the door and leave. those who stay and engage in the personal and collective struggle need help to build the ‘decentred unities’ (apple, 2013) which offer the intellectual and emotional support to sustain their efforts and to build the democratic alternatives. as apple’s discussion of black american activist-teachers reminds us, ‘the educator as moral being, as community activist, as teller of the truth… as the keeper and defender of the memory of black history and culture…constituted a heavy burden to bear’ (apple, 2013, p. 90). committing to use one’s teaching to contribute to political change through hre will always make substantial demands on individual teachers. heroic teachers are heroic precisely because through their struggle they create the spaces for developing practices which (may) presage a fuller achievement of democratic citizenship and human rights. l.jerome 59 references akar, b. 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(2007). schools. in a. seldon (ed.), blair's britain 1997-2007 (pp. 361384). cambridge: cambridge university press. starkey, h. (2017). globalization and education for cosmopolitan citizenship. in j.a. banks (ed.), citizenship education and global migration: implications for theory, research, and teaching (pp. 41-62). washington, dc: american educational research association. stickney, j.a. (2012). judging teachers: foucault, governance and agency during education reforms. educational philosophy & theory, 44(6), 649-662. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-5812.2011.00752.x takeda, s. (2012). human rights education in japan: an historical account. characteristics and suggestions for a better-balanced approach. cambridge journal of education, 42(1), 83-96. https://doi.org/10.1080/0305764x.2011.651203 tibbits, f. (2008). human rights education. in m. bajaj (ed.), encyclopaedia of peace education (pp.99-108). charlotte, nc: information age publishing. tibbits, f. (2017). evolution of human rights education models. in m. bajaj (ed.), human rights education: theory, research, praxis (pp. 69-95). philadelphia, pa: university of pennsylvania press. https://doi.org/10.9783/9780812293890-005 un. (2011). united nations declaration on human rights education and training (a/res/66/137). new york, ny: united nations. un. (2014). report of the special rapporteur on the right to education (a/69/402). new york, ny: united nations. unhchr. (2010). final evaluation of the implementation of the first phase of the world programme for human rights education. report of the united nations inter-agency coordinating committee on human rights education in the school system. new york, ny: un high commissioner for human rights (unhchr). unicef private fundraising and partnerships division (pfp). (2014). child rights education toolkit: rooting child rights in early childhood education, primary and secondary schools. geneva: unicef private fundraising and partnerships division. waldron, f., kavanagh, r., kavanagh, a., maunsell, c., oberman, r., o’reilly, m., pike, s., prunty, a., & ruane, b. (2011). teachers, human rights and human rights education: knowledge, perspectives and practices of primary school teachers in ireland. dublin: the centre for human rights and citizenship education, st patrick’s college. webb, r. (2014). doing the rights thing: an ethnography of a dominant discourse of rights in a primary school in england (unpublished doctoral thesis). university of sussex, sussex, uk. yamasaki, m. (2002). human rights education: an elementary school level case study (unpublished doctoral thesis). university of minnesota, mn. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-5812.2011.00752.x https://doi.org/10.1080/0305764x.2011.651203 https://doi.org/10.9783/9780812293890-005 issn: 2535-5406 vol 5, no 1 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4498 date of publication 04-01-2022 © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org book and media reviews a vision for advancing children’s rights education in classrooms and communities jerome, l. & starkey, h. (2021). children’s rights education in diverse classrooms: pedagogy, principles and practice. london: bloomsbury publishing plc. 289pp., £81.00 (hardcover) isbn: 978-13500-6281-8; £64.80 (ebook) isbn: 978-1-3500-6284-9. reviewed by carol robinson edge hill university, united kingdom, carol.robinson@edgehill.ac.uk children’s rights in diverse classrooms: pedagogy, principles and practice starts from a seemingly simple question: what implications follow for teaching in schools if our starting point is that children are rights holders and teachers are duty bearers? the book addresses this question through exploring different approaches to teaching and learning about children’s rights in different countries. in doing so, jerome and starkey present a vision for what focused children’s rights education (cre) might look like and provide scholarly insights into the tensions and challenges that emerge when working to develop practices aimed at advancing cre in schools. the book is divided into three sections. the first starts with a general introduction to human rights and the principles which underpin these. it then focuses on the establishment of rights designed specifically for children and the development of cre, particularly school-based cre. this section also includes an in-depth look at ways in which human rights education and cre have been implemented across various cultures and contexts globally, and highlights the central role of teachers in this endeavour. jerome and starkey articulate how the united http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4498 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:carol.robinson@edgehill.ac.uk hrer book and media reviews 157 nations convention on the rights of the child (uncrc) (united nations, 1989) provides a set of principles and standards that can be used as a basis for developing policy and practice around cre pedagogy. in section two the authors discuss different forms of cre and demonstrate how different approaches to cre place different requirements on teachers. some approaches to cre position the teacher as having a passive role, for example, where teachers are expected to simply implement standards, while other forms of cre position the teacher as having more of an advocacy role. the authors argue, however, that for cre to be effective and meaningful for children, teachers need to see themselves as agents of change and be committed to cre, which leads to tackling systemic inequalities. as part of this, children also need to have agency and feel empowered to take action in situations where their rights are not respected. this section illuminates some of the competing tensions at play when teachers attempt to take on the role as agents of change, while simultaneously feeling constrained by systems and structures which dictate major elements of their practice on a day-to-day basis. thus teachers may find themselves having to grapple with external and contextual pressures relating to their professional role being at odds with their own beliefs and values relating to cre practices. the authors present a scholarly and insightful discussion around the complexity of the challenges faced by teachers who encounter such situations. they also provide researchinformed suggestions on how teachers can resist some of the constraining effects imposed on them by professional expectations ingrained within policy, processes and structures which curtail the development of their own agency and prevent them from promoting cre in ways which align to their personal beliefs. jerome and starkey draw on the work of three educational theorists, freire, dewey and freinet, to extend the discussion of teacher agency and critically explore different aspects of cre pedagogy. through focusing on the work of freire, attention is given to the relationship between learners and teachers, and to the significance of the role teachers can play in developing education which is transformational and empowering for individuals and communities. furthermore, through drawing on theories developed by dewey and freinet, a robust framework based on the concepts of communication, democracy, and cooperation is used to consider factors that can inform the development of a cre pedagogy grounded in social justice. within section three the authors explore, from theoretical and pragmatic perspectives, what it means to learn about children’s rights and what constitutes valuable knowledge in relation to children’s rights. they also outline factors to consider when working to create inclusive classrooms and to establish a child rights approach to behaviour management. throughout this final section, real-life examples of practices and approaches to cre which have been implemented by others and at the whole school level and in the community are presented, hrer book and media reviews 158 thus providing ideas that can be adopted to support teachers developing their own crefocused pedagogy. a major strength of the book is that discussions around effective cre pedagogy are substantiated through drawing on expansive reviews of evidence from international studies of practices relating to supporting human rights education and cre. many of these studies are presented as case studies throughout the book and illuminate a wide range of creative and inspirational ways in which cre can be built into pedagogical practices and support in establishing a rights-respecting school culture. the case studies also illustrate practical implications associated with embedding a child-rights focused ethos in schools, along with some of the potential pitfalls and challenges which teachers may encounter. the book is, therefore, of great value to teachers and practitioners in schools and early years settings as well as other professionals with responsibility for children’s rights education. references united nations. (1989). convention on the rights of the child. general assembly resolution 44/25, 20 november 1989. u.n. doc. a/res/44/25. retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/documents/professionalinterest/crc.pdf https://www.ohchr.org/documents/professionalinterest/crc.pdf a vision for advancing children’s rights education in classrooms and communities references majority rights and minority responsibilities: young people’s negotiations with human rights issn 2535-5406 vol 4, no 3 (2021) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3968 date received: 14-08-2020 date accepted: 04-05-2021 peer reviewed article © 2021 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles majority rights and minority responsibilities: young people’s negotiations with human rights kerenina k. dansholm university of stavanger, norway, kerenina.k.dansholm@uis.no abstract this paper is a case study of student discussions of rights and responsibilities, which contributes to filling the existing knowledge gap on the topic. tenth grade majority students who participated in three group discussions on inclusive citizenship spoke of rights as belonging to the majority or to the minoritised other. in line with earlier research findings, students referenced human rights as national rights or values, while making explicit connections between majority rights and minority responsibilities and implicit references to the responsibility of the majority to protect minority rights. this analysis indicates a need in human rights education (hre) for both legal literacy and a deeper discussion of human rights. this can, for example, be achieved through a focus on the local context so that young people may better understand minority barriers to rights, as well as the role of the majority in issues of social justice. keywords human rights, responsibilities, human rights education, young people, citizenship, norway http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3968 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:kerenina.k.dansholm@uis.no human rights education review – volume 4(3) 90 introduction human rights and citizenship education are important aspects of global school curricula, particularly in the social sciences (schulz et al., 2016). however, research shows that, in school, minority students are more likely to face discrimination than other types of bullying (durkin et al., 2012). the #blacklivesmatter movement focuses on one important minoritised category; yet this is just one example of a minoritised other, a group whose lived experience often contradicts democratic ideals (banks, 2009). local public debate shows that this also holds true in scandinavia (hansen, 2020; a. d. johansen, 2020). this was demonstrated at norwegian #blacklivesmatter protests, where younger speakers spoke of racist incidents they had witnessed at school or their own experiences of racism. human rights were invoked both explicitly and implicitly, and it was stressed that it is the responsibility of everyone to combat discrimination (bjørheim, 2020; hansen, 2020). while much has been written about human rights, children’s rights, and children’s and young people’s perspectives on rights (for example, ruck & tenenbaum, 2014; barton, 2020), relatively little research explores student perspectives on the relationship between human rights and responsibilities. this article therefore contributes towards filling this knowledge gap with a case study consisting of three group interviews with 10th grade students in a norwegian school. the main aim is to explore how majority students view the minority in terms of citizenship and rights, with a focus on the universal declaration of human rights [udhr] (united nations [un], 1948). the paper begins with a contextualisation of the topic and the national setting. this is followed by a theoretical section on citizenship and human rights education (hre), and then a methodology section. the paper concludes by showing that while the interview guide focuses on inclusive citizenship (kabeer, 2005), rights and responsibilities emerge as recurring themes in student discussions. the findings highlight how students’ negotiations enable them to explore the relationship between rights and responsibilities locally, as well as gain a deeper understanding of minority (in)access to rights, and majority responsibility. these negotiated discussions with young people are a form of consultative participation (lansdown, 2009) which can contribute to hre scholars’ and educators’ research and praxis. literature review and background hre provides a framework for understanding what is necessary for human dignity (osler & starkey, 2010) and raises awareness of universal rights (lile, 2019; osler & solhaug, 2018). additionally, extensive research has been carried out on hre models and their implementation, as shown by for example bajaj (2011) and barton (2020). hre shares some common goals with citizenship education (osler & starkey, 2010), and both fields seek to address the gap between ‘democratic ideals and societal realities —and the existence of k. dansholm 91 discrimination and racism’ (banks, 2009, p. 104). two examples of this gap are the public debate on immigrants taking ‘our’ jobs (bell, heggebø, tolgensbakk, & seeberg, 2019; landro, 2019) and the ‘go back to where you came from’ narrative that targets refugees (internet movie database [imdb] 2015; polakow-suransky, 2017). such public debate narratives are symptomatic of political and policy issues, such as the framing of citizens with different skin colour as the other, and the overlooking of barriers to rights access faced by minorities, as well as migrant populations–work migrants and refugees–who do not have national citizenship (osler & starkey, 2010). isin and turner (2007) show that one of the discrepancies between citizenship and human rights is that while national citizenship has intrinsic accompanying responsibilities, such as paying taxes, human rights does not. thus, while there are international conventions providing a basis for human rights law, responsibilities connected to human rights are ethical obligations connected to social justice. international research into children’s perspectives on rights shows that in children’s analyses of who deserves rights and which rights to prioritise, there can sometimes be a conflict between reasoning based on morality and reasoning based on social conventions (helwig, 1995; ruck, abramovitch, & keating 1998; ruck, keating, abramovitch & koegl 1998; ruck & tenenbaum, 2014; tenenbaum & ruck, 2012; barton, 2020). the research shows that human rights are often understood by young people as mainly individualistic values, and they lack an understanding of human rights’s juridical institutions. furthermore, while bjerke’s research shows that for young people ‘there is an interwoven relation between participation rights and responsibilities’ (2011, p. 76), and there are numerous examples of research exploring children’s views of citizen responsibility (covell, howe & mcneil, 2008; osler, 2000; thakaso & preece, 2018), research on the connection between human rights and responsibility is limited. this could be partially explained by the lack of explicit mention of responsibilities in the universal declaration of human rights [udhr] (un, 1948). conversely, the african charter on human and peoples’ rights, which also applies to children, articulates duties as well as rights (african union, 1981), such as duties towards family and society. moving to the context of this case study, norway has an immigrant population of 14.8 %, out of which 4.5 % have a refugee background (statistics norway, 2021a). an additional 3.6% of the total population are born in norway to foreign-born parents (statistics norway, 2021b). norway suffered a national tragedy at utøya in july 2011, when 77 people were murdered by a white norwegian home-grown terrorist who supports an extremist right-wing political discourse, specifically anti-immigrant and islamophobic ideologies (eriksen, 2011). in the early hours after the tragedy, prior to the release of information about the perpetrator, non-white norwegians were targeted and harassed due to assumptions that muslim terrorists were responsible (eriksen, 2011). however, the memorialisation of the utøya terror attack has rehuman rights education review – volume 4(3) 92 framed the perpetrator as a different other (hakvåg, 2015), thus lessening concerns regarding racism and islamophobia within norwegian society. additionally, lile (2019) shows that while hre is enshrined in the norwegian constitution, its articulation within national curricula is subsumed under christian and humanistic values. this is compounded by norway’s public image as a global champion of human rights, which results in framing human rights violations as distant phenomena (vesterdal, 2019), thus ‘reproduc(e)[ing] stereotypes and moral superiority’ narratives (hahn, 2020, p. 12). hre is therefore weak and often conflated with democratic values (hahn, 2020; osler & solhaug, 2018), while an emphasis is placed on helping non-western immigrants adopt norwegian values (osler & solhaug, 2018). the present study should also be seen in light of the nordic ethos of egalitarian individualism (gullestad, 2002), which was visible in informant discussions. kjørholt defines it as follows: ‘egalitarian individualism indicates a close relation between an emphasis on the individual’s right to self-realization and self-determination on the one hand, and on equality and collectiveness on the other’ (2002, p. 68). let us now consider the theoretical perspective. theoretical framework the term ‘minority’ is defined in the light of my informants’ references to ‘them’ or the other, where they used the term ‘immigrant’ (innvandrer) to cover a wide range of residential and citizenship statuses: work immigrants, refugees, international students, and non-white norwegians. as gullestad (2002) explains, ‘immigrant’ in norway has a double meaning: it is a lexical description of everyone born outside the country, and it also signals racialised minorities (gans, 2017). i therefore use ‘minority’ in a broad sense to encompass both meanings of ‘immigrant’. however, neither the minority or the majority are homogeneous groups, and my majority informants at times acknowledged hybridity (bhabha, 2015). yet, the minoritised other–or immigrants generally–were often framed by majority interviewees as subaltern, with constrained agency (balibar & spivak, 2016). this research project was focused on citizenship and thus hre will be discussed using a citizenship framework which offers four dimensions: legal status, rights, membership and participation (stokke, 2017). beginning with legal status and rights, the udhr (un, 1948) is not legally binding in itself, although the international conventions derived from the udhr are part of international human rights law. norway has incorporated five of these conventions into national law (norwegian national human rights institution [nhri], 2020), thus creating an overlap between human rights and citizen rights. in some respects this is positive, as human rights apply to both norwegian citizens and foreigners. however, hre research shows that young people tend to frame human rights in individualistic and moral terms, and they overlook juridical institutions. thus, scholars argue that for hre to become truly transformative, legal k. dansholm 93 literacy is needed (barton, 2020; lundy & martínez sainz, 2018). secondly, membership can be framed juridically as national citizenship or as belonging, and community participation can grant access to membership. however, minority inclusion, or access, is not a given. the decolonial scholar mbembe compellingly argues that access is ‘the right to belong’ (2015, p. 5). he explains that access-as-belonging is not a matter of tolerance and charity and does not require assimilation into the majority culture. access is about not being ignored and feeling comfortable enough to figuratively take up space. mbembe further argues that decolonial pluriversity gives room not only to ethnic and cultural diversity, but also to epistemic diversity (mbembe, 2015). this echoes bajaj, canlas and argenal’s (2018) discussion of the humanising imperative of hre and could be argued to be at the heart of the udhr (un, 1948) and its principles of human dignity and equality (toivanen, 2004). thirdly, participation is connected to responsibility (stokke, 2017) and is important in both hre and citizenship education (osler & solhaug, 2018). however, a distinction should be made between participation as an imperative and as an invitation. participation as an imperative is politically desirable, as mouritsen and jaeger (2018, p. 4) explain: ‘active citizenship is seen as a kind of panacea for all sorts of social and political ills, such as political apathy, strains on welfare spending, crime, and social unrest’. however, this framing can overlook both the barriers to participation faced by minorities as well as assimilationist notions, such as those highlighted by mbembe; these issues were visible in my informants’ discussion on the responsibility to participate. on the other hand, children’s participation could be described as a facilitated invitation. for example, lansdown (2009) argues that the first level of children’s participation rights is consultative participation. thus, while a longer theoretical discussion could be had on participation as an imperative versus an invitation, this article begins the conversation by providing a participatory space for young people’s concerns about human rights issues. the relationships between rights and responsibilities which emerged from the analysis of the young people’s discussions can be visualised in figure 1. majority students used the terms ‘our’ and ‘their’ to distinguish between the majority and the minority other. explicit correlations were made between majority rights and minority responsibility, while implicit correlations were also acknowledged between minority rights and majority responsibility. additional intersections visualised in figure 1 are minority rights seen as a threat to majority rights, as well as minority rights becoming minority responsibility. human rights education review – volume 4(3) 94 figure 1 relationships and intersections between majority and minority rights and responsibilities methodology this article is based on data from a larger research project where group interviews with 10th graders (aged 15) were conducted at three schools in norway. the data subset is drawn from one school, where a total of 12 students participated. earlier in the school year, the class had covered human rights more generally, as part of their social studies curriculum. this included the history of human rights, international organisations and ngos working with human rights issues, and an examination of some specific articles, although without a specific focus on the norwegian context. this school was singled out from the data because its students had described incidents involving minorities (specifically refugees) that had caused them concern and discomfort. the predominant discourse of students at other schools in the larger data set lent heavily towards inclusivity; thus, the more vociferous stance taken by some students in this case study school was striking. additionally, the teacher had not been able to secure written parental permission for minority students to participate, due to language barriers. this meant that group participants were white majority students, predominantly female. i recruited a master’s student in education that i know well to act as co-interviewer. she lives in the school’s catchment area and is fluent in the local dialect (unlike myself), but had no previous connection with the school. both of us are white women. she assisted with taking notes, explaining the dialect to me when needed and spontaneously asked students clarifying k. dansholm 95 questions. the interview guide for this study includes questions on the meaning of the words citizen (statsborger) and co-citizen (medborger), and on the concepts of ‘minority citizens’ and ‘dual citizenship’. additionally, students were asked to give their perspectives on new citizens and residents–as part of the landscape of co-citizenship. some way into the interviews, i showed a two-minute national television clip to exemplify the public debate on issues of citizenship and diversity. in the clip, faten al-hussaini, a non-white norwegian television host with a hijab, interviews siv jensen, a white norwegian politician from the populist right-wing progress party. the discussion centres on citizenship, belonging, and participation, with jensen circumventing acknowledgement of al-hussaini as norwegian, and insinuating minorities themselves are responsible for their marginalisation. for example, in response to al-hussaini’s query as to whether she can be norwegian with a hijab, jensen says that the question is rather whether one wants to be part of norwegian society, as one can be a norwegian passport holder but isolate oneself in a minority environment. the clip concludes with al-hussaini’s commentary, where she expresses frustration with the lack of recognition and being in an inbetween space (al-hussaini, 2017; norwegian broadcasting corporation [nrk] p3, 2017). this clip played a role in informing the discussion, as seen later in the analysis. i conducted analysis on the original fully transcribed interview texts, after which i translated the relevant excerpts, which are included in this article. a native norwegian speaker proofread the translated excerpts. i employed thematic analysis (nowell, norris, white & moules, 2017), focusing specifically on the 30 articles of the udhr (un, 1948). building on banks’ (2009, p. 101) argument that hre in school should address young people’s personal experiences, my analysis employs the feminist and postmodern methodology of polyphony (liamputtong, 2007). this analytical method gives greater space to participant voices; there is less editing of dialogue segments, which allows participants’ negotiated and at times conflicting voices to take centre stage. this methodology contributes to young people’s engagement in consultative participation (lansdown, 2009). it also ensures greater analytical transparency. while the data for this case study consisted of only three group interviews of 45 minutes to one hour each, the thematic analysis yielded extensive discussion material, relevant to human rights. the next section offers an analysis of the three main groups of rights singled out in the interviews; freedom of religion and freedom of expression [articles 18 and 19]; equality and freedom from discrimination [article 2], and the right to participate in democratic processes [article 21] (un, 1948). polyphonic discussion of rights and responsibilities the young people in these group discussions touched on diverse rights covered in the udhr human rights education review – volume 4(3) 96 (un, 1948). some of these were framed as rights and others as responsibilities. some were framed as national citizenship rights, while others were framed as universal rights–with some tension between the two, as the following section demonstrates. (code key: students are coded by group and gender; for example, g3mii stands for group three, male two.) negotiating minority rights versus majority rights this segment makes visible negotiations between minority and majority rights, with students acknowledging the lived experience of the minoritised other and their desire for stability and safety. however, this segment also shows that some students experience an underlying frustration, and they argue that minority rights ought not to interfere with or threaten majority stability and norms. the oscillating negotiated opinions in this segment focus on the rights of refugees and work migrants: g1fi: no, i think it’s good that they come, but like… g1fiv: i think they must follow norwegian rules, in a way, because they have, they follow the rules from their country. and when they come to norway then it’s that... they have difficulty, in a way, with the norwegian rules. but they have to… they live here so they have to follow them, in a way. you are not an exception just because you come from another country, other rules, so that you can break the rules, like many do. g1fi: and there are so many excuses given about them that they have gone through a lot and such, but it affects us that live here if, like... what has affected them maybe if they have fled from another country, and not like... that they can’t manage to follow the rules here, so then it’s, like, we feel unsafe and... if something happens. g1fi: but at the same time it’s good that they get to come here because it could have been us who fled from another country. g1fiv: and norway is a very safe and stable country to live in, and it’s nice to live here. that’s probably why… uh, maybe more than where they came from. g1fi: and there is, also there are some who come for work and such. and i think that’s good because… but as long as it doesn’t become, like, that those in norway don’t get enough work then. this dialogue segment touches specifically on three human rights: the right to seek asylum [article 14], the right to life, liberty and security of person [article 3], and the right to work [article 23] (un, 1948). however, it demonstrates a tension between rights and responsibilities where, while the minority right to seek asylum is acknowledged, the majority right to security of person presupposes the responsibility of the minority to follow majority rules. thus, k. dansholm 97 assimilation into majority culture is understood as a precondition for access to rights, while diversity of norms is not welcomed (mbembe, 2015). the one student’s comment about excuses made regarding what ‘they’ (refugees) have gone through demonstrates a frustration with refugees’ hardship taking up space. this signals the students’ understanding that the majority must offer tolerance and charity to refugees, rather than offering them access-as-belonging (mbembe, 2015). the comment that ‘we’ (majority) would also want to be able to seek asylum, if necessary, denotes a politically correct conscience. however, again, conditionality is visible in the reference to narratives of immigrants taking ‘our’ jobs (bell et al., 2019; landro, 2019). this frames minority rights as problematic if they appear to threaten majority rights. interestingly, another group (g2) framed the right to work [article 23] (un, 1948) as a responsibility, a form of societal participation. overall, this segment shows a juxtaposition of minority rights and responsibilities against the perceived threat they can pose to majority rights, as well as the responsibility of the minority to assimilate into majority society. freedom of religion and freedom of expression [articles 18 and 19] the rights to freedom of religion and freedom of expression (un, 1948) came up in the discussion of the television clip. students acknowledged it was probably al-hussaini’s hijab which caused jensen to avoid acknowledging her as fully norwegian, and they pointed out that rights to freedom of religion and freedom of expression invalidate this type of prejudice. the following segment demonstrates the negotiation of prejudice and rights: g3fii: hmmm. and... yes. she [al-hussaini] had a strong opinion that she herself felt she was norwegian, but it was... i didn’t really understand why jensen didn’t want to say... because she asked her, ‘do you think i’m norwegian even though... that, if i have a hijab?’ then she [jensen] didn’t, like, answer the question. g3fi: it has to do with if she... g3fii: it has to do with religion, and she can have the religion she wants, even though she lives in norway. in norway, people have the right to have whatever religion they want. also, we have freedom of expression, you have the right to say exactly what you mean. but she didn’t dare say... no, it’s not like you have to come from syria to use the hijab, and like, there are many who are 100% norwegian who also use the hijab in norway. g3fi: you can, of course, convert to a different religion, even if you are norwegian and were christian. human rights education review – volume 4(3) 98 g3fii: yes, that about which religion... i could have used the hijab because i had changed religion, and still been norwegian. like, it has nothing... country or cocitizenship, citizenship, whatever [in english], has nothing to do with your religion. it only has to do with, in norway everyone is... uh, the biggest percentage is christian, or nothing. uh... also there are a lot of different kinds of christians, like jehovahs and all that. but, it’s mainly christians that are the biggest percentage, and then you have a lot of different ones from here. but the reason i think she sees her as majority in another religion is because those with a different religion are often maybe immigrants. g3fi: she has characteristics that show she’s not 100% from norway, and that she uses the hijab can be a reason. but like, when she has a hijab and has a little darker skin tone, then the connection is made, then you understand that, like, she doesn’t have a totally norwegian background. and i think the reason she [jensen] had trouble saying it is because, like, people know that she’s from [a certain political party] and [that party] is against, they’re against taking in so many immigrants... and then when jensen is a public figure against taking in immigrants, then you understand that... maybe it’s not necessary to say, but they have a bit, like, racist ideas and look down on them. g3fii: but i understand that maybe they are a bit sceptical about taking in [refugees] because so many incidents have happened with immigrants, in a way. uh, but there’s a kind of label, the multicultural norway... in norway, we’re multicultural and many have different cultures also, as she probably has. g3fi: i feel that there is, that it is a part of society in norway also to not be totally norwegian. that we are used to having people from other countries, because a lot of people want to move to norway because things are so good here, and if norway had been a country with only, like, norwegians, it wouldn’t be the same as it is now. this dialogue demonstrates an understanding of the rights to freedom of expression and religion [articles 18 & 19] (un, 1948), although they are framed as norwegian rights rather than human rights. this supports research showing human rights being framed as national values rather than universal rights (hahn, 2020). the segment also highlights normative understandings of religious prejudice and discrimination as being racist and unacceptable, again pointing to norway’s image as a human rights champion (vesterdal, 2019). it could be argued that the extended discussion of freedom of religion and expression is an implicit understanding that the minority right to freedom of religion invokes the responsibility of the majority to uphold that right. on the other hand, it could also be argued that the reference to public debate on criminal incidents involving immigrants (ø.d johansen, 2019; moore, 2019) made by one of the students demonstrates the ongoing negotiation of majority rights versus the responsibility of the minority to follow the rules as a precondition for being tolerated, following mbembe (2015). the final comment that part of ‘norwegianness’ is not being k. dansholm 99 norwegian indicates an appreciation for pluriversity or hybridity (bhabha, 2015; mbembe, 2015). thus, this discussion signifies students’ understanding of rights and access-asbelonging, where even the hijab as a religious symbol is provided legitimate space; at the same time, they are also conscious of conflicts in the public sphere. equality and freedom from discrimination [article 2] related to this discussion of freedom of religion is the right to freedom from discrimination (un, 1948). in some dialogue segments, students demonstrated an awareness of prejudice and discrimination, while in other instances they seemed unaware of the discrepancies in their arguments. for example, in one of the interview groups, the students discussed the indigenous minority group, the sami. students outlined the historical oppression foisted on the sami as well as the special rights currently in place, granted to the sami by the norwegian government in reparation (international labour organization [ilo], 1989). the students framed this differentiated treatment protecting sami culture and language as a good thing, while one added: g3fi: it’s, like, their culture and their way of life. this comment was made in a relaxed, laissez-faire manner and contrasts with the rather strong opinions of some students about the importance of immigrants and refugees following the rules. regarding the sami, it was implicitly understood that it is the majority’s responsibility to protect their rights–including their cultural and linguistic rights. thus, it could be argued that to some degree the sami are granted access-as-belonging (mbembe, 2015) while other minoritised groups are expected to assimilate. students in interview group three seemed more reflective on the challenges faced by minoritised ‘immigrants’, as well as minority right to equal access. however, they still implied that norwegian norms and behaviour were the correct ones: g3fii: yes. so those who come from other countries should, like, have the same opportunities as us, regardless of how old they are, … and it’s a very good offer, but they can often behave a little differently, because they don’t know how to act. g3fii: they don’t know the norwegian rules. this again implies that the relationship between the rights of minorities to equality and equal access [article 2] (un, 1948) is correlated to their responsibility to learn norwegian rules and norms–again demonstrating mbembe’s (2015) notion of assimilation as a precondition for minority access-as-belonging. group three also confirmed previous research showing that human rights violations, such as human rights education review – volume 4(3) 100 discrimination, are often understood as something that happens somewhere else (osler & solhaug, 2018; vesterdal, 2019). for example, while some students were clearly aware of the existence of prejudice and discrimination against non-white minorities, they initially framed it as happening elsewhere: g3fi: it depends on how far out it is, if a person came here who had two norwegian parents, or one parent who is foreign, then i feel you’d be seen as totally normal. but when you come here… if you come from abroad and have dark parents especially, then racism can easily come into the environment. i feel that you’d be, like… i feel that in some places if you’re dark then you won’t be seen as norwegian even if you have, like, lived in norway your whole life. so especially that can be a problem at least now, there is more racism and abuse here there is an initial acknowledgement of hybridity (bhabha, 2015), through the mention of those with one norwegian parent and one ‘foreign’. however, this hybridity is legitimised through parentage, and thus those with two foreign parents are more likely to face discrimination, especially if they have a darker skin. when asked about discrimination in their own school environment, the students said that they did not think it was much of a problem, and asserted that where a person is from did not matter to them, as long as they can speak norwegian: g3fii: or, like, we don’t care if someone has other parents, in a way and all that. we think that they… it doesn’t affect us any if someone… so long as they, in a way, speak norwegian. this comment could be understood as a legitimisation of hybridity through language. on the other hand, one student later said: g3fi: it’s not like, that, if you come here and can speak norwegian 100% that you won’t get, like, racist comments flung at you because you have dark skin. additionally, one commented that prejudice is often an automatic reaction: g3fii: it’s just something one automatically thinks, even if like, one doesn’t want to discriminate against anyone... yes. these successive comments confirm a pattern of framing human rights violations as happening far away. however, when students discuss and explore the issue more deeply, they may develop a more nuanced understanding of the lived reality of minorities’ experiences of hybridity, as well as discrimination closer to home. the following dialogue segment demonstrates this more nuanced understanding where some k. dansholm 101 students appeared to empathise more in depth with the minoritised other, and were able to negotiate majority responsibilities in relation to the minority’s right to not be discriminated against. in the following segment, participants are discussing minority students in the norwegian language class at school–the introduction class comprised mostly of refugees–and these students’ interactions with the rest of the student body: g3fi: i think there are many that feel that, you have, like, at school those of us here, that… there are many that see the introduction class as a part that doesn’t belong to the school because they’re a group together… they don’t, like, hang out with others at school. and they often keep to themselves even though… they don’t need to. g3fi: i think it has a bit to do with culture, like, and i think they can feel a bit like… i think they have that feeling themselves because they are… said themselves that when you come here you can probably get racist comments flung at you, and if you get comments then it goes very deep in you and you can pull away, like, and can get that feeling that you don’t really belong, like the others do. and then you often pull away towards those that have a bit of the same culture, and like, have lived in the same situation. g3fii: and like very… also feel vulnerable. g3fi: yes. g3fii: uhh, so it could be that it’s a bit our fault and that maybe they have not been very good at being welcoming… we students. maybe that’s it. g3fi: yes, and they have, you know, none of us can feel what that person has if they came here on boats with forty people, on a little rubber boat in the mediterranean, like. it’s something that sits in their psyche, and it’s like, it can affect them and how they are, how their behaviour looks. and its things that we can’t imagine, and like, understand their situation. and then we can, like, think the way they are is strange. this segment demonstrates students’ reflections on the challenges faced by the other, with implicit understanding of both the need for human rights, such as the right to seek asylum [article 14] and the right to freedom from discrimination [article 2] (un, 1948), along with majority responsibility to not discriminate against the other, regardless of their ‘strange’ behaviour. a change can thus be seen from earlier comments, where discrimination is viewed as a distant phenomenon, to an admission that they share responsibility. the importance of connecting discrimination to the local context can also be seen in the light of norwegian research which shows a lack of discussion in schools of the july 22nd utøya terror attack (anker & von der lippe, 2015; erdal, 2018), and hakvåg’s (2015) argument regarding human rights education review – volume 4(3) 102 the discourse of july 22nd memorials that reinforce the norwegian self-image of democratic equality and sameness. post-utøya public debate has moved further towards anti-immigrant and islamophobic discourse with the establishment of a right-leaning coalition government (fangen & vaage, 2018), and the 2019 attack by another white norwegian on a mosque and the murder of his non-white sister (nrk, 2019) raises further concerns. public debate surrounding the 2019 tragedy (stoksvik, 2020) demonstrates concern about the radicalisation of individuals who become racist terrorists, but there are also worries about family and friends who bear a responsibility to take action when such views become apparent. this demonstrates the need to help students explore issues related to discrimination and minority experiences within their local context. the right to participate in democratic processes [article 21] another right frequently referred to in discussing citizenship is the right to participate in democratic processes (un, 1948). the students at this school were especially keen to point out that voting and being part of the decision-making process was not reserved for elites: g1fi: if we are part of the decision-making, like, all of us. it’s not just the higher-ups. g1fiv: that’s it. like, that they listen to us, you know. they should at least listen to us, if we have something to say or something we want to bring up, then they listen to us. voting was framed more generally as a responsibility, specifically a criterion for citizenship. as the dialogue shows, participation in elections was understood as part of one’s responsibility for contributing to positive change in society: g2fii: that you, for example, vote, because you have… if you participate in an election, for example, and that is… democracy is so that everyone can be part of the decisionmaking. g2miii: yes, a bit, like, if you want change in your society, then you have to go and vote. if not, then there won’t be change. this comment implies that the right to vote is also a responsibility correlated to contributing to positive change in society. thus, the right to participate in the democratic process [article 21] (un, 1948) becomes the responsibility to participate–or more explicitly, the responsibility to vote. this can be seen as an internalisation of the participation narrative in the public debate (bøe, 2019), where the onus is placed on individuals to make their voices heard and access their rights. however, the following example shows that more than voting may be necessary to effect change. political participation [article 21] on the part of the community was visible in the discussion of k. dansholm 103 a refugee whom the community rallied around. due to his participation in the cultural life of the community [article 27] (un, 1948), the community protested against his imminent deportation: g3fii: it has to do with belonging, and like that many think they [certain refugees] belong here… uhm, maybe the state thinks… g3fi: and it has to do with participation and that they took some initiative themselves, like one of them, he was a gymnastics trainer, he worked at the school there and was often, like, with young people for free time activities. and then the parents of the children know who he is and such. so, then he was very close in the community and, when you... many young people who are into music or sports and especially such activities asked... and he had so much to do with everything, so everyone knew who he was. and then, like, a big percent of the local community supported him against the government, so they wouldn’t send him away. g3fi: it has to do with that we have a democratic country and so we have the right to participate in deciding what we think is right. g3fi: like, that they stand for those who were to be sent out, they were... like, they were a part of [the community]. then, we have the right to be heard. while some students saw minority rights as a threat to majority rights, this example shows the right to democratic participation being utilised by the majority to protect the minority’s right to security of person [article 3], the right to seek asylum [article 14], and the right to participate in the cultural life of the community [article 27] (un, 1948). however, this segment also demonstrates an assimilation narrative, where the minority right to participate in the cultural life of the community [article 27] becomes the responsibility to participate–or integrate. and yet, it was not the refugee’s cultural participation that granted him access to the right to asylum; this right was secured by the majority community’s political participation. thus, the conflation of rights and responsibilities can lend itself to naïve assumptions regarding access to rights as well as limited understanding of barriers. such examples offer opportunities to clarify conflations, affirming what todd (2007) shows in her discussion of hre, that it is in dialogue with the other where justice is fully understood and co-created. conclusion this analysis contributes to research on young people and human rights by focusing on majority students’ implicit and explicit understandings of the relationship between rights and responsibilities, as figure 1 (page six) visualises. the use of polyphony and extended dialogue segments allows hre researchers and educators to gain deeper insight into young people’s negotiated and oscillating perspectives on minority citizens and their rights. as shown, young human rights education review – volume 4(3) 104 people demonstrate an awareness of both human rights ideals and public debate narratives, while they often conflate rights and responsibilities. such misunderstandings may hinder students’ comprehension of human rights in general, larger societal injustices–such as those related to #blacklivesmatter–as well as their ability to recognise human rights violations within their own community. hre seen through the lens of citizenship dimensions legal status, membership, participation, and rights (stokke, 2017) facilitates reflection on student discussions and concerns. for example, the legal status and rights dimensions highlight the importance of majority students recognising principles of equality before the law and rights as being universal regardless of legal status; this underscores hre scholars’ recommendations for the inclusion of legal literacy in transformative hre (barton, 2020; lundy & martínez sainz, 2018). participation as a right was facilitated through students’ negotiated discussions, which gave voice to their concerns (lansdown, 2009), and these concerns highlighted some problematic assumptions: namely, participation as minority responsibility to assimilate, along with a lack of comprehension of barriers to participation. bajaj et al. (2018, p. 18) argue that ‘teaching human rights begins with humanizing our students in order to build connections to human rights and to one another’. therefore, it is vital for hre to aid majority students in understanding that for minorities to participate and feel a sense of membership, they must first have access. furthermore, related to the membership dimension, student discussions reveal a perceived dichotomy between majority and minority rights, indicating that minorities with other or ‘strange’ behaviour are not viewed as full members, which highlights the importance of mbembe’s (2015) access-as-belonging and pluriversity. in conclusion, a first step is for young people to recognise the minority’s legal rights, both citizen rights and human rights. secondly, and perhaps more importantly, examining participation and membership through minorities’ barriers to access in their local community may help students gain greater awareness of the rights and access which the majority take for granted, and the responsibility of the majority in helping to protect minority rights–such as freedom from discrimination [article 2] (un, 1948). this discussion shows that exploring rights and responsibilities is important for deepening young people’s understanding of the complexities and challenges of access-as-belonging, helping human rights questions evolve from the superficial: do minorities have legal access to rights?, to deeper questions: do minorities feel welcome and comfortable asserting their rights?. how do majority young people perceive minorities ‘taking up space’ in order to claim their rights, and how do they reflect on their own responsibilities in relation to minority rights? asking such questions and engaging with young people’s concerns therefore has the potential to aid, particularly the majority, to become stronger allies in the global fight for social justice and human rights. k. dansholm 105 acknowledgements special thanks to my co-interviewer, heidi d. stokmo, for her contribution. references african union. 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(2019). championing human rights close to home and far away: human rights education in light of national identity construction and foreign policy in norway. human rights education review, 2(1), 5–24. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2907 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.2012.01755.x https://doi.org/10.17159/2520-9868/i71a07 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-5812.2007.00310.x https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-5812.2007.00310.x https://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/index.html https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2907 children’s rights and teachers’ responsibilities: reproducing or transforming the cultural taboo on child sexual abuse? volume 2, no 1 (2019) date received: 15-12-2018 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3079 date accepted: 22-03-2019 issn 2535-5406 children’s rights and teachers’ responsibilities: reproducing or transforming the cultural taboo on child sexual abuse? beate goldschmidt-gjerløw university of agder, norway. abstract: enhancing young learners’ knowledge about appropriate and inappropriate sexual behaviour is crucial for the protection of children’s rights. this article discusses teachers’ understandings of their practices and approaches to the topic of child sexual abuse in norwegian upper secondary schools, based on phone interviews with 64 social science teachers. countering child sexual abuse is a political priority for the norwegian government, and the committee on the rights of the child acknowledges several state initiatives to counter child sexual abuse through education. nevertheless, this study finds that teachers do not address this topic adequately, indicating that cultural taboos regarding talking about and thus preventing such abuse, including rape among young peers, still prevail in norwegian classrooms. furthermore, emotional obstacles, including concerns about re-traumatising and stigmatising learners, hinder some teachers from addressing this topic thoroughly. additional explanatory factors include heavy teacher workloads, little preparation in teacher education programmes, insufficient information in textbooks, and an ambiguous national curriculum. keywords: children´s rights, social science education, child sexual abuse, norway b. goldschmidt-gjerløw: beate.goldschmidt-gjerlow@uia.no mailto:beate.goldschmidt-gjerlow@uia.no human rights education review – volume 2(1) 26 children’s rights and teachers’ responsibilities: reproducing or transforming the cultural taboo on child sexual abuse? doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3079 issn 2535-5406 beate goldschmidt-gjerløw beate.goldschmidt-gjerlow@uia.no university of agder, norway abstract: enhancing young learners’ knowledge about appropriate and inappropriate sexual behaviour is crucial for the protection of children’s rights. this article discusses teachers’ understandings of their practices and approaches to the topic of child sexual abuse in norwegian upper secondary schools, based on phone interviews with 64 social science teachers. countering child sexual abuse is a political priority for the norwegian government, and the committee on the rights of the child acknowledges several state initiatives to counter child sexual abuse through education. nevertheless, this study shows that teachers do not address this topic to any great extent, indicating that the cultural taboos regarding teaching about and preventing such abuse, including rape among young peers, still prevails in norwegian classrooms today. emotional obstacles such as concerns about re-traumatising and stigmatising young learners hinder some teachers from addressing this topic thoroughly in the classroom. additional explanatory factors may include heavy teacher workloads, little preparation in teacher education programmes, insufficient information in textbooks, and an ambiguous national curriculum. keywords: children´s rights, social science education, child sexual abuse, norway introduction ‘sexual violence should not be a topic in social science education. we (teachers) don’t have time to deal with the consequences’ (personal communication with the author, 2018). this norwegian teacher’s statement might provoke several questions. does sexual violence have anything to do with social science education? do we have time to talk about sexual violence, as doing so might open up pandora’s box? what would the consequences be of keeping that potentially troublesome box closed, and why do some teachers avoid the topic? although teachers have the potential to detect and prevent violence, the council of europe (2015, p. 7) pinpoints that many young people do not, in school, get the opportunity to discuss topics such as sexual orientation, gender-based violence or child sexual abuse. some teachers may feel that these issues are too challenging to address. previous research in norwegian secondary schools shows that sex education is primarily taught in natural science classes, less so in religion classes and even less so in the social sciences (røthing & svendsen, 2009, p. 16). a narrow understanding of sexuality appears to have dominated norwegian sex education, one primarily emphasizing the biological aspects such as fertilization and reproduction (ibid, p. 23) instead of the more social dimensions of sexual behaviour. http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3079 mailto:beate.goldschmidt-gjerlow@uia.no b. goldschmidt-gjerløw 27 in 2007, the norwegian centre for violence and traumatic stress studies conducted a survey among 548 students studying to become preschool teachers, elementary teachers or child protection workers. they were surveyed about how much knowledge they got about the following topics through their education: 1) the united nations convention on the rights of the child (uncrc), 2) physical child abuse, 3) child sexual abuse and 4) conversational methods with children (øverlien & sogn, 2007). elementary school teacher students, in particular, reported a great lack of preparation regarding how to deal with children exposed to violence (ibid). in a follow-up study eight years later, results show that 427 students within the same disciplines report that they have received more teaching about the four topics than those participating in 2007 (øverlien & moen, 2016, p. 3). however, the students in this study do not report a clear increased focus on these issues in their educational programme. the researchers find this worrisome and pinpoint how teachers and preschool teachers are in the unique position of seeing children daily and over time, which: gives them the opportunity to observe children’s well-being, behavioural changes, signs of injury or other signals indicating that the child is in a difficult situation. therefore, they have an important role in prevention and intervention (øverlien & moen, 2016, p. 3) this article is based on the first study of how the issue of sexual violence is taught in social science classes in norwegian upper secondary schools. the empirical data was collected through a phone survey of 64 upper secondary school teachers in 2018. the analytical focus of this article is narrowed down to child sexual abuse, and the research question is: ‘to what extent are social science teachers reproducing or transforming the cultural taboo on child sexual abuse?’ this is an essential field to study, because sexual crime against children and adolescents is a serious social challenge both in norway and across the world today (national police directorate & norwegian prosecuting authority, 2018; mossige & stefansen, 2016; myhre, thoresen & hjemdal, 2015; world health organization, 2017). countering violence and child sexual abuse is a political priority for the norwegian government (norwegian ministry of children, equality and social inclusion, 2014). there is a need for more knowledge about teaching practice on child sexual abuse in order to strengthen the practical implementation of the uncrc through education. this article argues for the need to address this issue. the argument is based on key articles of this convention, which sees children’s rights as a framework for education for social justice (osler, 2016). the factors influencing teaching practice, based on empirical material, will be analysed. this is followed by recommendations on how teachers can include the children’s rights perspective and use literary fiction in their teaching. child sexual abuse in norway this section briefly outlines what i refer to when using the concepts of sexual violence and child sexual abuse, and how i perceive the differences between these terms. sexual violence is a gendered phenomenon as it is ‘intertwined with understandings of both masculinity and femininity as well as gendered relations of power on a societal level’ (skilbrei and stefansen, 2018, p. 11). this article draws on the world health organization’s definition of sexual violence as: human rights education review – volume 2(1) 28 any sexual act, attempt to obtain a sexual act, unwanted sexual comments or advances, or acts to traffic, or otherwise directed, against a person’s sexuality using coercion, by any person regardless of their relationship to the victim, in any setting, including but not limited to home and work (world health organization 2002:149). i consider child sexual abuse to be a branch of the wider concept of sexual violence. child sexual abuse entails any sexual act between an adult and a minor under the age of consent, or between two minors who have an asymmetrical power relationship, either in age, physical strength, or development, and there is an element of coercion (bechtel & bennett, 2019). sexual abuse includes forcing or persuading a child to engage in sexual contact, including non-contact acts such as exposure to pornography, involving the child in pornography, and sexualized communication through the phone or the internet (townsend & rheingold, 2013). children can sometimes also sexually offend each other, and this phenomenon is referred to by different terms. the following section is based on skilbrei and stefansen’s overview of this body of literature (2018, pp. 14-15). the psychologist kjellgren (2009) refers to this phenomenon as ‘adolescents who sexually offend’ or ‘youth who sexually abuse’. in addition, the term ‘young people displaying sexually harmful behaviour’ is also found in research literature; this is often defined as young people who commit sexual acts in an asymmetrical relation of power due to age, emotional maturity, gender, physical strength, and/or intellect (myles-wright & nee, 2017). in norway, it is illegal to engage in sexual acts with children under the age of 16. it is also illegal for minors to have sex with each other. sexual acts with children below the age of 14 are considered rape, in order to enhance children’s protection and signal the severity of engaging in sexual acts with children (national police directorate & norwegian prosecuting authority, 2018, p. 53). in a phone survey conducted by the norwegian centre for violence and traumatic stress studies, 1,012 girls and 1,050 boys between the ages of 16 to 17 were asked if they had experienced sexual abuse (myhre, thoresen & hjemdal, 2015). thirteen percent of girls and four percent of boys said that they had experienced sexual abuse, which includes sexual contact before the age of 13, rape, drug-related abuse, unwanted touching by using threats, or pressure to commit sexual acts. seventy-five percent of these abuses were committed by a person known to the victim (ibid, p. 14). in mossige and stefansen’s study (2016), 2,673 girls and 1,857 boys between 18 and19 were asked about their experiences of sexual violence. the results showed that 775 girls and 130 boys of the 4,530 teenagers surveyed had experienced sexual abuse. according to the norwegian police, there has been a substantial 46 percent increase in reported crime related to sexual acts and rape of children under the age of 14 from the first third of 2017 to the first third of 2018 (national police directorate & norwegian prosecuting authority, 2018, p. 55). this increase in reported crime is explained by several factors; there has been an increase in uncovering unreported cases, but the police also believe that there has been an actual escalation in sexual crimes against children, especially related to online abuse. b. goldschmidt-gjerløw 29 norway’s implementation of the uncrc in educational institutions the uncrc is a legally binding document, since norway ratified the convention in 1991. two articles in the uncrc, namely articles 19 and 34, explicitly protect the child from violence and sexual abuse; article 19 1.states parties shall take all appropriate legislative, administrative, social and educational measures to protect the child from all forms of physical or mental violence, injury or abuse, neglect or negligent treatment, maltreatment or exploitation, including sexual abuse, while in the care of parent(s), legal guardian(s) or any other person who has the care of the child. (uncrc, 1989, article 19, part 1) article 34 states parties undertake to protect the child from all forms of sexual exploitation and sexual abuse. for these purposes, states parties shall in particular take all appropriate national, bilateral and multilateral measures to prevent: (a) the inducement or coercion of a child to engage in any unlawful sexual activity; (b) the exploitative use of children in prostitution or other unlawful sexual practices; (c) the exploitative use of children in pornographic performances and materials (uncrc, 1989) in order to provide children and adolescents with protection from child sexual abuse, it is important they have access to knowledge and participation rights (osler, 2016, p. 144). this is linked to the right to education (uncrc, article 28) and the right to be heard in matters that affect their lives (uncrc, article 12). according to the report of the united nations special rapporteur on the right to education: the right to education includes the right to sexual education, which is both a human right in itself and an indispensable means of realizing other human rights, such as the right to health, the right to information and sexual and reproductive rights […] thus, the right to comprehensive sexual education is part of the right of persons to human rights education (united nations, 2010, p. 7). human rights education consists of education and training about, through and for human rights (united nations human rights office of the high commissioner, 2011, article 2). education about human rights includes ‘knowledge and understanding of human rights norms’, education through human rights consist of ‘learning and teaching in a way that respects the rights of both educators and learners’, and education for human rights entails ‘empowering persons to enjoy and exercise their rights and to respect and uphold the rights of others’ (ibid). when addressing how child sexual abuse is a violation of children’s rights, the teacher creates a space for education about human rights. by actively listening to children’s voices in the classroom, and perhaps listening to their experiences with this kind of human rights education review – volume 2(1) 30 violence outside the classroom, the teacher educates through children’s rights. through that potential transfer of knowledge about abusive situations from student to teacher, the teacher has an ethical and professional commitment to act on behalf of that acquired knowledge: the uncrc article 3 safeguards this by stating that ‘the best interests of the child shall be a primary consideration’. the teacher could directly influence the life of a child who is being abused through talking about how some secrets should not be kept, informing the child protection services and contributing to ending the violence. such actions are efforts that work for children’s rights. education for human rights in relation to sexual violence entails equipping young learners with profound respect for their own human worth, their own bodily rights, and the human worth and rights of others both in the present and in the future. it must be stressed, however, that the child’s voice should also be taken into consideration when informing the child protection services, because it might take some time before the child agrees to that. this could constitute an ethical dilemma, because according to the norwegian law on child protection services §6-4 (www.lovdata.no, 2018), notifying the authorities if there is suspicion of child abuse is a professional obligation. in such cases, it would be important to talk with the child in question about how some secrets should not be silenced (raundalen & schultz, 2016). in the new norwegian general principles for education, it is stated that ‘when teachers care for the pupil and see the individual, human worth is recognized as an essential value for the school and society’ (norwegian directorate for education and training 2017, p. 5). this document confirms that education should be in concordance with the uncrc regarding both children’s knowledge and practical implementation of their rights. the committee on the rights of the child monitors implementation of the uncrc by its state parties (united nations human rights office of the high commissioner, 2019). the latest report from the committee acknowledges that the norwegian state has undertaken measures to deal with violence and child sexual abuse through education (committee on the rights of the child [crc], 2016). from 2014-2016, county governors organized courses on talking to children about violence and sexual abuse for staff working in kindergartens and schools. the report affirms that: the school’s role in preventing violence and sexual abuse has been strengthened in recent years. the goals concerning pupils’ knowledge about violence, violations, violence linked to sexuality, and violence in close relationships were clarified in the learning objectives […] in 2013 (crc, 2017, p13) the norwegian government has made it a priority to counter violence and child sexual abuse, publishing the strategic document childhood comes but once (2013) and the action plan a good childhood lasts a lifetime (2014). this plan includes an increased focus on violence and child sexual abuse in professional educational programs and assigns human resources in schools to support the teachers in their work (norwegian ministry of children, equality and social inclusion, 2014). the document a good childhood lasts a lifetime acknowledges that: b. goldschmidt-gjerløw 31 we all have a duty to act when we have reason to believe that a child or an adolescent is at risk. management and the individual staff members in public service agencies have a special responsibility. it is also important that members of children’s social networks act on any suspicion of violence or sexual abuse. we can all make a difference in the lives of children and youth at risk. there is no excuse for looking the other way (norwegian ministry of children, equality and social inclusion, 2014). according to this document, countering violence and child sexual abuse is norway’s most important contribution to fulfilling the country’s commitment to the uncrc (ibid, p. 9). nevertheless, there appears to be a discrepancy between the alleged strengthening of the school’s role in preventing violence and sexual abuse when this is compared to my empirical material on teaching practice in norwegian upper secondary schools (discussed later). the cultural taboo on child sexual abuse the concept of cultural taboos is essential to understanding the findings in my empirical data. this section is in part based on my translation of søftestad’s discussion of cultural taboos (søftestad, 2008, pp. 49-52). the taboo is here defined as a cultural phenomenon that entails a social prohibition on making visible or telling others about child sexual abuse (leira, 1990). the culture maintains its taboos with contempt as a sanction and this contempt can lead to shame, stigmatization, and isolation. most people will seek to avoid these social reactions, and therefore subordinate themselves to comply with the norm of making sure that the invisible remains unseen. according to mossige (2000), the cultural taboo regarding child sexual abuse can work in two ways: firstly, it prevents adults from engaging in sexual actions with children; secondly, it works as an obstacle for talking about the sexual abuse that has taken place for the offender, the offended, and others who know or might know about the misconduct. steine et al. (2016) conducted a survey of 508 victims who had experienced sexual abuse as children. the anecdotal evidence reflects some of the emotional obstacles victims of sexual violence face: afraid of consequences/punishment, afraid of not being believed, afraid of ruining the family, afraid of doing harm to the perpetrator and the rest of the family, the feeling it was my fault, i had done something wrong, afraid that others would get mad at me, shame, afraid that everybody else would know what i had done, afraid of being rejected, afraid that everybody else would know how disgusting i was, and that they would think i was disgusting (steine et al., 2016, [the author’s translation]). this quote pinpoints how fear and shame work as obstacles to telling someone about their experiences. it takes on average 17.2 years before victims of child sexual abuse tell anyone (ibid). human rights education review – volume 2(1) 32 international research on preventive teaching there is international recognition for the potential of preventive teaching to enable children to recognize and avoid potentially sexually abusive situations, as ‘developmentally, it makes sense to educate young people in appropriate and inappropriate sexual behaviour in a time when their sexual identities are forming’ (who, 2010, p. 46). a review on child maltreatment prevention from mainly englishspeaking countries found mixed results on the effectiveness of child sexual abuse (csa) programmes in schools (mikton & butchart, 2009, p. 354). through these programmes, children learn about body ownership, the difference between good and bad touch, and how to recognize abusive situations, say no, and disclose abuse to a trusted adult. these programs have a positive effect on strengthening knowledge and protective behaviours against sexual violence. however, it is uncertain whether such programmes decrease child abuse. a review of 24 school-based education programs for the prevention of child sexual abuse (walsh, zwi, woolfenden & shlonsky, 2015) also indicates that preventive teaching is effective. these studies included 5,802 participants in both primary and upper secondary schools in the united states, canada, china, germany, spain, taiwan, and turkey. the educational programs included the ‘teaching of safety rules, body ownership, private parts of the body, distinguishing types of touches, and who to tell’ (ibid, p. 3). children who receive preventive education are more likely to report past or on-going abuses, and it is likely that such education increases the child’s capability to protect himself or herself from abuse (ibid). merging quantitative and qualitative research methods i collected the data for this study through a phone survey with 64 social science teachers in norwegian upper secondary schools from february – october 2018. the 34 female and 30 male respondents were currently teaching, or had previously taught, the mandatory social science subject in upper secondary school in the previous two years. this subject is the only social science subject taken by all upper secondary school students in norway, regardless of their study program. my interview technique was to use a structured survey with fixed response alternatives, but simultaneously invite the participants to share their thoughts during the phone interview, merging elements from both quantitative and qualitative methods. this resonates with a branch of mixed methods research called ‘merged method’, embodying in one single method the advantages of both approaches or methods (gobo, 2015). one of the objectives of this study was to quantitatively measure which sensitive topics are being taught and, at the same time, gain insight into the teachers’ experiences from everyday life in the classroom. in most cases, i asked follow-up questions that were not part of the structured survey, because i wanted to know more about why the informants answered the way they did. i took detailed notes on a physical copy of the survey, while also ‘ticking the boxes’ on the predetermined likert scale, which will be explained below. the answers to the fixed response alternatives were later transferred to the computer programme stata for analysis, and the qualitative information was gathered in a notebook. alvesson and sköldberg (2009) call for ‘reflexive research’, referring to awareness of how one produces knowledge. my previous job as a phone-interviewer for statistics norway influences how i view statistical knowledge production. at statistics norway, we only registered informants’ answers to the fixed response alternatives, although people often wanted to explain why they replied the way they b. goldschmidt-gjerløw 33 did. in my own study, i wanted to include teachers’ reflections on why they responded the way they did, because it provides a richer understanding of how they perceive their practice. this article’s analysis is based on descriptive statistics and qualitative information i obtained through my phone interviews with the teachers. in addition, i have conducted a brief content analysis of the most frequently used social science textbook. survey design this survey was designed based on my experience as a social science teacher in 3 different norwegian upper secondary schools over the last six years. it consists of: 1) personal information: age, gender, education, work experience. 2) perceptions of:  their education’s relevance for teaching about gender, sexuality and sexual violence  their eligibility to teach about these issues  the importance of addressing gender, sexuality and sexual violence in the classroom  the difficulty of teaching about these issues in different classrooms to measure their perceptions, i applied a version of the likert scale. for example, in asking ‘to what extent has your educational background been relevant to teaching about sexual violence’, the fixed alternatives range from 0 – to no extent, 1 – to a little extent, 2to some extent, 3 – to a relatively high extent, and 4 – to a high extent. 3) 14 questions about to what extent certain topics related to sexual violence are covered through their teaching:  rape: statistics and penalties for committing rape  laws protecting against sexual harassment and abuse  the #metoo movement  sexual harassment: gender differences in sexual harassment, sexual harassment as a challenge for gender equality  asymmetrical relations of power in sexual harassment and abuse  non-consensual sharing of sexual imagery  child sexual abuse i calculated the mean average of what all of the respondents answered to each of these 14 questions. each topic has a score between 0-4 – see table 1. 4) questions about what kind of work methods teachers use to address sexual violence, including to what extent they use: human rights education review – volume 2(1) 34  clips from tv-series, movies or news audio-visual tools  reading the social science textbook  reading news articles  writing  group work  class discussion 5) questions about to what extent social science textbooks cover topics related to gender, sexuality and sexual violence. 6) questions about to what extent the national curriculum covers the issues in question. 7) questions about cooperation among the social science teachers and focus on sexual violence from the school management. the ‘dark room’ investigation and media coverage of child sexual abuse recently, the norwegian police launched an investigation named ‘dark room’, in which 84 persons have been charged with rape, human trafficking, and presenting and sharing sexualized pictures and abusive material online, involving babies and children worldwide (www.nrk.no, 2019). this is the most extensive investigation related to online child sexual abuse in norwegian history, and the trials have been closely covered in the media. in 2019, a man was sentenced to 16 years in prison for having sexually abused over 190 babies and children under the age of 16. this man had contacted a mother in the philippines, paying her to make her three-year-old daughter sexually abuse her three-month-old baby brother (rognstrand, 2019). this case illustrates how child sexual abuse has moved to digital realms – transcending time and space as it can be video-recorded and spread worldwide, no longer being confined to the physical presence of victim and perpetrator. although there is much focus on child sexual abuse in the media, the cultural taboo in personal relations seems to prevent teachers from addressing this topic thoroughly. søftestad (2008, p. 51) writes that media often portray scandalous cases of this kind of abuse, which might give the impression that child sexual abuse is no longer a general cultural taboo. however, she points out that the cultural taboo still prevails in the everyday work of uncovering such abuse by schools, kindergartens, and child protection services. this coincides with the findings in this survey that portray the prevalence of taboos on this issue in norwegian classrooms today. factors influencing teachers’ practice regarding sexual violence this model pinpoints factors influencing teachers’ practice regarding sexual violence; it is based on my empirical material. the analytical focus has evolved around three aspects: namely, teachers’ perceptions of how sexual violence is addressed in 1) the most widely used textbooks, 2) the national curriculum for social science and 3) the media. the concept of cultural taboos is relevant for understanding how child sexual abuse is partly silenced in social science textbooks and the national curriculum. b. goldschmidt-gjerløw 35 figure 1: structural and relational factors influencing teaching practice in the classroom. (the stars indicate the analytical foci of this article. the model is based on empirical data collected by the author, 2018. it is inspired by uri bronfenbrenner [1979]). human rights education review – volume 2(1) 36 from teaching about #metoo to child sexual abuse table 1 portrays the mean averages of responses regarding the extent to which social science teachers say they cover these topics through their teaching. it includes a percentage overview, so that nuances may be seen: table 1: perceived teaching methods when addressing sexual abuse according to table 1, the #metoo movement was the most discussed topic regarding sensitive issues during the school year 2017/2018, whereas the two least addressed topics were rape among young peers and child sexual abuse. there appears to be more focus on the penalties for rape rather than on the legal framework that protects citizens from sexual harassment and abuse, and we see a greater b. goldschmidt-gjerløw 37 emphasis on punishment than on the rights every human being possesses. there is room for improvement in how norwegian social science education can raise young students’ awareness of the legal framework protecting children and adolescents from sexual violence. this resonates with the report from the committee on the rights of the child, which states there is a need for more familiarity with the uncrc in norwegian educational institutions (crc, 2017, p. 5). in the words of osler (2016, p. 119), ‘people need to know they have rights in order to claim them’. forty-two percent of the informants said that they do not, or to a small degree, cover the topic of child sexual abuse through their teaching. in this study, i have identified several obstacles to why teachers are willing to address child sexual abuse. some are hesitant because it might be time-consuming to hear the children’s stories of abuse and from there take necessary measures. this is linked to at least two factors: the workload teachers face, and the sheer amount of competence aims in the current curriculum. the mandatory social science curriculum consists of 35 competence aims with only three 45-minute teaching lessons per week (norwegian directorate for education and training, 2013). such organisation makes many teachers feel stressed for lack of time, disabling them from contributing to in-depth learning for their students, which is not an ideal situation. there is one competence aim in this curriculum that clearly states: ‘analyse the extent of various forms of crime and abuse and discuss how such actions can be prevented, and how the rule of law works’ (norwegian directorate for education and training, 2013). however, 73 percent of the informants stated that the national curriculum in social science does not, or to a small extent, cover sexual abuse. this might be because of the different interpretations of the norwegian word for ‘abuse’ [overgrep] – this term can also be used for physical or psychological abuse that is not sexual. however, it is most commonly used in referring to sexual abuse (www.overgep.no, 2017). this lack of clarity provides room for individual interpretation, which contributes to making this topic invisible to many teachers. the objective here is not to blame teachers, but rather to critically examine the curriculum. beyond the ‘lack of time’ phenomenon and the ambiguity of the curriculum, 66 percent of the informants said that their educational background has had no or little relevance for teaching about sexual violence. there is reason to believe that there is room for improving how teacher education programmes can open up for classroom dialogue about sexual violence and, in particular, child sexual abuse. moreover, there are several emotional obstacles to putting child sexual abuse on the agenda. some teachers are anxious about re-traumatising children who might have experienced unwanted sexual acts by talking about it in the classroom. most teachers are concerned about not causing the students any harm, and some feel that teaching about child sexual abuse could potentially do this. my interpretation of this is that most teachers care for their young students, but that their care is misunderstood if this issue is not addressed: such silence does no-one any favours. addressing child sexual abuse is a way of taking the child seriously, recognizing that, for some children, childhood can have dark sides. some teachers surveyed spoke of the risks for potential stigmatization, if, for example, one of the students exits the classroom in tears during the lesson. this shows a concern for how fellow students would react if they knew, and also a concern for how the potential student would feel if s/he knew that others possibly knew that there had been an abusive situation. this is linked to the cultural taboo: what if human rights education review – volume 2(1) 38 someone found out about something that no one was supposed to know? i would argue that the silence needs to be broken if we wish to counter the perpetuation of sexual abuse. teachers have the opportunity to do this, and an ethical responsibility to do something about the fact that it takes an average of 17.2 years for victims to disclose that they have suffered child sexual abuse. according to table 1, rape committed by young peers is, on average, the second most silenced topic in the classroom. this relative silence is problematic for a variety of reasons. when examining the surveys on the prevalence of unwanted sexual acts experienced by children and adolescents in norway, we see that those who most frequently sexually abuse girls under the age of 14 are not adult men, which is the stereotypical image, but rather adolescent boys between 15 and 19 (mossige and stefansen, 2016). in mossige and stefansen’s study (2016), the respondents who had at least one experience with unwanted touching, rape or attempted rape, also answered a question regarding their relationship to the offender. two-thirds of the unwanted sexual acts were committed by a friend, boyfriend/girlfriend or acquaintance (ibid). according to skilbrei and stefansen (2018, p. 59), knowledge about which relations that are most ‘dangerous’ is important for preventing sexual violence when talking to adolescents. the mandatory social science subject is offered in the first year for those in general studies and the second year for those in vocational studies, meaning that most students taking the course are between 16 and 17. this is a crucial age for discussing these issues. preventive teaching can not only make adolescents aware of potentially abusive situations, but it can also increase their knowledge about their inherent rights and sense of self-worth. in addition, young people who sexually offend could also become more aware of the implications and consequences of their actions. one of the challenges teachers face when addressing rape among peers is victim-blaming. this concept refers to how victims of sexual violence are perceived as having taken part in what happened to them and having shown poor judgement by being at the wrong place at the wrong time (skilbrei & stefansen, 2018, p. 12). one informant, whose pseudonym is maya, told me that one of the comments she hears in the classroom is ‘it’s not really rape – the girls want it’. when this occurs, she tries to relate it to a beloved member of the family: ‘what would you say if someone raped your mother or your sister?’ she says that this is useful in making young students think about what they are actually saying and is a way of triggering their sympathy. making sexual violence invisible in social science textbooks most of the informants surveyed use the textbook fokus (aschehough, 2013), whose nearly 300 sides have only half a page devoted to sexual violence. this includes some information about an increase in reported sexual crime, and three sentences about how many victims of sexual abuse often know the offender. there is no mention of the asymmetrical relations of power that often prevail between victim and offender, nothing about the shame that might make victims reluctant to press charges, nothing about how the uncrc explicitly protects children from sexual exploitation and abuse, and, perhaps what is worst, nothing about the importance of telling someone after experiencing unwanted sexual acts. seventy-four percent of the informants believe that the social science textbook does not include or to a small degree include the topic of sexual violence. to counter the insufficiency of the textbooks, many informants find alternative tools for addressing sensitive topics. table 2 portrays b. goldschmidt-gjerløw 39 which kind of teaching methods the teachers use if addressing sexual violence in the classroom: teaching methods mean average 0 (no degree) – 4 (high degree) no degree little degree some degree relatively high degree high degree class discussion 2,64 8% 9% 23% 30% 30% news articles 2,07 8% 23% 37% 16% 16% group work 1,73 23,5% 19% 28% 20% 9,5% video-clips, movies or other audiovisual tools 1,62 22% 25% 33% 9% 11% writing 1,26 25% 37% 27% 8% 3% reading the textbook 1,12 28% 39% 26,5% 4,5% 2% table 2: perceptions of teaching methods based on data collected by the author in 2018. in this study, the most common teaching method for addressing sexual violence is class discussion. several teachers reported how they use news articles as a point of departure for class discussion and/or group work. several of the informants said that they use different kinds of literary fiction and/or documentaries as a strategy of varying the teaching methods and countering the insufficiency of textbooks. two of the series and video-clips they mention are the popular norwegian tv-series skam [shame] (https://tv.nrk.no, 2016) and the video-clip “the uk explained sexual consent in the most british way possible” (www.youtube.com, 2016). this latter production uses the metaphor of drinking tea – we would not pour tea down someone’s throat if they had said they didn’t want a cup. countering the insufficiency of textbooks by cultivating the learner’s narrative imagination it can be challenging as a teacher to know where to start when planning a class on child sexual abuse. discussing different approaches with colleagues and designing a lesson together can be useful. when dealing with highly sensitive issues in general, i believe that it is important to prepare the students some days in advance. in this case, this would entail informing them that the next lesson will be about child sexual abuse, and telling them how you will be working with the topic. i recommend that teachers explicitly highlight how this topic is related to the uncrc every child has the right to be protected from sexual exploitation and abuse, the right to comprehensive human rights education review – volume 2(1) 40 sexuality education including child sexual abuse and the right to be heard in matters that affect their lives. it is essential to mention to students that if anyone has questions or any comments, they are more than welcome to approach the teacher privately beforehand. in this section, i would like to make some recommendations on how to go about the actual teaching. in addition to tv-series or video-clips such as those mentioned above, it can be useful to turn to literary fiction, to short stories or animated picture books. inspired by the indian poet and educator tagore, nussbaum writes about the importance of cultivating young people’s narrative imagination, which can be defined as: the ability to think what it might be like to be in the shoes of a person different from oneself, to be an intelligent reader of that person’s story, and to understand the emotions and wishes and desires that someone so placed might have. as tagore wrote, ‘we may become powerful by knowledge, but we attain fullness by sympathy… but we find that this education of sympathy is not only systematically ignored, but it is severely repressed’ (tagore 1961, p. 219 in nussbaum 2006, p. 391). from my perspective, enhancing both knowledge and sympathy is probably the most powerful combination when addressing different kinds of oppression. nussbaum goes on to say that ‘the narrative imagination is cultivated, above all, through literature and the arts’ (ibid). the idea is that through our imagination we can gain insight into the experience of another person that is difficult to attain in daily life (nussbaum 2014, p. 391). raundalen and schultz (2016) suggest the use of literary fiction for opening up a dialogue about child sexual abuse in the classroom. the great advantage of this approach is that young students learn through a story and characters that are not them, but with whom some might identify. it creates a common platform for discussing the content, which can form the basis of a democratic dialogue between teacher and pupils about social taboos, feelings of shame and guilt, asymmetrical power relations, the power of trust, and adults’ responsibility to protect children and adolescents from harm. in their book, they include literary fiction on preventive teaching through the story ‘mom’s secret’ (raundalen & schultz 2016, pp. 75120). the protagonist of the story is 16-year-old kaja, who discovers that her mother had been sexually abused by her own father as a child, and that her best friend kathrine has also been abused by her step-father. it might be thought that this story upholds stereotypical images of who sexual offenders are; both kaja’s mother and kathrine were abused by older adult men, which is not necessarily always the case. however, it creates a common platform for discussion. the picture book blekkspruten [the octopus] (dahle & nyhus, 2016) tells the story of a young girl who is sexually abused by her teenage brother. here the stereotypical image of an adult male offender is challenged because it recognizes that there are also some children who abuse other children sexually. in mossige and stefansen’s study (2016), approximately 10 percent of unwanted sexual acts were committed by a family member. in both of these fictional works we meet a girl who is abused by an older boy or man. in the classroom, it would be important to pinpoint that sexual abuse is not b. goldschmidt-gjerløw 41 just something that happens to girls it also happens to boys and, in some cases, the perpetrator of violence could be of the same gender. moreover, it is increasingly important to talk about the fact that abuse can also occur online. literary fiction can be used to explain the term ‘asymmetrical relations of power’ and students need to be provided with knowledge about how asymmetrical relations of power and shame are part of the cultural taboo that maintains the silence. discussion of this issue can be based on søftestad’s more extensive overview of what often characterizes the relationship between offender and offended (søftestad 2008, pp. 49-55). asymmetrical relations of power can be understood as relations in which one party has a greater ability to get his or her needs covered than the other party, given differences in age, physical strength, and so on. by not taking into consideration the other person’s emotions and wishes, a subject-object relationship is established. treating a person as a subject instead of an object requires respecting the person’s own will, emotions and wishes. it could be a useful exercise for the students to identify the asymmetrical relations of power that are at play in the piece of literature. the shame many victims feel is also an element that should be brought up in class. i recommend pinpointing that victims of sexual violence are never to blame for the crime committed, although some might feel that way. students should also know that it takes on average 17.2 years before a victim tells anyone about his or her experiences, because shame is a powerful obstacle to disclosure (steine et al., 2016). perhaps the most important aspect to include in this kind of teaching is the importance of telling someone if you are the victim of sexual abuse this enables young learners’ action skills. telling a trusted person about such experiences requires acknowledging and respecting one’s own human worth and dignity, as well as upholding one’s right to freedom from sexual abuse. it might be that becoming aware of one’s right to freedom from violence and sexual abuse can contribute to restoring a sense of worth. through breaking the silence, a victim of sexual injustice can embark on a process of healing, transforming himor herself from a victim to a survivor. concluding remarks sexual injustice cannot be silenced in educational institutions if we are to foster healthy, respectful, and democratic citizens who protect not only their own human worth and human rights, but also those of others. however, there are factors maintaining the cultural taboo on child sexual abuse in the classroom: inadequate preparation in teacher education programmes; insufficient information in textbooks; and the ambiguous national social science curriculum. moreover, some teachers are concerned about doing harm to students when addressing child sexual abuse. it would appear that these factors combine to silence this topic in the classroom. i argue that today’s teaching practice on child sexual abuse does not fully comply with the children’s right to education, the right to be heard in matters that affect their lives, and the right to freedom from sexual exploitation and abuse. as pinpointed by the norwegian government, there is no excuse for looking in a different direction, because despite these obstacles, teachers have both the agency and the opportunities to counter the perpetuation of child sexual abuse. i recommend working closely with other social science teachers, as well as in interdisciplinary teams, when designing classes on child sexual abuse. working together can overcome the cultural taboo. including literary fiction to cultivate young learners’ narrative imagination is a powerful teaching method in combination with human rights education review – volume 2(1) 42 key knowledge about the uncrc, asymmetrical relations of power, how the cultural taboo works to maintain victims’ silence and the importance of telling someone about the crime committed. i conclude with an inspirational quote: ‘equipping learners with skills implies equipping them with action skills through which they can take the next step to shape and realize a more just society’ (osler, 2016, p. 119). acknowledgement i am deeply grateful for the contribution of each teacher who took the time to take part in this study. this article is written in great gratitude and solidarity with all of you. this article is my contribution to making the factors influencing teaching practice on child sexual abuse more widely understood. i would also like to express my sincere gratitude to the anonymous reviewers and the team at human rights education review. b. goldschmidt-gjerløw 43 references alvesson, m., & sköldberg, k. 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(2007). kunnskap gir mot til å se og trygghet til å handle [knowledge gives the courage to see and the security to act]. report 3/2007. oslo: norwegian centre for violence and traumatic stress studies. retrieved 04.04.2019 from: https://www.nkvts.no/content/uploads/2015/08/kunnskapmottryggheth andle.pdf øverlien, c. & moen, l.h. (2016). «takk for at du spør!» en oppfølgingsstudie om kunnskap om vold og seksuelle overgrep mot barn blant blivende barnevernspedagoger, grunnskolelærere og førskolelærere [«thank you for asking!» a follow up-study on knowledge about violence and child sexual abuse among future child protection workers, elementary school teachers and preschool teachers]. report 3/2016. oslo: norwegian centre for violence and traumatic stress studies. retrieved 04.04.2019 from: https://www.nkvts.no/content/uploads/2016/02/rapport_nkvts_3_2016 _nett.pdf https://doi.org/10.1002/14651858.cd004380.pub3 https://www.who.int/whr/2002/en/whr02_en.pdf?ua=1 https://www.who.int/reproductivehealth/topics/violence/clinical-response-csa/en/ https://www.who.int/reproductivehealth/topics/violence/clinical-response-csa/en/ https://www.nkvts.no/content/uploads/2015/08/kunnskapmottrygghethandle.pdf https://www.nkvts.no/content/uploads/2015/08/kunnskapmottrygghethandle.pdf https://www.nkvts.no/content/uploads/2016/02/rapport_nkvts_3_2016_nett.pdf https://www.nkvts.no/content/uploads/2016/02/rapport_nkvts_3_2016_nett.pdf children’s rights and teachers’ responsibilities: reproducing or transforming the cultural taboo on child sexual abuse? introduction child sexual abuse in norway norway’s implementation of the uncrc in educational institutions the cultural taboo on child sexual abuse international research on preventive teaching merging quantitative and qualitative research methods survey design the ‘dark room’ investigation and media coverage of child sexual abuse factors influencing teachers’ practice regarding sexual violence making sexual violence invisible in social science textbooks countering the insufficiency of textbooks by cultivating the learner’s narrative imagination concluding remarks acknowledgement volume 4, no 1 (2021) date received: 08-09-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3991 date accepted: 02-12-2020 issn 2535-5406 examining relationships and sex education through a child rights lens: an intersectional approach francesca zanatta university of east london, uk. abstract: inspired by audrey osler’s call for the development of novel approaches to intersectionality in human rights education praxis, this article presents an undergraduate module on children’s rights, examining processes of teaching and learning about rights through the topic of relationships and sex education (rse). the module, designed for future educators, intersects elements of children’s rights education with the theoretical positions of queer studies and critical pedagogy. drawing on data from two focus groups, consisting of students following the programme, the author analyses students’ views and attitudes to rse, using foucault’s overarching concept of problematisation and the concept of sites of struggle. data analysis reveals tensions and potential clashes between the students’ professional selves, their personal values, and elements of the theoretical framework adopted in the course. these tensions are nevertheless constructive, highlighting the potential of children’s rights education to contribute to transformative human development. keywords: relationships and sex education, children’s rights education, critical pedagogy, queer theory, teacher education, intersectional learning francesca zanatta: f.zanatta@uel.ac.uk mailto:f.zanatta@uel.ac.uk human rights education review – vol 4(1) 50 examining relationships and sex education through a child rights lens: an intersectional approach doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3991 issn 2535-5406 francesca zanatta f.zanatta@uel.ac.uk university of east london, uk. abstract: inspired by audrey osler’s call for the development of novel approaches to intersectionality in human rights education praxis, this article presents an undergraduate module on children’s rights, examining processes of teaching and learning about rights through the topic of relationships and sex education (rse). the module, designed for future educators, intersects elements of children’s rights education with the theoretical positions of queer studies and critical pedagogy. drawing on data from two focus groups, consisting of students following the programme, the author analyses students’ views and attitudes to rse, using foucault’s overarching concept of problematisation and the concept of sites of struggle. data analysis reveals tensions and potential clashes between the students’ professional selves, their personal values, and elements of the theoretical framework adopted in the course. these tensions are nevertheless constructive, highlighting the potential of children’s rights education to contribute to transformative human development. keywords: relationships and sex education, children’s rights education, critical pedagogy, queer theory, teacher education, intersectional learning introduction at in april 2019, the department for education, responsible for early years to secondary education services in england, published a set of guidelines outlining new policy requirements for the content and delivery of relationships and sex education (rse). the publication highlighted the two most notable changes being applied to the prior requirements for the delivery of ‘sex and relationships education’ (sre): the shift in the name, and the extension of compulsory relationship education to primary schools. the announcement was received with very mixed responses from parents, the wider community and educators (allen-kinross, 2019; johnston, 2019), confirming the historical status of rse as one of the most controversial school subjects, one that has been a great concern to teachers (wolley, 2011). the subject has aroused great controversy in both the policy-making and public spheres, and this has limited opportunities for constructive conversations and knowledge exchanges between policy makers, educators, parents and children (alldred & david, 2007). the results of the 2019 consultation conducted by the national education union (neu) and the national society for the prevention of cruelty to children (nspcc) showed that half of the teachers participating shared a lack of confidence in their readiness to deliver the new compulsory subject. the consultation also reported on the top priorities identified by educators to ensure a confident delivery f. zanatta 51 of rse. training and clear guidance for teachers and information for parents emerged as the most important (nspcc neu, 2019). research has evidenced that placing the sole responsibility for the development and incorporation of rse on individuals in schools, without specific requirements or guidance for implementation, leads to disparities in quality and access (nelson, odberg & emmelin, 2019). the inconsistencies are, however, influenced by many other factors, beyond policy and guidance. above all, rse has an evolving and dynamic nature, one shaped by socio-historical and cultural factors and this is also outlined in a 2016 policy brief, published by the european expert group on sexuality education (2016) in the journal ‘sex education’. as such, the curriculum and delivery of rse tends to be shaped by the moral panics and political agendas of the time (ezer, jones, fisher & power, 2019). social, cultural and moral discourses impact directly not only the content, delivery and implementation, but also educators’ attitudes and beliefs. children’s rights education is a pedagogical approach that promotes a shift in discourses of childhood. it recognises children as active agents in society (wyness, 2015), and centres rights at the heart of work and interactions with children (tibbitts, 2017). mindful of the role that discourses of childhood play in shaping pedagogies and strategies for rse in educators and practitioners (jones, 2014; robinson, 2012), cre is here proposed as a unique opportunity for exploring attitudes and beliefs on rse with future educators (tibbitts, 2017). this article explores the experiences of undergraduate students engaged in a children’s rights module, delivered as part of a ba in early childhood & education. the module adopts cre as a framework to unpack attitudes and beliefs towards rse, through the intersection of cre, queer theory (bersani, 1995; edelman, 2004) and critical pedagogy (hooks, 1994; kincheloe, 2008). the study considers how engagement with children’s rights education might support students in approaching the subject of rse through rights-respecting and anti-oppressive practice. specifically, it analyses the sites of struggle impacting the disposition of students, as future educators, to navigate and negotiate knowledge, power dynamics and identities. through engagement with existing literature and materials, we contextualise the status of rse, and provide a brief overview of research on educators’ perspectives and experiences of rse. we then introduce the context of the investigation; the children’s rights undergraduate module within an early childhood and education programme. this module uses children’s rights as a framework for the exploration of rse. the data, collected through two focus groups, will then be presented through a process of problematisation (foucault, 1988), a tool for critical analysis of the experiences and reflections of undergraduate students. the findings will outline some of the sites of struggle experienced by students as future educators, and the role of children’s rights education (cre) in creating opportunities to engage with rse through agency-rights (liebel, 2012). human rights education review – vol 4(1) 52 relationships and sex education through politics at the heart of most public discourses on rse is a perennial binary preoccupation on whether it should or should not be included as compulsory teaching in educational curriculums. in england, rse sits outside of the national curriculum; this means its knowledge is not tested, nor is its content regulated. its status as ‘non-subject’ remains unvaried, even in the new policy guidance (department for education, 2019a). the political nature of rse is enshrined in its very nature as a non-neutral subject and in its topics: sex, sexuality, identity, social identities, relations, dynamics, power and consent (epstein & johnson, 1998). these components are social constructs (foucault; 1988) within a specific context, the dynamic set of circumstances and factors in which a discourse develops and exists. it is within this political context that rse is faced with binaries linked to morality and ideology (roodsaz, 2018). undeniably, the focus of rse is susceptible to its close links to political discourses of power (zimmerman, 2015). literature has identified historical discourses of morality that gravitate around purity, social hygiene, and (hetero)normativity (epstein & johnson, 1998; selman, 2003). analysis of policies has also identified political agendas on matters such as individual responsibility (associated with neoliberal politics), nationalism and preservation of social structures and hierarchies of power (ball, 2013). the two most prominent examples of these tendencies in england are the introduction of section 28 (19882003) and the subsequent publication of the equality act (2010). the ideology of section 28, the infamous policy which set the prohibition on promoting homosexuality by teaching or by publishing material in schools, is arguably still present and embedded within the educational policies of the early 2000s. the rising conservatism in the political context has since shaped the british educational system (jones, 2014) on three levels. firstly, conservativism has led to a rising datafication of education (bradbury & roberts-holmes, 2017) and the prioritising of performance-driven systems (jarke & breiter, 2019). these shifts have limited the knowledge formation of educators and their capacity for teaching outside the realm of educational performance, such as rse. secondly, conservative policies have brought about changes in the formation of educators, promoting an emphasis on practice over theoretical formation (jones, 2014) and the de-professionalisation of practitioners and educators (osgood, 2010). lastly, through an action of ‘muscular liberalism’ (latour, 2012), the role of teachers has shifted towards that of promoters and guardians of national identity and britishness. relationships and sex education through education political and social attitudes and rse guidance have been identified as key factors in promoting a proactive teacher engagement with rse (vega, glynn & van pelt, 2012). for example, educators reported positive experiences in utilising the equality act 2010 as a legal framework to support their work towards inclusive education (carlile, 2019). however, the controversial nature and low status of rse have led to a gap in the provision of in-depth guidance and support. as a result, teaching rse can be an ‘emotionally charged’ (p. 11) and complex experience for educators (van leent & ryan, 2015). in a study comparing practices of development and deployment of rse in the netherlands and in england, lewis and knijn (2002) argue that the ‘adversarial nature’ (p. 126) of attitudes towards rse in england has historically led f. zanatta 53 to mixed approaches in its delivery, both in terms of content and quality. teachers’ curricular choices are impacted not solely by personal beliefs and views, but also by anxiety and fear of repercussions in terms of job security (dickson, parshall, & brindis, 2019) and their positioning and role within the wider community (darroch, landry & singh, 2000). conversely, wilder (2018) explores how strong school leadership with a confident knowledge of rse can be a core tool for the enhancement of teaching and learning practices. wilder’s findings (2018) corroborate suggestions (alldred & david, 2007) that educators need to feel comfortable enough to teach rse. this is consistent with other international studies which have identified the beliefs and attitudes of rse educators as crucial factors in its delivery (astuti, sugiyatno & aminah, 2017; depalma & francis, 2014; iyer & aggleton, 2013; martin,riazi, firoozi, & nasiri, 2020). in alignment with wilder’s suggestions (2018), research shows that educators’ knowledge and attitudes towards the topics presented through rse seldom appear to be shaped by research and evidence; they are rather based on personal experiences, societal views and beliefs, and access to support and guidance (carlile, 2019; da silva, guerra & sperling 2013; depalma & francis, 2014). decades of research have focused on developing new and radical projects to deliver rse in schools (renold & mcgeeney, 2017). yet, gaps remain, both in practice and policy. the new english policy (department for education, 2019b) leaves many gaps in relation to the support and guidance provided to educators and schools alike. poignantly, the policy makes no mention of changes in the training of prospective educators, and the responsibility to develop meaningful and effective educational pathways for school staff remains with individual school leaders and educators. this issue has already been highlighted by atkinson (2002), in relation to the previous policy. at present, not even sweden, the first country to make rse compulsory, has clear requirements for the inclusion of rse training in initial teacher education. the lack of clear and formal requirements for rse in teacher training is reflected in the anxiety and sense of not being prepared shared by many teachers, as studies over the years have revealed (depalma & francis, 2014; wilder, 2018). the call for specific and dedicated educator training seems to be a central issue, although it is important to remember ullman’s (2017) admonishments that this would only constitute an initial intervention and would not suffice in fully changing the overall discourses and experiences of teachers and students. the argument presented in this article is that children’s rights education could play a fundamental role in the formation of discourses of childhood(s) for educators, and therefore in their approaches to teaching and learning rse. the context of study: relationships and sex education through a children’s rights module the module, here discussed as the setting for the investigation, is a children’s rights module in an undergraduate programme in early childhood & education (zanatta, forthcoming). whilst i have led the design and delivery of this module for five academic years, this project was limited to the experiences of one specific term of a year of teaching. this is because, during the term studied, the focus of the module was specifically on the analysis of rse through a children’s rights lens, in response to the release of the new rse policy in england (department for education, 2019a). the pedagogical approach i adopt in this module is grounded in the disciplines of critical psychology (burman, 2008), the sociology of childhood (mayall, human rights education review – vol 4(1) 54 2006), and critical pedagogy (hooks, 1994). this pedagogical model is discussed in depth in other publications (zanatta & long, 2021; zanatta, forthcoming). the aim of the pedagogy is to encourage students to apply children’s rights frameworks and theories on contemporary issues that impact children’s agency in education and in the wider society (james & prout, 1997). during the module, students are encouraged to practice ‘staying with the trouble’ (haraway, 2016) to explore, unpack and reflect upon their own beliefs and practices, recognising and working within the dilemmas emerging from their personal, professional and scholarly engagement with children’s rights. in the term studied in this research, the module focused on the application of children’s rights theories and frameworks to the responses and challenges posed by the changes to the rse curriculum and delivery in england, as evidenced by the mixed reception to the new 2019 policy (allen-kinross, 2019; johnston, 2019). in this context, the module incorporated elements of queer theory and critical pedagogy. aspects of queer theory (bersani, 1995; edelman, 2004) were specifically introduced in the unpacking and questioning of traditional constructs of ‘childhood’, as presented in developmental psychology. the rationale for using queer theory is that it promotes a further layer of analysis of concepts of normativity. this opens the possibility for dialogue and for the reimagining of not only the roles of the individual, but also of the social (martino & cumming-potvin; 2016). this in turn develops the possibility for intersectionality in rights education praxis (osler, 2016). the teaching and learning is also informed by principles of critical pedagogy, specifically the centrality of dialogue and the continuous requirement for reflective analysis of the self and its engagement with others and the content of teaching and learning (mclaren, 2003). the rationale for the engagement with critical pedagogy is to extend the destabilisation of structural, cultural and power norms, a process promoted by queer theory (kincheloe, 2008). invited to step outside the circle of conformity and neutrality, students are encouraged to reflect critically both on their own experiences (hooks, 2004) and on behaviours, attitudes and beliefs acquired and transmitted through prior studies, practices and experiences (steinberg, 2012). methods the research is situated in the context of the teaching and learning in the children’s rights module that was briefly introduced in the previous section. students were approached during the module, after ethical clearance had been obtained from the university. to maintain students’ anonymity, no personal characteristics will be disclosed. the data collection started after the completion of the term in which the students engaged with the topics explored in the study, once they had received grades for their assessments. the methodological approach employed is informed by narrative inquiry, which enables a ‘retrospective meaning making’ (chase, 2005, p. 656) in which narratives are incorporated with thoughts and interpretation. students’ narratives were collected from two focus groups, of three and five participants respectively. the number of participants and opportunities for collaborative discussions were limited by the global covid-19 pandemic, which suddenly interrupted face-to-face teaching during the second term of the academic year. the first focus group was person-to-person, whilst the second was online. each focus group was recorded and transcribed for analysis. to promote the focus on narrative data, the groups were conducted as dialogues in which students were invited to present their learning journeys. there was a specific focus on reflecting on elements of the experience they recognised as challenging in approaching rse from f. zanatta 55 a children’s rights perspective. data was then analysed and interpreted alongside reflective notes i collated during my teaching in the module (in this term), mindful of my role as participant in the discursive site of struggle (britzman, 2012) of the interactions and stories shared by students. i adopted framework analysis to organise and code the data. in this context, the conceptual framework is intended as the analysis of ‘a network, or ‘a plane’, of interlinked concepts that together provide a comprehensive understanding of a phenomenon or phenomena’ (jabareen, 2009, p. 51). a conceptual framework of problematisation enables the exploration of how and why certain things become a ‘problem’ (foucault, 1988). in discussing the process of problematisation, through the analysis of the technologies of the self, foucault (1988) refers to relations as a core element of his thinking. the technologies of the self are then summarised as a matter of relations between knowledge, power, and the self. this framework is suitable, as it develops in relation to the study of ‘the rules, duties, and prohibitions of sexuality’ (foucault, 1988). informed by the work of britzman (2012), problematisation is used as a tool for the recognition of curriculum-based research as a complex site, where narratives and experiences mix with discourse analysis and theory. specifically, problematisation offers the opportunity to acknowledge what foucault (1988) classifies as the four categories of technology, interconnected structures, and realities that enable the production and modification of the human experience. for the purpose of this investigation, i will focus the analysis on the application of three of the four technologies: technologies of knowledge, understood here as the elements shaping meaning-making; technologies of power, the regimes of practice and power framing the issue in context; and, finally, technologies of the self, within which students navigate their roles as learners, professionals and activists and i negotiate those of educator, researcher and activist. it is in this multiplicity of roles that i find the space and opportunity to reflect on my teaching practices and my positionality as researcher. in these roles, i frequently question whether the liminal space, from where i act, leans towards antioppressive commitment or towards a more explicit political agenda. experimentation and dialogue with students helped to develop an environment where i did not fear lack of neutrality and where students seemed to become more vocal in expressing their thinking. for example, one day i decided to wear to class a t-shirt with the slogan ‘support trans kids’, a political statement in current times of growing transphobia in the uk (lewis, 2019, ferber, 2020). i noted in my reflections an unusual sense of fear, an anxiety that i was imposing my views on students. of course, supporting trans children is a political act, but one that is grounded in antioppressive practice and human rights. my role as teacher, researcher and activist in the project adds a welcome complexity to the study. findings: problematising the learning experiences technologies of knowledge knowledge constitutes a crucial element of the children’s rights approach (covell & howe, 1999). in line with the teachings of critical pedagogy, with the view to coconstruct knowledge, students’ existing expertise is incorporated and unpacked as part of the learning journey. at the beginning of the module, students were invited to contribute to our shared wall of knowledge, a visual representation focused on the concepts framing and informing their existing understanding of ontologies and experiences of childhood(s). throughout their learning journeys, we frequently human rights education review – vol 4(1) 56 returned to this wall to review and unpack concepts through a children’s rights perspective. whilst most students were familiar and knowledgeable about core topics such as the united nations convention of the rights of the child, childhood as social construct and children’s agency, the application of such concepts in practice developed as the first site of struggle. this was discussed by two participants: i started with the focus on the innocent child, now i think about the knowing child and what this means in different contexts. but what does this mean when i work with a child? i think i am ok with child rights but what this means in schools and in the teaching? empirical rights-framed research was also often discussed by students as a reliable tool to unpack complex thinking and apply it to practice. hearing the voices of children through the findings of the empirical studies seemed to have an impact on students’ perspectives: i can see i used to think that childhood is innocence but from reading the research of robinson and davies i have found out that children are not that naïve and started thinking ‘ok then, what else they know?’ alongside empirical research, the use of real testimonies and examples of children exercising rights was also impactful, perhaps as offering the possibility to experience ‘childhood’ differently (long, 2019). another sticky point, as noted by a participant, was identified in questioning the association of childhood with innocence, an insight that came through engaging with elements of queer theory (edelman, 2004): the stickiest point of everything is children’s innocence. that’s where i keep going back to. the concept of children’s innocence is widely recognised and discussed in children’s rights literature, which identifies innocence as problematic and limiting. this topic offers therefore a great opportunity to intersect queer theory with children’s rights education. robinson (2012) applies foucault’s thinking to reframe the reliance on innocence as a form of policing and governing of the child. robinson (2012) and burman (2008) identify in developmental psychology a core root for the hegemony of innocence in an ontology of childhood, a point i have discussed in other papers (zanatta, 2018; zanatta & long, 2021). attempting to unpack innocence through the questioning of psychological theories is complex, however, and generally leads to confusion. as discussed elsewhere (zanatta & long, 2021), students have been heavily exposed to developmental psychology, in both their previous studies and their practice with children. a participant discussed the challenges encountered in reviewing developmental psychology through a critical lens: the critique of psychological theories when that is a lot of my thinking of childhood. that’s confusing – you see? what about what i learned? i was thinking of how we always see children as children, and we want to protect f. zanatta 57 them by saying ‘you are innocent, and i am the adult and i will protect you’. what’s wrong with that? underpinned by developmental psychology, students’ interpretations and understanding of development, mostly in relation to the capacities of children, largely confirmed their views on innocence. we should allow children to be children, children are open minded, they only learn discrimination through parents and teachers, etcetera. but also they should only be taught when the child is ready. a helpful tool for the re-conceptualisation of development through a children’s rights framework in cre has been offered by peleg (2019), who has argued for and theorised the adoption of a capability approach in establishing development as a right. here, development is seen as access to freedom, rather than as a futureoriented deficit account of skills. still, in students’ experiences, concepts such as competence and freedom lead to another site of struggle, in the meeting with traditional thinking about childhood: children are not mature enough and might cause dispute in families if the children are taught things like this, i think it is important that they are ready and at right time. in this site of struggle, critical pedagogy offers a helpful tool, through the destabilisation and the critique of colonial thinking in western-centric practices and theories (kincheloe, 2008). just like encountering children’s voices through empirical studies, the analysis of racialised agendas in meaning-making of innocence and the consideration of development through other cultural practices and beliefs opens the possibility for dialogue and reconsideration of innocence. texts such as montgomery’s (2008) anthropological exploration of childhood and bernstein’s (2011) historical account of racialised uses of innocence support a further layer of questioning of established theories. learning about innocence has always confirmed the importance to keep children safe, but also to check why we are doing this. i never knew that innocence was used by racists for that. the new sociology of childhood has helped me understand the critique of innocence, i had not thought about the use of race in innocence. we should allow children to be children, children are open minded, so that is different from innocent you see? they only learn discrimination through parents and teachers. the complex and personal nature of rse (wolley, 2001) enabled students’ discussions to include matters closer to their personal experiences and the realities of rse. this seemed to open these new possibilities for dialogue and questioning, as also suggested by hooks (1994, p. 148): ‘a simple practice like including personal experience may be more constructively challenging than simply changing the human rights education review – vol 4(1) 58 curriculum’. through dialogue, these openings enabled students to think about the possible applications of a children’s rights perspective in practice. where i was a kid there was no discussion of this kinds of situation, the needs were mostly about how you are gonna live together as a family, so more about the social thing. now they are separating the emotional needs and the sexual needs. you can make it for the children so that they can understand the situation where they are. another important opening came with the acknowledgment of the absence of knowledge in adults and with a growing comfort in exploring the trouble experienced because of this gap (haraway, 2016). in reflecting about their learning journey, most students recognised that ‘not knowing’ was crucially shaping their thinking. wellbeing has to be understood in the wider sense, it is not just a physical matter. you have all of this you know, not just about being a child and innocent. i knew nothing about rse before and having that knowledge is going to help me in my profession, so that i can provide them with that understanding and knowledge. through gaining that i can move it forward and pass it on. we learned that knowledge is everything. we need the foundation so we know that this is possible, and it can be done, this is there for the children we are going to be caring for. the questioning of prior knowledge, particularly adult-centric theories and practices, is the major site of struggle when we engage with children’s rights frameworks that may be regarded as unpopular novelties (woodhead, 1999). in the next part of the exploration of data, the perceived unpopularity of children’s rights is brought to the discussion. technologies of power the idea of how power shapes regimes of practice and dynamics featured at times in students’ discussions, mostly through notions acquired through another module, on social policy, which had introduced them to a political framing of practice. in the classroom and in the conversations, mentioning politics would often lead to animated discussions. significantly, this might have influenced the fact that students reflected on matters of politics in the focus groups, as represented in this exchange: s1: one thing, the political approach can be a challenge. so one approach says that the government should only focus on the health services and welfare of children. another says they are supposed to tell what children should learn and be specific and say this and this and this. but this is what i think make things harder for the practitioner, they are the ones working with the children and some policies do not take that into account. like for example the fundamental british values. there is need to differentiate according to the area, and think respectfully about the culture. f. zanatta 59 s2: yes, but if it’s coming down one line and someone says ‘you have to do it this way’ then at least you have it and that’s it. when you give it out to people, then teachers can choose i don’t want to teach this. but everyone has to stick with it. if we say that there is not one standard, then the practitioners could all have so many different ideas and who knows who is right. s1: i liked the process of consultation that took place in scotland for the change in policy. that’s what children’s rights is, no? again, the needs of each area are different, to have one policy for all is difficult. i think you know that in certain areas teachers face challenges to teach rse. in some other areas parents are just fine, so how does policy address that? even the students’ behaviour creates a problem and that it upsets the whole system. so yes you need a policy from the government, but also a policy at local level, maybe the local authority or the school? and everyone should be included. problems with (a lack of) governance discussed in the exchange above reflect the level of confusion and unclear leadership/allocation of responsibility discussed by wilder (2018). policy, as an element of compliance, is discussed as a possibility for quieting or exacerbating controversies on rse. interestingly, students appeared inclined to incorporate elements of a children’s rights framework in ensuring that policies and practices are developed through a democratic and community-based approach, one also called for in the no outsider programme (depalma & atkinson, 2009). one of the respondents referred to children’s rights in relation to the processes of consultation conducted in the example of the time for inclusive education (tie) campaign and consultation in scotland. although this was not discussed in the focus groups, the different political approaches taken in other parts of the uk were often mentioned as opportunities for comparison and assessment of specific policy making and political agendas. discourses of power, control, and compliance also emerged in discussions questioning whether in practice children are considered as incompetent, subordinate, or equal. it is interesting to note how the role of adults as educators is questioned in relation to matters of respect, voice (robinson, 2005) and participation (lundy, 2007, siderac, 2016): s1: are children ever trusted and believed? adults might think ‘i am the grown up, i know what is best for you’. this is at the bottom of the relationship between the child and the adult. s2: it is not empowering or helpful for children to be told let me think this for you let me do this for you, it is important they understand. s1: i think for me it is a matter of understanding it. most of teachers don’t know what it is, parents think that teachers want to change their children but that is not what rights do. it is all about knowledge and understanding and respect. issues of normativity and compliance at a wider societal level were also mentioned, particularly in relation to lgbtiq+ experiences and whether these should be human rights education review – vol 4(1) 60 explored with children. there was a shared understanding of the dynamic nature of matters discussed in rse. by the time one finishes with this it will be natural. now it’s not there, but once we acquire the knowledge, then it becomes natural. hopefully in few years’ time this will not just be something we are learning, but something we are fully implementing and carrying on. respondents discussed the role of technology in terms of both access and opportunities to subvert adult control and requests for compliance, but also in terms of a channel where children would come across realities different from those of their local community. we should be flexible to turn our values to ways you can make it more flexible for the children. technology has changed all, and children can view and access things they should not be seeing. you start with one approach and it becomes a habit and you cannot see the opportunities for change in yourself and in your practice, technology might be helpful to teachers too. examining the political and adopting elements of children’s rights frameworks opens here for the possibility of education beyond compliance (gilbert, 2014). it seems that the recognition of rse as dynamically informed by new socially constructed experiences and tools, such as technology, supports the learning journey and makes it an opportunity for discovery and change. technologies of the self this last category of the problematisation process analyses extracts in which participants introduced reflections on their own value systems and the ways in which they navigate these. in class, the learning journey focused on the analysis of standards set for practitioners, and how to navigate ethical dilemmas stemming from points of struggle between the personal and the professional. this constituted a core element of the assignment for the course, in which students were invited to formulate how the children’s rights framework would assist them in acting as advocates for children in engaging with rse. as a result of this process, students approached the discussions in the focus groups with a similar attitude, positioning themselves as advocates and educators: if i am a practitioner my responsibilities are with those children, i have to think about their future, when they go out in the street, in the world. we are educated, we have to be there for them and give them that knowledge our parents didn’t give us. similarly, respondents shared reflections on their experiences of being minoritised or excluded due to race and/or ethnicity. it is hard to distinguish whether these responses are informed by a need to comply with the teachings of the module, by an acknowledgment of the temporal nature of social discourses, or by the engagement with anti-oppressive practice. interestingly, in both the examples below, the respondents make indirect references to countering the ‘silence’ (depalma & f. zanatta 61 atkinson, 2009; robinson, 2005), both in educators and pupils. it could be argued that this is an indicator of engagement with anti-oppressive practices. s1: personally, i think the views i hold from my cultural background…the children i am working with, in terms of children’s rights i am there to provide an enabling environment. that is the main aim of any setting. i need to be there to support this. at first i was like ‘what is the point of teaching this in a school?’, but then after seeing some cases in the school i thought ‘ok, we need to take steps’. s2: the way i see this is: i have things i believe in, sure, but the minute i am in a position that i am responsible for people and children i need to push mine aside. especially if i believe that, you know, society is changing, and we must move with the time. we cannot bury our heads. it is important to note how in this exchange both students suggest pushing personal views to the side as a strategy to engage in their work with children. this attitude could, however, lead to complacent practices, such as following the need to conform to normativity (depalma & atkinson, 2009), or responding to bullying and other incidents by turning a blind eye (vega et al., 2014). conversely, the recognition of the importance of dialogue and relational respect leads to a more empowering argument, in which both educators and pupils are actively engaged and participative: as long as it’s for the good of the children. i don’t see why (he) students could be against learning and expanding their knowledge on anything really, we are here to be advocates, can i use the word ‘advocate’? that is our main theme for coming here, we are learning to support children in any way possible, and if it means learning about their rights, learning about what to do, fighting for their rights that’s what we have to do. from sites of struggle to opportunities for agency-rights people learn from each other, so i think talking with children also helps me learning. so i think children’s rights pedagogies help thinking about this. attitudes and beliefs of educators and practitioners play a central role in the shaping and delivery of rse (abbott, ellis & abbott, 2016; alldred & david 2007; van leent, 2017). universities, in this case education departments, have the unique opportunity and, arguably, a responsibility to support and develop the knowledge and confidence of prospective practitioners and teachers in approaching rse (renold & mcgeeney, 2017; ullman, 2017). the students’ narratives offer an insight into the elements of the educational journey that they discussed as a site of struggle in reflecting about the implementation of rse in an early childhood and education programme. through the framework of problematisation (foucault, 1988), students’ experiences are organised thematically under technologies of knowledge, of power and of self. previous educational experiences seem to act as a powerful factor in shaping students’ learning journeys. whilst students are familiar with the multifaceted human rights education review – vol 4(1) 62 nature of childhood(s) and with the various elements that they have to consider in their professional work, they also appear to hold a strong sense of loyalty to traditional theoretical formulations widely deployed as foundation knowledge in early childhood and education programmes. concepts of competence and innocence and the hierarchy of powers between adults and children, as discussed in developmental psychology, inform the core of students’ struggles in relation to knowledge. cre provides opportunities to question and unpack these teachings. the questioning of traditional theories of childhood also positions cre to challenge traditional power dynamics, in which children are presented as a function of their relations with adults (burman, 2008). cre also offers the opportunity for critical reflections on how classic theories, such as attachment theory (zanatta, 2017), have been incorporated in everyday language and experiences without ever being challenged (woodhead, 1999). the intersection of cre with elements of queer theory and critical pedagogy offers the opportunity for ‘reimagining of how people engage with forms of being-becoming-belonging otherwise’ (coll & charlton; 2018, p. 308), for radical deconstructionism, and for the rupture of the conventional status quo. engaging with children’s voices and experiences reconfigures the meaning of competences and skills through a rights-informed perspective. approaching diverse cultural practices, and unveiling political agendas of othering, supports students through a journey of questioning the solidity of the obstacles produced by their prior knowledge. the analysis of compliance and performance through a political lens constitutes a second site of struggle for students. the recognition of education as a relational experience, in which acknowledgement and acceptance of not-knowing constitute a site of learning and the opportunity to question powers of a political nature, also opens new possibilities in reframing students’ thinking. the democratic and participatory nature of cre supports experiences of empowerment, in opposition to compliance and performance. this gives students the possibility to challenge social discourses and experiences, fracturing hierarchies of power within and beyond their work with children. i attempted to support this, and admittedly often failed, through the practice of engaged pedagogy, being mindful of the call to ‘acknowledge that the education most of us had received and were giving was not and is never politically neutral’ (hooks, 1994, p.30). as such, learning about rse and climate change (the other contemporary issue impacting children’s rights, and discussed in the second term of the module) was a political act. a third site of struggle is found in reflections around ethical dilemmas experienced by students in relation to their personal beliefs and value systems. cre, underpinned by elements of engaged pedagogy (hooks, 1994), creates space for students to view personal experiences through a different frame, a rights-informed one. when i consider my teaching over the years, many students have used the module as an opportunity to reflect on the status of children’s rights both in their childhood experiences and in their realities as parents. reflecting on personal experiences of infringement of rights provides the opportunity to recognise how important it is to be informed of these very rights if one is to be empowered. this resonates with lundy and martínez sainz’ (2018) postulation that knowledge of rights diminishes the opportunities for their infringement. the analysis of findings suggests that the adoption of a rights-based framework allows for the reconsideration of attitudes and views and for a shift towards participation and active citizenry. f. zanatta 63 concluding reflections this paper provides further evidence to substantiate calls for the development of a multiplicity of interventions to address the gap in training, resources and support provided to teachers and practitioners in training (and in service) (carlile, 2019; van leent & ryan, 2015). the findings highlight three core sites of struggle for prospective educators to engage with in their thinking and positioning towards rse, and how cre intersected with elements of queer theory and critical pedagogy can support students in navigating these problematic areas. through this process, students can engage with concepts of equity, respect, diversity and solidarity with and for children, and acquire critical tools to analyse the role of children in rse (siderac, 2016). in this learning journey, students are challenged to reframe normative and discriminatory understanding of children, and to acknowledge the possibility that adults ‘might not know’ and that co-production of knowledge is a powerful tool in navigating conflict and tackling difficulties. students’ responses highlighted three core sites of struggle: the questioning of pre-existing knowledge; engaging with the ‘political’; and navigating ethical dilemmas. the discussion of openings enabled by cre, intersected in the module with elements of queer theory and critical pedagogy, emphasise the opportunities that cre holds in shaping attitudes and dispositions in future educators and their work with children. specifically, cre emerges as an educational opportunity for students to reconsider the learning and application of dogmatic theories and practices. to conclude, i argue that the inclusion of intersectional cre, underpinned by elements of queer theory and critical pedagogy, in the formation of future educators/practitioners offers a unique opportunity for students to question and revisit sites of struggle in their engagement and open new attitudes towards rse in its form as agency-right. acknowledgments i would like to thank and acknowledge students for their contributions, with the hope that the next paper will be written together, as a collective. i am indebted to the reviewers and the editors for their thorough and supportive work, it has been a pleasure working with you. many thanks to dr elsie whittington and fiona byrne for feedback and support. a special mention to dr catherine atkinson, dr leanne colle, dr ruari santiago and dr elsie whittington for all they taught me 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(2011). controversial issues: identifying the concerns and priorities of student teachers. policy futures in education, 9(2), 280-291. https://doi.org/10.2304%2fpfie.2011.9.2.280 woodhead, m. (1999). reconstructing developmental psychology: some first steps. children & society, (1), 3–19. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1099-0860.1999.tb00097.x wyness, m. (2015). childhood. cambridge: polity press. zanatta, f. (2017). beyond the dyad. an ethnographic journey revisiting attachment theory with african-caribbean families in london. unpublished thesis, university college london. zanatta, f. (2018). are we really doomed? critical pathways for advancing children's rights through theory and practice-in g. martinez sainz & s., ilie (eds.), international perspectives on practice and research into children's rights. mexico: centre for human rights studies. zanatta, f., & long, s. (2021). rights to the front. rights based education in early childhood degrees. journal of early childhood education research, 10(1) (manuscript accepted). zanatta, f. (forthcoming) a right(s) way. teaching and learning children’s rights in heis through knowledge deconstruction and sustainable activism. zimmerman, j. (2015). too hot to handle: a global history of sex education. princeton: princeton university press. https://doi.org/10.1080/10665684.2012.671095 https://doi.org/10.1177%2f0017896917737343 https://doi.org/10.2304%2fpfie.2011.9.2.280 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1099-0860.1999.tb00097.x issn: 2535-5406 vol 5, no 1 (2021) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4536 date of publication 04-01-2022 © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org book and media reviews nordic reflections on child rights and childhood: realising sustainability? ødegaard, e.e and borgen, j.s. (eds). (2021). childhood cultures in transformation: 30 years of the un convention on the rights of the child in action towards sustainability. leiden, the netherlands: koninklijke, brill nv. reviewed by muireann ranta institute of technology carlow, ireland, muireann.ranta@itcarlow.ie the book examines childhood cultures and children’s rights in action towards sustainability. it begins by critically addressing the debate on ‘ideals espoused’ in the united nations convention on the rights of the child (crc) in the context of the shocking reality of the everyday suffering of millions of children caused by ‘political calculation’. this uncomfortable paradox continues to be examined through the introductory and second chapters, which argue for a reconceptualisation of the child that reflects cultural diversity and ‘an entirely new range of childhood experiences’ in the modern world (p. 2). this overarching theme is shared by all contributors; to understand children is to also understand the complex contexts in which they live. equally important is the necessity to position the child as both a ‘being’ and a ‘becoming’, in order to increase his/her agency and authentic enjoyment of rights. the collection mounts a considerable challenge to the idea that rights are universal solutions. it is rather through transformative transdisciplinary research that recognises the ambivalences in childhood cultures, underpinned by respect for children’s expertise regarding their own lives that would more effectively correlate with choices that are in their individual best interests. in chapter 3 von bunsdorff concentrates on the cultural rights of infants and suggests the convention and its emphasis on speech and language is ‘symptomatic of an adult centric view http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4536 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ hrer book and media reviews 163 of human beings’ and is ‘less fitting for children’ (pp. 38-39). instead, an ‘existential’ approach that ‘recognises the embodied, relational and affective dimensions of infant agency’ (p. 39) would better support the treatment of infants on equal terms with any other rights holder. vindhol evensen also highlights that to be understood is a human right and calls for a better understanding of symbolic communication in order to acknowledge all expressions as fully worthy. a communicative human ‘intentionally wants to pass on a message’ and it is time to overcome the ‘dichotomy of being abled or disabled’ (p. 58). tuppil oropilla focuses on how our youngest children’s views are addressed, in a systematic review of the literature of intergenerational interactions. while experiences of such interactions are captured from an adult perspective, there is a notable lack of focus on young children’s own experiences. furthermore, research on the topic has been in the fields of health/medical and geriatric studies rather than education and pedagogy, despite the ‘need to talk about repercussions of having intentional intergenerational interactions in pedagogical practices’ (p.1 09). i was left speechless after reading lysa’s chapter on the ‘frustration education’ approach to the perceived challenges made by children or ‘spoiled little emperors’ (p. 121) in contemporary and future chinese society. the author writes of the experience of taking a kindergarten class to an army base, leaving them alone in a room and telling them they would be staying there rather than returning home to their parents. such an approach is considered necessary and aligned with the children’s best interests, in helping them learn to cope with life’s hardships. china’s ‘single child policy’ has resulted in parents ‘drowning their children with love’ (p. 133) and fostering a type of individualism which in turn leaves a ‘risk society’ of future generations not having the tools to deal with pressure. chapter 7 is about kindergarten children’s food choices. describing three feeding styles as ‘authoritarian, authoritative and permissive behaviours’ (p. 139), the authors argue that the approach that is taken, alongside both the availability and accessibility of food, offers perspectives on how children’s freedom to choose their own food is respected under article 12 in the crc. the importance of understanding local context is also stressed by klitgaard povlsen et al. who critically examine the complexities of research on children’s use of media, research that has traditionally focused on ‘didactical concerns’ (p. 162). in relation to the various interpretations of the term ‘in the best interest’, borgen et al. explore how the category of ‘children at risk’ is problematic in public health policy. children’s active agency under article 12 is in contention with ‘risk reduction’ policies that can inadvertently lead to ‘risk production’ by creating ‘new problems, such as standardisation, variation and exclusion’ (p. 178). the significance of context is raised again in that ‘risk, as it relates to society and children must be understood through context’ and provide a detailed analysis of the rhetorical use of concepts in linking political language to political action. hrer book and media reviews 164 for those looking to understand more about dismantling power relations in their research space, ylonen explores the concept of ‘aesthetic sublation’—a mode of meaning-making that seeks to degrade an object. the author presents ‘the philosophical potential that disgusting matters have’ (p. 200) to gain insight into another’s culture and makes us think about how we may adopt listening approaches that give greater respect to the rights of the child. grindheim writes about the necessity to ‘challenge the dichotomy between agency and structure’ (p. 210) and its bearing on the integration of participation under the crc. again, this chapter highlights that agency can be ‘recognised as more than the spoken word’ (p. 214) and is ‘an entanglement of constitutive human and nonhuman elements’ (p. 220). the author also emphasises the necessity to understand that there are multiple actors in a child’s life and that contradictions exist between ‘play and learning’, ‘humans and materials’, and ‘child initiated’ and ‘adult initiated’—contradictions which present challenges for a child’s authentic agency. pesch explores the intersectionalities of multilingual children’s lives. generational complexities, such as contrasting views of linguistic practice forms amongst the adults in a child’s life, can act against the best interests of multilingual children. this indicates a need for more research on multilingual children themselves and their own experiences. karlsson continues with the discussion of children’s participation being a multi-faceted phenomenon and introduces us to the finnish concept of osallisuus (in english, ‘involvement’). to really explore child perspectives and real-life experiences, the author argues for the significance of building a ‘reciprocal participatory culture’ where we are aware that ‘subjectivity, agency, community, participation and power help to create a realm of listening, encountering and sharing’ (p. 256). the final chapter from borgen and ødegaard succinctly concludes by highlighting the paradoxes in global education trends ‘wherein social rules and mandatory tasks are played out as a means of imparting lessons about freedom and independence’ (p. 274). citing the organisation for economic co-operation and development (oecd) 2030 project’s website (a global policy forum that promotes policies to improve the economic and social well-being of all humans), that calls for an education system where goals are ‘globally informed and locally contextualised’ (oecd, 2018), the authors present ‘a pedagogy of awareness’ which really seems to echo the overall message of this timely book: that educators must firstly connect with their own students and be aware of their experiences and views to create an ideology that more authentically addresses the rights of the child in action towards sustainability. i recommend this book to readers with a good knowledge of child rights who are looking for a contemporary analytical discussion on the best interest principle and the relevance of local context in its application. i particularly enjoyed the emphasis on how the culture of the local context must first be respected for a child to authentically enjoy his/her rights. sustainability hrer book and media reviews 165 as a concept is made up of several interconnected pillars; ecological, economic, political, social and cultural (pramling samuelsson & kaga, 2008). so too are child rights. the focus of this book takes that into account and addresses how we can work towards a fuller realisation of the rights of the child in action towards sustainability. references organisation for economic co-operation and development. (2018). oecd future of education and skills 2030. position paper. retrieved from https://www.oecd.org/education/2030-project/ pramling samuelsson, i. & kaga, y. (eds.) (2008).the contribution of early childhood education to sustainable society. paris: unesco. retrieved from https://www.gcedclearinghouse.org/sites/default/files/resources/%5beng%5d%20la %20contribuci%c3%b3n%20de%20la%20educaci%c3%b3n%20inicial%20para%20una %20sociedad%20sustentable.pdf https://www.oecd.org/education/2030-project/ https://www.gcedclearinghouse.org/sites/default/files/resources/%5beng%5d%20la%20contribuci%c3%b3n%20de%20la%20educaci%c3%b3n%20inicial%20para%20una%20sociedad%20sustentable.pdf https://www.gcedclearinghouse.org/sites/default/files/resources/%5beng%5d%20la%20contribuci%c3%b3n%20de%20la%20educaci%c3%b3n%20inicial%20para%20una%20sociedad%20sustentable.pdf https://www.gcedclearinghouse.org/sites/default/files/resources/%5beng%5d%20la%20contribuci%c3%b3n%20de%20la%20educaci%c3%b3n%20inicial%20para%20una%20sociedad%20sustentable.pdf nordic reflections on child rights and childhood: realising sustainability? references majority rights and minority responsibilities: young people’s negotiations with human rights issn: 2535-5406 vol 4, no 3 (2021) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4536 date of publication 29-10-2021 © 2021 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org book and media reviews important scholarship on the right to education and universality fredman, s., campbell, m., and taylor, h. (eds) (2016). human rights and equality: comparative perspectives on the right to education for minorities and disadvantaged groups. bristol (uk) and chicago, il (north america): policy press. 177pp., us$63.25 (hardcover) isbn: 978-1-44733763-8. also available as epub isbn: 978-1-4473-3765-2; mobi isbn: 9781-4473-3766-9; epdf isbn: 978-1-4473-3764-5. reviewed by daniel hedlund uppsala university, sweden, daniel.hedlund@jur.uu.se this edited book offers ten contributions concerned with the interesting and imperative issue of concretising human rights and equality in education. the contributions involve analyses of specific challenges in jurisdictions such as ireland, kenya, south africa, the united states (new york) and india, and include pedagogical explanations of the contexts of each case. the ten contributions are divided into four parts. part i is concerned with the role of public and private actors in education. part ii is about balancing the right to freedom of religion and culture and the right to education. part iii covers gender equality in education. part iv focuses on litigation for educational quality and equality. the book is accessible throughout and easy to read, while maintaining an emphasis on key challenges for theory and practice in each of the different chapters. as a result of this design the chapters’ conclusions have a wide relevance that goes beyond the cases that are discussed. indeed, the comparative dimension is one of the book’s strengths, as the ten delimited contributions connect to broader issues relevant to education and equality in both http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4536 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ hrer book and media reviews 116 the global south and the global north. it is aimed at readers committed to education and its role in sustainable development and the future of human rights. the key questions raised in part 1 relate to the state’s responsibility to guarantee the welfare of children and the quality of delivery when education is provided via private actors. the authors point out the state’s remaining accountability for rights violations in educational settings (conor o'mahony) and the need for effective state regulation vis-à-vis private actors’ operations (gilbert mitullah omware), but they also show how private initiatives can contribute to enhanced quality and the overcoming of legacies of oppression (melanie smuts). part ii develops some of these issues, as the interconnections between different and sometimes contrasting rights are highlighted. one example is how private actors might attempt to use minority rights deceptively in order to create leeway in relation to norms and standards guaranteed by law (jayna kothari). we also have the example of the complexity of language rights in law and practice when a minority language holds a relatively privileged position (michael bishop). part iii underscores the importance of gender equality for human rights in education by shifting to substantive equality rather than using quantitative measurements of access as the focus (sandra fredman), and we also read about the positive obligation under the convention on the elimination of discrimination against women (cedaw) for states to provide good-quality sex education for girls and women, even when conservative and religious norms are working against equality and girls’ human rights (meghan campbell). part iv brings forward the question of litigation as a procedural struggle for equality in education, by focusing on the relationship between quality and equality and illustrating how litigation can bring constitutional questions and uneven public investment in education into the light (helen taylor). this theme is also developed when discussing constitutional guarantees for quality and various stakeholders’ responsibilities in education, where court process can be an important route for furthering engagement (jason brickhill and yana van leeve). part iv ends with a concluding chapter in which the editors recap some of the contributors’ analytical findings. many of the topics brought up in this edited book could be seen as dealing with human rights challenges in different types of capitalist welfare states – of course with different formats and fiscal dimensions. marketisation is undermining equality, universality and thereby human rights within (welfare) states. the concept of the welfare state is, however, not expanded on in this book. such an approach is by no means mandatory (and the welfare state literature is certainly wide and diverse) but some analysis could have helped to bridge equality and human rights by further acknowledging the system that creates inequality and oppression, i.e., capitalism. seen from my own jurisdiction (sweden), i can identify points of connection between education and equality that, to some extent, relate to every chapter: for example, issues concerning ‘integration’, multilingualism and public responsibility for private schools. hrer book and media reviews 117 conversely, however, in the swedish context educational issues are primarily treated as welfare state matters (the delivery of public services) rather than human rights dilemmas. this is one example of how the book’s insights about human rights and equality could contribute to further scholarly discussion. moreover, with regard to teaching, master’s courses could benefit from using the whole book or a selection of chapters as points of departure for discussions. another possible audience could (or should) be policymakers and activists, not least because education is a key political and legal area for the realisation of human rights and equality. consequently, i hope that this book receives the positive attention and wide use that it so much deserves. volume 2, no 2 (2019) date received: 18-03-2019 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3295 date accepted: 21-08-2019 issn 2535-5406 human rights activism: factors which influence and motivate young adults in australia genevieve hall monash university, australia. abstract: human rights activists aim to create social and political change. this article analyses the factors which influence and motivate human rights activists in australia to want to be a part of this movement. human rights education is an important part of activism. the pedagogy about, through and for human rights education was used in this study to assess the processes that the activists engaged in prior to and through the experiences of their activism. the findings demonstrated that these human rights activists were motivated to be justice-oriented citizens by altruism, often through the influence of their families rather than their schooling. some participants also experienced political socialisation through their families when they were children, which enabled them to have knowledge and agency as human rights activists. the study also found that belonging to a non-governmental organisation was an important part of maintaining the motivation of human rights activists. keywords: human rights activism, human rights education, youth agency, citizenship education, non-governmental organisations, australia g. hall: genevieve.hall1@monash.edu http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3295 mailto:genevieve.hall1@monash.edu g. hall 27 human rights activism: factors which influence and motivate young adults in australia doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3295 issn 2535-5406 genevieve hall genevieve.hall1@monash.edu monash university, australia. abstract: human rights activists aim to create social and political change. this article analyses the factors which influence and motivate human rights activists in australia to want to be a part of this movement. human rights education is an important part of activism. the pedagogy about, through and for human rights education was used in this study to assess the processes that the activists engaged in prior to and through the experiences of their activism. the findings demonstrated that these human rights activists were motivated to be justice-oriented citizens by altruism, often through the influence of their families rather than their schooling. some participants also experienced political socialisation through their families when they were children, which enabled them to have knowledge and agency as human rights activists. the study also found that belonging to a non-governmental organisation was an important part of maintaining the motivation of human rights activists. keywords: human rights activism, human rights education, youth agency, citizenship education, non-governmental organisations, australia introduction human rights activists are individuals who advocate for the protection of their own rights, as well as for the rights of others. this is often done through joining together with other like-minded people as part of a movement to ‘make a difference’. this paper discusses findings from a larger study which analysed the factors which influence and motivate human rights activists in australia. it is important that research in this field in australia is conducted, since australia is a signatory to all the major international human rights documents. therefore, australia has an obligation under international law to protect and promote the rights set out in these treaties and conventions. activists in civil society play a key role in ensuring states such as australia adhere to these commitments, through publicising human rights abuses and undertaking human rights education in the community. it is a particularly pertinent time to be researching human rights activism, as questions are being raised about the commitment of countries to uphold and promote international human rights standards. a glance at any news source reveals that human rights abuses occur almost daily all over the world (human rights watch, 2017). hathaway (2002) argues that this is because human rights law ‘stands out as an area of international law in which countries have little incentive to police noncompliance … [as] human rights treaties impinge on core areas of national sovereignty’ (p. 1938). non-governmental groups (ngos) have therefore stepped into this space to play a crucial role in promoting international human rights instruments and publicising gross human rights violations. http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3295 human rights education review – volume 2(2) 28 human rights education is an important element of human rights activism. article 2(2) of the declaration on human rights education and training (2011) states that the pedagogy of human rights education should include: a) education about human rights, which includes providing knowledge and understanding of human rights norms and principles, the values that underpin them and the mechanisms for their protection b) education through human rights, which includes learning and teaching in a way that respects the rights of both educators and learners c) education for human rights, which includes empowering persons to enjoy and exercise their rights and to respect and uphold the rights of others therefore, formal classroom tuition in schools ‘about’ human rights is only one element of a human rights education pedagogy, which also includes learning ‘through’ and ‘for’. education ‘for’ human rights can occur outside of the formal school curriculum, such as through belonging to a human rights ngo. indeed, human rights activism is implied in the wording of the third clause of article 2(2), as it states that a pedagogy of human rights education should include ‘empowering persons’ to ‘respect and uphold the rights of others’. this paper begins with discussion of how human rights activism is an evolving field of research within the citizenship education literature. this is followed by reference to theoretical frames in broader philosophical and sociological literature, in order to analyse the factors which influence and motivate young adult human rights activists. the paper then examines the influences and motivations of six human rights activists aged between 20 and 26 who belong to two ngos: an international legal human rights organisation and a christian development organisation. human rights activists are active citizens; they engage with human rights issues locally, nationally and internationally by lobbying politicians, organising petitions and protests and undertaking awareness-raising education campaigns. human rights activists can therefore be categorised as justice-oriented citizens, as they address injustice through knowledge about social movements and seek to question and change the established political and social structures which cause problems. they can be compared with the personally responsible citizen, who undertakes individual acts of charity (westheimer & kahne, 2004). the extent to which the social, cultural and financial capital of young adults impacts on their capacity to be human rights activists is also considered in this paper, especially in light of cruikshank’s (1999) claim that active citizens ‘are not born; they are made’ (p. 3). human rights activists: influences and motivations according to morrell and o’connor (2002), being an activist involves: … a deep, structural shift in basic premises of thought, feelings, and actions... a shift of consciousness that dramatically and permanently alters our way of being in the world. such a shift involves our understanding of ourselves and our self-locations; our relationships with other humans… our understanding of relations of power in interlocking structures of class, race, and gender; … and our sense of possibilities for social justice and peace and personal joy. (p. xvii) g. hall 29 being an activist involves both an intrinsic desire to create change, as well as extrinsic factors which encourage and enable one to become an activist, such as connecting and communicating with other passionate and like-minded individuals about these issues. davies, evans and peterson (2014) describe how activists have multiple routes to engagement: some may be driven by altruistic tendencies, and/or a desire to develop specific skills and knowledge which may be used for future social and educational advancement. it is possible that a feeling of efficacy and ability to benefit from networks and individuals that make engagement a pleasant, and achievable reality(sic). (p. 6) atkeson and rapoport (2003) argue that activists often possess a strong, intrinsic helping intentionality, that can be fostered through role-modelling in families, which compels them to do the work that they do. altruism is defined as pro-social behaviour intended to help others and includes ‘intentions, goals, and predispositions to work towards the betterment of society such as the alleviation of poverty or suffering’ (saha, 2000, p. 10). social scientists have identified a strong relationship between young people’s sense that they are competent civic actors as individuals and their desire to participate in social activism groups such as ngos (westheimer & kahne, 2004). the agency of young people can be influenced by the extent to which they are politically socialised as children, and the degree to which they are enabled to feel they have the knowledge and capacity to create change (mcintosh & youniss, 2010). hyman (1959) argues that the political understanding of young people is mainly influenced by the modelling they experienced through their families. however, mcdevitt and chaffee (2002) argue that young people who have had civic experiences outside of the home, through school and community-based activities (such as ngo groups), are often able to challenge the political views of their parents, which in turn prompts parents to increase their own civic knowledge. human rights activists are also often highly educated, economically advantaged and drawn from the same privileged social class. tsutsui and wotipka (2004) state that populations with more resources are more likely to engage in movements such as human rights, because: … once basic human needs have been met, citizens can turn their attention to other needs. the human rights movement is often considered an example of such post-materialist movements… citizens who are better educated may possess the cultural capital needed to be aware of their rights, to recognise when those rights have not been met, and to possess the tools needed to articulate the demands and to organise for change. (p. 596-7) further evidence for this is provided in the 2016 international civic and citizenship education study (schulz, ainley, frallion, losito & agrusti, 2016) across 19 countries, which found that socio-economic status, measured by parental occupation and the number of books in the home, was positively associated with student civic knowledge. this study also found that parental and student interest were the strongest background predictors of expected civic engagement. social capital is developed human rights education review – volume 2(2) 30 through the informal education transmitted through family, political parties and cultural groups which enables individuals to have the attitudes and knowledge required to succeed in society (tsutsui & wotipka, 2004). social capital also involves features of social organisation such as networks and social trust that facilitate coordination and cooperation for mutual benefit (putnam, 1995). the findings of the 2016 international civic and citizenship education study also have implications for the conceptualisation of human rights activism as a form of active citizenship, if it is contingent on people’s socio-economic status and positive familial experiences. according to dejaeghere, josic & mccleary (2016): sociological and anthropological studies of education debate how youth agency can be constrained by structures of class, gender, and racial inequalities in society, and they acknowledge that social change is not easily achieved even though education may foster aspirations and individual agency. (p. 2) black (2017) also argues that low socio-economic status affects a range of attitudes and capacities for civic participation by young people, and that many such young people are promised the ability to contribute to social justice endeavours despite having little access to it in practice. another factor which influences young people to engage with human rights is a desire to belong to a group of like-minded others. yuval davis (2011) defines belonging as a physical and emotional experience that has political effects, or a feeling of being ‘at home’ (p. 10). according to yuval davis (2011), belonging has three elements: social and geographical locations, attachment to cultural and symbolic practices of social group, and the value systems that individuals and groups use to make judgments about their own and others’ belonging. youniss, bales, christmas‐best, diversi, mclaughlin and silbereisen (2002) suggest that the social bonds, affiliation and emotional support gained through belonging to a community with shared commitments (such as a human rights activist group) can sustain civic involvement despite intimidating challenges, frustrating experiences and a sense of hopelessness at ever being able to create effective change. kirshner’s (2007) research also found that ‘the collaborative, distributive nature of work in an activist group enables participants to accomplish goals they would be hard-pressed to accomplish on their own’ (p. 369). post-colonial theorists have problematised the seemingly benign and wellintentioned desire of privileged young people in the global north to ‘help others’ in the global south. the concept of the ‘humanitarian gaze’ questions the motivation of privileged western human rights activists ‘to think that he or she is there to help the rest of the world’ (kapoor, 2004, p. 630). the humanitarian gaze has been defined as contributing to ‘recurring geopolitical discourses of north–south relations that naturalize[s] political, economic and social inequality’ (mostafanezhad, 2014, p. 112). spivak (2004) argues against the social darwinism inherent in the human rights discourse, where ‘the fittest must shoulder the burden of righting the wrongs of the unfit’ (p. 524); she argues that those most directly affected should be the drivers of these programmes. however, article 12 of the united nations declaration on the right and responsibility of individuals, groups and organs of society to promote and protect universally recognised human rights and fundamental freedoms (1998) states g. hall 31 that ‘everyone has the right, individually and in association with others, to participate in peaceful activities against violations of human rights and fundamental freedoms’. therefore, it can be argued that all people have the right and responsibility to be human rights activists, not just victims of human rights abuses, and indeed many victims may find it too difficult to become engaged because of the trauma they have experienced (knuckey, satterthwaite & brown, 2018). methodology my study uses the interpretative lens of critical theory, which involves researchers acknowledging their own power, engaging in dialogues and using theory to interpret or illuminate social action (habermas, 1979). this perspective has been chosen because my study conceptualises human rights activists as justice-oriented social actors (westheimer & kahne, 2004), and critical theory is concerned with the ‘desire to comprehend … the underlying orders of social life those social and systemic relations that constitute society’ (morrow & brown, 1994, p. 211). the use of case studies is appropriate for this qualitative research, which is explanatory and strives to answer howand why-type questions about contemporary events (yin, 2009). a case study methodology involves the collection of exploratory and descriptive qualitative data from one or more cases within a bounded system (yin, 2009). the qualitative data collected in a case study involves perceiving what is happening in key episodes or testimonies, and then representing these events with direct interpretations and narratives which are, in turn, used to optimise understanding of particular cases (stake, 1995). the two particular cases were chosen because they each provided the opportunity for an interesting in-depth analysis and comparison of the factors which motivate and influence human rights activists. this purposeful sampling strategy allows for the representation of diverse cases on the topic and allowed me as the researcher to choose case studies that were illuminating (creswell, 2007). the interviews with three participants from each ngo were semi-structured, and the volunteer participants were interviewed individually for about 1 ½ hours. i chose to interview young adults who were very committed to this cause (they volunteered at least one day a week) in order to understand how their childhood and educational experiences impacted on their decision to be human rights activists. the interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed to enable a rich and dense thematic analysis. documentation from each organisation, specifically their mission statements, were also analysed as part of this research. the first case study is an international legal human rights ngo that campaigns to protect human rights as set out in the universal declaration of human rights (1948). the organisation does not accept financial contributions from governments, in order to maintain its independence. this allows it to take action to defend human rights when they are breached, both in australia and internationally. it campaigns for the rights of indigenous peoples, refugees and women. the activities organised by this ngo as part of their human rights activist work includes rallies, letters to news organisations, petitions to parliaments, direct lobbying of politicians, digital activism campaigns and awareness-raising education programmes about human rights issues. three participants (two male and one female) from this organisation volunteered to be interviewed after i approached the organisation and gained their permission to conduct the research. human rights education review – volume 2(2) 32 the second case study is a christian development ngo which advocates on behalf of people who live in extreme poverty. the organisation opposes proselytising and coercion of any kind and is therefore dependent on gaining the consent of the communities involved. the aim of the organisation is to work towards eliminating poverty and its causes, using the united nations 2030 sustainable development goals (2015) as a framework. according to the united nations high commissioner for human rights, ‘human rights principles and standards are now strongly reflected in… [the] ambitious new global development framework, the 2030 agenda for sustainable development’ (office of the high commissioner of human rights, 2015). a major focus of this organisation is a campaign to ban child labour, which involves consumer activism, lobbying politicians and awareness-raising education programmes. another important campaign supported by this organisation is lobbying the australian government to raise the foreign aid budget to fund programmes for those living in extreme poverty in developing countries. three female participants agreed to be interviewed as part of this analysis after i approached the organisation and asked for volunteers. pseudonyms are used to protect the identity of the participants and the organisations were de-identified. the participants were not observed as part of this study to see if their responses in the interviews correlated with their actions; this could form a second phase of this research to help triangulate the findings from the interviews (yin, 2009). case study 1: a legal human rights ngo three human rights activists were interviewed as part of the first case study: aryan, sophia and robert. aryan is 24 years old and is the volunteer leader of a local branch of this ngo. he is an indian citizen who has been studying for a community development degree as an international student in australia for the past three years. in his role as community organiser he recruits and supports the members of his local group through providing training, resources and support, planning future events and liaising between the local group and the branch office. aryan spends one day a week in this role and has been involved in the organisation for one year. in describing his motivation to be a human rights activist, aryan said: i was looking for some voluntary work to help with my résumé to build up some work experience which i thought would help me to find a job in the future. it is interesting that this participant admitted that part of his initial motivation for being a human rights activist with this group was to contribute to his résumé. this supports davies, evans and peterson’s (2014) findings that some activists ‘may be driven by … a desire to develop specific skills and knowledge which may be used for future social and educational advancement’ (p. 6). he further explained how his family and background had also influenced his interest in human rights: i’m from india and i’ve grown up seeing a lot of stuff that is not right. twenty years of seeing human rights violations every day, especially domestic violence. his views were influenced by other experiences in his family, as he explained: g. hall 33 my grandmother experienced human rights violations herself. her family had to flee bangladesh for india because of their religion, and many of them were left behind and disappeared. a lot of the people from her village also fled to india, and she really helped to look after them as they had nothing. this story is always told in my family. aryan’s comments are interesting because he situates his intrinsic desire to be a human rights activist within a narrative of witnessing and hearing about injustices in his family and community (atkeson & rapoport, 2003). sophia is 25 years old and is the volunteer leader of an inner suburban local group of this ngo. she is from an italian-australian family and is studying full time for a degree in international development at a university in melbourne. her unpaid role with this ngo involves similar tasks to those performed by aryan. sophia spends one day a week in this role and has been involved in this organisation for 18 months. sophia was asked about her motivation to be involved with this organisation. she said: when i was a child i was very sick for a long time, and when i got better i thought, right, i’m going to change the world! at first it wasn’t really human rights, i was more interested in charity work like helping orphans in africa. my family has always been interested in social issues, so i’ve always grown up with the idea of helping other people. my grandmother always tried to help people in other countries through donating money and goods, and i think that got me interested too. the narrative that sophia presents is one in which her personal experiences of illness and her family traditions of altruism influenced her decision to be a human rights activist (saha, 2000). she also situates her initial motivation within a helping intentionality paradigm where she in the global north ‘helps’ those in the global south (kapoor, 2004). robert is 26 years old and holds a voluntary leadership position with this ngo. robert is studying full time for a degree in human rights law. he spends about two days a week in this unpaid role, and has been involved in the organisation for a number of years. when asked about his motivation for being a human rights activist, robert said: my family had strong political views, so i had that influence from early on. i have this need to do something. i would be very bothered if i wasn’t involved in this cause in some way. robert’s comments provide support for hyman’s (1959) argument that the political understanding of young people is often influenced by the modelling they experience through their families. the human rights activists in this case study are all tertiary-educated. this supports tsutsui and wotipka’s (2004) argument that citizens who are better educated may be better equipped to organise for change. however, it is significant to note that despite their educated status, these participants did not mention that learning about human rights at school was a motivating factor in them becoming a human rights education review – volume 2(2) 34 human rights activist. rather, they stated that the formative influences provided by their families while they were growing up was the major influence (schulz et al, 2016). for educators, these findings raise questions about the lack of impact that education ‘about’ human rights at school had on the motivation of these human rights activists, and this is an area for further research. if confirmed by other studies, this finding is significant because schooling can play a crucial role in equitably enabling all young people to be involved in the protection of their own and other people’s human rights. i asked sophia about the impact that belonging to this human rights ngo had on her motivation to continue to be a human rights activist, despite the challenges involved in trying to improve human rights (youniss et al, 2002). interestingly, the three elements of yuval davis’ (2011) theory of belonging were evident in her answer. she said: i like being involved in the local community [social location]. it is not just being involved in the big international issues, it is having a connection with people who care about the same things [value systems] that you do who live close by [geographical location]. belonging is a huge part of the experience all the community organisers meet together once a year and last time we met we talked about how we had all been bitten by the [human rights] bug [cultural and symbolic practices]. i really like that idea that you are in, you are part of the team supporting each other, we are one big family [value systems, social location]. i know it is not by chance that i feel this way, the organisation has been set up that way so that people feel a strong sense of connection. aryan also described the significance to him of belonging to a group in maintaining his motivation. he said: you need the support of the group to do this work together as a team. this work can be pretty depressing otherwise. similarly, robert also talked about the importance of belonging to a group. he commented that: being involved in a community of people who think alike and who are trying to solve the same problems is an important part of the experience, and it definitely makes it more enjoyable. you need the support of other people, engage with other people who have different skills than you do, so you can all work together to achieve something you couldn’t do on your own. in terms of belonging, sophia also commented: through my involvement with this group i’ve really learned that the most important thing about being an activist is to engage with the community you are trying to help and ask them what they think would work to make things better. so we have aboriginal elders who advise us about the juvenile justice campaign, they run all the training and write the materials. you have to g. hall 35 consult with the local community about their needs, rather than saying ‘we know what’s best for you’. as an adult, sophia has developed a more sophisticated motivation for her human rights activism, compared with the ‘white saviour’ mentality she had as a child of wanting to ‘help orphans in africa’ (mostafanezhad, 2014). the mission statement of the organisation indicates that human rights activists should work in collaboration with those who are most directly affected by the issues (spivak, 2004). this approach lessens the ‘humanitarian gaze’ dynamic that human rights activists can develop (mostafanezhad, 2014). in this way, the participants in this case study could be described as justice-oriented citizens (westheimer & kahne, 2004), as they are seeking to improve society by critically analysing and addressing social issues and structural injustices rather than emphasising individual acts of charity. in conclusion, the participants in this case study were influenced by their families to become human rights activists and the social connections, education and infrastructure provided to the participants by the ngo enabled them to maintain their motivation. case study 2: a christian development ngo three human rights activists were interviewed as part of the second case study: anita, carol and rebecca. anita is 23 years old and has a leadership position with this ngo. she moved to australia from england as a child. she is studying for a degree in international relations, specifically focused on gender inequality and development. in her leadership role, anita organises a group of thirty other young adults, and has been in this position for two years. her role involves organising the campaigns, activities, training, resources, recruitment and administration of the group. in describing her motivation to be a human rights activist, anita said: since i was a child i have been involved in issues of poverty and injustice. when i was 11 years old my parents took us to south africa and we went to soweto, and this was my first experience of seeing poverty. that was the moment that i realised that the world wasn’t fair. so i thought, cool, i’ve got the power to do something about this, and that’s what i want to spend the rest of my life doing. these comments are instructive because they demonstrate that this participant has been influenced to become engaged in this work by the experiences her family have given her, which led to a ‘shift of consciousness that dramatically and permanently’ altered her way of being in the world (morrell & o’connor, 2002, p. xvii). through this experience of witnessing poverty in the global south, anita developed a mindset that although ‘the world isn’t fair’, she has the knowledge, capacity and agency to do something about it (mcintosh & youniss, 2010). however, mostafanezhad (2014) discusses how such ‘voluntourism’ experiences do not necessarily recognise the limits that one individual or group can have on the real amelioration of human rights abuses and poverty. in this way, it can be argued that such comments are not reflective of a justice-oriented citizen who wants to change the system that reproduces inequalities by working in collaboration with the communities affected, human rights education review – volume 2(2) 36 but are instead focused on individual acts of charity as a personally responsible citizen (westheimer & kahne, 2004). carol is 20 years old and is the leader of the school education team with this ngo. she moved to australia from china as a child, and lives with her parents. in addition to volunteering one day a week with this organisation, she is studying for a commerce degree. in her role with this organisation, carol provides support to school students who are involved in the ngo through a newsletter and training materials. carol was asked to reflect upon her motivations for being a human rights activist. she said: you have to be passionate about these issues. that’s what keeps you going at the end of the day. you have to have that special twinkle in your eye. i don’t think it can be taught, you either have it or you don’t. it is very much part of who i am. these comments support atkeson and rapoport’s (2003) argument that activists often possess a strong, intrinsic helping intentionality which compels them to do the work that they do. carol also reflected on the influence of her family: i’ve had some amazing people in my life who have really helped me. i know i am very lucky and that has given me a very strong sense of giving back. i think that has really nurtured my sense of giving. whatever i end up doing in my life i know it will be about serving other people in a meaningful way. my grandmother has always encouraged my sister and i to think about those who are less fortunate. she has this awesome saying: ‘you can’t do everything, but everyone can do something’. i think that really influenced me from a young age. in this way, carol’s formative experiences with her family nurtured her altruistic desire to help or ‘serve’ others (saha, 2000). rebecca is 20 years old. she is from an anglo-australian family and lives with her mother. she is studying an international business degree full-time at university. rebecca spends about one day a week in her voluntary role with this ngo as leader of a university group, which she has done for one year. in this role, she is involved in recruiting and maintaining group members and giving them roles, organising campaigns and planning events. in particular, rebecca has campaigned for the service providers within the university to purchase fair trade goods that do not use child labour in their production. rebecca was also asked about the influence that her family had on motivating her to be a human rights activist. she said: i’m an only child and my parents got divorced and then my mum was diagnosed with breast cancer, so my home life was crazy. i think i really threw myself into this group as a way of coping. in contrast to the first two participants who emphasised the importance of the altruism encouraged by their families, rebecca described how her motivation to g. hall 37 become a human rights activist stemmed from escaping a personal crisis she was experiencing and her desire to belong to a group of other like-minded people. when asked further about her family’s influence in sparking her interest in human rights, rebecca said: it’s a bit weird but they aren’t interested in this stuff at all. in fact, it is more that i have influenced them! they just see it as a distraction from studying. but i showed my mum, who normally isn’t interested in politics or issues, a video about the negative effect that australian foreign aid cuts are having on the poorest people in the world, and she said, ‘i finally get it now, i get what you do and why you do it’. it really hit home for her that when you round the foreign aid budget in australia to the nearest whole number it is zero. and that is really wrong. in terms of political socialisation, rebecca’s comments reflect mcdevitt and chaffee’s (2002) findings that young people who have had civic experiences outside of the home, through school and community-based activities, are often able to challenge the political views of their parents which in turn prompts parents to increase their own civic knowledge. all of the participants in this case study attended private, religious secondary schools, and were engaged in tertiary studies as young adults. carol also discussed whether her experiences at school influenced her to become a human rights activist: in year 9 i moved from a co-educational public school in the outer suburbs to an all-girls private inner-city school. i got the opportunity there to volunteer with an ngo advocacy group where i really learned about international issues such as human rights by listening to guest speakers, going to conferences and being involved in campaigning. these comments support the literature that human rights activists are often highly educated, economically advantaged and drawn from the same privileged social class (tsutsui & wotipka, 2004). rebecca was also asked about the influence that her schooling had on her becoming a human rights activist. she explained: i went to a private school for 13 years. one of the great things i was exposed to at school was the lunchtime social justice program they had, where we learned about human rights. we even got to go to canberra [the capital of australia] to lobby politicians about human rights issues. everyone wanted to be involved. it is significant to note that these participants reference the positive influence that voluntary extracurricular activities had on their motivation to be human rights activists. like the participants in the first case study, these participants did not identify that learning ‘about’ human rights in the formal school curriculum influenced them; it was rather the opportunities they gained through extracurricular activities which exposed them to human rights education (declaration on human rights education and training, 2011). the private, religious schooling provided to these participants by their families also allowed them to access experiences such as conferences and travel in order to lobby politicians, opportunities that may not be human rights education review – volume 2(2) 38 available to other interested students in australia because of the costs involved (black, 2017). this is an example of how ‘agency is embedded in social relations with deep inequalities’ (dejaeghere et al, 2016, p. 7). as this ngo is a christian organisation, it could be assumed that religion would have played a role in motivating these participants to become human rights activists, and a philosophy of helping others who are ‘less fortunate’ is apparent in the mission statement of the organisation. however, it is interesting that none of the participants identified themselves as currently having strong religious beliefs. when asked whether religion influenced her to become a human rights activist, anita said: i’m not religious at all now, although i was raised as a catholic and went to a catholic school. i wanted to be a human rights activist with this group because it was welcoming and friendly and the people were so passionate and had such great energy that i thought i want to be a part of what they are part of! similarly, when asked why she chose to be a human rights activist with this organisation, carol said: it wasn’t the religious thing. but i do like being a part of something that is bigger than myself. hmm, now i hear myself saying that, it does sound very religious, and i’m trying to work out if that bothers me or not? maybe belonging to this group is something that i need because i don’t have religion in my life? when asked about the role of religion in deciding to become a human rights activist, rebecca explained that: originally, i didn’t want to join this group at university because i saw it as too christian. but then i realised that there were lots of non-christians involved in it, so it was fine. i like that it is a values-based organisation, it’s about being ethical. we do start and end each meeting with a prayer but that doesn’t bother me. therefore, although none of the participants professed to being motivated by religion, it was evident that they had internalised the values of altruism which religion emphasises (saha, 2000). in addition, carol’s comments raise the possibility that belonging to this organisation as a human rights activist may have acted as a religion substitute for her, as it involves belonging to a group of like-minded people who have similar values and a common cause and who undertake shared rituals (yuval davis, 2011). anita spoke about how important the sense of belonging to a group was in order to maintain her motivation. she said: whenever i’m feeling overwhelmed, i just go to a meeting and instantly i feel inspired again. you could never do this work on your own, being in a group is essential. g. hall 39 carol expressed a similar sentiment when i asked her how important it was to her do this work as part of a group. she explained: i came for the cause, but i’m staying in it for the group. the benefits to me personally of belonging to this organisation have been huge. i’m a bit of an introverted person so i really feed off the energy of other people and need that to stay inspired and develop my confidence. rebecca emphasized the importance of the group to her as a way of coping with the difficulties of really alleviating extreme poverty: you just couldn’t do this stuff by yourself, it’s too depressing. it is really important to have other like-minded people around you who care about the same issues and you can feel like you are in it together, otherwise you would just give up as it is too hard. some of the issues we campaign about are pretty terrible, so it’s important to have a laugh together sometimes. these comments reflect kirshner’s (2007) research which found that ‘the collaborative, distributive nature of work in an activist group enables participants to accomplish goals they would be hard-pressed to accomplish on their own’ (p. 369). the participants clearly valued the support of having other like-minded people around them to help them stay motivated. understandably, such a committed group of similar people formed strong friendships as a result of belonging to this group. anita said: we’re a real community. the people in the group are some of my best friends. we all have a strong sense of compassion and we really look after each other. similarly, rebecca commented that: i’ve made some amazing friends, everyone is so friendly and welcoming. being part of a group is so motivating. these comments reflect youniss et al’s (2002) research which suggests that the social bonds, affiliation and emotional support gained through belonging to a community with shared commitments can sustain civic involvement despite intimidating challenges, frustrating experiences and a sense of hopelessness at ever being able to create effective change. carol’s comment ‘i came for the cause, but i’m staying in it for the group’ is particularly illuminating, as her site of belonging became the group rather than the broader human rights movement. conclusions this research investigated the factors which influenced and motivated young adult human rights activists in australia. the findings support the literature which identifies the factors involved when people become activists. there is both an intrinsic, deeply personal desire to create change, as well as extrinsic factors that encourage and enable future activists (morrell & o’connor, 2002). a major factor which influenced the participants across the case studies was their family’s interest in human rights issues, and their intrinsic human rights education review – volume 2(2) 40 helping intentionality was also fostered and encouraged by their families (atkeson & rapoport, 2003). some of the participants also experienced political socialisation through their family life when they were children, which enabled them to have the knowledge and agency to be human rights activists (mcintosh & youniss, 2010). all of the participants in the two case studies worked at least one day a week in their unpaid roles with the organisations. committing a significant portion of their week to this pursuit meant that these participants had significant social and financial assistance which allowed them to spend this significant amount of time in unpaid work, as there was an opportunity cost in volunteering to this extent. this indicates that these participants not only had the intrinsic motivation to do this work, which was fostered by the attitudes of their families, but also the time, money and support to commit to this degree of activism (tsutsui & wotipka, 2004). this is not the case for all young australians (black, 2017). it is instructive to compare the findings from my study with that of black’s (2017) work, as she examines the activism practices of young people in low socioeconomic communities in australia. as opposed to the mainly positive experiences of my participants, who were encouraged and commended for their activism by their families, schools, communities and elected representatives, black (2017) found that young people in low socio-economic communities often lack a sense of belonging and recognition, finding themselves instead to be subjects of distrust by their communities. that is, while young people who have a high socio-economic status can be conceptualised as desirable activists, those of a lower socio-economic status who participate in the same types of activities can be perceived as trouble-makers who threaten the status-quo (dejaeghere et al, 2016). unlike in the first case study, the participants in the second case study did not emphasise the importance of collaborative partnerships being developed between human rights activists and those who they advocate for (spivak, 2004). emphasising collaboration can be a way to counter the potentially disempowering dichotomy of ‘helpers’ and ‘victims’ which can develop in the human rights activist space (mostafanezhad, 2014). the human rights activists across the case studies recognised the importance of belonging to a group, as it gave them common social and geographical locations, attachment to cultural and symbolic practices and similar value systems (yuval davis, 2011). we see that belonging to a group makes it easier for activists to successfully engage with issues such as human rights than if they were acting alone (kirshner, 2007). however, another powerful motivation for some activists’ engagement is the sense of belonging to a group of like-minded people who have a common cause. in conclusion, my study indicates that education about, through or for human rights at school was not a factor which influenced these participants to be human rights activists; rather, it was primarily the influence their families provided to them in terms of altruism and political socialisation. if confirmed by further studies, these findings could have implications for human rights educators, at this crucial time when questions are being raised about the commitment of countries such as australia to uphold and promote international human rights standards. giving students exposure to a pedagogy ‘for’ human rights in the formal classroom curriculum can potentially foster the knowledge, dispositions and competencies required for all young people to be active citizens, not just those who happen to have been born into a family which fosters an interest in human rights issues. g. hall 41 acknowledgement this research was supported by an australian government research training program (rtp) scholarship and received the approval of the ethics committee of the university in australia where the author is affiliated. human rights education review – volume 2(2) 42 references atkeson, l. r., & rapoport, r. b. 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(2007). introduction: youth activism as a context for learning and development. american behavioral scientist, 51(3), 367-379. https://doi.org/10.1177/0002764207306065 knuckey, s., satterthwaite, m. & brown, a. (2018). trauma, depression, and burnout in the human rights field: identifying barriers and pathways to resilient advocacy. columbia human rights law review, 49(3), 267-323. mcdevitt, m., & chaffee, s. (2002). from top-down to trickle-up influence: revisiting assumptions about the family in political socialization. political communication, 19(3), 281-301. https://doi.org/10.1080/01957470290055501 mcintosh, h. & youniss, j. 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(2016). iea international civics and citizenship education study 2016 assessment framework. international association for the evaluation of educational achievement (iea). amsterdam: springer. spivak, g. ch. (2004). righting wrongs. the south atlantic quarterly, 103(2/3), 523581. https://doi.org/10.1215/00382876-103-2-3-523 stake, r. (1995). the art of case study research. thousand oaks: sage. tsutsui, k. & wotipka, c. 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(2004). educating the ‘good’ citizen: political choices and pedagogical goals. political science and politics, 37(2), 241-247. https://doi.org/10.1017/s1049096504004160 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2014.04.004 http://www.ohchr.org/documents/publications/factsheet20en.pdf https://doi.org/10.1353/jod.1995.0002 https://doi.org/10.1177/000494410004400205 https://doi.org/10.1215/00382876-103-2-3-523 https://doi.org/10.1353/sof.2005.0022 http://www.un.org/en/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=a/res/217(iii) https://doi.org/10.1017/s1049096504004160 human rights education review – volume 2(2) 44 youniss, j., bales, s., christmas‐best, v., diversi, m., mclaughlin, m., & silbereisen, r. (2002). youth civic engagement in the twenty‐first century. journal of research on adolescence, 12(1), 121-148. https://doi.org/10.1111/15327795.00027 yuval davis, n. (2011). the politics of belonging: intersectional contestations. london: sage. yin, r. (2009). case study research design and methods (4th ed). thousand oaks: sage. https://doi.org/10.1111/1532-7795.00027 https://doi.org/10.1111/1532-7795.00027 human rights activism: factors which influence and motivate young adults in australia introduction human rights activists: influences and motivations methodology case study 1: a legal human rights ngo case study 2: a christian development ngo conclusions acknowledgement references issn: 2535-5406 vol 5, no 1 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4560 date of publication 04-01-2022 © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org book and media reviews addressing educational inequalities in southern contexts rose p., arnot m., jeffery r. and singhal n. (eds) (2021). reforming education and challenging inequalities in southern contexts: research and policy in international development. oxford: routledge. 260pp., (paperback) isbn: 978-0-367-74093-1; (hardcover) 978-0-367-26489-5; (ebook) isbn: 978-0-429-29346-7 reviewed by anjali thomas university of warwick, united kingdom, anjali.thomas001@gmail.com this book is a labour of love dedicated to the late professor christopher colclough, who inspired research on educational inequalities and evaluation of access to education in different southern contexts. it is an insightful book for students, academics and researchers who are interested in educational inequality, reform and development. the different chapters use different disciplinary lenses such as economics, sociology, gender studies, political science, education studies, disability studies, and human rights to understand educational inequalities in the global south. as a person interested in gendered inequalities, families and access to education, i was particularly drawn towards the chapters which focus on gender and identify the family as the key gendered site influencing unequal access to education. the book is divided into two parts. the first part explores the historical, economic and political aspect of educational inequalities and educational reforms across and within different countries in the global south. the second half includes chapters which are based in specific countries and focus on how families are involved in engaging with different kinds of inequality as students access education. http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4560 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ hrer book and media reviews 160 the chapters in the first half of the book raise important questions for policy makers, educational planners, and administrators. they explore state-funded schooling, public-private partnerships, gendered inequalities, educational financing, and how different countries produce different patterns of educational returns. all the chapters in the first half acknowledge that although there has been significant improvement in access, education continues to be unequal in multiple ways. the third chapter was of particular interest to me, as it argues in favour of southern countries financing educational access through domestic revenue. this raises questions about how and to what degree international human rights agencies and charitable organisations which work towards universal education and schooling could be involved in global south contexts where universal education is financed through domestic revenue. the sixth chapter, which concludes the first part of the book, presents a compelling argument advocating a need to understand gender-frameworks and inequalities and how positive educational reforms can be inadvertently undermined by the individual perceptions and prejudices of the different stakeholders involved in executing educational reforms within their country. this chapter, which looks at wider political and economic contexts across the world, is well-placed. it provides an effective bridge into the book’s second part, where the chapters focus on stakeholders such as families, students, and teachers. the seventh and eighth chapters explore how education is perceived by families in rural communities who are struggling with poverty and gendered norms. these chapters present how families in pakistan are patriarchal and embedded within rural communities. in india, similar gendered patterns have been defined as patrilocal (mukhopadhyay and seymour 1994; mukhopadhyay 2019); educational decisions made within the family prioritise the needs of the male family members and female sexuality is monitored. it has been argued that in india the improvement in women’s access to education continues to be geared to patriarchal and gendered political norms (chakravarti 2012), in order to create educated mothers and partners for a socially mobile family. this pattern can be discerned in the eighth chapter, which focuses on gendered educational access in pakistan. while the seventh chapter is primarily focused on class-based inequalities, the eighth chapter introduces gendered inequalities. inequalities based on gender, sexuality and poverty are further explored in the ninth chapter, which looks at ugandan communities. the last three chapters in the book, focussing on ghana, india and pakistan, raise important questions about the relevance of curriculum, pedagogy and educational purpose. the eleventh chapter insightfully explores disability and inclusive schooling in india. it critically highlights the need to develop non-ambiguous inclusive practices which are relevant to the cultural and social setting of india, in a very different context from the global north. the author recommends that teachers be significant stakeholders who need to be involved in policy hrer book and media reviews 161 making and planning processes to improve inclusive schooling. the second part of the book resonates with the argument advanced in the sixth chapter that stakeholders be involved when educational reforms and policies are developed and implemented. the findings and observations made in the book’s different chapters are congruent with the findings and observations of my doctoral thesis (thomas, 2021), which explores how families are involved in making gendered educational decisions. in addition, my experience of being part of research teams in india studying gender and education has been greatly indebted to collaborations with local stakeholders, key informants and gatekeepers who provide information and access to communities, institutions, families, and students. the different chapters of this book reiterate the significant contribution that a collaborative approach in the development of contextual knowledge and information can make towards bringing about positive social change. this book, across its twelve chapters which are arranged into two distinct and complementary parts, advocates for a collaborative outlook towards educational reforms to address different and contextual educational inequalities. additionally, the work of the authors who have contributed towards this book—especially in the co-written chapters and collaborations with authors placed in the global south—provides a collaborative and international development of knowledge and research which is relevant and based on the contextual examination of social, historical, economic and political inequalities. references chakravarti, u. (2012). rethinking the goals of education: some thoughts on women’s education and women’s development. contemporary education dialogue, 9(2), 223243. https://doi.org/10.1177%2f097318491200900205 mukhopadhyay, c. (2019). family matters: understanding educational choices and gendered science in india, in h.e. ullrich (ed.), the impact of education in south asia, anthropological studies of education, 53-82. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-31996607-6_4 mukhopadhyay, c. and seymour, s. (1994). introduction and theoretical overview in women, education and family structure in india (pp 1-35). westview press, colorado. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429268649-1 thomas, a. (2021). role of family in the gendered educational trajectories of undergraduate students in haryana, india (unpublished doctoral dissertation). university of warwick, coventry, uk. https://doi.org/10.1177%2f097318491200900205 https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-96607-6_4 https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-96607-6_4 https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429268649-1 addressing educational inequalities in southern contexts references volume 4, no 2 (2021) date received: 20-06-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3930 date accepted: 09-04-2021 issn 2535-5406 the islamic republic of iran and children’s right to education: acceptability and adaptability shabnam moinipour university of london, united kingdom abstract: iran, as a united nations member state, has made moral and legal commitments to conform to international human rights standards, including the 1966 international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights (icescr) and the 1989 convention on the rights of the child (crc), which address the right to education. this article reviews iran’s commitments to children’s educational rights, drawing on the 4-a scheme developed by the former special rapporteur of the un high commission for human rights on education, katarina tomaševski, whereby education should be available, accessible, acceptable, and adaptable. it examines the state’s obligation to ensure education is acceptable and adaptable. it identifies a number of legal and political reasons why children are unable to claim their educational rights. it calls for substantial educational and societal reform and the prioritisation of the child’s best interests, over those of the state. keywords: right to education; iran; international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights (icescr); legal barriers; gender equity; school violence shabnam moinipour: shabnam.moinipour@gmail.com mailto:shabnam.moinipour@gmail.com s. moinipour 27 the islamic republic of iran and children’s right to education: acceptability and adaptability doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3930 issn 2535-5406 shabnam moinipour shabnam.moinipour@gmail.com university of london, united kingdom abstract: iran, as a united nations member state, has made moral and legal commitments to conform to international human rights standards, including the 1966 international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights (icescr) and the 1989 convention on the rights of the child (crc), which address the right to education. this article reviews iran’s commitments to children’s educational rights, drawing on the 4-a scheme developed by the former special rapporteur of the un high commission for human rights on education, katarina tomaševski, whereby education should be available, accessible, acceptable, and adaptable. it examines the state’s obligation to ensure education is acceptable and adaptable. it identifies a number of legal and political reasons why children are unable to claim their educational rights. it calls for substantial educational and societal reform and the prioritisation of the child’s best interests, over those of the state. keywords: right to education; iran; international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights (icescr); legal barriers; gender equity; school violence introduction in 2015, the united nations (un) adopted the 2030 agenda, which contained 17 goals, one of which was sustainable development goal 4 (sdg4). sdg4 was adopted to ‘ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all’ (un, 2015b). along with the agenda, the education 2030 incheon declaration and framework for action (united nations educational, scientific and cultural organization [unesco], 2016) was designed as a roadmap to achieve this goal. the agenda was adopted unanimously by all 193 un member states, including the islamic republic of iran (un, 2015a). however, in 2016, when states were required to start implementation, controversies over the agenda began to brew in iran and among the country’s authorities. these were triggered by an announcement made on a nationwide education initiative by the (unesco office in iran (tasnim news, 2017). ultimately, the supreme leader of iran weighed in on the matter, stating that: the islamic republic of iran will not submit to documents such as [agenda] 2030 of unesco. why should a so-called international body, which is undoubtedly under the influence of world powers, have the right to set tasks for the world's nations? it is principally wrong to sign a document and then come and execute it in silence. no! this is absolutely not allowed. (tasnim news, 2017) mailto:shabnam.moinipour@gmail.com human rights education review – volume 4(2) 28 this paper focuses on the legal reasons why the agenda was supposedly rejected and on educational-related principles in other core un instruments that iran has signed and ratified, and not as yet rejected. it will also examine how and whether these principles are applied as part of the 4 a right to education framework (tomaševski, 2001, p. 13-15) as outlined in the international covenant on economic, social, and cultural rights (icescr). this article will only focus on two of these rights: acceptability and adaptability of education. the first two rights, availability and accessibility, are discussed in a separate article (moinipour, 2021). as that article illustrates, discussion of human rights education in iran at this point is futile as the islamic republic has not as yet implemented it. nevertheless, a discussion of the right to education is essential, as the right to education is a precursor to the implementation of human rights education (moinipour 2021). the constitution of the islamic republic of iran the controversies that arose around the preparation of the 2030 national education document based on agenda 2030 and commitment to unesco are founded on articles 77, 125, 138, and 153 of the iranian constitution, according to tasnim news, a semi-official iranian news agency. article 138 states that the council of ministers' decisions must not be contrary to the ‘text and the spirit of the laws’. it is also stated in this article that the ‘regulations and protocols of the government, and the legislation of the commissions’ must be communicated to the ‘president of the republic’ (islamic republic of iran [iri], 1989). iran’s commitment to agenda 2030, however, was supposedly not communicated. in addition, according to the news agency, the 2030 national education document contradicts article 153, which states that ‘[a]ny form of agreement that would result in foreign domination over the natural and economic resources, foreign domination over culture, the army, and other affairs of the country, is forbidden’. article 77 also states that the islamic consultative assembly must ratify '[t]reaties, transactions, contracts, and all international agreements’. lastly, article 125 states that ‘[a]ll the treaties, transactions, agreements, and contracts between the government of iran and other governments as well as all the pacts related to the international unions, after they are approved by the islamic consultative assembly, must be signed by the president of the republic or his legal representative’ (iri, 1989). members of the supreme council of the cultural revolution also had issues with having to follow a un document under the guidance and supervision of the unesco office. that is because iran’s supreme leader ordered the council to be the country’s cultural ‘command room’, or the supreme cultural and scientific headquarters of the country’s institutions (tasnim news, 2017). despite strong opposition to agenda 2030, the right of children to education, the state's obligation to secure it, and the need for a remedy to allow for the right to exist in the first place are all defined elsewhere in international human rights law. the icescr is one of the core instruments by which the legal right to education is established. even though this treaty was signed and ratified prior to the islamic revolution, the islamic republic of iran inherited it without opposition and, as such, is legally committed to it (moinipour, 2018). under article 9 of the iranian civil code, the islamic republic is liable for its international obligations. article 9 of the civil code states: ‘[t]reaty stipulations which have been, in accordance with the constitutional law, concluded between the iranian government and other government [sic], shall have the force of law’ (iri, 1935). this means that the s. moinipour 29 provisions of these instruments are part of the ordinary iranian legal system, among other laws. this is recognised by iranian researchers such as katouzyan and rahimi (2003, p.189), and ghodratollah (2013). consequently, the islamic republic of iran is obligated to implement the 4a right to education framework, making education available, accessible, acceptable, and adaptable (tomaševski, 2001, p. 13-15). the convention on the rights of the child in 1991 and 1994 respectively, the islamic republic signed and ratified the convention on the rights of the child (crc), not because it suddenly had an epiphany about children’s right to education but because ‘it was under pressure at the time due to its human rights practices’ (heyns & viljoen, 2001, p. 492). articles 28 and 29 of the crc are dedicated to the child’s right to education. according to article 28, following ratification, iran agreed to recognise ‘the right of the child to education … with a view to achieving this right progressively and on the basis of equal opportunity’. article 29 is particularly relevant to the acceptability and adaptability of education. it requires states to direct the education of children to: (a) the development of the child's personality, talents and mental and physical abilities to their fullest potential; (b) the development of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, and for the principles enshrined in the charter of the united nations; (c) the development of respect for the child's parents, his or her own cultural identity, language and values, for the national values of the country in which the child is living, the country from which he or she may originate, and for civilizations different from his or her own; (d) the preparation of the child for responsible life in a free society, in the spirit of understanding, peace, tolerance, equality of sexes, and friendship among all peoples, ethnic, national and religious groups and persons of indigenous origin; (e) the development of respect for the natural environment. (un, 1989a) the agreement to commit to the above, however, became conditional immediately upon the islamic republic’s reservation regarding the ‘articles and provisions which may be contrary to the islamic shariah’. by doing so, the islamic republic relieved itself of its duty to implement them fully. in addition, upon ratification the islamic republic of iran reserved ‘the right not to apply any provisions or articles of the convention that are incompatible with islamic laws and the international legislation in effect’ (moinipour, 2018; un, 1989b). as long as this reservation is in place, enforcement of crc will prove complicated. however, this does not mean that the islamic republic is not still obligated to respect the right of children to education and to implement the 4a right to education framework, based on its commitments in the icescr. the former united nations special rapporteur on the right to education, katarina tomaševski, emphasised that if providing an education based on the 4a right to education framework were not treated as a legal obligation of the state, education could be: delivered by religious institutions, with an implicit (or explicit) purpose of proselytizing; it can be perceived as a gift by a country’s political leaders or human rights education review – volume 4(2) 30 aid donors. such models do not make education sustainable (proselytizing is often resisted, a gift can always be taken away) while beneficiaries are not treated as subjects of rights but rather as objects of charity, aid or political patronage. (tomaševski, 2001, p. 15) the above analysis is important as we delve into the educational system of one of the most religion-centred states in the world, and its theocratic, authoritarian political system. once the implementation of agenda 2030 was halted in 2017, the supreme council of the cultural revolution considered implementing its own fundamental reform document of education (frde) instead. this was drafted in collaboration with the ministry of education and the supreme council of education and adopted in 2011 during the presidency of mahmoud ahmadinejad. the first goal in this document emphasises the concern n tomaševski is making. in reforming education, this goal emphasises ‘fostering monotheist individuals … in compliance with the islamic norm system’. the goal, according to this document, is not just limited to iranian citizens. the islamic republic intends to create an educational system ‘capable of materializing … the ideal islamic life, universal justice and islamic-iranian civilization’, which will lead to the ‘realization of a global reign for perfect mankind’ (iri, 2011). this, plus the emphasis on ‘loyalty to the islamic republic of iran’s ruling system’, as enshrined in goal 2 of this document, instils doubt as to how the principles of the icescr might be implemented or further compromised once these goals are achieved. as tristan mccowan states, ‘rights-respecting environments are important sites of learning’, and the intentions and objectives of the state in achieving this are equally important; otherwise, the ‘goals in question are irrelevant or inimical to the enhancement of rights’ (mccowan, 2012, p. 67). based on this, creating such environments is essential for every child, not only for those who conform to the islamic republic’s theological agenda. although the crc is a treaty exclusively dedicated to children's rights, the icescr still ‘provides the most comprehensive protections of the right’ to education (kalantry, getgen, & koh, 2010, p. 261). articles 13 and 14 of the icescr are dedicated to the right to education and lay out, among other things, the principles of the acceptability and adaptability of education, both of which are discussed below. it is worth keeping in mind that states are obligated to progressively realise most of the principles enshrined in the icescr. however, certain aspects of these principles, such as the non-discriminatory implementation of rights (to the extent restored by the state), must be immediately adhered to upon acceptance of the treaty. what states cannot do is to ‘deliberately halt progress or regress’ (kalantry et al., 2010, p. 257). the next two sections examine the acceptability and adaptability of education in iran in accordance with the icescr to determine how and to what extent children's right to education is being affected by the state’s policies and its resistance to meeting its international obligations. acceptability based on the principle of human dignity, acceptability of education, ‘addresses the form and substance of the education with regards to both quality and appropriateness’ and lays out the responsibilities of the state in ensuring that ‘schools have certain minimum standards for teachers, students, building facilities and curricula’ (kalantry et al., 2010, p. 278) s. moinipour 31 article 13(2)(e) of icescr specifically addresses questions of acceptability. it states that: ‘[t]he development of a system of schools at all levels shall be actively pursued, an adequate fellowship system shall be established, and the material conditions of teaching staff shall be continuously improved’ (united nations, 1966). the committee on economic, social and cultural rights (cescr), a treaty body that monitors and evaluates the compliance of states parties with the icescr, has elaborated on the acceptability of education in its general comment no. 13 (1999). this will be further discussed below. adequate fellowship system according to article 13 (2)(e) of the icescr (un, 1966) and the committee’s clarification of this law (cescr, 1999), the state is obliged to have a ‘developmental strategy for its school system’. this includes all levels of schooling, and must be prioritised by the state. the state is also required to establish ‘an adequate fellowship system’, which the committee interprets to mean that the provisions of the covenant’s non-discrimination and equality must be taken into consideration. this also means that the fellowship system ‘should enhance equality of educational access for individuals from disadvantaged groups’ (cescr, 1999, para. 26). article 19 of the iranian constitution states that ‘[t]he people of iran enjoy equal rights, regardless of the tribe or ethnic group to which they belong. colour, race, language, and other such considerations shall not be grounds for special privileges’ (iri, 1989). however, there is discrimination against refugees, particularly afghan children, girls, disabled children, and children belonging to minority ethnic communities. children belonging to religious minorities, particularly to religions not recognised in the constitution, such as the bahá’í faith, face particular discrimination. one reason may be that ‘religion’ is not explicitly mentioned in the above article, making this law open to abuse. in addition, article 20 of the constitution states, ‘[m]embers of the nation, whether man or woman, are equally protected by the law. they enjoy all the human, political, economic, social, and cultural rights that are in compliance with the islamic criteria’ (iri, 1989). while this article states that women and men are equal before the law, the ‘islamic criteria’ make this law, in essence, deeply discriminatory towards girls and women; so much so that it prioritises boys over girls when it comes to education. in addition, it considers girls to be mature at the age of nine, allowing them to be married off or pulled out of school and normalised as second-class citizens. material conditions of teaching staff according to article 13 (2)(e) of icescr, the material conditions of teaching staff are also important, not only in realising students’ right to education but also in allowing teachers to teach in accordance with the ‘norms and standards of quality education’(un, 1966). the quality of education is inevitably undermined if teachers are ‘underpaid, overworked, and work under difficult conditions’ (unesco, 2019b, p. 113). under the law, the state is obliged to continuously improve the working conditions of teachers in order to fully realise the right to education. therefore, the right to education and the rights of teachers are intertwined. article 2(2) obliges states parties to ‘guarantee that teachers are free from discrimination’. according to article 3, ‘both male and female teachers have equal economic and social rights’. based on article 6, teachers have ‘the right to work’, as well as ‘the right to favourable human rights education review – volume 4(2) 32 conditions of work’ (article 7), and ‘the right to form and join trade unions’ (article 8) (cescr, 1999, para. 27; un, 1966; unesco, 2019b, p. 113). as teachers are at the forefront of delivering the curriculum and have the task of imparting the aims of education, their role in the ‘educational process’ is essential and of particular importance (unesco, 2019b, p. 112). in this regard, the committee on the rights of the child states that ‘efforts to promote the enjoyment of other rights must not be undermined, and should be reinforced, by the values imparted in the educational process. this includes the content of the curriculum and the educational processes, the pedagogical methods, and the environment within which education takes place’ (committee on the rights of the child, 2001, para. 8). the committee on the rights of the child further stipulates that it is ‘important that the teaching methods used in schools reflect the spirit and educational philosophy of the crc and the aims of education laid down in article 29 (1)’ (2001, para. 18). it is, therefore, paramount for the islamic republic to withdraw its reservation to the crc for there to be any hope of realising the right to education in accordance with international human rights law. teaching methods should also be ‘tailored to the different needs of different children’(committee on the rights of the child, 2001, para. 9). academic qualifications and training are needed for teachers to be able to ‘deliver quality education’ (unesco, 1960, article iv (d)). in iran, the educational system is centralised, and the ministry of education is responsible for training teachers. there are teacher training centres, which train teachers for primary (ages 6-11), guidance cycle(middle school, grades 6th to 8th), and gifted children’s schools’ (arani, kakia, & karimi, 2012, p. 2). individuals are able to obtain an associate degree from these centres once they complete a two-year programme. the only prerequisite for entry into such a programme is a high school diploma and a pass in the national entrance exam. training for teachers at the high school level (grades 9-12), which is not mandatory, is somewhat different. according to an article published by three authors, two of whom are employees of the ministry of education, in order to teach in a high school, theoretically a ‘bachelor’s degree is required’. however, because there are not enough teachers in iran, ‘schools have been compelled to use teaching staff with other educational backgrounds’ (arani et al., 2012). even though there are not enough teachers, as a result of iran’s postdesecularisation programme and the ministry’s recruitment policies (irna, 2020), the only teachers allowed to stay on and continue to be employed are those who understand ‘the true meaning of islam’ (arani et al., 2012, p. 6). this is regardless of how good or bad they are as teachers. that is why many qualified teachers may be left out of the equation altogether. the state's concern seems not to be the teachers’ commitment to the right of children to education and whether they can deliver quality education. it is rather the teachers’ loyalty to the state, their willingness to ‘follow a curriculum as outlined by the ministry of education’ and ultimately proselytisation. teachers are ‘expected to cover the content entirely without any opportunity to deviate from the approved curriculum’ (arani et al., 2012, p. 6). this rigidity does not allow the needs of different children to be met, as required by the crc. marginalised and minority groups such as disabled children and children belonging to ethnic and religious minorities suffer the most as a result. the ministry also fails to compensate properly its teachers. they are paid below the poverty line, which is 10 million tomans [2,375 usd] for a family of four (the world of economics, 2020), and, as a result, have to hold second and third jobs. s. moinipour 33 the situation is even worse for ‘unofficial’ teachers (eghtesad online, 2020). even though teachers are struggling to make ends meet, the ministry also fails to ensure they are paid on time. delays in payments for as long as five months (tabnak, 2020), which have led to strikes and imprisonment of union leaders, show the state’s failure to improve the material conditions of its teaching staff. consequently, the right of children to an acceptable education is compromised. curricula and pedagogy educational acceptability also alludes to the quality of educational form and substance. this quality, and particularly curricula and pedagogy, determines how meaningful education is to every single child, the community he or she belongs to, and to the whole society (kalantry et al., 2010, p. 278). curricula and pedagogy must be appropriate and of high quality. accordingly, it is the responsibility of the islamic republic as a state party to ‘regulate the education sector – both public and private – to ensure that establishments at all levels and of all types meet the minimum standards as set out by the state’. the law also requires education to be ‘relevant and culturally appropriate’ to the students. acceptability of education, however, goes beyond children, even though they remain the main beneficiaries. acceptability of education is extended to parents, who should have freedom both in terms of religious education and the language of choice (unesco, 2019b, p. 77). language of choice for education to be acceptable, the language of instruction needs to be taken into consideration. language barriers, particularly those faced by children belonging to indigenous and minority groups and disabled children, as well as by teachers, could also affect educational accessibility and acceptability (tomaševski, 2001, p. 12). though the issue of official language(s) of instruction is still debated, states are obliged to respect the right of minorities to set up their own schools with instruction in minority languages (tomaševski, 2001, pp. 29-30). there are numerous ethnic groups in iran, and many children are not exposed to any other language except their mother tongue until they go to school. they often face difficulty once they begin education, since they are abruptly placed in an unfamiliar and somewhat hostile environment. these children are not permitted to speak their own languages even amongst themselves, and they may be punished for doing so. in addition to what could perhaps be called a culture shock, they are often humiliated for not knowing farsi or for speaking it with an accent (unrepresented nations peoples organization [unpo], 2018). article 15 of the iranian constitution states that while ‘persian is the official and common language and script of the people of iran’, the ‘use of regional and ethnic languages in … the teaching of their literature at schools, alongside the persian language, is freely permitted’ (iri, 1989). however, according to various human rights organisations there are ‘strict limits on the usage of… minority languages in iranian schools’. so much so that there is a ‘relatively low academic performance and high dropout rates of ethnic minority students compared to persian students’ (ceasefire centre for civilian rights, centre for supporters of human rights & minority rights group international [cccr, cshr, & mrgi], 2018, p. 24). there is a diverse group of minorities who speak languages other than persian (farsi): these include ‘azeri, kurdish, gilaki, mazandarani, luri, arabic, balochi, and turkmen; smaller languages such as, qashqai, taleshi, baadi, and numerous other local human rights education review – volume 4(2) 34 languages’ (moradi, 2020, p. 1171) . there are also different dialects and offshoots of various languages. what the state has been aiming to do over the years is to create a homogenised nation-state, and to do this, it has ‘deployed various mechanisms such as standardised universal education in persian, monopolizing the media, and demographic change through internal migration’ (moradi, 2020, p. 1171). this illustrates that the state’s efforts are not as geared towards the fulfilment of their legal obligations as they make them out to be. on the contrary, the islamic republic of iran has been pushing its religious-political agenda, and continues to do so. parental beliefs and convictions according to international human rights standards, parents should also be free to ‘send their children to schools that conform to their religious, moral, or philosophical beliefs’ (unesco, 2019b, p. 77). under article 13(3) of the icescr, the state should respect the rights of parents to establish schools ‘to ensure the religious and moral education of their children is in conformity with their own convictions’. in this regard, the state has a negative obligation, which means that it should ‘follow a policy of non-interference in private matters’ (coomans, 2004, p. 65). according to the committee, official schools are also required to teach the ‘general history of religions and ethics’ only if this is taught objectively and without bias and if the freedoms of opinion, conscience, and expression are respected. the committee also makes it clear that instruction in a specific religion or belief is in conflict with article 13(3) unless ‘provision is made for non-discriminatory exceptions or alternatives that would accommodate the wishes of parents and guardians’ (cescr, 1999, para. 28; veriava & paterson, 2020, pp. 130-131). in 2006, ali khamenei, the supreme leader of iran, stated that there is a need for ‘evolution and reorientation of education’, in yet another call for the renewal of the importance of islamic teachings in the educational system. the evolution and reorientation that he referred to was not meant to ensure that article 13(3) of the icescr was respected. it was rather to ensure that a ‘philosophy of islamic education’ was clearly defined. the creation of the frde was a response to the supreme leader’s statements. the controversies surrounding the 2030 agenda brought about a reconsideration of the frde, a document which bases education on the ‘islamic norm system’ in order to prepare children to achieve the stages of hayate tayyebah [the ideal islamic life] (iri, 2011, p. 10). even though the branch of islam is not specified in this document, iran has a shi’a muslim majority. therefore, the ‘islamic norm system’ is based on shi’a islam. thus, the proposed ‘evolution and reorientation’ continues to disregard the country’s estimated 5-10 per cent of sunni muslims (out of the estimated 99.4 per cent of the muslim population). another branch of islam, sufism, also exists, with an unofficially estimated several million adherents. besides muslims, there are other religious minority and belief groups in iran such as bahá’ís, christians, jews, sabeanmandaeans, zoroastrians, and yarsanis (u.s. department of state, 2019). their children are forced to receive instruction based on a specific religion without ‘nondiscriminatory exceptions or alternatives that would accommodate the wishes of parents and guardians’. even though a few of these minority religions, such as christianity, judaism, and zoroastrianism, are recognised in the iranian constitution as being legally permitted to establish their own schools based on their beliefs, all minority groups’ rights are violated in one way or another and to varying degrees. s. moinipour 35 the severest violations are reserved for the followers of those religions not recognised in the constitution, such as the bahá’í. parents and guardians who belong to non-recognised religions are not just prevented from exercising their right to establish schools ‘to ensure the religious and moral education of their children is in conformity with their own convictions’. historical negationism is also used to incite hatred against particular religious minority groups, and to ensure the islamic republic remains legitimate and relevant. one example is the state’s decades-long dealings with the bahá’í community, which is the largest non-muslim religious minority group in iran. in 2008, all primary school children in one iranian city received a ‘gift’ on their last day at school. the ‘gift’ was a 12-page colour booklet that ‘provided an erroneous and misleading life story of the báb’, the forerunner of bahá’u’lláh, the founder of the bahá’í faith, and an important and holy figure for bahá’ís. in this booklet, the báb was ‘presented in a mocking and degrading manner’ (bahá’í international community [bic], 2008, p. 20). pedagogical approaches for education to be acceptable, pedagogical approaches—both subject matter and teaching methods— should be non-discriminatory. the curricula should ‘incorporate content appropriate to the students’ cultural, linguistic, and social backgrounds’. this must be of good quality and relevant to students and parents (kalantry et al., 2010, p. 278). both content and teaching methods should be subject to the objectives of article 13(1) of the icescr, upon which the islamic republic has agreed to direct education to ‘the full development of the human personality and the sense of its dignity’ and to ‘strengthen the respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms’ (un, 1966). besides ensuring that pedagogical approaches meet article 13(1)’s objectives, the committee clarifies that states are required to ‘establish and maintain a transparent and effective system which monitors whether or not education is, in fact, directed to educational objectives set out in article 13(1)’ (cescr, 1999, para. 49; kalantry et al., 2010, p. 278). curricula the issue in the islamic republic is not only what is in the curricula but also what is not. censorship of textbooks, though not often exposed as a human rights violation, does count as censorship, which is a type of violation. besides affecting the acceptability of education, this type of violation also affects accessibility (tomaševski, 2001, pp. 13-15). in 2008, a study of 95 compulsory textbooks at all levels, including the fiveyear compulsory elementary school, the three-year middle school, and the first three years of high school, was carried out (paivandi, 2008). unsurprisingly, the study found that the textbooks are heavily censored, and this censorship is particularly due to the ‘islamization of the schools’ (paivandi, 2012, p. 87). everything taught in the textbooks—every viewpoint, every phenomenon, every event—is based on the shi’ite perspective. according to saeed paivandi: islam appears as a full-fledged universal social and spiritual discourse which is not timeor place-specific and which has eternal credibility. the education system seems to seek a form of “divine” and “sacred” legitimacy about the essence of its discourse. the direct consequence of this orientation is the dominant presence of religious themes in textbooks. (paivandi, 2012, p. 87) human rights education review – volume 4(2) 36 religious education (re) textbooks are impregnated with subject matter on everything surrounding islam, such as its history, historical and contemporary figures, principles, and practices, while only briefly mentioning other constitutionally recognised religions. however, other textbooks such as ‘social studies, history, persian language, and science’, where one would not expect religion to be mentioned, are also filled with discussion of ‘religious, islamic, and political issues either directly, by insinuation, or by using metaphors’ (paivandi, 2013, p. 87). in re textbooks, any non-discriminatory mention of other religions not recognised in the constitution is intentionally left out. while children from the three religious minorities groups recognised in the constitution, namely zoroastrians, christians, and jews, receive religious education relevant to their beliefs, all children, including those from both recognised and not formally recognised religious groups and those who are nonbelievers, are forced to learn ‘topics in non-religious textbooks that do not correspond to their beliefs’ (paivandi, 2012, p. 91). besides the disproportionate focus on islam in re books and its unnecessary incorporation into other textbooks, the fact that the state’s form of islam is at present based on shia tradition has created a large divide between girls and boys (paivandi, 2012, pp. 88-89). not only are schoolchildren sexually segregated, but curricula are also heavily focused on men, hence institutionalising the inequality that is the basis of the patriarchy that exists in iran. women are presented as being less important than men, and the way in which they are depicted is also age-discriminatory. women are shown alongside men only in ‘images of family, social, and religious issues’ and alone only in ‘connection with the subjects of family, education, daily life, and pastimes’. women are only present in seven per cent of images related to work and the professions (paivandi, 2012, p. 89). this serious under-representation of women in the work/professional world is reflected in clear terms. for example, in a grade 4 social studies textbook, it is stated that ‘usually, the father works outside the home. he has the duty to provide food, clothing, and other necessities for his wife and children. in some families, the mother works outside the home, as well’ (paivandi, 2012, p. 89). there is next to no mention of important female personalities in cultural, scientific, political, social, and religious fields (paivandi, 2012, p. 89). this is in clear violation of international human rights law that guarantees non-discrimination in educational quality. in addition, based on the 4-a right to education framework, material should not be censored and must ‘reflect a wide range of ideas and beliefs’. in order for education to be acceptable, international human rights law also requires that no student be expected to ‘conform to specific religious or ideological views’ (osler, 2016, p. 20). based on state policies, this is exactly what the islamic republic of iran intends to do. it wants to ensure curricula are such that every single individual conforms to the islamic norm system of shi’ism, as interpreted by the islamic republic. teaching methods besides the curricula, discriminatory stereotypes of girls and boys also invite discriminatory teaching methods. in girls’ schools, the focus is more on the teaching of arts and humanities, due to the belief that girls have different physical and cognitive abilities and are usually assumed to be weaker than boys. on the other hand, the focus for boys is more on science, technology, engineering, maths and s. moinipour 37 sports (unesco, 2019b, pp. 88-89). in order to have any hope and opportunity for the rectification of this gap, and to give all children access to quality education, the islamic republic needs to sign and ratify the convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women (cedaw) as a first step. article 10 of cedaw, in particular, ‘sets forth the normative content in relation to the elimination of discrimination against women and ensuring equal rights with men in the field of education’ (unesco, 2019b, p. 88). teaching methods should also be appropriate for children and their unique needs (unesco, 2019b, p. 115), while respecting the child’s dignity. this includes the elimination of corporal punishment. corporal punishment is inconsistent with article 13(1) of the icesr, which obliges the state to ensure the right to dignity of the human personality of children under its jurisdiction are safeguarded. public humiliation is yet another form of discipline which negatively affects human dignity. international law requires states to introduce positive and ‘non-violent approaches to school discipline’ instead (cescr, 1999, para. 41). therefore, in order for education to be acceptable, corporal punishment, a normal disciplinary measure in iran, must be prohibited. international human rights law states that disciplinary measures must respect the dignity of the child (osler, 2016, p. 20). it is quite common for staff at iranian schools to be unjust and aggressive towards students if they are found to be violating rules or misbehaving (hedayati, kuusisto, gholami, & tirri, 2019, p. 472). in a recent study, students complained of punishments, mainly physical, that were inflicted arbitrarily, or punishments that were inflicted on the whole class because of one student. insulting students is another form of punishment used as a supposed ‘effective means of discipline’. punishments are usually imposed when a student violates the ‘rules, values, and duties’ of the school. these rigid expectations, particularly those concerning values, may be in conflict with the students’ own values and beliefs. all students are put under pressure, in an effort to deliver ‘true believers’ to the society and to convert non-muslims to islam. students are forced to attend friday prayers at school, recite and memorise the quran and wear proper and ‘dignified’ uniforms with dull colours such as grey or black. the girls are constantly under pressure to cover their heads and bodies. even their wimples must be a certain length. students are punished if they deviate from these rules, values, and duties. all students are in the same educational system, one that uses punishment in general as a disciplinary measure by way of which their dignity is violated. however, some groups are particularly targeted, such as disabled children, refugee children, and children belonging to minority groups. these children are subjected to targeted harassment. in various instances, school authorities and teachers encourage muslim students to physically hurt children belonging to religious minority groups. the school authorities also segregate these children from others in the classroom (bic, 2019). physical and mental punishment and abuse by teachers and school authorities, and encouraging children to hurt each other are also in violation of article 29 of the crc. iran signed the crc in 1991 and ratified it in 1994. however, on signature, it made a reservation ‘to the articles and provisions which may be contrary to the islamic shariah, and preserve[d] the right to make such particular declaration, upon its ratification’. upon ratification, the government reserved ‘the right not to apply any provisions or articles of the convention that are incompatible with islamic laws’ (un, 1989). article 29.1b and 1d requires states parties to human rights education review – volume 4(2) 38 empower children through education to develop ‘respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, and for the principles enshrined in the charter of the united nations’ and to prepare them for a ‘responsible life in a free society, in the spirit of understanding, peace, tolerance, equality of sexes, and friendship among all peoples, ethnic, national and religious groups and persons of indigenous origin’. the role of education should be to prevent violence, not encourage it (tomaševski, 2001, p. 31). the islamic republic has recently taken some steps towards the prohibition of corporal punishment., on 2 june 2020, a bill consisting of 51 articles was approved by the guardian council to ‘protect children and adolescents’. article 9 of this bill (the child and adolescent protection bill) states that anyone responsible for bodily harm, sexual harassment, disability or death of a child due to negligence will be punished. however, this bill is mainly directed at the child's guardians, and is not very specific about child protection at school. the reason why the bill is so specific about children’s guardians, and the reason why it was approved in june 2020, after being previously rejected on many occasions, is thought to be the death of a 14-yearold girl by the name of romina ashrafi. she was beheaded by her own father, reza ashrafi, in may 2020, for eloping with her boyfriend, an adult man. following the elopement, romina was returned to her family by the police, in spite of fears that she would be subjected to violence (rothwell & vahdat, 2020). the child protection bill does not cover all aspects of violence that affect a child’s dignity in the educational environment. in order for the islamic republic of iran to uphold its obligation to make education acceptable, it must protect the dignity of all children against physical, psychological, and sexual violence from authorities, families and other children. as is shown in the unesco illustration (figure 1), there is more to violence than corporal punishment, and most violence does not necessarily cause children to leave education since violence is encouraged and has become the norm in iranian schools. causing a child to leave education is punishable, as per article 8 of the bill. this article explains the punishment for anyone who threatens, persuades, or encourages a child or adolescent to run away from home or school or drop out of school. however, this bill does not protect children from other serious threats such as ‘child marriage and imposition of the death penalty’, threats that could affect girls as young as nine and boys as young as 15. in addition, not all forms of female genital mutilation are prohibited nationwide (human rights watch, [hrw], 2020) and there is no mention of circumcision, the genital mutilation of boys and a prevalent form of physical harm towards children. studies show that circumcision during infancy can lead to post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, anger, and intimacy problems later on in life (boyle, goldman, svoboda, & fernandez, 2002; goldman, 1999; hammond, 1999). some or all of these symptoms may well affect these children’s learning. this suggests that the state’s responsibility to implement the 4-a right to education framework requires more than just a onedirectional focus on education. it must be holistic and should take into account all other aspects of an individual’s life. s. moinipour 39 figure 1 conceptual framework of school violence and bullying (unesco, 2019a, p. 11) adaptability what states are expected to do in terms of adaptability of education is to consider the best interests of the child and ensure that schools adapt to children, keeping their viewpoints in mind when reviewing ‘contents and process of learning’, and not the other way around. in the states whose governments have failed or made no attempt to enforce the concept of adaptability as expressed in international human rights law, children are forced to adapt to whatever educational system is available, and those who do not fit or cannot adapt are rejected (tomaševski, 2001, p. 15 & 31). under international human rights law, ‘education has to be flexible, so that it can be adapted to the needs of changing societies and communities, and to respond to the needs of students within their specific social and cultural context’ (coomans, 2004, p. 68). flexible education in order for education to be adaptable, flexibility is required. according to international human rights law, not only the state but also its schools and those working in them should take into account the background of every child. they should consider whether a child belongs to a minority or indigenous group, as well as children’s varying capabilities (veriava & paterson, 2020, p. 133). human rights education review – volume 4(2) 40 this consideration should particularly extend to those children who, for one reason or another, cannot attend school: it is their education that is important, not their physical presence in the school building. as such, minors in detention, working children, and refugee children must all be educated, and the state must take education to them (tomaševski, 2001, p. 15). this does not justify the existence of child labour, disregard for refugee children, or setting young offenders on a path to a worse life. ultimately, child labour must be completely abolished. refugee children must be respected, protected and their rights as children fulfilled. young offenders must be set on a path to a better life. children’s violation of the law must not result in the loss of their rights — quite the opposite. human rights conventions ‘recognise the particular vulnerability of their situation, by affording them an additional set of protections’. therefore, under international human rights law, child offenders must maintain their rights to ‘education, health, protection from violence, family life’. the crc is also explicit about how the judicial system must focus on the child’s ‘rehabilitation and social reintegration and that the child’s best interests should be a primary consideration in all decisions affecting them’ (children's rights alliance england (crae), 2013, p. 1). this is only possible through education, which, besides assisting them with their rehabilitation and reintegration, will contribute to their health and ‘purposeful development’ (ibid, p. 12). needs according to international human rights law, education should also adapt to children’s needs. the needs of refugee children are one such example. for a long time, refugee children, particularly afghans, were denied access to education. it was not until 2015 that the current supreme leader allowed afghan children to have access to education ‘regardless of their residency status’ (moinipour, 2018, p. 7), as if the right to education of children is something to be ‘bestowed’. even with the supreme leader’s 2015 order, the afghan children are still deprived of education, as they are affected by other things, such as war. although there is no war in iran per se, these children are recruited to fight in syria, in iran’s proxy conflict. the 2015 order from khamenei, which did not materialise due to other obstacles, along with the state’s general treatment of refugees, shows a complete lack of concern for their well-being. in fact, the government ‘proposed offering incentives such as a path to citizenship for families of foreign fighters who die, become injured, or are taken captive during “military missions”’ (hrw, 2017). if the right of children to education is not respected, their other rights are consequentially violated, as the committee makes quite clear. it states that education is ‘both a human right in itself and an indispensable means of realizing other human rights’ (cescr, 1999, para. 1). it is not only afghan children, particularly boys, who are affected by war. many iranian children died in the eight-year-long iran-iraq war, and to this day war is glorified in schools. one textbook tells the story of a 14-year old child by the name of hossein fahmideh who blew himself up to stop an iraqi tank during the war, and schoolchildren are taught about his ‘sacrifice’ and ‘true faith’. he is remembered as a hero. during the war, even the bodies of children who were ‘martyred’ were showcased in schools, particularly in boys’ schools. this narrative, of course, feeds into the state’s ideological agenda and appears to be preferable to educating for peace. another example of adaptability to the needs of the child is the case of disabled children. the convention on the rights of persons with disabilities (crpd) s. moinipour 41 was acceded by iran in 2009. however, upon accession, iran declared ‘... that it does not consider itself bound by any provisions of the convention, which may be incompatible with its applicable rules’ although by entering this reservation to the treaty iran made its commitment to the convention conditional, article 24(1) does require states parties to: recognize the right of persons with disabilities to education. with a view to realizing this right without discrimination and on the basis of equal opportunity’, state parties must ensure ‘an inclusive education system at all levels and lifelong learning directed to (a) the full development of human potential and sense of dignity and self-worth, and the strengthening of respect for human rights, fundamental freedoms and human diversity; (b) the development by persons with disabilities of their personality, talents, and creativity, as well as their mental and physical abilities, to their fullest potential; (c) enabling persons with disabilities to participate effectively in a free society’. (un, 2006) while the iranian government has taken steps to improve access of children with disabilities to education by allocating a larger budget for their schooling and ensuring accessibility to renovated and newly-built schools, a human rights watch (hrw) investigation shows that significant barriers still exist. hrw’s investigation found that ‘girls with disabilities, children with intellectual disabilities and autism, and children in remote or rural areas’ are at a higher risk of being excluded from accessing the educational system. hrw identified stigma and parents’ unfamiliarity with the right to education to be two obstacles. fear of social judgment, social pressure in attributing the child’s disability to parents’ sins or genetic defects, and bullying of the disabled child and his or her sibling(s) in school are other obstacles identified by hrw. another barrier that stands in the way of children with disabilities to gain equal and inclusive access to quality education is the ‘mandatory medical assessment for school enrolment that all iranian children must undergo’ (hrw, 2019). according to the hrw report: the assessment determines whether children are “educable” based on an iq (intelligence quotient) test, and whether they are allowed to enroll in a mainstream school, or if they must go to a special school. children with an iq below 70 are considered to have intellectual disabilities. those with an iq between 50 to 70 are deemed “educable” and must enroll in special schools; children with an iq under 50 are considered “uneducable” and cannot attend any school. (hrw, 2019) no effort is made to help these children learn. instead, they are prevented from learning. this violates article 24(2) of crpd, where states parties are required to ensure that (a) disabled persons are not ‘excluded from the general education system on the basis of disability…’. even though iran has made a declaration regarding this treaty, which exclusively concerns persons with disabilities, the state has fully and unreservedly committed itself to the icescr. the right to education has been recognised as a human right. this right must be respected, not only for a fraction of society but also for every person, and including those with disabilities (article 13.1). human rights education review – volume 4(2) 42 whether certain individuals or phenomena are present or absent in the educational system influences how children see and understand the world and the community they live in (tomaševski, 2001, p. 31). a lack of adaptability to the needs of disabled children, the denial of access to those deemed ‘uneducable’ and the absence of children with disabilities or the concept of disability from textbooks shape how disabled people are socially perceived. in iran, this amounts to being ‘nonexistent’. instead, on the very first few pages of every single textbook there is a fullpage picture of the founder of the islamic republic of iran and the first supreme leader, ruhollah khomeini, usually with one of his quotations. much attention is given to his life, rather than the lives of children. this is supposedly done to create a dependency of children on this ‘fatherly figure’ and ensure they internalise the hierarchy, which feeds into the state’s agenda. conclusion under international human rights law, the islamic republic of iran is obliged to make education acceptable and adaptable. the state’s obligation towards the right of children to education goes beyond simply providing physical spaces called schools. the state must also make education acceptable by providing quality education, devoid of any discrimination and censorship. the islamic republic of iran is not only failing to adhere to these obligations; it is forcing all children to conform to shia islam, in conjunction with the state’s political ideology. even those whose beliefs are in conflict with this religious and ideological view are forced to conform to it, and this is in violation of international human rights law. the glorification of war, along with the cultural and social acceptance of physical, emotional, and sexual abuse as forms of discipline, does not promote the best interests of children (tomaševski, 2001, p. 35). the solution lies in the complete transformation of the whole iranian educational system. as part of this transformation, the 4-a right to education framework must be fully implemented and human rights education must become part of the curriculum. as amita sharma argues, initiatives must ‘question whether processes of reform will really ensure the transformation of relationships on more equal terms or will they reinforce dependency and hierarchy’ (sharma, 2003, p. 3391). such reform should also protect the dignity of all children by not exposing them to humiliation and degradation. in addition, under reform initiatives, language barriers must be removed and the educational system should adapt to the needs of the child. special attention should be paid to vulnerable groups such as disabled children, refugee children, minors in detention, and working children, as well as to children belonging to religious and ethnic minorities. education must also initially be taken to children who, for one reason or another, cannot attend school. it is important for these children to get educated; however, this measure should be temporary. the ultimate goal of the state should be to abolish barriers so every single child’s right to education is respected. since a complete transformation of the educational system requires time, the islamic republic should, in parallel, take more immediate steps towards this goal. first and foremost, the exact definition of ‘islamic criteria’ needs to be laid out in order to avoid a broad interpretation of the law, and its abuse. secondly, all religious and ethnic groups need to be recognised in the iranian constitution to undo the discrimination that exists due to their absence. thirdly, reservations and declarations against the crc and crdp should be withdrawn, and the cedaw needs s. moinipour 43 to be signed and ratified without reservation. these measures need to be taken as foundational steps towards the implementation of the 4-a right to education framework in order for the islamic republic to fulfil its international human rights law obligations. without taking any such substantial steps, more un agendas will be rejected, and the islamic republic’s production of one document after another, with titles such as the ‘fundamental reform document of education’, will only continue to be used as a ruse to stall and to misguide the international community. ultimately, however, it is the position of the supreme leader, and the authoritarianism that it invites, that is the biggest impediment to any positive change taking place towards the fulfilment of the state’s obligation in implementing the principles of the international human rights law. human rights education review – volume 4(2) 44 references arani, a. m., kakia, l., & karimi, v. 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(2019b). right to education handbook. paris: united nations educational, scientific and cultural organization. unrepresented nations and peoples organization. (2018, september 26). iran: minorities campaign for right to education in their mother tongue. retrieved from https://unpo.org/article/21115 veriava, f., & paterson, k. (2020). the right to education. in j. dugard, b. porter, d. ikawa, & l. chenwi (eds.), research handbook on economic, social and cultural rights as human rights. cheltenham and northampton: edward elgar. https://doi.org/10.4337/9781788974172.00015 https://unpo.org/article/21115 https://doi.org/10.4337/9781788974172.00015 majority rights and minority responsibilities: young people’s negotiations with human rights issn: 2535-5406 vol 4, no 3 (2021) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4595 © 2021 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org erratum: 4(1) jerome, l., liddle, a., & young, h. (2021). talking about rights without talking about rights: on the absence of knowledge in classroom discussions. human rights education review, 4(1), 8–26. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3979 this article incorrectly included 'equality' in the department for education (dfe) list of fundamental british values to be promoted in english schools. the full list is: ‘democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty, mutual respect for and tolerance of those with different faiths and beliefs, and for those without faith’. http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4595 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3979 majority rights and minority responsibilities: young people’s negotiations with human rights issn: 2535-5406 vol 4, no 3 (2021) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4536 © 2021 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org obituary shulamith koenig 1930-2021 many have been inspired by the work of human rights education advocate and activist shulamith koenig. all who encountered her recall her passion, whether or not they agreed with her approach. below human rights education review includes an obituary written by respected human rights educator nancy flowers. nancy flowers human rights educators usa, nancymaryflowers@gmail.com in august 2021, human rights education lost one of its earliest and most passionate advocates with the passing of shulamith koenig, whom some have called ‘the mother of human rights education’ or human rights learning, as she preferred. when she founded the people’s movement for hre (pdhre), in 1988, no other organisation in the world had made hre its sole purpose and no other activist had envisioned its transformative power. indeed, she was a rebel and a visionary, seeking what she called a ‘human rights revolution’. shula was the driving force behind a campaign advocating for worldwide human rights education that sparked the un decade for human rights education (1995-2004). as executive director of pdhre, she conducted consultations and workshops with educators and community leaders in more than 60 countries. under her leadership, pdhre established ‘human rights cities’ on every continent. in 2003 the un recognised her work with its prize in the field of human rights. born in jerusalem in 1930, shula koenig was an industrial engineer and fierce defender of the human rights of palestinian activists, which led to her emigration to the usa in the 1960s. she developed that passion for social justice into a global vision of human rights as a way of life for all people. she was an inspiration and mentor to many. as activist loretta ross said of her, ‘she was not perfect, but she was perfectly shula, a sculptress, artist, mentor, and the grandmother i wish i'd had’. http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4536 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:nancymaryflowers@gmail.com hrer obituary 122 as she said many times in many different ways: ‘it is not enough to have human rights; it is essential that everyone owns them and are guided in their daily lives by the holistic human rights framework, enabling women and men to participate as equals in the decision-making process towards meaningful, sustainable economic and social transformation. there is no other option’. human rights education’s curriculum problem volume 1, no 1 (2018) date received: 24-11-2017 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2450 date accepted: 19-01-2018 peer-reviewed article issn 2535-5406 human rights education’s curriculum problem walter c. parker university of washington, usa. abstract: employing a theoretical perspective from the critical sociology of education, this article identifies a curriculum problem in human rights education (hre) in schools and suggests strategies to solve it. the main problem is hre’s lack of an episteme—a disciplinary structure created in specialist communities—and, related to this, the flight of scholars from the field of curriculum practice, redefining it away from subject matter. a more robust hre in schools will require not only advocacy but a curriculum, one that teachers can adapt to local needs, constraints, and students. knowledge matters. if knowledge work of this sort is missing from hre then it is difficult to claim that hre has a social justice mission. keywords: human rights education, epistemology, knowledge, curriculum coherence, curriculum development, content selection walter c. parker: denver@uw.edu http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2450 w.c. parker 5 human rights education’s curriculum problem doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2450 issn 2535-5406 walter c. parker denver@uw.edu university of washington, seattle. abstract: employing a theoretical perspective from the critical sociology of education, this article identifies a curriculum problem in human rights education (hre) in schools and suggests strategies to solve it. the main problem is hre’s lack of an episteme—a disciplinary structure created in specialist communities—and, related to this, the flight of scholars from the field of curriculum practice, redefining it away from subject matter. a more robust hre in schools will require not only advocacy but a curriculum, one that teachers can adapt to local needs, constraints, and students. knowledge matters. if knowledge work of this sort is missing from hre then it is difficult to claim that hre has a social justice mission. keywords: human rights education, epistemology, knowledge, curriculum coherence, curriculum development, content selection introduction while evidence suggests that human rights education (hre) in some respects “has expanded dramatically over the last few decades” (russell & suarez, 2017, p. 39), its curriculum remains at best opaque and at worst so under-developed as to include only “mentions” of something called “human rights.” a deep conceptual understanding of subject matter goes well beyond this, of course, as does the kind of curriculum development that facilitates it. the world programme for human rights education (united nations, 2005), to take one prominent example, 1 calls for a curriculum of knowledge, skills, values, and action, but does not develop one. stopping short of curriculum development may be a wise strategy, as curricula need to be developed locally, where they must make sense, enjoy legitimacy, and get enacted. however, the result is that the hre curriculum remains scattered, illdefined, and too variable to be robust. this problem becomes apparent when hre is compared to curricula that are coherent and well-established—school curricula for algebra and biology, for example, or national history. such a comparison may strike readers as unfair, like comparing an infant to adults, or novices to experts, but doing so points to factors that can help hre succeed in schools. curriculum development is what hre requires now if it is to move forward to institutional stability in schools. school courses are notoriously difficult to establish, and once established they become entrenched as part of the “routine delivery of services to local constituencies” (westbury, 2008, p. 2). curriculum reform initiatives come and go, and then come and go again (cuban, 1990). advocates strain to enact change but face an uphill battle against the inertia of the curriculum already in place. my objective is three-fold: to indicate why curriculum development and implementation are difficult; to clarify hre’s curriculum problem; and to suggest particular forms of curriculum development that should strengthen hre in schools. i will show how countervailing forces to the effort to strengthen hre come not only http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2450 human rights education review – volume 1(1) 6 from the ethno-nationalist right, as might be expected, 2 but also from the cosmopolitan-progressive left, where we would expect to find a lot of interest in developing the hre curriculum. a key part of the problem is that curriculum scholars on the left have renounced curriculum development—a trend that began nearly fifty years ago (e.g., pinar, 1975; young, 1971). dismissing curriculum development as technocratic, atheoretical, instrumental, uncritical, and so forth, these scholars disengaged themselves from school improvement, especially curriculum development. this robbed hre of what could be a useful source of expertise today: curriculum scholarship that is focused squarely on the curriculum and on curriculum reforms such as hre. this article focuses mainly on the united states, where the federal system of government decentralizes education policy. public school curriculum development is a matter for the fifty state governments, most of which further devolve authority to local school districts, thereby making some 14,000 ministries of education nationwide, each with a locally elected board of directors.3 my own interventions are curriculum research-and-development studies, or design experiments, in secondary schools in several states. as we shall see later in this article, these studies involve collaborative curriculum decision-making for college-preparatory courses. these courses have vast amounts of material to “cover,” and student learning is often superficial—just enough to pass the high-stakes summative exam. my colleagues and i endeavor to organize this subject matter so that core, driving concepts and skills might be learned more deeply without sacrificing the breadth of knowledge needed for exam success. the theoretical perspective at work in this article is sociological, epistemological, and critical. however, it does not stem from the two prominent sociological paradigms in education — neither the ‘old’ sociology of education that was anchored in structural-functionalism and concerned mainly with system stability and efficiency (e.g., parsons, 1951), nor the ‘new’ sociology of education that was critical in its intentions and approaches and concerned mainly with inequality, class interests, social control, and reproduction (e.g., apple, 1979; young, 1971). each of these two traditions, one conservative and purportedly neutral, and one radical and purportedly emancipatory, has a disabling knowledge—and therefore curriculum—problem. instead, i draw on a more recent development in the sociology of education, one that is called social or critical realism. contemporary exemplars are collected in the volumes knowledge, curriculum and equity: social realist perspectives (barrett, hoadley, & morgan, 2018), and knowledge and the future school: curriculum and social justice (young & lambert, 2014). these scholars, intellectual descendants of emile durkheim and basil bernstein, are sober about what the education sector can and cannot do to ameliorate social inequalities originating in the surrounding political economy, but they have produced discerning scholarship focusing on what education can do. they are able to focus on the social justice potential of the school curriculum without committing either of two common, albeit contradictory, errors made by the left: exaggerating education’s ability to change society (e.g., dewey 1956); and dismissing education as merely epiphenomenal (e.g., bowles & gintis, 1976). the relevance of this scholarship to hre is straightforward. if the reaction to the structural-functionalists was to abandon the rough-and-tumble of school improvement for the rarified chambers of radical theory and critique, then the current requirement for curricula, in general, and hre, in w.c. parker 7 particular, is a synthetic praxis: a form of critical educational scholarship that is engaged unabashedly in school improvement, especially curriculum development. my method is interpretive, except for a brief section of empirical research that i include to illustrate a content selection strategy. i have organized this article discursively, with a problem-solution frame drawn from social movement theory (gamson & meyer, 1996). nothing as firm as a solution is actually offered, however; rather, solution strategies are tendered. i begin with a brief examination of the general lack of hre in u.s. schools, and then move to a broader treatment of the main task before us: developing and institutionalizing an hre curriculum in schools. problem: access to what? hre has a small presence in u. s. schools. the reason, in part, is rather widespread anti-united nations sentiment and political opposition to cosmopolitan discourses in u. s. political culture (see analyses by caporaso & mittelman, 1988; parker, 2011). for example, when a utah legislator voted against additional funding for the international baccalaureate (ib) program in that state’s schools, she explained that she was ‘opposed to the anti-american philosophy that’s somehow woven into all the classes (ib courses) as they promote the u.n. agenda’ (fulton, 2008, ¶ 10). she did not feel the need to explain further, confident that this brief rationale would be understood. and presidential campaigns in the u.s. typically feature some amount of resentment toward the u.n., at least by the more conservative candidates, blaming it for undermining american sovereignty and for taking a disproportionate share of u.s. dollars without producing commensurate results or acquiescence to u.s. geopolitical positions. recently, president trump’s “america first” campaign is indicative, as is his bellicose criticism of the u.n. equally consequential, however, is that there has been much contention over the meaning and aim of human rights education amongst its enthusiastic advocates. this constitutes a significant signal-noise problem that hampers hre curriculum development. starkey (2012), for example, advocates hre as an intervention that will enable ‘people whose value systems are diverse and apparently incompatible nonetheless to recognize and accept common standards and principles that make living in society possible’ (p. 22); meanwhile, matua (2011) suggests that the whole un-based human rights initiative, while not exactly ‘a western conspiracy to deepen its cultural stranglehold over the globe’ (p. 3) is nonetheless delaying an open debate about the ‘reformation, reconstruction, and multiculturalization of human rights.’4 this is only one example of the tension barton (2015) has identified ‘between widespread recognition of its importance and lack of consensus over its meaning’ (p. 50). conflict over definitions and goals, and, for some at least, a sort of existential crisis about the regional (european) origins of a putatively “universal” initiative, rumble on unresolved alongside a passionate support for the project. the united states is not the only country facing this second obstacle to hre being taken more seriously (see examples in bajaj, 2017, and banks, 2017). there is a third obstacle that is more specifically american: hre in the u. s. is situated mostly within the social studies curriculum, when it is to found at all; and the social studies curriculum already relies on a civil rights discourse. the civil rights idiom in the u. s. is a rights discourse, to be sure, but it is nationalistic rather than cosmopolitan. it is based on a three-century historical narrative that runs from the declaration of independence of 1776 and the bill of rights of 1789, neither of them rejecting slavery or patriarchy, to the declaration of rights and sentiments of women in 1848, the human rights education review – volume 1(1) 8 civil war and emancipation proclamation soon thereafter, and then the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s. these benchmarks of the american “civil rights” struggle show that the story begins with a human rights promise (‘we hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal’), moves quickly to a codification of those rights (for some), proceeds to a struggle for the extension of rights to women (‘…that all men and women are created equal’), and then goes on to secure racial equality. here is martin luther king, jr. using the civil rights idiom in his “i have a dream” address at the march on washington in 1963. note his reference to the earlier promise: we have come to our nation’s capital to cash a check. when the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the constitution and the declaration of independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every american was to fall heir. . . . we have come to cash this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice. (king, 2001, p. 82). my point is that a rather widely accepted civil rights discourse in u. s. schools—a discourse that is mainly national and political—may be precluding more attention to a human rights discourse that is cosmopolitan in reach and, further, that adds social and economic rights to political rights. (granted, king made this transition later in his campaign, as did malcolm x, but public opinion generally did not.5) a human rights approach would de-center the national narrative for a global narrative and, of course, include the study of texts such as the universal declaration of human rights and the convention on the rights of the child. in a number of countries where civil and cosmopolitan rights discourses compete for curricular space, we find similarities to the situation in the u.s. (e.g., see osler, 2016, on norway; bozec, 2017, on france; ho, 2017, on singapore). however, it would seem that a united nations-based, cosmopolitan, human rights discourse is more common in much of the rest of the world.6 a fourth reason for hre’s small footprint in the u. s. school curriculum is epistemological. this is the problem that i will explore in greater depth, before turning to some ways forward—solution strategies—that are aligned with this problem. the problem itself can be called “knowledge blindness” (maton, 2014, p.3) and its crux is the curriculum field’s lack of attention to the curriculum. i am referring to the fact that curriculum scholars have abandoned curriculum planning, implementation, and evaluation. these very experts with the pertinent knowledge (historical, theoretical, comparative, and practical) are interested in other things, and largely ignore questions about the selection of knowledge and skills for teaching and learning in schools (the curriculum). this is ironic on several fronts. we live in a historical period that is branded as the “information age” and many people are said to work in a “knowledge economy.” the very thing that is trumpeted as central to nearly every aspect of our lives today is itself undertheorized, and this negligence extends to the one field where everyone needs it to be addressed deliberately and explicitly: education, and especially the curriculum field. what explains the lack of interest in school knowledge-formation—the curriculum—in the scholarly community? it is here we would expect to find the most nuanced and robust attention. a good part of the explanation lies in the rise of w.c. parker 9 competing discourses in the education field. 7 curricularists have turned their attention elsewhere, mainly to ideology critique (skepticism, debunking, unmasking covert interests). unfortunately, the curricular baby was thrown out with the structural-functionalist bathwater. additionally, curricularists have turned their attention to a learner discourse and a learning discourse. each is important, but attention needs to be paid to both of them. schooling is not about one thing only; it is an interdependent mix of things. the first of these competing discourses is a fifty-year-old sociological program of educational criticism that debunks schools’ pretenses to ideological neutrality and reveals how school curricula reinforce rather than challenge the status quo and reproduce the inequalities of the surrounding society. this discourse has identified and analyzed educational inequality. it has also passionately advocated and worked towards enabling equal access to schools and, within them, to knowledge. this project is obviously very important insofar as it goes, but it does not go far enough. it is incomplete, for it does not attend to the forms of knowledge thus distributed nor to curriculum decision-making about which forms ought to be distributed. the question left unasked in this discourse is ‘access to what?’ to what knowledge? this critical discourse has become mainstream in educational scholarship, despite its radical origins, and is often today’s default setting in the academy—at least in education and the social sciences. the original works in england were by bernstein (1971) and young (1971) and then a bit later, in france, by bourdieu and passeron (1977) and the united states by bowles and gintis (1976), apple (1979), and giroux (1979). mostly neo-marxist, but not exclusively (e.g., pinar, 1975), this critical discourse focuses on political-economic factors that are external to the education sector of society but structure what goes on there, reproducing relations of domination and subordination. moore and muller (1999) summarize: ‘knowledge relations were transcribed as class relations’ (p. 190) and soon thereafter as gender relations and then race relations.8 once transcribed in this way, such that knowledge is conflated with knowers, the category of knowledge becomes, as moore (2007) writes, ‘exhausted in standpoints and interests that it is held to represent. once knowledge is “named” in this manner there is nothing else than can be said about it— the job has been done’ (pp. 32-33). instead, we say things about the learner and learning. the contemporary discourse on the learner is child-centered and progressive. it places the learner in familial, ethnic, and other primary cultural contexts and identifications, and uses these referents to help students recognize themselves in the curriculum and to help them learn the curriculum, whatever it may be. learners are individuals embedded in cultures; they have funds of relevant and usable knowledge—assets, not deficits. there is a touch of rousseauian romanticism in this discourse: the child’s purity is assumed and it is not to be corrupted. the curriculum should be guided by the intention to draw out and nurture the child’s true self. the child’s culture, too, is to be drawn out, recognized, and sustained. contemporary exemplars of this literature in the united states are ladson billings (1995), moll et al. (1992), and paris (2012). this discourse may now be even more popular than the critical discourse, particularly in the wide-ranging discussions of culturally relevant pedagogy and differentiated instruction, both now standard fare in many teacher education programs. the third, a learning discourse, draws attention to learning processes and the human rights education review – volume 1(1) 10 psychology of learning. it is dominated today by a newer education discipline that calls itself “learning sciences”; this is rapidly replacing educational psychology, at least in name. this discourse reached its zenith in the united states with the publication of a national academies of science report, how people learn (bransford, brown, & cockling, 2000). here, teaching is for and about learning, and learning includes learning processes, learning environments, and learners’ socio-cultural and familial homes. biesta (2009) derides this “learnification” (p. 36) of educational discourse. it is the redefinition of teaching as the facilitation of learning and of education as the provision of learning opportunities or learning experiences; it can be seen in the use of the word ‘learner’ instead of ‘student’ or ‘pupil’; it is manifest in the transformation of adult education into adult learning, and in the replacement of ‘permanent education’ by ‘lifelong learning.’ (p. 37) learning in this discourse is intellectual labor done by the learners themselves—this is constructivism—and it is facilitated and scaffolded, assessed and evaluated by the teacher. teaching becomes the orchestration of learning. additionally, learning is enhanced in some (often unspecified) way by new media and information technologies, which are lionized in this discourse. in all of this, knowledge is assumed. mceneaney and meyer (2000) explain that ‘research inattention to curricular content arises, not because scholars think the matter unimportant, but because they tend to see it as obvious’ (p. 191). scholars take the curriculum for granted because ‘the necessary content of modern education . . . is mostly established.’ today we accept more or less without question that schools teach math, science, social studies, literature, and language. this is the curriculum— these are the school subjects. the matter is settled, more or less, around the world, and the urgent questions are about other things, especially access: achieving equal access to the curriculum (whatever it is), and then achieving equal learning of it (whatever), by better understanding how people learn it (whatever). there is overlap between the three discourses and variation within them, but each highlights a crucial facet of education: first, the schools’ reproduction of unequal power relations and distributive injustices in the surrounding society; second, the child, understood as a cultural being deserving care and recognition at school; and third, processes of learning. for present purposes, note that none of the three discourses attends to which knowledge students should learn and are entitled to learn at school. none proposes a curriculum, a selection of subject matter. this is a problem; since not everything can be taught, choices have to be made and, inevitably, are made. this subject matter selection is anything but neutral, as young (1971) and apple (1979) established long ago; the curriculum is a social construct (it is located materially in the social and historical practices and conditions of its production) and, as such, relays power relations from the political economy into the school. much “critical” scholarship reveals how, where, and to whose disadvantage this occurs. still, and here is the rub, a curriculum is needed if the school is to be a school. it is the asset that anchors and justifies the others: teachers, instruction, students, classrooms, assessment, parentteacher conferences, administrators, cafeterias, and janitors. save for its curriculum, there is no need for a school. and, at school, some forms of knowledge are more w.c. parker 11 powerful—that is, more empowering to learners and to society—than others. hre should be focusing on these forms. scholarly inattention to this project means that schools generally, and hre in particular, must proceed without curricular expertise. the curriculum field, having been drawn to adjacent matters (critiques of neoliberalism and reproduction, rapt attention to learners and learning), is of little help to hre. whatever may have been its problems when joseph schwab called the curriculum field “moribund,” today it has simply renounced its object. the curriculum field is circling inside an old discovery, rearticulating the seminal, critical work of the 1970s. this is important work, to be sure, but the project does not end here. curriculum-making, implementation, and evaluation is needed. in the post-war years, progressive educators began to associate curriculum development with conservatism and, by the 1970s, the left was abandoning subject matter concerns altogether. 9 the consequences of this have dealt a serious blow to social justice education. the school curriculum was surrendered to interest groups and market forces whose testingand-accountability initiatives and social-efficiency imperatives narrowed the curriculum in socioeconomically distressed schools to reading and math, thereby exacerbating inequalities in educational achievement, fueling school privatization and segregation, and opening the door to an instrumental curriculum of so-called “21st century skills.”10 solution: toward an episteme for hre the situation is one of “crisis,” according to sociologist of education michael young (young, 2013, p. 101). what compels us to listen to him is that he is the same michael young whose 1971 book knowledge and control launched the critical discourse discussed above—the ‘new’ sociology of education that jettisoned knowledge from the curriculum field by transcribing the field as power relations. young now sees that the critical sociology he initiated was only half correct. showing how school curricula relayed power relations from outside schools into the schools themselves, creating rather than attenuating achievement gaps and reinforcing rather than reforming the status quo, was enlightening; but the exposé left in its wake no curricula for schools to teach. curriculum development, then, was left to politicians, corporate wunderkinds, entrepreneurs, and a multitude of state and local committees charged with creating curriculum standards. furthermore, curriculum theory itself, where we would expect to go for expertise, was left without an epistemology, that is, without a theory of knowledge for content selection. accordingly, let us turn to young’s newer analytic framework, which is the social realist alternative referenced in the introduction to this article and neatly summarized by the title of his book, bringing knowledge back in (2008). bringing knowledge back in if there is to be hre in schools, there needs to be an hre curriculum. the curriculum is the knowledge, the subject matter, the what teachers and others choose for instruction and, therefore, what students have the opportunity to learn should they be fortunate enough to gain access to good schools and good teachers. the curriculum is the school’s defining characteristic, its raison d’être. it is what parents send their children to school to learn. furthermore, the what is not to be confused with the how: instruction. instruction is about how teachers teach the curriculum and how they relate to students.11 just as there are different kinds of instruction (didactic, human rights education review – volume 1(1) 12 constructivist, teacher-centered, student-centered, etc.), there are different kinds of curricular subject matter. the two main kinds of subject matter are content (information, concepts, principles) and skills, sometimes called know-what and know-how, or in schwab’s (1964) terms, the substantive and syntactical structures of knowledge. together, they comprise the largest portion of the school’s explicit curriculum.12 like any curriculum (e.g., courses in biology, music, or history), a human rights curriculum needs to be based on a theory of knowledge (an idea of what is meant by knowledge). further, it needs a pedagogical theory about how to organize that knowledge for learning by children and young people of different ages and stages. this will include, among other things, a framework explicating beginning, intermediate, and advanced understandings of human rights. the scheme for the former cannot simply distinguish one subject from another—say, physics from history—for this barely touches the problem. and the latter cannot rest simply on a quantitative metric of more (for “advanced”) and less (for “beginning”) knowledge of human rights, as this confuses breadth with depth. moreover, and importantly for present purposes, both theories, the epistemological and the pedagogical, are, like any theory, social constructs; they are not found in nature or the heavens but in social activity. but this does not obviate the need for both. (believing it does is the error made too often in the critical discourse described above—this is young’s “crisis.”) both theories contribute to the classification of the resulting knowledge as “disciplinary.” disciplinary knowledge is undergirded by a theory of what knowledge is, as well as a theory of how to organize it for teaching and learning. but more central to defining disciplinary knowledge is young’s re-introduction of durkheim’s (1912) insight that there are two kinds of knowledge: abstract and concrete; that is, theoretical (disciplinary, scientific, academic) and experiential (everyday, sociocultural, local). the two overlap to some extent in pedagogical practice, but the distinction is useful and has profound implications for deciding on the school curriculum. disciplinary knowledge transcends the everyday, context-dependent, experiential knowledge of students; it is not common sense. it is generative, not static, because its central ideas stimulate additional inquiry; one discovery prompts another. consequently, it is the most powerful knowledge students can be taught at school. it enables them to think outside the boxes of their upbringing. students deserve to be taught this knowledge—and need to be taught this knowledge— precisely because it is not available in their experience. this is its window-opening, emancipatory promise. mcphail and rata (2018) capture it well: by having access to disciplinary knowledge, with its counterintuitive character (i.e., it does not correspond to the everyday world of appearances), students can think about the world in abstract or context-independent ways. this takes students beyond the common-sense understandings acquired from their sociocultural location, enabling them to develop a critical awareness of the forces structuring their lives and to imagine alternatives beyond their everyday experiences…. it is this liberating potential of disciplinary knowledge that makes it a political, as well as an epistemological, resource, one that all students should have access to. (p. 70) w.c. parker 13 the concepts that we expect to see at the core of a curriculum on human rights education are disciplinary concepts. these include, inter alia, universal rights, universal respect, human dignity, peaceful coexistence, justice, dissent, and activism. these are abstract ideas that are exemplified in and animated by an array of day-today cases and struggles. the ideas transcend the particulars, but they arise from them and are applicable to them. we use the concepts to recognize and analyze the cases, clarifying and defining them. we use them also to identify and define violations of human rights, and to protect rights and prevent violations. imbued with such concepts, students are empowered; they develop the intellectual power to take intelligent action because they understand the world in new ways. in the u.n. general assembly’s (2011) declaration on human rights education and training, concepts like these fall into the category of “education about human rights.” this category “includes providing knowledge and understanding of human rights.” here are the norms and principles of human rights, the values that underpin them, their histories, the mechanisms for their protection, and methods and stories of political activism to hold governments accountable for protecting human rights and to protest and prevent violations. the authority for these concepts is found in intellectual fields: the hre specialist communities that create them. this is true across disciplines: the physicists, biologists, and historians who argue over the core concepts, values, and procedures of those intellectual fields are the specialists who define those fields. ‘such fields have structures, principles, and logics of their own,’ writes moore (2007, p. 36), which is what make their output “disciplinary.” similarly, the hre specialists who argue over the goals of hre and the meaning of core categories such as rights, respect and peaceful coexistence are the actors who define human rights education. but more pertinent to the e in hre are those specialists who focus on education for human rights. human rights is a scholarly field within law, sociology, political science and other academic fields as well as in interdisciplinary centers. human rights education is a related scholarly field; but the two are not identical. it is one thing to identify a field or discipline and another to select the subject matter and pedagogies for teaching and learning it in school. making the move from one to the other— “recontextualization” is bernstein’s famous term (bernstein, 2000, p. 41)—requires a consideration of subjects (these are young people, not adults; students, not experts), setting (schools, not workplaces or ball fields), and purpose (general education, not vocational or higher education). 13 the point is that a specialist community is at the social heart of any discipline and that the disciplinary knowledge it produces is provisional, by definition, and subjected to ongoing criticism and revision within the community. the specialist community argues over the field’s truth claims and interventions, constructs its parameters and the rules and procedures by which claims are legitimated, and, in the process, defines its substance and syntax. knowledge is both social and real—both the knowledge claims and the conditions of their production are available for examination. the specialists’ arguments are transparent thanks to their communities’ conferences and peerreviewed journals. 14 this is not the case for everyday, socio-cultural knowledge. one is not better than the other, but they are different; and to acquire the one, but not the other, is why children are sent to school. we can further specify three conditions needed for a powerful human rights curriculum in schools. first, as we have seen, its knowledge is abstract and therefore applicable to and anchored in numerous on-the-ground cases and contexts. second, human rights education review – volume 1(1) 14 this knowledge is generated socially in specialist communities that are more-or-less autonomous collectives. historically, this has meant that these communities are relatively independent of religious dogma and government intimidation. galileo, we recall, was forced to recant his observations of the moon when he was called to the inquisition in rome. however, he was not working alone but sharing his observations with other specialists who were also observing nature. so, in the end, while disciplinary knowledge lost a battle in rome in 1633, it began to win the war that became the scientific revolution. today, the membership of the international astronomical union, not the pope, decides whether pluto is a planet. similarly, content selection for schools draws largely on the specialist communities known as the academic disciplines rather than on the clergy, the party, or the military police. the proceedings of these scholarly collectives are transparent and their truth claims are subjected to ongoing criticism and revision via conferences and peer-review journals. fallibilism (belief in the provisional nature of truth claims) anchors the value system. therefore, the knowledge selected for instruction in schools is warranted by the procedures used to generate that knowledge. third, a powerful human rights curriculum is powerful because it is organized into a coherent symbolic order, as are the established curricula in physics, history, and biology. this includes logical conceptual progression from incipient understandings to complex and integrated ones—to “advanced” knowledge of human rights. it is in this third condition that hre’s curriculum problem mainly resides and where curriculum development initiatives can be most fruitful. as we saw at the outset of this article, the miniscule attention paid to hre in u. s. schools can be attributed in part to opposition to cosmopolitan discourses in schools and in part to a national civil rights discourse that already occupies the space that might be given to an international human rights approach. but the two additional problems discussed at the outset especially affect this third condition: one is the tension caused by hre advocates who disagree with each other about goals and meanings; the other is the abandonment of curriculum development and evaluation by its primary specialist community curriculum scholars. these two problems produce the epistemic incoherence of hre—its ‘weak grammar’ (bernstein, 1999, p. 168). the solution is to work toward greater epistemic strength. the school subjects of physics (with a hierarchical knowledge structure) and history (with a horizontal knowledge structure)15 can serve as models, for they have successfully achieved, despite their epistemic differences, institutionalization in schools. they have stable, large footprints. we see the feeble school presence of hre when we contrast it with these relatively successful school subjects. conceptual progression (rata, 2016) means that a school subject has an epistemic framework—an organized system of meaning—which includes a scheme for sequential teaching and learning. this requires in turn that educators possess a shared understanding of what constitutes a preliminary grasp of the subject and a more advanced grasp, and an understanding of the difference between superficial and deep knowledge of the subject. these understandings allow educators to plan instruction (lessons 1, 2, 3; courses 1, 2, 3; etc.) that systematically deepens students’ understanding of the subject. but to do this, and here is my point, hre has to be organized and coherent within itself, internally. this is its episteme. w.c. parker 15 strategies hre lacks this basic structure, this disciplinary integrity. the first step to achieving it, as we have seen, is to identify hre’s knowledge base: its disciplinary concepts, cases, history, literature, and skills. this involves organizing its knowledge into at least two sets: a smaller one judged to be core and a larger, broader one judged to be marginal. the two sets are interdependent and related center-to-periphery, like a sun with its orbiting planets and moons. this strategy (if not the solar metaphor) was made popular by the mid-century “structure of the disciplines” movement led in the united states by bruner (1960) and schwab (1964). as they saw it, nearly any curriculum will contain too many topics to be internally coherent, let alone teachable and learnable, if it is not organized in such a way that some topics—let us call them core topics—anchor the others. 16 hilda taba (1945) had written earlier that the overcrowding of a curriculum ‘is such a time-worn criticism as to appear trite. the content in many subject areas…has been expanded to the point where only superficial knowledge is possible, and little or no time is available for thoughtful reflection and generalization’ (p. 93). this is precisely the problem that requires content selection and core-periphery organization. as bruner argued, to learn any meaning system—any conceptual framework—is to grasp how its parts are related. this insight requires hre specialists to do the intellectual work of selecting and articulating core and peripheral knowledge in such a way that the gravitational pull of the suns carries the planets and moons along with them. an illustration of this strategy from a recent empirical study may be helpful. my research team was attempting to select and organize knowledge for a college-preparatory course that hundreds of thousands of american high school students take in upper secondary school. the course is called advanced placement u. s. government and politics. our goal was that students would perform as well or better on the summative, breadth-oriented exam as students in traditional versions of the course, but they would learn the subject matter more deeply. this meant that students would need to learn both the core content deeply and the peripheral content at least superficially. our task was not to replace breadth with depth but to articulate the two, and our procedure was a practice we called deliberative content-selection. this practice entails deciding collaboratively and iteratively, in face-to-face meetings, on the substantive and syntactical structure of the course.17 the concepts federalism, limited government, and separation of powers were eventually selected as the substantive suns of the course and constitutional reasoning and perspective taking as the syntactical suns. once these core concepts and skills were selected, they could be spiraled through the course, thereby affording recursive instruction on them, deepening students’ understanding while drawing in the peripheral knowledge along the way. details and results of the study can be found elsewhere (parker et al., 2011, 2013; parker & lo, 2016; parker, valencia, & lo, 2018). generally, students in the course did as well or better on the exam as students who were following traditional courses. however, they learned the core knowledge more deeply. the point to be made for present purposes concerns the essence of this strategy: selecting and organizing the curriculum so that instruction has a clear object. a second strategy is needed, too, although this one is instructional rather than curricular. beyond selecting and arranging knowledge into a center-periphery scheme, teachers need to articulate this disciplinary knowledge with students’ everyday, socio-cultural knowledge. these two are also related and interdependent, for as moll (1990) wrote, after vygotsky, ‘everyday concepts mediate the acquisition human rights education review – volume 1(1) 16 of scientific concepts’ (p. 10).18 children’s home knowledge mediates their learning of disciplinary knowledge at school. this second strategy has enjoyed renewed attention in the past twenty years as part of the rise of the “learner” discourse sketched above and is a familiar theme in the hre literature (e.g., bajaj 2017; lundy, 2007; osler, 2016). it represents a traditional, one could say classic, tension in education. it appears in plato’s dialogue meno and is summarized in the title of john dewey’s 1902 essay the child and the curriculum. dewey wrote, abandon the notion of subject matter as something fixed and ready-made in itself, outside the child’s experience; cease thinking of the child’s experience as also something hard and fast; see it as something fluent, embryonic, vital; and (then) we realize that the child and the curriculum are simply two limits which define a single process, just as two points define a straight line. (dewey, 1956, p.11) the two strategies—the articulation of core and peripheral disciplinary knowledge and the articulation of disciplinary knowledge with students’ everyday knowledge—will go a long way toward organizing a curriculum and helping students learn it. the second without the first, however, is meaningless because instruction is adrift without a curricular object. a human rights education designed with both strategies in tandem, whether for a single course or spiraled systematically across the years of compulsory schooling, would be an achievement. conclusion knowledge is the central category of education. it is education’s activity (transmitting knowledge) and goal (achieving knowledge; closing achievement gaps between groups of students). hre can be strengthened in schools if concerted attention is paid to its knowledge base—its curriculum. school subjects like physics and history have been successfully institutionalized around the world, not without argument and variation of course, but they are relatively stable and routine nevertheless. they have strong grammars—epistemic coherence—constructed through decades of theoretical debate, research, practice, and revision in more-orless autonomous specialist communities. hre does not have this advantage, this path to institutionalization. far from it; hre is young and fractious and anything but a school staple. in the united states, it is a curricular wannabe. its prospects for institutionalization are limited, and progress will be slow and episodic. furthermore, the abandonment of curriculum development by curriculum scholars has not helped. the shift of attention to ideology critique, learners and learning has resulted in a lacuna at the core of hre: content selection and organization. my argument has been that knowledge matters in hre, and that we must pay attention to this fact. i have critiqued the trends that have pushed it so far into the background that knowledge blindness affects the very field we rely on for advice on the knowledge dimension of schooling: curriculum studies. i do not suggest that ideology critique and attention to learners and learning should be pushed to the background to make room for curriculum in the foreground; rather, i suggest that all four concerns be kept in the foreground at once, rather like a juggler keeping multiple balls in the air. again, schooling is not about one thing only, but an interdependent mix of things; and if epistemology and curriculum decision-making are missing from w.c. parker 17 the action, it is difficult to claim that the action has a social justice mission. wanting to learn important content and skills is, after all, the reason why marginalized groups struggle to gain access to schools. similarly, it is why already advantaged groups scramble to get into ever-better schools (labaree, 2010). if school-access and school-inclusion initiatives are to be meaningful, then the school curriculum itself must be meaningful; and this requires that it be deliberated, selected, and organized rather than presumed. hre’s curriculum problem is twofold: the flight of expertise from the field of curriculum practice, redefining it away from subject matter to students, their lives and learning processes; and hre’s lack of a coherent knowledge structure—an episteme. a more robust hre requires not only advocates and arguments but a reasonably stable curriculum that its advocates—teachers, policy makers, and hre specialists—can adapt to local needs and circumstances. it will be particularly interesting in the united states to see how hre curriculum-makers articulate its core concepts, cases, history, and skills with those already at the center of the more successfully institutionalized civil rights curriculum. there are, no doubt, parallels in other nation-states where local norms, desires, and understandings encounter abstract, cosmopolitan ideals. acknowledgement i am grateful to brian barrett for helpful comments on an earlier draft of this paper. human rights education review – volume 1(1) 18 notes 1 the world programme is just one example. it is a valuable initiative, and there are many others (e.g., council of europe, 1985). i would not claim otherwise. 2 see analyses by osler (2016) and panjwani et al. (2018). 3 see tyack’s (2003) account. 4 see also keet (2015) and zembylas et al. (2017). 5 see foner (1998). 6 john meyer’s cross-national research is insightful, alongside that of russell and suarez (2017). for example, meyer, bromley, and ramirez (2010) show that hre in textbooks has an implicit goal to construct a common humanity of rights-bearing individuals, each a sovereign actor on the public stage. 7 this section draws from parker (2017). 8 moore (2007) demonstrates the inadequacy of standpoint theory for explaining how knowledge is produced socially and, consequently, its inability to produce a school curriculum. by reducing knowledge to knowers and their contexts, standpoint theory inevitably must show that there is actually no knowledge, per se, of anything. see also, wexler (1987). 9 see the accounts of moore and muller (1999), moore (2007), and young (2008, 2013); also delpit (1988) and gramsci (1971) for their critiques of progressive educators’ abandonment of powerful subject matters for “progressive” child-centered pedagogies. 10 studies of this phenomenon include labaree (2010); mcphail and rata (2018); and morgan and lambert (2018); 11 on the distinction between curriculum and instruction, see deng & luke (2008) and young (2013). 12 see eisner (2002) on the distinction between explicit, implicit, and null curricula. 13 shulman’s (1986) category “pedagogical content knowledge” points in a similar direction: educators’ knowledge of how to ‘represent… the subject to make it comprehensible’ to students (pp. 6-7). but in bernstein’s (2000) analysis, more than this is involved in the selection and transformation of knowledge into pedagogic communication. 14 in the field of human rights education, a short list of its specialist-interlocutors writing in english would include bajaj (2011), bowring (2012), keet (2015), osler (2015), starkey (2012), suárez (2007), and tibbitts (2017). and the field’s journals would include the new one you have in your hands as well as the journals in which these authors’ articles were peer-reviewed and published, and others as well. 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(2007). education professionals and the construction of human rights education. comparative education review, 51(1), 48-70. https://doi.org/10.2307/4122376 https://doi.org/10.1086/508638 taba, h. (1945). general techniques of curriculum planning. in n. b. henry (ed.), american education in the postwar period. 45th yearbook, national society for the study of education (vol. 1, pp. 80-115). chicago: university of chicago press. tibbitts, f. l. (2017). revisiting 'emerging models of human rights education'. international journal of human rights education, 1(1). retrieved from http://repository.usfca.edu/ijhre/vol1/iss1/2 https://doi.org/10.9783/9780812293890-005 tyack, d. b. (2003). seeking common ground: public schools in a diverse society. cambridge, ma: harvard university press. united nations general assembly. (2011). declaration on human rights education and training. new york: the united nations. united nations high commissioner for human rights. (2005). revised draft plan of action for the first phase (2005-2007) of the world programme for human rights education. new york: u.n. general assembly, office of the high commissioner for human rights. retrieved november 20, 2017, from http://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/wphre/firstphase /pages/planaction.aspx wexler, p. (1987). social analysis of education. new york: routledge. young, m. f. d. (1971). knowledge and control: new directions for the sociology of education. london: collier-macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1016/s00199958(71)90651-6 young, m. f. d. (2008). bringing knowledge back in: from social constructivism to social realism in the sociology of education. london: routledge. young, m. f. d. (2013). overcoming the crisis in curriculum theory: a knowledgehttps://doi.org/10.9783/9780812293890-003 https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189x015002004 https://doi.org/10.1080/0305764x.2011.651205 https://doi.org/10.2307/4122376 https://doi.org/10.1086/508638 http://repository.usfca.edu/ijhre/vol1/iss1/2 https://doi.org/10.9783/9780812293890-005 http://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/wphre/firstphase/pages/planaction.aspx http://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/wphre/firstphase/pages/planaction.aspx https://doi.org/10.1016/s0019-9958(71)90651-6 https://doi.org/10.1016/s0019-9958(71)90651-6 human rights education review – volume 1(1) 24 based approach. journal of curriculum studies, 45(2), 101-118. https://doi.org/10.1080/00220272.2013.764505 young, m., & lambert, d. (2014). knowledge and the future school: curriculum and social justice. london: bloomsbury. zembylas, m., charalambous, p., charalambous, c., & lesta, s. (2017). toward a critical hermeneutical approach of human rights education: universal ideals, contextual realities and teachers' difficulties. journal of curriculum studies, 49(4), 497-517. https://doi.org/10.1080/00220272.2016.1188156 https://doi.org/10.1080/00220272.2013.764505 https://doi.org/10.1080/00220272.2016.1188156 human rights education’s curriculum problem introduction problem: access to what? solution: toward an episteme for hre bringing knowledge back in strategies conclusion acknowledgement notes reinventing freire: a political and childhood reading of education issn: 2535-5406 vol 5, no 2 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4586 date of publication 08-06-2022 © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org book and media reviews reinventing freire: a political and childhood reading of education kohan, w. o. (2021). paulo freire. a philosophical biography. london: bloomsbury publishing. 277pp., £13.99 (paperback) isbn: 978-1-35019598-1; £58.50 (hardcover) isbn: 978-1-3501-9599-8; £12.59 (ebook) isbn: 978-1-3501-9600-1; £12.59 (epub & mobi) isbn: 978-1-3501-96018. reviewed by gisselle tur porres swansea university, uk, g.m.turporres@swansea.ac.uk walter omar kohan invites the reader to rediscover paulo freire, in a lively account of freire’s philosophy, pedagogy, life, love, and hope. his book offers the reader an opportunity to think about new dimensions of freire’s work for example, the connection with childhood. this is an unexplored link with freire’s pedagogical thoughts, one that challenges the reader to rethink the significance of childhood and ways of understanding education. educators, practitioners, scholars, students, or any ‘person’ who is interested in equality, social justice, democracy, and non-hierarchical relations will find in this book an opportunity to ‘put the world into question’ and a new way of understanding freire. the book is a learning journey through five philosophical principles that provoke a pedagogy of questioning. each principle raises questions; the author’s intention is not to solve problems about what ‘life’, ‘equality’, ‘love’, ‘errantry’, and ‘childhood’ mean for freire. rather, the point of departure of this journey is a re-reading of freire, and the destination is a new journey, full of questions, images, and transformation. drawing on freire’s life, work, dialogues, and philosophical, political and pedagogical encounters, the book reflects on why freire’s work is still relevant. and it makes us think about what is happening in our societies http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4586 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ hrer book and media reviews 118 and education systems that makes it still necessary to find new ways of questioning power, oppressive relationships, lack of opportunities, and the hidden voices of minorities. in current education policies, discourses, and practices it is common to encounter pedagogic and education approaches that support critical thinking, attempt to give voices to minority groups, and care about inclusive principles and methods. but, in practice, is education transformative? what are the principles we take for granted, and how do they prevent education from becoming ‘emancipatory’, ‘liberating’ or ‘transformative’? travelling back to a time when it was felt that education, emancipation and transformation were possible is one of the strengths of this book. moreover, a dynamic approach to the concept of childhood is presented, a concept which questions how we think about childhood as a chronological time in life. this approach, which goes ‘against’ developmental discourses, offers new opportunities for education. walter omar kohan writes in the introduction: ‘i wish to contribute to thinking about a relevant problem for a philosophical education: how to understand that education is political, or more precisely, that the act of educating is a political act’. (p.11) indeed, kohan’s contribution to a re-thinking of childhood that goes beyond a chronological time or developmental stage is a political act, in a freirean way. it embraces a suspension of time that gives childhood a unique and lifelong voice to transform power relations and to transform educational practices. it appreciates the need to discover the world, the curiosity to understand the world, and the possibility of a new beginning of emancipatory opportunities and transformation. thinking about childhood as another experience of time and space brings a new understanding of the philosophical education of freire, as well as facilitating a dialogical approach towards children. a childlike or childhood approach to education as ‘something that educates’, would have been greatly appreciated to encounter more closely, as kohan indicates in the fifth principle of childhood. the book elaborates on different moments where we encounter freire’s childlike and childhood ‘attitude’ towards questioning, experiencing, transforming life, understanding and questioning the world, and engaging with a new beginning. the recovery of freire’s childhood, as a political act, is an invaluable aspect of this book, one that guarantees we can think about the potentiality of childhood as a form of education and transformation. and a radical childhood approach to education is an interesting and challenging one. this is an approach that allows any person to question their own reality, to keep curiosity alive, to enter into dialogue and different ways of relating to others. a radical approach that, in the end, will allow people to become fully aware of ‘oppressive’ conditions of life, to confront, to transform and to see the world with children’s eyes. this, perhaps, is a good opportunity and moment to consider a childhood approach to education and emancipation. it is also a good time to contribute with transformative new beginnings; not only a beginning of ‘becoming conscious’ and keeping alive the ‘inner’ child, but also a hrer book and media reviews 119 beginning that gives children a ‘time’ in education from their early years and listens to their voices and questions. recovering an image of the child and childhood in education opens a time and space to question and transform the world. this recovery can be a powerful encounter and an opportunity for further discussion within the education community to celebrate childhood, to understand our present and transform our future. a hope that can become a philosophy for a liberatory and emancipatory education. reinventing freire: a political and childhood reading of education volume 3, no 2 (2020) date received: 11-09-2020 opinon piece doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3996 issn 2535-5406 the covid-19 pandemic: a challenge and an opportunity for human rights educators abraham magendzo universidad academia de humanismo cristiano (uahc), chile. with audrey osler university of leeds, uk and university of south-eastern norway, norway. abstract: in this opinion piece, abraham magendzo and audrey osler discuss a range of challenges facing educators, many of which are thrown into sharper relief by the covid-19 crisis. both authors see the need for deep reflection within the community of human rights educators and recognise the crisis as an opportunity for informed dialogue among educators and between teachers and their students. they highlight elements of international and regional (european and inter-american) human rights instruments within which this dialogue might be set. osler stresses how the human rights framework was created out of a period of crisis, and is designed to be used in times such as the one in which we are living. any attempt by state authorities to bypass human rights in the time of coronavirus needs to be resisted. magendzo proposes a series of concrete questions to provoke discussion and debate among educators and among students. corresponding author: abraham magendzo: magendzoabraham14@gmail.com http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3996 mailto:magendzoabraham14@gmail.com human rights education review – volume 3(2) 69 the covid-19 pandemic: a challenge and an opportunity for human rights educators doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3996 issn 2535-5406 abraham magendzo universidad academia de humanismo cristiano (uahc), chile. magendzoabraham14@gmail.com with audrey osler university of leeds, uk and university of south-eastern norway, norway. a.h.osler@leeds.co.uk human rights: tools for a crisis audrey osler how might human rights education help learners around the world traverse the global crisis of the coronavirus pandemic? this is the timely question behind abraham magendzo’s reflections on human rights and human rights education (hre). he has written this to develop a conversation about human rights education at a time of crisis. we include it as an opinion piece in this edition of human rights education review because we believe it to be pertinent to many educators who want to discuss the human rights implications of the crisis on children’s education. what can human rights education offer in the circumstances in which we find ourselves? to answer this question, it is important to remind ourselves of the context in which the modern human rights project was conceived. in 1948, when the universal declaration of human rights (un, 1948) was agreed upon, communities across the globe were reeling from several decades of global upheaval, including two world wars, the ‘spanish flu’ pandemic of 1918-1920, which killed tens of millions of people, and the economic depression of the 1930s. history illustrates how societies under pressure frequently turn in on themselves and how many citizens living under such stress may be attracted to ‘strong’ authoritarian leaders. uncertainty generates fear and, in such circumstances, people may well turn on each other and look for scapegoats. such patterns risk repetition today. the body of human rights law established in the 1940s has not ossified but has expanded over the years. magendzo does not claim to provide comprehensive coverage of human rights values and legal frameworks, but he nonetheless brings together in one place a collection of ideas and resources designed to support educators, whether or not they self-identify as human rights educators. there are many reasons why it would be a mistake to suspend the human rights standards, checks and balances that history has shown to be so important. these checks and balances protect us from illiberal actions by governments. human rights enable and support critical voices who ask difficult questions. critical voices may seem annoying and irrelevant at times of crisis, but they are a central means by which we hold governments to account. they are essential to democracy. the questions that magendzo poses are not new questions, but ones which governments and citizens repeatedly face. the process of building healthy, democratic societies requires educators to engage with these questions and to mailto:magendzoabraham14@gmail.com mailto:a.h.osler@leeds.co.uk a.magendzo with a.osler 70 support their students in doing the same. this engagement with complex human rights dilemmas is at the core of citizenship education. human rights have helped shape our institutions, our governments and courts, in ways that take into consideration our basic rights to life, liberty, freedom of expression, and so on. they are there to serve as an underpinning set of values or principles, ensuring that these institutions continue to function effectively when a crisis occurs. in good times, but particularly in times of crisis, such as the one in which we are living, governments are required to make difficult moral decisions that require a balancing of rights: they are required to allocate resources; they may need to decide when certain rights and privileges should be suspended; and whether to protect the many or the few. at the centre of the human rights framework are two key concepts: the right to life and that of human dignity. all other rights follow from the right to life, expressed in the 1948 universal declaration of human rights (article 3) and the 1950 european convention on human rights (echr) (article 2) (un, 1948; council of europe, 1950). without the right to life, other rights do not exist. nation-states have quite a lot of leeway in protecting the right to life, allowing them to temporarily suspend other rights to guarantee and protect life. this is recognised in the echr, where under article 5, ‘the lawful detention of persons for the prevention of the spreading of infectious diseases’ is permitted (council of europe, 1950). the world health organization’s (who) 2005 international health regulations confirm that any health measures should be implemented ‘with full respect for the dignity, human rights and fundamental freedoms of persons’ (who, 2016: article 3). while there is considerable leeway for a state to protect citizens against the impact of a pandemic by suspending certain rights, this scope is not unlimited. human dignity or worth cannot be earned and cannot be taken away. the government cannot torture people or treat them in an inhuman and degrading way. the government should not detain people unless it can be shown to be necessary and proportionate. effectively, the ways in which specific governments act to address the pandemic reveal the values of the country, the state of democracy and the extent of the culture of human rights in that country. as canadian prime minister justin trudeau observes, covid-19 throws a spotlight on democracy, highlighting: impacts of the pandemic on the state of democracy around the world. from enabling the free flow of information to ensuring transparency and accountability, democracy has an important role to play in helping us confront the global pandemic. (trudeau, 2020) the council of europe commissioner for human rights reminds us of the principles of equality of dignity and non-discrimination: the enjoyment of human rights is affected by the pandemic and the measures adopted to encounter it. […] it is therefore crucial that the authorities take measures that do not lead to discrimination and are proportionate to the aims pursued. access to health care for all population groups based on sound medical evidence is clearly the priority. positive measures are required to meet the specific needs of the groups at particularly high risk. (council of europe, 2020) human rights education review – volume 3(2) 71 a report by human rights watch (2020) published in the early months of the pandemic highlights a wide range of key human rights issues arising from lockdown measures. importantly, ensuring that emergency powers are properly scrutinised and that they are time-limited is critical to the protection of citizens’ rights. all affected by emergency measures, such as quarantine, need to be aware of their human rights. governments need to ensure that citizens have access to the full factual picture. this is essential so that citizens can be assured that government decisions are both rational and transparent. finally, and importantly, as magendzo makes clear, looking at potential and actual responses to the coronavirus through a human rights lens does not generate easy answers. yet is essential that educators and students have opportunities to explore the issue in depth. as eleanor roosevelt, one of the architects of the udhr reminds us: ‘human rights begin in small places close to home’ (roosevelt, 1958). this implies that human rights educators live by these same human rights values, and that we look out for each other and for our students. we need to think how we can each protect vulnerable people. it is by modelling kindness, or what noddings (2013) refers to as ‘an ethics of care’ that human rights will be strengthened and will make sense to learners. some teachers in the city where i live illustrated this when schools were closed by turning their school into a food bank and delivering parcels to the families of students in need. a human rights curriculum needs to build empathy and care, as well as skills of criticality. it can be strengthened by human rights educators modelling care and kindness. by such means, learners understand and experience the reality of interdependence and solidarity. human rights knowledge and an ability to ask difficult questions will be meaningless unless they are matched with a commitment to justice in action. we have the human rights laws and tools to address a crisis. our role as educators must be to communicate them more effectively so that we strengthen a culture of human rights, one that will outlive the pandemic. a challenge and an opportunity for educators abraham magendzo the pandemic we are experiencing has motivated reflections and deliberations in all countries, from a variety of perspectives. we, as human rights educators, cannot abstract ourselves from reality and must necessarily think, and talk (albeit it virtually) among ourselves and, above all, with our students, about the human rights implications of this crisis. we should, as educators, insist on the principle that human rights are indivisible and interdependent. while the right to life is absolute, there is no hierarchy of rights, so that violations or consequences of specific rights should not be addressed in isolation from other rights. no human right is more important than another. interdependence means that all human rights are interrelated. however, it should be noted that human rights have limitations or restrictions established by the public authorities and the authorities exercise these limitations in different ways. public authorities should conform to human rights standards, acknowledging the structural limits within which they operate. according to the vienna declaration, any application of restrictions must be understood as exceptional (ohchr, 1993). i am suggesting, then, that human rights educators in the time of the pandemic need to be aware that although the right to life is fundamental, it is necessary to clarify the extent to which other rights are affected and demand that the state be cautious in acting to restrict rights. we should make it clear in our educational work that, during the mid-1980s, a.magendzo with a.osler 72 the un economic and social council (ecosoc) and the un human rights committee addressed situations of emergency and freedom of movement and provided authoritative guidelines on government responses that restrict human rights for reasons of public health or national emergency. any measure taken to protect the population that limits people's rights and freedoms must be legal, necessary, and proportional. according to the 1984 siracusa principles, that address potential limitations on the provisions of the 1966 international covenant on civil and political rights (iccpr) (united nations, 1966), states of emergency must be of limited duration and any reduction in rights must take into account the disproportionate impact on specific populations or marginalized groups (american association for the international commission of jurists [aaicj], 1985). furthermore, the siracusa principles specifically state that, minimally, restrictions should:  be imposed and applied in accordance with the law.  respond to a legitimate objective of general interest.  be strictly necessary for a democratic society to achieve its objective.  be as less invasive and restrictive as possible to achieve your objective.  based on scientific evidence and not applied in an arbitrary or discriminatory mode.  have a limited duration, be respectful of human dignity, and be subject to revision.  address concerns in the field of human rights (aaicj, 1985). referring specifically to the coronavirus pandemic, the united nations high commissioner for human rights, michelle bachelet, stresses that emergency measures should not be used as a cover for human rights abuses: emergency powers should not be a weapon governments can wield to quash dissent, control the population, and even perpetuate their time in power. exceptional measures should be used to cope effectively with the pandemic – nothing more, nothing less. […]. violations [by police and security forces] have often been committed against people belonging to the poorest and most vulnerable segments of the population. […] in some cases, people are dying because of the inappropriate application of measures that have been supposedly put in place to save them. (ohchr, 2020) according to the inter-american commission on human rights (iachr), it is the gross inequalities and social divides of the region that leave populations vulnerable to adverse health and economic outcomes of covid-19: the americas are the region of highest inequality on the planet, characterized by profound social divides where poverty and extreme poverty are problems that cut across all countries of the region, along with the lack of or poor access to drinking water and sanitation, food insecurity, environmental pollution and the lack of adequate housing. all of this prevents or makes it difficult for millions of people to take basic measures to prevent the disease. (iachr, 2020: introduction) human rights education review – volume 3(2) 73 the iachr re-emphasises that governments introducing emergency measures should: ensure that any and all restrictions or limitations placed on human rights to protect health in the context of the covid-19 pandemic comply with the requirements of international human rights law. in particular, such restrictions must comply with the principle of legality, be necessary for a democratic society and therefore be strictly proportionate to achieving the legitimate purpose of protecting health. (iachr, 2020: article 20) additionally, in the event of establishing a state of emergency, the iachr reminds governments that: i) it must be stated that an exceptional emergency situation does exist, the seriousness, imminence and intensity of which represent a real threat to the independence and security of the state; ii) the suspension of some rights and guarantees is only for a period of time strictly limited to the requirements of the situation; iii) the measures taken are proportionate, that suspension of rights or guarantees is the only means of addressing the situation, and that it cannot be dealt with by the use of the regular powers of government, and that the measures taken do not cause greater harm to the right that is suspended in comparison with the benefit obtained; and iv) the measures taken are not incompatible with other obligations under international law and do not entail any type of discrimination on the basis of, in particular, race, colour, sex, language, religion or social origin. (iachr, 2020: article 21) amnesty international (2020) has drawn up a 10-point action plan that human rights educators may discuss with learners to consider the impact of the pandemic and consequent government actions on our everyday lives. this is a summary of the key points: 1. quarantines, particularly those that affect the right to liberty and security of persons, are only permissible if carried out in a non-discriminatory manner: ‘they must be of limited duration and reviewed periodically, and if there are several types of possible limitations, the least restrictive should be adopted’. 2. the same is true of travel restrictions and prohibitions, which can also affect the right to freedom of movement. when they are imposed, they must be legitimate, necessary, and proportional, i.e., the least restrictive of all possible alternatives, and non-discriminatory. 3. states must ensure that all affected individuals and communities have access to clear, accessible, timely, and meaningful information on the nature and degree of the threat to health, information on possible measures taken to mitigate risks, as well as early warning information about possible future consequences and ongoing response initiatives. 4. states must ensure that everyone has access to social security, including sick leave, health care, and parental leave, if they are sick or in quarantine, or if they need to take care of dependents, including children affected by school closures. 5. health workers are at the forefront of this epidemic. states should minimise a.magendzo with a.osler 74 occupational risks and ensure provision of adequate and quality personal protective equipment, information, training, and psychological support. 6. international standards on the right to health indicate that health care goods, facilities, and services, including access to care and future vaccines and cures developed for covid-19, must be available in sufficient quantity for all, especially for the most vulnerable and marginalised sectors of the population, who should have access to them without discrimination. 7. the right to health includes both physical and mental health. 8. according to the world health organization (who, n.d.), the elderly and those with pre-existing medical conditions (such as asthma, diabetes, or heart disease) seem to be more exposed to becoming seriously ill with the virus. thus, states must do everything possible to protect them. however, we cannot forget that there are other vulnerable groups, including people living in poverty, who have less access to preventive measures. 9. women and girls may also experience particular and disproportionate impacts: ‘all response efforts should include a gender analysis to ensure that the rights of women, girls, and gender non-conforming people are protected and that receive appropriate support’. 10. solidarity and cooperation are more necessary than ever. as i have already pointed out, the pandemic challenges us to examine a series of issues relate to human rights more deeply with our learners, in both formal and informal settings. of course, we should address the right to life and health, the right to liberties and non-discrimination, the right to education, and the right to work. we should also analyse the rights of persons deprived of liberty who have been affected by the pandemic. the right to life undoubtedly, and it could not be otherwise, all countries have focused on protecting udhr article 3, the right to life: ‘every individual has the right to life, to freedom and the security of his person’ (un, 1948, article 3). it is important to note that the right to life is placed on the same level as freedoms and security, meaning that they are interrelated. in guaranteeing the rights of all people without distinction, states have implemented (some more than others) a series of measures that safeguard the right to life: isolation, quarantine, use of masks, the medical care of people infected by the virus, closure of schools and businesses, cancellation of sporting and artistic events, additional forms of surveillance, and so on. addressing the right to life provides human rights educators with an opportunity to deepen the dialogue on a series of controversial issues:  is it possible, on the one hand, to defend the right to life by taking extreme measures and, on the other, to validate and approve the death penalty (capital punishment)?  should intensive treatments be guaranteed to patients with greater chances of therapeutic success? should treatments privilege those patients with the longest life expectancy?  does it make sense to worry about what will happen to the economy and the right to development before focusing now, above all, on the right to life? human rights education review – volume 3(2) 75 freedom of movement some measures adopted in order to control the pandemic, such as quarantine and isolation, although justified, call into question the right to freedom of movement and migration that is guaranteed in the udhr: ‘everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state‘, and ‘everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country’ (un, 1948: article 13). it is important to note that restrictions on these rights can only be imposed when they are legal, have a legitimate purpose, and when the restrictions are proportional, even after evaluating their impact. it should be noted that quarantine limits freedom of movement, even for people who may not be infected, to prevent the virus from spreading. human rights educators should invite a dialogue and reflection with learners about whether some rights can be limited to protect others, addressing such questions as:  should there be restrictions on the exercise of rights?  can quarantine be mandatorily imposed?  can people be detained against their will? what is more, those who are in quarantine may not be infected and would be deprived of their freedom without any other basis than the possibility (remote or not) that they pose a risk to others.  can intimidation and even fear be used as a preventative measure? restrictions on the right of movement and on transnational travel have affected the human rights of migrants and their capacity to apply for asylum. there is considerable anti-immigrant rhetoric surrounding the epidemic and some countries have closed their borders. furthermore, the existence of expressions of xenophobia, prejudice, discrimination, and violence against migrants, linking them to the origin and spread of the pandemic, is evidence of targeted human rights abuse. clearly discriminatory and offensive language has been used when referring to the coronavirus as the ‘chinese virus’. in some countries, borders have been closed specifically to prevent immigration. the united nations network on migration (2020) suggests that nation-states protect migrants by implementing a number of measures: prevention; adequate testing and treatment; continued and increased access to emergency shelters for the homeless, without there being any barriers related to immigration status; and suspension of evictions. i reiterate that i am not disallowing the use of quarantine and isolation to control the spread of the virus, but instead motivating human rights educators to open up dialogues as to whether these measures or others are affecting human rights. for example, by asking the following questions:  is receiving information about infected people through cell phones or disclosing personal data, as in south korea, an interference with private life? the udhr is categorical in this regard: ‘no one shall be the object of arbitrary interference in his privacy, family, home or correspondence’ (un, 1948, article 12).  what measures need be taken to reduce violence against women, since the data shows that, far from decreasing, such crimes are increasing in many countries during the pandemic? (un women, 2020)  are state security and police forces proceeding appropriately (legally) or committing abuses against people who violate the curfew or quarantine orders? a.magendzo with a.osler 76 the right to education human rights educators need to ask to what extent the suspension of schooling, in order to prevent contagion, is a violation of the right to education under the udhr (article 26) and 1966 international covenant on economic social and cultural rights (icescr) (article 13) (un, 1948, 1966). these articles emphasise that the right to education must be exercised without discrimination. it should be noted that studying at home through remote learning platforms to complement regular school attendance is an alternative adopted in many countries. however, it carries a degree of discrimination, given that a considerable percentage of students do not have the necessary and adequate technological means to engage in distance learning. indeed, according to data from the international telecommunication union (itu), the percentage of people connected to the internet has increased considerably. at the same time, the itu highlights how: the internet is almost saturated in developed countries; the network is only within the reach of 47% of people in developing countries; and the situation is particularly critical in the 48 least developed countries where only 19% of their inhabitants are on line (itu, 2019). the united nations economic, scientific and cultural organization (unesco) reported in march 2020 that half of the total students in the world (about 826 million) were unable to attend school due to the pandemic (unesco, 2020). with digital remote learning the only option for ensuring the continuity of education for these children, the itc figures suggest that around 53 per cent of children in developing countries, and around 13 per cent in the wealthiest countries are without access to education. in addition, a large number of families in large cities live in micro-apartments of 18-40 square meters. these homes do not allow students to study properly. there is little space and there are people of all ages, including children and elders, who must adapt to this reality. furthermore, these homes do not respond to the standards of the udhr: ‘everyone has the right to an adequate standard of living adequate for the health of himself and his family, including food, clothing, housing, medical care and necessary social services’ (un, 1948: article 25, 1). the icescr protects the right to adequate housing and recognises ‘the right of everyone to an adequate standard of living for himself and his family, including adequate food, clothing and housing, and to the continuous improvement of living conditions’ (un, 1966: article 11). the concept of adequate housing means a space that provides adequate security, lighting, ventilation, basic infrastructure, and an adequate environment in relation to work and basic services. it also means having a place where one can be isolated, if desired. additionally, it is important to note that research in many countries, especially developing ones, has shown that teachers do not necessarily have the appropriate professional expertise to provide virtual education in times of the coronavirus (infodev, n.d.). it should not be forgotten that the majority of teachers are trained to teach face-to-face classes. human rights educators must, therefore, establish dialogues in relation to questions such as:  is the separation of students from schools on reasonable grounds not increasing inequalities and obstructing learning opportunities for the most vulnerable?  if teachers are not prepared to teach at a distance, is there any point in insisting on this modality? human rights education review – volume 3(2) 77  who decides when the students return to classes: the ministry of education or the ministry of health?  what messages does the pandemic deliver regarding the changes that need to be made to national educational systems? the right to work one right that has been seriously affected and should be a concern of human rights educators is the right to work, which includes the protection of workers and enterprises. the udhr states: everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment. every person who works has the right to a just and favourable remuneration, ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity, and supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection. (un, 1948: article 23.1 and 23.3) the international labour organization (ilo) 1998 declaration on fundamental principles and rights at work establishes that these rights are universal and that they apply to all people in all countries, regardless of the level of economic development (ilo, 1998). it addresses particular groups with special needs, such as the unemployed and migrant workers. it recognises that economic growth alone is insufficient to ensure equity and social progress and to eradicate poverty. the right to work has been seriously affected by the pandemic across the globe. a report by the ilo (2020) calculated that the covid-19 pandemic would bring about the disappearance of 6.7% of the world’s hourly jobs between april and june 2020. this is equivalent to the loss of 195 million full-time jobs. the most affected sectors, especially in low and middle-income countries, have a high proportion of workers in informal employment, with limited access to health services and social protection. in terms of employment at risk, 44% of workers in latin america are in sectors that are considered high risk, according to the ilo. this is a figure substantially higher than the global average, which is calculated as 38% of the workforce. faced with this dramatic situation for workers and companies, governments have developed diverse and varied policies aimed at preserving labour relations. these are financial policies aimed at protecting workers, protecting valuable employment relationships, and preventing company bankruptcies. it is important to note that the right to work in developing countries has been affected not only by the pandemic. its precariousness has been historical. it is not surprising then that wage and other work-related demands have been strongly expressed in the protests that took place in several countries prior to the pandemic. furthermore, there is uncertainty regarding the right to work, given that there is the possibility of a deep recession and a subsequent wave of layoffs. that the pandemic is seriously affecting workers is an issue that human rights educators should address. basic questions regarding the relationship between work and human rights need to be considered:  who is responsible for guaranteeing the right to work? the state, employers or workers?  why are many countries not implementing the right to equitable and satisfactory remuneration, in accordance with human dignity? a.magendzo with a.osler 78  the ilo has pointed out that the pandemic is not only a health crisis it is also a social and economic crisis. is the ilo right? deprivation of liberty one issue that has come to the fore during the pandemic is the situation of persons deprived of their liberty. human rights educators should pay close attention to this issue in relation to prison populations. there are those who think that prisoners have violated rights and are therefore not entitled to claim their rights. this position is not compatible with the udhr since: everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. (un, 1948, article 2) this includes, of course, the condition of being deprived of liberty. furthermore, the udhr asserts that: ‘everyone has the right to an adequate standard of living that ensures health and well-being, including […] medical care […]’ (un, 1948 article 25.1) and this, without a doubt, includes prisoners. for its part, the icescr recognises ‘the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health’ (un, 1966, article 12.1). this point should be underlined since, during the pandemic, there have been serious problems concerning prisons and prison populations in some countries, and this should be analysed and discussed by human rights educators. since its establishment, the iachr has devoted special attention to the situation of persons deprived of liberty in the americas. the commission (iachr, 2020) has found that respect for the rights of persons deprived of liberty is one of the main challenges faced by the member states of the organization of american states. the nature of the problems identified in this report reveals the existence of serious structural shortcomings that gravely impair non‐derogable human rights, such as the right to life and to the humane treatment of inmates. the main concern in recent weeks is not overcrowding, poverty and violence, but preventing the spread of covid-19 and death behind bars. drinking water and soap are in scarce supply while prisoners' demands for greater protection against contagion are increasing. the growing fear of the virus has led to strikes, escapes, and prison riots in chile, brazil, colombia, peru, argentina and other locations. in these countries, in order to correct the problem of overcrowding and contagion, it has been decided to free prisoners, excluding, for example in chile, individuals who have committed violent crimes, femicide, rape, child abuse, and crimes against humanity. regarding the last-mentioned group, who violated human rights during the civic-military dictatorship (1973-1990), a debate has arisen in the country. some chileans maintain that they should be treated like other prisoners who, due to age or illness, are allowed to complete their sentences at home with their relatives. others present convincing arguments that they should not enjoy this prerogative. it is important for human rights educators to engage in dialogue with students on this debate, always with the understanding that human rights violations are inexcusable. in summary, human rights educators can raise questions such as: human rights education review – volume 3(2) 79  should prisoners who have violated other people's rights have their rights respected?  should persons deprived of liberty who have committed crimes against humanity during dictatorships be granted amnesty and sent home when they are seriously ill, advanced in age, and have served a significant part of their sentences?  can people who have committed crimes against humanity be released on humanitarian grounds, as long as they acknowledge their crimes, tell the truth, and ask for forgiveness; or in all cases should they be forgiven and released? concluding remarks i wish to stress that, in my opinion, human rights education needs to carefully analyse the implications of the various measures and restrictions that have been adopted to control the coronavirus epidemic. in the words of amnesty international (2020): ‘censorship, discrimination, arbitrary detention and human rights violations have no place in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic. human rights violations impede, rather than facilitate, responses to public health emergencies, and reduce their effectiveness’. in other words, the health emergency should not be used as an excuse to engage in practices that violate human rights, nor to introduce unnecessarily repressive acts with the aim of protecting health. nor should actions be taken to silence the work of human rights defenders. the right to health, as guaranteed by the udhr, presupposes a number of related rights: the right to accessible health care; the right to access information; the prohibition of discrimination in the provision of medical services; the freedom not to receive medical treatment without consent; and other important guarantees. quarantines, which restrict the right to freedom of movement, can only be justified under international law if they are proportionate, time-limited, imposed for legitimate purposes, strictly necessary, and applied in a non-discriminatory manner. acknowledgements abraham magendzo and audrey osler thank kristi rudelius-palmer, university of minnesota, usa, for her insights and generous editorial work. a.magendzo with a.osler 80 references american association for the international commission of jurists. (1985). siracusa principles on the limitation and derogation provisions in the international covenant on civil and political rights. retrieved from https://www.icj.org/wp-content/uploads/1984/07/siracusa-principlesiccpr-legal-submission-1985-eng.pdf amnesty international. (2020). responses to covid-19 and states’ human rights obligations: preliminary observations. retrieved from https://www.amnestyusa.org/press-releases/responses-to-covid-19-andstates-human-rights-obligations-preliminary-observations/ council of europe. (1950). european convention for the protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms. signed at rome, 4 november. retrieved from https://www.echr.coe.int/documents/convention_eng.pdf council of europe. (2020, march 16). we must respect human rights and stand united against the coronavirus pandemic. statement from the commissioner for human rights. retrieved from https://www.coe.int/en/web/commissioner/-/we-must-respect-humanrights-and-stand-united-against-the-coronavirus-pandemic human rights watch. (2020, march 19). human rights dimensions of covid-19 response. retrieved from https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/03/19/human-rights-dimensions-covid19-response infodev (n.d.). quick guide: icts in education challenges and research questions. retrieved from https://www.infodev.org/articles/quick-guide-icts-education-challengesand-research-questions international labour organization. (2020, june 30). ilo monitor: covid-19 and the world of work. fifth edition updated estimates and analysis. retrieved from https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/@dgreports/@dcomm/docu ments/briefingnote/wcms_749399.pdf international telecommunications union. (2019). measuring digital development, facts and figures 2019. geneva: itu. retrieved from https://www.itu.int/en/itud/statistics/documents/facts/factsfigures2019.pdf inter-american commission on human rights. (2011). report on the human rights of persons deprived of liberty in the americas. retrieved from https://www.oas.org/en/iachr/pdl/docs/pdf/ppl2011eng.pdf inter-american commission on human rights. (2020). pandemic and human rights in the americas. resolution no. 1/2020. adopted by the iachr on april 10. retrieved from https://www.oas.org/en/iachr/decisions/pdf/resolution1-20-en.pdf noddings, n. (2013). caring: a relational approach to ethics and moral education (2nd ed.). berkeley, ca: university of california press office of the high commissioner for human rights. (1993). vienna declaration and programme of action. adopted by the world conference on human rights in vienna on 25 june. retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/vienna.aspx office of the high commissioner for human rights. (2020). covid-19: exceptional measures should not be cover for human rights abuses and violations– https://www.icj.org/wp-content/uploads/1984/07/siracusa-principles-iccpr-legal-submission-1985-eng.pdf https://www.icj.org/wp-content/uploads/1984/07/siracusa-principles-iccpr-legal-submission-1985-eng.pdf https://www.amnestyusa.org/press-releases/responses-to-covid-19-and-states-human-rights-obligations-preliminary-observations/ https://www.amnestyusa.org/press-releases/responses-to-covid-19-and-states-human-rights-obligations-preliminary-observations/ https://www.echr.coe.int/documents/convention_eng.pdf about:blank about:blank https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/03/19/human-rights-dimensions-covid-19-response https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/03/19/human-rights-dimensions-covid-19-response https://www.infodev.org/articles/quick-guide-icts-education-challenges-and-research-questions https://www.infodev.org/articles/quick-guide-icts-education-challenges-and-research-questions https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/@dgreports/@dcomm/documents/briefingnote/wcms_749399.pdf https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/@dgreports/@dcomm/documents/briefingnote/wcms_749399.pdf https://www.itu.int/en/itu-d/statistics/documents/facts/factsfigures2019.pdf https://www.itu.int/en/itu-d/statistics/documents/facts/factsfigures2019.pdf https://www.oas.org/en/iachr/pdl/docs/pdf/ppl2011eng.pdf https://www.oas.org/en/iachr/decisions/pdf/resolution-1-20-en.pdf https://www.oas.org/en/iachr/decisions/pdf/resolution-1-20-en.pdf https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/vienna.aspx human rights education review – volume 3(2) 81 bachelet. retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/en/newsevents/pages/displaynews.aspx?newsi d=25828&langid=e roosevelt, e. (1958). excerpt from a speech made at the presentation of ‘in your hands: a guide for community action for the tenth anniversary of the universal declaration of human rights.’ 27 march, united nations, new york. retrieved from https://www.carnegiecouncil.org/publications/100_for_100/in-yourhands-a-guide-for-community-action trudeau, j. (2020, september 15). prime minister of canada: statement on the international day of democracy. retrieved from https://pm.gc.ca/en/news/statements/2020/09/15/statement-primeminister-international-day-democracy united nations. (1948). universal declaration of human rights. adopted by general assembly resolution 217 a of 10 december. retrieved from https://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/ united nations. (1966). international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights. adopted and opened for signature, ratification and accession by general assembly resolution 2200a (xxi) of 16 december. retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/cescr.aspx. united nations economic, scientific and cultural organization. (2020, march 19). half the world's student population not attending school: unesco launches a global coalition to accelerate deployment of remote learning solutions. retrieved from https://en.unesco.org/news/half-worlds-studentpopulation-not-attending-school-unesco-launches-global-coalitionaccelerate united nations network on migration. (2020, july 8). standing in solidarity with migrants: supporting civil society & other stakeholders in responding to the covid-19 pandemic. retrieved from https://migrationnetwork.un.org/standing-solidarity-migrants-supportingcivil-society-other-stakeholders-responding-covid-19 https://www.ohchr.org/en/newsevents/pages/displaynews.aspx?newsid=25828&langid=e https://www.ohchr.org/en/newsevents/pages/displaynews.aspx?newsid=25828&langid=e https://www.carnegiecouncil.org/publications/100_for_100/in-your-hands-a-guide-for-community-action https://www.carnegiecouncil.org/publications/100_for_100/in-your-hands-a-guide-for-community-action https://pm.gc.ca/en/news/statements/2020/09/15/statement-prime-minister-international-day-democracy https://pm.gc.ca/en/news/statements/2020/09/15/statement-prime-minister-international-day-democracy https://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/ https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/cescr.aspx https://en.unesco.org/news/half-worlds-student-population-not-attending-school-unesco-launches-global-coalition-accelerate https://en.unesco.org/news/half-worlds-student-population-not-attending-school-unesco-launches-global-coalition-accelerate https://en.unesco.org/news/half-worlds-student-population-not-attending-school-unesco-launches-global-coalition-accelerate https://migrationnetwork.un.org/standing-solidarity-migrants-supporting-civil-society-other-stakeholders-responding-covid-19 https://migrationnetwork.un.org/standing-solidarity-migrants-supporting-civil-society-other-stakeholders-responding-covid-19 a.magendzo with a.osler 82 un women. (2020, april 6). violence against women and girls: the shadow pandemic. statement by phumzile mlambo-ngcuka, executive director. retrieved from https://www.unwomen.org/en/news/stories/2020/4/statement-edphumzile-violence-against-women-during-pandemic world health organization. (n.d). coronavirus disease (covid-19) advice for the public: mythbusters. retrieved from https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus2019/advice-for-public/myth-busters world health organization. (2016). international heath regulations 2005 (3rd ed.). retrieved from https://www.who.int/ihr/publications/9789241580496/en/ https://www.unwomen.org/en/news/stories/2020/4/statement-ed-phumzile-violence-against-women-during-pandemic https://www.unwomen.org/en/news/stories/2020/4/statement-ed-phumzile-violence-against-women-during-pandemic https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/advice-for-public/myth-busters https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/advice-for-public/myth-busters https://www.who.int/ihr/publications/9789241580496/en/ majority rights and minority responsibilities: young people’s negotiations with human rights issn: 2535-5406 vol 4, no 3 (2021) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4585 date of publication 29-10-2021 © 2021 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org book and media reviews diverse international perspectives on the value of human rights and human rights education roux, c & becker, a. (eds.) (2019) human rights literacies: future directions. cham: springer; 311 pp., issn 2509-2960 issn 2509-2979 (electronic); interdisciplinary studies in human rights; isbn 978-3-31999566-3; isbn 978-3-319-99567-0 (ebook); https://doi.org/10.1007/9783-319-99567-0 reviewed by uvanney maylor university of bedfordshire, united kingdom, uvanney.maylor@beds.ac.uk this edited collection by roux and becker (2019) critically examines differences between human rights philosophies and how human rights play out in practice. it looks at human rights education (hre) and human rights literacies in diverse contexts and geographical spaces in south africa, germany, the netherlands, the uk, israel and india. the book comprises 12 chapters that are explored in three sections. the first section, ‘setting the scene’, prepares readers for understanding the various ways in which diverse groups of people/cultures have been included, excluded and marginalised in society. the introductory opening chapter examines ‘boschi’s (2016) ‘culture of remembrance’, which argues for ‘a culture of remembering of the suffering of others, not only those for one’s own ethnic group or nation’ (p. 9). such remembrance draws attention to power relations: between colonisers and colonised in western, asian and european empires; between slaves and slave owners; and between developing and developed countries. pertinently, in ‘setting the scene’ readers are reminded that a change of status, such as from being colonised to self-governance, does not http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4585 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ hrer book and media reviews 112 mean that everyone has access to the same human rights or human rights education. the chapter explores how individuals can be empowered to explore ‘human rights education/pedagogical knowledge with insights derived from e.g., united nations educational, scientific and cultural organization (unesco)’s policy on education, re-imaging epistemological/transformation and working in circles or searching for new beginnings’ in human rights. further, the chapter reveals the dissonance between how human rights education is interpreted and the situation of the recipients of human rights education, whilst outlining the possibilities of human rights literacies and consequent pedagogical implications. chapter 2 examines ontological/epistemological in/exclusion through the declaration of the rights of man (sic) and the work of theorists such as kant, descartes and derrida, while chapter 3 draws on critical race theory to examine decoloniality vis-à-vis race, gender and disability, decolonising student movements such as rhodes must fall, human inclusion and power relationships. chapter 4 covers human rights, human rights education and gaps in hre, linking these issues to poverty, the holocaust, peace education, global citizenship education, colonial and post-colonial discourses, and critical approaches and methodologies. the six chapters in the second section, ‘possibilities and probabilities’, are devoted to human rights and human rights education research projects undertaken in schools, universities and teacher education. areas covered include research design, data collection, methodological and analytical approaches, and the perspectives of educators, students and families. the projects studied are located in diverse geographical, spatial and educational contexts. they vividly demonstrate that the need for human rights education is not confined to non-western countries, and that student teachers/ the teaching profession are not exempt from the need for such knowledge-building. a pertinent example here is a longitudinal south african research study entitled ‘human rights literacy: quest for meaning’. this was conducted in two phases between 2012 and 2016, with an additional focus group discussion in 2017 conducted by researchers in the netherlands. the project combines national and international perspectives whilst exploring meaning-making in time, place and space. what is interesting about this study is the collaboration of researchers in south africa, norway, the netherlands, israel and india, which speaks to the ability of researchers with different ethnic, cultural and class backgrounds and educational experiences to coalesce around hre. another project worth noting is ‘sectarian violence and ethnic conflict in india: issues and challenges’. although this is the only project in this section which does not mention human rights in its title, it examines a serious human rights issue the impact of cultural traditions on religion and caste violence. it brings attention to the salience of human rights education in conflict resolution and peacemaking. there are two chapters in the final section, ‘unpacking future directions: critiques and conversations’. ‘human rights rip: human rights literacies—critique and possibilities’ offers a critique of and possibilities for human rights literacies and curriculum development while hrer book and media reviews 113 ‘(re)capturing human rights literacies: starting conversations’ highlights the importance of positioning human rights literacies in time, space and place. the latter chapter discusses a human rights literacies framework developed to create a ‘literacy turn’ (p. 295) alongside bottom-up strategies in different countries that are designed to create ‘liberation possibilities’ by addressing issues of ‘diversity, difference, othering, marginalisation and violence’ (p. 296). global issues of exclusion, inclusion, marginalisation and social justice are key areas addressed in this text. the book’s foreword highlights the following central questions:  how can the united nation declaration of human rights of 1948 become a reality for human beings globally?  what role could human rights education play to make these rights more of a reality worldwide as well as in local situations?  how are they to be re-formed to be efficient?  and what new thinking could guide the way forward in the further development of human rights education, not least given the post-colonial critique of universalism and other renewing contemporary philosophical trends? the role of compulsory education and higher education knowledge systems in maintaining silence around systemic and epistemic violence is also questioned, together with how human rights education can contribute to peace and social justice, and thereby eliminate inequality. the book is decolonial in its approach and this is evident from the outset. for example, it highlights the western lack of knowledge about the african charter of human and people’s rights (1981, 1986) and its contribution to human rights education and philosophies. however, with its emphasis on family, community and liberation from colonialism for the whole african continent, the african charter continues to be important to its signatories in the 21st century and ‘constitutes a different and comparable approach towards the virtues and values of the universal declaration of human rights (udhr) (1948)’ (p.11). the book is rich in detail (literature and empirical studies) and has a strong knowledge base. it is theoretically informed, applies intersectional analyses and through its criticality offers a wealth of opportunities to challenge deficit discourses (including those of student teachers) about african countries/peoples and minority ethnic communities more broadly, alongside interrogating religious differences and mis/understandings. reading the book, i was struck by how much its first part (setting the scene) reminded me of the address haile selassie i delivered at the united nations. the emperor of ethiopia critiqued the ‘subhuman bondage’ that african people suffered under colonialism and called for ‘basic human rights’ to be ‘equally guaranteed to all’, without regard to race (selassie, 1967 p374). fifty-six years later roux and becker’s collection has drawn attention to criticisms of the hrer book and media reviews 114 ontology and epistemology of the universality of western thought and human rights. selassie’s hope for the future was one of ‘world citizenship’ and ‘lasting peace’ where ‘africans’ are able to ‘stand and speak as free beings, equal in the eyes of all men (sic)’ (selassie, 1967, p. 374). just as selassie called for recognition of black peoples’ human rights, this book seeks a future whereby all people are/become knowledgeable about human rights and have the freedom and ability to access human rights education as part of this process. indeed, human rights literacies is a hopeful text with future possibilities for liberation and mechanisms for achieving world peace. this book will be a key contributor to human rights education. it will be invaluable to school/university educators, researchers and policymakers alike. references selassie, h. (1967). selected speeches of his imperial majesty haile selassie i (1918-1967). ethiopia: imperial ethiopian ministry of information. retrieved from https://www.worldcat.org/title/selected-speeches-of-his-imperial-majesty-haile selassie-first-1918-1967/oclc/758016 https://www.worldcat.org/title/selected-speeches-of-his-imperial-majesty-haile-selassie-first-1918-1967/oclc/758016 https://www.worldcat.org/title/selected-speeches-of-his-imperial-majesty-haile-selassie-first-1918-1967/oclc/758016 perspectives about citizenship, human issn: 2535-5406 vol 5, no 2 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4653 date of publication 08-06-2022 © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org book and media reviews perspectives about citizenship, human rights and reconciliation in the postgenocide period garnett russell, s. (2020). becoming rwandan: education, reconciliation, and the making of a post-genocide citizen. new jersey and london: rutgers university press. 255 pp., $28.95 (paperback) isbn: 978-1-9788-0286-5. reviewed by johannes seroto university of south africa, south africa, serotj@unisa.ac.za garnett russell is one of the most prolific scholars in human rights education, reconciliation and peace education in post-conflict societies. russell has produced a number of publications in the context of rwanda. her most recent book, titled becoming rwandan: education, reconciliation, and the making of a post-genocide citizen, is to be applauded as a unique contribution to the complexities and ambiguities in education and policy in rwanda in the post-1994 genocide period. the book investigates ‘the way the rwandan state uses the country’s education system to promote peacebuilding and reconciliation in the aftermath of 1994 genocide’ (p.3). russell critically reviews how the state has selectively positioned itself in global discourses about citizenship and human rights to draw together broader human rights legitimacy to rwanda while simultaneously avoiding discussions of controversial issues. russell uses interviews with government officials, policy makers and academics to demonstrate that even though the rwandan discourse on human rights and reconciliation is prevalent in national and curricular policy documents, open discussion on human rights in the education system has been silenced. http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4653 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ hrer book and media reviews 121 the book consists of six chapters. the first chapter, an introduction, provides an overview of the history of education in rwanda before, during and after the genocide. russell also outlines the research design and methodology she has followed. in her second chapter she provides an insightful discussion on how the rwandan state strategically employs the education system and global rights discourse to promote peace building yet avoids controversial issues of the past. in chapter three, russell engages with strategies the state uses in the education sector to foster its problematic post-genocide peace-building project to create a ‘new civic identity’. russell points out that the use of ethnic terms (e.g., hutu, tutsi) are prohibited; however, she cautions that ethnicity ‘continues to exist with real consequences, even when the government does not officially sanction its existence’ (p.97). chapter four is an extensive account of how the state draws on human rights discourses in some contexts and ignores violations in other ones. using an analysis of national policy documents and interviews, russell illustrates that more current and relevant violations of human rights in rwanda are not mentioned in curriculum documents and not discussed in classroom settings. instead, more general human rights such as gender equality are given privilege. russell argues that the government promotes socio-economic rights and ignores violation of political and civil rights. in chapter five she uses a detailed analysis of national documents, interviews and school observations to illustrate how the rwandan government uses education as one of its arenas to address the past. russell argues: …the manner in which the history of the genocide is taught, and reconciliation is encouraged in schools hinders discussions about the past and creates fear rather than social cohesion, impeding the progress of the regime’s peacebuilding project. moreover, the goals of the peacebuilding are decoupled from the lived realities of students and teachers in schools. (p. 177-178) the narrative around the genocide did not unlock discussion on how multi-ethnicity and diversity could play a pivotal role in peace-building and reconciliation. russell exposes contradictions, complexities and inconsistencies that face teachers and students in their anecdotal engagement with the genocide. russell raises a question in chapter six: are the global discourses in promoting citizenship, human rights and reconciliation efficient if they are diluted and reinterpreted at the local level? in her attempt to address this question, she makes a number of observations: rwanda (under the leadership of the rwandan patriotic front) has not fully succeeded in using global discourses to promote peacebuilding and reconciliation; the government has taken a political stance to engage in a selective and strategic application of human rights; the government forbids discussion of past injustices and human violations in the name of reconciliation resulting in a tension that concerns the ‘nexus between genocide, reconciliation and ethnic identity’ (p. 185). russell argues that in discussions and education, the deliberate disconnect of rwandans from the ethnic identities that led to the genocide is a hrer book and media reviews 122 very serious concern when it comes to peacebuilding and reconciliation. in this chapter russell highlights the fact that issues she raises in the book may be applicable to other countries in post-conflict contexts. the book is well-researched with participants from three districts in rwanda, representing 15 secondary schools that are either government-run, private or religious. the findings are well substantiated, supported by apt interview excerpts, clear statistical tables and striking observation clips. unlike many other books of this nature, russell includes appendices of the survey she conducted, biographies of her participants, and details of data analysis instruments as well as the national documents she perused. the research is clear and is presented in an engaging manner. overall, becoming rwandan: education, reconciliation, and the making of a post-genocide citizen is a pensive account of various perspectives about citizenship, human rights and reconciliation in the post-genocide context of rwanda. this book will be an interesting and useful resource for educators, students, policy makers and researchers exploring peace education, citizenship education and human rights issues. perspectives about citizenship, human rights and reconciliation in the post-genocide period volume 3, no 1 (2020) date received: 07-02-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3724 date accepted: 08-06-2020 issn 2535-5406 human rights teaching: snapshots from four countries carole hahn emory university, usa. abstract: this article examines how some schools with ethnically diverse student populations are teaching about, for, and through human rights. the author conducted a secondary analysis of qualitative data from a multi-site study, which included secondary schools serving students from immigrant backgrounds in four countries: denmark, germany, the netherlands, and the united kingdom (england and scotland). the author found that schools taught about the history of human rights, rights in terms of national constitutions, and violations of human rights in the global south; she observed fewer examples of human rights discourse addressing national and local issues. across schools, students experienced respect of their human rights, through voicing their opinions and contributing to school-level decisions primarily on school councils. some students developed knowledge, skills, and dispositions for exercising their rights and respecting others’ rights as they deliberated issues and took civic action locally and globally. keywords: human rights education, immigrant students, citizenship education, comparative education carole hahn: chahn@emory.edu http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3724 mailto:chahn@emory.edu c. hahn 9 human rights teaching: snapshots from four countries doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3724 issn 2535-5406 carole hahn chahn@emory.edu emory university, usa. abstract: this article examines how some schools with ethnically diverse student populations are teaching about, for, and through human rights. the author conducted a secondary analysis of qualitative data from a multi-site study, which included secondary schools serving students from immigrant backgrounds in four countries: denmark, germany, the netherlands, and the united kingdom (england and scotland). the author found that schools taught about the history of human rights, rights in terms of national constitutions, and violations of human rights in the global south; she observed fewer examples of human rights discourse addressing national and local issues. across schools, students experienced respect of their human rights, through voicing their opinions and contributing to school-level decisions primarily on school councils. some students developed knowledge, skills, and dispositions for exercising their rights and respecting others’ rights as they deliberated issues and took civic action locally and globally. keywords: human rights education, immigrant students, citizenship education, comparative education introduction at this moment in time, the world is witnessing a global health pandemic, a massive economic recession, daily examples of extreme inequality, and racial injustice. such times reveal individuals’ basic instincts for survival. to some it is a time to think and act first to protect their own family, community, and nation. to others, the times demand that we come together, as one human family to tackle overwhelming problems that cannot be solved alone and work harder for justice for all, particularly for the poorest and most vulnerable of our societies, near and far. the latter inclination makes clear the need for human rights education (hre) now more than ever. as scholars osler (2016) and barton (2020) emphasize, hre, unlike nationalistic approaches to civic education, promotes a broadly humanistic regard for all people, whereby individuals think and act in solidarity with all members of the human community. additionally, hre can expose young people to universal standards and means for protecting and ensuring rights for all. as a teacher educator in the united states, i have had a longstanding interest in education for global citizenship and human rights education (hahn, 1984, 1985, 2005). when i took my first sabbatical from university teaching over 30 years ago, i used the opportunity to research education for citizenship in diverse european countries (hahn, 1998). since then i have identified as a comparative civic education researcher, seeking opportunities to learn from researchers and practitioners working in varied socio-cultural and national contexts. most recently i conducted a study of education for democratic citizenship in an age of globalization, migration, and transnationalism (hahn, 2020), focusing on secondary schools serving many http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3724 mailto:chahn@emory.edu human rights education review – volume 3(1) 10 students from immigrant backgrounds in four north european countries – denmark, germany, the netherlands, and the united kingdom (england and scotland). from 2009 until 2018 i made repeated visits to schools, observing lessons in subjects like social studies, social science or citizenship, and interviewing teachers and students. the purpose of that study was to address questions related to a number of issues: transnationalism and student identity, teaching practices and globalization, migration, and transnationalism, and teacher perceptions of challenges and opportunities in teaching for democratic citizenship to students from immigrant backgrounds (hahn, 2020). while collecting data for that study i noted examples of human rights education, although that had not been my original focus. for this article, i conducted a secondary analysis of my data for evidence to answer the question: how do classroom teachers and schools enact human rights education in different national contexts? literature review the concept of human rights has a long history, from ancient greece through the enlightenment to the present; however, research on human rights education [hre] is relatively new and theories of hre are in their infancy. synthesizing hre scholarship, bajaj (2011) concluded there were varied ‘schemas for theorizing the emergence, conceptualization, and implementation of human rights education across the globe’ (bajaj, 2011, p. 485). she posited that the ideological orientations of most hre initiatives could be classified in one of three categories: (1) hre for global citizenship; (2) hre for coexistence (to sustain peace in post-conflict societies); and (3) hre for transformative action (in the tradition of paulo freire’s work). bajaj noted that although the categories were not mutually exclusive, they offered a useful way to conceptualize differing rationales for hre. this article and the data upon which it is based fit within the category of hre for global citizenship. bajaj explained that hre for global citizenship seeks to prepare youth for membership in an international community by developing their knowledge and skills related to universal values. from this perspective, the content knowledge that is taught includes international treaties and conventions, the words and practices of human rights leaders, and the history of human rights. this approach seeks to develop empathy and compassion, including solidarity with those who are oppressed; it promotes student actions such as letter writing, fundraising, and participation in model united nations programs. rooted in a cosmopolitan framework, this perspective seeks to cultivate a sense of global citizenship, emphasizing interdependence and a need to work for justice everywhere. as i collected data for my study i observed these features of the enacted curriculum and instruction in the schools i studied. within the global citizenship tradition, many years ago, lister (1981) distinguished teaching about human rights (knowledge and awareness); teaching for (the securing and maintenance of) human rights; and teaching in human rights (teaching in institutions that respect human rights). thirty years later, the united nations [un] adopted a similar framework in the united nations declaration on human rights education and training (un, 2011). it defines hre as including teaching about, through, and for human rights. education about human rights includes developing knowledge of human rights norms and principles, the values that underpin them, and the ways they can be protected. education through human rights includes teaching and learning in ways that respect the rights of teachers and c. hahn 11 students. teaching for human rights aims to empower learners to exercise their rights and respect and uphold the rights of others. taken together, these dimensions aim to foster a human rights culture. as i used the un (2011) framework to analyse and present the data from this study, i found much overlap. one instructional activity or experience often addressed two or even three categories. that was particularly true for activities that simultaneously respected students’ rights and prepared them to take action to exercise their rights and respect those of others. nevertheless, i found the framework useful for comparing hre content and processes across schools and countries. as the scholarly literature in human rights education has grown, most authors have advocated for what hre should be, rather than reported empirical research. among the empirical studies, several researchers have examined policy documents, curricula, and/or textbooks for their treatment of human rights content and pedagogy (e.g. meyer, bromley, & ramirez, 2010; osler, 2015; skinner & bromley, 2019). other scholars have explored students’ understanding of human rights and human rights-related topics using quantitative (hahn, 2005; torney-purta, wilkenfeld & barber, 2008) and qualitative (barton, 2020) methods. there are, however, few studies of the enacted curriculum using ethnographic methods in naturalistic settings, such as classrooms, in different countries. one exception is russell’s study of the intended and enacted curriculum in post-conflict rwanda (russell, 2018). in that study, in addition to examining policy documents and textbooks, russell observed classes in seven schools and interviewed teachers and students. she found the intended and enacted curriculum included global norms toward human rights and global citizenship as well as traditional approaches to building a national identity. she also found that human rights discourse focused on abstract principles and vague concepts, rather than tackling issues that were sensitive in the contemporary rwandan context. teachers and students tended to focus on noncontroversial aspects of human rights linked to international organizations, violations in other countries, and rwanda’s past history of genocide. notably, teachers “constrained discussion of contentious” topics and avoided confronting human rights violations in present day rwanda. in particular, there was no discussion of ethnicity and multiculturalism, which were sensitive topics following the rwandan genocide. additionally, non-controversial economic and social rights were prioritized over political rights, thus avoiding discussions that could lead to criticism of the current political regime. russell emphasized that her findings were obtained in a particular context with a legacy of genocide and an authoritarian government, where freedom of expression was not guaranteed. she called for greater attention to context in conducting future research in post-conflict societies. like russell, i sought to gain insights into the enacted curriculum and pedagogy of hre in a particular region, but unlike russell, i situated my study in a region with a long history of democracy and human rights ideals. looking at previous literature on hre in northwest europe, where i conducted my study, i identified several empirical studies. conducting a discourse analysis of norwegian policy documents, vesterdal (2019) demonstrated that human rights was a component of norway’s identity and foreign policy, conveying that the country was a peace-loving promoter of human rights and democracy. however, he found the country’s approach in both foreign policy and education emphasized human rights violations in other countries. he concluded that although there was some limited recognition that human rights violations could occur in norway, overall human rights education review – volume 3(1) 12 ‘the message is that human rights are basically a problem outside norwegian borders, where the violations are large-scale and extremely grave’ (vesterdal, 2019, p. 14). he argued such a view reproduces stereotypes and moral superiority, while maintaining norway’s reputation as a human rights-friendly nation. osler (2015) similarly criticized norway’s policies and practices that focused on human rights violations abroad while failing to reflect critically on the country’s human rights record at home. she argued that although the approach might encourage empathy and concern for oppressed people elsewhere, it could lead to citizens being blind to injustice for some individuals in their own country or community. denmark is another northwest european country with an international reputation for supporting human rights and was a specific focus of my study. in 2013 the danish institute for human rights [dihr] published a report of their study of human rights education in primary and lower secondary schools (decara, 2013). the researchers analysed policy documents, surveyed teachers, and conducted focus group interviews with students and teacher educators. they found that hre in primary and lower secondary schools, as well as in teacher education programs (for teachers of that level), was ‘diffuse and unsystematic.’ for the most part, human rights were taught indirectly, without teachers referring explicitly to ‘human rights.’ the law governing folkeskoler (basic schools for pupils in grades 0 to 9 or 10) required schools to prepare young people for ‘participation, joint responsibility, rights and duties in a society based on fundamental freedoms and democracy,’ offering unrealised potential for including hre. the dihr, therefore, recommended that the education act be revised to specifically include attention to human rights, as well as to democracy and equality. writing about the netherlands, oomen (2013a) (like vesterdal writing about norway) noted that human rights held a central place in dutch foreign policy. she explained the netherlands used human rights law as a yardstick for others and was viewed as a guiding nation for international human rights law, particularly as host of the international court in the hague. however, argued oomen (2013b), the netherlands did not confront racism, domestic abuse, and other issues as human rights issues at home and hre was not prominent in the netherlands. she argued that while the ministry of foreign affairs gave a high priority to human rights, it was her experience that departments within the ministry of education did not. importantly, in 2006, at a time of increasing concern about growing numbers of immigrants with a muslim heritage, the netherlands adopted a new educational policy requiring primary and lower secondary schools to provide instruction for ‘active citizenship and social cohesion.’ the policy emphasized social skills and acceptance of basic dutch values such as tolerance and non-discrimination, rather than referencing human rights. citing a series of events, oomen (2013b) argued the ministry of education lacked interest in developing a national action plan on hre. the ministry took the position that the topic was already featured in the curriculum, that under the dutch principle of ‘freedom of education’ the government could not impose topics, and the government’s priorities were language skills and mathematics. other scholars, bron and thijs (2011), also reported that human rights was not a prominent topic in the curriculum for dutch basic education. they explained that by leaving it to individual schools to decide how they would implement citizenship education, ‘any emphasis on human rights or the rights of the child depends on the perceptions and motives of individual teachers’ (bron & thijs, 2011). looking at hre in germany, stone (2020) focused on the requirement that c. hahn 13 immigrants demonstrate proficiency in the german language and understanding of german norms and values. to enable individuals to meet the requirements, the state provided instruction in the german language and an orientation course covering norms and values. however, the requirements, stone argued, revealed a deficit perspective, assuming that newcomers were lacking essential skills and knowledge for their successful integration into german society. stone conducted a content analysis of the unit ‘politics in democracy,’ which was part of the orientation course. he found that the course did teach about ‘fundamental rights’ in terms of rights guaranteed in the german basic law (the de facto constitution), rather than explaining that fundamental rights apply to all people in the world. he concluded that although there was potential to teach hre to the adult newcomers, the course material revealed a missed opportunity in favour of a national approach to rights. other scholars, eksner and cheema (2017), described a human rights project sponsored by an ngo in germany. the goal of the project was to empower marginalized youth, particularly those who are marked as muslim, to recognize and confront human rights abuses in their daily lives. the program was run by the anne frank education center in frankfurt, which promoted democratic principles based on human rights and discussion of human rights issues from diverse perspectives. although the authors of these articles made comments about the typical approach to civic education in german schools, which focused on political literacy and the german constitution, they did not study practices in primary and/or secondary schools. in the united kingdom (uk), when the labour party came to power in 1997, prime minister tony blair appointed an advisory group, chaired by bernard crick, to develop a plan to introduce citizenship into the national curriculum in england. subsequently, schools were required for the first time to deliver citizenship in 2002. critics of the crick report, the subsequent legislation, and a later curriculum review led by keith ajegbo argued that those initiatives gave insufficient attention to human rights (osler, 2008). further, as increased attention, particularly after the london bombings, focused on the need to promote ‘british values,’ critics such’ as osler (2008) and starkey (2018) called for greater attention to global values of universal human rights. also referring to uk policies, jerome (2013) argued that from the time citizenship was introduced there was an on-going tension as to whether the subject should promote human rights as universally held by all individuals or whether rights should be understood as conditional on the rights-bearer’s acceptance of a social contract in which duties were specified. jerome explained that new labour under prime minister blair wanted to promote a culture of universal human rights as associated with the human rights act while simultaneously promoting a communitarian view of rights and responsibilities. the latter idea was extended by prime minister brown who emphasized that for newcomers, citizenship ‘should depend upon actively entering into a contract through which, by virtue of responsibilities accepted, the right of citizenship is earned’ (brown, 2008, as quoted in jerome, 2013). jerome argued the tension between understanding rights as rights for all humans (including children) and emphasizing rights and responsibilities as reciprocal was evident in the series of educational policy documents, including the crick report, the ajegbo review, and the curriculum and assessment authority’s policy papers. in addition, jerome conducted case study research in two schools to determine how teachers and students understood rights. he found that at one school human rights education review – volume 3(1) 14 teachers’ and students’ understanding reflected a ‘vague communitarian model, in which responsibilities were always attached to rights and these were frequently seen as moral obligations, derived from relationships’ (jerome, 2013, p.10). at the second school there was more routine teaching about human rights, but ‘this was most frequently discussed in relation to overseas contexts…as a framework for understanding conflict and the consequences of underdevelopment’ (jerome, 2013, p. 10). jerome was sceptical of human rights being addressed in more depth in the near future as conservative-led governments under prime minister cameron (from 2010 onward) were increasingly hostile to the notion of human rights, the human rights act, and decisions of the european court of human rights. in summary, findings from the available studies indicate several themes. multiple researchers found that curriculum and/or instruction focused more frequently on rights as guaranteed by national constitutions than on international human rights; when instruction did address international human rights, it tended to focus on violations in other countries and did not use human rights language to describe issues in the home country. further, although authors wrote that hre should give attention to pedagogy, as well as content, most studies focused primarily on content or the knowledge to be acquired rather than on the processes of instruction and school ethos. i identified no qualitative studies of the enacted curriculum and instruction that examined hre practices at multiple sites in and across countries. this study sought to build on the earlier literature by looking at how students were taught about, through, and for human rights in multiple schools across countries, with an eye toward whether instruction addressed local, national, and/or global applications of human rights. methods this study is a secondary analysis of a qualitative data set that i generated in a study of civic education, globalisation, migration, and transnationalism in four northwestern european countries. in the original study i observed civic-related classes and interviewed teachers and students in secondary schools (for pupils aged approximately 11-18 years old) that served students from immigrant backgrounds. sample i selected the four countries of denmark, germany, the netherlands, and the united kingdom because they were similar economically, politically, and culturally, yet had different approaches to civic education (hahn, 1998). importantly, these four countries shared a long intertwined history and historic commitments (interrupted by world war ii and the holocaust) to democracy and human rights ideals. as members of the council of europe (coe), these countries were signatories to the european convention on human rights and, along with other member states, they adopted the coe charter on education for democratic citizenship and human rights education (council of europe, 2010). although the four countries had reputations as open and tolerant societies, in recent years all had experienced xenophobic incidents, populist political parties, and anti-immigrant movements.1 since 1985 i had been following developments related to civic education in those countries and i had colleagues who could assist me in recruiting schools. because the initial study focused on relationships between civic education and globalisation, migration, and transnationalism, i purposefully selected four or five secondary schools in each country that met these criteria: they served students c. hahn 15 from immigrant backgrounds (immigrants, migrants, refugees, and children of immigrants); they reflected different types of schools characteristic of each country (such as gymnasia and integrated schools in germany; mixed vocational and general, and more academic tracks in the netherlands; comprehensive state schools in england and scotland, including one single-sex school in england; and gymnasia and a basic school in denmark); and they were located in different regions of each country. most schools were located in urban areas (and in western states in germany), where many immigrants lived. although most of the schools served a population that was more than one-third from immigrant backgrounds, in each country i included one school with fewer immigrant-background students to capture a range of experiences. (see appendix for schools and their demographics). procedures i observed lessons in citizenship in england and modern studies in scotland, social studies and social science (samfundsfag) in denmark, study of society (maatschappijleer) in the netherlands, and civics or social studies in germany. from 2009 through 2018 i made repeated visits to 18 schools for a total of 60 days.2 in field notes i recorded the main content themes of each lesson and the instructional activities used. after each lesson, teachers debriefed with me (in english) to ensure i had understood the main ideas that were taught in danish, german, and dutch. i also conducted semi-structured 90 minute interviews in english with 52 teachers and i interviewed students (n=85) (in english) in small groups and at one school in each country as a whole class. teachers and colleagues acted as translators as needed, particularly in interviews with lower track students in the netherlands and some classroom observations in germany. for this article, i drew primarily on observational data, as they contained more information about hre than did the interviews. for further details of research methods see hahn (2020). analysis i read through all field notes and transcripts multiple times. for this analysis i initially coded examples of human rights, rights, civic action, and pedagogy. then i went through the identified examples and recoded as evidence of teaching about, through/in, or for human rights. i compared examples across schools within each country, then compared examples across countries. i sought multiple examples of the same phenomena, contrasting examples, and unique examples to illustrate the range of practice. positionality as an american, throughout my schooling i learned about rights in terms of the u.s. constitution and bill of rights and the history of civil rights and civil liberties in the united states. while in graduate school in the 1970s i was introduced to the concept of global education or global perspectives in education, which included attention to international human rights. in the 1980s i attended several international conferences that addressed hre and i began to write and speak about the need for u.s. schools to give greater attention to international human rights (hahn, 1985). it was also in the 1980s that i began to conduct research on education for citizenship in the four countries that are the focus of this study. during that period, i met several british academics who were early advocates of hre: ian lister at the university of york, derek heater at brighton polytechnic, and jim dunlop at jordanhill college, glasgow. human rights education review – volume 3(1) 16 as a teacher educator, for many years i included the topic teaching international human rights in the global perspectives as part of my social studies methods courses for beginning and experienced teachers. despite these experiences, i did not approach this study initially in terms of hre, but rather as a study of education for democratic citizenship, with attention to increasing transnational diversity in student populations. although i had been studying civic education and civic culture in the four countries of interest over many years, as an english-speaking american academic, i remained a cultural outsider with both advantages and disadvantages. on the one hand, i likely noticed some things that an insider would take for granted. on the other hand, no matter how much i checked my evolving understanding with insider key informants, probably there remain cultural understandings that i misunderstood or missed altogether. conducting research across national contexts, i am a constant learner, which makes such work fascinating. limitations it is important to keep in mind that the teachers and schools in my sample were not selected because of a commitment to human rights education, nor did i explicitly ask about their views of human rights education. rather, while looking at citizenship education in 18 schools, i obtained “snapshots” of how human rights teaching can address similar goals yet vary in practice as it reflects the educational policies, pedagogical culture, and the wider socio-cultural context of a country. like all qualitative studies in naturalistic settings, this one reflects limitations and benefits. my findings are limited to the schools and classes i studied and cannot be generalized to all schools. rather, the findings might suggest hypotheses and questions for further research and/or offer insights for practices and policies that educators in other contexts might adapt. further, what i observed may not have been ‘typical’ of practices on the days i was not present and other observers may have interpreted the settings differently. i had the benefit of observing the enacted curriculum in real classrooms across time, schools, and countries. i have organized my findings by country because teachers in the same country are influenced by similar educational policies, pedagogical traditions, and cultural factors. within countries, i describe human rights education in terms of dimensions identified by ian lister (1981) and used by subsequent human rights educators over the years (un, 2011): teaching about human rights (knowledge and understanding); teaching for (the securing and maintenance of) human rights; and teaching in or through human rights (teaching in institutions that respect the human rights of teachers and students). teaching human rights in denmark students in denmark attend the basic school, called a folkeskole, from years 0 (kindergarten) through 9 or 10; they usually stay with the same class of students from years 1 through 9/10 (and either the same teacher for 9/10 years or one team of teachers through primary grades and another team through the upper grades). during this time, students study history in grades 3 through 9 and social studies (samfundsfag) in years 7-9, which includes politics, economics, sociology, and international relations. most students subsequently attend a gymnasium for three years, where they take history and social science (also called samfundsfag and covering politics, economics, sociology, and international relations) or they enroll in c. hahn 17 a two-year program to prepare for the ‘hf’ exam. notably, folkeskoles are required to teach democracy by modelling democratic practices, while in gymnasia, teaching should contribute to developing students’ interest in and capacity for active participation in a democratic society. the subject social science aims to develop a critical-perspective in students. teaching and learning about human rights although there was an official chronological ‘canon’ for history, teachers with whom i spoke seemed to see it as a general guideline primarily for folkeskoles and did not report feeling constrained by it. the canon included several human rights-related events and the specific topic ‘human rights’ in the post-world war ii period. gymnasium teachers and students explained that in history and social studies/social science classes (as well as in most other subjects), students in consultation with their teachers decided what topics they would study and how within broad guidelines. in the schools i studied, gymnasium students had chosen to study the topics migration, the danish welfare state, and political topics, which implicitly teach about human rights without using the specific label ‘human rights.’ one gymnasium social science class had chosen to study human rights explicitly, including the universal declaration of human rights. many of the immigrant-background students were in the hf track, which was more prescriptive. for example, the ministry of education specified that the topic ‘democracy and human rights’ was required. gymnasium students were required to do interdisciplinary inquiry projects (modified somewhat since 2016). classes i visited at syd and oester gymnasia3 did projects related to human trafficking, south african education, and one called ‘blood in the mobiles’ to create awareness of child labour in the democratic republic of the congo, from where minerals were mined for mobile phones. by taking civic action after researching these topics, students learned both about human rights and taking action as global citizens. one day i observed a group of teachers and students who were generating plans for their global school. the students discussed what they could do to avoid a ‘saviour-victim’ approach when tackling issues in the global south. despite this concern among some students, others explained to me they were undertaking a project ‘to help’ children in a partner school in south africa (7/10/12). learning through and for human rights importantly, danish students learn through human rights as they participate in frequent deliberative discussions and decision making, such as in the planning session for the global school noted above. many students reported that they had participated in numerous discussions – both in class and among peer groups – about a newspaper publishing a political cartoon depicting muhammad as a terrorist. the students said that in those discussions they talked about balancing freedom of speech and respect for diverse religions and cultures. folkeskole classes had regular class meetings where they discussed issues related to student behaviour, planned class trips, and advised their representatives to the student council. student councils in both folkeskoles and gymnasia engaged in lively discussions about issues that students raised. the national organization for student councils in gymnasia sponsored an annual operation work day, when individuals stayed out of school to spend the day raising money for a designated project. during the years i visited danish schools, students raised money for projects in myanmar, niger, and the amazon basin. one year a student council at oester human rights education review – volume 3(1) 18 gymnasium was especially active, sending representatives to the copenhagen youth climate conference and sponsoring a whole school debate on whether they should become a fair trade school. students, teachers, and canteen (cafeteria) workers participated in that school-wide deliberation. the president of the student council that year also told me that they sponsored a culture and debate group where they ‘talked about human rights issues.’ this school was more activist and globallyoriented than the others i studied, yet across schools, many students had participated in operation work day, student councils were important to the life of the school, and students described many class discussions in which they expressed their opinions about public policy issues. clearly, students’ rights to express their opinions and influence the learning environment were respected. in addition, as they experienced democratic deliberation and decision-making they developed skills and participative dispositions for exercising and working for human rights in the present and future. a number of teachers and students made comments similar to those of the student who said, ‘being danish means having a commitment to the danish welfare system, participation, and supporting free speech’ (3/10/10). such commitments can be seen as important to preparing young citizens for a society that respects human rights; alternatively such notions can be seen as implying that those values are uniquely danish and immigrants are deficient in those values, which they must acquire to successfully integrate into danish society. in germany in germany’s federal system, education is the responsibility of the federal states and as a consequence titles and content of courses, required hours of instruction, and school organization (comprehensive or tracked by ability) varies from state to state. nevertheless, in all the schools i visited in three different states, students took a course in something like social studies every year they were in school. teaching and learning about human rights the social studies courses included topics related to human rights. for example, one grade 9 social studies textbook discussed human rights since the french revolution, citing articles from the universal declaration of human rights. it discussed rights violations in the democratic republic of the congo and myanmar and conflicts and crises in africa, the middle east, and asia, and included a highlighted section on ‘child soldiers.’ the textbook also showed human rights violations in germany in the past, including child labour during the industrial revolution and the holocaust in nazi germany. a chapter on ‘youth and their rights’ addressed contemporary issues. further indications of students learning about human rights came from teachers saying that year 9 students learned about germany’s basic law (constitution), the french revolution (as the foundation for human rights), migration, and young people and the law. with respect to global citizenship education, but not explicitly human rights, i observed multiple lessons in social studies classes on climate change, renewable energy policies, and financial and economic policies at the national and european level. additionally, several teachers and students noted that students learned about multiculturalism in their language lessons, such as in the english-speaking or spanish-speaking world in their english and spanish classes. i also observed history lessons on nazism and the holocaust and i accompanied a 9th grade class from nordweston stadtteilschule to a reconstructed work camp. one of the teachers told me she wanted her students to learn from the c. hahn 19 visit ‘that average people were in the ss’ (6/5/2012). at the camp, when students asked ‘why didn’t they run away?’ guides explained that people living near the camp were complicit and would likely have reported any escapees. the guides and the displays did not tell a story of victimization alone, rather they discussed the perpetrators and resistance in the camps. a colleague who also accompanied the field trip explained to me that it could be a challenge to teach this topic to students of migrant backgrounds because they sometimes raise the point: why should we study this? this was a german problem. that is why, my colleague emphasized, it is important to teach that the holocaust was a human problem that could happen again, anywhere. learning through and for human rights in the entrances to several german schools i observed signs that read ‘school without racism, a school with courage.’ schools received the designation when students voted to become such a school and pledged to hold events against racism. one teacher explained, however, that although achieving that status had been meaningful to the cohort of students who made the pledge and worked for the designation, with time she did not think it meant as much to subsequent classes of students. the schools i visited in germany all had elected student councils, with teachers and students noting that some years they were more active than other years. for example, when one federal state government adopted a policy requiring all comprehensive schools to distinguish between a pre-university and a less-academic track, the student council at a school that would be affected organized a large demonstration in the city centre and the student council president spoke to the media. eventually, the policy was modified (perhaps in response to adults’ objections more than students’; however, either way students observed that civic action can affect policy). teachers in two schools in germany commented that students had raised money for victims of disasters. these included victims of an earthquake in haiti and the earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear power plant meltdown in japan. importantly, like students in the danish schools in my study, the students in the german schools were most likely to learn through human rights practices as they participated in frequent discussions of public policies. in all of the german schools i observed pro-contra discussions. these were discussions in which students gave arguments for (pro) or against (contra) a particular policy, such as lowering the voting age in their state’s elections or changing asylum laws. at nordosten gesamtschule, a banner in the school lobby welcomed visitors to their ‘european school.’ on one of my visits i observed the celebration of europe day, when classes were suspended and students participated in several europe-related activities. the older students (approximately aged 15-18), heard a presentation from their member of the european parliament (mep), who spoke about european economic, financial, and migration policies. that was followed by a challenging and wide-ranging question and answer session. after the mep left, the students observed a student-run debate on the question: should turkey be admitted to the european union? one student gave the arguments for and another gave arguments against admission. then the discussion was opened up to everyone in an auditorium full of about 200 students standing and expressing their opinion. the mep had earlier stated that turkey would have to comply with human rights laws and regulations if it were to join the eu. the students’ human rights education review – volume 3(1) 20 arguments referenced human rights criteria as they mentioned ending torture, ensuring equal rights for women, and improving rights for kurds. one girl stood up and said, ‘after world war ii, there were still nazis and other countries helped germany to become a normal country…so we should help turkey become a respecter of human rights’ (5/26/11). clearly, these students had learned the language of human rights and many were passionate about applying those principles to contemporary issues. in the netherlands when students in the netherlands leave elementary school at the end of grade 6 (about 12 years old), they follow one of six tracks, from vocational to pre-university academic tracks. only since 2006 have elementary and lower-secondary schools (for students to age 16) been required to promote active ‘citizenship and social integration.’ following the dutch principle of ‘freedom of education,’ it has been left to each school to decide how it addresses the cross-curricular theme with attention to democracy, diversity, tolerance, and acceptance. additionally, at the time of the study, secondary schools offered a oneor two-year course in the study of society (maatschappijleer), which addressed the topics politics, the multicultural or plural society, media, youth, criminality, and work. history was taught as a separate subject, or in some schools combined with the study of society. teaching and learning about human rights zuid schole featured human rights in two art installations. a large fingerprint was painted over the united nations declaration of the rights of the child on a wall in a stairwell that students used multiple times daily. on another wall, portraits of human rights leaders including nelson mandela and martin luther king jr. were painted. despite these visible symbols, none of the teachers at the school mentioned teaching human rights in the subject maatschappijleer (study of society). they did, however, teach history lessons about nazism, the holocaust, the nazi occupation of the netherlands, and post-world war ii immigration. at another dutch school, west schole, students did study the topic ‘human rights’ explicitly, along with ‘dutch rights,’ in their maatshappileer class. in teaching dutch rights, they focused primarily on article i of the dutch constitution, which ensures equality for all and says there shall be no discrimination. at this school, like the one noted above, students had history lessons about world war ii, the holocaust, and immigration. they also studied the european union and the united nations. teaching through human rights the four dutch schools i studied had student councils, reflecting a relatively new policy. however, unlike in the other countries in this study, the student councils in these schools were not elected, but were made up of volunteers and operated like a club, although (unlike schools in the other countries) the schools did not have clubs. because the student councils were not elected in competitive elections, this could be seen as a missed opportunity to experience the human rights principle of electoral representation. two of the schools did, however, hold mock elections at the time of the general election. c. hahn 21 teaching for human rights students in some schools were encouraged to take action to help others, which might enable them to develop skills, values, and dispositions for taking action to exercise and support human rights in the future. at two schools, students raised money for victims of disasters. in only one dutch school, zuid west katholieke schole (zwks), which was located in a small town, did a teacher report there was a local tradition of volunteerism. for several years the ministry of education required all students to engage in a certain number of hours of ‘community service,’ but eventually the policy was dropped. when the policy was in effect i visited west schole, which was a pioneer in offering community service opportunities to students. i observed students visiting a home for elderly people. the next day, young people from immigrant backgrounds (with families primarily from suriname) would be taking the white dutch elders to a nearby forest. a few years later, however, students in only one ‘profile’ (specialty) at that school continued to engage in community serviceprimarily serving guests at school functions. another school, noord college, asked students to keep track of the number of hours they helped others, such as helping neighbours, family members, and small children. across schools in the netherlands, teachers emphasised the importance of teaching students to respect different views, as well as cultures. for example, one teacher at zwks explained, ‘students need to recognize different ideologies and different views...not to have a right or wrong position but to know the alternatives and that positions depend on your world view‘(4/20/12). another teacher, at noord college, explained, ‘the plural society is a topic we teach. it is perfect that we have 55 nationalities at the school...no one is considered strange. they accept differences and learn to respect different opinions’ (9/29/16). in the united kingdom i found the greatest variation among the schools i studied in the united kingdom. because each nation – england, scotland, wales, and northern ireland – determines its own educational policies, it was not surprising that i found differences between the schools in england and scotland in my study. in addition, within england i observed a wide variation in practices. since citizenship was required in 2002, it has been left to each school to decide how it would implement the mandated subject. additionally, since the labour government was replaced by a series of conservativeled governments beginning in 2010, government policies have deemphasised citizenship education and promoted other initiatives like academies and free schools, and the teaching of ‘fundamental british values’ (fbvs). teaching about human rights in north street school, in scotland, students took the subject modern studies, which included a unit on ‘representation and democracy.’ in it, students learned about the scottish assembly and the westminster parliament. i observed lessons in which students simulated a general election and studied united nations agencies. two english schools combined citizenship with personal, social, and health education (pshe), which was taught by non-specialist ‘tutors’ (like german class teachers or u.s. homeroom teachers). when one of those schools became an academy, it dropped citizenship lessons completely; students then had weekly news quizzes in ‘tutor time’ and a school administrator gave talks on ‘democracy’ and ‘fundamental british values’ in two school assemblies. in history lessons, students in various schools human rights education review – volume 3(1) 22 studied the trans-atlantic slave trade, child labour in the industrial revolution, nazism and the holocaust, and the u.s. civil rights movement. in none of these three schools did any teachers or students mention that they had explicitly addressed the topic of human rights. in contrast, southside girls school (sgs) gave citizenship and hre a very high priority. initially, all students prepared to qualify for a citizenship general certificate in secondary education (gcse). later, citizenship became an optional course for the gcse. nevertheless, all students continued to have lessons in citizenship as part of social studies in years 7 through 9, which included the topic human rights; and some students chose the optional citizenship subject for years 10 and 11 in which they studied many issues connected to human rights. in order to fulfil requirements for ‘controlled assessments,’ students chose to explore an issue among several possibilities. they were required to research the issue, explain how it was a local, national, and/or global issue, interview individuals with different opinions on the issue or research different views, identify related articles in the undhr and/or rights of the child, write their opinion about the problem and possible solutions, and finally decide on and execute an action they would take. some of the issues which students investigated and took action for were: syrian refugees, mental health, climate change, clean water, food poverty, a living wage, housing benefits, funding for women’s refuges, and lowering the voting age to 16. teaching through and for human rights east high school recognized black history month each october with wall displays and a school assembly. for several years, they also had an event celebrating refugees, as their school population contained 192 students from refugee families. students in the four british schools i studied had frequent charity drives, with students raising money for many local, national, and international causes that were related to human rights. the british schools all had elected student councils until the one academy replaced its council with a group of teacher-appointed ‘leaders.’ reflecting the idea in the un convention on the rights of the child and european human rights law requiring students to participate in decisions that affect their schooling, ‘student voice’ programs were prominent in the british schools i studied. as part of the student voice programs at east high school and sgs, some students had been trained to observe lessons and give feedback to teachers and some students participated in the process of interviewing candidates for teaching and administrative posts at the schools. even the academy solicited student opinion, with surveys on topics like the learning environment and bullying. hre was most pervasive in the one school that gave the subject citizenship a high priority, southside girls school. the active student council worked hard for several years for their school to become one of uk unicef’s rights respecting schools. the school had an active amnesty international club, which sponsored activities to involve the whole school in letter writing and other campaigns. there was also a model united nations club that participated in city-wide conferences. citizenship lessons addressed human rights topics from the local to the global. each year students participated in civic action projects, working with local charities and national ngos. they worked on campaigns against female homelessness and ‘forced marriages,’ and for affordable housing, a living wage, and girls’ education globally, as well as a campaign called ‘refugees welcome here.’ they also worked on local and c. hahn 23 global campaigns for clean air and water, as well as addressing climate change. in spring 2019 some of the students participated in the ‘climate strike,’ boycotting school for a day to draw attention to the climate crisis. the citizenship teachers decided to show their solidarity with the students by carrying placards that read ‘we support our students’ in front of the school at lunch time. as noted earlier, when sgs students wrote up their projects for class assignments and for their gcse assessment, they were required to reference the appropriate article from the universal declaration of human rights and/or the rights of the child. although this is the only school in my study where hre permeated the whole school, it showed me what is possible. summary and discussion because the samples of schools that i visited in each of four countries were not representative ones, it is not appropriate to generalize to all schools in a given country. additionally, it is possible that students received more lessons about human rights at times when i was not present, although this was not mentioned by teachers or students. other researchers who plan studies explicitly focusing on hre in these and other countries should from the beginning systematically examine curricular documents and textbooks for human rights content and directly ask students and teachers about the teaching of human rights over the course of a year. as this represents a secondary analysis of an existing dataset, i was not able to do that. nevertheless, from my snapshots in schools, i did obtain insights that reinforce and extend findings from other studies, which might be useful to future researchers and practitioners. let me begin with what i observed about teaching and learning about human rights. like russell (2018), i observed that across schools in this study in the four countries, students studied about the history of human rights-related events such as the trans-atlantic slave trade, the french revolution, the holocaust, and the civil rights movement. however, in most of these cases they did not use the language of human rights. as oomen (2013b) and stone (2020) found, i observed in the study’s schools in germany and the netherlands, students studied about rights issues in terms of their national constitutions. one dutch teacher reported that his school taught the topic ‘human rights’; however, i did not hear that term used in the other dutch schools. in one german school, students were knowledgeable about and used the language of human rights as they tackled global issues, such as how the international community should deal with countries that violated human rights. like jerome (2013), i found that several uk schools taught the topic ‘rights and responsibilities’ but only the one rights respecting school explicitly taught the topic human rights and asked students to apply human rights principles in their investigations of numerous issues. osler (2008) and starkey (2018) had warned about the danger of focusing on ‘british values,’ including democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty, and tolerance of those with different faiths and beliefs as if these were unique to britain. i similarly heard reference to dutch values of nondiscrimination and freedom and danish values of democratic participation and freedom of expression. without referencing standards that apply to all humans, students might mistakenly believe their country is the only one holding such values and that individuals who live in their country but are not national citizens do not also have rights. human rights education review – volume 3(1) 24 decara (2013) found that folkeskoles in denmark tended to approach human rights indirectly, rather than explicitly using human rights language. however, i found a more complex picture. while listing many topics from danish national history, the chronological canon for history instruction did list the topic united nations human rights for the 20th century. for students older than 16, the topics for the hf exam also included the topic ‘democracy and human rights.’ danish gymnasium students deliberated and decided what and how they would study topics; consequently, only one gymnasium teacher mentioned that a class had decided to study human rights per se. other gymnasium students had learned about violations of human rights as they undertook multidisciplinary inquiry projects like the ones i observed about conditions in the congo and south africa; and many danish students also learned about human rights violations in countries that were the focus of operation work day. as vesterdal (2019) and osler (2015, 2016) noted, such an approach can convey a sense of moral superiority over those who live in the global south. interestingly, it was a group of students in one danish gymnasium who articulated the potential problem of instilling a saviour-victim attitude toward the global south. a similar problem can ensue when students raise money for victims of disasters around the world, without taking similar action for those whose human rights were not being met in their local and national communities. osler (2016) and gaudelli (2016) have written about the need for students to become aware of the everyday experiences of human rights in their own communities, as well as to develop empathy and solidarity with human rights activists in communities far and wide. in my study only one school, sgs, taught about human rights at the local, national, and global levels. the students had numerous lessons and projects that referenced human rights documents and they engaged in campaigns to address human rights at all levels. numerous authors recommended that hre should not be limited to knowledge about human rights, it but should also provide students experiences in and through human rights (in institutions that respected human rights), and for the exercise of their rights and respect for others’ rights. i did not, however, locate any previous empirical studies that identified if and how those goals were being implemented. i found that all of the schools in my study offered some opportunities in and through human rights although they did not label them as ‘human rights in action. students did have experiences that enabled them to exercise their rights and to develop skills and attitudes for (securing and maintaining) human rights. in particular, the schools provided opportunities for students to discuss and debate about political and social issues and to make decisions that affected life in their school community. these opportunities were extensive in three british schools (particularly sgs and excluding the academy) and in the danish and german schools i visited. in lessons and in student extra-curricular activities students deliberated about issues in their school and in the wider society. student councils were more or less active from one year to the next, and one school to another. clubs were less common, but the few schools that had amnesty international, model united nations, or a culture and debate club enabled students to exercise their rights as global citizens working to ensure rights for all. all of the schools in the study reflected bajaj’s (2011) description of hre for global citizenship, with the varied ways they enacted education about, through, and for human rights. one theme that emerged from my study was that visible symbols of a human rights culture can lose their value over time as individual students and teachers move c. hahn 25 on. at one point in time a class of students deliberated and took seriously the decision to become a fair trade school and other classes committed to being a school without racism, a school with courage. similarly, adults planned inspirational art installations at one school to feature the rights of the child and human rights leaders’ portraits; they may have hoped, but could not guarantee, that the hundreds of students who passed those images daily would absorb their meaning. without deliberate efforts to keep such symbols alive, they can easily become forgotten messages from earlier times. alternatively, they can continue to inspire new generations if committed teachers are alert to their potential and deliberately use the symbols as catalysts to ask students to reflect on what the symbols could mean in the present in their multiple communities – local, national, and global. recently, parker (2018) has called for more robust hre than that which predominated in the past. he argues that we should develop and enact curricula that provide students with ‘powerful knowledge.’ he explains that such knowledge includes abstract concepts, which are powerful because they can be applied to numerous cases across time and space. he suggests several concepts that can contribute to a robust hre, including universal rights, human dignity, justice, dissent, and activism. parker recommends that curriculum scholars work with human development specialists to identify conceptual progressions that will connect young people’s everyday experiences and knowledge with powerful concepts, thus enabling youth to develop deeper understandings of the wider world. my snapshots indicate that the seeds of such an enacted curriculum exist in some schools. although some examples fall short of the ideal as they use only national referents rather than those of human rights and/or they focus on violations in the global south or in the national past while overlooking violations close to home in the present, those seeds could be nurtured and developed into a more robust hre. importantly, some students are already learning powerful concepts and principles articulated in international documents which they are able to apply to diverse cases. although i only saw students at one school using human rights discourse extensively as they studied issues and engaged in civic action at the local, national, and global levels, their experiences indicate what is possible with a cohesive, carefully sequenced, robust hre. finally, it is clear that across schools and countries, the ways in which human rights education is carried out varies in light of the interest and commitment of individual teachers and schools, as well as the pedagogical culture of a society. human rights is not merely a topic to be studied but a way of life and worldview or perspective to be experienced. human rights education review – volume 3(1) 26 notes 1 these include but are not limited to the following: in denmark the rise of the danish people’s party and the incident of a political cartoon that depicted muhammad as a terrorist, which generated protests across the globe; in the netherlands, international media covered the killing of two individuals who argued against ‘the islamization of society’ and geert wilders’ anti-immigrant party obtained seats in parliament; in germany, the rise of the far right political party alternative for germany; and in the united kingdom, earlier anti-immigrant rhetoric of the british national party and more recently anti-immigrant and anti-europe sentiments of the ukip and brexit parties. 2 i visited most schools three times over this period. however, i was only able to visit one city in germany and one city in denmark once. at the other end of the spectrum, i visited one school in england, sgs, 10 times because it was such an ‘information-rich’ case. 3 names of schools are pseudonyms. c. hahn 27 references bajaj, m. 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(2019). individual and collective social justice education: comparing emphases on human rights and social movements in textbooks worldwide. comparative education review, 63(4), 502-528. https://doi.org/10.1086/705428 starkey, h. (2018). fundamental british values and citizenship education: tensions between national and global perspectives. geografia annaler: series b, human geography, 100(2), 149-162. https://doi.org/10.1080/04353684.2018.1434420 stone, n. (2020). learning to belong? an analysis of germany’s migrant orientation programme from an hre perspective. human rights education review, 3(1), 1-18. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3694 torney-purta, j., wilkenfeld, b. & barber, c. (2008). how adolescents in 27 countries understand, support, and practice human rights. journal of social issues, 64(4), 857-880. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4560.2008.00592.x united nations (2011). united nations declaration on human rights education and training. retrieved from https://undocs.org/en/a/res/66/137 . vesterdal, k. (2019). championing human rights close to home and far away: human rights education in light of national identity construction and foreign policy in norway, human rights education review, 2(1), 6-18. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2907 https://doi.org/10.1177/0038040710367936 https://doi.org/10.1177/016934411303100103 https://doi.org/10.1093/jhuman/hut010 https://doi.org/10.1080/00933104.2015.1034393 https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2450 https://doi.org/10.1086/698305 https://doi.org/10.1086/705428 https://doi.org/10.1080/04353684.2018.1434420 https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3694 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4560.2008.00592.x https://undocs.org/en/a/res/66/137 https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2907 c. hahn 29 appendix: schools and their demographics country school * demographics** uk-england southside girls school 95% ‘ethnic minority.’ most 2nd generation bangladeshi + some somali, e. european immigrants uk-england east high school 92% ‘ethnic minority’ diverse heritage countries include turkey, bangladesh, pakistan, india, somalia, etc. uk-england west academy 10% ‘ethnic minority’ most 2nd generation pakistani heritage uk-scotland north street school 50% ethnic minority, speaking 46 languages (hyper-diversity) denmark centrum skole 90% immigrant & 2nd generation from turkey, pakistan, palestine etc. immigrants from afghanistan, iraq, somalia, morocco, syria, ghana, albania, georgia (country) denmark oester gymnasium 40% immigrant background, most 2nd generation, from middle east, africa, south asia denmark nord gymnasium 30% immigrant background, most 2nd generation from 30 countries denmark vesterskole 22% immigrant backgrounds denmark syd gymnasium 10% immigrant backgrounds, including from turkey, afghanistan germany nordosten gesamtschule backgrounds: iraq, afghanistan, turkey, palestine, panama, korea, egypt, poland, russia, vietnam germany gymnasium nordwesten 60% with ‘migration backgrounds’ from turkey, macedonia, ghana, china germany nordwesten stadtteilschule 15-20% migration backgrounds from turkey, afghanistan, saudi arabia, india, poland, russia germany sudosten schule backgrounds from turkey, morocco, afghanistan, iran, pakistan, kosovo, croatia human rights education review – volume 3(1) 30 germany gymnasium sudwesten 90% migrant background. 40 languages (hyper-diversity), iran, afghan, bangladesh, morocco, russia, serbia, vietnam, china, japan etc. netherlands zuid vmbo many families from turkey & morocco. also from curacao, indonesia, aruba netherlands west vmbo most 2nd & 3rd generation from suriname & many from turkey, morocco netherlands noord college 50% new immigrants. 50% went to dutch elementary schools, most 2nd generation, from 55 countries (hyper-diversity), e.g. turkey, morocco, syria, ghana, antilles, suriname, ethiopia, eritrea, ecuador, italy netherlands zuid west katholieke skole 10%-most in mavo track, from turkey, morocco, poland, russia, indonesia, vietnam, spain *names of schools, as well as of teachers, here and in the text are pseudonyms. i added a 5th (folkeskole) school for denmark, and an additional school for germany that i was only able to visit once. **demographics were reported to me by teachers and principals. they tended to use general percentages and they used different terms in different countries, such as from ‘ethnic minority communities’ in england and ‘migration backgrounds’ in germany. i have used the term ‘hyper-diversity’ when a school contains students from as many as 40 national backgrounds. i have included urban schools with a majority of students from immigrant backgrounds and schools in towns with many fewer immigrant-heritage students to reflect the range that exists. ***i have noted the grade or year in school in parentheses, although terms vary across countries. for example, in england, teachers refer to years 7 through 11 and in scotland, teachers use the terms s1 to s4 for secondary school standard 1 to standard 4. because danish basic schools (folkeskoler) include grades 0 to 9 or 10 and many students take a year or more out before attending gymnasia or hf programs, my citing years 11-13 is an approximation. issn 2535-5406 © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org acknowledgements reviewer acknowledgements the editors would like to thank the following colleagues for the time and careful attention given to manuscripts they reviewed in 2021. rebecca adami stockholm university, sweden vanessa andreotti the university of british columbia, canada madeleine arnot university of cambridge, uk keith barton indiana university, usa oddrun bråten norwegian university of science and technology, norway tony burner university of south-eastern norway, norway claire cassidy university of strathclyde, uk sicong chen, kyushu university, japan https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ hrer reviewer acknowledgements 167 sandra cullen dublin city university, ireland cecilia decara the danish institute for human rights, denmark judith dunkerly-bean old dominion university, usa suzanne egan university college dublin, ireland dag øistein endsjø university of oslo, norway kristin gregers eriksen university of south-eastern norway, norway william r. fernekes rutgers graduate school of education, usa bjørn aksel flatås, university of south-eastern norway, norway liam geeron university of oxford, united kingdom viola b. giorgi university of hildesheim, germany sue gollifer university of iceland, iceland rolf gollob university of teacher education zug, switzerland chelsea hackett university of colorado, usa 168 carole l. hahn emory university, usa shandon harris-hogan university of oslo, norway lisa hartley curtin university, australia peter hervik aarhus university, denmark marlene printz jellesen university college of northern denmark, denmark camilla stabel jørgensen norwegian university of science and technology, norway despina karakatsani university of peloponnese, greece susan roberta katz university of san francisco, usa astrid de keizer university of applied sciences leiden, the netherlands yuka kitayama osaka university, japan lisa van leent queensland university of technology, australia hadi strømmen lile østfold university college, norway johan lövgren university of south-eastern norway, norway hrer reviewer acknowledgements 169 knut lundby university of oslo, norway laura lundy queen’s university belfast, uk david lundie university of glasgow, uk uvanney maylor university of bedforshire, uk caroline oliver university college london, uk barbara oomen utrecht university, the netherlands farid panjwani aga khan university, pakistan eugenia pastor university complutense, spain mario peucker victoria university, australia jefferson r. plantilla hurights osaka, japan norman richardson stranmillis university college, uk hans ingvar roth stockholm university, sweden cornelia roux stellenbosch university, south africa 170 josefine scherling pädagogische hochschule kärnten, austria peter schreiner comenius-institut, germany feroz mehmood shah university of south-eastern norway, norway farzana shain goldsmiths, university of london, uk mira skadegård aalborg university, denmark pamela slotte university of helsinki, finland trond solhaug norwegian university of science and technology, norway marta stachurska-kounta university of south-eastern norway, norway hugh starkey university college london, uk stine helena svendsen norwegian university of science and technology, norway paul thomas university of huddersfield, united kingdom reetta toivanen university of helsinki, finland tuukka tomperi tampere university, finland hrer reviewer acknowledgements 171 özgür ulubey muğla sıtkı koçman üniversitesi, turkey knut vesterdal norwegian university of science and technology, norway rune øystese nla university college, norway volume 4, no 2 (2021) date received: 03-07-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3937 date accepted: 29-04-2021 issn 2535-5406 ‘human rights and democracy are not self-evident’: finnish student teachers’ perceptions on democracy and human rights education tuija kasa university of helsinki, finland matti rautiainen university of jyväskylä, finland mia malama finnish committee for unicef, finland arto kallioniemi university of helsinki, finland abstract: this article discusses democracy and human rights education (dhre) in finnish teacher education, drawing on existing literature, curricula and a survey of student teachers’ perceptions. earlier studies suggested that dhre in finnish teacher education is unsystematic, implicit, and dependent on the teacher’s individual interests. these studies highlight a sense of national exceptionalism, where dhre is assumed to be self-evident. in 2019, we conducted a survey of student teachers (n=300) in one university. data content analysis reveals that student teachers now see dhre as relevant and timely, and by no means self-evident. student teachers believe that dhre needs to be explicit and part of their professional education. although the finnish national curriculum addresses dhre explicitly, there is a lack of implementation and explicit dhre teacher education. we contend that the data reflects societal change, and that the notion that democracy and human rights are self-evident needs to be challenged in finland. keywords: human rights education, democracy education, teacher education, student teachers, content analysis http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3937 human rights education review – volume 4(2) 70 ‘human rights and democracy are not self-evident’: finnish student teachers’ perceptions on democracy and human rights education doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3937 tuija kasa matti rautiainen mia malama arto kallioniemi tuija.kasa@helsinki.fi university of helsinki, finland university of jyväskylä, finland finnish committee for unicef, finland university of helsinki, finland abstract: this article discusses democracy and human rights education (dhre) in finnish teacher education, drawing on existing literature, curricula and a survey of student teachers’ perceptions. earlier studies suggested that dhre in finnish teacher education is unsystematic, implicit, and dependent on the teacher’s individual interests. these studies highlight a sense of national exceptionalism, where dhre is assumed to be self-evident. in 2019, we conducted a survey of student teachers (n=300) in one university. data content analysis reveals that student teachers now see dhre as relevant and timely, and by no means self-evident. student teachers believe that dhre needs to be explicit and part of their professional education. although the finnish national curriculum addresses dhre explicitly, there is a lack of implementation and explicit dhre teacher education. we contend that the data reflects societal change, and that the notion that democracy and human rights are self-evident needs to be challenged in finland. keywords: human rights education, democracy education, teacher education, student teachers, content analysis introduction societal issues such as the rise of autocratisation (lührmann & lindberg, 2019), the number of hate crimes (rauta, 2017, p. 8), racism (fra, 2017) and children’s climate activism create an urgent need to address such controversial matters in teacher education. there is a potential for democracy and human rights education (henceforth, dhre) to increase teachers’ readiness to handle such topics. previous finnish studies, published in 2014, show that dhre is unsystematic in teacher education; it is dependent on individual teachers. it is also the case that human rights education (hre) is detached from its judicial basis (human rights centre [hrc], 2014; rautiainen, vanhanen-nuutinen & virta, 2014). the central finding of these studies was that although human rights and democracy were generally seen as central principles and values for teacher education, on the practical level they did not have a central role in curricula, teaching and culture. on the other hand, connected topics were included in all teacher education units and the operating culture included forms of participation. the main issue for further development was http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3937 mailto:tuija.kasa@helsinki.fi t. kasa, m. rautiainen, m. malama & a. kallioniemi 71 to make human rights and democracy a more visible part of curriculum texts and the operating culture (rautiainen et al., 2014). after these studies were carried out, there have been national core curricula reforms which have made human rights and democracy thoroughly explicit (finnish national agency for education [fnae], 2014; 2018; 2019). human rights education (hre) research in finland is scarce (lehtomäki & rajala, 2020). in the previous studies teachers perceived hre as ‘obvious yet alien’ (matilainen, 2011) and human rights problems like racism, the treatment of indigenous people, and violence against women in finland have been neglected (toivanen, 2007, p. 41). we would argue that the ideas that democracy and human rights are self-evident and that dhre belongs somewhere else belong to the notion that scholars have termed ‘national exceptionalism’ (e.g. sirota, 2017). we wanted to compare the 2014 results (hrc, 2014; rautiainen et al., 2014) to the situation in 2019 and examine student teachers’ perceptions of dhre. the hypothesis is that if teacher education has considered the recommendations of previous research and national curricula reforms, this should be visible in student teachers’ answers. in this article, we 1) briefly introduce conceptions of dhre, 2) present the finnish context, 3) summarise international research results and 4) examine student teachers’ perceptions through content analysis of questionnaire data (n=300). conceptualising democracy and hre: theoretical, legal and practical observations in this section we introduce some conceptual, judicial and practical observations that can help us to understand democracy and hre as intertwined theories and practices. we acknowledge that democracy education or citizenship education (ce) and hre have been perceived as separate educational fields (osler & starkey, 2010, p. 125; toivanen, 2009), and one practical problem has been that governments have stated they have fulfilled their commitment to hre through ce (osler & starkey, 2010, p. 113). however, we would claim that for educational and societal reasons, democracy and human rights are interdependent: democracy needs human rights to achieve its inclusive aims (ibid., p.116–127) and human rights need democratic processes to be actualised (cf. benhabib 2011, pp. 77–94). from the legal perspective, dhre is justified, since democratic government is a human right. the right to participate is guaranteed in the universal declaration of human rights (udhr, article 21), the international covenant on civil and political rights (iccpr, article 25) and in the constitution of finland (1999/731, 2 §, 14 §). today, the council of europe’s charter for education for democratic citizenship and human rights education (edc/hre) outlines the common ground of edc and hre, but also identifies important ways in which these two complementary fields differ (cm/rec(2010)7, section i, 2, 3). the united nations declaration on human rights education and training (united nations [un], 2011, a/res/66/137) states that hre is education about, through and for human rights (un, 2011, article 2.2a–c.). our study uses the terms ‘explicit’ and ‘implicit’ to describe how hre is practiced in the classroom (müller, 2009, pp. 8–9): explicit hre focuses on canonical international norms and mechanisms; implicit hre focuses on human rights problems, and social relations and actions that embody the spirit of human rights. studies suggest that in finland hre has been implicit (hrc, 2014; matilainen, 2011). the question arises as to whether implicit hre (which neglects human rights legal human rights education review – volume 4(2) 72 instruments) is problematic if schools adopt a pedagogy that promotes human dignity and implicitly adopts ‘human rights values and encourages students to act to protect human rights’ (müller, 2009. p.9) or whether hre must necessarily engage with human rights legal frameworks. neglecting any explicit reference to human rights systems or legal aspects may produce a discourse which is detached from the actual societal international political structure, and the lack of clear definitions makes human rights mere opinions. these factors may produce an inability to recognise human rights problems in one’s own context; teachers should understand that human rights are binding by law and not just empty rhetoric (toivanen, 2007, p. 43). forms of ce and hre have been critiqued. ce has been critiqued for number of things: advancing exclusion that is connected to citizenship status, nationalist agendas and identity construction; failing minority groups; and for being uncritical of governments (osler & starkey 2010, pp. 114, 116, 125–126; toivanen, 2009). hre has been perceived as an opportunity to recognise a cosmopolitan perspective, a shared humanity and the notion that human rights principles should underpin the content and practice of edc (osler & starkey 2010, p. 127). on the other hand, hre has been criticised for producing orthodoxies of heaven-hell binaries representing some countries as ‘hellish’ and others as morally superior (okafor & agbakwa, 2001), and for being declarationist, uncritical, ahistorical and apolitical (zembylas & keet, 2019). we conceptualise dhre as having the potential to raise societal consciousness, including judicial knowledge and critical, political and historical learning. dhre can be grounded in a more holistic approach to democracy (biesta, 2006)—as opposed to reducing democracy and citizenship to voting and obedient citizenship—and holistic rather than ahistorical or uncritical conceptualisations (zembylas & keet, 2019). without reducing the judicial aspects of hre to ‘declarationism’ (keet, 2012, p. 7), we see it as part of a democratic society and hre as a form of ‘democratising’ judicial knowledge. this is important in finland, where teachers have perceived hre as a matter for experts from outside of the school (matilainen, 2011). our conception of dhre as a pedagogical practice emphasises the ethical complexity of teaching (adami, 2017) and the critical analysis of power structures. it includes international human rights and domestic law, and concepts of democracy that are not reductionist simplifications. one’s ethical stance is crucial in pedagogical practice, and a moral rejection of inhumane treatment is not merely a matter of conventions (gaita, 2002; todorov, 1996). the finnish context: curricula and dhre in teacher education finnish legislation is based on human rights and democratic values and principles. the constitution of finland (1999/731) includes fundamental and human rights (§6–21) and §22 states that ‘the public authorities shall guarantee the observance of basic rights and liberties and human rights’. thus, the core curricula for early childhood education (ece) (fnae, 2018), basic education (fnae, 2014) and upper secondary school education (fnae, 2019) refer to human rights and democracy as basic values, binding obligations that apply to both learning and educational content. hre is not explicitly mentioned as an education area or as a separate subject, but dhre contents are found in different subjects (e.g. history, social sciences, secular ethics and religious education). for example, the aim of social studies in grades 4-6 is that ‘the pupils are guided to act in a pluralistic society that understands diversity t. kasa, m. rautiainen, m. malama & a. kallioniemi 73 and respects human rights and equality in accordance with the values and principles of democracy.’ (fnae, 2014, section 4.4.9.). however, the impact on teacher education has not been as strong as it has been in schools. the main characteristics of teacher education in finland are autonomy and research-based teaching, a consequence of the large-scale reforms at the end of the 1970s. in practice, this means that all qualified teachers have a master’s degree, and teacher education follows academic principles in its developmental work (niemi & jakku-sihvonen, 2006). there is no single national curriculum for teacher education in finnish universities; all units develop their own curricula. the 1970s reforms have had long-term consequences for dhre in teacher education, because curricula, staff expertise and operational culture have been mainly grounded in disciplines based on didactics and the psychology of education (rantala & rautiainen, 2013). disciplinebased teaching does not focus strongly on integrative topics like human rights, and social sciences and democracy are marginal themes in finnish teacher education (männistö, rautiainen & vanhanen-nuutinen, 2017). this has crucial consequences for schools if teachers do not help students to become critical, democratic citizens (fornaciari & rautiainen, 2020). the lack of hre research in finland (lehtomäki & rajala, 2020; matilainen, 2011, pp. 65–68) has consequences for research-based teacher education. in the 2000s the ministry of education and culture has supported dhre in teacher education by funding developmental projects (e.g. männistö et al., 2017). based on the 2019 curriculum analysis carried out by the authors of this article, democracy and human rights are a general basic value in teacher education. the phenomenon is approached mainly by societal knowledge building, especially from the perspectives of educational sociology and philosophy. democracy and human rights occasionally occur as concepts in curricula. democracy is mentioned in several curricula as a part of courses that deal with the relation of schools and teachers to society. human rights are sometimes connected to the notion of inclusion. compared with the situation reported in 2014 (rautiainen et al., 2014), dhre has been strengthened. however, it is still mostly based on individual teacher educators’ work rather than on an institutional strategy to strengthen dhre. research review: common implementation problems after the un decade for hre in 1995–2004, mahler, mihr & toivanen (2009) made a six-country study analysing the results: they found implementation gaps, projects that were short-term, a dependence on individuals, and a lack of national strategies (mahler et al., 2009, p. 31, 38). later, finland adopted systematic promotion measures, such as adding explicit references to national curricula (fnae, 2014; 2018; 2019). the government has also adopted national action plans (nap) (ministry of justice, 2017a; 2017b) that have included dhre, and there are many ongoing processes, such as the national steering group for democracy and hre established by the ministry of education and culture 2020-2023. the problem that researchers found, in their evaluation of the naps, was that they were perceived as a list of short-term projects (rautiainen, sinkkilä & keinänen, 2020). teachers have been seen as central actors in advancing dhre, but there is an ongoing weakness in the way in which they are prepared (ahmed, martin & uddin, 2020, p. 216; bemis, 2013, p. 10; decara, 2013; edling & mooney simmie, 2020; hrc, 2014). educational systems where schools have a high degree of autonomy, such as in finland and switzerland, emphasise the importance of the teacher’s human rights education review – volume 4(2) 74 understanding and professional expertise. it is this that is considered to be the determining factor in the successful implementation of hre (rinaldi, 2017, p. 87). teachers’ responses to hre have been manifold. preand in-service teachers have raised a number of concerns: hre is too abstract, biased and controversial (struthers, 2016); there is a lack of knowledge about age-appropriate teaching (decara, 2013, p. 3; struthers, 2016); and rights are represented without obligations (cassidy, brunner & webster, 2014; waldron et al., 2011, p. 31). teachers have found difficulties with the political or controversial sides of hre (bemis, 2013, p. 26–27; cassidy et al., 2014; rinaldi, 2017, p. 92; struthers, 2016) and democracy education (waage, kristjánsson & björnsdóttir, 2016, p. 116). at the same time, human rights have also been perceived as useful in teaching complex issues (decara, 2013, p. 31). the deficit in advancing democracy education has been studied in a variety of european countries (raiker, rautiainen & saqibi, 2020; waage et al., 2016). in finland, the teacher has historically been constructed as the ‘model citizen’ (rantala, 2020). this has led to anxieties about introducing politics in school, and to an emphasis on an imagined ‘neutrality’ in teaching that effectively disregards or minimises societal questions or context in teacher education. this notion was reinforced when school democracy experiments in the 1970s failed and became political power battles. the praxis of finnish teacher education has been criticised for its lack of societal content, and its failure to promote greater participation in a democratic society. (fornaciari & männistö, 2015, p. 78.) democracy education in finland has been strongly based on representative democracy and has followed the existing democratic models, e.g. school student council boards (raiker & rautiainen, 2017, p. 11). teachers in finland emphasise education for social responsibility at school, rather than civic activity and participation in society (fornaciari & rautiainen, 2020, pp. 196–199). this emphasis is in line with other research which finds teachers viewing hre as a mere tool for social cohesion rather than as education for empowerment or activism (bemis, 2013, p. 24). icelandic research into teachers’ attitudes towards democracy education found a lack of implementation, as well as views that the subject was self-evident and about abstract value goals rather than concrete insights (waage et al., 2016, p. 114, 115). similar views of human rights were described in norway: democracy and human rights were seen as an abstract values basis for education or as a part of political discourse, but there was a general need for political, critical or legal analysis (vesterdal, 2019, p. 7, 12, 15–17). one way of analysing the obstacles to the implementation and overall recognition of dhre is to investigate the concept of ‘national exceptionalism’. exceptionalism in relation to dhre may manifest itself in the perception that democracy and human rights are ‘self-evident’ and that it is other countries that need dhre. this has been found to be the case in the united states (sirota, 2017, p. 13), finland (matilainen, 2011), norway (vesterdal, 2019, p. 17), and iceland (waage et al., 2016). in finland, teachers viewed hre as ‘self-evident’, even though they could not recognise human rights norms or mechanisms (matilainen, 2011). in the nordic countries, human rights and democracy are somehow perceived as part of the ‘national identity’, which is problematic and encourages othering (osler, 2016, pp. 71–73). to conclude, dhre’s advancement has been very dependent on active individuals (mahler et al., 2009; müller, 2009, p. 15), and this has led to the sporadic or unsystematic realisation of dhre (bemis, 2013, p. 11, 28; decara, 2013, p. 32, 38; t. kasa, m. rautiainen, m. malama & a. kallioniemi 75 hrc, 2014; rautiainen et al., 2014; vesterdal, 2019). there is a need for more explicit (decara, 2013; bemis, 2013, p.24), critical (zembylas & keet, 2019) and holistic approaches (vesterdal 2019, p. 17) and this is also the case in finland. methodology and material the research data was collected in spring 2019, as part of the human rights, democracy, values and dialogue in education project (2018–2021). in the course of two lectures (duration 1h 45min) we collected student teachers’ anonymous written answers to a semi-structured questionnaire. the students were taking a compulsory pedagogical course at finland’s biggest teacher education unit, in the university of helsinki. usually, dhre is not a compulsory course. the lectures were interactive, so students could discuss the topics, and write their answers in class. there was time reserved (10 min) at the end of the lecture to respond to the questionnaire. the semi-structured questionnaire included open and closed questions, but the closed questions also included space to elaborate. the self-determination of participants was respected: answering was entirely optional, students gave a varied number of answers to questions, and only those who gave permission for research were analysed. answering was entirely anonymous to encourage honest responses and, in line with the data minimisation principle of general data protection regulation (gdpr, 2016/679), background information was not systematically collected as it was not necessary in this study. we received 300 answers from two groups. group 1 had 178 respondents, mainly early childhood education and care, elementary school, special education, handicraft and home economics student teachers. group 2 had 122 members, mainly specialist subject teachers (e.g. secular ethics, philosophy, psychology, biology, geography, english, physics, mathematics, finnish, religious education, history and social studies) and adult educators. students were at all levels of their studies. their answers produced mainly qualitative data, but there was also some quantitative data (frequency of mentions of concepts, percentages in closed questions). the qualitative data was analysed by content analysis (tuomi & sarajärvi, 2018; weber, 1990). the setting was interesting: because the course was obligatory, we assumed that we would get answers from students who would not normally choose a dhre course. however, because answering was entirely optional, it is possible that the most negative students did not answer. data may often be biased because it is only respondents who are already interested that answer (cf. bemis, 2013). semantic validity (weber, 1990, p. 21) was enhanced by presenting the basic concepts to all participants. the questionnaire took up various issues: what is the role of dhre in teacher education? what topics are important? what kind of topics cause uncertainty? closed questions (with why? plus space to elaborate) and with a yes-no option were: 1) should dhre be a general part of teacher education? 2) should dhre be a compulsory part of teacher education? 3) does anything in dhre cause you uncertainty? open questions in relation to dhre were: what kind of support is needed? what topics should be taught in dhre? what topics are important in your own and other teachers’ work? there was also a free-response section. constructing themes from the material (tuomi & sarajärvi, 2018, chapter 4.1.) was carried out by means of content analysis on several levels. the material was firstly read through carefully, so we could obtain a general overview and perceive categories. coding and themes were then systematically established by coding terms human rights education review – volume 4(2) 76 and all mentioned items into categories and sub-categories. finally, all categories were carefully examined and combined into the most common themes found in the answers. not all references included in the categories were unambiguous and sentences included overlapping themes. the reproducibility and reliability of the coding (weber, 1990, p. 17) was controlled in research group discussions. the limitations of the methodology include the possibility of bias because of the influence of the lectures and optional answering. the results are not generalisable for all students in different educational programmes or to student teachers in general as they were only obtained from students in one university. we also acknowledge the problem of not separating items on democracy education and on hre in our questionnaire. however, the space to elaborate gave respondents the opportunity to clarify subjective meanings, and this also helped us to interpret answers. findings student teachers were asked whether dhre should be a general or a compulsory part of teacher education. in total, 89.2% (n=298) said it should be a compulsory part of teacher education and 96% (n=298) said it should be a general part of teacher education. 93% of group 1 (n=178) and 83.3% of group 2 (n=120) answered it should be compulsory. more students in group 2 mentioned that they had already studied the basics. students explained their negative responses in different ways. the notion of compulsory dhre was criticised in some answers: ‘compulsion does not increase the willingness to understand things’. it was also mentioned that the content of teacher education is already quite full, that general abstract ‘values jargon’ is not needed because it is self-evident, and that concrete approaches were needed. some students wrote that they could not evaluate the role of dhre in teacher education because they were at the beginning of their studies while others wrote that they were about to graduate, and that ‘this far, the issues have been weakly presented and i’m at the master’s level already!’ a number of reasons were given for why dhre should be part of teacher education: the current lack of teaching or insufficient teaching; the fundamental importance of dhre in education; the fact that it is mentioned in curricula; and legal aspects. many students wrote that compulsory studies were necessary because then every future teacher would have the same level of basic knowledge. thus, dhre would not only be for those who are already active and interested; those who are not interested would also gain knowledge. some described that they would not have themselves participated in optional studies but were content that they had learned the basics in the lecture. subject student teachers made a number of statements: ‘if the meaning of fundamental rights is not understood, then teacher education ensures that everyone gets the knowledge’; ‘important topics and it’s frightening how little many know about them’ (biology and english student teacher); ‘every teacher’s most important task is enhancing students’ knowledge and skills of human rights and democracy, which are our societal orders’ most important values. they are not emphasised enough’ (history and social studies student teacher). several answers mentioned that democracy and human rights are not self-evident. one adult education student put it this way: ‘these issues are not self-evident in the end. you grow into them, they can be learned. if you follow public discussions, you can see that there is a need.’ t. kasa, m. rautiainen, m. malama & a. kallioniemi 77 the main content categories were constructed through qualitative content analysis of open answers (see table 1). the most referenced important themes were 1) rights and responsibilities, 2) equality and equity, 3) democracy, agency and participation, 4) practical skills, 5) diversity and inclusion, 6) ethics, 7) discrimination and 8) encounters in general. the topicality of dhre was mentioned several times. sub-categories describe representational themes that were included in the main categories. table 1. categories in student teachers’ responses on democracy and human rights education the implications of topical societal issues handled in the media and in public discussions were often referred to: ‘nowadays there are several pressures put on it: racism, hate speech, etc. democracy is in crisis.’ mentions were made of world politics, disinformation and debates about gender issues in schools. one student mentioned that ‘understanding international treaties is increasingly important nowadays’. a lack of dhre in teacher education was mentioned several times as a cause for concern. some students recognised that dhre has been related to other topics, but not explicitly. teachers’ questions on age-appropriate teaching were also present in our data. this was especially the case with group 1 (n=178), which included early human rights education review – volume 4(2) 78 childhood and elementary-level students. respondents from this group brought up the need for handling children’s rights, understanding democracy, and generally knowing how to teach and practise dhre with different age groups, especially children in early childhood. naturally, in these answers co-operation with home and caregivers was mentioned more than in group 2. students made remarks about diverse families, caregiver’s rights and one described ‘the possible disagreements with parents if they don’t, for example, accept some children’s rights’ as a cause for concern. the understanding of the principles of democracy and human rights at school or in praxis was described as important in many answers. the importance of knowing how to apply dhre to everyday teaching praxis was mentioned; this was often concretised with wishes for pedagogical tools and examples from real life. the interactive way in which lectures treated real-life situations was appreciated. when practical skills and concerns were reflected upon, many respondents brought up the issue that they lack knowledge and education: ‘i feel like i’m not yet ready to teach these issues although the curriculum supposes i should be able to.’ one student brought up the importance of ‘bringing the issues to the level of everyday praxis so that they are not “somewhere out there” at the level of articles or are too self-evident to be visible’. the previously mentioned suggestion that human rights problems are seen as belonging ‘somewhere else’ (toivanen, 2007, p. 41) occurred in some answers: ‘people don’t have enough knowledge of human rights problems in finland. often problems are seen as “somewhere else”.’ another response was that ‘finnish people know [about dhre] already’. in relation to discrimination and practical skills, one student wrote: ‘our own society has structural discrimination and unequal practices e.g. towards some minorities. how should we address this in primary school?’ ethical issues were highlighted in many answers and some saw dhre as an ‘ethical cornerstone’, meaning that its ethical values and legal principles provided guidelines in difficult situations. in subject teachers’ and adult educators’ responses there were more references to the importance of the ‘all-round educational’ aspect of dhre. in finnish the word is sivistys; there is no direct translation, but it means a combination of ethical knowledge, wisdom, and general educational understanding. this was articulated in the idea that through dhre ‘ethical professionalism would develop with every future educator’. discussion and conclusions there are three main conclusions to be drawn from our research data: 1) there is a wide support for dhre among student teachers—96% (n=298) state it should be part of teacher education; 2) there is evidence of societal change over the last ten years (cf. matilainen, 2011; rautiainen et al., 2014), since student teachers perceive dhre as relevant and no longer regard it as self-evident; 3) although there is an official commitment to dhre in finland (fnae, 2014; 2018; 2019), it is inadequately implemented in teacher education. we interpret the results in relation to international research, descriptions of implicit and explicit hre (müller, 2009, p. 9) and ‘national exceptionalism’. in finland, explicit references to democracy and human rights in national curricula have not yet been transferred to university teacher education curricula. the national differences in teacher education have been growing, producing differences in the ability of graduate teachers to include dhre in their work. the reasons for this t. kasa, m. rautiainen, m. malama & a. kallioniemi 79 may be the government’s project-based steering and the growing profiling of universities; these may, in the future, increase differences between finnish universities. the results of this study are typical for an educational system based on autonomy. developmental work is progressing slowly, because there is no strong tradition of dhre and work is still based on the interest of individuals rather than on systematic institutional planning. in addition, tensions inside the educational system and universities hinder implementation, even though democracy and human rights are recognised as basic educational values. our results highlight the complicated relationship between international treaties and declarations, national curricula, and difficulties in the realisation of values principles. previous studies concluded that there had not been the political will to improve the role of hre in finnish universities (toivanen, 2007, p. 39), and that universities had not explicitly promoted hre (hrc, 2014). we interpret our results through ‘implicit’ and ‘explicit’ lenses (müller, 2009, p. 9); a lack of explicit reference to human rights instruments and legal knowledge in hre is widely experienced (bemis, 2013, p. 24; decara, 2013; hrc, 2014; waldron et al., 2011, p. 4). teachers cannot compensate for the lack of political will to institutionalise hre (cf. rinaldi, 2017, p. 99); and we see this in our data when student teachers say that their education does not properly prepare them to explicitly address hre issues. the lack of explicit reference and the detachment of hre from its judicial basis (hrc, 2014) also helps us to understand why the legal justification for hre was the most referenced item in our data (table 1). this contrasts with results from germany, where the legal foundation was perceived as the least important item (müller, 2009, p. 18). neglect of hre legal standards, which we have characterised as implicit handling of human rights, relates to the lack of preparation of teachers (ahmed et al., 2020), which teachers and student teachers have mentioned in interviews (bemis, 2013, p. 9; decara, 2013, p. 2, 32). our data bears out these results; student teachers see dhre as important (cf. waldron et al., 2012), substantial, topical and challenging. students also see a number of challenges and causes for hesitation. these refer to issues of practical implementation regarding age-appropriate teaching (cf. decara, 2013, p.3; struthers, 2016) and a lack of teacher education (cf. bemis, 2013, p. 45) that makes them question their own competence. a fear of difficulties with families was also reported. this apprehension is similar to that expressed by scottish student teachers who, even though they did not have any experience of encountering difficulties, noted that parents may be a barrier to teaching human rights, due to different cultural, religious and moral factors (cassidy et al., 2014, p. 26). we suggest, in accordance with cassidy et al. (ibid., p. 27), that students need greater clarity on the right to teach human rights. in our data, the need for training on democracy education in primary schools and ece was apparent. one thing that students were critical about was unnecessarily abstract ‘values jargon’. in scotland, some critical respondents perceived hre as ‘a meaningless add-on to the curriculum’ (bemis, 2013, p. 40). a similar concern was present in our data; without any connection to ‘reality’ the issue remains ‘somewhere out there’, on the legislative level. this relates to what müller (2009, p. 6) argues; that as long as democracy and human rights are merely represented as abstract values or judicial systems and their true meaning is not known or relevant to a large part of the population, they remain vulnerable to challenges. human rights education review – volume 4(2) 80 not surprisingly, wide references to the topicality of dhre were made, given current societal issues such as the rise of autocratisation (lührmann & lindberg, 2019), public debates on controversial educational issues, and the questioning of international norms, including edc/hre (muñoz ramírez, 2018). the questioning of human rights norms can be read from a wider perspective as a counter-hegemonic distrust (zembylas & keet, 2019, p. 24) which poses a challenge to dhre: teaching should include critical and ethical analyses of power relations. in our data, some students interpreted the knowledge of international norms as important in the climate of populist and nationalist agendas. this sample of students overwhelmingly supported dhre. however, this research is limited, and more precise research is needed to explore the barriers and orientations of finnish teachers in general. as our study focused on initial teacher education, understanding the impact of the emphasis on dhre in national curricula requires further investigation. finally, we interpret the general situation of dhre in finland from the perspective of ‘national exceptionalism’. an interesting change (cf. matilainen, 2011) that our data describes is that students do not see dhre as self-evident. however, if we look at the official commitments to dhre and various implementation barriers in teacher education, it leads to the question of whether attitudes in finland are similar to those in norway (vesterdal, 2019, p. 16), where dhre is seen as already implemented. if the realisation of hre is analysed from the perspectives of teachers and teacher education, there would seem to be a critique of the abstract attachment to values, in a political discourse that may be interpreted as hypocritical (cf. vesterdal, 2019). we would argue that notions of exceptionalism and selfevidentiality need to be challenged. curricular commitments are not alone sufficient for implementation (cf. rinaldi, 2017, p. 90) in teacher education in finland; as is the case for other democratic and human rights policies, there is a need for comprehensive and long-term (rautiainen et al., 2020, p. 51) promotion. we acknowledge that many processes concerning dhre are ongoing in finland and there is certainly a need for further research to fill the gaps between dhre policies and investigate the realities of the educational field. the situation in finland is a good example of the case that even though national curricula can be explicit, implementation might well be inadequate. we conclude that dhre will not be realised without democratising it so that children, teachers and educational professionals are properly involved in its actualisation, and that curricular or legal reforms do not seem to be enough if there is a lack of systematic, long-term and continuous teacher education. further investigation is needed to understand the right measures to be taken for dhre to have an impact and meaning in the educational field. one interesting aspect is the societal activity of students: because of climate change and the threats to democracy, young people have become activated. are teacher educators facing a politically and socially more conscious, active and critical student generation in the near future? will these students crucially change teacher education so that it is more strongly based on democracy and human rights? acknowledgements this work was carried out as part of the human rights, democracy, values and dialogue in education: the development of education for democratic citizenship and human rights education in teacher education 2018–2021 -project. t. kasa, m. rautiainen, m. malama & a. kallioniemi 81 references adami, r. 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(2019). critical human rights education: advancing socialjustice-oriented educational praxes. cham: springer international https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-27198-5 https://julkaisut.valtioneuvosto.fi/handle/10024/162286 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11125-018-9419-z https://doi.org/10.1007/s11125-018-9417-1 https://doi.org/10.1093/hrlr/ngv040 https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2907 https://doi.org/10.4135/9781412983488 https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-27198-5 volume 3, no 2 (2020) date received: 18-06-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3925 date accepted: 01-10-2020 issn 2535-5406 children’s rights in swedish teacher education åsa olsson karlstad university, sweden. abstract: in 2020, the united nations convention on the rights of the child (uncrc) was incorporated into swedish domestic law. in the proposals for new legislation, it is emphasised that steps be taken to develop knowledge of children’s rights among professionals at all levels. this article explores the presence and status of children’s rights in swedish teacher education. a total of 362 teacher-education course plans and syllabi at 12 universities were examined, and a questionnaire was conducted among 156 teacher educators. although teacher educators judge knowledge around children’s rights to be important for pre-service teachers, the syllabi provide little guidance as to what knowledge pre-service teachers need. using the framework for analysing human rights education designed by educational specialist felisa tibbitts, it is concluded that swedish teacher education fits with a values and awareness model, which is associated with socialisation but not with social change. keywords: children’s rights, uncrc, swedish teacher education, syllabus, contents corresponding author: åsa olsson: asa.olsson@kau.se http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3925 mailto:asa.olsson@kau.se a.olsson 50 children’s rights in swedish teacher education doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3925 issn 2535-5406 åsa olsson karlstad university, sweden. asa.olsson@kau.se abstract: in 2020, the united nations convention on the rights of the child (uncrc) was incorporated into swedish domestic law. in the proposals for new legislation, it is emphasised that steps be taken to develop knowledge of children’s rights among professionals at all levels. this article explores the presence and status of children’s rights in swedish teacher education. a total of 362 teacher-education course plans and syllabi at 12 universities were examined, and a questionnaire was conducted among 156 teacher educators. although teacher educators judge knowledge around children’s rights to be important for pre-service teachers, the syllabi provide little guidance as to what knowledge pre-service teachers need. using the framework for analysing human rights education designed by educational specialist felisa tibbitts, it is concluded that swedish teacher education fits with a values and awareness model, which is associated with socialisation but not with social change. keywords: children’s rights, uncrc, swedish teacher education, syllabus, contents introduction at the beginning of 2020, following a lengthy national debate in sweden, the united nations convention on the rights of the child (uncrc) was incorporated into swedish legislation. arguments had been put forth that the principles of the best interests of the child (article 3) and children’s rights to participation (article 12) would be reinforced. in the proposal for the new legislation, it was argued that a general development of competence among professionals at all levels was required (ministry of health and social affairs, 2016; sou, 2016). in comments to sweden’s fifth periodic report to the united nations committee on the rights of the child in 2015, the committee expressed concern that ‘relevant professionals do not have sufficient training in assessing the best interests of the child’ (2015, p. 4). undoubtedly, teachers fall into this category of relevant professionals. this article focuses on the presence of children’s rights and the uncrc in swedish teacher education. children’s rights can either be seen as separated from human rights and described in terms of provision, protection and participation rights – or, they can be seen as included in human rights, as children’s human rights (quennerstedt, 2010). in this article, children’s rights are seen as part of a broader human rights framework; therefore, children’s rights education is considered part of the overarching concept of human rights education (hre). the united nations declaration on human rights (udhr) (united nations, 1948, article 26) and the uncrc (articles 29 and 42) declare that all humans are entitled to know their rights and that states have the obligation to inform and educate mailto:asa.olsson@kau.se human rights education review – volume 3(2) 51 their citizens about them. a major component of the effectiveness of an hre initiative is the quality of teacher training (boutros, 2018). this article aims to explore the presence and status of children’s rights in swedish teacher education. the following research questions are addressed:  what knowledge and capacities regarding children’s rights are pre-service teachers expected to demonstrate, according to policy documents for teacher education?  what are the goals and contents of children’s rights in teacher education and where do they belong in the curricula, according to policy documents and teacher educators?  to what degree are knowledge and capacities regarding children’s rights important for pre-service teachers, according to teacher educators? to strengthen efforts to educate people globally about their rights, the general assembly of the united nations proclaimed the world programme for human rights education (ongoing through 2024) to advance the implementation of hre (united nations general assembly (2005). the second phase (2010–2014) (ohchr, 2010) focuses on hre for higher education, and on human rights training programmes for teachers and educators. 1 according to the programme, hre encompasses three elements: knowledge and skills (i.e., learning about human rights and mechanisms for their protection, as well as acquiring skills to apply them in daily life); values, attitudes and behaviours (i.e., developing values and reinforcing attitudes and behaviour which uphold human rights); and action (i.e., taking action to defend and promote human rights) (un, 2005, p. 4). to further strengthen the right to education, the un declaration on hre was adopted in 2011, highlighting education about, through and for human rights: human rights education and training encompasses education: (a) about human rights, which includes providing knowledge and understanding of human rights norms and principles, the values that underpin them and the mechanisms for their protection; (b) through human rights, which includes learning and teaching in a way that respects the rights of both educators and learners; (c) for human rights, which includes empowering persons to enjoy and exercise their rights and to respect and uphold the rights of others. (un general assembly, 2011, p. 3) the first clause reaffirms that hre has a place in all forms of education and training, including the formal, non-formal and informal sectors (tibbitts, 2017). the second clause reflects the full spectrum of learner goals, such as knowledge/understanding, values, capacities and actions. the third clause draws attention to teaching and learning processes oriented towards taking action for human rights. a swedish context if one tried to identify a swedish self-image of children’s rights, one would most likely find images of a nation upholding and safeguarding them. the banning of all corporal punishment of children in sweden in 1979, as the first country in the world, caused some commotion internationally. sweden was also one of the first nations to ratify the uncrc, in 1990, and was one of the driving forces for the world summit for children in new york that same year. on the kidsrights index 2 for 2020, sweden ranks fourth. then again, the uncrc was also part of domestic legislation in sweden’s neighbouring countries long ago (finland in 1991, norway in 2003). sweden has, however, received comments from the un committee on the rights of a.olsson 52 the child on remaining challenges when it comes to protecting rights of children in vulnerable situations; e.g. children with substance-abusing parents, children with disabilities, and asylum-seeking children. the committee also urges that the rights of the child to be heard in different contexts should be strengthened. in sweden, ten years of schooling is compulsory for all children, from the age of six. preschool is accessible for children ages 1-5, and approximately 95% of all children attend it. professional certification is required for school and preschool teachers, and most of them complete a teacher education programme of 3.5–5.5 years. human rights—including children’s rights—have recently been emphasised in policy documents for primary and secondary school such as the education act (skollag, 2010) and the curriculum for the compulsory school, preschool class and school-age educare (national agency for education, 2018). national surveys have concluded that the overall impression is that hre in teacher education is working well (national agency for higher education, 2008; swedish higher education authority, 2015) although there are still areas in need of development, such as teacher educators’ opportunities for further training. teacher education in sweden is regulated at a national level by the higher education ordinance (swedish ministry of education and research, 1993), where general guidelines and goals for teacher education are stipulated. for all teacher education programmes, there is an overarching syllabus, also known as the programme study plan. in accordance with the higher education ordinance, all teacher education programmes include core education subjects of 60 credits, equivalent to one year of full-time study. core education subjects comprise of seven sub-themes 3 linked to future professional practice. the sub-theme of particular interest in this study is ‘history of the school system, its organisation and conditions as well as core educational values, including fundamental democratic values and human rights’. literature review hre is increasingly emerging and becoming institutionalised in university undergraduate and graduate programmes (bajaj, 2017). in professional settings across the globe, human rights training is offered for professionals such as social workers and teachers. bajaj (2017) explores how researchers and practitioners globally approach hre, dealing with the theoretical and conceptual foundations as well as practices. her book provides an overview of hre as a scholarly field, aiming at offering working definitions, critical insights and directions, among other things, into the expanding field of hre. tibbitts (2017) also points out that hre is a newly established field of educational theory and practice, gaining increased attention and significance across the globe. a strong presence of human rights in educational curricula in recent years is observed by garnett russell and suárez (2017), who link this development to three interrelated factors: globalisation, the growth of mass education, and the consolidation of the global human rights movement. we also see the growth of this movement in terms of the increased number of education textbooks mentioning human rights, as well as in the establishment of a human rights terminology. over the past decade, projects promoting holistic rights-based school policies have increased (meijas, 2017). these are rooted in the notion that human rights must be simultaneously learned and practised throughout the school, supported by theoretical, empirical and political approaches and initiatives. osler and starkey human rights education review – volume 3(2) 53 (2010) highlight the necessity for teachers and educators to not only teach human rights but to also demonstrate respect for human rights and democracy in education. several scholars discuss hre in terms of it being a transformative process, oriented towards action and social change (bajaj, 2011; boutros, 2018; kingston, 2018; osler & starkey, 2010; tibbitts, 2017). yet despite growing support for hre, human rights educators continue to face challenges. kingston argues that the u.s. lags behind other countries in integrating hre into public school and higher education curricula. at a majority of universities in the u.s., human rights may be addressed in just one or two supplementary lessons. this backlog of hre is global, according to roth (2015), as processes of implementing hre have been too slow both at school and university level-partly due to conflicting cultural and social norms and values, and partly to other established perspectives within educational systems, such as gender equality, sustainability and equal rights. in a literature review of global hre initiatives, boutros (2018) identified deficient teacher training, inadequate literature and a low level of commitment by school administrations to be major obstacles for effective implementation of human rights. lack of student interest was explained by insufficiencies in teacher training, teachers lacking confidence and understanding in the field, and teachers’ inability to connect content to students’ everyday lives. according to boutros, two important factors in implementing and realising human rights are, firstly, that teachers are taught about them and, secondly, that teachers try relate hre to pupils’ everyday lives. a vast majority of teacher education students in scotland agreed that it was important that children be taught about human rights (cassidy, brunner & webster, 2014), yet two-thirds of respondents did not feel confident in teaching about human rights, and many were uncertain about what to teach and how to teach it. the students expressed some confusion about the differences between human rights and children’s rights. moreover, religious and cultural beliefs and traditions in some settings may contradict the fundamental values of human rights. another barrier identified by the students was that curriculum contents would be prioritised over hre. bajaj (2011, 2017) stresses the importance of acknowledging varying ideologies of hre initiatives, with attention to social settings. implementing hre in schools involves different challenges in different contexts across the world. some scholars identify challenges associated with human rights values when they conflict with religious beliefs or cultural traditions (boutros, 2018; cassidy et al., 2014; faiz & kamer, 2017; muñoz ramírez, 2018). for example, in recent years, neoconservative catholic sectors in spain have mobilised people to engage in actions to remove hre from spanish curricula (muñoz ramírez, 2018). in iraqi kurdistan, a specific challenge raised by teachers was associated with teaching rights to children who had personal experiences of human rights abuses (osler & chalank, 2017). teachers acknowledged the need for both children and adults to learn about their rights, despite the teachers’ knowledge about the subject being limited. the researchers concluded that an even more serious problem was associated with teaching people their rights without addressing the authorities’ obligation to secure those rights. some studies suggest that even though preand in-service teachers may support the idea of teaching pupils about children’s rights, they expect to encounter different kinds of obstacles to implementing them in school. in faiz and kamer’s study in turkey (2017), pre-service teachers assumed that limitless freedom for a.olsson 54 pupils in school would lead to discipline problems, while hong kong teachers in leung and lo’s study (2012) feared that hre could not only pose a threat to school discipline but also to their own interests. howe and covell (2005) also point out that teachers’ fears of losing authority and respect from pupils and control in the classroom contribute to some teachers’ reluctance to teach human rights and, especially, children’s rights. another obstacle in the implementation of children’s rights observed by researchers is the potential conflict between children’s rights and parental rights. in the early 21st century, parents in canada asked questions about their children being informed about children’s rights and participating in a school election. these parents argued that this would undermine the integrity of the family and contribute to the erosion of parental authority (howe & covell, 2005). cassidy et al (2014) also found that pre-service teachers feared that some parents might be offended by hre as it might conflict with their cultural and religious beliefs. swedish research has mainly aimed at exploring how hre is implemented in school, including preschool. studies of swedish curricula proved that aspects of children’s rights and human rights were implicitly present in the texts but not expressed explicitly in terms of a rights perspective (quennerstedt, 2015). moreover, in national policy documents, hre is considered an interdisciplinary field; this implies that it concerns all subjects, yet there is an apparent risk that it does not belong anywhere (quennerstedt, brantefors, tellgren & thelander, 2019). teachers in the study of quennerstedt et al. felt insecure about appropriate hre content, and the researchers found that decisions about content and pedagogy regarding hre were largely the individual teachers’ responsibility. olsson, elvstrand and thelander (2020) concluded that human rights and children’s rights in teacher education was a matter of judgement and values rather than of knowledge and understanding. even though there is evidence that hre is expanding globally, several studies imply that teachers’ knowledge of the topic is limited and that many teachers are insecure about what to teach and how to teach it. goals, contents and pedagogy in education, including teacher education and training, vary across and within nations and must be understood in their cultural and social contexts. in times of reinforcing the uncrc in a swedish context, it seems timely to examine how national teacher education seeks to prepare pre-service teachers to educate children about, through and for children’s rights. conceptual framework to analyse children’s rights in swedish teacher education, tibbitts’ (2002, 2017) framework for analysing hre is used. tibbitts (2002) has suggested three models for categorising and analysing hre practice: values and awareness; accountability; and transformation. the values and awareness model is associated with socialisation, the accountability model with professional development, and the transformation model with activism. tibbitts argues that the goals of hre are oriented around the elimination of human rights violations, and it therefore involves social change and activism. tibbitts analyses any plausible link between the models and social change strategies. in the values and awareness model, she finds no connection to theories of social change. the goal is rather to provide learners with knowledge of human rights but not encourage them to take action. in the accountability model, the theory of change is linked with the individual and his/her professional role. education aims at influencing learners’ knowledge, attitudes and actions so that they will respect and human rights education review – volume 3(2) 55 promote human rights standards in their professional roles. if professionals-or future professionals-find human rights relevant for their work and change their beliefs and behaviour, this may eventually prevent human rights violations. finally, in the transformation model, the theory of change is quite prominent. in this approach, the methodologies are associated with transformative and emancipatory learning. this involves critical pedagogy and reflection, and this leads to personal transformation that results in action. the models were later revised (tibbitts, 2017) by applying some new dimensions based on tibbitts’ research and observations of practice. tibbitts added four kinds of methodologies used in education, which intersect with the goals for hre. these are outlined below. didactic methodologies. these are oriented towards the delivery of content to learners, influenced by the traditional culture of education where learners are expected to memorise specific contents without having opportunities to critically reflect or discuss. due to the lack of participation and critical reflection, this approach can be seen as one of attempted socialisation. participatory or interactive methodologies. these have the purpose of helping learners reach a better understanding of human rights content and apply these values to issues at hand. these methodologies may result in engagement in the actual teaching and learning practices, but they are not actually intended to foster agency in the learner. critical reflection on human rights values and standards and social problems may be addressed as an analytical exercise. participatory learning takes place in both the accountability and the transformation models. empowerment methodologies. these are oriented towards agency in learners, through developing specific capacities such as leadership and practices of nondiscrimination. empowerment methodologies are distinguished from participatory methodologies in that the learning processes aimed at increasing participants’ capacities to influence their environment. transformative methodologies. these have explicit aims of social transformation through human rights activism. in hre, learners are prepared to organise human rights awareness-raising activities such as campaigning. methodologies of transformative and emancipatory learning are associated with critical pedagogy, which encourages learners to think critically about connections between individual problems and social contexts and to take action against oppression. critical pedagogy is associated with the transformation model. materials and methods teacher education in sweden is provided at 26 universities. this study covers five teacher education programmes: early-years education, primary education, grades f– 3 and 4–6, secondary education, and upper-secondary education. methods used in the study are a content analysis of policy documents and a survey. to address the first research question (‘what knowledge and capacities regarding children’s rights are pre-service teachers expected to demonstrate, according to policy documents for teacher education?’), programme study plans and syllabi for core education courses were analysed. to answer the second research question (‘what are the goals and contents of children’s rights in teacher education and where in the curricula do they belong, according to policy documents and teacher educators?’), data from both the document analysis and the survey were used. data from the survey were used to analyse the third research question (‘to what degree are knowledge and capacities a.olsson 56 regarding children’s rights important for pre-service teachers, according to teacher educators?’). the document study included syllabi for teacher education programmes of twelve universities, selected by geographical placement and size. programme study plans and syllabi from 2018 for each core education course were collected. altogether, the empirical material added up to 49 programme study plans and 313 syllabi. the programme study plans and syllabi were reviewed in search of explicit and implicit keywords such as children’s rights, un convention of the rights of the child and human rights. the survey consisted of an anonymised online questionnaire, sent to teacher educators at all 26 universities. closed questions with options to comment were asked about goals and contents concerning children’s rights in teacher programmes. questions were also asked about teacher educators’ knowledge, attitudes, interest and engagement in teaching children’s rights. the questionnaire was sent to 317 teacher educators (69 programme coordinators and 248 course leaders) and the response rate was 49% (156 participants). in the analysis of the data of the survey, no significant differences between categories of teacher educators (preschool to upper secondary school programmes) were found in any of the questions asked. results from the survey are presented as descriptive statistics. findings document analysis to examine contents and goals relating to children’s rights expressed in policy documents, the analysis was performed in two steps. in the first step, the focus was on how goals and content of the higher education ordinance swedish ministry of education and research (1993) were transformed into local programme study plans at the university level. the second step examined how programme study plans were interpreted, translated and developed into syllabi for each core education course. the analysis of the first step showed that local programme study plans at universities closely mirrored national goals in the higher education ordinance, often using the exact wording, with no or little effort to elaborate or concretise these goals. this circumstance is in a sense natural since all universities have obligations to fulfil national goals. nevertheless, it has a nation-wide impact on swedish teacher education. the higher education ordinance describes what teacher students shall demonstrate in order to gain a degree. there are three subheadings: knowledge and understanding, competence and skills, and judgement and approach. regarding human rights, it declares that teacher students satisfy the following requirements: competence and skills: demonstrate the capacity to communicate and instil core educational values, including human rights and the fundamental democratic values. judgement and approach: demonstrate the capacity to make assessments in educational processes, with particular respect for human rights, especially children’s rights according to the convention on the rights of the child. however, under the sub-heading knowledge and understanding there is no description of what students should demonstrate. consequently, no programme higher education ordinance programme study plans core education syllabus human rights education review – volume 3(2) 57 study plan at any teacher education programme in sweden describes what preservice teachers need to know and understand about children’s rights or the uncrc. in the second step of the analysis, 313 core education syllabi were examined, using nvivo software for qualitative analysis. six main categories of goals and contents related to children’s rights were identified. the first category contains explicit references to uncrc (including alternative wording). in the second category, quotes related to children’s rights were organised. the four remaining categories concern children’s participation, equality or equal rights, non-discrimination, degrading treatment and terms related to these themes, and human rights. at one university alone, the best interest of the child was mentioned in the syllabi. additionally, single references were made to children’s right to play and children’s right to special needs support. the numbers of related terms and sentences in each category are listed in table 1: categories syllabi quotes universities uncrc 14 19 7 children’s rights 21 25 8 participation 21 43 8 equality, equal rights 18 23 8 discrimination, degrading treatment 47 58 12 human rights 35 77 10 table 1. terms found in syllabi children’s rights and the uncrc although almost all course education plans (43 of 49) copied the exact wording from the higher education ordinance (demonstrate the capacity to make assessments in educational processes […] with particular respect for human rights, especially children’s rights according to the convention on the rights of the child[…]), goals and contents concerning the uncrc was found only in 14 of 313 syllabi. at five of the 12 universities, the uncrc was not mentioned in any syllabus for core education courses on any teacher education programme. in the case of children’s rights, the result was similar. at four universities, children’s rights were not mentioned in the syllabi. hence, despite a distinct emphasis in the higher education ordinance and the programme study plans, this was not reflected in core education course syllabi. furthermore, at four of the universities that mentioned either the uncrc or children’s rights, the terms occurred only in programmes for pre-service teachers in preschool and primary school. an overall reflection is that few substantial examples were given of the knowledge and skills related to the uncrc or children’s rights that students were expected to demonstrate. human rights were mentioned more frequently in policy documents, although examples of specific content were few. the relation between human rights and children’s rights was not addressed in any syllabi. a.olsson 58 participation children’s participation was frequently mentioned (43 quotes) in the core education course syllabi. there were, however, no explicit links between participation and article 12 in the uncrc, declaring children’s right to express their views and be listened to. in only a few cases the term participation was used in relation to children influencing or participating in decision-making. on the other hand, several examples were given of goals and contents about social participation. for example, teacher students were expected to demonstrate skills to strengthen pupils’ interactional skills,’ or apply inclusive methodologies. also, participation was associated with special needs and inclusive education. fundamental values the higher education ordinance declares that pre-service teachers should demonstrate knowledge of fundamental values such as human rights, along with skills to prevent discrimination and degrading treatment. in the syllabi, there are several goals and contents relating to these skills. for example, the requirement that pre-service teachers acquire skills to prevent bullying and promote tolerance and compassion for others is implicitly related to various articles in the uncrc. yet there are few cases where these fundamental values are, in fact, associated with children’s rights. one single example is given in quotes from a syllabus from the teacher education programme at one university: the school’s mission is to take children’s rights into accountto promote equal treatment and prevent discrimination and degrading treatment of pupils. hence, in the syllabi, several aspects related to the uncrc are present. however, these aspects are not presented from the perspective of children’s rights. survey a questionnaire was distributed to study teachers’ engagement in and knowledge of children’s rights. the survey covered programme coordinators and course leaders for core education courses in five teacher education programmes at all 26 swedish universities. questions were asked about participants’ views and opinions about preservice teachers’ need for knowledge and skills in children’s rights and the uncrc, and about children’s rights education in relation to other subjects and perspectives. questions were also asked about contents in the participants’ courses, along with questions about their competence, the competence of colleagues and opportunities for further training. questions were closed, and respondents could make comments. the importance for pre-service teachers when asked to what degree participants agreed with the statement ‘knowledge about children’s rights is important for pre-service teachers’, 96.8% agreed or strongly agreed. a corresponding question asked about the importance for preservice teachers to have knowledge about the uncrc, and results were similar; 83.5% of participants fully agreed while 13.3% agreed. thus, 96.8% of the participants in the survey supported the importance of both children’s rights and the uncrc in teacher education. only one participant did not agree with either of these statements. human rights education review – volume 3(2) 59 frequency percent valid strongly agree 140 88.6 agree 13 8.2 disagree 0 0 strongly disagree 1 0.6 no answer 4 2.5 total 158 100 table 2. the importance of knowledge about children’s rights subject and contents when asked in what subject field children’s rights belonged, 51.2% responded that it was an interdisciplinary field concerning all core education courses, while another 38.8% reported that children’s rights should be part of their own or other core education courses. of the participants, 3.7% supported the idea that children’s rights should be a subject on its own. participants were asked to mark what knowledge and skills about children’s rights pre-service teachers need. the pre-defined responses were:  knowledge of the articles in the uncrc;  knowledge about the uncrc, its history and global deployment;  knowledge and skills to observe the principles of the uncrc in their future profession;  knowledge and skills to foster children to exercise their rights; and  knowledge and skills to foster children to take action defending their own and other children’s rights. participants could choose all applicable responses. the most frequent response was ‘knowledge and skills to observe the principles of the uncrc in their future profession’ (80%). about 73% chose knowledge about ‘the articles in the uncrc,’ and ‘skills to foster children to exercise their rights.’ the two other alternatives were each checked by approximately 50% of the participants. when asked whether knowledge and skills concerning children’s rights are most important for pre-service teachers for younger children, 23% of the participants agreed or strongly agreed. (note that there were no significant differences between teacher educators for different stages.) competence and priority questions were also asked about how participants rated their own and their colleagues’ knowledge and skills concerning children’s rights. 92.2% of participants judged their knowledge to be good or satisfactory, while colleagues were trusted to have good or satisfactory knowledge in 93.8% of cases. furthermore, a question was asked as to whether education about children’s rights risked being deprioritised as a result of competition with other perspectives such as sustainability, gender equality and cultural diversity. on this notion, 21% agreed or strongly agreed, while 30% agreed to some degree, and 22% disagreed. in open-ended commentaries to the question, some (n = 7) responses stated that children’s rights should be regarded as integrated into an overarching theme of core values, involving sustainability, gender equality and cultural diversity. several comments (n > 10) in open-ended responses also stated that the contents in the courses they were responsible for related implicitly to the uncrc; however, these a.olsson 60 were not expressed in the goals: ‘perhaps not explicitly in course goals, but it is present in course contents, definitely.’ ‘children’s rights are included but not mentioned specifically,’ and ‘[…] not explicitly but covered by goals, the way i see it.’ analysis teacher educators appear to highly support the idea of children’s rights and the uncrc as important and relevant perspectives in teacher education programmes. yet, the results of the study reveal uncertainties about appropriate content for preservice teachers to learn, and it is unclear where in the curriculum children’s rights belong. overall, children’s rights seem related to judgements and values rather than to knowledge and understanding. the contents are expressed in general terms, and syllabi provide little guidance about what teachers need to know to be prepared to teach children’s rights. the message in national policies is that teacher students should demonstrate respect for children’s rights according to the uncrc, which is reflected in programme study plans. despite this, goals and contents in syllabi are rarely clarified and concretised; they rather turn out vague or simply vanish. several comments in the survey reported that the course contents implicitly relate to the uncrc or are expressed in other words than in terms of children’s rights. other comments expressed that children’s rights were to be regarded as integrated into an overarching theme of core values, involving sustainability, gender equality and cultural diversity. hence, children’s rights seem to be conceptualised by teacher educators as part of a body of democratic values rather than in specific terms. out of the three models for categorising and analysing hre practices introduced by tibbitts (2002, 2017), the values and awareness model seems to be the most applicable to the results of this study. few traces of social change, empowerment or transformative contents or methods are found in the study data. it is noteworthy that 70% of teacher educators supported the notion that pre-service teachers should acquire ‘skills to foster children to exercise their rights’. a limitation was, however, that participants could choose all applicable responses without being encouraged to prioritise. aside from this result, no other examples related to social change were found. the values and awareness model of hre is, according to tibbitts, noncritical towards society; consequently, it is not designed to cultivate critical reflection, learner agency or social transformation. tibbitts describes the model as fragmented and incomplete, analysed in terms of the un definition, which includes the concepts of about, through, and for hre. in tibbitts’ opinion, it is also potentially counterproductive, due to the lack of participation and critical reflection. discussion given the notion of children’s rights education being about, through and for human rights, the results of the study indicate that the goals and contents of swedish teacher education are predominantly about children’s rights. participants agreed that teacher education should aim at pre-service teachers observing the principles of the uncrc in their future profession, suggesting some support for the through aspect. nevertheless, there is little evidence in the syllabi, aside from general goals and contents, of what teacher students are expected to learn about children’s rights. prior research has found that teachers and teacher students for different reasons often feel insecure about what to teach and how to do it in the field of human rights including children’s rights (cassidy et al. 2014; kingston, 2018; quennerstedt human rights education review – volume 3(2) 61 et al., 2019; roth, 2015). parker (2018) argues that hre curricula are ‘at best opaque’ (p. 5) and at worst underdeveloped, only mentioning human rights. he advocates that there is a need for an hre curriculum based on a theory of knowledge, clarifying what knowledge about hre includes. parker also presents outlines for such a curriculum: here are the norms and principles of human rights, the values that underpin them, their histories, the mechanisms for their protection, and methods and stories of political activism to hold governments accountable for protecting human rights and to protest and prevent violations. (parker, 2018, p. 13) furthermore, the curriculum needs a pedagogical theory about how to organise knowledge for children and young people of different ages and stages, parker argues. in this study, policy documents indicate that children’s rights and the uncrc are more important for teachers of younger children. the study does not provide data to explain this circumstance, though it may support parker’s idea about a curriculum explicating beginning, intermediate and advanced understandings of human rights. in syllabi and in the survey, children’s participation seems to be an essential issue within the field of children’s rights. article 12 in the uncrc is widely known as the ‘participation article,’ following hammarberg’s (1990) grouping of the articles according to three p’s: provision, protection, and participation. the intention of article 12 is that children should have the right to express views and opinions and have them respected. participation may, however, be mixed up with other understandings of the concepts, such as people’s right to participation and accessibility in society, but also to be socially included among peers and in school. thomas (2007) distinguishes two ways of looking at children’s participation; one that regards it in terms of social relations and another that sees it in terms of political relations. according to thomas, the social discourse of networks, inclusion and of social connection is predominant. although the two alternative discourses relate to different versions of participatory practice, thomas reflects that they may also be describing the same practice from different perspectives. inspired by thomas, elvstrand (2009) uses the concepts social participation and political participation. in the document analysis, no examples were found where participation is associated with article 12 in the uncrc, and only a few examples were found of political participation. several examples, however, are associated with themes such as inclusive education, special needs, diversity, and anti-oppressive pedagogy. these are related to social participation and all are relevant to the uncrc although not to article 12. several comments from participants suggest that children’s rights and the uncrc are addressed implicitly in courses. this aligns with previous research into swedish curricula for primary and secondary school, which concluded that aspects of children’s rights were present in the texts but not expressed explicitly in terms of a rights perspective (quennerstedt, 2015). moreover, in the survey, approximately half of the group of participants supported the idea of children’s rights as an interdisciplinary field concerning all teacher education courses. a similar result was found by quennerstedt et al (2019), yet the researchers saw an apparent risk that children’s rights end up not belonging anywhere, with noone responsible for teaching them. this concern was also commented on by one of the participants in the survey: ‘though there is a risk that if it is not in the course plan; that it is forgotten about unless there is a devoted course leader.’ a.olsson 62 as for the implicit presence of children’s rights education or contents in the document analysis, several words and sentences included themes such as equal rights, discrimination or degrading treatment, with strong relevance to the articles in the uncrc. these statements were, however, rarely expressed in terms of children’s rights, and results were similar to previous research (quennerstedt, 2015). questions have been raised by researchers as to whether children’s rights education may be crowded out by curriculum content (boutros, 2018; cassidy et al., 2014; faiz & kamer, 2017) or by other interdisciplinary perspectives (roth, 2015). in the survey, questions were asked about whether children’s rights education might be deprioritised in relation to subjects such as maths and language or competing perspectives such as sustainability and cultural diversity. more than one-fifth of the group responded negatively to these questions, while the rest either confirmed that, to some extent, there was such a risk, or responded: ‘do not know.’ human rights education may vary, depending on national context and social location (bajaj, 2011; tibbitts, 2002). three models of ideological orientations of hre are introduced by bajaj: for global citizenship, for coexistence and for transformative action. the ideological basis for swedish teacher education seems predominantly to be associated with the global citizenship model, which seeks to provide learners with knowledge and skills related to universal values and to foster empathy and compassion. the aim to promote global citizenship is seen as beneficial in its own terms. bajaj suggests that learners usually have a privileged position and that the emphasis in education is commonly put on individual rights, rather than on what might be perceived as a challenge to the state. conclusions results from the survey and the document analysis are, to some extent, contradictory. teachers appear to find knowledge of children’s rights and of the uncrc highly important for pre-service teachers, and competence among teacher educators is judged to be good, while the analysis of policy documents points in a slightly different direction. results of the document analysis give few examples of what teacher students are expected to learn about children’s rights, and despite the clear position made in the higher education ordinance, there seems to be a gradual dilution of goals and contents from the national to the local level. in relation to un standards about hre being about, through and for human rights, swedish teacher education must be considered incomplete, particularly in terms of the account of the last-mentioned aspect there is a lack of attention to transformation processes oriented towards taking action for human rights (tibbitts, 2017). hence, an overall conclusion is that the policy document for swedish teacher education does not contain ambitions to foster agency in new generations of pupils, nor does it aim at empowering pupils to defend and promote their own and other children’s rights. importantly, these results neither present how teacher educators understand children’s rights education nor discuss how they practice it in their courses. in practice, the participants in the study may very well conduct lessons and courses which encourage student’s critical reflection and social change. however, these events largely depend on engaged and informed individuals taking responsibility for children’s rights education. consequently, there is a risk that children’s rights in swedish teacher education may become a matter of all or nothing. human rights education review – volume 3(2) 63 notes 1 the first phase (2005–2009) focused on human rights education in the primary and secondary school systems. the second phase (2010–2014), civil servants, law enforcement officials and military personnel. the third phase (2015–2019) focuses on strengthening the implementation of the first two phases and promoting human rights training for media professionals and journalists. in the fourth phase (2020–2024), youth are the focus group of the world programme for human rights education, with special emphasis on education and training in equality, human rights and nondiscrimination, and inclusion and respect for diversity. 2 information about methodology and indicators are found on kidsrights.org. index is based on quantitative data published by unicef, undp and qualitative data published by the un committee on the rights of the child. 3 these sub-themes are 1) history of the school system, its organisation and conditions as well as the core values of early years education, including fundamental democratic values and human rights, 2) syllabus theory and didactics, 3) theory of knowledge and research methodology, 4) development, learning and special needs education, 5) social relationships, conflict management and leadership, 6) assessment and grading, and 7) evaluation and development processes. a.olsson 64 references bajaj, m. 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(a/res/217(iii). retrieved 28.09.20 from https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b3712c.html united nations general assembly. (2005). world programme for human rights education. (a/59/525/rev.1). retrieved 28.09.20 from https://undocs.org/en/a/59/525/rev.1 united nations general assembly. (2011). united nations declaration on human rights education and training. (a/res/66/137). retrieved 28.09.20 from https://www.un.org/ga/search/viewm_doc.asp?symbol=a/res/66/137 office of the high commissioner for human rights. (2010). plan of action for the second phase (2010-2014) of the world programme for human rights education. (a/hrc/15/28). retrieved 28.09.20 from https://undocs.org/en/a/hrc/15/28 https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b3712c.html https://undocs.org/en/a/59/525/rev.1 https://www.un.org/ga/search/viewm_doc.asp?symbol=a/res/66/137 https://undocs.org/en/a/hrc/15/28 issn 2535-5406 vol 5, no 1 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4727 date of publication 04-01-2022 © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org editorial exploring the intersections between human rights education and religious education geir skeie university of stavanger, norway, geir.skeie@uis.no christian stokke university of south-eastern norway, norway we are happy to present this special issue of human rights education review, which explores the intersections between human rights education (hre) and religious education (re). for the first time, the journal devotes an entire issue to bringing together two distinct fields of research, each with its own scholarly literature, in the hope of expanding hre research. most contributors to this issue are religious education scholars. re researchers have for a long time engaged with human rights issues, and here they break new interdisciplinary ground by engaging explicitly with hre in new ways. for hre scholars, re in public schools should be a highly interesting and relevant field of enquiry, one that raises a wide range of human rightsrelated questions in an educational setting. the background for launching this issue springs from the debates about re caused by globalisation, secularisation, cultural diversity and religious plurality, including the challenges and opportunities that come when religious education and human rights education intersect. re in public schools takes a variety of forms in different national contexts, ranging from countries where public schools provide no distinct religious education (usa, france) to those where public schools only educate young people in the country’s official faith, as in many muslim-majority nations. in between, we find systems that aim to include knowledge about religious diversity; either in joint classes for all students (uk, scandinavia), or in separate http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4727 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:geir.skeie@uis.no human rights education review – volume 5(1) 2 classes based on students’ religious faith (germany, finland). in some countries, re is the responsibility of the state, in others it is a collaboration between state and religious organisations. the framework of re as part of state-run and private education raises human rights’ issues in itself. research into the practice of re raises questions about the right to education and freedom of speech, as well as issues about how children’s rights and parents’ rights can be balanced. re raises questions regarding freedom of religion and belief, nondiscrimination, minority rights, the right to identity, and the rights to intercultural education as well as to moral and spiritual development. in various school systems, re may provide education about, for, and through human rights. the uk and scandinavian approach of having one re subject for all students aims to encompass plurality and includes ethics, moral education, intercultural education, and education about human rights. in terms of education for and through human rights, the practice of re may support empowering young people to think critically about issues of religion and belief and equip them with knowledge that can help them shape their own worldviews. at times, re may even be the object of criticism, as when the european court of human rights (2007) ruled against norway for discrimination because re only supported the development of christian students’ identities. against this backdrop of issues in the interface between hre and re, we offer readers a series of informative and thought-provoking articles. first, we have three empirical articles from the nordic countries that respectively focus on children’s rights in public religious education in denmark, norway, and finland. these are followed by three conceptual articles that discuss didactical approaches for hre in danish re, mutual learning potentials between hre and re in switzerland, and the teaching of competences for democracy and human rights in greek re. the final article discusses indigenous people’s rights in the norwegian re curriculum. the first article, about re in denmark, is written by eva lindhardt. she analyses the present curriculum, showing that it puts the church of denmark in a privileged position. it links the christian cultural heritage to danish national identity and this, given that denmark is a culturally diverse country, is problematic. lindhardt draws on benedict anderson’s ‘imagined community’ and gert biesta’s terminology about the aims of education. her main criticism of danish re is, however, the tension between the re curriculum and human rights principles. she argues that teaching about, through and for human rights could improve both the re curriculum and classroom practice. next, ole henrik borchgrevink hansen and audun toft from norway discuss tensions between children’s rights and parents’ freedom of religion that emerge from an educational public service television series on religion much used in norwegian public schools. children’s rights c. stokke & g. skeie 3 is a complex field, which requires a balance between children’s freedom of religion and parents’ liberty to raise their children according to their convictions. the tv series’ didactic design emphasises children’s options to ‘pick and choose’, with little focus on parental rights. this seems to be in line with both the public broadcaster’s policy for their children’s channel and the accompanying teaching materials made by save the children. from the perspectives of both human rights and religious education, hansen and toft problematise the neglecting of parental perspectives and argue that this undermines the community aspect of freedom of religion. in the third empirical study, from finland, salmenkivi, kasa, putkonen and kallioniemi find that human rights and children rights hold the position of an ‘overarching ethics in the curriculum’ in both re and its secular alternative. however, there remain issues about contents and practices, and the relationship between rights and responsibilities. drawing on michael young’s theory of ‘powerful knowledge’, they problematise the neglect of specialist knowledge in school curricula which allows postmodern constructionist approaches to dominate. this may lead to shortcomings with regard to human rights education. on the other hand, the finnish system of offering ‘parallel’ state-constructed curricula for different religious and worldview groups secures the rights of families and children, especially those with minority backgrounds. in the first of three conceptual articles, sigurdsson and andersen discuss didactical approaches for hre in danish re, with a focus on teacher education. they argue that human rights need to be given more attention in denmark, also in re. the authors draw on a concept-oriented approach inspired by lenz, and on theory from benner and arendt. among the concepts they consider are conscience and consciousness. the article also launches an approach to teaching about, through and for human rights, where dialogue, diversity and narratives are key elements, using arendt’s idea about the perplexities of the rights of man. next, jasmine suhner from switzerland assesses the mutual impacts and learning potentials between transdisciplinary hre and re in public schools. while germany and austria have denominational school subjects informed by theology, switzerland now has a secular and pluralistic re subject. this recognises all students’ faiths and confirms the public relevance of religion but does not foster personal religiosity. suhner proposes a matrix for human rights awareness that serves as a framework to categorise various hre approaches and models of public re and assess their potentials for hre. the dimensions of the matrix allow for a nuanced comparison of different re models. in the last conceptual article, koukounaras liagkis, skordoulis, and geronikou seek to measure how re teachers promote competences for democratic citizenship and hre. from a greek human rights education review – volume 5(1) 4 context, where re is still primarily mono-religious but also includes some knowledge of world religions, the authors discuss how hre and citizenship education can be taught through re. they develop a scale to measure competences for democratic culture, which they define as values, attitudes, skills, knowledge, and understanding. this article focuses on how to measure the teaching of democratic competences, rather than assessing how greek religious education teachers promote these competences. finally, renate eggen addresses the situation for the indigenous sámi people, living mainly in norway, finland, sweden and russia. the discussion focuses on the new norwegian curricula, particularly the re one. eggen problematises the inclusion of indigenous peoples’ issues under a general framework of ‘diversity’. this neglects the special status of indigenous peoples and the colonial relationship with norwegian majority society. they discuss historical perspectives on diversity and indigeneity, drawing on examples from other parts of the world and making a discourse analysis of norwegian policy. the authors conclude that the formulations in the re curriculum risk categorising the sámi as just one among many minorities, thus failing to recognise the sami’s rights to express and develop their own cultural identity as an indigenous people. taken together, these articles show the importance and potential of studying the relationship of hre with re. the issues raised display a complex dynamic between formal curricula and teaching practices as well as the many ways in which history, politics and classroom practices are interlinked. we hope these important and interesting research texts will inspire other researchers to continue moving forward the study of human rights in religious education. references european court of human rights. (2007). case of folgerø and others v. norway. retrieved from https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/fre?i=001-81356 https://eur03.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3a%2f%2fhudoc.echr.coe.int%2ffre%3fi%3d001-81356&data=04%7c01%7cline.jenssen%40usn.no%7ce5bbe24951c341035b9108d9c3bc14f6%7cbc758dd0ab5343729a7ce98a9620862c%7c0%7c0%7c637756034835313919%7cunknown%7ctwfpbgzsb3d8eyjwijoimc4wljawmdailcjqijoiv2lumziilcjbtii6ik1hawwilcjxvci6mn0%3d%7c3000&sdata=9fgxrhl%2bjmqc8d6x19uyitaeuscfwtcenwn%2fvrfgsco%3d&reserved=0 exploring the intersections between human rights education and religious education references education for citizenship and human rights and the impact of neoconservative catholic influences in spain volume 1, no 1 (2018) date received:20-03-2018 doi:http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2656 date accepted: 13-06-2018 peer-reviewed article issn 2535-5406 education for citizenship and human rights and the impact of neoconservative catholic influences in spain alicia muñoz ramírez university of salamanca, spain. abstract: using the global discourse of human rights as a basis, the purpose of this article is to analyse how education for citizenship and human rights has been implemented in spain in recent years. in addition, discourse analysis and the theory of social movements have been used to study the mobilisation that arose against this instruction, showing how the neoconservative catholic sectors of spanish society encouraged catholics to engage in conscientious objection and civil disobedience in order to gradually achieve the removal of education for citizenship and human rights from spanish curricula. keywords: human rights, education for citizenship, social movements, conscientious objection, spain. almura@usal.es http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2656 human rights education review – volume 1(1) 46 education for citizenship and human rights and the impact of neoconservative catholic influences in spain doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2656 issn 2535-5406 alicia muñoz ramírez almura@usal.es university of salamanca, spain. abstract: using the global discourse of human rights as a basis, the purpose of this article is to analyse how education for citizenship and human rights has been implemented in spain in recent years. in addition, discourse analysis and the theory of social movements have been used to study the mobilisation that arose against this instruction, showing how the neoconservative catholic sectors of spanish society encouraged catholics to engage in conscientious objection and civil disobedience against this subject to gradually achieve the removal of education for citizenship and human rights from spanish curricula. keywords: human rights, education for citizenship, social movements, conscientious objection, spain. introduction since the transition to democracy in the late 1970s, ideological, cultural and moral pluralism, as well as secularisation and laicismo1, have been gaining importance for spanish citizens, undermining long-established symbols of national catholic identity that have been part of spain’s heritage for several centuries. this trend has influenced a range of social policies, including educational ones. accordingly, it is worth noting that during the spanish socialist workers’ party’s administration under the leadership of josé luis rodríguez zapatero (20042011), several laws were debated and approved. among these were the law amending the civil code for the regulation of same-sex marriages (2005), the law on assisted human reproduction techniques (2006), the organic law of education (2006), the organic law for effective equality between women and men (2007), and the organic law on sexual and reproductive health and voluntary termination of pregnancy (2010). these laws were much welcomed by one sector of spanish society; for this group they signified progress on social rights and democratic principles, and a detachment of public policy from catholic morality. however, the spanish episcopal conference and the holy see viewed such measures with mistrust and aversion, interpreting these initiatives of the socialist government as aggressive secularism in support of moral relativism, ‘gender ideology’ and anti-clericalism. this situation strained the relationship between the catholic church and the socialist government. spanish society’s neoconservative catholic 2 forces felt threatened by these policies and started to regroup and adopt a public, moralizing militancy. in this regard, the words spoken by cardinal antonio maría rouco varela, president of the spanish episcopal conference (1999-2005, 2008-2014), right-hand man to john paul ii and benedict xvi and one of the most prominent exponents of http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2656 a. muñoz ramírez 47 spanish catholic neoconservatism, were very enlightening. in his view, if spain were to lose touch with its catholic roots, it 'would not only stop being catholic christian, but would no longer be spain' (rd/agencias, 2005). the ambition of neoconservative catholic forces to defend a catholic-based moral, political, historical and cultural universalism can be fully understood through an analysis of the impact of such forces on the field of education, specifically in regard to education for citizenship and human rights. this school subject was developed by the socialist government in the organic law of education of 3 may 2006. neoconservative catholics saw this change to the curriculum as a secularizing threat and as state interference in the monopoly on moral education and educational values held by the catholic church, as a result of its political and legal privileges. thus, they engaged in a process to encourage and facilitate conscientious objection and civil disobedience. they even managed to prevent the inclusion of the contents and values of education for citizenship and human rights in the new organic law for the improvement of educational quality of 9 december 2013. however, before analysing the entire process by which education for citizenship and human rights was discredited and mobilised against, it is essential to understand how this subject was implemented and why it was developed. for this purpose, the first step is to briefly explain the demands and recommendations that the united nations and the council of europe have developed in the last few decades for the incorporation of human rights education and education for democratic citizenship in curricula and in the social consciousness. international recommendations on human rights education and democratic citizenship education over the last seven decades, the united nations has supported several recommendations and guidelines to raise awareness and reflect the importance of developing an education in and for human rights, encouraging states and social actors to create educational policies and programmes. one of the most significant examples is the world programme for human rights education (2005-present), which consists of a series of consecutive phases to advance the implementation of human rights education in schools, higher education, teacher training programmes and society in general (office of the united nations high commissioner for human rights & united nations educational, scientific and cultural organization, 2012). hence, it should be noted that human rights education is not only a legal and political commitment, but also a continuous, permanent and open process of formal, non-formal and informal training through multiple and diverse teaching and learning methods, whose full development depends on the commitment of all social actors in democratic societies (united nations, 2011). furthermore, as observed by ribotta (2006, p. 153): educar en y para los derechos humanos es el único camino que conduce a las mujeres y hombres del mundo de todos los pueblos, las culturas, las religiones, las edades, las opciones sexuales y situaciones sociales, económicas y políticas, a convertirse en ciudadanos del mundo y artífices de su propio destino [educating in and for human rights is the only way by which all women and men, no matter what their background, culture, religion, age, sexual human rights education review – volume 1(1) 48 preference or social, economic and political situation, can become world citizens and architects of their own destinies]. in the same vein, since the 1980s, the council of europe has initiated several projects and programmes to reawaken the democratic values, knowledge and behaviour that will foster human rights and citizen participation. one of these has been recommendation no. r (85) 7 of the committee of ministers of the council of europe to member states on teaching and learning about human rights in school (council of europe, 1985). there is an even stronger emphasis in the final declaration and action plan of the second summit of heads of state and government of the council of europe, where the "desire to develop education for democratic citizenship based on the rights and responsibilities of citizens, and the participation of young people in civil society" was expressed (council of europe, 1997). moreover, in 2002, the council of europe recommended member states and contracting states of the european cultural convention to include education for democratic citizenship in their curricula, on the understanding that this education is essential for social cohesion, mutual understanding, intercultural and interreligious dialogue, and the defence of liberty, pluralism, human rights and gender equality (council of europe, 2002). likewise, according to the recommendation adopted by the committee of ministers of the council of europe on 11 may 2010: education for democratic citizenship and human rights education are closely inter-related and mutually supportive. they differ in focus and scope rather than in goals and practices. education for democratic citizenship focuses primarily on democratic rights and responsibilities and active participation, in relation to the civic, political, social, economic, legal and cultural spheres of society, while human rights education is concerned with the broader spectrum of human rights and fundamental freedoms in every aspect of people’s lives (council of europe, 2010). therefore, human rights education necessarily involves the learning of civic and democratic values, and vice versa. the implementation of education for citizenship and human rights in spain in spain, the right to education is provided for in article 27 of the spanish constitution of 1978 3 . this article, a source of controversy and tension, was formulated with calculated ambiguity so that different governments would be able to apply this right in terms of their ideological interests, and that the spanish ecclesiastical hierarchy would be able to maintain certain educational privileges (martínez de pisón, 2003, p. 125). in fact, over the last 40 years, spain has had seven educational laws4, and disputes between the different political and ideological actors have hindered all efforts to attain a much-needed consensus. furthermore, despite the fact that the spanish constitution of 1978 and subsequent democratic laws on education have allowed the development of education for human rights and democratic citizenship, this was not a priority in curricular planning. it was treated as an interdisciplinary topic and, in most cases, fell into oblivion. therefore, spanish society suffered from a lack of education for human rights and democratic citizenship, a situation that was denounced by a. muñoz ramírez 49 amnesty international (amnistía internacional [amnesty international], 2003) and by katarina tomaševski, united nations special rapporteur on the right to education (1998 2004), in an interview given in spain in 2004 (barroso, 2004). this lack of education for human rights and democratic citizenship was not consistent with several of the spanish government’s commitments. for example, in 2002, under the right-wing government of the people’s party, spain supported the recommendation of the committee of ministers of the council of europe which specified that education for democratic citizenship should be given priority (council of europe, 2002). however, the socialist government of josé luis rodríguez zapatero (20042011) showed a greater concern to satisfy such commitments and implement civicdemocratic and human rights education. in 2005, under the socialist government, spain effected the world programme for human rights education to promote such education in the educational system and in society as a whole (office of the united nations high commissioner for human rights & united nations educational, scientific and cultural organization, 2006). in addition, from september 2004 to march 2005, the ministry of education and science, led by socialist minister maría jesús san segundo (2004-2006), engaged in discussions to draft a new law on education, emphasizing the need to teach education for democratic citizenship, not as an interdisciplinary topic, but as a separate subject. this would counteract the limitations of previous approaches and deal with the growing complexity and plurality of spanish society. over the last 35 years, spanish society has experienced different social, economic, political and migratory changes that have led to a multiplicity of moral, political and ideological codes that sometimes clash with each other. therefore, it was considered that a specific school subject that taught democratic knowledge and values was essential to encourage the acquisition of norms that could support coexistence, mutual respect and solidarity, and so ensure the full development of the human personality (ministerio de educación y ciencia [ministry of education and science], 2004; tiana, 2009). the spanish committee, created on 8 march 2005 to boost the objectives of the council of europe’s proposal to proclaim '2005 european year of citizenship through education', was the venue where the contents of this subject were assessed. after reaching relative consensus among public administration representatives and educational and social organizations, the ministry of education and science presented the drafts that contained the contents of the curriculum. such drafts were approved by the general commission of education and by a large majority, albeit not by unanimous decision, of the state school council, the advisory and consultative body for the sectors of the educational community. its members are the president and vice president of the state school council, and 105 representatives from educational sectors. thus, in the organic law of education of 3 may 2006, spain introduced a new subject that taught democratic citizenship, one that encouraged a universal culture of human rights (law no. 7899, 2006). an analysis of spain’s recent history underlines the importance of such education. after a long period of dictatorship, apathy and lack of democratic practice, spanish society was gradually gaining an awareness of the need to know, analyse and practice democratic values and human rights. moreover, spaniards were calling for greater democratic participation. hence, this subject was the perfect means for human rights education review – volume 1(1) 50 developing a participatory and reflective democratic culture that, far from dogmas or prejudices, would seek to defend justice, dignity and the freedom of all its citizens. the subject education for citizenship and human rights was taught in the last stage of primary education, and in one of the three first courses of compulsory secondary education. pupils went on to study ethical-civic education in the fourth year of compulsory secondary education, and philosophy and citizenship in the first year of pre-university education. the organic law of education and the royal decrees of 2006 and 2007, which laid down the minimum requirements of the contents of primary education, compulsory secondary education and pre-university education, were endorsed by the council of state and the council of ministers. thus, for the first time in spain, the competencies, contents, aims and teaching hours for human rights education were established. in addition, following the recommendation of the council of europe of 2002, it was determined that the objectives and contents of this subject should range from the individual sphere of identity and personal relationships, to that of social coexistence and collective responsibilities. this led to the development of several competences, all of them revolving around social and civic competence, with a special emphasis on respect for human rights. the subject content was organized into different blocks; for primary, secondary and pre-university education. the main goal of this subject was to confront the fact that there was an inadequate culture of democracy and human rights in spain. this problem was to be addressed by providing all students with a space where they could study, analyse and reflect on democratic principles and human rights. a number of things were stressed: e.g., the importance of participation in public life; the identification and management of situations of discrimination, poverty or human rights violations; the development of self-esteem; and respect for custom, belief and sexual orientation diversity. special attention was to be paid to the issue of gender equality. the minimum teaching hours established were fifty for primary education, seventy for compulsory secondary education and one hundred and five for preuniversity education. in certain autonomous communities, such as extremadura, asturias, the canary islands or castile-la mancha, education authorities increased the number of hours for teaching human rights at the primary and secondary levels. this placed spain ahead of other european countries, as far as the amount of hours for primary schools was concerned. however, for practical reasons, the average number of hours per year for secondary education was set at one hour a week, far below the european average (amnistía internacional [amnesty international], 2008). some teachers criticized this, claiming they were not being given time to encourage critical and reflective thinking and, if they were to achieve the expected outcomes in hr, time would have to be taken from other subjects. (carabaña, 2010). education for citizenship and human rights was finally implemented in the compulsory secondary education system and in pre-university education in the 2008-2009 academic year. certain autonomous communities, such as andalusia, castile-la mancha, catalonia, asturias or navarre, had already started to introduce it as a secondary school subject in 2007-2008. however, in primary education it was not taught until 2009-2010. in addition, although education for citizenship and human rights was a step towards developing a sound education for democracy and human rights in spain, a. muñoz ramírez 51 there were several ways in which it could have been better implemented. for example, amnesty international (2008) reported the need for a national implementation follow-up commission to look at this education, as well as the appropriateness of the contents of specific teacher training programmes and their application. critical analysis of the type of citizenship that was being shaped was essential (fernández, fernández, alegre & brieva, 2007). unfortunately, these issues were never addressed, since neoconservative catholic sectors diverted the public debate on education for citizenship and human rights away towards other matters. specifically, they steered the discussion towards deliberations as to whether it involved a degree of indoctrination, and whether parents might object to this (muñoz ramírez, 2016a). it was the ways in which the subject focussed on personal and social relationships, respect for diversity, identity and otherness, different family models and gender equality that spain’s neoconservative catholics objected to. it was argued that they constituted indoctrination and that parents with catholic beliefs should protest. all this was nothing but a manoeuvre designed to delegitimize education for citizenship and human rights, since certain catholics saw it as the main threat to the cultural hegemony of the church. impact of neoconservative catholic influences on education for citizenship and human rights from the moment that the ministry of education announced its intention to implement education for citizenship and human rights, the spanish episcopal conference took a stand against it (puga davila, 2004; comité ejecutivo de la conferencia episcopal española [executive committee of the spanish episcopal conference], 2005; conferencia episcopal española [spanish episcopal conference], 2006). at the time, the spanish episcopal conference was under the ideological sway of cardinal antonio maría rouco varela and cardinal antonio cañizares, vice president of the spanish episcopal conference (2005-2008; 2017-). both men were prominent spanish exponents of catholic neoconservatism, and advocates of john paul ii and benedict xvi’s ideological and discursive project. thus, spain’s ecclesiastical hierarchy, interpreting education for citizenship and human rights as a tool for the secularisation of spanish society, did not hesitate to mobilise as an ethical-political and religious pressure group. their actions were grounded in the holy see’s transnational discourse and supported by the people’s party and mass media and catholic organizations with a similar ideological orientation. all of these actors portrayed catholic families as victims, encouraging them to take action by appealing to their emotions, and to the fact that they were the people who could make a difference; a strategy similar to that used by post-fascism. accordingly, catholic neoconservative forces encouraged catholic families to criticize the citizenship and human rights curriculum and practice conscientious objection and civil disobedience. the ideological position of the spanish episcopal conference was closely linked to the ideological project of the holy see, reproducing its discourse. an analysis of such discourse, studying the papacy of john paul ii, 1978-2005, and that of benedict xvi, 2005-2013 (muñoz ramírez, 2017), reveals it had a number of characteristics: a defence of europe’s catholic roots; the promulgation of the human rights education review – volume 1(1) 52 apostolic letter summorum pontificum to facilitate the use of pre-conciliar forms in the celebration of the roman rite and in most of the sacraments; the establishment of the pontifical council for promoting the new evangelization. the pontifical council is a vatican ministry, and was established so that countries that seemed to be falling into laicismo, such as spain, could recover their catholic identity. similarly, the holy see believed that some of the guidelines and measures adopted by the council of europe and the united nations were leading countries towards secularisation, threatening the catholic family unit and man’s true nature. consequently, it was only logical for the ecclesiastical hierarchy to criticize certain policies that were being developed in spain, and promote mobilisation against the curriculum and lay values of education for citizenship and human rights (los obispos llaman [the bishops call], 2006; el vaticano opina [the vatican thinks], 2008). furthermore, the political and legal privileges enjoyed by the catholic church in spain enable it to intervene in certain political, legal, social and cultural affairs. and this has certainly been the case with education for citizenship and human rights, inasmuch as the catholic institution has used these privileges to justify the process of discrediting it. on the one hand, articles 14 and 16, of the spanish constitution of 1978, although implicit and ambiguous, enshrine a principle of political and religious modernization, deconfessionalization and secularization of the spanish state (llamazares fernández, 2005). however, on the other hand, the 1979 agreements between the spanish state and the holy see maintain the link between church and state. this undermines the state’s authority in matters of religion and makes it hard to break legal ties (díaz burillo, 2013), in particular those relating to the funding received by the catholic church from the state and in its involvement in matters of moral and values-based education. attention should also be drawn to the fact that the people’s party and the spanish catholic hierarchy have a close relationship, so that this party usually incorporates the catholic institution’s demands on issues such as education, marriage, divorce or abortion in its election manifestos (díaz-salazar, 2007). it is not surprising, therefore, that, in december 2006, education ministers in the autonomous communities governed by the people’s party agreed to only implement the minimum legal requirements for education for citizenship and human rights in their schools. and neither was it unusual for them to draw up their own curricula, removing contents related to homosexuality, gender equality or the peaceful settlement of conflicts (muñoz ramírez, 2016b). this was possible because of the decentralization of the education system. in spain, the minimum content of the educational curriculum, which serves as a common framework, is set by the central government through royal decrees. however, the different autonomous communities are able to customize what is taught in their schools. as a result, although curricula in the autonomous communities are similar, there is no uniformity. it neither should be overlooked is that certain media, such as the newspapers el mundo and la razón and the cope network of popular spanish broadcasters, covered, broadcast and encouraged the above-mentioned criticism of education for citizenship and human rights. likewise, the support and cooperation of several catholic institutions and organizations, such as profesionales por la ética [professionals for ethics], foro español de la familia [spanish family forum]; conferencia católica nacional de a. muñoz ramírez 53 padres de familia y padres de alumnos [national catholic conference of parents and parents of students] and hazteoir played a decisive role. it is worth noting that some prominent spanish neoconservative catholics appear to be associated with the el yunque organization (lobo, 2012). this seems to be a secret paramilitary extreme right-wing association, originally mexican but with an international dimension. its purpose is to establish god’s kingdom on earth by controlling public policies and infiltrating the highest levels of political power (lópez luengos, 2010; garrido, 2014). the fact is that, from 2006, the first groups of catholic parents in favour of conscientious objection against education for citizenship and human rights began to raise their voices, dissatisfied with how the socialist government had defined some aspects of the subject. for example, they disagreed with what was said on topics such as gender equality, diversity of marriage, or sexual minorities, claiming that it went against their moral and religious beliefs (profesionales por la ética [professionals for ethics], 2009). these catholic families, reproducing the ideals guiding the catholic hierarchy, believed that the inclusion of such topics comprised an indoctrination that imposed laicismo, relativism and ‘gender ideology’. the young were encouraged to engage in sexual activity, there was a fostering of homosexuality, and women were discouraged from wanting to become mothers or start a family. from june 2007, specific associations and platforms were formed to disseminate and coordinate catholic parents’ collective action. examples were: ¿xq te callas? [why do you remain silent?], los padres eligen [parents choose], plataforma de madres objetoras [the movement of objecting mothers] or objetores.org [objectors.org], among others. some of these were grouped in the españa educa en libertad [spain educates in freedom] national federation, made up of more than 70 organizations. the mobilisation against education for citizenship and human rights took the form of a large number of campaigns, conventions, meetings, performances and press conferences. additionally, several protest rallies were organized and lots of documents, guides, videos and books were disseminated (muñoz ramírez, 2016a, pp. 485-518). furthermore, to ensure the success of this mobilisation, different identity references were used to produce a cultural framework that offered a mythical reading of the national history of spain, linking dignity, truth, goodness and civic virtue to the catholic faith. analysis of these ideological-cultural frameworks reveals a desire to revitalize certain ideological components of the religious fascism that prevailed during franco’s "national-catholic" spain (muñoz ramírez, 2016a, pp. 519-532). owing to the pressure of this mobilization, the socialist government reached an agreement with the organization of catholic schools 5 , chaired by inmaculada tuset (2007-2015), so that these schools could adapt education for citizenship and human rights to their religious beliefs. this made it possible for schools belonging to the catholic schools organization to drop contents they disagreed with (escuelas católicas [catholic schools], 2007). while many of the catholic parents who had mobilized were satisfied with this measure, unyielding neoconservative catholics believed it was not enough and continued to mobilize in favour of conscientious objection and civil disobedience, in pursuit of the complete elimination of education for citizenship and human rights. human rights education review – volume 1(1) 54 however, not all spanish catholics were negative. for example, people such as the theologian juan josé tamayo and the former claretian priest benjamín forcano, both advocates of liberation theology, saw education for citizenship and human rights as a good way to develop cosmopolitan, global and democratic citizenship. they criticized the irresponsibility of certain political groups in opposing it, and were also critical of the action plan of the spanish ecclesiastical hierarchy to encourage civil disobedience. they even expressed their rejection of the socialist government’s decision to allow the contents of this subject to be adapted to the thinking of catholic schools (forcano, 2007; tamayo, 2007). similarly, the philosopher josé antonio marina and olegario gonzález de cardedal, catholic priest, theologian and member of the royal academy of moral and political sciences of spain, both considered that the subject did not contradict the tenets of christian humanism, and found no reason to object to it (bastante, 2007; marina, 2007). however, such voices were in a minority: criticism of education for citizenship and human rights continued, and encouragement of conscientious objection persisted. on the one hand, neoconservative catholics defended parents’ right to conscientious objection by mainly referring to article 27.3 of the spanish constitution 6 . on the other hand, rodríguez zapatero’s government and those defending this education used article 27.2 7 of the constitution, the universal declaration of human rights and international treaties, agreements and recommendations supported by spain to justify its implementation. several families, objecting to education for citizenship and human rights and wanting to invalidate the minimum contents of the subject as indoctrination, began to lodge contentious administrative appeals before the superior courts of justice in several autonomous communities. the judicial decisions of these courts varied: some of them ruled in favour of parents’ right to conscientious objection while others did not. this whole situation generated a huge controversy about the legitimacy of such conscientious objection. the rulings of the supreme court of spain, of 11 february 2009, were expected to solve the questions of whether the subject involved indoctrination, and whether conscientious objection was legitimate. the decisions, which were in response to four cassation appeals8, established that there was no indoctrination, and that the right to conscientious objection was not acceptable. nonetheless, certain autonomic supreme courts continued to issue judgements in favour of conscientious objection, one example being the supreme court of justice of castile and leon’s ruling of 23 september 2009. the neoconservative catholic movement against education for citizenship and human rights continued its actions. in 2010 there were more than 1,000 registered students no longer taking this subject and, in 2012, there were more than 54,000 requests for conscientious objection throughout spain (urcelay, 2011). in november 2010, the movement appealed to the constitutional court of spain and in february and march 2014, two of its complaints were dismissed. similarly, in march 2010, 300 people brought before the european court of human rights a claim against spain for alleged violation of fundamental rights contained in the european convention on human rights. the court has not yet issued its ruling. towards the end of 2010, the protest movement against education for a. muñoz ramírez 55 citizenship and human rights made the leap into the international scene, activating transnational networks and obtaining the support of international and european catholic organizations. in this way, the protest movement against education for citizenship strengthened its capacity to act in other countries. it entered a coalition with the alliance defending freedom (adf) and the european centre for law and justice (eclj), and extended its contacts with european dignity watch and christian action research and education (care) for europe. the movement also had the support of the european people’s party group. it was in this context that the movement against education for citizenship presented its case before the council of europe and the united nations human rights council. however, although it failed to obtain the desired support. following the electoral victory of the people’s party, under the leadership of mariano rajoy, in the 20 november 2011 general election, protests and actions against education for citizenship and human rights were toned down. josé ignacio wert, the people’s party’s minister of education, culture and sports (2011-2015), announced that controversial topics would be dropped. the subject would be renamed civic and constitutional education and taught in the second year of compulsory secondary education. afterwards, giving its full support to the demands of the catholic hierarchy, the people’s party decided to implement civic and constitutional education, but only as an interdisciplinary topic, in the academic year 2014-2015. this would be part of legislation in the new organic law for the improvement of educational quality of 9 december 2013. students would be able to choose whether to take a subject where they learned about catholicism or other subjects. topics covered in these alternatives are very different from the contents and values of education for citizenship and human rights; they are called "social and civic values" in primary education and "ethical values" in compulsory secondary education. (law no. 12886, 2013). this initiative of the people’s party encouraged more than 60 national, international and european organizations, such as fundación cives [cives foundation], amnesty international and democracy and human rights education in europe, to react to the neoconservative catholic forces and denounce the suppression of this subject at the council of europe. these organizations considered that this action was a backward step for spain to take. it meant inadequate education for human rights and democratic citizenship, and constituted a serious setback to gender equality and the rights of sexual minorities. they also saw it as a breach of commitments made by spain, and as an attack on the very structure of spanish democracy. (fundación cives [cives foundation], 2013) this whole situation prompted the intervention of the council of europe’s commissioner for human rights, nils muižnieks, who supported these organisations and criticized the people’s party’s decision, seeing it as a threat to democracy and human rights education. furthermore, he believed that human rights and citizenship should be an integral part of education at all levels, as prescribed by the council of europe charter on education for democratic citizenship and human rights education (commissioner for human rights, 2013). the committee on the elimination of discrimination against women also issued a statement, in july 2015, claiming that an approach based on alternative subjects such as "social and civic values" and "ethical values" was an inadequate one, if the aim was to develop a proper education in democratic values and human rights (committee on the elimination of discrimination against women, 2015, p.9). human rights education review – volume 1(1) 56 however, the central government of the people’s party disregarded the commissioner of the council of europe for human rights’ recommendations, as well as the claim of the committee on the elimination of discrimination against women. education for citizenship and human rights was removed from spanish curricula. nevertheless, certain autonomous communities, such as andalusia or aragon, currently under socialist governments, have used their devolved authority to continue delivering this education, as part of a set of freely and autonomously defined subjects. conclusion since neoconservative catholic sectors believe that ethical universalism and civicdemocratic education rely on the confessional discourse of catholic instruction, they did not hesitate to criticize parts of the education for citizenship and human rights curriculum. moreover, they encouraged a mobilization, with certain touches of religious re-politicization, to abolish this subject and thus maintain the monopoly of moral, civic and values education based on catholic criteria. furthermore, this group’s intention is to control the model of citizenship so that catholicism may remain a constituent element of national identity and of the democratic system itself. this is a particularly dangerous scenario because it challenges not only moral and religious pluralism, which should prevail in any democratic state, but also the principles of democracy and human rights, which are eroded by extreme religious and ideological beliefs. at the same time, this situation creates a conflict of normative values regarding the definition of the basic ethical principles of a democratic society, while also contravening the international commitments undertaken by the spanish state in terms of democratic and human rights education. this re-opens unresolved issues in spanish education and in the very structure of spanish democracy. the success of catholic neoconservative mobilization in spain could be the trigger for neoconservative catholic and extreme right-wing forces to take action in other countries, e.g., france or germany. in fact, the transnational dissemination of the catholic neoconservative discourse and the rise in the number of radical and post-fascist right-wing groups in recent years threatens the timid but important advances being made in human rights education. a. muñoz ramírez 57 notes 1 the ideological current that defends the independence of man or society, and especially that of the state, from all religious or ecclesiastical influence. 2 the term refers to a very restrictive fundamentalist manifestation of the democratic system. catholic neoconservatism does not use the language of catholic traditionalism after the second vatican council it updated its language to make it compatible with the modern world. in addition, it encourages and relies on the actions of grassroots catholics to exert political pressure to achieve their goals, trying to shift the limelight from the catholic hierarchy to the grassroots. these sectors represent a part of the political right and of the catholic church that, reproducing the renewed discourse developed by popes john paul ii and benedict xvi, seeks to impose the social doctrine of the catholic church in legal, political and socio-cultural spheres. 3 article 27 of the spanish constitution of 1978: 1. everyone has the right to education. freedom of teaching is recognised. 2. education shall aim at the full development of the human character with due respect for the democratic principles of coexistence and for the basic rights and freedoms. 3. the public authorities guarantee the right of parents to ensure that their children receive religious and moral instruction that is in accordance with their own convictions. 4. elementary education is compulsory and free. 5. the public authorities guarantee the right of everyone to education, through general education programming, with the effective participation of all parties concerned and the setting up of educational centres. 6. the right of individuals and legal entities to set up educational centres is recognised, provided they respect constitutional principles. 7. teachers, parents and, when appropriate, pupils, shall share in the control and management of all the centres maintained by the administration out of public funds, under the terms established by the law. 8. the public authorities shall inspect and standardise the educational system in order to guarantee compliance with the law. 9. the public authorities shall give aid to teaching establishments which meet the requirements to be laid down by the law. 10. the autonomy of universities is recognised, under the terms established by the law. 4 the educational laws approved in the current democratic spain are: the organic law of the council of state, 1980; organizational regulatory law of the right to education, 1985; general organic law of the educational system, 1990; the organic law for the participation, evaluation and administration of centers of education, 1995; the organic act on the quality of education, 2002 (never came to be applied); the organic law of education, 2006 and the organic law for the improvement of educational quality, 2013. 5 catholic schools make up 60% of the spanish privado-concertados schools. in spain there are three types of schools: 1) public. created, administered and financed by the government. 2) privado-concertados. created and administered privately but mainly financed by the government. the vast majority of these schools defend a catholic ideology and belong to the catholic church. 3) private. created, administered and financed privately, although they have to follow the minimum requirements of the general curriculum. in spain, approximately 69% of schools are public, 28% privado-concertados and 3% private. 6 see footnote 3. 7 see footnote 3. 8 three cassation appeals were brought by three pairs of parents against three rulings issued by the high court of justice of asturias, on 11 and 22 february 2008, which had ruled against conscientious objection. a cassation appeal was brought by the public prosecutor, the state attorney and the counsel of the junta de andalucía against the ruling of the high court of justice of andalusia, of 24 july 2008, in favor of conscientious objection. human rights education review – volume 1(1) 58 references amnistía internacional [amnesty international]. 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(2004). la universidad católica de murcia acoge el ii congreso de educación y familia. la familia: educación integral [the catholic university of murcia hosts the ii congress on education and family. the family unit: integral education]. alfa y omega, 429, 3-4. retrieved from https://www.alfayomega.es/documentos/anteriores/429_16-xii-2004.pdf rd/agencias. (2005, may 23). el cardenal rouco afirma que españa será cristiana y católica o dejará de existir como tal [cardinal rouco claims that spain will be christian and catholic or cease to exist as such]. periodista digital. retrieved from http://www.periodistadigital.com/old/75975.shtml ribotta, s. (coord.). (2006). educación en derechos humanos. la asignatura pendiente [human rights education. a pending subject]. madrid: dykinson. tamayo, j. j. (2007). ¿qué educación para la ciudadanía? [what education for citizenship?]. pueblos. revista de información y debate, 29, 5. tiana, a. (2009). por qué hicimos la ley orgánica de educación [why we drafted the organic law on education]. madrid: wolters kluwer. united nations. (2011). united nations declaration on human rights education and training. new york and geneva: united nations. urcelay, j. (2011). los falsarios de la historia. ‘poner fin al adoctrinamiento de epc, recuperar libertad’ [counterfeiters of history. ‘put an end to the indoctrination of epc, recover freedom]. la razón histórica, 16, 118. https://www.alfayomega.es/documentos/anteriores/429_16-xii-2004.pdf http://www.periodistadigital.com/old/75975.shtml human rights education review – volume 1(1) 62 figure 1. mobilization against education for citizenship and human rights in spain. some of the most important dates. a. muñoz ramírez 63 human rights education review – volume 1(1) 64 source: prepared by the author. education for citizenship and human rights and the impact of neoconservative catholic influences in spain introduction international recommendations on human rights education and democratic citizenship education the implementation of education for citizenship and human rights in spain impact of neoconservative catholic influences on education for citizenship and human rights conclusion notes references figure 1. volume 4, no 2 (2021) date received: 20-06-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3929 date accepted: 09-12-2020 issn 2535-5406 the islamic republic of iran and children’s right to education: availability and accessibility shabnam moinipour university of london, united kingdom. abstract: the islamic republic of iran is obliged to respect the right to education under international human rights law and has made legal commitments to conform to the 1966 international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights (icescr) and the 1989 convention on the rights of the child (crc). drawing on the framework developed by former special rapporteur of the un high commission for human rights on education, katarina tomaševski, that education must be available, accessible, acceptable and adaptable, this article discusses iran’s response to its obligation to make education available and accessible. it illustrates how the state is falling short in its duty to make education available and accessible to all children under its jurisdiction, reinforcing the gender inequities experienced by girls and practising religious discrimination in educational access. keywords: right to education, the islamic republic of iran, availability, accessibility, gender (in)justice, religious discrimination shabnam moinipour: shabnam.moinipour@gmail.com mailto:shabnam.moinipour@gmail.com human rights education review – volume 4(2) 6 the islamic republic of iran and children’s right to education: availability and accessibility doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3929 issn 2535-5406 shabnam moinipour shabnam.moinipour@gmail.com university of london, united kingdom abstract: the islamic republic of iran is obliged to respect the right to education under international human rights law and has made legal commitments to conform to the 1966 international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights (icescr) and the 1989 convention on the rights of the child (crc). drawing on the framework developed by former special rapporteur of the un high commission for human rights on education, katarina tomaševski, that education must be available, accessible, acceptable and adaptable, this article discusses iran’s response to its obligation to make education available and accessible. it illustrates how the state is falling short in its duty to make education available and accessible to all children under its jurisdiction, reinforcing the gender inequities experienced by girls and practising religious discrimination in educational access. keywords: right to education, the islamic republic of iran, availability, accessibility, gender (in)justice, religious discrimination human rights education and international law in the evolution of human rights, children have come to be recognised as full citizens and as such are entitled to rights, in which they must be involved to determine how these rights need to be realised. one of these rights is the right to education, which includes human rights education, consisting of three parts. firstly, children should learn about their rights. secondly, they must be protected through these rights. thirdly, they should learn to become advocates for their own rights and those of others (hantzopoulos, 2016; katz & mcevoy spero, 2015; osler, 2016; sirota, 2019, p. 356). the need for human rights education is emphasised in certain international human rights instruments, including the foundational universal declaration of human rights, where it is stated that ‘every individual and every organ of society’ should strive to promote respect for the rights and freedoms enshrined in the declaration through ‘teaching and education’ (united nations [un], 1948). while global awareness about human rights education is on the rise, many countries are still behind in implementing it in their educational systems. the islamic republic of iran is one such country and, as is shown in a study made by a group in iran, human rights education has been ‘neglected in one way or another in the system’ (shekarey, zare-ee, haji rashidi, & sadeghat rostami, 2010, p. 2107) and ‘teaching human rights has not been taken into consideration’ (aghaii khozani, 2006, p. 46). the fact that human rights education is missing from iran’s national curriculum is partially due to the fact that children are not as yet recognised as full citizens entitled to human rights whose voices need to be heard in the realisation of those rights (osler, 2016, p. 104105; sirota, 2019, p. 356). this is evident in the fact that although the islamic mailto:shabnam.moinipour@gmail.com s. moinipour 7 republic of iran has signed and ratified the convention on the rights of the child, it continues to resist removing its reservation against adopting the entire convention. the convention on the rights of the child in 1991, the islamic republic of iran signed the convention on the rights of the child (crc). this treaty was then ratified in 1994. however, upon signing, iran made a reservation (referred to by iran as a declaration) regarding ‘the articles and provisions which may be contrary to the islamic shariah’, and preserved ‘the right to make such particular declaration, upon its ratification’ (un, 1989). subsequently, upon ratification the iranian government reserved ‘the right not to apply any provisions or articles of the convention that are incompatible with islamic laws and the international legislation in effect’ (un, 1989). as the persia education foundation rightly points out, ‘[h]ad the iranian government specified the exact articles or provisions in the crc which were contrary to the islamic laws rather than announce a blanket reservation, there would be more transparency and clarity in the area of child’s rights in iran’. however, ‘the general nature of the reservation creates many problems and opens the way for ambiguity and misuse’ (persia educational foundation, 2017, p. 5). failure to remove the reservation from the convention dedicated to the rights of the child and not having human rights education in the curriculum are big issues in themselves, which must be rectified by the state. however, what is already in place should also meet international human rights standards, as incorporating human rights education into the curriculum first requires the realisation of basic rights to an available and accessible education. in other words, availability and accessibility of education are prerequisites of human rights education. these standards are categorised into a 4-a right to education framework (tomaševski, 2001b, p. 13-15), which is comprised of availability and accessibility, discussed in the present article, and acceptability and adaptability, discussed elsewhere (moinipour, 2021). these standards are enshrined in the international covenant on economic, social, and cultural rights (icescr) that iran is committed to without any reservations. articles 13 (aims and objectives of education) and 14 (plans of action for primary education) of icescr contain provisions whereby the states are committed to respect the right to education (committee on economic, social and cultural rights [cescr], 1999). the idea behind becoming a member of the united nations and signing and ratifying instruments such as icescr is that states create and change their national law ‘through democratic processes’ (tomaševski, 2006, p. 40) to ensure that international human rights law has primacy over national law. in iran, however, this has not been the case. right from the 1979 islamic revolution, the legitimacy of secular law has been challenged by the islamic republic of iran (tomaševski, 2006, p. 40). the right to education, however, found its way into the cairo declaration on human rights in islam, which iran presented to the un in 1992. as expected, this was not based on international human rights law. it was based on islam. this lack of full compliance with international human rights law by sidelining it through shariah law as the ne plus ultra, (also described as ‘the highest point capable of being reached or attained’ (fellmeth & horwitz, 2009)), of the islamic republic of iran’s governance (moinipour, 2018), has allowed the laws and regulations of the country to hinder the availability, accessibility, acceptability and adaptability of education for the children there. the civil code and the penal code of human rights education review – volume 4(2) 8 iran, for instance, lack a clear definition of the ‘child’, one that is needed to protect children and ensure each child gets a proper education. article 4 of the constitution states: all civic, penal, financial, economic, administrative, cultural, military, political, and other laws and regulations must be based on islamic criteria. this principle governs all the articles of the constitution, and other laws and regulations. the determination of such compatibility is left to the foqaha (islamic jurists) of the guardian council. (islamic republic of iran [iri], 1989) therefore, any law related to the education of children and their rights in general are ‘also affected by the interpretation of the lawmaker and the guardian council of sunnah (islamic traditions) and sharia’ (persia educational foundation, 2017, p. 31). structure of education in iran in iran, pre-school education at ages four to five is not compulsory. however, primary education is compulsory and starts from the age of six for the duration of five years. this means that from the age of 12 (secondary and higher education) education is not compulsory (tomaševski, 2001a, p. 26; united nations economic, scientific and cultural organization [unesco] 2011). families have the option of sending their children to two types of schools: state schools, and non-state or private schools. even though the non-state schools are seemingly established by non-state actors, both types of school are administered by the government through the ministry of education. they are only different in how they are funded. the state schools are financed by the government and are, therefore, ‘free of charge’ to families (even though tuition-free, there are other associated costs [persia educational foundation, 2017, p. 7]) whereas the non-state schools charge a tuition fee and are financed by the parents of the students. what is essential to note here is that the educational system in iran is centralised. this means that according to the regulations and laws, the ministry of education, as a government agency, is responsible for monitoring standards, organising teacher training, developing curricula and educational materials, and building and maintaining schools. it also plans, organises, leads, coordinates, and oversees the education of preschool, primary, secondary, high school and affiliated centres across the country (ministry of education, 1988a; world education news + reviews [wenr], 2017). this includes both state and non-state schools. what this means is that there is a monopoly on the flow of knowledge in iran. reza arjmand states that this monopoly exists in the muslim world in general. according to him, a monopoly on education has been one way that the clergy have safeguarded islam and that they utilise ‘their monopoly over education as means to control the flow of knowledge’ (arjmand, 2008, pp. 22-23). while there might be mentions of certain human rights instruments and principles in educational syllabuses, most of which are presented within the islamic framework (aghaii khozani, 2006), there need to be holistic changes in the system and the society for any one human right to be truly and meaningfully realised. without practical realisation of rights, no amount of mentions of human rights terms and instruments in a syllabus has any value. this article aims to evaluate whether, in practice, the islamic republic of iran complies with the educational criteria that are s. moinipour 9 expected of states who subscribe to international human rights law. this is by no means an exhaustive study. availability under international human rights law, states are obliged to make education available to all. they have to make it universal, free, and mandatory, at least for the compulsory education age-range. educational institutions, programmes and materials such as books must also be adequate. ‘availability’ also refers to functional and necessary facilities, which should meet safety and sanitation standards. teachers must be qualified, receive competitive salaries and have teaching material at their disposal. facilities such as libraries, computers and information technology must also be available (koh, getgen, & kalantry, 2009, p. 31; osler, 2016, p. 20). availability criteria can be divided into two categories: schools and teachers. for states to make the right to education available, they need to meet certain standards with regard to schools and teachers, and these are discussed under the relevant subheadings below. schools the islamic republic has seemingly democratic but complex institutional structures. it has one individual as the most powerful religious and political head, the supreme leader, who appoints six of the twelve members of the guardian council. the head of the judiciary nominates the other six. the head of the judiciary is also appointed by the supreme leader. the individuals nominated by the head of the judiciary then undergo an approval process administered by the islamic consultative assembly (majlis). the guardian council, therefore, is either directly or indirectly selected by the supreme leader. meanwhile, the presidential nominees, who are members of the public, go through a screening process before general elections can be held and, as such, must be approved by the guardian council (moinipour, 2018, p. 17). therefore, whoever is seemingly democratically elected by the public to be president is, in fact, the supreme leader’s choice and must do his bidding. the minister of education and all other cabinet members, while appointed by the president, are, as a consequence, the supreme leader’s choice. one of the outcomes of this absence of safeguards against the abuse of power is a monopoly in education in both state and non-state schools. such a monopoly is not consistent with international human rights law. this is why another ‘facet of the obligation to ensure that schooling is available are safeguards against abuses of power’ by the state (tomaševski, 2001b, pp. 17 & 1920). following the 1979 islamic revolution, private schools were abandoned, due to them being considered the shah’s legacy (arani, kakia, & taghavi, 2015, p. 2). however, after the iran-iraq war, they were brought back since the state was unable to cover the enormous cost of education (aftab online, 2014). even after doing this, iran has still failed to meet its obligation to ensure education is available to every single child in the country; although there are no official statistics available, an estimated 7.4 million children did not go to school in 2018 (iran focus, 2018). in addition, many issues have begun to arise, even with the private schools. they now have too many vacancies and financial problems (arani et al., 2015, p. 2) which may suggest, amongst other things, that there is greater poverty in iran’s whole economic spectrum. those who used to attend private schools are now forced to attend state schools, which are already overcrowded. this development may also be forcing out those children whose families are on the fringe of poverty. human rights education review – volume 4(2) 10 the issues that have led to dropouts from private schools and suspensions of the schools are many. according to a study supported by the research institute of education and the ministry of education, the first one is that more than 80% of the founders of these schools did not own the actual school buildings. they had to pay rent. due to high inflation and reduction in the value of currency, both mortgages and rental rates of buildings have skyrocketed. in addition, mismanagement on the part of the state and its agencies has created various barriers that make it difficult for school owners to obtain loans. lastly, the cost of private schools and the income of the public are not at all proportionate. in addition, there has been no real support from the government and the ministry of education has no specific policy on private schools. the ministers each have their own thoughts on how private schools should be run and these are usually very conflicted. more importantly, human resources have not been distributed properly and the ministry of education has completely banned the transfer of teachers to private schools, even though there is a surplus of teachers in state schools. that is why the owners of private schools have been unable to hire reputable teachers (arani et al., 2015, pp. 3-4). while international human rights law requires there to be some sort of ‘accreditation and/or licensing so as to ensure that schools are properly equipped and staffed and that their programmes conform to the definition of education’ (tomaševski, 2001b, p. 18), the government and its agencies, namely the ministry of education, parliament, the ministry of work and social affairs, municipalities, banks and others, have played a big role in the worsening situation of the private schools. the ministry of education has received most criticism, because of its conflicting official by-laws and the misleading interpretation of rules and regulations by its own different departments. the ministry has also been setting unrealistic tuition fees without taking social and economic realities into consideration. in addition, it has been issuing excessive licenses for the establishment of new private schools. with a decrease in the number of students and the situation of the already existing but struggling private schools, such measures have been counterintuitive (arani et al., 2015, p. 5). the state has violated international human rights law. it is supposed to be the ‘investor of last resort’ to make sure that all children receive primary education, but the islamic republic of iran has instead unduly interfered with the private sector in every way possible. it has thrown sand into the smooth running of the private schools’ machinery, and this has jeopardised their very existence. poverty and educational supplies as one of the solutions to their problems, private schools have had to reduce the purchase of equipment and needed supplies (arani et al., 2015, pp. 5-6). the state schools remain free, but other barriers get in the way of education being easily available to children. students have to pay for school supplies, books, bags, shoes and school uniforms. in recent years, prices have skyrocketed and continue to increase due to the lack of monitoring of prices, a lack of stability in the market, an increase in the price of currency and the importation of 40% of goods from abroad (mehr news, 2019). it is very likely that education has become and will continue to become less available to children from poor families as a result, since the percentage of the population living in absolute poverty in iran has increased to 50% in 2020 (figure 1) (iran international, 2020, khabaz, 2019). in 2019, the deutsche welle broadcaster (dw) reported that with the poverty line index set at 3,400,00 tomans [80.9 usd], the monthly income of 55% of iranian households fell below that amount (dw, s. moinipour 11 2019). therefore, the current percentage of the population below the absolute poverty line may be considerably more than what the iran international station has reported. even though these statistics are telling, the committee on economic, social and cultural rights emphasises that the definition of ‘poverty’ goes beyond numbers. poverty refers to ‘the lack of basic capabilities to live in dignity. this definition recognises poverty’s broader features, such as hunger, poor education, discrimination, vulnerability and social exclusion’ (cescr, 2001, p. 2). all these issues exist, even amongst students who are able to attend school, and this will be discussed below. figure 1 % of population living in absolute poverty line 2011-2020 health and safety health, safety and environmental (hse) conditions are also of concern in iran. the results from a study conducted in 100 primary schools in two districts in sari, a city in northern iran, showed that although private schools generally had better hse ratings than state schools, even they needed improvements. although the ministry of health has ‘guidelines, standards and programs for health affairs in schools’, not enough funding is allocated for any of these standards to be met. shutting down these schools is also impossible, as education will be unavailable to even more children. according to the authors, the ministry of education has ‘failed to supervise health standards’ (asadi behzadkolaee et al., 2016, p. 78). students are seriously affected by 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 2011 2018 2019 2020 % year % of population below the absolute poverty line poverty line human rights education review – volume 4(2) 12 various incidents, such as fires in substandard buildings with substandard facilities, or natural disasters; these are obstacles to the availability of education to many students. the state’s investment in educational facilities is insufficient, and this has caused the educational units to be in poor condition or insufficiently safe (payvandi, 2014). according to the islamic republic of iran’s organization for development, renovation and equipping schools, in 2006 67% of schools were found to be unsafe and required ‘retrofitting or reconstruction’. in 2017, this organisation reported to the united nations office for disaster risk reduction that 87% of this work had already been done and would be completed within a few years (organization for development renovation and equipping schools of i.r.iran [dres], 2017, p. 2). however, if proper retrofitting or reconstruction is being carried out, it is not being done quickly enough. in 2012, a faulty oil stove exploded. two students were killed and 26 were burnt and needed reconstructive surgery, which has yet to be funded by the government (dw, 2017). in 2018, in a similar incident, three students died after suffering 90% burns on their bodies (lipin, 2018). more recently, in the early months of 2020, 263 schools were destroyed in iran due to flooding (government of the islamic republic of iran, , 2020). this is such a high number that the state is either making false claims or proving the point that there is immense corruption in iranian construction with ‘funds being misappropriated for financial gain’ (hosseini et al., 2020, p. 205). as a result of this, education becomes unavailable to victims, and the stress that children experience in the anticipation of such incidents affects their learning. teachers the increase in prices of books and school supplies has also led to a trend amongst iranian school authorities. in some schools, principals and teachers buy essential school supplies from the market and sell them with interest to the students (iranian students’ news agency, 2018). such behaviour is encouraged by the state. this is partly due to the crooked recruitment system that emboldens hypocrisy, and this will be discussed later. it is also partly due to the failure of the state to pay outstanding wages or to increase salaries in a tumbling economy, which has pushed many teachers to the brink of poverty. in addition, insufficient investment in educational facilities by the state has caused the equipping of schools to progress slowly and forced teachers to take second and third jobs because of unpaid salaries (payvandi, 2014). teaching unions have been organising demonstrations to protest the state’s violation of international human rights law. they have demanded pay increases, and the payment of outstanding wages and overtime to combat poverty. the unions have also protested against the arrest of union activists and the filing of charges against teacher activists (morning star, 2019). the dispute between teaching unions and the government is ongoing and these prolonged protests and arrests have taken the focus away from the most important group the children, and their right to a proper and uninterrupted education. in order to survive, private schools have also commonly used tactics such as increasing the number of students through unrealistic grading. this not only affects the quality of learning, but also puts an extra burden on the shoulders of teachers who have to simultaneously face reductions in their salaries. despite these pay cuts, s. moinipour 13 teachers are also required to conduct extra activities and curriculum programmes to ensure schools can make enough money to survive (arani et al., 2015, pp. 5-6). proper recruitment and training of qualified and competent teachers is the obligation of the state in ensuring that education is available to all children. in article 2 of the law on the selection of teachers and educational staff, approved by the islamic consultative assembly in 1995, in addition to meeting general employment conditions such as knowledge competence and physical and mental capabilities, applicants must also meet the moral, doctrinal and political expectations set out in seven paragraphs and notes under this article (islamic consultative assembly, 1995). they are as follows: 1. belief in the religion of islam or one of the official religions recognised in the constitution of the islamic republic of iran. 2. practical commitment to the rules of islam. 3. belief and commitment to the velayat-e-faqih, the system of the islamic republic and the constitution. 4. not being known for moral corruption or openly engaging in morally corrupt acts. 5. no history of organisational dependence, support for parties and organizations and groups whose illegality has been or will be declared by the competent authorities, unless their repentance is proven. 6. no history of effective criminal conviction. 7. no drug addiction. the above criteria are obviously discriminatory and in clear violation of international human rights law. they are also in violation of the children’s right to education; individuals are not selected on the basis of their competence and how best they can serve and educate children, but on how loyal they are to the islamic republic of iran. according to an article published in the voice of the teacher (´abdullahi, 2017), which consists of a group of teachers and experts in iran, when it comes to entering educational institutions, there is systemic discrimination: between a religious person and a non-religious one; between a person who believes in the system and one who opposes it; between an individual who is obliged to carry out religious duties and one who is not; between someone who believes in the velayat-e-faqih and someone who does not; and between a non-political person and one who supports a political party. based on the aforementioned law, people who have no religion or believe in a religion not listed in the constitution cannot become teachers. concentration on this type of selection has taken attention away from the professional qualification of teachers and government employees and this has negatively affected iranian children’s right to a proper education. even those candidates who claim to have faith and a commitment to islam and the regime are subjected to the selection staff’s ‘feelings’ on the subject and will not be admitted to the educational system if it is suspected their claims are false. through interviews and research, the selection staff try to find out the ‘true’ belief and commitment of the candidate. candidates, eager to have a job and enter the governmental system, have a full knowledge of the selection criteria and will try to convince interviewers of their loyalty. once they succeed in doing so, they will pass the selection barrier. this situation produces hypocrisy and double standards in some government employees (´abdullahi, 2017; payvand news, 2010). human rights education review – volume 4(2) 14 this attempt to discover candidates’ true beliefs may lead to them being investigated, and this is not only in violation of international human rights law but also of article 23 of iran’s own constitution, which states that ‘investigation of individuals’ beliefs is forbidden, and no one may be molested or taken to task simply for holding a certain belief’ (iri, 1989). in addition, the candidates who actually do get into the system complain about inefficiency, the sale of grades and degrees, and a failure to meet quality standards of education, training and management (´abdullahi, 2017). this points to the fact that education is far from being available in iran, since availability does not merely refer to the existence of school buildings and free access to them. it also refers to the quality of education, which is in need of fundamental change. materials and textbooks under international human rights law, the islamic republic of iran is obliged to ensure that education is available to every single child in its jurisdiction. however, the law absolutely prohibits iran from ‘monopolizing education, let alone transforming it into institutionalised indoctrination’ (tomaševski, 2003, p. 15), which it has done. iran’s teacher recruitment criteria are designed to create a monopoly and to indoctrinate shi’a islam through education. as was discussed previously, this monopoly affects every other aspect of education, including teaching and learning materials such as teachers’ guides and students’ textbooks (aghaii khozani, 2006, p. 45). while no child, even shi’a muslims, should be forced to go through the institutionalised indoctrination of islam, those who are not shi’a muslims are particularly affected. article 1 of the laws and regulations of the ministry of education (1988b) states that: according to article 12 of the constitution, in areas where followers of other islamic religions reside, the ministry of education is obliged to arrange for the religious education of students in accordance with their religious jurisprudence. sunnis belong to the largest non-shia islamic group in the country and the above article gives the impression that the institutionalisation of shia indoctrination is, to an extent, rectified. however, complaints from the sunni community indicate that the state has been violating its own constitution and has failed to provide the community with religious education based on sunnism. in provinces where a high population of sunnis resides, there are not enough schools and this deprives many children of an education (ion, 2017). while sunnis and the three non-muslim religious minority groups recognised in the iranian constitution are permitted to have their own schools, they still face discrimination and restrictions. for instance, schools belonging to jews, christians and zoroastrians must be run by muslim principals (wright, 2000, p. 210) and students belonging to jewish, christian and zoroastrian communities have to ‘study from textbooks specifically prepared for them’(paivandi, 2008, p. 73). other religious minorities who are not recognised, such as the bahá’ís, are not allowed to have religious education in accordance with their religious jurisprudence at all. s. moinipour 15 accessibility in international human rights law, accessing education has been defined differently. it has been defined based on the different educational stages. states are responsible for making sure every child in the ‘compulsory education age-range’, often defined internationally as 6-15 years, has access to education. however, they are not obliged to provide secondary and higher education. primary education must be free and fees or tuition charges for other levels of education must be affordable (tomaševski, 2001b, p. 13). iran has one of the world’s shortest compulsory education age-ranges; it is next to haiti and malaysia. pre-school education (4-5) is not compulsory but primary education is, starting at the age of six and lasting for five years. this means that from the age of 12 (secondary and higher levels) education is not compulsory (tomaševski, 2001a, p. 26; unesco, 2011). this forces children to leave school at a very young age, and raises other issues such as child labour and child marriage, which will be touched upon later. minimally, the state is obliged to guarantee equal access to every single child on the basis of equality and without discrimination, be it on physical, gender, ethnic, or religious grounds (benedek, 2012, pp. 256-257). gender and access the lack of equal access of all children to education is yet another issue in iran. one reason for this is that the state does not have the political will to create equality. another reason is the existence of other barriers, such as parental lack of cooperation in some areas of society, due to cultural and religious beliefs. some parents prevent their children, particularly girls, from going to school and stop them from exercising their right to education. while under international human rights law parents should be free to choose their children’s education, and such freedom is ‘not subject to progressive realisation but should be guaranteed fully and immediately’ (tomaševski, 2001b, p. 27), stopping a child from going to school is in violation of the child’s right to education. even though the ministry fails to produce reliable data on the number of children not having access to education, it admits to one thing: the number of girls without access to education is much higher than the number of boys. the dispersal of villages in the country affects female students more than male ones, as boys are more likely to travel from one village to another to study. such inequality is a feature of traditional and conservative cultures, especially in rural and suburban areas. many families believe that girls do not need to study and prefer that they get married at an early age (khabaz, 2019, radio zamaneh, 2018). sayings such as ‘if you do not get married early, you will rot’ are very common. married girls may also face opposition from their husbands, even if adult schools are made available to them. the belief that education does not ultimately benefit girls is striking, even in urban areas. this belief emanates from state policy and the intense official campaigns that incessantly define women as second-class citizens. the state’s outlook on women has also led to a limited job market for educated females and the dominant belief that wives should stay at home. such policies and campaigns have spiralled into a vicious cycle where girls are taught from a very young age to fulfil a traditional role, one that mainly involves performing the duties of a wife and childbearing, while having limited legal rights. these beliefs have made girls themselves reluctant to complete their primary education. in addition, many girls have to work at home and on farms. boys are also an important part of the work force of deprived and rural families. however, there is more flexibility in their human rights education review – volume 4(2) 16 education. with fewer girls studying, there is consequently a shortage of female teachers, particularly in rural areas. many families do not allow their girls to attend classes with male teachers and the same is true for classes that may be co-educational (radio zamaneh, 2018). while the islamic republic has entered reservations to crc, article 28 of this treaty does require the state parties to (1) ‘recognize the right of the child to education’, and this right must be achieved ‘on the basis of equal opportunity’. it must be kept in mind that under the convention, a child is defined as ‘every human being below the age of eighteen years’ (article 1). the reservation entered by the islamic republic of iran is partly due to the fact that the iranian regime maintains that under shariah law boys mature at fifteen and girls at nine. this means that boys as young as fifteen and girls as young as nine are legally allowed to get married or work once they reach these ages. this violates the right of these children to education and prevents them from accessing the educational system. girls are particularly disadvantaged. for instance, all girls are forced to cover their heads as soon as they start primary school at the age of six. they are required to learn knitting and sewing, while boys are taught mechanics. according to golnar mehran: compulsory veiling, banning co-education at the pre-university level, reinforcing gendered practices by determining ‘appropriate’ fields of study for women, compiling different technical-vocational textbooks for girls and boys, and barring unmarried women from studying abroad using state school-scholarships are some examples of post-revolutionary educational policies to ensure that women do what is deemed ‘proper. (mehran, 2009, p. 543) the state’s concern for children’s ‘proper’ behaviour has actually been an impediment to their access to proper education. textbooks: discriminatory and ideological discourses educational textbooks are also of utmost importance in ensuring that a culture of equality, free from discrimination, is developed and instilled in children. the textbooks used in iran have quite the opposite function. they encourage discrimination, both directly and indirectly. the textbooks for all three educational levels in iran favour men in their pictures, particularly in religious teachings, where there are no pictures of women at all. even in those pictures where women are presented, they are mainly shown in the house. besides pictures, the names of professional men are also mentioned more often than the names of women and distorted information is given about the work that women do outside of the home (aghaii khozani, p. 52). in a mixed methods analysis of the curriculum of the islamic republic, it was also found that ‘discriminatory attitudes’, mainly towards women and religious and ethnic minorities, are not ‘accidental or sporadic’. they are rather ‘continuous, consistent, and systematic’ (paivandi, 2008, p. 73). this illustrates that students are intentionally denied access to education and hence the international human rights law on accessibility is violated by the state. even though over the years the ideological and religious discourse in textbooks has been reduced (paivandi, 2008, p. 75), the state is far from working towards the progressive realisation of the right to education as is required of states through icescr. this requirement takes into s. moinipour 17 consideration the ‘financial resources available to individual governments’. however, in the case of iran, the situation is not due to an absence of resources, but to ideological and political reasons. these ignore the fact that the gradual realisation of economic and social rights needs to begin from the ‘bottom up’, which means that the state is obliged to concentrate its efforts ‘on the most vulnerable or disadvantaged groups in society’ (nevile, 2008, p. 4). a minimum requirement for iran is that women and minorities are ensured equal access to education and presented as equals to their counterparts in the curriculum. religious and ethnic minorities providing access for children should also be non-discriminatory. the law requires every single child to have access to education ‘without discrimination on any ground’ (coomans, 2009, p. 434). however, the ministry of education and the department of education report very low statistics on the number of children without access to education, perhaps to avoid showing accessibility as an issue in iran. back in 2019, abdolreza fooladvand, the head of tehran’s department of education, stated that only 140,000 children were missing out on education across the country (tehrantimes, 2019). however, by comparing two consecutive censuses, rouydad, a reformist online publication in iran, was able to estimate that about 7.4 million children did not attend school in 2018 (iran focus, 2018). there are children living in iran who do not have id documents and a number who are not registered because they were born out of wedlock. these are children who are unaccounted for in the estimate of 7.4 million (radio zamaneh, 2018). the official figure of only 140,000 seems to be unrealistic, particularly because iran is still grappling with issues such as child labour, migrant children, and child marriage. child workers (particularly afghans), disabled children, girls who have married young, and other girls and boys facing cultural barriers are among those for whom education has not been made accessible (payvandi, 2014). considering the fact that religion in iran is politicised, discrimination against religious minorities also hinders the education of children belonging to such groups. the bahá’í community, the largest non-muslim religious minority group, is particularly affected by such policies. the state refuses to recognise the bahá’is in its constitution, and this has severe consequences. article 13 of the constitution states that: zoroastrian, jewish, and christian iranians are the only recognised religious minorities, who, within the limits of the law, are free to perform their religious rites and ceremonies, and to act according to their own canon in matters of personal affairs and religious education. (iri 1989) besides bahá’í teachers, who were all dismissed at the beginning of the revolution, bahá’í children have been and continue to be particularly targeted and discriminated against. based on article 2(1) of the ministry of education, i.e., the ‘development of moral virtues and the purification of students based on the higher teachings of islam’, bahá’í children…bahá’í children are regarded as ‘infidels’ and ‘impure’ (khamenei, 2020). however, they have to join the compulsory friday prayers at school. they are forced to learn arabic, attend islamic religious classes (while children from recognised religious minorities can skip such classes), and learn and memorise the qu’ran. they are also expelled if they mention they are bahá’ís to anyone at school. human rights education review – volume 4(2) 18 these children begin to experience discrimination first-hand at kindergarten where, according to the former un special rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief, heiner bielefeldt, ‘kindergarten staff are supposed to spot bahá’ís so they can be under special surveillance’(the baha’i international community, 2016). when they reach the age of nine, bahá’í girls are also forced to attend the ceremonies that enforce the idea that this is the age when girls mature and are, therefore, legally allowed to marry or work, with an emphasis on marriage. discrimination against minorities, which forces children to be silent and hide their identities, goes beyond religion. children belonging to ethnic minorities are also under pressure, according to various groups such as the dur untash studies centre, which focuses on the plight of the ahwazis. iran’s policies force the many non-persian ethnic minorities, such as kurds, arabs, turks, balochis, turkmens, gilaks and mazandaranis, to abandon their identities and languages. members of these groups find themselves abruptly placed in purely persian language environments where they are humiliated because of their accents and ways of speaking. a new assessment policy proposed by the elementary education department, in collaboration with the organization for the education of children with special needs, will ‘evaluate children’s level of proficiency and comprehension in the persian language as part of a broader health assessment plan for preschool children’ (iri, 1989). many ethnic children only speak their mother tongue and such assessments undoubtedly affect them negatively (hamid, 2019). article 15 of iran’s own constitution does state that ‘the use of regional and tribal languages in the press and mass media, as well as for teaching of their literature in schools, is allowed in addition to persian’ (iri, 1989). however, this is deceptive. in reality, the actions of the state and its other discriminatory policies do not only jeopardise the accessibility of iran’s multi-ethnic and multi-religious mosaic to education. they also seem to be intentionally aimed at eradicating these minorities. physical access ensuring all children have physical access to education is also an obligation of the state, based on international human rights law. physical access to schools for children in rural areas, disabled children and migrant children living in iran is particularly challenging. schools’ capacities are usually at their maximum when it comes to admitting more afghan children. the age of these children also prevents them from accessing schools because the majority are ‘overage’. afghan children also have no access to pre-schools and this creates ‘major gaps in cognitive skills between iranian and afghan children’ (norwegian refugee council , 2017, p. 4). due to ‘extensive geographic distribution and the extent of the country’, children living in rural areas are also restricted when it comes to physical access to schools. because there are no accurate statistics available, it is hard to determine how many children are being denied access to education (economic and social commission for western asia [escwa], 2014, p. 19). according to human rights watch, in recent years the islamic republic has taken steps to ensure children with disabilities have more access to education by allocating more funds for this purpose. they have also taken measures to construct new buildings and renovate older ones to ensure disabled children can physically access them. however, such measures are insufficient to meet the international human rights standards as enshrined in the international convention on the rights of persons with disabilities (icrpd). iran ratified this in 2009, but made a reservation regarding article 46. this article state that ‘(1) reservations incompatible with the object and purpose of the present s. moinipour 19 convention shall not be permitted’ and ‘(2) reservations may be withdrawn at any time. the islamic republic declared ‘that it does not consider itself bound by any provisions of the convention, which may be incompatible with its applicable rules’ and refuses to withdraw this declaration (moinipour, 2018). as such, children with disabilities are still denied access to education due to stigma, ‘lack of information about the right to education among parents’, bullying, and ‘mandatory medical assessment for school enrolment’. disabled girls and poor children living in rural areas are more severely affected as, in addition to facing all of these challenges, they have problems physically accessing school buildings (hrw, 2019). the seemingly positive measures taken by the state are minimal; they only serve to provide ‘proof of improvement’ for the scrutinisation mechanisms of the united nations, such as the universal periodic review. none of these measures are fundamental to guaranteeing inclusive education for all children. conclusion beside the issues discussed in this article, there are a number of other ones that force children to leave education: social crisis, addiction, a lack of awareness about rights and responsibilities, homelessness, broken families, and familial stress. to these must be added intra-school issues such as lack of motivation and failure at school. the islamic republic appeared to have made efforts to identify and help all children in the compulsory education age-range through a number of initiatives: the establishment of the board of directors to block the roots of illiteracy; the national secretariat for educational justice and the prevention of illiteracy; and the obstruction of roots of illiteracy program. however these measures do not appear to have substantially improved the children’s situation (khabaz, 2019), and have only added to the already complicated web of state agencies and institutions. the copious issues contributing to the lack of availability and accessibility of education point to the instrumental and manifold role of the state. the state needs to, first and foremost, withdraw the declarations made to the crc and crpd respectively and make sure that the law of compulsory education applies to every single child. it also needs to create programmes to ensure that adults who have had no formal education get one, and raise parental awareness about the right of children to an education. the state should also ensure that no cultural practices, religious or superstitious beliefs such as ‘honour killings’ endanger children and violate their right to education. this must start with the state’s own policies and propaganda. availability and accessibility to education are two obligations of the state and part of the 4-a right to education framework that ensures every child’s right to education is respected. while the islamic republic has made a commendable effort to improve the rate of literacy in the country, it has fallen short on so many other obligations. progress on literacy does not begin to help raise the standards that need to be met by the state in fulfilling its obligation to respect the right to education of every child. the state has failed to respect the right to education of its citizens, as well as the right of those who have taken refuge in the country for the past four decades. education is unavailable or inaccessible to children partly due to poverty and its consequences, and this has only come about because of the regime’s mismanagement and lack of competency in administrating an oil-rich country. other hindrances to education are the results of the ideological and political tools that intentionally aim to outroot those who do not conform. human rights education review – volume 4(2) 20 this is why in order to ensure the state respects children’s right to education, it is not only the educational system but also the social infrastructure that needs to change. safeguards need to be put in place to prevent abuse of power by the state. a transformation of the justice system, the incorporation of human rights in education, and a ban on media campaigns laws, policies that encourage discrimination at all levels are also changes that need to be 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(2001a). free and compulsory education for all children: the gap between promise and performance. right to education primers no. 2. retrieved from https://www.right-to-education.org/sites/right-toeducation.org/files/resource-attachments/tomasevski_primer%202.pdf https://doi.org/10.1080/1323238x.2008.11910843 https://adsp.ngo/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/ir-15_afghan-children%e2%80%99s-access-to-education-in-iran-what-happened-after-the-supreme-leader%e2%80%99s-decree.pdf https://adsp.ngo/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/ir-15_afghan-children%e2%80%99s-access-to-education-in-iran-what-happened-after-the-supreme-leader%e2%80%99s-decree.pdf https://adsp.ngo/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/ir-15_afghan-children%e2%80%99s-access-to-education-in-iran-what-happened-after-the-supreme-leader%e2%80%99s-decree.pdf https://www.unisdr.org/files/globalplatform/sasakawa%202017-%09statement-3%20minutes-dres-iran.pdf https://www.unisdr.org/files/globalplatform/sasakawa%202017-%09statement-3%20minutes-dres-iran.pdf http://www.payvand.com/news/10/nov/1047.html https://www.radiofarda.com/a/f8-4m-quit-education/26602047.html https://www.persia.education/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/pef_irans-childrens-report.pdf https://www.persia.education/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/pef_irans-childrens-report.pdf https://www.radiozamaneh.com/413227 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2010.07.421 https://doi.org/10.1080/14754835.2019.1623015 https://www.tehrantimes.com/news/438753/140-000-children-out-of-%09school-in-iran https://www.tehrantimes.com/news/438753/140-000-children-out-of-%09school-in-iran https://www.right-to-education.org/sites/right-to-education.org/files/resource-attachments/tomasevski_primer%202.pdf https://www.right-to-education.org/sites/right-to-education.org/files/resource-attachments/tomasevski_primer%202.pdf s. moinipour 25 tomaševski, k. (2001b). human rights obligations: making education available, accessible, acceptable and adaptable. right to education primers no. 3. lund/stockholm: raoul wallenberg institute/swedish international development cooperation agency (sida). retrieved from https://www.right-to-education.org/sites/right-toeducation.org/files/resource-attachments/tomasevski_primer%203.pdf tomaševski, k. (2003). education denied: costs and remedies. london: zed books. tomaševski, k. (2006). the state of the right to education worldwide: free or fee? 2006 global report. in s. a. moore & r. c. mitchell (eds.), power, pedagogy and praxis: social justice in the globalized classroom (pp. 19-54). rotterdam: sense united nations. (1948). the universal declaration of human rights. retrieved from https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights united nations. (1989). status: convention on the rights of the child. retrieved may 10, 2021 from https://treaties.un.org/pages/viewdetails.aspx?src=ind&mtdsg_no=iv 11&chapter=4 united nations economic, scientific and cultural organization. (2011). world data on education. retrieved from http://www.ibe.unesco.org/fileadmin/user_upload/publications/wde/201 0/pdf-versions/islamic_republic_of_iran.pdf world education news + reviews. (2017). education system profiles: education in iran. retrieved from https://wenr.wes.org/2017/02/education-in-iran wright, r. (2000). the last great revolution: turmoil and transformation in iran. new york, ny: alfred a. knopf. https://www.right-to-education.org/sites/right-to-education.org/files/resource-attachments/tomasevski_primer%203.pdf https://www.right-to-education.org/sites/right-to-education.org/files/resource-attachments/tomasevski_primer%203.pdf https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights https://treaties.un.org/pages/viewdetails.aspx?src=ind&mtdsg_no=iv-%0911&chapter=4 https://treaties.un.org/pages/viewdetails.aspx?src=ind&mtdsg_no=iv-%0911&chapter=4 http://www.ibe.unesco.org/fileadmin/user_upload/publications/wde/201%090/pdf-versions/islamic_republic_of_iran.pdf http://www.ibe.unesco.org/fileadmin/user_upload/publications/wde/201%090/pdf-versions/islamic_republic_of_iran.pdf https://wenr.wes.org/2017/02/education-in-iran championing human rights close to home and far away: human rights education in light of national identity construction and foreign policy in norway volume 2, no 1 (2019) date received: 06-09-2018 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2907 date accepted: 05-03-2019 issn 2535-5406 championing human rights close to home and far away: human rights education in the light of national identity construction and foreign policy in norway knut vesterdal norwegian university of science and technology, norway. abstract: human rights education (hre) has been recognised in international educational discourses as a sustainable practice to develop active citizenship and protect human dignity. however, such education has not been fully explored in a broader political context. in addition to contributing to empowering citizens to resist human rights violations, hre plays several roles in society, contributing to both national identity and international image-building. the article explores possible relations between national identity construction, foreign policy and hre in norway through the following research question: what interplay occurs between norwegian foreign policy and national identity in relation to human rights, and, within this context, what is the role of hre? the article presents a qualitative analysis of norwegian policy documents and reports, arguing that hre is a component of norwegian national identity as well as political currency in foreign relations. keywords: human rights education, national identity, foreign policy, norway k. vesterdal: knut.vesterdal@ntnu.no http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2907 mailto:knut.vesterdal@ntnu.no human rights education review – volume 2(1) 6 championing human rights close to home and far away: human rights education in light of national identity construction and foreign policy in norway doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2907 issn 2535-5406 knut vesterdal knut.vesterdal@ntnu.no norwegian university of science and technology, norway. abstract: human rights education (hre) has been recognised in international educational discourses as a sustainable practice to develop active citizenship and protect human dignity. however, such education has not been fully explored in a broader political context. in addition to contributing to empowering citizens to resist human rights violations, hre plays several roles in society, contributing to both national identity and international image-building. the article explores possible relations between national identity construction, foreign policy and hre in norway through the following research question: what interplay occurs between norwegian foreign policy and national identity in relation to human rights, and, within this context, what is the role of hre? the article presents a qualitative analysis of norwegian policy documents and reports, arguing that hre is a component of norwegian national identity as well as political currency in foreign relations. keywords: human rights education, national identity, foreign policy, norway introduction why do states promote human rights education (hre)? what and who does it serve – the state, its citizens? international educational discourses have identified hre as a sustainable practice for developing active citizenship and protecting human dignity (georgi, 2008; ippoliti, 2009; mihr, 2009; suarez, 2007). hre promotes the empowerment of individuals and vulnerable groups and the development of human rights mechanisms in local, national and international contexts. it also promotes conflict resolution, active democratic citizenship, and rights and obligations (tibbits, 2002; vesterdal, 2016). there are a number of factors that may justify the value of citizenship education and hre in educational policy. among these are democratic deficit 1 , weakening political and civic engagement, terrorism, human rights violations, globalisation, and tensions related to increased migration and diversity (kerr, 2008; osler & starkey, 2010). the pressure and work of the grassroots and non-governmental organisations (ngos) to put hre on the international agenda have also been crucial to its recognition (mihr, 2009; suarez, 2007). moreover, international organisations such as the united nations (un), the council of europe (coe) and the european union (eu) impose a number of obligations on their member states regarding hre (decara, 2013). these encourage incentives to conform to global educational standards (karlsen, 2006; spring, 2009) and to follow and respect international law and norms http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2907 mailto:knut.vesterdal@ntnu.no k. vesterdal 7 which, if ignored, may lead to sanctions or, at least, a loss of reputation and criticism from ‘the international community’ (risse, roppe & sikkink, 1999). however, the ideal purposes of hre and the embracing of the concept as a way to develop human rights-friendly societies and democratic citizenship do not fully explain why it is in the interest of a state to promote it. as bajaj (2017, p. 8) argues, ‘nation-states and policymakers have diverse reasons to support human rights education — that may or may not include a transformative vision’. it is not a given that education of this nature is in the interests of nation-states, in spite of a rhetorical consensus at the inter-state level. this is also the case in norway, where human rights are included and explicitly referred to in different educational steering documents. hre is included in the education act (2010) as well as in the new overarching curriculum and the curricula of different subjects, particularly in social and religious studies (norwegian directorate for education and training, 2017, 2013, 2010). are there also other motivations for states such as norway to promote hre? why do states and governments promote hre, thereby empowering their citizens with human rights consciousness, risking demands for change, loss of support or their very legitimacy? by reformulating the question, we may open other arenas to explore relevant factors: how can norway as a small state gain influence in international relations? how is its national identity constructed, what are the values that are worth promoting internationally and how is its self-image compatible with state branding efforts abroad and to what purpose? such questions are raised when it comes to the role of education and educational research and are transferable to international contexts, as a number of countries share several challenges concerning the implementation of hre despite promoting this educational concept (decara, 2013; mahler, mihr & toivanen, 2009; mejias, 2017; vesterdal, 2016). the analysis of these questions contributes to understanding why and how the concept is addressed and used on the policy level, for the purpose of understanding how political discourses frame hre practice in different educational settings. this article will explore and discuss possible relations between national identity construction, foreign policy and hre in norway through the following research question: what interplay occurs between norwegian foreign policy and national identity in relation to human rights, and, within this context, what is the role of hre? the article will argue that in norway national identity is in several ways intertwined with foreign policy and, within this relationship, hre is an essential component in constructing the image of a human rights-friendly norwegian identity. the image of a peace-loving country, a promoter of democracy, human rights and development, has both domestic and ‘state branding’ dimensions; it may be intended not only to develop human rights-friendly communities, but also to produce national identity, as well as to gain access to negotiating tables in international relations. using discourse-analytic approaches (connolly, 1993; fairclough, 1992; neumann, 2001), i scrutinise a sample of norwegian policy documents and reports to explore the constituting elements of hre discourses in norway. investigating how and why social phenomena take the forms they do is an essential purpose of discourse-analytic techniques (neumann, 2001, p. 14). these techniques rest on the assumptions that meaning is socially constructed, and that discourse consists of representations that are grouped in specific ways (neumann, 2001, p. 23). the relation between text, language, content and meaning is illustrated by the following comment by fairclough, which states that discourse contributes to ‘all those human rights education review – volume 2(1) 8 dimensions of social structure which directly or indirectly shape relations, identities and institutions which lie behind them. discourse is a practice not just representing the world, but signifying the world, constituting and constructing the world in meaning’ (1992, p. 64). this view that discourse analysis is a fruitful tool to analyse policy documents is comparable to eriksen’s claim in the previous edition of this journal (2018) that ‘major curriculum documents hold power and discursive productivity in the foucauldian sense; they are vital for locating normative cultural discourses about the ideal citizen’ (eriksen, 2018, p. 27). studies of the norwegian context what do we know about the norwegian context concerning relations between hre, national identity construction and foreign policy? little research has been performed to explore this nexus in the educational field, although studies exist exploring the relation between education and national identity construction. the role of the school as the main arena for nation-building has been emphasised in the works of telhaug and mediås (2003), with a focus on steering documents in norwegian education from 1739 to the early 2000s. lorentzen (2005) also emphasises the role of the school as a crucial arena for nation-building, through his study of history textbooks (and more recent social studies textbooks) and how these have presented and reproduced the ‘grand narratives’ of norway and norwegians in different periods. engen (2010) points to the exclusion of national minorities and indigenous peoples in the development of the comprehensive school system, which has been based on an imagined community of one people ethnic norwegians; the cultural heritage of minority groups has been assimilated and excluded in the construction of a norwegian national identity. børhaug (2012, p. 71) has discussed the role of social studies in norway, suggesting that it paradoxically represents a ‘national subject in a globalised world’. he describes the focus on national issues and the nation state as the primary unit, and how social studies supports the production of national identity. børhaug also argues, as tvedt (2003, 2007) does in his analysis of norway’s national ‘do-gooder’s regime’, that the image of norway as a promoter of peace and development has become prominent in the textbooks (børhaug, 2012). osler and lybæk (2014) contribute to understandings of the norwegian context by examining ways in which educational policy supports an inclusive notion of nationhood and promotes an exclusive model of national identity. this analysis of educational policy ‘identifies a tension in policy between recognition of diversity and concerns about social cohesion’ (osler & lybæk, 2014, p. 15). they propose instead a curriculum that genuinely integrates minority perspectives and narratives to develop ‘the new norwegian we’, based on osler and starkey’s concept of education for cosmopolitan citizenship (2003, 2005, 2018). this concept advocates citizenship learning that ‘recognises our complex, interconnected world; and draws on young people’s experiences of living in communities characterised by diversity, in which they negotiate multiple loyalties and belongings’ (osler & starkey, 2018, p. 37). this sample of studies on the link between education and national identity construction contributes to this discourse, although none of them have specifically studied hre. there has been a growing recognition of education as an essential component of competitiveness in global markets, as human capital and skills are the key contributors to economic growth in the knowledge society (karlsen, 2006; norwegian ministry of education and research, 2017; organisation for economic co k. vesterdal 9 operation and development, 2005; sandlin & mclaren, 2010; spring, 2009). the recognition of education as a prerequisite to economic growth and wealth (at least increased gdp) within states is necessarily connected to global competitiveness, and thus a component of not just domestic policy, but also increasingly of foreign policy, as education is related to vital national interests (norwegian ministry of foreign affairs, 2016; 2014a; wojciuk et al., 2015). with these perspectives in mind, let us, for the time being, leave the educational system in order to understand and interpret the purposes of hre on a societal level. national identity construction and foreign policy ‘norway has a long tradition of continuity in foreign and security policy, and there is broad consensus on the values that underpin our policy: democracy, human rights, and respect for international law’ (norwegian ministry of foreign affairs, 2017, p. 6). these values are expressed in the government’s 2017 white paper no. 36, setting the course for norwegian foreign and security policy. what are the core elements of norwegian national identity, and how do foreign policies interplay in this process? my aim here is not to evoke all possible elements regarding national identity and key priorities of the foreign policy of norway, but to introduce some constitutive elements that are relevant for our discussion on the role of hre and its political framework. in this context the starting point is political concepts. these are understood as socially constructed and there is a recognition of their multiple meanings and dynamic nature (berenskoetter, 2016). identity is a multifaceted concept; here i follow johnston (1999), who defines the term “national identity” as a social category. johnston refers to some shared notions of community that are thought to be distinct from other nations, where markers of identity represent constitutive elements that distinguish one nation from others, as well as differences between the self and the other, imagined or not (anderson, 2006). on a national level, the need for legitimacy of the nation, the state and regime type have both internal and external purposes and functions. if we recognise the sphere of foreign policy as both the bridge between domestic and international relations and the wall between the secure and the insecure, the predictable and the unpredictable (leira et al., 2007, p. 8), then this policy sector has a significant impact on how national identity is constructed as well. in this discussion, i combine the purposes and nature of foreign policy with its relations to the school system as a key engineer of national identity construction. developing an argument on the interdependency between foreign policy, national identity construction and the role of hre in norway rests on some key assumptions. here, johnston’s arguments on the relations between legitimation, foreign policy and national identity are fruitful. let us look at what johnston proposes: 1) regime legitimation involves the construction of a ‘national identity’ among the members of a society; 2) identity construction rests on establishing and perpetuating differences between the ingroup and outgroups; 3) foreign policy is a process in which differences between a sovereign nation-state ingroup and a sovereign nation-state outgroup are recreated; 4) therefore, foreign policy is critical for identity construction and thus for legitimation (johnston, 1999, p. 4). when there is some degree of consistency between internal identities and ‘the normatively appropriate, pro-group behaviour expected by international audiences’, an optimal balance of internal and external legitimation will obtain. these assumptions are somewhat harmonious with global opinion theory (rusciano 2003), which argues human rights education review – volume 2(1) 10 that ‘(…) the construction of national identity derives, in part, from a negotiation between a nation’s selbstbild (or the nation's national consciousness, or the image its citizens have of their country) and a nation's fremdbild (or the nation’s perceived or actual international image in world opinion)’ (rusciano, 2003, p. 361). johnston’s and rusciano’s arguments on the close relationship between foreign policy and national identity construction are echoed by david campbell. in writing security: united states foreign policy and the politics of identity, he argues that foreign policy in general has to be understood as identity politics that aim to discipline society (campbell, 1998). he claims that foreign policy is less about defending territorial boundaries than defending the boundaries of american identity and ‘our way of life’. here, the preservation and reproduction of identity are constituted through the construction of an external threat. this external threat is related to the ‘self’ and the ‘other’; it is not necessarily external in terms of territorial boundaries, but creates the distinction between what ‘we’ are or not. thus, national identity is, according to campbell, in many ways developed through images of ‘foreignness’. this is of interest when we look at how national identity is constructed in norway through, among other influences, hre. this is not to argue that foreign policy is limited to producing national identity, as ‘hard’ power perspectives related to realpolitik are obviously a necessary and vital part of foreign policy. these dimensions, however, do not exclude the nexus of national identity and foreign policy. with this theoretical foundation in mind, we turn to the norwegian perspectives. hre as a component of foreign policy and national identity construction in norway why do states promote hre? as presented in the introduction, we may point to several factors where hre seems to play a significant role (vesterdal, 2016). cardenas states: ‘according to its proponents, hre should appeal to states because it promises to foster social tolerance, a democratic citizenry, and a climate wherein human rights abuses are less likely to occur’ (cardenas, 2005, p. 364). thus, it should be in the self-interest of democratic states to embrace the concept. it can also be argued that norway promotes hre because doing so is its duty. international obligations form a legal and moral basis for the implementation of this subject in the norwegian school system, and the state is ‘under a duty to enact legislation and to take other measures to bring about human rights education in line with these commitments’ (alfredsson, 2001, p. 282). in this context it is appropriate to emphasise the legally binding conventions with their specific references to hre manifested through, for instance, the un convention on the rights of the child (crc), article 29 (1), the international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights (icesc), article 13 (1) and protocol 1 article 2 to the european convention on human rights (echr). in addition, there are declarations, charters and recommendations – international standards that are agreed upon and recognised, but not legally binding (andenæs & bjørge, 2012). these also represent global standards that states conform to, a dimension of what spring (2009) terms the ‘globalisation of education’. global superstructures directly and indirectly influence national school systems through international organisations and multinational educational corporations; states choose to adopt policies from these to be competitive in the global economy (karlsen, 2006) on the other hand, the concept can lead the population of the state to an awareness that may undermine the legitimacy of the government. if people are aware k. vesterdal 11 of their rights, are they not more likely to demand that those rights be protected? following this logic, cardenas asks an essential question: ‘why would states, most of which violate human rights to one degree or another, encourage dissent and run the risk of undermining their very legitimacy?’ (cardenas, 2005, p. 364). what are the motives of states to comply with and promote international standards concerning human rights, and specifically hre? if we adopt a classical realist position in the study of international politics, then such education seems inadequate, naïve or even irrational and, consequently, inimical to classical interest-based policies that emphasise constitutive elements such as power, security, regime stability, control of the state and its citizens, economic growth, and geopolitical and military-strategic factors. an alternative (neo)-realist position would be that states embrace hre hypocritically, expecting to ‘reap the international benefits of doing so’ (cardenas, 2005, p. 364). moreover, the promotion of hre may contribute to regime stability through the construction of a set of common values and norms that include both majority and minority groups, resulting in a national and cosmopolitan hybrid, which this author would describe as a ‘cosmonational’ identity. such strategies concerning norwegian identity construction can fit into such a framework, and hre is one of the aspects of the educational system that plays a role here. in 2017 the norwegian government presented white paper no. 36 on norwegian foreign and security policy, stating: ‘ the government will continue to promote human rights, the rule of law and democracy, in line with the white paper on human rights in norway’s foreign policy and development cooperation. this is a good way of safeguarding norwegian values’ (norwegian ministry of foreign affairs, 2017, p. 40). in norway’s follow-up of agenda 2030 and the sustainable development goals in 2016, the government also recognised human rights education as a priority in foreign policy: ‘the norwegian government has made education a top priority in its foreign and development policy. consequently, norway will double its funding to education over a four-year period to promote economic development, democracy and human rights globally’ (norwegian ministry of foreign affairs, 2016). this is also emphasised in white paper no. 10 (norwegian ministry of foreign affairs, 2014b, p. 26) concerning the government’s international human rights policy, asserting the government will ‘focus on the promotion of human rights education.’ these ambitions and elements of norway’s foreign policy are important for our discussion on the role of hre, if we take this starting point into consideration and relate it to the theories of johnston, rusciano and campbell. foreign policy is here considered both in terms of the bridge between national and international politics, but also the wall between the two spheres, creating the frontier between the ‘us’ and the ‘them’, the secure and the insecure, and as the outer limit for our ‘unique’ norms, values and system. in both cases it is fruitful to describe foreign policy as identity politics, following leira in his analysis of norwegian foreign policy (leira et al., 2007, p. 8). in a norwegian context, this view of foreign policy seems to be a useful one for several reasons, which i will come back to in the course of this discussion. according to tvedt (2007), discourse analysis is useful when it comes to the norwegian ‘southern political system’, the national 'do-gooder regime’ and the framing of the norwegian strategic communicative regime towards the world and itself. in his view, norway attaches her state branding to development and peace policies in the global arena, and this policy field has also served as an important reservoir for national identity production. in his argument about the exercise of soft human rights education review – volume 2(1) 12 power, nye (2004) uses norway as an example of a state that enjoys more political influence internationally than its military and economic weight because it defines its national interest to include legitimate or (morally) attractive causes such as economic aid or peacemaking. the peacemaker image identifies norway with values shared by other nations, resulting in access to negotiating tables in other, more vital, arenas in world politics (ibid, p. 10) – a soft power approach. de carvalho and lie (2015) conclude that the image of a ‘humanitarian superpower’ through a policy of involvement has contributed to making norway more visible to great powers and has clearly brought status rewards. baehr and castermans-holleman (2004) find in studies of selected countries (for instance the netherlands and norway) that governments of some small states use human rights both as a tool and as an objective of foreign policy. hence, there are both external and internal motives for constructing a national identity based on the image of a ‘humanitarian superpower’. 2 nonetheless, the construction of this identity cannot be effective or flourish within a society without some kind of consensus, which needs to be based not only within the political system, but in the population as well. the building of self-image and identity needs to be carried out through ongoing processes of production, reproduction and manifestations that constitute and reaffirm the core elements of the framework on which a given national identity is developed. following this, state branding and public diplomacy to establish a good, positive reputation abroad need credibility. this factor is illustrated by former state secretary in the ministry of foreign affairs, thoril widvey, in a speech on norwegian public diplomacy in ottawa in 2003, where she emphasised that: ‘in order to create an image of a genuine and trustworthy nation we have to practice what we preach. moreover, the messages we project to the world must reflect the way our citizens view themselves (…)’ (widvey, 2003). this credibility depends on the compatibility between image-building and political action and between the content of image-building and the national identity. this is similar to what johnston (1999) refers to as a balance of internal and external legitimation. if norway aims to establish an international image based on high moral standards, advocating peace, democratic rule and human rights, then this is necessarily conditioned by some degree of consensus in the general public. following this logic, the role of the education system seems to be significant in order to influence people’s norms, values and attitudes and to establish a common national identity. consequently, considering the constituting elements of national identity and image-building that are emphasised here, education for democratic citizenship and hre are subjects of high relevance to this discussion. if we go further and take into account public documents related to hre in norway, i will argue that there are recognisable elements that suggest hre has a role to play in constructing and confirming a modern national identity, as well as being a component of public diplomacy. constituting hre in educational documents and reports in norway this section will illustrate how hre is integrated in the construction of national identity and as a component of public diplomacy through its presence in a sample of policy documents. these are white paper no. 21, the core curriculum (1993) and the purpose clause of the educational act (2010), as well as extracts from norwegian reports to international organisations on the topic (council of europe, united nations, united nations educational, scientific and cultural organization, unesco). a k. vesterdal 13 starting point here is the norwegian human rights act of 1999, which aimed to strengthen the status of human rights in norwegian jurisdiction. this legislation was followed by government white paper no. 21, 1999–2000, a plan of action for human rights called focus on human dignity. this included a general plan to ‘provide information, instruction and education with a view to protecting and promoting human rights in norway’ (norwegian ministry of foreign affairs, 1999, p. 243). it further states that ‘the government regards information, instruction and education as important tools to protect and promote human rights in norway’ (ibid, p. 245). here the policymakers acknowledge the importance of hre as a tool for strengthening human rights culture in the country and the school system, as well as establishing a field of research. it states: ‘in the years to come, therefore, the government will seek to strengthen training in the field of human rights in public educational institutions at all levels, and will intensify research on human rights in norway’ (ibid). however, in a review prior to the action plan that evaluated how knowledge of human rights was disseminated in the educational system at that time (1999), the government claimed that ‘the human rights aspect appears to be safeguarded satisfactorily in legislation and regulations in the field of education’(ibid, p. 244). this reaffirms the national (self) image of a promoter of human rights, even before the plan was implemented. the first argument to justify hre is that norway is obliged under international law to do so; through the ratifying of human rights conventions she is obliged to promote knowledge and awareness through education and information. following the theoretical framework of this article, this is in line with the ambition of the state to be a promoter of international law, which respects universal human rights and works for their protection. this interest-based policy can also be interpreted as a part of international image-building, based on nye’s concept of soft power, alongside the identity-constructing aspect of following international obligations. this is in addition to the more normative dimension of respecting international human rights norms because doing so leads to peace, tolerance and a political culture that facilitates democratic rule. presenting the reasons for why norway needs a plan of action for human rights in general, we may also recognise this topic as a way of drawing the line between the secure and the insecure, the we and the other in identity construction processes, and confirming the image of norway as a ‘frontrunner’: the major challenges in the field of human rights are to be found in the international arena, where human rights situations may be far more complicated and serious than is the case in norway. the poverty problem is a key factor and is compounded by violent conflicts. very often, human rights violations are large-scale and extremely grave (…) norway is one of the first countries in the western world to present a separate national plan of action to promote human rights. the government has reported on its efforts to draw up the plan in international fora, and the response has been favourable. the government hopes that the process behind this plan and the lessons that can be learned from the process will provide inspiration and assistance in efforts to draw up similar plans of action in other countries. (norwegian ministry of foreign affairs, 1999, p. 2–4) human rights education review – volume 2(1) 14 although it is recognised that human rights violations occur in norway too, the message is that human rights are basically a problem outside norwegian borders, where the violations are large-scale and extremely grave, similar to what okafor and agbakwa (2001) describe as the ‘heaven-and-hell binary’ in international hre practice. the dichotomisation constituting the human rights ‘heaven’ of the west and the human rights ‘hell’ of the third world (okafor and agbakwa, 2001) reproduces stereotypes and moral superiority, while working effectively to produce images of a human rights-friendly nation. the insecure conditions outside the borders are contrasted to the harmonious nature of norwegian society, which aims to serve as a role model for other countries that have not reached ‘our’ level. hence, the document also constructs a sense of moral superiority that has both domestic and state branding functions. this superiority shares some common elements with orientalism, where said (1978) describes western stereotypical conceptions that over centuries have been established about people and cultures in ‘the orient’. the western world represents rational, developed, tolerant and harmonious individuals, while the people of the east (and south) are the opposite: irrational, superstitious, primitive, chaotic and intolerant. if the action plan is a relevant starting point for legitimating an explicit hre agenda in norway, the education act and the curricula are the policy tools for implementing it in the educational system. the purpose clause of the education act stresses that education is to be based on values rooted in human rights. its position, however, is shared with other sources of fundamental values: education and training shall be based on fundamental values in christian and humanist heritage and traditions, such as respect for human dignity and nature, on intellectual freedom, charity, forgiveness, equality and solidarity, values that also appear in different religions and beliefs and are rooted in human rights. (education act, 2010, sec.1-1) the preferred values in this passage are connected to norway’s christian and humanist heritage and tradition, while acknowledging that they are present in different religions and beliefs. these can be seen in the light of the first sentence of the purpose clause, which states that education and training shall ‘(…) open doors to the world and give the pupils and apprentices historical and cultural insight and anchorage’ (ibid.). this balance between focusing on the national heritage and, at the same time, opening doors to the world is repeated in section 1-1, which calls for a ‘cosmonational’ view where citizens’ fundamental values should be both anchored in national identity and have a global outlook, as a hybrid of cosmopolitan citizenship (osler & starkey, 2005) and national citizenship. the balancing act continues through the next passage where education is to help increase ‘the knowledge and understanding of the national cultural heritage and our common international cultural traditions’ and further ‘provide insight into cultural diversity and show respect for the individual’s convictions’ and simultaneously ‘promote democracy, equality and scientific thinking’ (education act, 2010, sec.1-1). these different statements point towards an implicit ambition – that of developing social cohesion and avoiding social unrest and division in what educational authorities describe as a k. vesterdal 15 heterogeneous society (norwegian ministry of education and research, 2007, p. 45– 48). in the core curriculum document3, which is part of the quality framework of the school system, it is stated that human rights are part of the fundamental values of the school system because these are part of norwegian traditions: ‘our christian and humanistic tradition places equality, human rights and rationality at the fore’ (norwegian ministry of education and research, 1993, p. 7). the statements in this part of the curriculum seem to establish and constitute human rights and democracy as part of a unique ‘norwegianness’, a cultural heritage that is a foundation of norwegian national identity. it is important to uphold this heritage and educate future generations to be a part of it. although there is explicit reference to the term ‘human rights’, this document basically expresses it through a value-based approach. this is a common element of the white paper, the educational act and the core curriculum – human rights are basically understood as a set of universal values at the cost of other dimensions, such as juridical, critical and political ones. there is some congruency in the belief in human rights as a set of values – sacralisation – rather than political tools and legal mechanisms to empower individuals against violations (vesterdal, 2016). human rights are obviously rooted in values, but are at the same time something different; rights claims can be asserted in both national and international courts of justice, whereas values cannot. in addition to values and the philosophical groundwork, the political and juridical dimension of rights makes the concept more than a rhetorical and non-obligatory normative statement it also provides tools for participation through different channels of political influence (donnelly, 1999; landman, 2005; risse, roppe & sikkink, 1999). additionally, it represents rules, legal tools that regulate the relation between the individual and the state, protecting the individual from state violations (andenæs & bjørge, 2012; høstmælingen, 2007). norway has also signed and supported the main international agreements and standards concerning hre. in light of these, i will illustrate how norwegian authorities describe and constitute the status of hre in their reports to the international institutions monitoring these processes. the reports aim to describe the current situation concerning how and to what degree hre is implemented, and possible challenges related to the implementation of the subject in the country. following the council of europe’s adoption of the edc (education for democratic citizenship)/hre charter in 2010, a questionnaire on the implementation of the charter was conducted in 2012 to collect information on what was happening in the signatory states. commenting to the council of europe on the extent to which these topics are included, the norwegian authorities argue that edc/hre is to a large degree implemented in the core curriculum and in subject curricula. moreover, the respondents argue: iccs also indicates that norwegian pupils as competent in knowledge about edc/hre, for edc/hre and in willingness to put edc/hre into practice. the core curriculum and the quality framework instructs teachers and leaders to promote human equality and equal rights, intellectual freedom, democracy and tolerance. (norwegian directorate for education and training, 2012, p. 6) human rights education review – volume 2(1) 16 concerning the question of whether concrete measures/activities have been taken to promote implementation of the charter in the country, the answer is negative, since ‘the measures in the charter are already a part of norwegian education policy in this area. it has therefore not been necessary with specific activities to promote the implementation of the charter’ (ibid: 8). a similar response can be found in the norwegian report to unesco’s recommendation of 1974 on education for international understanding, cooperation and peace and education relating to human rights and fundamental freedoms. commenting on the implementation of the recommendation, the report says that a strategy related specifically to the recommendation has not been developed, and that ‘no decision has been taken on the national implementation of the world programme for human rights education (wphre)’ (norwegian ministry of education and research, 2009, p. 6). it further argues that: ‘norwegian policy and activities generally have been developed independently of the wphre. the main reason for this is that themes and activities embedded in the programme are perceived to be well integrated into the norwegian education system’ (ibid). the norwegian ministry of education and research, in its responses concerning the questionnaire for governments’ unesco evaluation of the first phase of the world programme for human rights education, also stresses that the human rights aspects are satisfactorily safeguarded in the field of education. thus, international statements by the representatives of the ministry of foreign affairs and the reports to intergovernmental organisations (igos) concerning hre illustrate the international branding of norway as a human rights champion, also in the educational field. conclusion: hre as a component of national identity construction and foreign policy this article has explored and discussed possible relations between national identity, foreign policy and hre in norway. the different policy documents, reports, statements and steering documents give an overview of how human rights and hre are constituted in norwegian policy in light of the research questions raised, while a more comprehensive overview of the role of hre in norway through its practice, approaches and implementation is discussed elsewhere4. the statements from the norwegian reports to intergovernmental organisations on the status of hre indicate that the authorities find the implementation of hre satisfactory and well integrated in the educational system, confirming the image of a state dedicated to human rights. here the message to the international society is that hre is sufficiently implemented. the study of relevant theoretical contributions, policy documents and reports contributes to the depiction of hre as both a component of norwegian national identity construction and an element of state branding in the international arena. nonetheless, in spite of states promoting and adopting the rhetoric of such education, several european countries face common challenges on the practice level, and it is not carved in stone that hre is sufficiently implemented. these common challenges are particularly visible in terms of sporadic and implicit hre, as part of a civic education that basically focuses on voter education and there is a compliance with the nation-state and its political institutions at the expense of a holistic approach to hre (decara, 2013; mahler, mihr & toivanen, 2009; matilainen & kallioniemi, 2012; mejias, 2017; osler & starkey, 2010; toivanen, 2009). additionally, the focus on citizens’ rights rather than human rights seems to be an k. vesterdal 17 obstacle in several countries where different minorities are excluded from human rights narratives, or diversity is regarded as an obstacle to rather than a part of the democratic process. these approaches also tend to be disciplining rather than empowering (mahler, mihr & toivanen, 2009: osler, 2009; toivanen, 2007; vesterdal, 2016). studies by vesterdal (2016) and lile (2011) point towards challenges to the implementation of hre in norway that are similar to those in the international context. moreover, vesterdal’s study (2016) shows that although there is a consensus on its importance among norwegian teachers, hre tends to be conceptualized as learning about violations of human rights outside national borders, as a self-evident imperative and as a set of values rather than learning for human rights. hence, the role of hre in national identity construction and foreign policy also raises questions about the substance of the topic in norwegian schools. research on norwegian hre seems to reveal a gap between rhetoric and practice, between (self)-image, the political will to implement comprehensive hre, and its purposes (committee on the rights of the child, 2005, 2010; lile, 2011; vesterdal, 2016). if this gap is to be closed, human rights principles and mechanisms need to be clarified more explicitly to reduce the possibility of defining human rights along non-critical, complacent and national lines, which is counterproductive to the purpose of hre. the new core curriculum that will come into effect around 2020 signals that human rights are still basic principles of education. additionally, the government recommends giving priority to three interdisciplinary topics when renewing the school subjects: democracy and citizenship, sustainable development, and public health and wellbeing (norwegian ministry of education and research, 2016). these topics are closely related to human rights, and could represent a more comprehensive implementation of hre. however, it remains to be seen if human rights are addressed sufficiently in the renewal of the curricula and in practice, or if the interdisciplinary topics are ornamentations of a school system prioritising other basic skills more ‘suitable’ to developing human capital for economic growth and global competitiveness. in light of this scenario, there is a need for holistic, explicit, empowering and critical approaches to hre in norway as well as in other states promoting human rights. human rights education review – volume 2(1) 18 notes 1 democratic deficit here refers to supranational institutions like the eu, whose decision-making procedures suffer from a lack of democracy and seem inaccessible to the ordinary citizen due to their complexity. kerr (2008, p. 167) points out that such deficits produce concern about a weakening of political and civic engagement in europe. 2 a concept related to a report by leonard & small (2003) (requested by the norwegian ministry of foreign affairs) on the significance of norwegian public diplomacy: ‘norway might only be 115th in the world in terms of its size, but it is leading the world as a humanitarian power – outperforming all other countries in terms of its contributions to aid, its role in peace-keeping and peace processes and its commitment to developing new kinds of global governance’ 3 the revised overarching/core curriculum ratified in the parliament in 2017 will take effect in connection with a renewal of the school subjects (https://www.regjeringen.no/no/aktuelt/skolensnye-grunnlov-er-fastsett/id2569170/). 4 see vesterdal (2016). https://www.regjeringen.no/no/aktuelt/skolens-nye-grunnlov-er-fastsett/id2569170/ https://www.regjeringen.no/no/aktuelt/skolens-nye-grunnlov-er-fastsett/id2569170/ k. vesterdal 19 references alfredsson, g. 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(2002). understanding what we do: emerging models for human rights education. international review of education, 48(3–4): 159–171. https://doi.org/10.1023/a:1020338300881 toivanen, r. (2007). education on human rights – a method for inducing global critical thinking. in kaivola, t. and melén–paaso, m. (eds.), education for global responsibility–finnish perspectives. publications of the ministry of education: 13. helsinki: helsinki university press, pp. 33-44. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0922156501000280 http://hdl.voced.edu.au/10707/182913 https://doi.org/10.1080/03054985.2014.946896 https://doi.org/10.1080/0013191032000118901 https://doi.org/10.1080/00131911.2018.1388616 https://doi.org/10.1086/508638 https://doi.org/10.1023/a:1020338300881 human rights education review – volume 2(1) 24 toivanen, r. (2009). the politics of terminology: human rights education vs. civic education. international journal for education law and policy, 5(1–2), 37– 44. tvedt, t. (2003). utviklingshjelp, utenrikspolitikk og makt: den norske modellen [development aid, foreign policy and power: the norwegian model]. oslo: gyldendal akademisk forlag. tvedt, t. (2007). international development aid and its impact on a donor country: a case study of norway. the european journal of development research, 19, 614–635. https://doi.org/10.1080/09578810701667672 vesterdal, k. (2016). the roles of human rights education in norway. a qualitative study of purposes and approaches in policy and in upper secondary schools. (ph.d. dissertation, norwegian university of science and technology) trondheim: ntnu. widvey, t. (2003). public diplomacy (speech to the norwegian-american chamber of commerce, ottawa 7 nov 2003). retrieved from https://www.regjeringen.no/no/aktuelt/public_diplomacy/id267536/ wojciuk, a., michaleg, m. & stormowska, m. (2015). education as a source and tool of soft power in international relations. european political science, 14(3): 298–317. https://doi.org/10.1057/eps.2015.25 all web addresses are controlled as valid by january 30, 2019. https://doi.org/10.1080/09578810701667672 https://www.regjeringen.no/no/aktuelt/public_diplomacy/id267536/ https://doi.org/10.1057/eps.2015.25 championing human rights close to home and far away: human rights education in the light of national identity construction and foreign policy in norway introduction studies of the norwegian context national identity construction and foreign policy hre as a component of foreign policy and national identity construction in norway constituting hre in educational documents and reports in norway conclusion: hre as a component of national identity construction and foreign policy notes references a fruitful banyan tree of peace and human rights issn: 2535-5406 http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4766 date of publication 07-09-2022 © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org book and media reviews a fruitful banyan tree of peace and human rights hantzopoulos, m. & bajaj, m. (2021). educating for peace and human rights: an introduction. london: bloomsbury publishing. 440pp., £24.29 (paperback) 978-1-3501-2971-9; £19.43 (ebook) isbn: 978-1-3501-29719. reviewed by nomisha kurian university of cambridge, uk, nck28@cam.ac.uk educating for peace and human rights: an introduction represents another rich and complex work by renowned peace educators maria hantzopoulous and monisha bajaj. in this book, monisha and maria draw on their wealth of academic and practitioner experience to draw transdisciplinary connections between human rights education and peace education. their work provides a thoughtful and concise overview of both fields, flagging their differences and similarities as well as evolutions and contestations across the past few decades. it is thus a valuable text for scholars, practitioners and educators at all stages of their journey in peace education, human rights education, and related fields. the book is divided into six chapters. chapter 1 traces the origin and evolution of peace education, shining a light on pressing debates in the field. chapter 2 animates the theories introduced in the previous chapter with two formal and non-formal examples of peace education in the united states. chapter 3 turns to human rights education, charting the development of the field. chapter 4 draws on two case studies of transformative human rights education from india and bangladesh. bridge-building begins in chapter 5. this chapter charts the goals and approaches that both fields have in common and also discusses the concepts of dignity, agency and liberatory education. lastly, chapter 6 presents a dialogue between the http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4766 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ hrer book and media reviews 2 advisory board members of this bloomsbury book series. this conversational format illustrates key debates, reflections, and guidance for researchers, practitioners and students. the book also includes an extensive annotated bibliography of important literature in both peace education and human rights education. a major strength of the work is its close attention to the lived experience of students and communities engaging with peace and human rights education. the book’s theoretical rigour is enhanced by a range of case studies showcasing practical examples of teaching and learning across diverse cultural contexts. this animation of theory helps make the work useful and accessible to academic and practitioner audiences alike. moreover, the carefully contextualised explorations of critical consciousness help fulfil monisha’s own call for ‘renewed attention to larger structural realities, particularly in the global south’ (bajaj, 2008, p. 138). an ever-growing number of peace educators stress the importance of nuanced understandings of local contexts (salomon & nevo, 2002; wessells, 2012; zembylas & bekerman, 2013). sensitivity to the lived experiences of peace praxis has been deemed ‘absolutely imperative’ (call-cummings & hook 2015, p. 106). maria and monisha therefore make a significant contribution towards pushing both peace and human rights education to ‘re-engage intimately with structural analysis’ (kester & cremin 2017, 1418). notably, they accomplish this criticality while still centering the voices of students, teachers and families. another strength of the work is its creative distillation of complex conceptualisations. for example, the authors visualise a peace and human rights education ‘possibility tree’ which suggests how the two fields ‘interlock foundationally despite their distinct characteristics’ (hantzopoulos & bajaj, 2021, p. 10). in doing so, they build on paulo freire’s ‘problem tree’ (a visual conceptualisation of systemic oppression) and explore how ‘dignity’ and ‘transformative agency’ can conceptually ‘provide some of the nourishing soil to the intertwined roots’ of peace and human rights education (p. 115). they also provide a visual of a banyan tree with ever-expanding roots (p. 97) to show the emergent and process-driven nature of the two fields. the tree takes on symbolic life as ‘the pedagogy of peace and human rights education in action, both in process and as a ‘work-in-progress’ product’ (p. 10). this aligns with a growing number of studies that employ the aesthetics of peace to craft hopeful responses to direct and indirect violence (cremin, 2018; bevington, kurian & cremin, 2019). using ecological metaphors also conveys monisha and maria’s commitment to praxis that is organic, dynamic and sustainable rather than stagnant. their ‘visual catalyst for imagining new worlds and possibilities’ (p. 6) is thus highly effective. the dialogical nature of the final chapter also shows the work ‘walking the talk’ – by adopting a polyvocality that reflects the inclusive aims of peace and human rights education. in a time when academics are increasingly cognisant of the need for accessible and engaging research, creative and personal approaches to writing and thinking about peace and justice are hrer book and media reviews 3 flourishing (e.g., cremin et al, 2021; cremin, 2018). maria and monisha’s choice to foreground personal communication with other scholars in their closing chapter is thus admirable. the reader interacts with leading voices such as nancy flowers, asha hans, michalinos zembylas, and margo okazawa-rey, thereby benefiting from monisha and maria’s generosity of spirit in a way that seems fitting for peace and human rights scholarship. their choice may encourage scholars who are interested in departing from the solipsistic conventions of academic writing and adopting fresh dialogical approaches. if one could ask for additions to this rich text, then attention to peace educators’ own welfare might be a worthwhile extension of the banyan tree. it is understandable for an introductory text to centre around students and young people as the intended beneficiaries of peace and human rights education. there is increasing recognition, however, that educational innovations cannot achieve their intended effects without attention to educators’ own struggles. a rising body of literature explores the vulnerability of peace educators as imperfect human beings who face their own psychic turmoil in unequal and conflict-ridden societies (cremin & kester, 2017; kurian & kester, 2019). for example, kurian’s (2020) case study of indian teachers’ ‘everyday tensions and frustrations’ suggests that ‘moments of seeming failure might yield fresh understandings of sociocultural complexities’ and reveals how peace educators struggle with the same social and structural barriers that hinder their students (p. 187). moreover, the stories of southern peace educators show that teachers carrying marginalised identities may battle the same oppression that their pedagogy tries to challenge (kurian & kester, 2019). such struggles affect the sustainability of peace and human rights praxis. if the ‘lifeblood’ of educators goes unnurtured that is, if they cannot feel safe, be well, or ‘ask for help and support without fear of judgement’ then initiative for societal change may feel ‘hollow and ineffective’ (culshaw & kurian, 2021, p. 14). perhaps future work could depict educator wellbeing as core to sustainable peace and human rights education. overall, educating for peace and human rights: an introduction is an exceptional text from two luminaries of the field who skilfully synthesise and integrate two distinct yet interconnected fields. in building bridges and signposting new paths, it promises to serve as a valuable foundation for academics, students, school-based educators and practitioners across a range of fields directly, or indirectly, related to peace and human rights. references bevington, t., kurian, n., & cremin, h. (2019). peace education and citizenship education: shared critiques. in peterson, a., stahl, g. & soong, h. (eds.), palgrave handbook of citizenship and education. cham, switzerland: palgrave macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-67905-1_51-1 https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-67905-1_51-1 hrer book and media reviews 4 call-cummings, m. & m. r. hook. (2015). endorsing empowerment? a critical comparative study of peace education in jamaica and peru. journal of peace education, 12(1), 92108. https://doi.org/10.1080/17400201.2014.970616 cremin, h., aryoubi, h., hajir, b., kurian, n., & salem, h. (2021). post‐abyssal ethics in education research in settings of conflict and crisis: stories from the field. british educational research journal, 47(4), 1102-1119. https://doi.org/10.1002/berj.3712 cremin, h. (2018). an autoethnography of a peace educator: deepening reflections on research, practice, and the field. emotion, space and society, 28, 1–8. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.emospa.2018.05.001 cremin, h. & kester, k. (2017). “bare-foot hope for peace: vulnerability in peace learning.” in mckenna, m. & brantmeier, e. (eds.), the pedagogy of vulnerability. north carolina: information age publishing. culshaw, s. & kurian, n. (2021). love as the lifeblood of being-well: a call to care for teachers in england’s schools. journal of pastoral care in education, 39(3), 269-290. https://doi.org/10.1080/02643944.2021.1938647 kurian, n. (2020) ‘kindness isn’t important, we need to be scared’: disruptions to the praxis of peace education in an indian school. journal of peace education, 17(2), 1-22. https://doi.org/10.1080/17400201.2020.1728237 kurian, n. & kester, k. (2019). southern voices in peace education: interrogating race, marginalisation and cultural violence in the field. journal of peace education, 16(1), 128. https://doi.org/10.1080/17400201.2018.1546677 salomon, g., & nevo, b. (eds.) (2002). peace education: the concepts, principles, and practices around the world. mahwah, nj: lawrence erlbaum associates. wessells, m. (2012). cosmology, context, and peace education: a view from war zones. in p. trifonas and b. wright (eds.), critical peace education: difficult dialogues (pp. 89– 99). berlin: springer science & business media. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-4813945-3_6 zembylas, m. & z. bekerman (2013). peace education in the present: dismantling and reconstructing some fundamental theoretical premises. journal of peace education, 10(2), 197–214. https://doi.org/10.1080/17400201.2013.790253 https://doi.org/10.1080/17400201.2014.970616 https://doi.org/10.1002/berj.3712 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.emospa.2018.05.001 https://doi.org/10.1080/02643944.2021.1938647 https://doi.org/10.1080/17400201.2020.1728237 https://doi.org/10.1080/17400201.2018.1546677 https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-3945-3_6 https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-3945-3_6 https://doi.org/10.1080/17400201.2013.790253 a fruitful banyan tree of peace and human rights references volume 4, no 1 (2021) date received: 25-09-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4010 date accepted: 08-02-2021 issn 2535-5406 child migrants’ right to education in a london academy: tensions between policy, language provision, and international standards vanessa hughes london school of economics, uk. abstract: as a signatory to the un convention on the rights of the child, enshrined in national legislation, all children in the uk have the right to education. in the everyday life of schools, this human rights framework must often be balanced with other policies, such as immigration and securitisation ones. teachers are expected to police membership boundaries and keep their students under surveillance, while delivering results in compliance with audits and league tables. based on a thematic analysis of an ethnographic study of an english as an additional language (eal) classroom in a diverse london academy, this paper argues that recently-arrived migrant students and their teachers often find themselves at the intersection of contradictory policy agendas that rarely consider the needs of the children themselves. analysing how national and international policy discourses play out in the classroom, i argue that there is a mismatch between different policy areas, and between policy expectations and everyday practice. keywords: migration, education policy, everyday life, uk, english as an additional language (eal), right to education, convention on the rights of the child. vanessa hughes: v.hughes@lse.ac.uk mailto:v.hughes@lse.ac.uk v. hughes 71 child migrants’ right to education in a london academy: tensions between policy, language provision, and international standards doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4010 issn 2535-5406 vanessa hughes v.hughes@lse.ac.uk london school of economics, uk. abstract: as a signatory to the un convention on the rights of the child, enshrined in national legislation, all children in the uk have the right to education. in the everyday life of schools, this human rights framework must often be balanced with other policies, such as immigration and securitisation ones. teachers are expected to police membership boundaries and keep their students under surveillance, while delivering results in compliance with audits and league tables. based on a thematic analysis of an ethnographic study of an english as an additional language (eal) classroom in a diverse london academy, this paper argues that recently-arrived migrant students and their teachers often find themselves at the intersection of contradictory policy agendas that rarely consider the needs of the children themselves. analysing how national and international policy discourses play out in the classroom, i argue that there is a mismatch between different policy areas, and between policy expectations and everyday practice. keywords: migration, education policy, everyday life, uk, english as an additional language (eal), right to education, convention on the rights of the child. introduction according to national and international legislation, every child in the uk of compulsory school age has the right to education. however, for some children this right is complicated in practice by immigration, security, and anti-terrorism policies. this article, which examines the impact of these often contradictory policy areas on teachers and students in an english as an additional language (eal) classroom, is a contribution to the literature on migration and education (pinson, arnot & candappa, 2010). in the uk, ‘english as an additional language’ (eal) refers to learning english in addition to the learner’s first language or languages, and learning english in an english-speaking environment such as a school. eal can be used interchangeably with ‘english as a second language’ (esl), although eal is often preferred as it acknowledges that students might speak several other languages. in the uk, ‘english to speakers of other languages’ (esol) is usually used to describe adult learning of english as an additional language. there is no central policy or guidance in the uk for how eal needs should be addressed in uk schools and as a result there is significant variation between schools’ practices (arnot & pinson, 2005; d’angelo, sales, rodriguez & ryan, 2008; pinson et al., 2010). options include withdrawal programmes for such students, supporting them in mainstream classes, additional language classes, or no extra provision at all. mailto:v.hughes@lse.ac.uk human rights education review – vol 4(1) 72 eal learners therefore find themselves between contradictory policy areas. education and child-centred policies aim at an inclusive approach towards all students in a classroom regardless of where they come from, while immigration and anti-terrorism policies encourage exclusionary practices and suspicion towards students from certain backgrounds. most noteworthy are policy agendas such as ‘fundamental british values’ and ‘prevent’, which expect teachers to police the boundaries of the ‘community of values’ or nation (anderson, 2013; lander, 2016; pinson et al., 2010). the prevent duty was introduced in the uk as part of the counter-terrorism and security act 2015; it specifies that certain authorities, including schools, have ‘due regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism.’ based on ethnographic research in an eal classroom in a diverse school in london, i analyse how these policy agendas play out in the classroom. how are they interpreted and understood by teachers and students? how do they impact dynamics between teachers and students, and how do they affect the education delivered? the field of sociological knowledge of the education of refugee and migrant children is no longer the wasteland described by pinson and arnot in 2007, thanks in part to their own contributions, such as education, asylum, and the ‘non-citizen’ child (pinson et al., 2010). however, significant gaps remain. one challenge, as they argue in their 2020 review paper, is ‘to rethink the role of schooling in increasingly unstable and increasingly hostile, often racialised political environments’ (pinson & arnot, 2020, p. 839). part of this work is to investigate how educational institutions and classrooms are shaped and influenced by such broader, hostile and racialised policy agendas and societal discourses. this article contributes to the literature by examining how this societal ‘state thought’ (sayad, 2004) plays out in the microcosm of one school’s eal classroom. through in-depth exploration, the article argues that the responsibilities and expectations placed on students and teachers caused by a complex policy environment for migrant and refugee schoolchildren are at odds with their educational needs. these needs, as jill rutter argues, ‘[have] complex causes that are often related to their different pre-migration and post-migration experiences’ (2006, p. 4). while educational audits and league tables expect teachers and students to deliver measurable attainment results, refugee and migrant students are more concerned with learning english, knowing how to navigate the school and its rules, processing recent experiences, and feeling safe. teachers in the eal classroom become caught between providing a safe space for their students and complying with policies that focus on attainment and surveillance. there is then a significant mismatch between three factors: the expectations of a metric-driven education system; what teachers feel they want and should deliver for these young migrants; and what the young recently-arrived migrants need. the article is divided into four sections. the first section examines the theoretical and policy context of the right to education and other competing policy areas, and is followed by a discussion of methods. the third section examines the needs of migrant and refugee children in the eal classroom. the final section considers the impossible task teachers face in addressing their students’ needs while also maintaining their professional responsibilities and duties. immigration and the right to education in the uk all children in the uk have the right to access education regardless of their background or immigration status, as per the education act 1996 and the education v. hughes 73 and inspections act 2006 (spencer & hughes, 2015). although this right can be interpreted as an implicit right for some migrant groups, such as migrants who do not have legal residence status, the national subject association for eal, naldic, maintains it exists irrespective of immigration status. in their 2012 briefing they point out: ‘local authorities have a legal duty to ensure that education is available for all children of compulsory school age… this duty applies irrespective of a child’s immigration status, country of origin or rights of residence in a particular area’ (naldic 2012). beyond national legislation, the uk has international legal obligations through being a signatory to the un convention on the rights of the child (crc) and the european convention on human rights, enforceable in the uk through the 1996 human rights act (1998) (protocol 1, article 2). the crc specifies the right to education in article 28 and guarantees non-discrimination in education. however, as osler has discussed, in order for children and young people to effectively access their right to education in practice, its implementation needs to be considered in its specific context and often requires broader changes (osler, 2016, p.18). to think through how ‘abstract provision of international human rights’ can be interpreted for ‘real-life issues’, former special rapporteur on the right to education katarina tomaševski developed the ‘4-a scheme’ of availability, accessibility, acceptability, and adaptability (2001, p. 14). under adaptability, tomaševski specifies the needs of child migrants and refugee children; she states that schools and educational establishments should adapt to these special needs if these children’s right to education is to be fully met. however, in the uk migrant children stand at the intersection of often contradictory policy areas, namely education and children’s rights on the one hand, and immigration policies on the other (sigona & hughes, 2012). while education and children’s rights policies adopt an approach to include all children in the right to education, immigration policies restrict migrants’ access to the welfare state, including education (oliver & hughes, 2018; sainsbury, 2012). although restricting children’s education on the grounds of their immigration status would contradict the uk’s international and national commitments to the right to education for all children, recent governments have tried to introduce such policies. in the summer of 2015, the home office proposed introducing immigration checks in schools (watts, 2016), with the intention to ‘deprioritise children of illegal immigrants’ (kuenssberg, 2016). this initiative was dropped after media reports and a public outcry. in september 2016, the uk government tried a different tactic by introducing a requirement that primary, middle, secondary schools and colleges collect country-of-birth and nationality information for children aged between 5 and 19 as part of the school census. although this was not a requirement to collect immigration status data, the initiative was linked to the ‘hostile environment’ immigration policy introduced by then home secretary theresa may in 2012 (goodfellow, 2019), and resulted in information being passed from the department for education to the home office which could be used for immigration enforcement (weale, 2019). this requirement is a further indication of the direction of travel, with increased surveillance information being collected on students. the policy was strongly resisted by schools, teachers’ unions, migrants’ rights organisations and human rights education review – vol 4(1) 74 other actors, such as the schools abc campaign; they all argued that schools should be safe spaces for children, and teachers and school staff should not be implicated in immigration enforcement. after a persistent campaign and a complaint against the collection of such data in schools, this controversial requirement was removed in april 2018 (whittaker, 2018). increasing expectations on teachers to carry out surveillance work, and the closer working relationships between schools, the police and the home office, also contribute to a hostile school environment for migrant children. the introduction of the prevent duty in 2015 placed teachers, like many other public sector workers, under a legal duty to adopt ‘due regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism’ (home office, 2019:1). this demand, which also requires teachers to watch out for violent and non-violent extremism, implicates them in the state’s counter-terrorism surveillance strategy. as panjwani, revell, gholami, and diboll argue, prevent has ‘effectively placed a duty of care on all practicing educationalists…to act as the eyes and ears of the home office and other governmental agencies’ (2017, p. 6). this duty is part of the broader counterterrorism policies of the counter-terrorism and security act 2015. in schools the policy is usually implemented by appointing a prevent officer and by compulsory staff training to detect students ‘at risk of radicalisation’. the training focuses on spotting ‘unusual behaviour’ among students and emphasises that young people who have low confidence and self-esteem, are isolated, lack friends, do not feel like they belong or have difficult home lives are especially vulnerable to being radicalised. as liberatore points out, such criteria are problematic, because ‘many of the identified “behaviours” are normal for many young people and do not constitute unlawful activities’ (2017, p. 248). given the policy’s focus on prevention, students are suspects before they have committed any unlawful actions or engaged in criminal behaviour. prevent has also individualised behaviour and assumes certain people are more likely to engage in terrorism than others, ignoring broader societal problems or underlying structural inequalities. concerns such as the alienation of muslims or a lack of future employment prospects are dismissed (liberatore, 2017). in schools prevent has led to increased discrimination against muslims, who are being disproportionately reported under the strategy (home office, 2017, 2018; versi, 2017). in 2016/17, 61% of individuals were ‘referred for concerns related to islamist extremism’ (home office, 2018, p. 4). figures for the same year show that 81% of reported cases referred via prevent were dismissed (home office, 2018, p. 4). given the absence of a typical single risk profile that leads individuals to become terrorists, teachers are told to follow their ‘gut feeling’. however, such ‘gut feelings’ are often ‘predicated upon racialised biases’ and ‘produced through racialised understandings of risk and vulnerability’ (fernandez, walker & younis, 2018). as awan has argued, rather than ‘prevent[ing] extremism [it] risks labelling the muslim community as “suspect”’ (2012, p. 1158) and contributes to a ‘politics of unease’ about british muslims, who are ambiguously viewed as a threat to societal security in the post-9/11 securitisation agenda (archer, 2009). the prevent duty is closely related to the ‘british values’ agenda, as counterterrorism policy defines extremism as being against fundamental british values. as liberatore points out, ‘under prevent, british values have become juxtaposed with “extremist ideology”’ (2017, p. 252). this development came in the wake of a backlash against multiculturalism; to the then prime minister, david cameron, the solution lay in a stronger national identity and the redefining of britishness. in this v. hughes 75 context, immigrants are welcome only if they comply with ‘british values’. this follows a longer history of racial exclusion of black britons from the british nation despite their british citizenship, as gilroy argued in the 1980s, and where the british nation remains imagined largely as white (2002; see also anderson, 2013; sharma, 2015). bhabha’s research has further shown how migrant students are othered and marginalised in schools through nationalist and postcolonial hierarchies (2004). the power and processes of racist social and hierarchical ordering continues to be reconstituted (hall, 2017) and, over time, these racial exclusions from britishness have been extended to include eastern europeans and muslims (de noronha, 2017). in the recent iteration of such hierarchies, in the context of islamophobia and the ‘war on terror’, religion has become a key identity marker, and this presents specific challenges for young muslims in schools (arnot, schneider & welply, 2013, p. 573). as pinson et al., have argued, schools play a crucial role in ‘[demarcating] who is allowed to be included in the national constituency’ (2010, p. 206). as part of the prevent duty, teachers have been tasked to teach ‘british values’ in uk schools and, as a result, to inadvertently define the boundaries of britishness. however, ‘british values’ have been criticised for being poorly defined (rights watch, 2016) and vague, mostly referring to universal human rights and democracy. in the home office’s policy document, ‘british values’ are defined as ‘democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty and mutual respect and tolerance of different faiths and beliefs’ (department for education, 2015, p. 5). but, as liberatore asks, ‘how are these values specifically british?’ (2017, p. 251). furthermore, the principles chosen ignore britain’s colonial and racist histories, that directly contradict many of these values. jarvis and lister argue ‘the discussion of “mainstream british values” that runs throughout the new prevent [policy] is both conceptually flawed and potentially dangerous’ (cited in awan, 2012, p. 1169). defining ‘british values’ in opposition to muslim values is problematic in a diverse classroom which includes students from different religious, national, and ethnic backgrounds. in addition to finding themselves in this complex intersection between education, children’s rights, immigration and securitisation, uk schools have to navigate an educational environment that has seen increased marketisation and academisation driven by neoliberal political agendas since the 1980s (kulz, 2017). teachers and schools have been expected to prove their success and progress, and this has led to the introduction of an audit culture of standards, league tables and increased testing; this has often led to a more authoritarian and disciplinarian ethos and style of teaching. the office for standards in education, children’s services and skills (ofsted) regularly inspects schools and assesses their quality. further pressure is added to schools by comparative league tables, requiring them to demonstrate their students have attained minimum standards of literacy and numeracy and satisfactory progress in other subjects. this ‘failure-success binary’ means other measures of good quality teaching become almost irrelevant: the only legitimated metrics are exam results (kulz, 2017, p. 8). schools are also pressured to reduce truancy and school absences, which must be reported to ofsted. sanctions for parents have been increased. they can now be fined, or in extreme cases even prosecuted, if their child does not go to school. methodology researching the lives of children who are globally mobile, subject to state surveillance and have experienced trauma poses methodological and ethical human rights education review – vol 4(1) 76 challenges. in a policy environment designed to be hostile towards migrants in the uk we have to take extra care when researching those exposed to it. the participants in this research might be considered vulnerable—as children and as refugees. the methods were therefore chosen so as not to exacerbate these vulnerabilities, and to work collaboratively with children across language barriers, cultural and religious differences. although the eal pupils were not a homogenous group, the majority spoke arabic, were muslim, came from syria and had held humanitarian status for five years. this contrasted with my privileged position as a white, middle-class woman and british citizen. a qualitative multi-methods approach was therefore adopted to respond to these differences in power and privilege, to offer flexibility in methods (gidley, 2019; jackson, 2010) and to enable an enlarged field of vision (das, 2010). this article draws on data from a doctoral research project that included a one-year ethnographic study of an eal classroom in a secondary school in a highly diverse north-west london borough during the academic year 2016-2017. the school’s students were diverse with respect to ethnic, religious, and immigration background. (ofsted, 2015). according to senior management, approximately 50% of the school’s students are muslim, over 50% are deemed disadvantaged, and more than 80 languages are spoken, with 75% of students in years 7 to 10 speaking languages other than english at home (survey from this research). in the eal classroom, recently-arrived migrant students with no or little english are prepared for mainstream school. in this school, ‘recently-arrived’ students were those who had only been in the school for a few months. this was many children’s first school after arriving in the uk, whereas some had come from other london schools which often did not have eal provision. three teachers worked full-time in the eal department teaching maths, english, religion, ‘british values’, and carrying out autobiographical and identity projects. one teacher provided mainstream class support for students and classes for parents. the teachers, all of whom were female, were a diverse group: from kosovo, romania and britain; muslim and christian; ethnic minority and white. the number of students in the classroom fluctuated between five and twenty with a high turn-over as students arrived throughout the school year and were graduated to mainstream classes as soon as possible. students stayed in the eal classroom for between a month and a year, were in years 7 to 11 (ages 11 to 16) and came from a variety of countries of origin, including afghanistan, brazil, guinea-bissau, iraq, italy, lebanon, nigeria, palestine, poland, romania, somalia, spain, sudan, and syria. as a result, they had a variety of pre-migration experiences and reasons for migrating. for one academic year, i spent two days a week at the school. at the start of my fieldwork, teachers introduced me, and i explained the purpose of my role as a researcher. over time, the boundaries of my role could blur, and students would refer to me as a teacher. i therefore used the opportunity of new students arriving to reexplain my role as a researcher. i also openly carried my notebook around with me and made notes in front of students, as a visual reminder. in addition to my mostly observational role in the eal classroom, i volunteered one hour a week as a mentor with a charity based at the school. i was matched with one student to provide homework help; she had formerly been in the eal classroom and was a syrian refugee. all fieldwork was carried out in english, but in some instances students would help to translate for each other, especially if there were very recently-arrived students. sometimes a teacher who spoke arabic would translate. this shows the importance of young people’s post-migration social networks in accessing services v. hughes 77 (sime & fox, 2015). communication was also often aided by drawing pictures, google searches, or sharing photos. consent was obtained from parents of participants under 18, and orally from the students themselves. i was dbs checked and the study received ethical approval from goldsmiths, university of london. it was made clear to the young people that participation in the research was voluntary, they could leave at any time and anything they told me could be withdrawn in the future. all information was treated confidentially, and names and locations have been anonymised to protect individuals’ identities. observations included lessons and break-times in the eal classroom and regular sessions run by the school psychologist. sometimes teachers asked me to give one-to-one support to students. for two terms i accompanied two students in mainstream maths classes. i also took part in an eal trip to the houses of parliament, christmas, and eid celebrations. after one term at the school i carried out, in addition to the ethnographic observations, more structured and child-friendly activities with eal students in the eal classroom (punch, 2002). these involved making photo diaries, which seventeen students volunteered to take part in (milligan & bartlett, 2015). students were provided with single-use cameras by the researcher to take the photos, which were collected and developed once the task was completed. one daily photo was taken at school and one outside the school for ten days to gain insights into children’s social worlds outside of school and to overcome language barriers. photos taken outside school were often of parks or close-ups of objects in their homes. there were varying degrees of enthusiasm for the photo diaries; only twelve students returned their cameras and fewer engaged in discussion about the photos. the discussions revealed new insights and there was a heavy focus on the eal classroom. the purpose of the photo diaries was to stimulate discussion and the photos themselves were not used in publications, in order to protect participants’ anonymity. there were also two poetry workshops on home and belonging. ten students took part and wrote poems either in english or in their first language, which were then translated. at the end of the academic year eighteen students took part in a one-day theatre workshop facilitated by an experienced drama practitioner. the intention of the workshop was to access more ‘embodied, dialogical and illustrative’ data (kaptani & yuval-davis, 2008, p. 4.3) and overcome language barriers. i helped with the refugee week school assembly and with carrying out an eal survey of 631 students in years 7 to 10. conversations with teachers were mostly informal as part of the ethnography, except for one formal interview. many of the most insightful conversations with students and staff were unanticipated, however, and took place during break-times, in staff offices and on walks through the school’s corridors. having discussed the methods and approach of this research, the next section will discuss the needs of the students in the eal classroom and how they relate to the outlined policy agendas. the ever-present past: refugee students’ needs in the school our research found that amongst this plethora of policies which impact on migrant and refugee children at schools, there was little focus on the students’ needs. instead of prioritising how education should deal with ‘real-life issues’, according to tomaševski’s ‘4-a scheme’, and adapting their educational offer to the needs of child migrants and refugee children, the school’s decisions were dominated by the pressure of league tables and ofsted inspections. as a result, the specific needs of human rights education review – vol 4(1) 78 refugee children were often invisible and hard to accommodate within the school’s existing parameters. the pre-and post-migration experiences of the students in the eal classroom were extremely diverse, as was their knowledge of english, former education, skills, abilities, and parents’ level of education. as previous research has argued, we must therefore be careful not to homogenise this group but be attentive to their specific and complex needs (e.g. rutter, 2006). in this particular context, the eal classroom had students with a variety of backgrounds and previous experiences, including refugee children, and eastern european students who had different levels of english and different experiences of education and life prior to joining the eal classroom (for experiences of polish pupils see d’angelo et al., 2008; and for syrian refugees see madziva & thondhlana, 2017). while some students had what might be considered a ‘normal’ childhood in their countries of origin, attending school and learning the latin alphabet, others had experienced severe war traumas, missed years of schooling or were maybe illiterate. research has shown the importance of learning english for recently-arrived migrant pupils to gain quality education, for friendships, and for their integration (d’angelo et al., 2008; evans & liu, 2018; madziva & thondhlana, 2017; pinson et al., 2010; rutter, 2006), and the importance of developing social networks to access services (sime & fox, 2015). in addition, this research found that past experiences and the loss of home, family and friends was a constant presence in the lives of recently-arrived migrant students. refugee children were more likely to have had a range of traumatic experiences prior to arrival, compared to other recently-arrived migrant students in the eal classroom. this could involve experiences of war and sudden removal from their homes. the journey to the uk often prolonged such experiences, and this could last many months or even years: stops in refugee camps or other places along the way, poverty, physical exhaustion, and the loss of family members. as a result, many refugee students have spent years outside of formal education (madziva & thondhlana, 2017). these recent experiences often remained a constant accompaniment to students’ everyday life at school, as they settled into their new environment. as they were learning a new language, often a new alphabet, and a new way of doing things, they were also processing often traumatic experiences. this was reflected in students’ conversations, which moved between discussions of the most recent match of the school football team and who or what food they missed from ‘home’. this presence of the past in refugee children’s daily life in school in the uk was brought home to me and their teachers during the theatre workshop. i explained the workshop was about understanding how students felt in their new school. however, these young people returned to their traumatic pre-migration experiences. towards the end of the workshop, students were split into small groups to devise and act short scenes about their everyday life. this led to three girls acting out a war scene from their past. this involved two friends walking, chatting, and laughing, when one of them is suddenly gets shot, falls to the ground, and slowly dies. the girl who played the friend dropped to her knees and started wailing and shouting ‘wake up! wake up!’ the student was crying stage tears, but at some point it became unclear whether they had become real ones. this girl had only recently found out she had lost many members of her extended family to a bomb attack in syria. we stopped the scene and took a break to check with the students, who insisted they were just play v. hughes 79 tears. either way, this scene of their everyday life prior to migration shows the prevalence of such past experiences in some students’ current lives in the uk. within this eal classroom most children were from syria. although there was a range of experiences even among these students, traumatic experiences were common. one 12-year-old boy was at home with his sister when their house was bombed, and only he survived—an experience that turned his hair white. the family fled and spent months in istanbul, where he worked in a shoe factory before they eventually made it to the uk. a 14-year-old girl had seen a neighbour in her village being decapitated by a soldier. another 12-year-old girl was sent to get food by her parents as she was the least likely in the family to be killed; yet every time she went she was not sure whether she would make it home. a 15-year-old afghani boy and the entire family’s savings were sent away by his mother after his father and brother were killed by the taliban. while in calais his mobile phone was confiscated by the police and he has since been unable to contact his mother. these students had very recently experienced extreme violence and fear for their and their families’ lives. processing these experiences, rather than academic achievement, was an important need. this was clear on many occasions throughout the school day: in classes, breaktime conversations and in the regular session with the school psychologist. in one session students were asked to draw their home country, and it was clear that the lives of many students, especially those from syria, were marked by loss, insecurity, and war, as well as love, strong relationships with friends and family, and resilience: within the violent and traumatic experiences is a deep sense of loss of home, as commonly documented in research on refugees (e.g. hughes, 2016). the students talked about their homes constantly; how much they loved them, how much they missed them and how they wanted to return to them. in a session i organised, we focused on ‘home’ and students wrote poems. this one by a 12-year-old syrian student clearly demonstrates these themes: human rights education review – vol 4(1) 80 my home my home is beautiful, where the family meets and everyone eats. they walk to each other. i close my eyes and i see my road. and my uncle is there and he is waving, and calling us to eat. when i was in lebanon, my mind was in syria. but my body i don’t know where it was. as a result of the powerful presence of the past in students’ everyday life, concentrating on schoolwork proved difficult. many students repeatedly said they found this hard because they missed their grandparents, parents, siblings, or friends, or because they were thinking about their experiences during the war or continually worrying about it. amira, a 12-year-old syrian girl, was one of the students who took part in the photo diaries. one photo was of birds in large outdoor cages in a local park. i was surprised to see this and asked amira why she had taken this photo. she explained she was sad for the birds because they were not free, and the cage is like a jail for them. she said, ‘if i had them, i would let them out. they are like the children in syria, they cannot get out.’ she continued to explain her sad feelings about the situation, especially when she watched the news about the war in syria. as well as being sad for everyone still in syria, she was happy she and her family were able to leave and now be in the uk. it was not only their own memories that impacted their ability to concentrate, but also the constant news cycle and social media reports of the ongoing war in syria. these experiences left many of the refugee students feeling different to their peers and not understood. the eal classroom provided a safe space for them to discuss these experiences and worries without being singled out or stigmatised, as most of their eal classmates had similar experiences. this created a shared sense of solidarity between eal students across year groups and backgrounds which supported their resilience to enter mainstream classes and school spaces. over time, the recent pre-migration experiences would move further into the background, as students became increasingly involved in their present lives and studies at school. the eal classroom is an important space for its students. while it prepares them for mainstream classes by teaching them english, certain core content, and how to navigate the school, it also provides a safe space. throughout my time at the school, students described the eal classroom as safe, like home, and its teachers as caring and like family, or in the words of one student, ‘the nicest place in the school’. another student said ‘the u40 [eal classroom] is like my room, the teachers are kind, they tell me to learn, i learn everything there.’ as the young people navigate their new life between past and present, the eal classroom and its teachers play an important role in supporting them through their transition into mainstream education; this is discussed in the next section. teachers’ impossible task as brokers the teachers in this research were acutely aware of their students’ complex needs, as outlined in the above section. they saw their task as teachers to create a safe space for their students within the school; this involved daily emotional labour and, as v. hughes 81 wallace puts it (2011), helping these new arrivals become pupils. however, teachers also need to navigate their role in relation to the education system and the school. teachers are expected to graduate students from the eal classroom into mainstream schooling as quickly as possible and focus on academic attainment and language acquisition. previous research makes clear the importance of language acquisition for recently-arrived migrant students’ academic attainment, as well as their inclusion and social integration (evans & liu, 2018; madziva & thondhlana, 2017). in line with madziva and thondhlana’s findings (2017), this research found that addressing these complex needs often meant increased workloads for teachers; despite the school having dedicated eal staff, resources were limited. in this process, eal teachers become ‘brokers’ between the students, with whom they build trusting relationships, and the rest of the school, which often shows little time and understanding for their complex needs. as discussed above, schools are under pressure to reduce truancy. this can lead to difficult relations between teachers and eal students, often exacerbated due to language issues. eal students would frequently complain to eal teachers about getting into trouble for not following rules they were unaware of. here the eal and arabic-speaking staff became crucial in explaining and translating the school rules to eal students. a common misunderstanding was about students’ timetables and not being in the right classroom for morning tutor time, which would mean they were marked absent in the school register: this could have serious consequences. although usually easily remedied by eal staff, these tasks were time-consuming. other situations could be harder to resolve and cause unnecessary harm and upset. the following series of events is a harsh example of this. one day sadiq, a recently-arrived student from syria, came in with dark rings under his eyes and handed the teacher papers from the london ambulance service. through chaotic translations by other students and reading the papers, we established his mother had been in hospital all night with shock due to her entire family—about 10 relatives—having died in a bomb attack in syria the day before. it then transpired that the school had called the family that morning because the three siblings were not in their respective tutor groups and had asked for ‘evidence’ if their absence were to be accepted. while the teachers spoke with sadiq i went to see his sisters, who were in floods of tears and shock in the school corridor. we moved to a staff room and another arabic-speaking teacher joined us to help make sense of the situation. together the two teachers arranged permission for the students to go home. while i sat with the students, they kept looking at their phones and eventually showed me what they were looking at: pictures of their dead relatives sent via facebook, a man and little children’s bodies covered in blood and dust. they put their phones away but thought this was the evidence required by the school. eventually, the arabic-speaking teacher and i took the students home, where the teacher explained the situation to the aunt. she was visibly anxious about whether the students needed to go to school the next day but seemed reassured by the teacher. this experience sat heavily with all eal students and teachers for the rest of the week. this example demonstrates a potentially harmful consequence for students when difficulties in communication between the school and parents of eal learners occur; examples of such situations are also to be found in schneider and arnot (2018) and in research on polish pupils by d’angelo et al (2008). there is a need for multilingual, sensitive and culturally appropriate mediation or intervention by human rights education review – vol 4(1) 82 trained staff. in sadiq’s case, the school’s fear of increased truancy numbers caused distress to vulnerable students. their needs are invisible in the schools standard procedural apparatus, where it is only accountable to its financial benefactors and central government. if it had not been for the eal teachers’ intervention between the students, parents, and the school, there may have been sanctions for truancy. the implications of the prevent duty seemed especially prevalent, as most eal students were muslims. in other words, they fitted the stereotypical profile of young people seen to be at risk of radicalisation, as put forward by prevent and its training sessions. teachers then had a conflicted role: on the one hand, they were to make their eal students from such a background feel safe, given their recent traumatic experiences; on the other, they had a legal duty to regard them with a certain level of suspicion and observe their behaviour for signs of radicalisation. given the superficial and problematic training for prevent, its interpretation posed many challenges for teachers—especially when deciding the seriousness of an incident. the following example illustrates this. a 12-year-old syrian male student started joking about wanting to bomb himself as he wrapped his scarf around his head. everyone in the classroom, including his older brother, laughed. however, the atmosphere quickly changed as the teacher became angry, telling him off for making such jokes, mentioning that if he did this sort of thing, she had to report him, and the police might question him. the student, often the class clown, tried to explain he was joking, with other students agreeing. however, the teacher was not amused asking ‘i don’t need to report this, do i?’ what was concerning about this incident was how quickly it escalated and led to what could be understood as discriminatory behaviour from a teacher who knew these students well and specialised in supporting recently-arrived migrant students from a range of different backgrounds. she later related the incident to another eal teacher who immediately dismissed it as a joke, and it was not taken further. this highlights the arbitrary and subjective implementation of this national policy and its dependence on individual interpretation that can lead to discrimination. had the student been reported and identified as ‘at risk’, he could have been referred to channel—the government’s deradicalisation programme, which is a multi-agency panel involving the police. furthermore, it demonstrates how such policies disrupt education and therefore undermine the uk’s obligations under international law to ensure the right to education for all children in the uk. as bolloten states, ‘prevent confuses the different professional roles of teachers and the police, and draws educational practitioners into becoming the eyes and ears of the counter-terrorism system’ (2015), taking their attention away from teaching. in this incident an entire lesson was lost. concerns over the implications of prevent have been raised by teachers, unions, academics, the un special rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and association, and other educational experts (adams 2016; bolloten 2015). there are a number of concerns: these include worries about censorship, compromises to freedom of speech, the stigmatisation of segments of the population, and too much surveillance in schools. despite these voices the prevent duty remains—and often with detrimental consequences for students (birt, 2015; khaleeli, 2015; rights watch, 2016; versi, 2017). as part of prevent, teachers are expected to teach so-called ‘british values’, albeit with little guidance. in the eal classroom, teaching ‘british values’ has become v. hughes 83 a core component. lessons consisted of teaching the ‘five pillars’ of british values— tolerance, democracy, rule of law, individual liberty, and mutual respect. students were encouraged to think about what the fundamental values in their countries of birth were and what was important to them. however, while the policy context makes teaching ‘british values’ fraught with difficulties, in the daily life of the eal classroom it also seemed to be a gateway into many practical conversations with students. teachers in the eal classroom, who themselves were of migrant and mostly muslim backgrounds, were able to explain certain expectations of behaviour within the school and in society more broadly. this was communicated from a point of experience as a migrant, having to learn certain ways of doing things, and from a point of concern. in this specific context we can see how ‘british values’ are implemented through a personalised perspective. as o’toole, meer, de hanas, jones and modood (2016, p. 174) found, there are two types of governance, which can act in different directions: on the one hand the ‘disciplinary mode of regulation’ and, on the other, the ‘contested practice’ that can be seen in the examples outlined here. while the practice of teaching ‘british values’ in this eal classroom did not contest ‘british values’, it did not teach they were opposed to muslim values. the teacher, herself being muslim, often pointed out the similarities. contrary to the policy discourse which sees ‘british values’ in opposition to muslim values, here ‘british values’ were used to establish a respectful relationship between students from different backgrounds. from the discussion in this section, we can see that in this school the burden of adapting the right of education for refugee children falls overwhelmingly on individual teachers. eal teachers’ roles are complex and multiple; they have to navigate a variety of professional and personal expectations, and often go to extra lengths to ensure all needs are met. for students, they create a safe space in the school, teaching english and ‘the rules of the game’. they support students through care, listening, and often fire-fighting crises. eal teachers also fulfil an important role as brokers between eal students and others in the school, engaging in a ‘politics of compassion’ (pinson et al., 2010). finally, eal teachers remain accountable to school management and its demand to show good results in league tables and ofsted reports, and comply with a plethora of national policies such as prevent and ‘british values’. to create a safe space for eal students in the context of an audit and surveillance culture, eal teachers are required to demonstrate adaptability and flexibility to navigate their obligations, duties and responsibilities on the one hand, and maintain care and empathy towards their students. conclusion although every child in the uk has the right to education, its implementation and practice is not always straightforward. and at times this complexity, or competing policy demands, results in the uk failing to meet its international obligations to the right to education for all children. furthermore, when examining the uk’s international obligations in relation to education, together with the ‘4-a scheme’ developed by tomaševski, we can pinpoint further shortcomings. firstly, given that the uk has no national policy for eal learners, i would argue that the uk falls short in meeting its obligations to make the right to education adaptable and accessible to refugees. instead, schools are left to find their own arrangements in adapting education to the special needs of refugee and migrant human rights education review – vol 4(1) 84 children. this burden falls heavily on teachers, rather than on actors at the national, local or school level. as was shown in this study and previous research, the result is that there is significant variation in educational provision for refugee and migrant children. whether a refugee or migrant student receives education adapted to their needs is often based on luck, due to the lack of a national policy providing guidance to schools. students in an eal classroom have complex needs that ought to be addressed by the uk government and schools under the principle of adaptability (tomaševski, 2001). refugee and migrant children often arrive in the classroom with traumatic pre-migration experiences, little or no english, and varying degrees of literacy and education. however, without a national policy on eal education and education for young refugees and migrants, it could be argued that the uk falls short of its international obligations to ensure the right to education for all children. secondly, the right to education is complicated by other policy priorities affecting how education is delivered and how teachers act in the classroom. in the context of an eal classroom, recently-arrived migrant children are not only constructed in relation to asylum and immigration policies and discourses, as pinson et al., have argued (2010), but also by the prevent and ‘british values’ agendas, which create an environment of suspicion towards muslim students. such hostile and racialised policies impact on refugee and migrant children at school and can lead to discriminatory behaviour by teachers. such discrimination, based on biases about students’ backgrounds and their (muslim) religion, compromises the uk’s obligation under the crc and echr for the right to education to be guaranteed without discrimination. as shown in this article, students of muslim background are more likely to find themselves excluded from education as a result of the prevent policy. furthermore, this conflicts with ensuring that education remains accessible to all children, as muslim students are more likely to miss out on education if they are removed from class or school. thirdly, adapting education to the complex needs of refugee children does not easily align with priorities of league tables, audits, and marketisation that schools have to comply with, under uk domestic legislation. these pressures from competing national education policies on schools means schools have fewer incentives to provide resources for students’ wellbeing, spaces to process their recent premigration experiences, and their broader integration. teachers’ attention is therefore often drawn to meeting metrics for exam results and truancy—which if not met can have serious negative consequences for a school—and away from adapting their teaching to the specific needs of refugee and migrant children. while previous research has often criticised the over-emphasis on refugee children’s’ trauma at the expense of their resilience and agency, my study suggests this is not a helpful binary. many refugee and migrant children display both tendencies, and therefore adapting education to their needs means creating space for students to process their often traumatic experiences as well as recognising their resilience. the school’s eal teachers performed an important role in bridging the right to education in law and the right to education in practice for migrant and refugee children. the availability of specially trained teachers is an important component in meeting refugee children’s educational needs. these teachers can ensure that education means a safe space in the school for these young people: a space where they can build resilience and create trusting relationships; a space where they learn english, the latin alphabet, how to read a timetable, how to wear a school uniform, how to get school lunch and pay for it, and what to do if they are sick; a space where v. hughes 85 they learn how to communicate with teachers and other students. education here, viewed in broad terms unrestrained by metrics, goes well beyond the curriculum. such education is crucial in bridging students’ previous worlds and their new environment, a moment of pause in the integration process. eal provision is an important and essential part of student’s integration in the school and their wider neighbourhood. without a national approach to eal learners, it is unclear how the uk can meet the obligation to interpret and implement the right to education ‘in reallife’, according to the 4-a scheme of accessibility, acceptability, availability, and adaptability—especially when it comes to availability (in terms of trained eal teachers and resources) and adaptability (in terms of special educational provision for eal learners). schools have been left to their own devices in the interpretation of eal education and therefore uneven provision exists. as a result, some students’ educational needs are met under international human rights obligations of the crc and echr, while others’ fall significantly short. acknowledgments i would like to thank the participants in this study, i.e. the teachers and students of the eal classroom and the guidance of my supervisors professors les back and heidi mirza. human rights education review – vol 4(1) 86 references adams, r. 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(2018, april 9). dfe ends divisive pupil nationality data collection. schools week. retrieved from https://schoolsweek.co.uk/dfe-ends-divisive-pupil-nationality-data collection/ https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137435088_11 https://www.compas.ox.ac.uk/2012/pr-2012-undocumented_migrant_children/ https://www.compas.ox.ac.uk/2012/pr-2012-undocumented_migrant_children/ https://doi.org/10.1111/chso.12092 https://www.compas.ox.ac.uk/2015/outside-and-in/ https://www.right-to-education.org/sites/right-to-%09education.org/files/resource-attachments/tomasevski_primer%203.pdf https://www.right-to-education.org/sites/right-to-%09education.org/files/resource-attachments/tomasevski_primer%203.pdf http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/nov/10/prevent-strategy-statistics-independent-review-home-office-muslims http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/nov/10/prevent-strategy-statistics-independent-review-home-office-muslims https://doi.org/10.1080/14708477.2011.556742 https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/theresa-may-immigrant-migrant-illegal-children-school-places-bottom-list-deprioritise-leaked-letters-a7449051.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/theresa-may-immigrant-migrant-illegal-children-school-places-bottom-list-deprioritise-leaked-letters-a7449051.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/theresa-may-immigrant-migrant-illegal-children-school-places-bottom-list-deprioritise-leaked-letters-a7449051.html http://www.theguardian.com/education/2019/nov/12/department-of-education-criticised-for-secretly-sharing-childrens-data http://www.theguardian.com/education/2019/nov/12/department-of-education-criticised-for-secretly-sharing-childrens-data https://schoolsweek.co.uk/dfe-ends-divisive-pupil-nationality-datahttps://schoolsweek.co.uk/dfe-ends-divisive-pupil-nationality-data volume 4, no 1 (2021) date received: 03-09-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3979 date accepted: 21-01-2021 issn 2535-5406 talking about rights without talking about rights: on the absence of knowledge in classroom discussions lee jerome middlesex university, uk. anna liddle university of leeds, uk. helen young london south bank university, uk. abstract: this article reports on research in three secondary schools in england where students were engaged in deliberative discussion of controversial issues. the teaching resources used illustrated rights-based dilemmas and the data analysis focused on the nature of the talk and the types of knowledge the students drew upon to inform their discussions. the article shares four insights: (i) there is a need to be more explicit about what constitutes human rights knowledge; (ii) human rights education requires the development of political understanding, which moves beyond individual empathy; (iii) educators need to value the process of deliberative discussions and avoid a push for conclusive answers; (iv) students need support to draw on knowledge from a range of disciplines. if these issues are not addressed, some students are able to engage in rights-based discussions with little knowledge and understanding of rights. keywords: human rights education, knowledge, curriculum, epistemology, classroom discussion, deliberation lee jerome: l.jerome@mdx.ac.uk mailto:l.jerome@mdx.ac.uk l. jerome, a. liddle & h. young 9 talking about rights without talking about rights: on the absence of knowledge in classroom discussions doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3979 issn 2535-5406 lee jerome anna liddle helen young l.jerome@mdx.ac.uk middlesex university, uk. university of leeds, uk. london south bank university, uk. abstract: this article reports on research in three secondary schools in england where students were engaged in deliberative discussion of controversial issues. the teaching resources used illustrated rights-based dilemmas and the data analysis focused on the nature of the talk and the types of knowledge the students drew upon to inform their discussions. the article shares four insights: (i) there is a need to be more explicit about what constitutes human rights knowledge; (ii) human rights education requires the development of political understanding, which moves beyond individual empathy; (iii) educators need to value the process of deliberative discussions and avoid a push for conclusive answers; (iv) students need support to draw on knowledge from a range of disciplines. if these issues are not addressed, some students are able to engage in rights-based discussions with little knowledge and understanding of rights. keywords: human rights education, knowledge, curriculum, epistemology, classroom discussion, deliberation introduction the starting point for this article is parker’s challenge to human rights educators (in the first edition of this journal) that we need to be more explicit about what knowledge might sit at the heart of a curriculum for human rights education (hre) (parker, 2018). he argued that hre frameworks often leave this issue relatively open and unexplored. whilst learning ‘about’ human rights is one of the three defining elements of hre according to the united nations (un) declaration on human rights education and training (the others being learning ‘through’ and ‘for’ rights), it is not clear what we should expect to be sufficient knowledge, nor indeed what an informed student should understand about human rights. parker’s discussion focuses on a number of issues but crucially observes there has been a kind of ‘knowledge blindness’ within hre, where advocates tend to avoid engaging with questions about human rights knowledge. he builds on vygotsky’s distinction between the everyday knowledge that arises from reflection on experience, and more conceptual scientific knowledge, which has to be more consciously taught (karpov, 2003). these scientific concepts unlock new ways to understand the world and therefore have significant transformative potential. despite curriculum theorists’ relative neglect of such issues, the importance of mailto:l.jerome@mdx.ac.uk human rights education review – vol 4(1) 10 knowledge and understanding has been described by writers as different as freire (1996) (in his dictum that we should learn to read the word and the world) and young and muller (2016) (in their recent controversial work on ‘powerful knowledge’). whilst these authors adopt very different perspectives on the curriculum, schools and pedagogy, they draw attention to the role of knowledge for unlocking new conceptual connections and new understandings about how the world works. in this article, we are concerned with what is meant by human rights knowledge and what constitutes a higher level of understanding of human rights. as parker argues, without answers to these basic questions, it is of little surprise that we continue to struggle to articulate what hre might offer, and to frame hre meaningfully when we do have the opportunity to embed it in curricula (jerome, 2018). rather than engage with this debate as an abstract theoretical challenge, we use it to frame our reflections on empirical data we have generated in classrooms. by reflecting on how secondary school students (aged 12-18) talked about human rights in the classroom, we seek to illuminate what constitutes an informed understanding, and reflect on some of the obstacles. the deliberative classroom project as hre the data were generated during a project called the deliberative classroom (jerome, liddle &young, 2020). this was framed in the policy context of the english education system, where schools must ‘promote the fundamental british values’ (fbvs); these are defined in statutory guidance (home office, 2019) as democracy, the rule of law, equality and tolerance. it has already been documented that calling these concepts ‘fundamentally british’ and ‘values’ may well have distorting effects, as it tends to deemphasise the extent to which they could be taught as contested political concepts and encourages teachers to focus on a vague notion of ‘britishness’ (busher & jerome, 2020). by contrast, the deliberative classroom aimed to teach the fbvs as complex concepts requiring discussion, evaluation and application in different contexts. one of the resource packs (association for citizenship teaching [act], 2018) focused on freedom and toleration through exploring the nature of the right to freedom of religion, and the circumstances under which the right could be limited. another pack focused on the rule of law and democracy, and considered how one might seek to justify breaking the law for political ends. human rights provided the foundation for the project and students were encouraged to think about how rights are defined, balanced, restricted and enacted in various circumstances. pedagogically, the project built on two main ideas. first, it aimed to engage the students in discussions incorporating some of the principles of deliberative democracy (dryzek, 2002; habermas, 1996). this includes a commitment that coming together for open, honest and respectful conversations across our differences can lead to better, more inclusive outcomes. whether or not it leads to a consensus, the process of deliberation is transformational in that it changes the way individuals perceive their own position, and that of others, and may well encourage people to review their beliefs to some extent. deliberative fora typically involve learning phases, where participants deepen their understanding of an issue, often in dialogue with experts. but, as with hre, some commentators have criticised deliberative democratic theorists for failing to develop an adequate account of the role and nature of knowledge (walter, 2008; h. young, 2017). our research complements the approach adopted by al-daraweesh and snauwaert (2018), who have begun to l. jerome, a. liddle & h. young 11 explore how deliberative pedagogy might contribute to hre knowledge. whilst they provide an illustrative sequence of classroom activities where students deliberate human rights principles, our work adapts a case study approach to consider human rights in specific contexts, as described below. the second pedagogic influence was hess’s (2009) work on teaching controversial issues. again, this was influenced by the policy context, where schools are both required to promote the fbvs and induct students into controversial discussions, including those about terrorism and extremism (department for education, 2015). hess argues that teachers have to think about controversial issues on at least two levels. at the most immediate level, there is the specific case which has been identified as controversial, such as gay marriage, outlawing religious sects, abortion, online hate speech, etc. but lurking beneath the surface is a ‘perennial issue’, which generally resembles a vygotskyan scientific concept, i.e. an abstract idea which requires interpretation and application (e.g. freedom, equality or minority rights). the deliberative classroom aimed to set up discussions about specific case studies in order to engage students with the perennial issues that underpinned them. the resources were written to engage with the fbvs as contested perennial issues and to address the human rights dimension to these issues, such as freedom of religion, freedom of speech, and freedom to organise. some hre advocates have long recognised the value of case studies as a means to explore multiple perspectives and counter-narratives, and to develop empathy as the basis for action (adami, 2004; osler, 2016: ch.4; osler & zhu, 2011). these two ideas of deliberation and teaching controversial issues informed the design of the project, but it was a genuinely open question as to what the students would do with the resources, and what kinds of conversations would be generated. one source of uncertainty stemmed from the fact that the resources encouraged the small group discussion which pace (2019), in her small-scale study, observed as typical in the approach adopted by english educators, an approach that left students free to veer off task. the resources reflected mcavoy and hess’ (2013) recommendations that resources should use genuinely controversial issues (open questions), distinguish between the case and the underlying issue, embrace ideological diversity and avoid prescribing a correct opinion. this meant students had considerable freedom to lead the conversation in different directions. mercer (1995) describes talk between teachers and students as the 'guided construction of knowledge' and argues that, through conversations in class, ‘knowledge is neither accumulated nor discovered by learners, it is shaped by people's communicative actions’ (mercer, 1995, p.19). mercer contends that a key role for teachers is to induct students into new discourses (in the same way that parker [2018] argues students need to be inducted into a human rights discourse). this reflects vygotsky's conception of scientific concepts which have to be consciously taught and acquired outside of normal everyday experience but, once acquired, can be used to transform the way one understands the everyday world (karpov, 2003). whilst students will gain some level of understanding of what constitutes rights from everyday life and conversations, a deep understanding will draw on political theory and law, and will include understanding what it means to claim and recognise a right (jerome, 2018). this involves learning some specialist political knowledge, such as how rights are enacted and how those processes can be influenced (barton, 2020). it may also involve deliberately teaching about different contexts, from the local to the national and international, in order to help students human rights education review – vol 4(1) 12 think consistently about the enactment of human rights principles (kim, 2019). this process may be made more compelling if learners encounter detailed authentic accounts of other people’s lives (barton & ho, 2020). these forms of knowledge tend to focus on additional factual information (e.g. how political processes work, how other people live, how political systems differ), but there is also a deeper vygotskian sense in which students should also acquire concepts which form a collective cultural tool. the curriculum does not consist simply of subject knowledge of a factual kind, but embodies ways of using language-discourses-which students need to be enabled to understand and use if they are to become educated. (mercer, 1995, p.85) teaching about human rights should attend therefore to the acquisition of factual and conceptual knowledge, the development of competence in using that knowledge to interpret different situations, an awareness of one’s own political agency in the broader development of rights and opportunities to tackle misconceptions (jerome, emerson & lundy 2015). in reflecting on how dialogue is supposed to facilitate learning, reznitskaya and gregory argue there are three processes: (i) discussion gives students experience of rational thinking, which they can then internalise. here they speculate that individual reasoning is a kind of internal argument with a generalised other, and that our thought is shaped through struggle with others' thoughts (reznitskaya & gregory, 2013, p.118). (ii) the cumulative experiences of such discussion help students build an 'argument schema' for a general understanding of how arguments are constructed and questioned, which enables students to judge between different interpretations. (iii) students develop an increasingly complex understanding of disciplinary knowledge, i.e. what it means to understand and think with concepts like rights. these general observations about the nature of learning through argument also resonate with al-daraweesh and snauwaert (2018), who suggest that deliberation can both develop knowledge about human rights and a deeper grasp ‘of the forms of thought characteristic of the discipline’, including the structure of moral and political discourse that underpins human rights (p. 86). reznitskaya and gregory (2013) also argue that teachers may unconsciously promote pseudo-enquiries by simply accepting all student contributions as valid, rather than testing and evaluating them appropriately. this alerts us to the observation that just because valuable learning can derive from classroom talk, we should not assume that all classroom talk leads to valuable learning. one way in which learning might be limited results from teachers not being clear about the purposes of such talk (mercer, 1995). another problem might be seen where students ‘do not advance their understanding ... they merely reiterate halfunderstandings which they already possess’ (barnes & todd, 1978, p.73 cited in mercer, 1995, p.95). this may happen when students never fully articulate and explain their positions and therefore fail to make themselves accountable to the l. jerome, a. liddle & h. young 13 group for what they say, which can lead to a ‘set of unexamined platitudes’. a third problem arises when students simply perform the role the teacher wants to see and rehearse the kinds of lines the teacher wants to hear as a form of classroom ventriloquism (pace, 2015). in addition to being alert to how classroom talk might go awry, we are also conscious that there are additional problems that may prevent students making progress in their learning about human rights. as parker (2018) suggests, students may have already learned to be dismissive of rights, or to think in simplistic and absolutist ways about them. they may have been taught that rights are directly dependent on responsibilities, and therefore may be conditional and easily forfeited (howe & covell, 2010). they may simply fail to see rights as relevant to the problems being discussed, and solve those problems using other reference points (jerome & lalor, 2015). or they may see rights as largely relating to other people in other parts of the world and reframe rights problems as cases for charity or volunteerism (jerome et al., 2015). they may have a restricted view of rights as moral values (kim, 2019) and/or a set of international declarations and documents (keet, 2015), and fail to understand the ways in which rights feature within political struggle (barton, 2020; jerome & lalor, 2015). methodology research approach as noted above, the research project generated data from classroom discussions that resulted from students engaging with the deliberative classroom resources. schools were approached in a variety of ways, including a general email through the association for citizenship teaching invitations to teachers with whom the researchers had worked on similar projects, and personal approaches to other schools. the intention was to record the classrooms where discussions based on the themes in the resource packs (act, 2018) were taking place. this paper draws on data generated in three of the schools. all three schools focused on the topic of religious freedom, hence our analysis discusses this concept in greater depth. the resources in this pack started with an historical account of the development of religious freedom in the uk. this clarified how religious freedom and toleration have developed over time, and demonstrated how contemporary assumptions about religious equality have only relatively recently become enshrined in law. the second activity included several case studies where religious freedom had to be interpreted and restricted in practice. these case studies included the following issues: • gay marriage and the church of england as an employer (and the church’s exemption from aspects of uk equalities legislation). • the uk welfare system’s rules on family and marriage in relation to polygamous relationships (and under what circumstances the state should acknowledge such relationships). • the uk’s new £5 banknotes (which include small quantities of beef fat), and whether the state has a responsibility to respect the beliefs of vegans and hindus. • how and when cults should be accepted, and when they should be viewed with suspicion and restricted. human rights education review – vol 4(1) 14 each case study included specific questions to focus discussion on the issue and then built up to a common question: ‘how does this case study help you think about the limits on religious freedom?’ the final activities included a variety of suggested debates and discussions, either to debate a single issue or case (e.g. everyone has a right to wear religious symbols or dress to work) or to draft a school resolution, setting out principles for the school to follow and encouraging students to debate, amend and vote on each element to maximise consensus. it should be noted that one aim of this research was to explore how the resources were received in schools by students and teachers, and to evaluate to what extent they scaffolded the discussion. by recording the sessions, generating transcripts, and identifying a variety of concepts to analyse the data, we are provided with what mason describes as ‘flashes of insight’ (2017, p. 44) from the student talk. data collection as mentioned above, the data was collected in three schools. in two of these, the lessons were with year 8 pupils (aged 12-13) in religious education (re) classes. in the third, the session was run with the school’s debating society. although there is a national curriculum in england, schools have great flexibility in what they teach in history, citizenship and re, which makes the prediction of prior knowledge particularly difficult. re is influenced by local frameworks and whether the school is designated as a faith school. in addition, academies (two of our schools) are exempt from following the national curriculum, which has particularly adversely affected citizenship education (hahn, 2020, p. 252). we are aware that as this is a small-scale study we are not able to generalise widely. however, with the classroom materials freely available, the study is replicable. the three schools are as follows: arun grammar this academically selective boys’ academy has very few children with special educational needs (sen), and very few receive free school meals (fsm) (fsm is widely used as a proxy indicator of disadvantage/poverty). a third of the students speak english as an additional language (eal). the material on religious freedom was taught by an re specialist teacher (with substantial experience of citizenship teaching), to year 8 (aged 12-13) boys. the researchers attended two lessons but only recorded discussions during the second visit, when the teacher included extended discussions. stour grammar this academically selective girls’ school has lower than average numbers of children with sen, fsm and eal. the material on religious freedom was taught by an re specialist teacher (who also had extensive experience of citizenship teaching) with year 8 girls. the researchers attended two lessons and generated data in both. the students sat around 15 small tables. this made it impossible to have a recorder on every table, so five small groups were recorded, plus the whole class discussions. avon school this comprehensive church of england academy has average numbers of children with sen and fsm but lower than average eal. it has roughly equal numbers of boys and girls and for this project a mixed-gender group of 14 student volunteers (12-18 years old) from the debating society agreed to participate in one deliberative l. jerome, a. liddle & h. young 15 discussion on religious freedom in school (the christian nature of the school does not mean only christians attend, many students are muslims). this was facilitated by two of the researchers, and small group and plenary discussions were recorded. the session was supported by the teacher who ran the society. in each school, recorders were placed on tables in the classroom if the pupils consented. recordings of small group discussions and whole class plenaries were transcribed, but in cases where there was a lot of off-task talk (in some of the small groups), transcriptions focused only on the sections of the recordings which were relevant to the tasks. analysis of the data and selection of themes two of the researchers applied an initial coding system on one transcript each in nvivo, then met to review each other’s work and discuss issues arising. this led to a revised set of codes, which were then applied to the whole data set and further moderated. the coding focused initially on classifying individual utterances and then on longer sections of conversations, where utterances are related to one another in relation to a topic or argument (mercer, 1995). full details on the coding system used and how these methods build on traditions in the field of classroom talk are in the project report (jerome, liddle & young, 2020). for this article, we have focused on those themes that seem to be related in some way with our concern for clarifying the role of knowledge in hre discussions discussion of data a number of key themes around hre knowledge emerged from our analysis. first, we consider whether starting with students’ own emotional responses might inadvertently restrict their capacity for engaging with other perspectives. second, we provide some examples that illustrate a tendency to cut short discussions and prevent students from deepening their understanding. third, we argue that the consensus-seeking behaviour inherent in deliberative discussions may lead to a form of cumulative talk, which discourages students from adopting a more critical perspective. it is this criticality that might be expected to lead to deeper engagement with underlying concepts. fourth, we noted very few examples of students drawing on knowledge gained elsewhere in the curriculum. opinions and restricted empathy in this section we consider whether the tendency to start with personal responses, which seems to make pedagogical sense, might ultimately restrict students’ ability to frame the issue from different perspectives. we suggest this may both limit their capacity for genuine engagement with the other (barton & ho, 2020; osler, 2016) because they essentially project their own emotional response onto others. this in turn could limit their political understanding of the case(s) being discussed because conflicting points of view are sidestepped. this presents a challenge for inducting students into the human rights discourses discussed above. deliberative democratic theorists have noted several relevant issues. first, in situations where the deliberating group is not diverse, this can lead to ‘limited argument pools’ where participants cluster around a shared perspective (sunstein, 2000, p. 75). second, there is a debate about the balance between the rational and affective dimensions to deliberation. habermas (1996) tends to focus on the need to articulate and exchange reasons for one’s view, but there have been many critiques human rights education review – vol 4(1) 16 of this emphasis (i. young, 2002). barton and ho (2020) point out that teachers should acknowledge that emotions are not simply problems to be tamed or managed in the classroom, but are actually integrally bound up with the positions we take and the reasons which we find compelling. whilst they suggest emotional responses, such as compassion, can be fundamental to developing regard for the other, we note here that the combination of limited argument pools and emotional empathy may also lead to problems. in a small group discussion in stour grammar, focusing on polygamy, one student reported: speaker 1: i watched a tv programme about that once, and he had like three wives, and they didn’t like each other because they were jealous of the other wife, because he went out to dinner with one of the wives, and she was like, but that’s my husband. [speaker 2: but that’s weird]. yes, that is weird, and he had three kids with one of them, and two with the other one, and then the other one was pregnant. the students went on to discuss how the children would feel in this situation, before the conversation turned back to the case study on the card, and then another participant introduced a second example from the media: speaker 3: i read this thing the other day, it was ‘i went to my best friend’s wedding and i fell in love with her and now we’re in a three-way marriage’. during this discussion, one of the researchers joined the group and tried to introduce an argument that one might consider polygamy from a different perspective (imagining how it might be seen in a different culture), but the students sidestepped the point, and returned to the media coverage as evidence of how women actually experience polygamous marriages. speaker 1: i feel if i was in that position having a husband with two other wives, i’d just think... speaker 2: i think even if i was brought up in that religion, i don’t think i would… speaker 1: i watched a documentary on it, as i’ve said like five times, but the women in it, they said they didn’t really… it wasn’t that, it was like they didn’t really want to say anything about it. speaker 2: it was like all the women were jealous of the other women [speaker 1: yeah] when they went out on dates and it was like they were trapped in it. in this example the documentary fills an experience gap. whilst the researcher is providing a general, relatively speculative argument about how the construct of marriage might be perceived, the students are keen to return to the concrete example provided by the programme they have watched. however, the main purpose of the programme seemed to be to bolster their individual emotional responses. here the participants couch the discussion in terms of how they would feel in a situation and focus on the emotional responses of the people in the programme. whilst this seems like a reasonable way to engage in the discussion, it is one-dimensional. notably, this l. jerome, a. liddle & h. young 17 framing entirely ignores the context of the case study, which had been carefully written to frame the issue in terms of religious diversity, migration to the uk, and the fact that the state’s welfare rules have acknowledged polygamy but its marriage rules have not. rowe’s (2005) work on young people’s political thinking similarly involved students discussing case studies in class. he argued that schema theory helps to describe the development of political literacy, as students learn to adopt a variety of different schemas (or ways of framing the problem) in order to understand the complexity of political phenomena and decision making. here, for example, the question can be viewed from an individual emotional perspective, which may include notions of romantic love, and may also include other emotional aspects, such as jealousy, bullying, etc. however, additional schemas might include a religious perspective, exploring which religions, and under what conditions, acknowledge polygamy. one might also adopt a feminist perspective, inviting questions about the gender inequalities within those relationships and in the societies that acknowledge polygamous marriage. one could also adopt an historical perspective, to think about the roots of such practices and how changing social norms affect one’s judgement. this case study was also framed from a bureaucratic perspective, to consider how the state inevitably has to take a position on the issue, because people engage with it through tax and welfare systems where marriage is important. in this discussion, the group’s schema is limited to the emotional framing, and even here the participants appear to generalise from their own emotional response to the emotional response of all others, thus erasing possible cultural or religious differences. as such, this represents a restricted sense of empathy, in which the participants seem to project their emotional responses onto others, in order to feel sorry for them. the more rigorous form of cognitive empathy required to appreciate diversity seems largely absent (endacott & brooks, 2013). this effectively means the case study is depoliticised; students pitch their discussion at an emotional and individual level, and reflect a level of thinking which might be described as ‘pre-political’ (jerome & lalor, 2015). this restricts the extent to which students apply a human rights framework; they paint all women in polygamous relationship as victims who need to be helped, rather than engaging with the legal challenge represented by different perceptions of what constitutes the right to a family life. task completion and ‘certainty’ the distinction between deep and surface learning is a common one, although it has been criticised for a lack of clarity (howie & bagnall, 2013). for our purposes, it reflects the distinction made in hess’s (2009) work that students move beyond the specific case towards the deeper perennial issue. this also resonates with shulman’s (1986) work on the acquisition of underlying concepts and processes that define an area of knowledge. in this section we consider a tendency in some classes that limits the students’ pursuit of greater depth, leading them to settle for a relatively superficial level of engagement. students commonly announced, in a rather arbitrary manner, that they had completed a task and were ready to move to the next. obviously, these are all openended controversial issues that can never be fully ‘completed’ in the sense of unpicking all the possible principles. none of this was surprising to us, but in this context we became very aware of the relationship between task completion and students’ engagement with ‘deeper’ knowledge. human rights education review – vol 4(1) 18 culturally, schools in england are very much structured around task completion, reflecting pressures associated with high-stakes testing (ball, 2017) and the school day being divided into very structured time sections (lingard & thompson, 2017). from a simple behaviourist point of view, task completion is the way to gain teacher praise. this has implications for open-ended deliberation, as is illustrated in the following extract from a small group discussion in stour grammar, relating to case studies on cults and on gay marriage. after an extended conversation, which began to identify different perspectives and possible tensions, the conversation was brought to a halt: speaker 1: [reading the question] how does this case help you think about limiting religious freedom? i think it does like when it comes to hurting people or manipulating them, then people need to stop it. speaker 2: are we meant to be writing it up? [long pause, writing down notes] speaker 1: can we have another discussion? completing the task in this arbitrary fashion narrows explorations and obscures possibilities for ambiguity and uncertainty. dryzek (2002) says deliberation can ‘multiply dimensions and options’ (p. 41), but this can only occur when deliberation is extensive and unconstrained by a need to complete tasks. the student exchanges demonstrated their ability to open up the issue as they engaged with the fact that there may be rights in tension, that there is a distinction to be drawn between freedoms to (such as joining a cult) and freedom from (harm), and that we should think cautiously about whether to advise free citizens or actually restrict their freedoms. the discussion appears to be moving in the direction of mill’s dictum ‘that the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection’ (mill, 1859, pp. 21-22). this reflects precisely the intention behind the resources, but the students did not sustain their enquiry in order to pursue these initial thoughts. it seems as though the task is judged as ‘done’ when the students feel they have expended sufficient energy for a short task. earlier we noted the possibility of ‘pseudo-enquiries’ and this exchange seems to exemplify this. at the least, it indicates a very limited enquiry. another discussion illustrates the same point. in the following small group discussion in the same lesson, students unpacked the issue of polygamy much more thoroughly than the example cited above (in ‘opinions and restricted empathy’). having drawn a distinction between polygamy and polyamory, discussed the nature of secular government in diverse societies, considered attitudinal change over time and touched on the sexual politics of marriage, the conversation is suddenly closed down: speaker 2: decades ago you could have said the same thing about gay people, you know like when people might have said you can’t explain gay people to children, that was their perception of society. speaker 1: yes, that is very true. speaker 2: it will be interesting to see what the views on this will be in 30 years when… speaker 3: when we’re older, because it’s definitely more common now. l. jerome, a. liddle & h. young 19 speaker 2: exactly, and less frowned upon i think. speaker 1: shall we go to case study 3, what’s this, hindu complaints about tallow in the new £5 notes [reads information]. consensus reznitskaya and gregory (2013) argue that deliberation will help to shift students from simplistic single narratives about socio-political issues towards an understanding that there are multiple perspectives and explanations which can be evaluated against the evidence and the standards of rational argument. in other words, deliberative discussion should enable students to develop their epistemological understanding of social issues such as human rights. in this section we consider whether the search for a consensus might restrict the extent to which students engage in sustained critical argument. deliberative democracy often emphasises consensus, and in our research we were struck by how the assumption of group discussions was that they should come to a consensus to report to the teacher or to us, rather than that they should reflect on the complexity of the issue. this was closely related to the issue of task completion and an unwillingness to stay with the uncertainty (explored above). an emerging consensus can create strong social pressure for others to agree and so closes down possibilities for further exploration of different perspectives. as a consequence, some deliberative democrats, such as i. young (2002), challenge the focus on consensus and emphasise the importance of acknowledging and living with conflict and disagreement: too strong a commitment to consensus as a common good can incline some or all to advocate removing difficult issues from discussion for the sake of agreement and preservation of the common good. (i. young, 2002, p. 44) in the classroom context, mercer (1995) notes that talk quite often tends towards an uncritical consensus, as group members are interested in demonstrating recognition of others and maintaining positive social relations. critiquing one another, testing arguments, asking for evidence or seeking clarification can be perceived as an aggressive or disruptive challenge, especially when working with friends. this was reflected in our data, in conversational chains coded as ‘cumulative’ talk. the following extract from a small group discussion in stour grammar illustrates this. the group began with a case study of gay marriage and the church, and then moved into a more general discussion of attitudes towards lgbt+ relationships. speaker 2: basically, in this day and age, love is love. … speaker 1: our grandparents for example were born in a time when being gay was seen as being something bad [speaker 2: a crime]. my grandma, i went to her house and it was this time last year and like there were loads of shows on pride, and she was like, turn it off i don’t want to watch it, because that’s how they’ve been brought up. it’s nothing, it’s not, they don’t mean to be discriminatory. speaker 3: it’s just how they think. human rights education review – vol 4(1) 20 speaker 1: that’s how they were brought up, they have not been shown a different world. speaker 3: also now our grandparents they’re like 70, 80 [speaker 2: they’re fixed in their ways] yes, they’re not going to change are they? they’re not going to change. here the students simply build on previous statements to construct a shared worldview. they agree with one another, they extend earlier points, they interject to confirm their agreement, and they finish off one another’s thoughts. this may all genuinely reflect their understanding, but ultimately it does nothing to extend their understanding of the political process of liberation, and it seems to reflect a rather uncritical perception that rights simply come with the progressive passage of time. this marginalises the role of lgbt+ activists who struggled over generations to achieve these changes in the uk, and who continue to do so here and elsewhere. the easy consensus the students reached also precluded them from exploring the tensions that were illustrated in the case study material, where the church of england is exempted from the equalities act so that religious beliefs are not compromised by lgbt+ rights. sources of knowledge students tended to draw primarily on their own experiences and on the vicarious individual experiences of others (drawn from friends and family or the media). such experiences seemed to serve as additional case studies or examples to help reinforce a point. for example, in one discussion a student went to some length to describe her mother’s choice to be a more traditional ‘stay at home mum’. even though this seemed at first to be irrelevant to the conversation, which was actually about polygamy, she used the anecdote to make a point about how easily outsiders can misinterpret aspects of a relationship. by contrast, it was relatively rare for students to draw on knowledge from the school subjects they were studying. we noted just two exceptions where students did draw on knowledge from elsewhere in the curriculum. at stour gramma a student brought in previous knowledge from history: well when it was tudor times there was conflict between protestants and catholics and like the church of england and there was more of a gap between those before other religions were brought into the equation. so they seemed very different until compared with something else. here her background knowledge helped to generate some insight into how one might account for the pace of change in the legal framework for religious freedom. in avon school, the debating society students came from different year groups and therefore had different types of curriculum knowledge to share. some of these students were taking a-level subjects (the advanced courses generally studied by 16-18 year olds), and were able to share relevant insights from sociology and law to discuss different ways to think about how to define and deal with offensive speech in the context of respecting religious diversity. in these examples the students drew on relevant prior learning to expand their discussions. however, these few examples represent all the instances in our data and so the most significant finding here is how rarely students drew on what they had already learned in school. l. jerome, a. liddle & h. young 21 concluding remarks on knowledge and hre we have shared these findings and our discussion of them in the spirit of open and honest reflection on our hre practice. our data includes other examples of conversations which seemed to be more successful in some regards, but by focusing on instances where problems arose, we have attempted to sharpen up our critique of the project and its theoretical foundations. from such a small data set we cannot seek to make generalised statements about hre; rather we offer four insights that we have identified to inform future work as researchers, teachers, and resource writers. insight 1: we need to be more explicit about teaching human rights as a discourse that can usefully frame our consideration of socio-political issues we believe it has been fruitful to follow parker (2018) in exploring what it means to have learned ‘about’ human rights. we suggest that taking vygotsky’s distinction between everyday and scientific knowledge together with mercer’s (1995) understanding of learning to perceive and think with specialist discourses is a useful way to think about our aims in hre. whilst we thought we had a clear sense of what this meant within the deliberative classroom project, we now appreciate that it might be useful to be more explicit about this human rights discourse. the argument that one can teach through case studies to perennial issues is compellingly made by hess (2009) and we saw some examples of this in our data, but the reality of busy classrooms means these conceptual connections are not always thoroughly explored or understood. it has particularly struck us that a human rights discourse holds tensions and confusions (where does one draw the line between different rights?) and offers a process for working through those tensions. it does not so much provide students with ready answers, as operate as one powerful way to frame a problem and reason through the complexities. as they stand, the resources we have used (and many others with which we are familiar) do not address this. as a consequence, it is possible for students to simply note the tensions and move on, without learning how to work within a human rights discourse. this is compounded by the possibility that students can draw on everyday understandings to ‘solve’ these problems without using a human rights discourse. many of the conversations resolved the scenarios drawing on personal experience and morality, without the need to invoke specialist discourses, so there is a role here for being more explicit about what a human rights discourse does and why that is useful. insight 2: we need to attend to the connections between understanding human rights and the broader development of political understanding our reflections have clarified that an understanding of human rights discourse is a part of the broader project of political education. barton’s (2020) work makes the point that many students who have studied human rights still lack an understanding of how human rights are enacted through international and local institutions, and thus their understanding of political action is limited. however, we feel that this does not quite go far enough, as it merely identifies another block of facts that could be taught. whilst keet (2015) argued that we should move beyond a ‘declarationist’ approach and avoid simply teaching about human rights agreements, so we believe barton’s invitation to teach more content knowledge is similarly restrictive. following rowe (2005), we want to assert that political understanding is not just a facility with political concepts, nor grasping what constitutes the political human rights education review – vol 4(1) 22 discourse. we rather perceive it as an ability to understand that the same issues can be understood through multiple framings, and from multiple perspectives. in turn, this helps us to understand any particular case study as a site of conflicting interests, priorities, and perceptions. importantly, this approach to political understanding also enables one to engage with the ‘other’ in more authentic ways-acknowledging their perceptions through acts of cognitive empathy, rather than through universalizing emotional empathy, which can erase difference, and thus obscure politics. the students’ discussions here have clarified the rather obvious point that human rights thinking is inevitably also political thinking, but that some students avoid this through excessively individualised and emotional responses to problems. insight 3: deliberation and consensus-seeking may restrict critical engagement with others’ views and thus encourage a superficial engagement with the topic if processes are not clearly explained and modelled. both mcavoy and hess (2013) and barton and ho (2020) make a powerful case that classroom deliberation can foster critical enquiry and constructive argument. similarly, al-daraweeh and snauwaert (2018) assume that deliberative activities will lead to a deeper understanding of human rights discourse and how to build arguments about human rights. our experience here demonstrates that, even within highly structured deliberative classroom activities, students may engage in talk which undermines these aims. in those discussions where talk was more ‘exploratory’, students pushed one another to consider alternative views and occasionally tested one position against another, but the examples of ‘cumulative’ talk in the extracts demonstrate that some talk narrows the focus and replicates some aspects of the pseudo-enquiries and enclave deliberation discussed above. this suggests the resources might usefully include a more explicit and structured focus on giving reasons and evidence, and allow them to be tested and analysed by the group. this requires teachers to focus on the deliberative process rather than a conclusive outcome. not only does this engage more with underlying perennial issues, but it seems to model a form of political reasoning which reveals the distinctive nature of political understanding, and also demonstrates how it is practically useful in the light of conflict and difference. deliberative discussion may well develop an argument schema, and thus contribute to an understanding of the process of reasoning through a human rights discourse, but this is not inevitable. insight 4: interdisciplinary perspectives are helpful but may need to be facilitated more deliberately as students do not spontaneously make connections between hre and other relevant school knowledge the students’ limited range of knowledge in these discussions reinforces how the application of prior learning might benefit from more deliberate practice. here we were undoubtedly hampered by the fact that the sessions we observed and recorded were one-off, short-lived projects that were not embedded in longer-term schemes of work. as mercer (1995) points out, it is more likely that students will learn to think with discourses as they become more familiar with them and the kinds of conversations they enable. nevertheless, this data has made us reflect on the challenge of connecting to relevant specialist knowledge and the problems with revisiting relevant curriculum content. the fact that only one student related their lesson to the history of the reformation indicated that although the other year 8 students in this school had covered the same history, they had not perceived it to be l. jerome, a. liddle & h. young 23 useful or relevant. the specialist knowledge that constitutes the human rights discourse is interdisciplinary, drawing on history, politics, sociology, economics and ethics. students may encounter this through history, geography, religious education, citizenship and other school subjects, but we cannot assume this knowledge will be drawn on by students without support. in this article, we have explored the ways that students responded to the deliberative classroom resources. those resources sought to build on keets’ (2015) warnings about a potentially conservative over-emphasis on declarationist knowledge and so focused on critical engagement with complex issues, rather than focusing primarily on teaching about human rights agreements and organisations. our use of diverse case studies reflected a commitment to engaging with others’ experiences and perspectives (adami, 2014; osler & zhu, 2011) and through these case studies we sought to engage with the concepts that underpin hre (parker, 2018). in reflecting on our experience we have argued, first, that there is a need to be more explicit about what human rights can do (and the power of a human rights discourse), with a stronger recognition of both the value of scientific knowledge as a powerful complement to everyday knowledge and the tensions within a rights discourse. second, hre must enable students to recognise the broader political context beyond just focusing on empathising with individual cases or acquiring information about political institutions (barton, 2020). third, we suggest educators need to be explicit about the process of deliberative discussions over the outcome and avoid a push for conclusive answers. fourth, educators need to support students to draw on knowledge from a range of disciplines. if these issues are not addressed, some students are able to engage in rights-based discussions with little knowledge and understanding of rights. acknowledgments this project was funded by the british academy (srg\170492). we would like to thank two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments. human rights education review – vol 4(1) 24 references association for citizenship teaching. 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(2016). curriculum and the specialization of knowledge: studies in the sociology of education. abingdon: routledge https://doi-org.ezproxy.mdx.ac.uk/10.1177%2f1746197911417414 https://doi.org/10.1080/00933104.2019.1595240 http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2450 https://doi.org/10.1080/00461520.2013.775898 https://doi.org/10.3102%2f0013189x015002004 http://www.yalelawjournal.org/essay/deliberative-trouble-why-groups-go-to-extremes http://www.yalelawjournal.org/essay/deliberative-trouble-why-groups-go-to-extremes https://doi.org/10.1080/10361140802267290 https://doi.org/10.1177%2f1741143215595415 analyses and solutions for solving the citizenship and civic education dilemma in multicultural nations and global contexts issn: 2535-5406 vol 5, no 2 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4711 date of publication 08-06-2022 © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org book and media reviews analyses and solutions for solving the citizenship and civic education dilemma in multicultural nations and global contexts banks, james a. (2020). diversity, transformative knowledge, and civic education. selected essays. london & new york: routledge. 235 pp., £29.59 (paperback) isbn: 978-0-367-86319-7; £96.00 (hardback) isbn: 978-0-367-86320-3; £29.59 (e-book) isbn: 978-1-003-01836-0 reviewed by jenni helakorpi university of helsinki, finland, jenni.helakorpi@helsinki.fi this book is a collection of essays by professor james a. banks, from different points in his career. its point of departure is the citizenship education dilemma of how to teach ‘democratic ideas and values within such social, political, economic, and educational contexts that contradict democratic values and beliefs’ contexts where unjust power relations such as sexism, racism and social-class stratification are embedded (p. 6). to approach this dilemma, the essays are organized into three broad themes: 1) race, knowledge construction and transformative curriculum reform; 2) cultural democracy and civic education in diverse nations; and 3) diversity, global migration and civic education. in what follows, i elaborate on each of these in turn. part 1, race, knowledge construction, and transformative curriculum reform, includes three essays which analyse knowledge construction and knowing from diverse perspectives. in the essays, banks analyses knowledge construction from multiple perspectives, taking knowledge about race as a starting point. he conducts historical analysis, elaborates on the positionality http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4711 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ hrer book and media reviews 124 of researchers and discusses the impact of researchers’ lived lives on their knowledge construction. banks provides a very practical outline of the nature of knowing and knowledge and the interrelation of objectivity and subjectivity in knowledge construction—and this account also contains a description of his own epistemological journey. he argues that understanding how knowledge is constructed is part of the process of learning and internalizing democratic ideals. he also states that understanding how knowledge is constructed, how subjectivity and objectivity are interrelated in knowledge and how power works within knowledge construction, will equip students with skills that enable them ‘to participate in the construction of knowledge that will help the nation to actualize its democratic ideals’ (p. 60). in the two essays in part 2, cultural democracy and civic education in diverse nations, banks approaches the dilemmas of multiculturalism, the nation state, the global context and the possibilities of civic education. he argues that civic education, in mirroring cultural democracy, renders an individual’s full participation in a nation’s civic life possible (p. 99). the first essay was written in 1982 and the second in 2009. written at very different times, these essays complement each other, and it is interesting to read them together. banks addresses the question of multiple identities, the sense of belonging, and of being part of the nation state. in the essay from 1982, banks writes about the goal of fostering an engaged american citizenry and he reflects on how young people can develop an american national identity while having multiple identities. he observes that schools should enable students to develop a commitment to a nation’s political ideals as well as to achieve such competencies that enable participation in the nation’s civic life. banks also addresses the question of citizenship education within the global context. he believes that having a healthy cultural identification enables the individual to have a healthy national identification that, in turn, enables a positive and reflexive global identification (p. 109). in the second essay of this section, banks writes about the changed context of intensified global migration. he finds that citizenship education needs to be transformed because of this ‘deepening diversity’ (p. 114). what banks absolutely argues against is assimilationist notions of citizenship; instead, he wants to develop multicultural citizenship and cultural democracy as the basis for civic education. he ends the essay with a practical educational tool, stages of cultural development typology, which he hopes teachers can use to help students to ‘attain higher stages of cultural development and develop clarified cultural, national, and regional global identifications’ (p. 123). in part 3, diversity, global migration, and civic education, banks dives deeper into the questions of migration and civic education, and the concept of citizenship. in the first essay in this section, he analyses and describes different understandings of citizenship, and the way they exclude certain ethnically or racially minoritized groups. banks introduces a citizenship typology which has four stages: legal, minimal, active, and transformative citizenship. the aim hrer book and media reviews 125 is to educate students toward a transformative citizenship where they promote values and moral principles such as social justice and equality (p. 147). here banks provides a solution to the citizenship education dilemma: when transformative citizenship education is implemented, students experience democracy in classrooms and schools, and this is how the internalization of democratic beliefs and values is accomplished. moreover, in the second essay of this third section, banks describes another typology of citizenship where transformative citizenship is also the goal. this typology includes failed citizenship, recognized citizenship, participatory citizenship, and transformative citizenship. the concept of failed citizenship that banks brings to the discussion is interesting. he analyses the role of school in failed citizenship and connects it, for instance, to radicalization. failed citizenship does not refer to persons failing; instead, banks refers to the structures and institutions that marginalize and exclude individuals from becoming full citizens (160). in this chapter banks also relies on implementing transformative citizenship education in schools, and he describes interventions that educators can utilize. in the book’s final essay, banks continues to examine the conceptualizing of civic education for noncitizens. he recognizes a gap in current citizenship education research if civic education for noncitizens is not considered. this collection is vast and enables the reader to contemplate the question of civic and citizenship education from multiple perspectives. the book has a lot to give to both researchers and practitioners within civic education. the captivating texts move from theory to practice and from history to the contemporary scene. however, it would have been interesting if there had also been an essay elaborating in more depth the question of school and its limitations or paradoxes for transformative citizenship or civic education. i would also have wished for a critical elaboration of such values or ways of being that the students may have to internalize in order to become transformative citizens, but which are counterproductive to the very goal of justice and democracy. it would be interesting to further examine the paradoxes of becoming transformative citizens. the last essay ends by discussing civic education for minoritized citizens and noncitizens. i would have been happy if there had also been a text on transformative citizenship education for majoritised students. banks refers to the discussion, but wants to concentrate on ethnically, racially and linguistically minoritized students in this collection. although i understand the limitations of one collection, i do believe that a more in-depth discussion on whiteness and transformative citizenship and the dynamics of transformative citizenship of majoritised students and minoritized students could have made this collection even more wide-ranging in its analysis of the citizenship and civic education dilemma. analyses and solutions for solving the citizenship and civic education dilemma in multicultural nations and global contexts issn 2535-5406 vol 5, no 1 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4456 date received: 10-05-2021 date accepted: 17-11-2021 peer reviewed article © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles human rights and children’s rights in worldview education in finland eero salmenkivi university of helsinki, finland, eero.salmenkivi@helsinki.fi tuija kasa university of helsinki, finland niina putkonen university of helsinki, finland arto kallioniemi university of helsinki, finland abstract in this article we examine the profiling of human rights and children’s rights in religious education (re) and its secular alternative in finland. we use the term ‘worldview education’ to describe the combination of these subjects. we analyse what kinds of human rights and ethical issues are raised in finnish worldview education. one specific focus is the explicit mention of human rights and children’s rights in the worldview education section of the finnish national core curriculum (2014). we conclude that the curriculum gives plenty of space to human rights and children’s rights, and that this enables one to conceive of human rights as being an overarching ethical perspective in worldview education. nevertheless, we indicate that the organisation of worldview education in finland has some problems when it comes to the realisation of children’s freedom of thought, conscience, and religion. keywords human rights, children’s rights, ethics, human rights education, religious education, worldview education http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4456 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:eero.salmenkivi@helsinki.fi human rights education review – volume 5(1) 48 introduction global and local societal trends, such as the rise of autocratisation, polarisation and populism, have underlined how important it is for schools and teachers to advance knowledge of human rights) and knowledge about important aspects of the constitutional state. human rights education (hre) has the potential to increase this knowledge. in finland, human rights were strengthened in the latest curricula reforms from early childhood to the upper secondary school (finnish national agency for education [fnae], 2018; 2019). our interest in this study is the human rights and children’s rights issues that arise in finnish worldview education. in analysing the finnish curriculum we focus on the national core curriculum for basic education (fnae 2014). this covers grades 1-9 (7to 16-year-olds). our analytical framework draws on müller’s (2009) definition of explicit and implicit forms of human rights education. the finnish school system is very homogenous; in basic education more than 96% of schools are municipal and practically all schools follow the national core curriculum. we use the collective term ‘worldview education’ to describe the education provided by religious education (re) and its secular alternative—culture, worldview and ethics (cwe). re is a compulsory subject in basic and general upper secondary education in finland, but the different syllabi for re and those for cwe are alternatives for pupils, and instruction in all of them is non-confessional in principle. a teacher can in theory teach any combination of worldview education subjects if he or she has the relevant university degree, because the teacher’s own worldview or religious community membership is not supposed to influence the non-confessional instruction (see e.g. seppo, 2003, p. 184). in basic education there are currently 10 different re syllabi and one for cwe. we describe this system in more detail below. we focus on these questions: 1) how are human rights and children’s rights profiled in the 2014 finnish national core curriculum for basic education, particularly in worldview education? 2) what kinds of human rights and ethical issues does the finnish worldview education system raise? human rights, children’s rights and human rights education human rights and hre can be defined from many perspectives. hre has moral, legal, political, and practical levels. in finland, like in many other european countries, there are continuous disputes related to the role of religion, secularism or worldview in the public institution of the school (see poulter, kuusisto, malama & kallioniemi, 2017; poulter, 2019). from the legal perspective, human rights are a part of public law, and this is relevant to the teacher as a public authority figure and schools as public spaces. hre has been criticised for overemphasising law, being considered ‘declarationist’ (keet, e. salmenkivi, t. kasa, n. putkonen, a. kallioniemi 49 2012, p. 7), uncritical and apolitical (zembylas & keet, 2019). without reducing hre to ‘declarationism’, we want to maintain an awareness of the legal principles of human rights in this article. there are many reasons for this. lundy and martínez sainz (2018) have argued that neglecting the legal knowledge aspect of teaching children’s rights is problematic. research has shown that in finland this neglect is a disquieting fact: the judicial base has been neglected in hre (human rights centre, 2014); teachers and students have not understood human rights but have seen them as ’obvious yet alien’ (matilainen, 2011); domestic human rights problems have been neglected (toivanen, 2007); and student teachers have wished for explicit teaching of human rights and children’s rights (kasa, rautiainen, malama & kallioniemi, 2021). our approach does not reduce human rights and conflicts to legal issues, nor is human rights law considered ’pure’ or neutral in the sense that it does not have biases. the european court of human rights decisions, for example, have been criticised for being biased against muslim minorities (pirjola, 2011). from the legal perspective, human rights are a part of international and national public law. in finland, human rights are included in the constitution (1999/731) as fundamental rights (§ 6-21) and § 22 states that public authorities must protect them. in section § 6 equality there is a special mention that ’children shall be treated equally and as individuals and they shall be allowed to influence matters pertaining to themselves to a degree corresponding to their level of development’ (constitution 1999/731, § 6.3). additionally, finland has ratified the european convention on human rights (echr) in 1990, the convention on the rights of the child (crc) in 1991, and 16 human rights treaties (see office of the high commissioner of human rights [ohchr], 2021). the crc (united nations, 1989) is the widest and most readily ratified convention in the world (howe & cowell, 2010, p. 92). it sets minimum standards to secure children’s rights in education; these include educating children about their rights as part of the formal school curriculum and creating a culture that reflects the principles of crc (osler & starkey, 1998, p. 313). these principles concern the best interests of the child (article 3), non-discrimination (article 2), the inherent right to life (article 6), and age-appropriate participation. participation means the right to be heard and the views of the child to be considered ’in accordance with the age and maturity of the child’ (article 12) (united nations committee on the rights of the child [uncrc], 2003, p. 12; howe & cowell, 2010, p. 93). sormunen (2021) has found that the legal interpretation of the concept of the best interests of the child varies and suggests a processual approach to the concept rather than trying to define it substantially. between 2001 and 2014, finnish supreme administrative court precedents related to children’s education did not show a profound awareness of the child’s interests and rights (sormunen, 2021, p. 199). this finding should be seen in the wider context of a lack of human rights knowledge in the field of education. the best interests of the child are not generally recognised as an human rights education review – volume 5(1) 50 obligation, although they ‘shall be a primary consideration’ in ‘all actions concerning children’ (crc, article 3.1., emphasis added). in soft law, at the declarational level, the right to have an education which strengthens respect for human rights is stated in the universal declaration of human rights (udhr) (united nations, 1948, article 26.2). the specific right to hre is defined in the universal declaration on human rights education and training (united nations, 2011), in which hre is defined in article 2.2 as education about, through and for human rights. on the ratification level, article 13(1) of the international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights (icescr) (united nations, 1966b) states that education shall be directed to the development of human personality to a sense of its dignity and shall strengthen respect for human rights. according to crc’s article 29 (b), the education of the child shall be directed to the development of respect for human rights. article 42 says that states parties shall undertake to make the convention widely known to adults and children. in the finnish context, definitions of implicit and explicit hre are relevant, since previous studies suggest that hre has only been implicit in finland (human rights centre, 2014; matilainen, 2011; kasa et al., 2021). müller defines explicit hre as referring to aspects of the hre ‘canon’, such as international norms and mechanisms. on the other hand, implicit forms of hre may focus on human rights problems, social relations and actions in the spirit of human rights, without specific reference to human rights documents (müller, 2009, pp. 8-9). we acknowledge that legal knowledge is not always the best pedagogical approach and that spiritual and implicit approaches may be good in various pedagogical settings. educational systems may implicitly enhance human dignity and encourage students to act to protect human rights (müller, 2009, pp. 8-9). however, neglecting legal knowledge in hre or when teaching children about children’s rights (cf. lundy & martínez sainz, 2018) may produce an inaccurate discourse. it may, for example, reduce child rights to some rosy talk about participation or ‘pupil voice’ (lundy, 2013), or discussion of values or lifestyle that is disengaged from concrete legal consequences (lundy & martínez sainz, 2018, p. 15)— discourse that is detached from actual international political and societal structures. inaccurate discourse may also reduce human rights to mere opinions or a vague range of related topics (democracy, participation, values, encounters, co-operation, etc.). furthermore, it diminishes the understanding of human rights problems in terms of one’s own context (cf. lundy & martínez sainz, 2018). it is important that the management and staff of educational institutions (osler & starkey, 1998)—teachers and principals—understand that human rights are binding law and not just empty rhetoric (toivanen, 2007, p. 43). e. salmenkivi, t. kasa, n. putkonen, a. kallioniemi 51 the finnish way of organising religious education and children’s freedom of religion and conscience after the second world war there has been turbulence around re in more and more pluralistic european states. this has led to different approaches (see e.g., grimmitt, 2000; jackson, 2014; stoeckl, 2015). it has even been suggested that ‘it might sometimes be appropriate to talk about the existence of religious educations in the plural’ (berglund & gent, 2019, p. 324). the historical roots of the organisation of re in finland can be traced back to when finland gained its independence, in 1917. the evangelical lutheran church played a notable part in the formation of finnish society and the school system (e.g. poulter, 2013). independence was followed by a civil war between whites and reds. this continuing cultural clash had a religious dimension (pikkusaari, 1998) and, together with an urge for reconciliation in the building of a new nation, led to a specifically finnish way of organising re. finnish re is based on membership and is compulsory for members of the majority lutheran church. pupils and students who are not members of the religious majority can be exempted from lutheran re and either have their own re or an optional secular alternative (salmenkivi, elo, tomperi & ahola-luttila, 2007). the secular alternative to re came to the fore with the hartikainen v. finland complaint to the un human rights committee (1981) that the curriculum of the subject designed for those released from lutheran re still had a largely lutheran content. due to this complaint, finland changed the curriculum and created a genuinely secular alternative subject (elämänkatsomustieto [finnish], livsåskådningskunskap [swedish] in english officially called ‘ethics’ until 2019, and subsequently ‘culture, worldview and ethics’) (salmenkivi et al. 2007, pp. 131-132; scheinin, 1998, p. 384). finland has had a very strong tradition of public schooling. in 2019, 2,172 schools providing basic education were municipal, while there were only 66 private schools (vipunen, 2019). if private schools receive state funding they are also obliged to prepare their curricula to confirm to the national core curriculum. just under 20 of private schools are religious, one jewish and the rest christian (mainly free church); about half provide an alternative pedagogy (mainly steiner schools) (vipunen, 2019). finland had a constitutional reform in 1995 related to the ratification of the echr in 1990. in the revised finnish constitution (1999/731, § 11) re became non-compulsory and nonconfessional: ‘no one is under the obligation, against his or her conscience, to participate in the practice of a religion’. this change was made because the constitutional committee of the parliament (perustuslakivaliokunta, 1982) considered confessional re to be a religious practice. the finnish parliament revised the freedom of religion act as well as school laws to comply with the new constitution, in 2003. re had to change: it could either be compulsory or confessional, but not both. the solution was simple: re was given in accordance with one’s human rights education review – volume 5(1) 52 own religion, based on membership of a religious community, but was no longer confessional. in practice, however, everything stayed as before, except that the law stated that re was not to be confessional anymore (seppo, 2003, p. 181). all re in finland is non-confessional, although it is based on membership of a religious community. connecting non-confessional re to religious membership appears to be an extreme case of the nordic way of ‘belonging without believing’, which grace davie contrasts with the british way of ‘believing without belonging’. the point is that in the nordic lutheran state church tradition ‘what the scandinavians believe in is, in fact, belonging. membership of their respective national churches forms an important part of nordic identity.’ (davie, 2000, p. 3; see also casanova, 2013; witte, 2013). it is natural in this tradition that even faith-based national re core curricula are issued by fnae, the finnish national agency for education. in practice, fnae cooperates with religious communities in the process of constructing a new re core curriculum for each religion, but the power to make decisions about both cooperation and curricula is with fnae (kallioniemi, 2007, p. 60; slotte, 2013, p. 340). nordic countries share a similar lutheran tradition, one in which the ties between church and state run deep (slotte, 2013, p. 333). however, re in public schools is organised differently in finland than in its nordic neighbours, which have integrated re models (slotte, 2010, pp. 252254; 2013, p. 343). slotte discusses some of the problems of the complicated finnish model (slotte, 2010, p. 254; 2013, pp. 340-342), but suggests that the finnish system of organising ‘non-confessional re along confessional lines’ may allow some additional safeguards for religious freedom (slotte, 2013, pp. 350-351). since the 1990s, immigration has increased religious plurality in finnish schools (see e.g., åhs 2020, pp. 16-17). in the finnish model, this could lead to multiple new re syllabi, because in theory any registered religious community can have its own re classes if there are at least three comprehensive school-aged children belonging to it in the same municipality (basic education act, section 13, 2003/454). currently, there are five different syllabi for different christian denominations (adventist, catholic, lutheran, pentecostal, and orthodox). five other religions (bahá’í, buddhism, islam, judaism, and krishna [iskcon]) (fnae, 2014; fnae, 2020) have one syllabus each, although there are, for example, dozens of registered islamic religious communities in finland. however, the majority of finland’s 110,000-120,000 muslims are not members of a registered religious community (konttori & pauha, 2021, pp. 237-238). the different re subjects and the secular subject of culture, worldview and ethics are subsumed under the term ‘worldview education’. the concept of worldview is complex and multifaceted (e.g. jackson 2014, pp. 27-31, 67-75; lemettinen, hirvonen & ubani, 2021, pp. 537-541; van der kooij, de ruyter & miedema, 2013). it is also a contested concept, both internationally (e.g. bråten & everington, 2019; freathy & john, 2019; lewin, 2017, pp. 450, e. salmenkivi, t. kasa, n. putkonen, a. kallioniemi 53 453) and in finland (e.g. åhs, 2020, pp. 69–84; lemettinen et al., 2021, pp. 539-540). however, in this article we only use ‘worldview education’ as an umbrella term for our findings concerning human rights and children’s rights in the finnish national basic education core curriculums of re and its secular alternative (see åhs 2020, pp. 31-34). section 11 of the finnish constitution (1999/731) guarantees freedom of religion and conscience. this right also applies to minors (hakalehto, 2018, section 13.4). additionally, crc (article 14.1) safeguards a child’s freedom of thought, conscience and religion. article 30 safeguards the right of children belonging to minorities to practise their religion. freedom of religion and conscience is also stated in the echr (council of europe, 1950, article 9) and the international covenant on civil and political rights (united nations, 1966a, article 18). on the other hand, udhr states that parents have the right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children (united nations, 1948, article 26.3). the parents’ right to choose their children’s religious and moral upbringing is stated in the icescr (united nations, 1966b, article 13) and article 2 of protocol no. 1 to the echr. according to crc, a child is the holder of the right to freedom of conscience and religion (crc, article 14; hakalehto, 2018). the parents’ or legal guardians’ task is to ‘provide direction to the child in the exercise of his or her right in a manner consistent with the evolving capacities of the child’ (crc, article 14.2). the act on the freedom of religion (2003/453) in finland also guarantees special rights for parents or guardians. according to article 3, the guardians decide a child’s religious affiliation. after a child turns 12, guardians need his or her written consent to change the child’s religious affiliation. a child who has attained the age of 15 years may join a religious community or resign from one, but he or she still needs a written consent from his or her guardians. only 18-year-olds can make decisions by themselves. this is also the case with schools and education: the organisation of a child’s religious education or secular alternative is under the parents’ control in the finnish system. a pupil or student who is a member of the evangelicallutheran church, the majority religion, must attend lutheran re even if this might not be in accordance with his or her own view. pupils who are members of lutheran or orthodox churches are automatically directed to their own re instruction and can only choose between the majority and their own re. this means that lutherans who are normally the majority do not have any choice and the orthodox can only choose their own orthodox or lutheran re. re instruction based on another background must by requested by the families, but they have more options: in addition to the majority lutheran re and their own re they can choose cwe and even full exemption from school re (hakalehto, 2018). human rights education review – volume 5(1) 54 human rights and children’s rights in finnish curricula human rights are referred to as a value basis, and their inclusion and transmission are obligatory in the finnish core curricula for basic education (fnae, 2014), early childhood education (fnae, 2018), and general upper secondary school education (fnae, 2019). in our analysis, we concentrate on the national core curriculum for basic education, which was approved in 2014 (fnae, 2014). it covers the education of the entire age group of 7 to 16year-olds, in grades 1–9. we have analysed the explicit mentions of human rights and children’s rights in fnae 2014, but focus on the role of these rights in the structure of the curriculum and in worldview education. the commitment to human rights and children’s rights is strong in the general part of the national core curriculum for basic education—the part of the document which introduces the background, values, and goals of basic education. human rights are mentioned nine times and children’s rights seven times (fnae, 2014, pp. 12-19). human rights treaties and declarations—including the crc, the echr, the icescr, the un convention on the rights of persons with disabilities, and the un declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples—are also specifically listed as obligations for organising schooling (fnae, 2014, pp. 13-14). the national core curriculum for basic education 2014 has marked structural elements that aspire to bridge the gap that might easily emerge between the general parts of the national curricula and subject-based syllabi. these parts also contain references to human rights and children’s rights that concentrate on transversal competence, for example: ‘school work systematically promotes the recognition and appreciation of human rights and, in particular, the rights of the child, and actions indicated by these rights’ (fnae, 2014, pp. 20-21). in our analysis we will concentrate on re and cwe, although the syllabi of other subjects contain many references to human rights and children’s rights. the only difference between the syllabi of different religious groups is in the specifications of content areas; everything else, including objectives and assessment criteria, is identical. however, the objectives and content areas often contain the expression ‘the studied religion’, thus implying different objectives and content. for example, grade units 7-9 objective 2 is ‘to guide the pupil to deepen his or her knowledge of the studied religion and its impacts’ (fnae, 2014, p. 483). the knowledge content will depend on the re study group—e.g., lutheran christianity, islam or judaism —that students belong to. all the different re syllabi share the same three key content areas:  c1 the pupil’s relationship with his or her own religion  c2 the world of religions  c3 the good life e. salmenkivi, t. kasa, n. putkonen, a. kallioniemi 55 in the common part of re instruction, ‘human rights’ is mentioned as an instruction objective for all grade units (1–2, 3–6 and 7–9). human rights and children’s rights are included in content area c3, ‘the good life’, which situates the themes of human rights education as ethical re issues. the relevant parts of both objectives and contents are collected in table 1. table 1: human rights as objectives of instruction and explicit content areas in the common religious education curriculum grades objective of instruction content areas explicitly related to human rights and children’s rights 1–2 o6: to guide the pupil to be fair, to empathise with other people’s situations, and to respect other people’s thoughts and convictions as well as human rights the pupils are given a preliminary introduction to the rights of the child and what they mean. the crc and holistic human well-being are taken into account when selecting contents. 3–6 o9: to guide the pupil to understand the inherent values of human rights and, in particular, the crc from the perspective of the individual and the community the crc is discussed in class. 7–9 o6: to guide the pupil to become acquainted with the key concepts of ethical thinking and human rights as well as the ethical principles of the studied religion and other religions and worldviews the ethics of the studied religion and other religions and worldviews as well as the udhr are emphasised. human rights violations, such as the holocaust, are also examined. while content can be categorised as ‘implicit’ in grades 1–2, according to müller’s distinction, the objective is more explicit. grade units 3–6 and 7–9 are explicit both in objective and in content. in the grade instructions the formulations are explicit. human rights and children’s rights in the cwe curriculum are presented in the same way as in re. human rights has always had a central role in cwe, but when the subject was launched in 1985 there was no similar emphasis in re (national board of education, 1985, pp. 113–130). the 21st century commitment to human rights and children’s rights in finnish re makes re syllabi similar to secular cwe. human rights education review – volume 5(1) 56 table 2: human rights as objectives of instruction and explicit content areas in the culture, worldview and ethics curriculum grades objective of instruction content areas related to objectives 1–2 pupils are given a preliminary introduction to the rights of the child and the child’s status in different communities. 3–6 o9: to guide the pupil to learn about the human rights that are ethically based on the udhr in particular the rights of the child they examine the rights of the child and reflect on their realisation in their own lives and elsewhere in the world. 7–9 o5: to guide the pupil to become aware of freedom of belief as a human right, as well as the national and international means for securing it o10: to guide the pupil to become aware of the significance and ethical foundation of human dignity, human rights, and human equality pupils become acquainted with human dignity, human rights, and equality. they familiarise themselves with the development of human rights and human rights violations, such as the holocaust. human rights as an overarching ethics the strong commitment to human rights and children’s rights in the general parts of the curriculum is clearly reflected in worldview education. this means that human rights and children’s rights provide an overarching curricular ethics. this is understandable, given the modern plurality of worldviews and the different cultural and social bases of morality. it is, however, an approach that could be considered clearly secular. the relationship between lutheranism and secularity is a moot point, and this approach might also be acceptable from a lutheran ‘two kingdoms’ perspective (witte, 2013; see also casanova, 2013; riitaoja, poulter & kuusisto, 2010). in the finnish context, however, a secular ethics has been opposed by the lutheran church (salmenkivi et al., 2007, pp. 128–129; slotte 2013, pp. 365–366). the last time such an overall ethical approach was proposed, in 2010, ‘finnish churches and religious communities concurred in their denunciation of the draft proposal’ (slotte, 2013, p. 266). e. salmenkivi, t. kasa, n. putkonen, a. kallioniemi 57 some researchers have also suggested that human rights compete with religions, arguing that they are just one religion among many (bahmanpour, 2004; palva, 2004, pp. 115–116) or a sacralised discourse (casanova, 2013, pp. 29, 32). from the perspectives of moral anthropology and cultural psychology, richard a. schweder (schweder et al., 2003) has suggested that there is a ‘big three of morality’, consisting of ‘values associated with autonomy (freedom of choice, freedom from harm, equality), community (duty, hierarchy, interdependency, loyalty, sacrifice) and divinity (purity, sanctity, cleanliness, sacred order)’ (shweder & menon, 2014, p. 358). in this context, religious ethics might be seen to emphasise community and divinity, while human rights emphasise autonomy. however, things are not that simple. human rights actors have often been accused of having a western individualistic and rationalistic bias. one particular aspect of this critique has been the position of children. in childhood studies and research on children’s rights there are new relational approaches in understanding children (e.g. klasson sundin, 2016). this is obviously related to the question of how to understand a child as a rightsholder in children’s rights (klasson sundin, 2016, pp. 81–86). this kind of approach seems promising when it comes to many of the ethical issues we discuss in this article (klasson sundin, 2016, pp. 186–197). in whatever way we understand children as rights holders in the children’s rights discourse, there is a further point concerning children in the 2014 finnish national core curriculum for basic education. the first value of basic education is the uniqueness of each pupil: ‘each pupil is unique and valuable just as he or she is. each pupil has the right to grow into his or her full potential as a human being and a member of society’ (fnae, 2014, p. 14). this appears to focus on the individual in relation to, for example, religious traditions, and this might be one of the reasons why human rights and children’s rights are natural common denominators of all ethics in worldview education. this does not, however, mean that the common ethical doctrines of various religions will be neglected in re. for example, the objectives for grades 3–6 are: ‘to guide the pupil to become acquainted with the ethical teachings of the studied religion and the common ethical principles of different religions’ (fnae, 2014, p. 284). in the case of religious ethics an inclusion of ‘obligations’ is added to hre in some re syllabi (e.g., fnae, 2014, p. 151). teachers have been suspicious of teaching rights if they are detached from responsibilities (cassidy, brunner & webster, 2013). this has led to miseducating children about their rights by overemphasising their responsibilities. although responsibilities are connected to rights, it has been argued that students should have the opportunity to find the connection themselves (howe & covell, 2010). robert jackson has argued (2019, pp. 119–120) for the inclusion of human rights education review – volume 5(1) 58 duties or responsibilities in the ethical education of re in addition to more explicit hre. he refers to the interaction council of former world leaders who have launched a universal declaration of human responsibilities, which ‘seeks to bring freedom and responsibility into balance’ (interaction council, 1997, p. 1). the interaction council has clearly been aiming at a universal ethics which can be approved by representatives of the major religions (giacomazzi, 2005, p. 170). many human rights actors have had certain reservations concerning the project (amnesty international 1998; giacomazzi 2005, pp. 172–173). the general question of using the language of rights in ethics is complicated (see wenar, 2021, chapter 7.2), but adding responsibilities to human rights-based ethics education does not seem to adequately respect human rights concepts. firstly, human rights are intrinsically linked to obligations of different actors (scheinin, 2014, p. 269) and human rights law focuses on the state as duty-bearer (e.g. scheinin, 2013, chapter 3). article 28 of udhr already contains many of the core obligations at both the social and the international level (eide, 1998), and article 29 explicitly mentions the duties of individuals. these issues are obviously complicated (opsahl & dimitrijevic, 1998), and the case of the rights, freedoms and duties of children is a particular conundrum (see e.g. klasson sundin, 2016, pp. 59–61), but the intrinsic conceptual connection between rights and responsibilities is essential in human rights. secondly, it does not acknowledge that the current human rights discourse is intimately connected with the contingent global historical, political, and societal developments and structures over the last hundred years. ethical and political dialogue and the implementation of various human rights mechanisms since 1945 have created, via explicit human rights instruments, a contingent, but real, societal backdrop for human rights ethics which cannot be sidestepped. finally, it misses the pedagogical chance for pupils and students to ponder the complicated and intriguing relations between the concepts of rights and responsibilities. human rights education’s curriculum problem and powerful knowledge hre’s curriculum problem, as formulated by walter parker (2018), is clearly present in the hre of finnish worldview education. parker (2018) argues that hre lacks a disciplinary structure created in a specialist community: ‘[t]he hre curriculum remains scattered, ill-defined, and too variable to be robust’ (parker, 2018, p. 5). on the one hand, parker refers to the need for local approval and the importance of the curriculum having legitimacy. this is what finnish worldview education appears to offer. on the other hand, he (2018, pp. 11–14) refers to the need for a background episteme, i.e., powerful knowledge about the subject matter allowing a construction of a curriculum that enables the structured teaching of knowledge, skills, and attitudes. e. salmenkivi, t. kasa, n. putkonen, a. kallioniemi 59 powerful knowledge is a concept created by michael young who, in the 1970s, was one of the pioneers of ‘the new sociology of education’. young tried to raise ‘questions about what might be meant by the notion of knowledge being socially organized or constructed. …how knowledge is organized and made available in curricula’ (young 1971, p. 19). politically, the idea was to criticise traditional ‘undersocialised epistemology´ (gericke, hudson, olin-scheller & stolare, 2018, p. 430) from the standpoint of social justice. by the end of the millennium, however, drawing upon postmodernist and constructivist perspectives, an oversocialised voice discourse (moore & muller, 1999, pp. 190–192) had developed. this had also become a threat to the idea of good education for all, because the concept of knowledge had almost become lost. thus, young (2008) suggested that knowledge be given a central place again— at the same time, there should be a continued awareness of its epistemological structure and social construction. this powerful knowledge is a specialised kind, one that is differentiated from and more powerful than everyday knowledge. it creates a third way to build curricula, between traditional academic elitist epistemological and postmodern and/or social constructionist approaches (young & lambert, 2014). powerful knowledge is often associated with science and mathematics, but young (2013, p. 108) explicitly argues that there can be a powerful knowledge of ethics. there are particular worries concerning hre (see parker, 2018; jerome, liddle & young, 2021). one of them is that hre is not a school subject. for example, in the finnish national core curriculum for basic education 2014 this tends to lead to the goals and contents of hre being mentioned in a somewhat scattered manner. crossing subject boundaries in search of powerful knowledge is, however, not impossible (jerome et al., 2021, pp. 20, 22; niemelä, 2020). naturally, the work of hre curriculum design on these lines is in its beginning, but our analysis of finnish re curricula shows the kind of pitfalls to avoid. the syllabi of grades 7–9 do not mention children’s rights at all in worldview education, except once in a list of human rights documents in the orthodox syllabus. it is a glaring oversight that the strongly endorsed crc is dropped at this critical stage; one would expect that pupils would deepen their understanding. of the four central principles of the crc (uncrc, 2003, para 12) the one connected with article 12—that the child has the right to express his or her views freely in ‘all matters affecting the child’ and that these views are given due weight—would appear to demand a greater focus in secondary education, when children’s understandings and responsibilities are growing. therefore, this omission is very detrimental. from the pedagogical point of view, it is quite understandable that adolescents are not called children, as they might easily take it as a grave insult. however, the inability to find words that avoid adolescent indignation should not be a reason to make major curriculum decisions. human rights education review – volume 5(1) 60 the best interests of the child and the child’s right to freedom of religion and conscience the finnish national core curriculum for basic education 2014 contains relatively strong support for human rights and children’s rights, but the uniquely finnish concept of worldview education raises further human rights, children’s rights and ethical issues. an important perspective in discussing these issues is that of the best interests of the child—one of the leading principles of the crc (uncrc, 2003). on the one hand, children are entitled to freedom of thought, conscience, and religion (crc, article 14); on the other, they are entitled to education which shall be directed to the fullest development of their personalities and abilities (crc, articles 8 & 29). it is probable that providing such education requires a point of view that surpasses the child’s current understanding. this implies that two perspectives, the children’s point of view as current agents and the point of view of the full potential of their personalities and abilities, are needed when children’s freedom of thought, conscience, and religion is evaluated. the developmental consideration above demands delicacy when it comes to dealing with schoolchildren’s religious freedom. this delicacy can be seen, for example, in the statements about children’s convictions, their possibility to be heard and make decisions about their learning, and the age limits concerning these issues. the finnish system is problematic if analysed from this perspective. the regulations and age limits of the act on the freedom of religion (2003/453) and the basic education act (1998/628) are problematic in relation to crc’s article 14 and finland’s constitution’s equality section (constitution 1999/731, 6.3.). it is curious that in finland 15-year-olds are responsible for their crimes but not considered mature enough to make their own decisions about belonging to a religious community until they are 18 (hakalehto & toivonen, 2021, p. 129). this raises the question of how the freedom of religion and conscience of the child is actually realised if there is disagreement between parents. the obligation for children who are members of the church of finland to take lutheran re has also been considered problematic. there is a discrepancy between a strong curricular commitment to children’s rights and a system which does not necessarily guarantee the child’s freedom of choice. the constitution of finland (articles 6 and 11) and crc (article 14) safeguard a child’s freedom of thought, conscience and religion. on the other hand, the udhr (article 26.3), the icescr (article 13) and article 2 of protocol no. 1 to the echr state that parents have the right to choose the kind of moral and religious education that children receive. it is obvious that in many cases the concept of one’s ‘own religion’ in the finnish model of re is not the child’s but the parents’ religion. the concept is problematic, anyway, because it is argued that no actual changes are needed in the curriculum or instruction to change confessional re into a nonconfessional ‘personal re’. one’s own religion, i.e., the family religion, is repeatedly e. salmenkivi, t. kasa, n. putkonen, a. kallioniemi 61 mentioned in all the re syllabi. this emphasises the role of parents, family and even the religious community in making decisions about a child’s religion. at the same time, the curriculum is adamant on the individuality and uniqueness of the child, which underlines his or her own freedom (see parliamentary ombudsman of finland, 2019). conclusions we have analysed how human rights and children’s rights are profiled in the basic curriculum and what kind of human rights and ethical issues are raised in finnish worldview education. finnish society emphasises human rights and children’s rights at the official level and our analysis shows that human rights and children’s rights have a strong presence in worldview education curricula at the comprehensive level. our analysis concentrates on the curriculum and general ethical and human rights issues, and it is obvious that further research is needed if we want to understand how hre is actualised in pedagogical practice. one might venture a guess that the faith-based but non-confessional re which is taught in practically all schools is unique to finland. as we have shown, this system has various interesting positive elements from the point of view of human rights and children’s rights. for example, it is possible for minorities to have their own re, and the non-confessional nature of the instruction protects pupils’ religious freedom. however, there is also a number of problems. the fact that the system is based on membership means that it is biased in favour of some religious views and it is especially problematic in families where parents have different religions or worldviews. in addition, compulsory lutheran re for students who are members of the church of finland is especially problematic from a children’s rights perspective. despite the strong commitment to human rights and children’s rights in the curricula, we conclude that it would seem that the finnish worldview education system does not sufficiently take children’s rights into account. references act on the freedom of religion. 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(2019). critical human rights education: advancing social-justiceoriented educational praxes. cham: springer international. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-27198-5 https://undocs.org/crc/gc/2003/5 https://doi.org/10.1080/00344087.2013.767685 https://vipunen.fi/en-gb/pre-primary-and-basic-education https://vipunen.fi/en-gb/pre-primary-and-basic-education https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2021/entries/rights/ https://doi.org/10.13109/9783666604492.56 https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203073667 https://doi.org/10.1080/00220272.2013.764505 https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-27198-5 human rights and children’s rights in worldview education in finland abstract keywords introduction human rights, children’s rights and human rights education the finnish way of organising religious education and children’s freedom of religion and conscience human rights and children’s rights in finnish curricula human rights as an overarching ethics human rights education’s curriculum problem and powerful knowledge the best interests of the child and the child’s right to freedom of religion and conscience conclusions references championing human rights close to home and far away: human rights education in light of national identity construction and foreign policy in norway volume 2, no 1 (2019) date received: 27-06-2018 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2832 date accepted: 23-05-2019 issn 2535-5406 ‘they don’t have as good a life as us’: a didactic study of the content of human rights education with eleven-year-old pupils in two swedish classrooms lotta brantefors uppsala university, sweden. abstract: drawing theoretically on the didaktik tradition, this paper examines teaching and learning content in teacher-planned human rights education with elevenyear-old pupils in two swedish classrooms. the results suggest that the principle aim for the teaching and learning of rights is to enable good interactions with other human beings. the findings indicate that teaching content and pupils’ learning outcomes are similar. four dominant themes are identified in teaching and learning: fundamental democratic values; declaration of (human) rights; bullying and violations; and negative life conditions. human rights are negatively interpreted, with an emphasis on rights violations and children’s need for protection and support. the paper concludes that human rights education is conflated with democratic education. although teaching and learning are closely aligned with the fundamental and democratic values stipulated in the swedish education act and the national curriculum, children are not expected to acquire in-depth knowledge about human rights. keywords: content, teaching, learning, education, human rights, children’s human rights l. brantefors: lotta.brantefors@edu.uu.se http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2832 mailto:lotta.brantefors@edu.uu.se human rights education review – volume 2(1) 48 ‘they don’t have as good a life as us’: a didactic study of the content of human rights education with eleven-year-old pupils in two swedish classrooms. doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2832 issn 2535-5406 lotta brantefors lotta.brantefors@edu.uu.se uppsala university, sweden. abstract: drawing theoretically on the didaktik tradition, this paper examines teaching and learning content in teacher-planned human rights education with elevenyear-old pupils in two swedish classrooms. the results suggest that the principle aim for the teaching and learning of rights is to enable good interactions with other human beings. the findings indicate that teaching content and pupils’ learning outcomes are similar. four dominant themes are identified in teaching and learning: fundamental democratic values; declarations of (human) rights; bullying and violations; and negative life conditions. human rights are negatively interpreted, with an emphasis on rights violations and children’s need for protection and support. the paper concludes that human rights education is conflated with democratic education. although teaching and learning are closely aligned with the fundamental and democratic values stipulated in the swedish education act and the national curriculum, children are not expected to acquire in-depth knowledge about human rights. keywords: content, teaching, learning, education, human rights, children’s human rights introduction at the end of 2017, the united nations refugee agency reported in its global trends study that 68.5 million people had been forcibly displaced worldwide as a result of war, conflicts, climatic catastrophes or economic disasters (united nations high commissioner for refugees [unhcr], 2018). the media constantly reports on situations in which human beings are threatened or humiliated. reports like these put human rights in the spotlight, in that they show how human rights are violated. but what do people in general know about human rights and, in particular, what do children know? what do they learn at school and what do teachers teach? in order to learn and grow as holders of human rights there is a need for adequate education. this didactic study examines the content of the teaching and learning of human rights in two swedish classrooms. as is advocated in international frameworks (e.g. united nations educational, scientific and cultural organization [unesco] & united nations high commissioner for human rights [unhchr], 2006), sweden emphasises the teaching and learning of human rights. this is also clearly stated in the education act (swedish ministry of education and research, 2016/2010) and the current national curriculum (swedish national agency for education, 2018): ‘education should impart and establish respect for human rights and the fundamental democratic values on which swedish society is based’ (swedish national agency for education, 2018, p. 5). the swedish http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2832 mailto:lotta.brantefors@edu.uu.se l. brantefors 49 education system builds on central government policy and so does the curriculum (cf. gundem, 2011), which means that all education in sweden is based on the same national guidelines. the fundamental democratic values, which also include human rights, are the core values of swedish education and are presented in the curriculum in the section fundamental values and tasks of the school. in the following extract, the central values are mentioned: the inviolability of human life, individual freedom and integrity, the equal value of all people, equality between women and men, and solidarity between people are the values that the school should represent and impart. in accordance with the ethics borne by a christian tradition and western humanism, this is achieved by fostering in the individual a sense of justice, generosity, tolerance and responsibility. teaching in school must be nondenominational (swedish national agency for education, 2018, p. 5). fundamental values is an important section in the curriculum and these values should permeate all education: ‘the education act (2010:800) stipulates that education in the school system aims at pupils acquiring and developing knowledge and values’ (swedish national agency for education, 2018, p. 5). this means that (all) swedish education should be based on subject knowledge and fundamental democratic values, in which human rights are included. this article will use the term ‘fundamental values’ to denote fundamental democratic values. in sweden, there is no specifically labelled human rights education (hre) (e.g. bajaj, 2017) and the teaching and learning of human rights is often part of the teaching and learning of fundamental values. bajaj (2011) discusses the contextualisation of hre and states that hre can no longer be characterised as a practice where there is a singular understanding; hre rather reflects the contexts where it is located. referring to felisa tibbitts (2008), bajaj stresses that hre is affiliated with different constituencies in different nations and suggests that in countries enjoying strong democratic and economic development the focus is often on issues of discrimination of migrants, minorities and women. sweden could be an example of such a focus. here, hre is not an isolated educational topic, but part of the teaching and learning of fundamental values. this could be one reason for the conflation of human rights and democratic values found in this study. another reason for a lack of clarity is the way in which human rights (united nations [un], 1948) and children’s rights (un, 1989) are used synonymously. this study, which was part of a three year didactic project (quennerstedt, et al 2014), investigated how human rights have been taught and learned. in contacts with the teachers and pupils, the researcher has used the term children’s human rights to enable the participants to make their own interpretations of rights. however, as the findings show, they (teachers and pupils) mix human rights and children’s rights and do not differentiate between them. sometimes they use human rights and at other times children’s human rights or children’s rights. in this article the term human rights is used. research on hre embraces a number of perspectives (e.g. quennerstedt, 2011; osler & solhaug, 2018) but, as far as can be ascertained, no studies have been conducted using a didactic theoretical approach (e.g. gundem, 2011) that specifically investigates teaching and learning content (thelander, 2009; brantefors & human rights education review – volume 2(1) 50 quennerstedt, 2016; brantefors & thelander, 2017). the exception to this is the above-mentioned didactic project (quennerstedt et al, 2014). this article reports on a field study that was carried out on researcherrequested, yet teacher-planned activity, in the teaching and learning of human rights in two classes of eleven-year-old pupils. the aim was to explore and clarify the teaching and learning content by drawing on the (european) didaktik (didactics) tradition (e.g. gundem, 2011). the article answers the following two questions: 1) what is taught in the classroom (educational content)? 2) what do the pupils say they have learned (substantive content)? here, content refers to topics, materials or subjects concerned with human rights (englund, 1997). in the critical research tradition on human rights and human rights education (e.g. zembylas & keet, 2018), questions of power and domination can also be investigated. human rights as an emancipative idea has been criticised for being merely symbolic, legitimising values of power and domination and lacking any substantial meaning. critical educators emphasise the need to be aware of these values and patterns of power and domination, otherwise there is a risk that such values will be legitimised in education (cranston & janzen, 2017). this study uses a didactic approach to investigate the content of swedish human rights education by analysing what is taught and learned and exploring the human rights knowledge and values that are transmitted in school; it does not ask questions about power and domination. the main contribution of didactics (didaktik) to human rights education (hre) is its focus on detailed and structured investigations of content (uljens, 1997). knowing what teachers select and offer and what children say they have learned is an important part of all human rights education, although there seems to have been less research into content. the contribution of didactic theory in this study is that it emphasises and analyses both the what and the plurality of meanings in the teaching and learning of human rights (cf. englund, 1997). knowing precisely what is taught and what is learned and comparing this with the alternatives that are available could make teachers more critically aware of their teaching, and this will enable children to gain a deeper knowledge of human rights. in the next section, educational research on the teaching and learning of rights is presented. this is followed by a description of the study’s theoretical and methodological framework. finally, the results are presented and discussed. educational research on the teaching and learning of rights educational research on hre is extensive and has been carried out from different perspectives. some studies adopt an ethnographic approach (thornberg, 2009; giamminuti & see, 2017), while others are more oriented towards analysing the curriculum (philips, 2016; robinson, 2017; parker, 2018). the majority of studies focus on questions about how children are (or should be) respected, listened to and taken seriously (i’anson & allan, 2006; theobald, danby & ailwood, 2011) and there is a wide and rich literature on student participation and citizenship (alderson, 2016; emerson & lloyd, 2017; osler & starkey, 2018). however, as indicated above, no studies have so far investigated the teaching and learning of human rights by using a didactic theoretical approach (quennerstedt, 2015). in order to better understand the variety of aims and content in the teaching and learning of human rights, a number of educational research publications have been examined, using a didactic theoretical approach (brantefors & quennerstedt, l. brantefors 51 2016).1 at first sight, these publications appear to reflect similar aims and content, although on deeper examination there are differences. six dominant aims for why children should learn about human rights have been identified. these are: 1) involvement – children should learn that they have the right to participate in daily life (e.g. johansson, 2005; bae, 2009; sandberg & ärlemalm-hagsér, 2011); 2) agency – children should be empowered to engage with other human beings (smith, 2007; armstrong, 2011); 3) awareness – children should learn to become aware of their rights (e.g. batur musaoglu & haktanir, 2006; akengin, 2008; eckmann, 2010; karaman-kepenekci, 2010); 4) citizenship – children should learn about rights in order to prepare for active citizenship (e.g. mcevoy & lundy 2007; mitchell, 2010; osler, 2013); 5) the respecting of rights – children should learn to behave in accordance with rights and cultivate good relations with others (e.g. howe & covell, 2010; covell, howe & mcneil, 2010; wallberg & kahn, 2011); and 6) social change – children should learn how to act critically and learn emancipatory values (e.g. frantzi, 2004; nieto & pang, 2005; mitchell, 2010). in a second study, one based on douglas roberts’ conceptualisation of knowledge interests (cf. roberts, 1982), the above-mentioned six categories are grouped into four hre traditions. these are: participation, empowerment, rights awareness, and rights respecting (brantefors & thelander, 2017). together, the two studies show that there is a range of aims, content and traditions in hre. bajaj (2011) describes three different ideological hre approaches that resemble the above-mentioned traditions: (i) hre for global citizenship, (ii) hre for coexistence, and (iii) hre for transformative action. the first of these, hre for global citizenship, fosters membership of an international community by teaching about human rights and skills related to universal values and standards. this category aligns with the rights awareness tradition, where the aim is to educate children for a human rights culture. the second category, hre for coexistence, focuses on the inter-personal and inter-group aspect of human rights, where education about human rights is regarded as a strategy for coping with ethnic or civil strife. this category is similar to the participation tradition. here, the aim of teaching and learning of human rights is to engage with other people and become members of society. the third and last category, hre for transformative action, usually involves learners who are economically or politically marginalised. here, hre is informed by the ideas of paolo freire, where the aim is to cultivate pupils’ critical consciousness and teach them how they can change their situation. this category aligns with the empowerment tradition and aims to empower pupils to work for social change. the rights respecting tradition is not represented in bajaj’s approaches. the similarities between descriptions of teaching and learning traditions (brantefors & thelander, 2017) and ideological approaches (bajaj, 2011) show some of the possibilities that are available in classifying human rights education. there is an affinity between the two categorisations that allows us to compare them. it is also clear that these categorisations make it possible to view the different alternatives that are available in human rights education. they also explain and show different ways of teaching and learning human rights. in other words, there is not only one tradition/approach in the teaching and learning of human rights, but several (e.g. englund, 1997). investigating the plurality of meanings in education (the traditions/approaches) is a characteristic feature of didactic approaches. human rights education review – volume 2(1) 52 theoretical framework: didaktik – didactics the didaktik tradition the study is theoretically anchored in the didaktik tradition, which has a long history in non-english speaking (northern) europe. didaktik is defined as the theory and praxis of teaching and learning, and focuses on one or several of the key elements of education, i.e. the content, the teacher and/or the student and/or the relationships between them (e.g. uljens, 1997; gundem, 2011). however, didaktik is not one theory but several, and is more of a theoretical framework than a precise conceptualisation. it is also contextually dependant and one concept does not always have the same meaning in all contexts. professor emeritus bjørg b. gundem describes this ambiguity: […] didaktik has different meanings. there is no common and unambiguous understanding of the content of didaktik, its scientific field, its methods or its structure. as there are different schools, different traditions and different models of didaktik, there are therefore numerous definitions, each claiming legitimacy in both historical and contemporary contexts. it should be emphasised that the didaktik field not is one field, but many different fields. the validity of one concept in one particular context is not necessarily valid in another. what we have is a conceptual richness that can be confusing (gundem, 2011, pp. 20-21, author’s translation from the norwegian). in english speaking countries the use of didaktik theory has been limited (hudson & meyer, 2011). in these countries the questions addressed by didaktik are often discussed in terms of teaching and learning, curriculum and curriculum theory. however, there has been an ongoing dialogue between the european didaktik tradition and the anglo-american curriculum research tradition, and this has resulted in the two traditions coming closer together over time (e.g. hopmann & riquarts, 1995; westbury, 1995; gundem, 1998; hopmann, 2007; hudson, 2007; hudson & meyer, 2011; hopmann, 2015). two examples of this are roberts’ (1982) curriculum emphases on different knowledge interests in science education (cf. roberts & östman, 1998) and englund’s historical conceptions of citizenship education (1986). both conceptualisations are examples of discursive analyses of the educational content. there are also examples of overlapping interests in the interface between didaktik and educational theory, for example in the work of john dewey (e.g. englund, 2016; stone, 2016). didactic theorising often involves approaches other than didaktik, such as philosophy or pragmatism (e.g. dewey 1916), for discussing and clarifying educational content and processes. gundem (2011) suggests using the term meta-analysis for this kind of socio-cultural analysis of educational issues. researchers in the curriculum theory tradition suggest that didaktik contains fruitful theoretical concepts and tools for the study of education. didaktik theory offers a language with which to systematically engage and talk about teaching and learning (uljens, 1997). in line with westbury’s suggestions (2000a) that didaktik contains concepts and a language for describing central issues in the teaching and learning of human rights, i suggest that didaktik theory can help to articulate and structure the analysis of the content of the teaching and learning of human rights and clarify the plurality of meanings. in english, the terms ‘didactics’ and ‘didactic’ have l. brantefors 53 different meanings and sometimes negative connotations, which means that misunderstandings might arise (cf. wickman, 2014). however, the word ‘didactics’ (for didaktik) has been commonly employed in research contexts in recent years and in order to engage with other didaktik researchers i have chosen to use the term didactics in this article.2 basic concepts one of the basic concepts of the didactics tradition is the didactic triangle (hopmann, 1997, 2007; klette, 2007; hudson & meyer, 2011). the triangle shows the fundamental elements in all educational situations, namely the content, the teacher and the student, and is a useful tool for educational planning and analysis (e.g. uljens, 1997; hudson & meyer, 2011). although the triangle has been used differently (e.g. hudson & meyer, 2011) in different contexts, the principal idea is that it describes the relationship between the three elements. the content is placed at the top of the triangle and the teacher and student on the other two angles. each side of the triangle represents a relationship; teacher–content, student–content, and teacher–student (hopmann, 1997). the elements and relationships in the triangle are all points of departure for analyses of teaching and learning processes. the focus can either be on the teacher or the student, on the content per se, or on the relationships between several dimensions in the triangle (cf. klette 2007). the triangle is thought to originate from the work of comenius (hopmann, 1997), as are the three didactic questions of ‘what’, ‘how’ and ‘why’ (kroksmark, 1994). the question ‘what’ addresses the content used in the educational situation, ‘how’ concerns the processes and the form of education, and ‘why’ focuses on the motives for the selection of content and processes. other didactic questions could be asked about the educational situation, such as ‘who’ is learning and with ‘whom’, ‘when’ should children learn, and ‘where’? (e.g. uljens, 1997.) consequently, several aspects of the educational situation can be analysed. in this study the ‘what’ question is examined from the teachers’ and pupils’ perspectives. wolfgang klafki is one of the most important modern german didacticians (hopmann, 1997). in his critical-constructivist didactics he combines a critical approach to education and school with a focus on current social problems (gundem, 2011). he is also known as the leading theorist in the field of didaktische analyse (klafki, 1995/1963). didactic analysis is a structured analysis used in educational planning, and is based on the above-mentioned didactic questions ‘what’, ‘how’ and ‘why’. klafki describes the double analysis of content in planning when he differentiates between the bildungsinhalt (the educational content) and the bildungsgehalt (the substantive content) (klafki, 1995/1963). the bildungsinhalt is the material to be taught, which seen through the pedagogical lens of education forms the subject matter into an educational content. the bildungsgehalt is the content of substance, or the educational substance in the content, and is the content that should be the effect of education. klafki (1995/1963) discusses the relationship between these two dimensions of content and emphasises that teachers must be aware of both in their educational preparations. although this is a structuralistic way of viewing the content dimensions (e.g. rorty, 1967), the reason for using klafki’s content distinctions is that they help to theoretically frame the analysis. accordingly, the concept of bildungsgehalt refers to the teaching content, whereas the concept of bildungsinhalt refers to the learning content the pupils create themselves. human rights education review – volume 2(1) 54 another conceptualisation that is used for the two dimensions of content is the meaning offered and the meaning created (englund, 1997). the meaning offered is the content that the teacher provides, while the meaning created is the content created by the pupils. these two concepts were developed at a time when the linear understanding of communication was being challenged. in this article, the ‘what’ is analysed as both the offered and the created content and is theoretically framed by klafki’s concepts of bildungsinhalt and bildungsgehalt. methodology this study was part of a three-year research project on the teaching and learning of human rights in four different year groups in sweden: at preschool, year 2, year 5 and year 8. the investigations for this article were conducted with eleven-year-old pupils (p1 and p2) in two year 5 classes. the field study was carried out between november 2015 and february 2016. during this period the researcher observed all kinds of education for approximately 10 hours a week. however, only some of these observations are referred to in this article. an invitation to take part in the study was sent to 25 urban and rural year 5 classes/schools in a swedish municipality. two classes accepted the invitation. the others declined due to lack of time. one of the classes (s1) was from an urban school with 600 pupils, where 60% originated from countries outside sweden; the other (s2) was from a rural school with 100 pupils, none of whom had non-swedish origins. both classes consisted of 22 pupils. the teachers (t1 and t2) had trained at teacher training institutions in sweden and were obliged to follow the education act (swedish ministry of education and research, 2016/2010) and the national curriculum (swedish national agency for education, 2018), both of which are guided by democratic working methods and progressivist ideals. both teachers had been in the profession for 5-10 years. the researcher asked the teachers to undertake planned teaching on children’s human rights and said that they were free to choose the content and the working methods. no further guidance was given. the researcher chose this approach so as not to influence the teachers in any way. the data was collected by means of video documented observations and interviews with the teachers and pupils (fitzgerald, hackling & dawson, 2013). the interview questions were related to the three didactic questions mentioned above ‘what’, ‘how’ and ‘why’ (cf. klafki, 1963/1995). the pupils were interviewed in pairs shortly after the lesson on human rights. in the interviews one of the pupils usually answered the questions, although his/her partner was also encouraged to respond, which almost always happened. the teachers were interviewed individually. the study followed the swedish research council’s ethical guidelines and requirements regarding information, informed consent, confidentiality and data use (swedish research council, 2011). all the people involved in the study agreed to participate, and did so until the study was completed. the material for the analyses outlined in this article consists of video records of planned teaching of human rights (5 hours per class) and the interviews with the teachers (1 hour per teacher) and pupils (2 hours per class). an analysis (klafki, 1963/1995; cf. gundem, 2011; hudson & meyer, 2011) of the ‘what’ in the transcribed material, i.e. the educational content (teaching content) and the substantive content (learning content), was carried out. l. brantefors 55 there were five analytical steps:  the different statements were highlighted in different colours to differentiate between the educational content (teaching content) and the substantive content (learning content).  statements with the same meaning were grouped together in a matrix.  different content themes of the educational content and the substantive content were identified and named.  the content themes were thoroughly examined in order to identify qualitative similarities and differences in themes and patterns (cf. braun & clarke, 2006).  finally, the themes’ educational content and substantive content were compared, which made it possible to identify different content themes. results – the content the main result of the study is that the educational content, i.e. the meaning offered by the teachers, is similar to the substantive content, which is the meaning that the pupils themselves created. in view of this, the teaching and learning content are not presented separately, but together. four common and dominant content themes (the ‘what’) were identified: 1) fundamental democratic values, 2) declarations of (human) rights, 3) bullying and violations, and 4) negative life conditions. the following abbreviations are used: t1=teacher 1. t2=teacher 2. p1=pupil from school 1. p2=pupil from school 2. 1. fundamental democratic values the teaching and learning of human rights is not an isolated theme, but is related to democracy and the fundamental values of the swedish curriculum (swedish national agency for education, 2018). one of the tasks of a school is to bring about and anchor these values in each pupil. this is also shown in the analysis. for example, t1 states that human rights are about ‘our dignity’, ‘our fundamental values’ and ‘our views of mankind’. t1 relates human rights to democracy in the sense that they are concerned with the right to decision-making: ‘everybody has the right to decide’, which also implies that pupils need to create their own views. in school 1, this is practised by forming (and discussing) opinions about school lunches, rules and prohibitions, whereas in school 2 the pupils are encouraged to air their own views: t2 says: ‘[…] the pupils should not always accept what the media says, or what i say, or what mum and dad say. free thinking is important’. accordingly, these examples show that decision-making and the creation of one’s own views seem to be related to democracy, rather than human rights. when the pupils talk about human rights in the interviews and relate them to democracy, they emphasise the same ideas and content as the teachers. a lack of clarity about the relationship between democracy and human rights is also expressed: ‘it is important that it is democratic, those rules are very important, that everybody has their rights’ (p1). they echo the teacher’s claim that everybody should be involved in decisions and that this is related to democracy: ‘it should be democratic’ (p1). some of the pupils try to sort out the relationship by saying that ‘everybody should get involved in deciding, this is connected to democracy […]’ (p1). however, only the pupils in school 1 (p1) emphasise ‘the right to have a view’ in the interviews by stressing that ‘[you can] believe in what you want or feel what you want’. interestingly, none of the pupils in school 2 mention the creation of one’s own human rights education review – volume 2(1) 56 views, despite teacher 2 having emphasised this. however, the pupils in school 2 always act in accordance with this model, in that they actively discuss and question the prevailing conditions and express their opinions. while it is understood that there is a strong connection between human rights and fundamental democratic values, the relationship between the two is not clear to the teachers or the pupils. 2. declarations of (human) rights the teachers’ principle aim when teaching about human rights is that the pupils should learn how to (inter)act with other people. based on the idea of equal value, the pupils should learn to respect others, become good fellow humans and not discriminate: ‘[…] first they should learn to cooperate and discuss, practise taking turns and socialising’ (t1). when working in groups, the pupils (p1) in class 1 study specific articles of the convention that t1 has selected: life and development (article 6), nationality and identity (article 7, 8), forming and expressing views (article 12), freedom of expression (article 13, 14, 15), and health and health care (article 24). in contrast, in class 2 the pupils (p2) decide themselves to work with children’s rights, children’s development and the rights of girls. in the lessons, information about rights is gleaned from websites (swedish version), such as those of unesco and amnesty international, and no textbooks are used. the choice of website thus determines which rights (e.g. human rights or children’s rights) are emphasised and how they are described. for example, amnesty international’s website emphasises freedom rights, whereas others prioritise other rights. in general, when rights are mentioned and conceptualised the convention on the rights of the child is referred to before the declaration of rights, although sometimes rights are not mentioned at all. even though the vocabulary changes, and concepts like children’s rights, children’s human rights and human rights are used, the concept of children’s rights appears more frequently. when the pupils are asked about what they have learned, they have very little to say about human rights. they say that they should know about human rights as ‘rules that the un has’ (p1) in order to know what you can do and not do in the future (‘when you are grown up’ [p2]). the most important right to be mentioned is equal value, which is repeated over and over again: ‘whatever you look like, or your background, or if you are homosexual or so, everybody has equal value’ (p2). when the pupils mention human rights they mostly highlight problems with rights that are not fulfilled, such as ‘the right to education and not working’ (p1), ‘having food and not starving’ (p2), ‘living with and having support from parents’ (p2), or ‘not being beaten’ (p1). they return to this negative view of rights on a number of occasions. 3. bullying and violations this study shows that human rights are related to bullying and violation. in particular, t1 discusses this: ‘this should grow, this should be more than just about violations and bullying, because this is a minor part of our human rights’. the teaching resembles earlier lessons about bullying and violations, although this time violations are not related to pupil interactions, but to the refugee and migration crisis of 20152016. the analyses show that violations of cultural rights are particularly emphasised in class and the focus is on those individuals who have their human rights violated. when the study was carried out, the closest example of this was the refugee crisis and the us presidential election. for example, the pupils note that president trump l. brantefors 57 violates human (cultural) rights: ‘he is a racist’, ‘if you were a muslim you would feel rejected’ (p1). you can say whatever you want as long as you are not violating anybody. he [trump] says what he thinks, but he is violating other people. he expresses it in a way that makes people sad […]. how can people vote for somebody who violates someone else? (p1) even though the term bullying is used, it does not necessarily refer to specific human interaction; it is also used for different kinds of violence or conflict (‘stop hating’ [t2]) (‘love each other/peace’ [p1]). however, the pupils underline the interactive, personal aspect and the need to counteract bullying. they repeatedly say that everybody has equal value and that nobody should be discriminated against or bullied: ‘you have to respect the situation and the circumstances, that is to say the religion, the skin colour or the belief…’ (p1). ‘[you can] say whatever you like as long as you do not violate or make somebody sad, or are racist’ (p1). the pupils stress that bullying and violations should always be counteracted. 4. negative life conditions the final content theme in my analysis is concerned with the conditions and circumstances of other human beings. in order to understand and respond to others, irrespective of background, the pupils have to learn about different life conditions: t2 says ‘[…] that’s what is central, we talk about different life conditions and equal value and that we are not as different as we think we are’. this theme is specifically about the negative life conditions of human beings or refugees in war-torn or developing countries, and is about children’s rights to (have) support and protection. in contrast to theme 3, which also focuses on refugees, immigration and violations of cultural rights, this content theme draws attention to how rich countries should help poor ones, ‘so that their conditions will be as good as ours, because everybody has equal value’ (p2). the following three examples illustrate the teachers’ selections of the teaching and learning content. a) the first example is a film clip showing clowns without borders entertaining large groups of children in war-torn areas. the children appear to be having fun. they clap their hands, laugh and smile. the idea behind clowns without borders is that they ‘bring laughter where it’s needed most’. b) the second example is a classroom discussion about what sweden could have done about the refugee situation in 2015-2016. most of the pupils want to support the refugees: ‘we should take care of them, give them food and somewhere to live’ (p2) although one pupil finds that problematic: ‘in the end there will be more of them than swedes’ (p2). c) the third example is a game called the lottery of life, from the save the children website. this game presents children’s negative living conditions such as war, flight, poverty, malnutrition, no housing, no schooling, child labour and corporal punishment. these conditions are presented in relation to swedish circumstances, which are regarded as being ‘much better’. human rights education review – volume 2(1) 58 these three examples illustrate children’s poor living conditions and the support that is needed. they also show that life is regarded as being ‘much better’ (p1 and p2) here (in sweden) and that the lives of ‘others’ would be improved if they received support and protection. the message is that solidarity should be developed with those migrating to sweden, or with the weak and vulnerable in far-off lands. when the pupils describe what they have learned, the content appears to have more or less the same meaning as that offered in class. they underline two things: the differences between rich and poor countries and the need for richer countries (‘us’) to support ‘the others’. the pupils state that children in other parts of the world ‘don’t have as good a life as us’ (p2). ‘the world isn’t fair; some flee, others die’ (p2). the subject that is most talked about in the interviews is people’s negative life conditions: ‘there are no schools’ (p2), ‘children get corporal punishment’ (p2), ‘children could be married off with anyone’ (p2), ‘homosexuals are discriminated against’ (p1) and ‘you cannot have an opinion’ (p1). with statements like these, the pupils show how unfair things are and that we need to care more about others. they continuously describe other people’s life conditions in polarised terms, i.e. what ‘the richer’ countries have and ‘the poorer’ countries do not have. ‘we’ have human rights and so do ‘they’ but ‘their’ human rights are not fulfilled. in contrast, some of the pupils have xenophobic ideas about people who are different from themselves. this is particularly so in relation to immigrants. discussion the purpose of the study is to examine the ‘what’ – the educational content (the teaching content) and the substantive content (the learning content) – in the teaching and learning of human rights in two year 5 classes. (cf. klafki, 1995/1963; gundem, 2011). the use of didactic theory enables a precise analysis of the content, and didactic conceptualisation clarifies and structures the analyses. the didactic approach also casts a light on shortcomings in the preparation of teaching and the teaching itself. the results show that the principle intention with the teaching and learning of human rights is to facilitate good interactions with other human beings. apart from the last theme, the four identified content themes – fundamental democratic values, declarations of (human) rights, bullying and violations, and negative life conditions –are concerned with cultivating ‘good’ relations with other human beings, which means that ‘the other’ should be treated with respect and solidarity. the four themes are related to human rights, but links are not always clear. there is also a negative interpretation of rights, with an emphasis on the violation of rights and the need for children to have support and protection. the results show that the meaning created by the pupils is the same as that offered in class, and that this is the case in both classes. even though there are contextual differences between the classes, the content of education and the content of substance are similar, albeit with slight variations. this indicates that the pupils seem to have learned the offered content. the most striking difference between the classes is that the urban class (s1) demonstrates more pluralistic and open-minded views of other human beings’ life conditions. these pupils also know more about life conditions in different parts of the world, which is natural given that they originate from different countries. in contrast, the rural class (s2) (with no pupils originating from outside sweden) has a narrower worldview. these pupils talk in more l. brantefors 59 charitable terms about how to take care of those in need, although xenophobic ideas are also expressed. as mentioned earlier, teachers in sweden can work independently, but they have to operate within the framework of the education act (swedish ministry of education and research, 2016/2010) and the national curriculum (swedish national agency for education, 2018). this is corroborated in the study. even though the pupils’ contexts and backgrounds are different, there are more similarities than differences in the work that is done in the classes; this could be due to the teachers’ state-regulated working conditions. interestingly, no participants express criticism of or critical ideas against human rights or human rights education. rather, they are very polite (except for the few xenophobic utterances) and seem to be unaware of such a possibility. four main conclusions can be drawn from the study: i) knowledge of human rights is weak, ii) human rights are the other’s rights, iii) human rights are violated and iv) human rights education resembles democratic education. let me elaborate on these conclusions. i) knowledge of human rights is weak when the pupils discuss human rights in the interviews they have very little to say, probably because they are not very familiar with them. according to the pupils, human rights are ‘rules that the un has’ (p1), or ‘rules that you need when you are grown up’ (p2). if we compare the more precise rights content (human rights or children’s rights) expressed in the group work with the content in the lessons, the knowledge that is talked about in the interviews is diffuse and imprecise. for example, rights are things that others do not have, are the basis for treating other people well, or are for protecting and supporting the weak and vulnerable. in this sense, human rights are not precise knowledge to be memorised and learned (appropriated), but guidelines for good social (inter)action. neither do the teachers have any definite opinions about which human rights the pupils should learn. the rights content (in class) is not chosen by the teacher, but is determined by his or her choice of website. this may be a coincidence, although it is more likely a result of the teacher’s (lack of) knowledge about human rights. the choice of content is a central didactic issue (cf. uljens, 1997; gundem, 2011). if content is not consciously chosen, it will have consequences for the education that is provided and for what pupils learn. this lack of clarity is also apparent in the pupils’ answers, which are imprecise. this means that as knowledge content, rights are cognitively weak (cf. englund, 1997). although the pupils work with human rights to a certain extent, they are not expected to remember or be particularly knowledgeable about them. ii) human rights are the other’s rights both schools relate the teaching and learning of human rights to the world’s refugee and immigration situation. the planned teaching has an international and cultural slant, although the primary aim is to become a good fellow human being. however, there is a greater interest in those who are weak and vulnerable, or in people living in poor conditions or difficult circumstances. human rights are something that others either have or do not have. the themes that the pupils talk most about, especially in school 2 (the rural school), are the poor conditions of refugees and immigrants and violations of human human rights education review – volume 2(1) 60 rights. the pupils continually repeat that ‘they’ have problems and that ‘we’ must help them. this educational discourse was dominant in the 1980s, when many noneuropeans migrated to sweden and the focus was on helping them and solving their problems (cf. brantefors, 2015, 2011). today, some thirty years later, ideas about pluralism have been modified and the educational trend is to counteract ‘us and them’ relations (swedish national agency for education, 2018). however, my data shows that parts of the older ‘us’ and ‘them’ discourse remain and that this is still dominant in classroom discussions. the curriculum also states that children should learn to have solidarity with those who are weak and vulnerable (swedish national agency for education, 2018). but what does solidarity mean to the children in our two classes? professor emeritus sven-erik liedman (2012; see also leistina, 2005) discusses two main principles of solidarity: one where there is an interdependent relationship, and another that is unilateral. in the first principle, solidarity is mutual and those who are related to each other benefit from the relationship. however, in the unilateral principle there is no reciprocity, which means that here solidarity is more like charity. the findings show that the unilateral principle of solidarity prevails in the two classes. ‘the other’ is not close, but somewhere else, often far away. the pupils never really get to know who they are to feel solidarity with, or what it means. it is clear that this unilateral solidarity shields the pupils and the teachers from real situations and makes their actions symbolic (cf. cranston & janzen, 2017). the question is how to challenge this approach. in order to overcome the charity-oriented discourse, teachers need to critically examine their teaching content and teaching methods and become more aware of the different alternatives. they also need to examine their own knowledge of human rights. although they have probably learned about human rights issues in their teacher education, the ‘us’ and ‘them’ approach still appears to dominate on the websites (swedish versions) they use. the conclusion is that the teachers need to be much more critical about their own knowledge of human rights and their teaching materials. it is also desirable that the quality of websites, as well as the messages their teaching and learning materials contain, is properly examined before being used in human rights education. iii) human rights are violated as the themes of bullying and violation are repeated at all levels of education, from preschool to higher education, the pupils in the two classes are already familiar with them. in this study, bullying and violations are emphasised as aspects of human rights, particularly by t1. however, they could just as well have been treated separately and the pupils could have talked about violations without even mentioning rights. for example, it is unlikely that pupils would say: ‘do not touch me, you are violating my human rights’. they would be more likely to say ‘you are not allowed to violate me’. violation is not just a matter of bullying; it has other forms and expressions, such as racism. violation and bullying can mean anything from interpersonal relations to hate between nations. silvia edling (2017) discusses an expanded view of violation and maintains that bullying, xenophobia, racism, homophobia, violation, discrimination and oppression are often treated as isolated phenomena in research into violence. however, in one way or another these phenomena are permeated by violence and often have common denominators: ‘[…] there are similar patterns between different forms of violence’ (p. 9). a common conception of the different l. brantefors 61 forms of violence is the inability ‘to handle and respond to human pluralism’ (p. 9). this study shows that pupils practise and learn how to engage with and relate to other human beings with or without relating their behaviour to human rights. relational issues and practical action in plural contexts are aspects of daily life at school and the pupils constantly acquire new experiences of them (cf. dewey, 1916). as edling advocates, these daily interactions are about dealing with differences between people (human pluralism). iv) human rights education resembles democratic education international overviews of the teaching and learning of human rights (brantefors & thelander, 2017; brantefors & quennerstedt, 2016, see also bajaj 2017) show that teaching and learning traditions are different in different parts of the world. as described in the introduction, the content of human rights education changes in relation to the context (bajaj, 2011). for example, in the scandinavian countries the focus is mainly on democracy and human rights, whereas in other parts of the world the focus is on human rights and knowledge about them. in sweden, fundamental values, including human rights, are emphasised at all educational levels. here, human rights education is either part of democratic education or is replaced by democratic education and fundamental values. this is also what this study has shown, namely that human rights are mixed with fundamental values and concepts of human rights are used unconsciously and unclearly. the same phenomenon (in a norwegian context) is also found by osler and solhaug (2018): ‘in everyday discourse, the terms “human rights” and “democracy” are often conflated, and the emphasis is generally on democratic practices in schools’ (p. 278). there are obvious differences between the present study and an earlier study of the teaching and learning traditions of human rights (participation, empowerment, awareness and respect of rights) (brantefors & thelander, 2017). the main difference is that the aims and contents of the teaching and learning of human rights do not correspond to any of the four traditions, but are instead concerned with democratic education. this could be understood in relation to the context – in this case swedish education. the study shows that the teaching and learning of human rights is more or less, and probably unconsciously, linked to fundamental democratic values. these values have a central place in the swedish education system, a system regulated by the education act (swedish ministry of education and research, 2016/2010) and the national curriculum (swedish national agency for education, 2018). the question is whether it would be possible to transform established fundamental values education into an education that has a specific human rights focus. and would this be deemed desirable? none of the three ideological approaches of hre – hre for global citizenship, hre for coexistence and hre for transformative action (bajaj, 2011) – are fully reflected in the results of my research. it can be noted that transformative and critical ideas about human rights education are practically absent in sweden. here, human rights education is strongly linked to fundamental democratic values and this means that human rights are described as things that are not necessarily for ‘us’, but for ‘them’. this result is interesting in relation to multicultural swedish society and this might raise the didactic question ‘for whom’. i will return to this point below. however, the problem remains of how to analyse and theorise the different contextual conditions of hre (bajaj 2011, cf. tibbitts 2008). i agree with bajaj and would argue that each context needs to be described in terms of its own conditions. human rights education review – volume 2(1) 62 with regard to the teaching and learning of human rights in sweden, i therefore suggest an additional category of tradition/approach: human rights education as democratic education. this category is suggested in order to show that sweden has a dominant tradition or ideological approach to the teaching and learning of human rights that is unique. the fundamental values of the swedish curriculum (in which human rights are included) have been criticised (e.g. roth, 1998) for not being adequate for a multicultural society. the problem is that so-called common values are seldom common, but are instead based on the values of the majority society (the national) (cf. osler, 2008, 2011). ljunggren (2011), on the other hand, states that open, pluralistic and tolerant sweden has always been a society in a state of continuous creation. this means that it is possible to see two different scenarios of values education: one in which ‘othering’ is more dominant (cf. brantefors, 2011, 2015) and another in which pluralism and mutuality are core values (cf. liedman, 2012). the results of this study of hre indicate that the teaching and learning of human rights take place at the junction between different conceptions of values education. the first conception is that fundamental values, including human rights, are for everyone. this is based on the pluralistic view of society expressed in the curriculum (swedish national agency for education, 2018). the second conception of ‘othering’ and charity is more problematic and is the one that emerges in this study. the conclusion is that the tension between what is expressed in the curriculum and what happens in the classroom requires action. if a different human rights education is desired, then this needs to be provided. finally, we can ask whether the human rights education the pupils receive has enabled them to become more critically aware of human rights and to grow as holders of rights. it is clear that they seem to have learned the content that their education has offered them. however, as has been described in the article, this content deals with other themes than human rights. dewey talks about the actively engaged child and that growing has to do with doing (dewey, 1916). what is characteristic of the education of the children in the two classes is practical action. although the connection to human rights is not clear, the pupils’ experiences involve human rights. they experience a democratic and human rights influenced education, although it is doubtful whether this has helped them to grow as holders of human rights. the final conclusion is that if a human rights education is required, then this needs to be discussed and the prerequisites for it changed. firstly, we have to actively discuss the curriculum (swedish national agency for education, 2018) and what human rights education means. we also need to ask some didactic questions: what should be the contents of human rights education, and how should it be taught? who are the rights for? we also have to reflect on the available teaching and learning alternatives and to make conscious selections. secondly, and finally, teacher education courses on the teaching and learning of human rights need to be examined. some research shows that this is a neglected area in teacher education. accordingly, we need to make student teachers aware of human rights and teach them how to critically examine rights and their preconditions. in order to provide a better education in human rights the preconditions for it will need to be fully scrutinised. l. brantefors 63 notes 1 in the first search for potentially relevant publications, 111 articles dealing generally with the teaching and learning of rights in early childhood education or formal education were selected. after screening the 111 publications, 57 remained and were read in full. 28 publications were included in the final analysis (brantefors & quennerstedt, 2016). 2 a european research network for 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(2009). rules in everyday school life: teacher strategies undermine pupil participation. the international journal of children’s rights, 17(3), 393–413. https://doi.org/10.1163/157181808x395590 tibbitts, f. (2008). human rights education. in bajaj, m. (ed.), encyclopedia of peace education. charlotte, nc: information age publishing. uljens, m. (ed.) (1997). didaktik – teori, reflektion och praktik [didactics – theory, reflection and practice]. lund: studentlitteratur. united nations (1948). universal declaration of human rights. general assembly resolution 217 a, 10 dec. 1948. retrieved 20.06.2019 from https://www.ohchr.org/en/udhr/documents/udhr_translations/eng.pd f united nations (1989). convention on the rights of the child. general assembly resolution 44/25, 20 nov. 1989. u.n. doc. a/res/44/25. retrieved 20.06.2019 from https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx united nations educational, scientific and cultural organization & united nations high commissioner for human rights (2006). plan of action. world programme for human rights education. first phase. new york/geneve. retrieved 20.06.2019 from https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000147853/pdf/147853eng. pdf.multi united nations high commissioner for refugees (2018). global trends. forced displacement in 2017. retrieved 20.06.2019 from https://www.unhcr.org/5b27be547.pdf wallberg, p., & kahn, m. (2011). the rights project: how rights education transformed a classroom. canadian children, 36(1), 31–35. https://doi.org/10.18357/jcs.v36i1.15138 westbury, i. (1995). didaktik and curriculum theory: are they two sides of the same coin. in s. hopmann & k. riquarts (eds.), didaktik and/or curriculum – an international dialogue (pp. 233–264). kiel: universität-karl-albrechts, ipn. westbury, i. (2000a). teaching as a reflective practice: what might didaktik teach curriculum? in i. westbury, hopmann, s., & k. riquarts (eds.), teaching as a reflective practice: the german didaktik tradition (pp. 15–40). mahwah, nj: lawrence erlbaum. wickman, p-o. (2014). teaching learning progressions. an international perspective. in n. g. lederman & s. k. abell (eds.), handbook of research in science education, vol 2 (pp. 145–163). new york: routledge. zembylas, m., & keet, a. (eds.) (2018). critical human rights, citizenship, and democracy education: entanglements and regenerations. london: bloomsbury academic. https://doi.org/10.1163/157181808x395590 https://www.ohchr.org/en/udhr/documents/udhr_translations/eng.pdf https://www.ohchr.org/en/udhr/documents/udhr_translations/eng.pdf https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000147853/pdf/147853eng.pdf.multi https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000147853/pdf/147853eng.pdf.multi https://www.unhcr.org/5b27be547.pdf https://doi.org/10.18357/jcs.v36i1.15138 ‘they don’t have as good a life as us’: a didactic study of the content of human rights education with eleven-year-old pupils in two swedish classrooms introduction educational research on the teaching and learning of rights theoretical framework: didaktik – didactics the didaktik tradition basic concepts methodology results – the content notes references multidisciplinary critique on, and solutions to, the human (rights) causes and consequences of global poverty 2 issn: 2535-5406 http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4862 date of publication 07-09-2022 © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org book and media reviews multidisciplinary critique on, and solutions to, the human (rights) causes and consequences of global poverty egan, s. and chadwick, a. (eds.) (2021). poverty and human rights: multidisciplinary perspectives. cheltenham (uk), northampton, massachusetts (usa): edward elgar publishing. 224pp., £85.00 (hardcover) isbn: 978-1-83910-210-3; also available as ebook, isbn: 9781-83910-211-0. reviewed by anne becker university of stellenbosch, south africa, annebecker@sun.ac.za ‘do we have no worth?’ (p. 179). this is the question an anganwadi worker from the kantapada block in india asked during an interview. the kantapada block is one of 14 blocks in the cuttack district, located at the coastal part of the odisha state in india. the nearest town to kantapada village is cuttack, which is known as the commercial capital of odisha. anganwadi workers are women who provide government-subsidised services to the poor while trying to combat their own poverty (chapter 11). this question, for me, embodies the human rights consequences of poverty. poverty has featured prominently in human rights discourse over the last decades. in this multidisciplinary book the rhetoric of poverty and human rights and the link between poverty and human rights are questioned, critiqued, unpacked, and analysed. the introductory chapter gives the reader a taste of some of the questions asked: is poverty a human rights violation, is poverty a symptom or the cause of human rights violations, could and should the human rights framework address poverty? http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4862 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ hrer book and media reviews 2 the book is divided into two parts: part one highlights critical debates and in parts two and three case studies are presented. the first part includes an outline of how poverty came to be associated with human rights and an analysis of various theoretical stances defining poverty as a human rights issue. critiques and challenges to integrating human rights into action on poverty are also discussed. part two presents case studies from the uk, ireland, spain, and india. the book opens with an interesting dialectic between the authors of chapters 2 and 3. in chapter 2, the rhetoric of poverty as a human rights violation is challenged and critiqued. linking poverty to human rights (violations) in an absolutist fashion, the author argues, is both superfluous and counterproductive. such rhetoric muddies the water in differentiating between poverty as an ethical issue and demand, and poverty as a domestic and international issue of law. in chapter three, the author argues that poverty is a human rights violation because it is an injustice ‘that has the particular features characteristic of human rights violations’ (p. 35). the author argues that the effects of poverty can be so devastating that people are willing to trade other rights, such as freedom, for means of subsistence. such a trade-off is discussed in chapter 3, where the author unpacks the chinese development model. chapters 4 and 5 deal with some of the causes of poverty. chapter 4 tracks the historic tension between property rights and subsistence rights in the development of law. chapter 5 explores the role of capitalism in both poverty and human rights. both these chapters deal with the consequences of colonialism in constituting and maintaining poverty and inequality through capitalism and property rights. in chapter 5, the author argues that the full realisation of human rights is not possible in a capitalist system, while in chapter 4 the author states that ‘law’s longstanding commitment to property rights is structurally linked to its inability to act on behalf of the poor’ (p. 58). while chapters 4 and 5 unpack causes of poverty and inequality, chapters 6, 7 and 8 unpack possibilities to re-think global political and economic systems to combat poverty, address inequality and to act on poverty through subsistence wars. in chapter 6 the posthuman implications for human rights, poverty and inequality are discussed. three problems for human rights in dealing with poverty and inequality are raised: algocracy, pharmocracy and chemocracy. in chapter 7, the author questions the assumed link between economic growth and the full realisation of socio-economic rights. the author makes an argument for sustainable development and distributive economic options that privilege people and the environment over profit. the case studies presented show the value ordinary people place on socio-economic rights. these chapters speak to the need to educate everyone, everywhere on their rights, and the hrer book and media reviews 3 need for training and inclusion and not just charity to alleviate poverty and exclusion. it also shows how the indignities of poverty and inequality cause a lack of self-worth and the agency needed to claim rights. the authors in chapter 9 (uk) present what survey data indicate that people at the grassroots level regard as the most important rights: education, health and social care, housing, an adequate standard of living, non-discrimination, and equality. they argue that policy change enabling the realisation of these rights can be possible through grassroots, bottom-up approaches, and human rights initiatives. the editors and authors raise some crucial points as to the link between human rights and poverty, the causes of poverty and possibilities to alleviate poverty and inequality. firstly, tackling poverty and inequality should be a multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary effort. secondly, arguing a link between poverty and human rights violations demands clear conceptualisations of both poverty and human rights violations. thirdly, the role of property rights, legal structures and systems, capitalism, and wealth accumulation in producing and maintaining poverty and inequality should be critiqued. there are multiple economic options to balance people, environment and profit that could lead to sustainable and distributive development. in the fourth place, the alleviation of poverty and inequality can only be achieved through grassroots involvement and input from ordinary people with everyday socio-economic problems. the historic and complex nature of poverty and inequality, as unpacked by authors, demands widening the scope of engagement on poverty, inequality, and human rights to include posthumanism and decoloniality. chapter 6, dealing with the posthuman consequences for human rights, is a step in the right direction. i am surprised that there is no chapter(s) on the role that human rights education can play in addressing poverty and inequality as the need to educate everyone, everywhere on their rights is expressed by authors. reading this book is an investment every scholar interested in global poverty, inequality, social justice, human rights, human rights education, international human rights law, policy and political studies should make. every chapter is theoretically and conceptually sound and the scope and depth of the contributions are thought-provoking. the multidisciplinary links between chapters flow effortlessly. congratulations to the editors and the authors. in the afterword the author reflects on the consequences of the covid-19 pandemic on global poverty and suggests that if poverty had been sufficiently addressed pre-pandemic, it would have led to more resilient communities during the pandemic. rising post-pandemic poverty and inequality coupled with the inevitable consequences of the war in ukraine paint a bleak picture for poverty-stricken people and populations globally. there is work to be done before we, as scholars and fellow humans, can confront and answer the question: ‘do we have no worth?’ (p. 179). this book makes a sizeable contribution in this regard. multidisciplinary critique on, and solutions to, the human (rights) causes and consequences of global poverty volume 2, no 2 (2019) date received: 01-07-2019 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3466 date accepted: 17-10-2019 issn 2535-5406 opportunities and constraints on human rights education when academic freedom is not guaranteed: the case of vietnam huong thi minh ngo vietnam national university, hanoi, vietnam. abstract: in vietnam, academic freedom is not guaranteed. this is especially so in relation to politically sensitive subjects such as human rights. this paper discusses how human rights education (hre) can develop in such contexts. the government of vietnam is a signatory to various un treaties and, consistent with its obligations, has encouraged the development of specialist human rights degree programmes and the introduction of human rights content into other degree programmes. the paper considers government’s role in course approval processes, discussing how political sensitivities are addressed and state monitoring operates to restrict academic freedom. it finds that, subsequent to the government of vietnam ratifying international human rights treaties, there is a softening of the ideology that ‘human rights’ are an alien concept in a socialist state. the need for hre and greater academic freedom are recognised, yet hre is largely restricted to higher education institutions where its implementation is monitored. keywords: human rights, human rights education, academic freedom, vietnam, higher education, curriculum development huong thi minh ngo: nmhuongvn@gmail.com http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3466 mailto:nmhuongvn@gmail.com human rights education review – volume 2(2) 8 opportunities and constraints on human rights education when academic freedom is not guaranteed: the case of vietnam doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3466 issn 2535-5406 huong thi minh ngo nmhuongvn@gmail.com vnu school of law, vietnam national university, hanoi, vietnam. abstract: in vietnam, academic freedom is not guaranteed. this is especially so in relation to politically sensitive subjects such as human rights. this paper discusses how human rights education (hre) can develop in such contexts. the government of vietnam is a signatory to various un treaties and, consistent with its obligations, has encouraged the development of specialist human rights degree programmes and the introduction of human rights content into other degree programmes. the paper considers government’s role in course approval processes, discussing how political sensitivities are addressed and state monitoring operates to restrict academic freedom. it finds that, subsequent to the government of vietnam ratifying international human rights treaties, there is a softening of the ideology that ‘human rights’ are an alien concept in a socialist state. the need for hre and greater academic freedom are recognised, yet hre is largely restricted to higher education institutions where its implementation is monitored. keywords: human rights, human rights education, academic freedom, vietnam, higher education, curriculum development introduction in vietnam, as in other single-party states, most notably china (and indeed in quasidemocratic southeast asian states such as cambodia and myanmar), academic freedom in the western democratic sense is not guaranteed. this is especially so in relation to politically sensitive subjects such as human rights. in 2011 the united nations general assembly adopted a resolution that underlined the significance of human rights education and training (un, 2011).1 prior to this resolution, however, and in the context of earlier un protocols, the communist party of vietnam’s (cpv) guidance on human rights education emphasised a ‘combination of universality and particularity of human rights in understanding and solving of human rights issues.’ the cpv further noted that ‘human rights and national rights are similar’ and that ‘human rights depend on economic, social and cultural traditions of the nation’ (ho chi minh political academy, 2002). these quotations provide a good illustration of ambiguities about universal concerns and particular, domestic ones. nevertheless, cpv guidance has encouraged the establishment of degree programmes in human rights as well as courses in human rights in other degree programmes (typically in law and the social sciences). the first part of this paper describes how human rights education (hre) has been developed and delivered in vietnam with special reference to the nation’s first degree-level programme, vietnam national university’s llm. the second part of the mailto:nmhuongvn@gmail.com h.t.m. ngo 9 paper discusses the role of government in the approval process for programmes and courses that are within these programmes, as well as research projects and publications. there is a focus on matters of academic freedom. reference is made to the ways in which political sensitivities have been raised and addressed and the ongoing monitoring role of the state. in broad terms it may be argued that there has been a genuine softening of the ideology that, in a socialist state, ‘human rights’ is an alien concept. development of human rights education in vietnam historical context the communist-led so-called august revolution in 1945, against french colonial rule, led to the development of highly centralized political and economic systems in the northern region of the country where the cpv had its strongest military presence. the first (cpv-promulgated) constitution, in 1946, unilaterally (that is, without the consent of the vietnamese people as a whole) proclaimed a communist state in the former french colonies of tonkin, annam and cochin (the parts of the present-day state of vietnam). in 1954, after nine years of fighting a guerrilla war against the communist vietminh, the french finally vacated their claim to vietnam. however, because large parts of the population, especially in the south, were non-communist, the 1954 geneva accord split the former french colony into northern and southern parts at the 47th parallel. the accord specified that within two years there would be a free and fair election to determine the government of the entire country, but this was never held. the consequent two decades of civil war between north and south vietnam ended in 1975. since then the unified state of vietnam has been led by the cpv, which continues to be underpinned by a marxist-leninist ideology that affects all aspects of social and political life, the economy and systems of governance. the constitutions of 1959 and 1980 were entirely socialist in nature and vietnam, to this day, remains a socialist state under one-party rule. the nation continues to be statecentric within a framework of ‘socialist democracy,’ a form of government in which various social groups are represented but where political parties other than the cpv are proscribed and where there is no direct election to a legislative body of citizens under a universal franchise. in 1986, in the light of vietnam’s poor economic performance and consequent low standards of living under soviet-style central economic planning, collectivization of agriculture and the elimination of private property rights, doi moi (economic renovation) was proclaimed. the parallel collapse of socialism and political fragmentation in the ussr saw vietnam shift radically to an ‘open-door’ economic policy aiming for economic integration on a global scale. this policy was based on principles of market economics but operated within the political context of a oneparty socialist state. human rights discourse after doi moi was proclaimed, the vietnamese state engaged in international human rights discourses and acceded to a number of un human rights instruments. to date, vietnam has ratified eight out of nine core international human rights conventions.2 changes in vietnamese society brought about by doi moi and vietnam’s progressive integration into the global economic system have created an increased demand for human rights education at the higher levels of the education system. the cpv and government have responded to these needs by opening up education institutions to human rights education review – volume 2(2) 10 ensure greater understanding of human rights. this is seen as supplementing, rather than replacing, the understandings of human rights in the marxist-leninist political ideology already entrenched in the education system. with this caveat, the cpv recognises human rights as universal values (cpv, 1992). furthermore, cpv assembly resolution ix confirms an official commitment: ‘to care for people, to protect rights and legitimate benefits of everyone, [and] to respect and implement the international human rights conventions on human rights that vietnam ratifies’ (cpv, 2004, my translation). 3 this commitment is further expounded to the international community in a speech given by the vietnamese delegation to the 1993 vienna conference and programme of action. cpv resolution (term xi) provides further perspectives on human rights that respect and protect human rights and dialogues with other countries (cpv, 2011b). despite these ‘openings in political space,’ as understood by many vietnamese, western conceptions of human rights remain controversial (ngo, 2016). at the association of southeast asian nations (asean) meeting in 1998, for example, vietnam joined with singapore and other (non-communist) states in upholding the principle of ‘non-interference’ in the internal affairs of states. asean further highlighted the ‘significance of national and regional particularities and various historical, cultural and religious backgrounds’ (asean, 1993). these caveats on the acceptance of the notion of universal human rights underpin the so-called ‘asian values’ debate (ngo, vu & nguyen, 2018). nevertheless, pressure to adopt and retain commitments to human rights led political leaders, including then prime minister nguyễn tấn dũng, to publicly assert vietnam’s commitment to human rights (nguyễn, 2014). this commitment is espoused in vietnam’s economic development plan (2011-2020), which aims ‘to ensure human rights and citizen rights for overall development’ (cpv, 2011a, my translation).4 notably, the constitution of vietnam was amended in 2013 to include a chapter 2 on human rights and citizen rights; this includes the fundamental civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights that align with other international human rights conventions. the vietnamese state thus recognises the need to enhance popular awareness of and education in human rights and citizen rights, in the context of vietnam’s ratification of international human rights conventions. changes in vietnamese society, together with vietnam’s integration into the global economic system, have created an increasing demand for human rights protection and education (cpv, 2010). the cpv and the government it controls have responded to these needs by authorising educational institutions to ensure dissemination of international (as well as domestic) understandings of human rights. human rights education is unambiguously regarded as falling within the domain of state policies and human rights are affirmed as the fundamental rights of human beings. as a corollary, human rights education aims to increase awareness of national laws and policies (cpv, 2011: pp. 116-117, 126). importantly, as noted above, such knowledge is seen as being in addition to rather than supplanting traditional curriculum content on human rights. despite this general support, the vietnam government has yet to provide clear guidance on a practical level for the development of human rights education in higher education. vietnam’s higher education system is subject to many new problems of an administrative, financial, pedagogical, and ideological nature (ngo, 2015). h.t.m. ngo 11 the universal periodical report as a trigger in 2009, vietnam accepted the united nations universal periodic review (upr) recommendations on human rights education (ministry of foreign affairs, 2009: para. 11). the second phase of the world programme for human rights education (2010-2014) was adopted by the human rights council (un human rights council, 2010), its focus being on hre in higher education and on human rights training for teachers, civil servants, law enforcement officials and military staff. the government of vietnam was elected a member of the human rights council in 2013. this was the trigger for vietnam national university (vnu hanoi) establishing the nation’s first hre programme. planning and preparation for a master’s degree in human rights law (llm) had actually been underway prior to 2009 and had formed part of universal periodic review (upr) preparations in vietnam. a group of academics, ministry staff and national assembly members had been quietly advocating that hre be offered in vietnamese universities. following the acceptance of the upr recommendations, a vnu proposal for work to begin on hre was presented to the prime minister’s office for approval. in 2010, the prime minister signed the agreement, and the project was launched. it might have been assumed that once the signature and support of a prime minister had been secured, implementation would be smooth sailing. however, it took almost two more years of planning and preparation before teaching commenced in november 2011. surrounding the project were (are) multiple stakeholders with diverse interests and agendas that needed to be considered. during 2018, vietnam reported to the 3rd cycle of the upr and submitted its initial state party report to the un committee of convention against torture (cat) (ohchr, 22018), and the 5/6th state report to the un committee of convention on the rights of the child (crc) (government of vietnam, 2018). vietnam had earlier submitted its 3rd report on iccpr in november 2017. in 2018, vietnam published the white book on human rights, in both vietnamese and english (ministry of foreign affairs, 2018). in this document, the government of vietnam prioritised human rights education for citizens and law enforcement officials, in order to ensure that fundamental rights align with vietnamese laws and international human rights standards. this shows the government’s commitment to human rights education as part of an effort to improve the quality of education for human resource development, and its determination to raise awareness of human rights in law enforcement agencies and the general citizenry. the pressure on government to adopt and retain commitments to human rights accordingly increased. the vnu vanguard llm programme vnu’s llm programme aims to provide students with a theoretical and practical understanding of global and regional human rights systems, including international human rights laws, mechanisms and standards. the programme also aims to enhance political and philosophical understandings of human rights in vietnam with regard to the embodiment of human rights in vietnamese law. the programme consists of four modules: (1) international human rights laws and mechanisms; (2) regional mechanisms, with a special focus on asean and its constituent nations’ experiences; (3) vietnamese policies and law regarding human rights; and (4) human rights in other branches of the law and the current development of human rights (vnu – school of law, 2015). human rights education review – volume 2(2) 12 the planning and implementation of vnu’s llm programme exemplifies the different expectations of diverse constituencies (mahidol university et al. 2013; 2019). the curriculum has been benchmarked against international programmes, notably those of the university of oslo (norway), lund university (sweden) and mahidol university (thailand). the university of oslo provided financial support between 2010 and 2016. this support was important in enabling academics from foreign universities to travel regularly to hanoi to teach. monash university (australia) now supports the programme in the same way. the programme was designated by vnu as a pilot programme but in 2017, after a favourable review by the asian university network’s quality assurance program (aun qa), it was formalised as an on-going element of vnu education. some expect that the programme will be a driver of democratization in vietnam. however, it is not surprising, given the political implications, that this is not a stated objective. another expectation is that the programme will promote cooperation in research and education between universities. so far, international cooperation with academic institutions, both in teaching and in research, has been greatly strengthened, as we see to be the case in many other academic institutions that address human rights (axinn, 1984). lecturers and researchers have benefitted from courses run by international universities and a range of research is conducted at national level. a new generation of lecturers and researchers has been actively participating in designing new programmes and courses in their respective universities. from a broader perspective, human rights education has been incorporated into the education strategy of vnu hanoi. programmes and courses are embedded in law and in other programmes, using an interdisciplinary approach (vnu, 2015). since its inception, the llm programme has been revised, following the recommendations of aun qa for greater interdisciplinarity. subsequent human rights education programmes the success of the vnu programme encouraged other educational institutions to offer master’s programmes, notably those of the vietnam academy of social science (vass), commencing in 2014, and the ho chi minh political academy, commencing in 2015. this expansion of teaching in human rights, not only in law schools but also in the social and political sciences, has provided more opportunities for students from all specializations to study human rights. in addition, human rights courses are integrated in the design of degrees programmes in subjects other than law. seven law universities and law schools offer human rights courses. it should be noted too that vass has been authorized by the government to develop hre across all levels of the education system. this will, however, require major resourcing and, as such, implementation is likely to take many years. the graduate academy of social sciences (gass)5 of vass was established during a restructuring of the many existent research institutes of vass. all graduate training and education are now managed by gass instead of by individual institutes, in order to avoid separation and duplication of research and education functions. the vass master’s programme on human rights was approved in 2012 and is currently being taken by a fourth intake of students. hanoi law university is the largest law university in vietnam and was established with the support of the ministry of justice. the university does not have a specific human rights programme or course.6 instead, human rights studies are mainstreamed into public international law, including courses on the international h.t.m. ngo 13 criminal court; private international law; child rights; domestic violence; gender equity and persons with disabilities. the course on international human rights law that had been taught since 2003 was removed when the faculty of international law was renamed the faculty of international economic law in 2006. ho chi minh law university, the leading law university in the south of vietnam, currently has four human-rights related courses taught in the faculty of international law (private international law, international human rights law, public international law) and the faculty of administrative law (citizen rights and human rights). in 2006 the university established a centre for human rights and citizen rights with a mandate to conduct research and support teaching in the field of human rights in cooperation with the danish institute of human rights. up to now this collaboration has focussed more on research than on human rights education. the diplomatic academy of vietnam supports both undergraduate and postgraduate programmes in four main fields: international relations, international law, international economics and international communication. the academy has strengthened its capacity to deliver education in international relations via cooperation with victoria university (new zealand). courses on human rights and peace studies are offered. however, the peace studies curricula are restricted to topics of international security and conflict resolution, in theory and practice, at the regional level. most courses are offered as electives. located in the international law faculty, a number of courses are offered: human rights protection mechanisms (postgraduate); and, at undergraduate level, security and conflicts after the cold war; security in the asia-pacific region; theories of international security; international conflicts; security cooperation mechanisms; and international human rights law. there is no doubt that vietnam is taking human rights education seriously. the national education strategy at university level requires a basic knowledge of human rights. human rights programmes can be proposed and developed by universities themselves and be given a pilot implementation for a limited period. they can then receive official approval and become part of the public education system, as in the case of vnu-sl. currently, most law schools/universities now include compulsory courses or course material on human rights in their curricula. programmes and courses generally take an interdisciplinary approach (government of vietnam, 2012, 2017). human rights education is also being developed at lower levels of the educational system (hoan, 2006), suggesting it is possible to include hre in the continuing professional development of teachers. this opens up a potential space for its future expansion beyond higher education. the 2017 government plan states that human rights education be provided in all formal official schools by 2025 (government of vietnam, 2017). impact of hre programmes it is difficult to assess the impact of hre programmes on the human rights situation in vietnam, given they have only been recently implemented. but the potential for graduates to have a positive impact on support for human rights is indicated by their numbers and their employment roles. in the case of vnu’s llm, 125 students have been enrolled in six cohorts. graduates work in state agencies, international organisations, social organisations and the private sector. thirty graduates work in universities. some are human rights lawyers, and some do legal work in ministries. bi-annual programme evaluations by vnu include information from employers about the quality of graduates. these numbers do not of course indicate any direct human rights education review – volume 2(2) 14 impact on the human rights situation but, at the least, they attest to an emerging critical mass of graduates well-suited to bring about progress. they also indicate that employers recognize the need for human rights-trained employees. academic freedom in human rights education academic freedom has been articulated as a universal right of scholars. this right implies the capacity to teach and conduct research unrestricted by political doctrine, freedom to disseminate the results of research, freedom to express opinions about the institutions and systems in which scholars work, freedom from institutional censorship, and freedom to participate in professional or representative academic bodies (unesco, 1997: para. 27). unesco’s (1974) the recommendation on the status of scientific researchers also reminds us that: open communication of ... results, hypotheses and opinions as suggested by the phrase – ‘academic freedom’ lies at the very heart of the scientific process, and provides the strongest guarantee of accuracy and objectivity of scientific results. (unesco, 1974: preamble). the 2017 revised unesco recommendation, which supersedes the 1974 recommendation, not only codifies the goals and value systems by which science operates, but also emphasises that researchers need to be supported and protected if science is to flourish (unesco, 2017). many nation states have acknowledged international treaty obligations that include, inter alia, protection for academic freedom and related values in higher education. academic conduct and content are clearly protected as specific forms of opinion and expression. the special rapporteur on the right to freedom of opinion and expression cites examples of violations of academic freedom as violations of freedom of opinion and expression, including ‘suppression of research on such controversial topics as a national independence movement that was active in the past; a ban on campuses of any independent organizations that are considered political; refusal of permission to hold a seminar on human rights’ (un commission on human rights, 2000: para. 37). academic freedom does not mean that university teachers and researchers are free of professional constraints on their activities. teaching and research programmes should be subject to approval processes within universities and research funding bodies, but these processes should be limited to ethical and technical considerations. approval processes should also respect the principle of peer judgement as to the value and validity of curriculum and course content and research projects. peer-reviewed publication protocols are designed to ensure that published work has used sound research methods and is based on established academic literature. whilst there is debate as to the precise nature of academic freedom, scholars working in the western democratic tradition would generally support a common paradigm that embodies the above criteria (see, for example, finkin & post, 2009). in essence, if an academic speaks or writes from a position of authority that is acknowledged by peers, any speech or publication should be free from political interference. this does not mean, of course, that what academics might say or write cannot be challenged by politicians or members of the general public. but being challenged does not mean being censored or proscribed in the ‘court of public opinion.’ when academics stray into public debates, however well based their h.t.m. ngo 15 opinions may be, they may expect to be subject to vigorous and sometimes poorly informed criticism. they are nevertheless entitled to express their views. when academics speak outside of their areas of expertise they should be seen as speaking as members of the public rather than from their university positions. in relation to the right to education, as stated in article 13 of the international covenant on economic social and cultural rights (un, 1966b), nation states are obligated to take affirmative action and to achieve as full a realisation of the right to education as resources permit. the committee on economic social and cultural rights (cescr) observes that states are obligated not only to respect but to promote academic freedom as a prerequisite to the delivery of high-quality education, noting that the right to education can only be enjoyed if ‘staff and students throughout the education sector are entitled to academic freedom’ (cescr, 1999: para. 38). furthermore: the committee also notes the relationship between articles 13(2)(e), 2(2), 3 and 6-8 of the covenant, including the right of teachers to organise and bargain collectively … and urges state parties to report on measures they are taking to ensure that all teaching staff enjoy the conditions and status commensurate with their roles (cescr, 1999: para. 27). in vietnam, as described above, programmes and courses with a human rights focus are still relatively new. this means that the government wants to assess the effectiveness and relevance of programmes and courses. it also wants to prevent any anti-government action that may occur if there is abuse of human rights and democracy. moreover, most academic institutions choose to integrate human rights topics into their currently approved curricula rather than establishing separate programmes on human rights. this limited approach arguably reduces the effectiveness of hre. the lack of an officially sanctioned framework and guidelines for the design of hre programmes and courses also remains a challenge to their implementation. this creates difficulties for universities and other higher education institutions attempting to have programmes approved by the relevant authorities. most programmes include international law, standards and norms, and mechanisms on human rights, but they also need to be aligned with the laws and policies of the vietnamese state. the vietnamese university system operates under the oversight of the ministry of education and training. however, research institutes and academies in fields such as social sciences, law, and the humanities are independent and have the authority to design their own education programmes. interestingly, academic systems may also be established by particular government ministries or organs such as the judicial, police, and military sectors. such arrangements have the aim of developing the competence of staff in realising the goals of the ministries they work in. umbrella universities such as vietnam national university hanoi, vietnam national university hue, and vietnam national university ho chi minh city operate and approve the programmes and courses for their subordinate universities and schools. this practice increases academic freedom at the university level, in particular when it comes to designing human rights courses. academic freedom has increased over the years in several areas: the development and amendment of syllabi; cooperation and exchange with international lecturers; production of learning materials; publications; teaching methods; research; and international human rights education review – volume 2(2) 16 cooperation. at the same time, academics enjoy greater independence in developing textbooks and reference books about human rights and related fields. the content of human rights publications intended for teaching and learning in higher education are not subject to censorship. all that is required is that they follow the publishers’ standard guidelines and copyright rules. given vietnam’s special history and sociopolitical conditions, the joint programmes and internationalisation in higher education have had an unexpected socio-political impact; lecturers from international universities can introduce new and updated reading materials and syllabi. effectively, they have supported the creation of special free academic zones (ngo, 2015). in general, curriculum design and the work of academics is founded on international standards. this freedom is expressed in the structure of curricula, the content of courses and international collaboration. there are, however, as noted below, instances where the state has moved to curtail certain behaviours that are outside of the formal education process. it is also true that academics are quite aware of implicit constraints on any overt criticism of vietnam’s system of government in their teaching, publications and public engagement. freedom in curriculum and course design from 2006, vietnam national university hanoi, under instruction no. 775/dt, required all new and existing courses to conform to a university-wide credit–based system in which expected learning outcomes were integrated across teaching programmes. accordingly, vnu law school has revised its hre courses in conformity with this regulation. the training objective of each course is clearly defined in relation to expected learning outcomes and translated into parts of the expected learning outcomes. course outlines specify and regulate a number of things: content and levels of knowledge; hard and soft skills; personal, professional and social ethics; the knowledge and skills that learners should be able to deploy after course completion. the school of law annually reviews and implements amendments to course syllabi to ensure they continue to fit programme goals. the llm programme has been amended to take a more interdisciplinary approach. this process shows that teaching programme and course development are very much in the hands of the school of law and not subject to micro-management by the university or the state. teaching materials another important indicator of academic freedom in hre has been the proliferation of published teaching materials. for example, since 2005 three public institutions have published textbooks and reference books on human rights and related subjects. these are vnu (school of law), vass, and the institute of human rights research in the ho chi minh political academy, which was the first human rights institution established under the political training agenda of the cpv. initially the academy researched and published books on human rights based on marxist-leninist ideology. but over the past decade the academy has taken a broader view, consistent with government mandates on hre, and has published, among other documents, translations of the udhr, and other conventions such as the convention on the rights of the child (un, 1989) and the convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women (un, 1979). the other two academic institutions have more freely developed text books and reference books, including translations of international human rights h.t.m. ngo 17 conventions and updates of research and articles on different human rights themes. vnu has itself published over 30 books which are translations of international human rights documents, recommendations and general comments, textbooks and reference books. the books also cover ideology and human rights philosophy and specific topics such as: human rights and the death penalty; human rights for vulnerable groups; human rights in international criminal law; the rights of migrant workers under international and vietnamese law; promotion and protection of human rights in asean; access to information; and constitutions and international experiences. in addition to a library of over 1,000 books, the school of law runs an online digital learning database, in both english and vietnamese, that shares documents on international laws and vietnamese laws related to human rights. to date, this is the only open source digital learning system for human rights education in vietnam. there is a great need for teaching materials, such as textbooks on human rights, in vietnamese. long before vnu launched the first cohort of its llm, in 2010, the university had conducted research and developed reading materials and textbooks in vietnamese. since vietnamese is the native language of students and teachers there still is, however, a lack of academic publications on human rights subjects available for teaching and learning. translations of international academic books and papers has therefore been a priority, although much more needs to be done. vnu aims to continue updating its library with materials in english and vietnamese. compendia of writings are developed as learning materials to support each course. in addition, international and vietnamese research papers are included in the teaching material. vnu is making good progress in digitising teaching and learning materials. the programme syllabi and reading materials for each course and each cohort are uploaded online. teaching methods lecturers in higher education determine their own teaching methods, without active intervention from university management. in this respect, their practice follows international standards. lecturers can apply learner-centred methods in order to encourage their students’ participation and building of knowledge. lecturers are facilitators/guides who provide orientation in class so that learners can think creatively. in addition, students are required to take responsibility for self-learning, by reading, researching and preparing class contributions, and working in groups to develop their analytical, debating and presentation skills. international cooperation in vietnam’s academic institutions, both teaching and research have been notably strengthened in recent years. the growing understanding of international standards of human rights may help to modify the dogmatic understanding of human rights based on marxist-leninist ideology. the new generation of lecturers and researchers has been actively participating in designing new programmes and courses in their respective universities. teaching exchanges with universities in other countries is now common. since its inception, vnu’s llm in human rights has been supported by regular one-week teaching visits by distinguished academics from europe, australia and southeast asia. these visitors bring international perspectives and, in the author’s experience, the content of their teaching is unconstrained by government or the university. human rights education review – volume 2(2) 18 research and policy advocacy in line with international standards, academic performance in vietnam is increasingly measured by publications and there are now several research publications by vietnamese academics in international journals and books. these contributions are invaluable to the field of human rights, because it has not been easy for international colleagues to gain insights into legal and political debates in vietnam. one visible measure of success in hre is the increasing robustness of vietnamese academics in actively engaging in debates and disagreements, even on policy-making processes. notable examples of this include the process of constitutional amendment, 2011-2012, and the formulation of new chapter on human rights into the 2013 constitution. these activities indicate a degree of political pluralism. there is still a certain amount of freedom to conduct human rights research into politically sensitive topics such as freedom of expression, freedom of association, and fair trials. but engagement in policy advocacy by academics is limited. in order to organize workshops and seminars on human rights, it is necessary to have the approval of the prime minister’s office. the freedom to conduct workshops and seminars to share research findings independently is also limited and, to some level, curtailed. a number of cases illustrate how teaching and research in the field of human rights and, indeed, the distribution of human rights material, as a form of hre, are curtailed. the case of nha thuyen (real name do thi thoan) of hanoi university of pedagogy is especially salutary. she was removed from teaching and, in 2014, had her master’s degree candidature rescinded because her thesis was about a vocal oppositional group of poets (mơ mieng group) (bbc news, 2014). another case concerns the university of forestry, which required academic and general staff and students to stop voicing opinions on the preservation of trees in hanoi (university of forestry, 2015). despite good progress in recognising academic freedom in human rights education, which mainly focuses on formal hre programmes, there are still limits to academic freedom in engaging in human rights matters in the informal and public spheres. the participation of academics in the ‘public space’ is very restricted, even when it comes to sharing and writing about human rights issues of public interest or expressing a political opinion. one example is the arrest in 2013 of young people for sharing and learning about the universal declaration of human rights in a park in ho chi minh city. rights activists nguyen hoang vi (a.k.a. an do nguyen) and vu quoc anh (a.k.a. august anh), who were the planned moderators for the discussion in ho chi minh city, were detained shortly after they distributed copies of the universal declaration of human rights to people in the park. both the distribution of the udhr and organization of a public discussion were deemed to be against the wishes of the state and the cpv (human rights watch, 2013). these examples show that challenges remain in achieving the academic freedom and realisation of hre regarded as the norm in democracies. restrictions to academic freedom are not, however, systematic across all educational institutions and universities. conclusion international human rights commitments by the government of vietnam have led to a softening of the ideology that ‘human rights’ is an alien concept in a socialist state. h.t.m. ngo 19 to put it more accurately, human rights, in the western sense, are accepted in vietnam as long as they do not conflict with traditional marxist-leninist conceptions or authorise direct criticism of the political system. the need for human rights education and academic freedom is recognised. however, hre was initiated and is still largely restricted to institutions of higher education, in order to control its implementation. there remain institutional challenges in undertaking human rights education, but changes have been made. firstly, both the state and the party have adopted policies that support human rights. secondly, academic institutions can open up to international cooperation, both in teaching and in research. third, lecturers and researchers have studied in foreign universities and a range of research is conducted at national level. a new generation of lecturers and researchers can design and deliver new programmes and courses and develop text books in their respective universities. due to international cooperation and the competence of academics, vietnam’s programmes and courses in human rights have been modelled on international best practice. they have been adapted to local circumstances and this, to some degree, has restricted a full acceptance of human rights norms. associated with this restriction are definite, if informal, constraints on academics and students engaging in the public domain outside of official channels. a corollary of this constraint is the limited scope to research human rights abuses, especially those construed to have arisen from the actions of government agencies and employees. as noted in the introduction to this paper, western conceptions of academic freedom are not unconstrained. the essential notion is that knowledge propounded in teaching and publications must be based on objective, peer-reviewed processes. there is also the question of when academics speaking/writing in the public domain base statements on personal expertise as opposed to the general opinion. in the latter case, academics should not be seen as speaking as academics but as members of the general public. in such cases western universities would generally frown upon an academic identifying him/herself as an employee of the university. in the public domain and informal education sector, human rights education is still not popular or well-organized. there are challenges ahead to mainstream and scale up human rights education in formal official schools at all levels. while the party and government have given human rights education high priority, setting out a long-term strategy and plan, vietnam continues to face challenges in realising hre due to limited qualified personnel, teaching materials and understanding of teaching methodologies appropriate to all levels of education. human rights education review – volume 2(2) 20 notes 1 the united nations declared 1995-2004 as the decade for human rights education, followed by adoption of the world programme for human rights education, the first phase of which (2005-2009) focused on primary and secondary education. the second phase of the world programme for human rights education (2010-2014) was adopted by the human rights council in its resolution 15/11 (30 september 2010), with the focus on hre for higher education and on human rights training programmes for teachers and educators, civil servants, law enforcement officials and military staff. 2 in 1982, four years before doi moi was proclaimed, vietnam ratified the international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights (cescr) (un, 1966b), the international covenant on civil and political rights (ccpr) (un, 1966a), the international convention on the elimination all forms of racial discrimination (un, 1965), and the convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women (cedaw) (un, 1979). 3 original in vietnamese: ‘chăm lo cho con người, bảo vệ quyền và lợi ích hợp pháp của mọi người; tôn trọng và thực hiện các điều ước quốc tế về quyền con người mà việt nam đã ký kết hoặc tham gia’ [translation: caring for people, protection of legitimate rights and benefits of every one, respect and implement international human rights conventions that vietnam ratifies]. 4 original in vietnamese: ‘quyền con người, quyền công dân và các điều kiện để mọi người được phát triển toàn diện’ [translation: human rights and citizen rights provide the conditions that ensure that everyone enjoys full development]. (cpv, 2011a). see also http://www.xaydungdang.org.vn/home/vankientulieu/2011/3511/chien-luoc-phattrien-kinh-texa-hoi-20112020.aspx 5 currently, vass/gass is cooperating with the danish institute of human rights, norwegian centre of human rights of university of oslo and konrad adenauer foundation, germany in conducting research on human rights. there is as yet no cooperation or joint education program on human rights established at gass. 6 despite the fact that hanoi law university (hlu) has 10 years of cooperation with lund university and has sent more than 30 lecturers to lund to study at master’s and phd level on international law and human rights and related issues, it has yet to establish a programme on human rights or a research centre on human rights. http://www.xaydungdang.org.vn/home/vankientulieu/2011/3511/chien-luoc-phat-trien-kinh-texa-hoi-20112020.aspx http://www.xaydungdang.org.vn/home/vankientulieu/2011/3511/chien-luoc-phat-trien-kinh-texa-hoi-20112020.aspx h.t.m. ngo 21 references association of southeast asian nations (1993, april 2). final declaration of the regional meeting for asia of the world conference on human rights (the bangkok declaration). un doc a/conf.157/asrm/8. axinn, g.h. 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(2015, october 30). curriculum. retrieved 31.10.2019 from http://law.vnu.edu.vn/fuploads/20160218161816913.pdf vietnam national university hanoi – school of law. (undated). human rights portal. http://hr.law.vnu.edu.vn http://law.vnu.edu.vn/fuploads/20160218161816913.pdf http://hr.law.vnu.edu.vn/ opportunities and constraints on human rights education when academic freedom is not guaranteed: the case of vietnam introduction development of human rights education in vietnam historical context human rights discourse the universal periodical report as a trigger the vnu vanguard llm programme subsequent human rights education programmes notes references bbc news. (2014, march 24). bất thường quanh một luận văn [translation: the abnormality about a thesis]. https://www.bbc.com/vietnamese/vietnam/2014/03/140323_luan_van_mo_mieng volume 4, no 1 (2021) date received: 07-09-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3986 date accepted: 17-11-2020 issn 2535-5406 human rights education in humanitarian settings: opportunities and challenges megan devonald overseas development institute, uk. nicola jones overseas development institute, uk silvia guglielmi overseas development institute, uk. jennifer seager george washington university, usa. sarah baird george washington university, usa. abstract: human rights education in humanitarian settings provides an opportunity for adolescent refugees to understand and exercise their human rights, respect the rights of others, and gain active citizenship skills. this paper examines non-formal education programmes and the extent to which they embed education about, through and for human rights; it draws on mixed method data from two diverse contexts– rohingya refugees in bangladesh and syrian refugees in jordan. we find stark differences in how human rights are reflected in non-formal education programming for refugees. in jordan, the makani programme integrates human rights across subjects and teacher pedagogy, and fosters skills for active citizenship. by contrast, in cox’s bazar, bangladesh, a lack of basic rights hinders the delivery of meaningful human rights education for rohingya adolescents. we conclude that human rights education should be a core pillar of humanitarian responses, but that it requires significant adaptations to contextual realities. human rights education review – vol 4(1) 28 human rights education in humanitarian settings: opportunities and challenges doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3986 issn 2535-5406 megan devonald nicola jones silvia guglielmi jennifer seager sarah baird m.devonald.gage@odi.org.uk gender and adolescence: global evidence, overseas development institute, uk. gender and adolescence: global evidence, overseas development institute, uk. gender and adolescence: global evidence, overseas development institute, uk. milken institute school of public health, george washington university, usa. milken institute school of public health, george washington university, usa. abstract: human rights education in humanitarian settings provides an opportunity for adolescent refugees to understand and exercise their human rights, respect the rights of others, and gain active citizenship skills. this paper examines non-formal education programmes and the extent to which they embed education about, through and for human rights; it draws on mixed method data from two diverse contexts– rohingya refugees in bangladesh and syrian refugees in jordan. we find stark differences in how human rights are reflected in non-formal education programming for refugees. in jordan, the makani programme integrates human rights across subjects and teacher pedagogy, and fosters skills for active citizenship. by contrast, in cox’s bazar, bangladesh, a lack of basic rights hinders the delivery of meaningful human rights education for rohingya adolescents. we conclude that human rights education should be a core pillar of humanitarian responses, but that it requires significant adaptations to contextual realities. keywords: human rights, education, humanitarian, refugees, adolescents, rohingya, syria introduction although the universal declaration of human rights states that ‘everyone has the right to education’ (united nations [un], 1948, article 26), there are currently 3.7 million refugee children who do not go to school (united nations high commissioner for refugees [unhcr], 2020). the recent global refugee forum highlighted education as a key area where refugees fall farthest behind (unhcr, 2019a). globally, 79.5 million people were forcibly displaced in 2019. around 26 million were refugees and approximately half were under the age of 18 (unhcr, 2020). education is both a human right in itself and a method of ensuring people are aware of their rights; it can thus help to prevent further rights violations (human security network, 2003). this is particularly important in humanitarian settings, as human rights education (hre) teaches key values, such as respect, empathy, mailto:m.devonald.gage@odi.org.uk m.devonald, n.jones, s. guglielmi, j.seager & s.baird 29 cooperation and dignity of self, to foster peace and social cohesion (reimers & chung, 2010; starkey, 2012). non-formal education schemes play a vital role in providing hre in refugee settings. one such scheme in jordan, the makani programme, for syrian refugees and jordanian host communities, teaches life skills and provides learning support and child protection activities. it teaches children concepts of rights and abuse using a human rights approach that ensures staff ‘not only promote but also respect human rights’ (united nations children’s fund [unicef], 2019 p.79). in bangladesh, temporary learning centres (tlcs) provide informal education and life skills training for rohingya children. although tlcs focus less explicitly on human rights, the life skills component is designed to teach them to make healthy choices and respect their community. both programmes are implemented by unicef, with the same child rights ethos at the forefront of their design. this article compares the extent to which hre is embedded in each of these programmes by assessing how far they deliver education about, through and for human rights (un, 2011). it starts with an overview of hre before going on to discuss the hre theoretical framework we have used. it then presents the methodology used, and describes the findings from mixed-methods research on adolescents, their parents and key informants in bangladesh and jordan. it concludes by discussing programming implications. overview of hre the universal declaration of human rights states that: ‘education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms’ (un, 1948, article 26). subsequently, further declarations have been adopted-such as the un covenant on economic, social and cultural rights (un, 1966) and the un convention on the rights of the child (un, 1989)-which state that education should develop respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. in 2005, the un world programme for human rights education was created to build ‘a universal culture of human rights’ (office of the high commissioner for human rights [ohchr], 2005). the programme’s fourth phase (2020-2024) is focused on expanding hre for young people in formal, nonformal and informal settings, prioritising the most marginalised (ohchr, 2019). adolescence is an important target for hre, as it is a unique developmental phase where significant cognitive and social transformations present a critical window for intervention (viner et al., 2015). during this life stage, young people begin to explore their identities and positions in society. consequently, hre can be important in shaping adolescents’ moral understanding and their ability to seek transformational change (un, 2016). context syrian refugees have been in jordan for almost a decade. while they initially faced significant rates of exclusion, over the last five years their educational opportunities have improved markedly (jones et al., 2019). they are able to attend formal school, following the introduction of a nationwide double-shift system (unhcr, 2019b), and there is non-formal education through the makani platform, which reaches approximately 100,000 vulnerable refugees and host community children and adolescents. in bangladesh, our study focuses on the rohingya population, one of the most world’s most discriminated groups (human rights council, 2018). the government of bangladesh refers to the rohingya as forcibly displaced myanmar nationals while the united nations system refers to them as refugees (inter-sector human rights education review – vol 4(1) 30 coordination group, international organization for migration, united nations high commissioner for refugees & united nations resident coordinator for bangladesh, 2020). in this article, this population is referred to as refugees. although they have been fleeing from myanmar for generations, 2017 saw 500,000 people cross the border in just one month (iscg, 2017). approximately 860,000 refugees currently reside in 34 makeshift camps in the ukhia and teknaf upazilas (administrative divisions) of cox’s bazar district–one of bangladesh’s poorest regions (milton et al., 2017). notwithstanding international commitments to guarantee refugee education (unhcr, 2018), rohingya adolescents have been denied this basic human right. this is partly because their lack of legal refugee status places them in a ‘legal and humanitarian limbo’ (bhatia et al., 2019). moreover, the limited capacity and political will to absorb rohingya into the education system or workforce excludes them from host community structures. the implications for the rohingya can be seen clearly in education; refugee children only have access to non-formal education, predominately ngo and un-run, in tlcs (unicef, 2020a). hre theories and programmes the un declaration on human rights education and training (2011) highlights three key dimensions of hre that provide a useful framework for analysing pedagogical programmes: education about human rights (providing an understanding of human rights principles and values); education through human rights (ensuring the way hre is taught aligns with the principles of human rights); and education for human rights (empowering participants so that they can exercise their own human rights and promote the rights of others). as these dimensions suggest, hre is not achieved by merely adding human rights to the curriculum and works best when embedded in both content and process (bajaj, 2011a). didactic methods of teaching hre have been criticised as only focusing on human rights content; thus, participatory teaching that include critical reflection is promoted (tibbitts, 2017). furthermore, as outlined by unicef (2007), an enabling environment for hre can be achieved through ensuring teacher behaviour and school policies are consistent with a human rights approach. empowerment is the ultimate goal of many hre programmes. tibbitts’ (2017) transformational model is aimed at empowering individuals, promoting social change and is often focused on participants who have personal experiences of human rights abuses, such as refugees. hre in refugee settings is a relatively unexplored field of research, yet there are some examples where integrating human rights into humanitarian education has facilitated positive social change. for example, unrwa schools across the mena region have provided opportunities for young palestinians to articulate a sense of identity and belonging (shabaneh, 2012). however, a number of specific challenges, such as continued exposure to human rights abuses, can impact hre programme implementation. this is highlighted in osler and yahya’s (2013) study of hre in post-conflict kurdistan, where denial of rights (particularly girls’) in both society and schools can cause a disconnect between the course content and the learner’s own experience, due to learners’ inability to claim the rights they have been educated about. similarly, hre in palestinian authority schools in the occupied west bank have been criticised for not accurately representing the reality under which palestinians live, and some teachers and students who have experienced rights denials have disengaged from hre (abu moghli, 2020). m.devonald, n.jones, s. guglielmi, j.seager & s.baird 31 some hre programmes do not address the broader political and cultural climate in their content. in a study of hre in rwandan secondary schools, russell (2018) found that the curriculum focused on abstract principles of hre rather than tackling issues relevant to rwanda, such as multiculturalism and political rights. the focus on non-controversial topics highlights some of the challenges of implementing hre in sensitive political landscapes. in a peace education programme in a refugee camp in kenya, gaps were found in its rights-based curriculum, which failed to discuss serious abuses of power or difficult gender topics, such as domestic violence (solem, 2017). further systemic problems can arise–a review of life skills and citizenship programmes in the middle-east and north-african [mena] region found that although non-formal interventions reached vulnerable populations, they were poorly coordinated, lacked long-term sustainability and sporadically implemented (unicef mena, 2017). further challenges stem from a lack of teacher training and low prioritisation by donors and governments (robiolle moul, 2017). teachers’ political and professional landscapes can also shape hre. a review of teachers’ roles in hre found that a lack of training, beliefs that do not align with hre and the use of hre rhetoric without achieving it in the classroom can have negative impacts however, teachers who challenge society’s cultural norms are highly instrumental to the hre process (jerome, 2018). a study of an ngoimplemented hre programme in india found that teachers play vital roles as advocates of human rights in the community (bajaj, 2011b). much of the existing evidence base, however, looks at hre in high-income countries (hahn, 2020; bajaj, canlas & argenal, 2017) and there is a lack of evidence for low-income countries, especially concerning refugees. there is also more work being done on the scholarly ideals of hre, but little empirical research on what works in practice or that centres on the voices of the young. this article aims to bridge these gaps by offering insights into two contrasting approaches to hre in refugee contexts. it assesses how two non-formal education programmes embody the un’s three components of hre: education about, through and for human rights. this framework is used because its multidimensional approach allows assessment of the programmes’ contents, teaching methodologies and empowerment-orientations. methods our research draws on data from a mixed-methods longitudinal study, gender and adolescence: global evidence (gage). this study generates evidence about 10–19year-old adolescents’ capabilities in lowand middle-income countries, in order to understand what assists their development. it is run by a consortium of research institutes in six focal countries, as well as in the uk and the us. the data was collected by local research teams in local languages and the analysis was carried out jointly by national researchers and researchers in the uk and the us (see jones, baird & lunin 2018). this article focuses on refugees in jordan and bangladesh, these countries being selected due to their high proportion of refugees and their contrasting approaches to refugee education. data collection human rights education review – vol 4(1) 32 the research sites in jordan spanned five governorates (amman, mafraq, irbid, zarqa and jerash) and three contexts–host communities, informal tented settlements and un refugee camps. in bangladesh, data collection took place in cox’s bazar across 32 of the 34 camps in which rohingya refugees reside. data collection took place in jordan in 2018 and 2019, and in cox’s bazar in 2019. in this paper, the quantitative sample focuses on younger adolescents (10–14 years) only. in jordan, the sample consists of 1,593 syrian adolescents (788 females and 805 males). in bangladesh, the sample consists of 608 adolescents (293 girls and 315 boys). we collected further data using interactive qualitative methods with a subset of adolescents purposely selected from the quantitative sample (117 in jordan and 73 in bangladesh) to ensure a mix of participants and non-participants, camp and host community residents, in-school and out-of-school adolescents, adolescent mothers and adolescents with disabilities. the qualitative sample included adolescents from two age groups (10-14 and 15-18), in order to capture insights from older adolescents who are part of non-formal education programming tailored towards young people of 15+, such as the makani social innovation labs. the findings also stem from qualitative interviews with parents and programme facilitators (see table 1). data was collected through face-to-face individual and group interviews by local researchers of the same sex as respondents. group interviews were conducted in single-sex groups of the same age category, and all three groups (students, parents and facilitators) were included in separate focus group interviews. data collection involved a number of participatory methods such as the ‘most significant change’ exercise with makani participants in jordan (jones, et al., 2019). table 1: overview of sample female male total quantitative fieldwork (jordan) adolescent interviews, (10-14) 788 805 1593 total 788 805 1593 qualitative fieldwork (jordan) individual adolescent interviews, (10 – 14) 39 27 66 individual adolescent interviews, (15 – 18) 34 17 51 most significant change focus group discussions 13 11 24 parent interviews 21 15 36 makani facilitators 15 37 52 innovation lab participants 9 8 17 total 131 86 246 quantitative fieldwork (bangladesh) adolescent interviews, (10 – 14) 293 315 608 m.devonald, n.jones, s. guglielmi, j.seager & s.baird 33 total 293 315 608 qualitative fieldwork (bangladesh) individual adolescent interviews, (10 – 14) 16 18 34 individual adolescent interviews, (15 – 18) 26 13 39 parent interviews 6 6 12 focus group discussions 9 9 18 key informant 5 4 9 total 62 50 112 ethical clearance for research was obtained from the overseas development institute’s research ethics committee and unhcr in jordan, and innovations for poverty action in bangladesh. ethical clearance for both countries was also obtained from the george washington university committee on human research institutional review board. verbal assent was obtained from participants under the age of 18, as well as verbal consent from their caregivers. researchers flagged any safeguarding issues that arose in interviews and directed the respondents to the appropriate services. data analysis the quantitative analysis compares a set of outcomes for syrians participating in the makani programme vs. those not participating, and rohingya enrolled in non-formal ngo schools vs. those not enrolled. we look at means overall by program participation and non-participation, and then participation/non-participation separately by gender. means are weighted (in bangladesh) to make results representative of study communities. after comparing means, we conduct a regression analysis of the same comparisons that are controlled for wealth (measured with an asset index), household size, age, location, whether the household head is female, and gender (dropped in the gender-specific regressions). these characteristics were chosen as they are (i) unlikely to be impacted by the programs, (ii) drive participation in these programmes, and (iii) affect adolescent outcomes independent of programme participation. controlling for these observable characteristics allows us to unpack whether differences in outcomes persist once accounting for selection into the programme. all differences discussed in the text are statistically significant at the p<0.05 level. in the quantitative tables provided, the x in the last column indicates whether the difference is still statistically significant after including the controls in the regression table (p<0.05). the o indicates p<0.1 after adding controls. gender-disaggregated tables are available on request. while we do not have questions that directly measure uptake of human rights knowledge, we do have measures of the skills gained by adolescents through learning about human rights including skills that support advocating for human rights. the outcome measures we focus on in the quantitative analysis include: (i) whether the adolescent reports talking to someone about experiences of peer violence and (ii) talking to their mother or father about bullying (about human rights); (iii) the degree of ‘togetherness’ felt in the community (through human rights, jordan only); and (iv) having a trusted friend, being able to express his or her opinion to an older person, human rights education review – vol 4(1) 34 and a measure of adolescent resilience (for human rights) (the child and youth resilience measure, resilience research centre, 2018). for the qualitative analysis, transcripts were translated into english, transcribed and coded thematically using the maxqda software by a small team of research assistants familiar with the context. the codebook is informed by the gage programme’s conceptual framework, which has a capabilities lens highlighting the interconnectedness of adolescent well-being domains such as education, bodily integrity and freedom from violence, and voice and agency. at the same time, differences in impact by gender, age and disability are explored (gage consortium, 2019). the quotes in the article were selected as illustrative of the main findings. strengths and limitations a limitation of the study is that it relies upon the self-reporting of students and teachers. future studies would benefit from the addition of classroom observations to complement the findings. the study is strengthened by the high numbers of participants in both the qualitative and quantitative sample. the incorporation of mixed-methods methodology was used to examine overall trends in the data, in addition to detailed explorations of respondents’ experiences. results makani overview the multi-donor makani programme was initially developed under the no lost generation initiative in response to the lack of school places in jordan for syrian refugees. more recently, makani has evolved to focus on complementary, non-formal tuition, life skills and child protection services. the programme operates its courses in three-month cycles; participants can sign up for one or multiple courses in each cycle, depending on availability. national and international ngos provide session facilitators and run centres in host communities, while in azraq and zatari camps, unicef works directly with syrian volunteers to deliver a core curriculum adapted by each provider to fit local needs. makani serves as a key pathway to formal schooling and has explicit links to unicef’s education-labelled cash for transfer programme, hajati. at the time of the quantitative survey, 394 of the 1,593 young adolescents surveyed (179 females and 215 males) attended makani. temporary learning centres overview the initial rohingya crisis response in 2017 focused on securing safe, child-friendly spaces in the camps for vulnerable young children (tay et al., 2018). in 2018, a second response phase focused on procuring quality education in the camps. education sector coordinating agencies unicef and save the children, alongside the government of bangladesh, set up tlcs to ensure learning progression for children and adolescents. partners and the bangladeshi government also developed, and are continuing to expand, the learning competency framework and approach – a tailored syllabus designed to bridge the gap in bangladeshi and burmese learning materials and curricula for 3-24 year olds. following negotiations between the governments of bangladesh and myanmar and humanitarian partners to allow the rohingya access to the myanmar curriculum in the second quarter of 2020, this was indefinitely paused due to the covid-19 pandemic (iscg et al., 2020). at the time of m.devonald, n.jones, s. guglielmi, j.seager & s.baird 35 the quantitative survey, 323 of the 608 young adolescents (159 females and 164 males) attended ngo-run non-formal education centres. education about human rights makani the makani programme is premised on unicef’s child rights-centred approach and, as such, its curriculum includes a substantial human rights content. facilitators, many of whom have a teaching background, are from the local community (jordanian with syrian refugee volunteers in host communities, since jordanian labour law restricts types of employment for refugees and syrians within camps predominantly to low-skilled occupations in the construction and agricultural sectors). they are given child protection training and are also able to refer to specialist services. these facilitators report that a key part of their role is teaching new students about the concepts of ‘rights’ and ‘duties’ or ‘responsibilities’, and creating a safe space where young people feel secure enough to talk about rights violations. as a makani facilitator in a host community noted: we communicate concepts…they know what their rights are…you may be subjected to violence and this affects your personality. i teach them about the safe places to go and talk about their rights…a lot of students come when they feel safe and say about things that have happened to them. the right to protection from violence is given prominence in child protection classes. a number of adolescents, especially girls, explained that they had been taught the differences between physical, psychological and sexual violence, and the importance of reporting risks of or exposure to violence to a trusted adult. this is reflected in the quantitative data; 48% of makani attendees know where to seek support if they experience violence, compared to 39% of those not attending (see table 2). this result is further supported in the regression analysis; even after controlling for household characteristics, makani participants are 8.6 percentage points more likely to know where to get support. we also observe gender differences in the likelihood of talking to someone about peer violence: male makani participants are 9.2 percentage points more likely to talk to someone about peer violence than nonparticipants, whereas female makani participants are less likely than their nonparticipant peers to talk to someone. we also see that makani boys are more likely to talk to their fathers about bullying than non-participants. we hypothesize that this gender difference is because peer violence for girls often takes the form of harassment by boys, and reporting this risks family honour (presler-marshall, jones, baird & malachoswka, 2019). human rights education review – vol 4(1) 36 table 2. makani and no makani, jordan in the qualitative data, makani facilitators described situations in which child protection classes have supported participants to report human rights abuses: a girl who was 14 years old [was] exposed to sexual harassment by her father at home. when she started to receive the sessions at the centre we talked about violence, its types and the ways of protection. additionally, we told them what to do if…exposed to this violence. then, she told us that she is exposed to harassment. after that, we dealt with her and informed the family protection department [who] took the girl to an accommodation centre. makani has a strong focus on child marriage, given the linkages between poverty and pressures to marry off daughters, as well as fears of sexual harassment en route to school and risks to family honour (presler-marshall et al., 2019). as a makani facilitator in a mafraq community centre explained: ‘we worked a lot on the topic of early marriage to raise awareness… the adolescents now demand their rights and they said to their parents that they don’t want early marriage.’ m.devonald, n.jones, s. guglielmi, j.seager & s.baird 37 similarly, a 13-year-old syrian refugee girl from an informal tented settlement– where the rates of child marriage are typically high–said she had participated in role plays at makani that explored the risks of early marriage: we acted in a role play about early marriage…i learned that early marriage before 20 years is bad because then you become more mature…now i think girls should focus on studying first. facilitators also explained that, where possible, human rights content is woven into the curriculum across subjects rather than just being taught in a specific course on life skills. a facilitator from a host community centre gave this example: in arabic lessons we [look] at the effects of physical violence…i ask the students to draw a picture of a child affected by violence and another not exposed to violence. we discuss how this happens, how can we deal with violence…i also showed the students a video about bullying and then we discuss the story. so the lesson becomes about bullying and how to prevent and report it, but also about arabic at the same time. makani centres also hold outreach sessions for parents to discuss the importance of education and the risks of child marriage and child labour to future trajectories. parents’ reactions are mixed; some appreciate the focus on their children’s futures, while others emphasise that early marriage is part of their cultural heritage and that employment options are highly limited for refugees. temporary learning centres in principle, the tlc approach in the rohingya camps is also grounded in transformative action, whereby educating refugees is believed to enable a ‘multiplier effect of empowering them, reducing their dependence on the host government, and contributing to long term peace and social cohesion’ (cox’s bazar education sector, 2019b p.20). life skills components in the syllabus are designed to teach self-care through healthy, safe choices and respect for the community and environment (cox’s bazar education sector, 2019a). the facilitators at the tlcs are locals from rohingya camp communities, and have received training from unicef. despite this, pilot classes have mostly focused on basic hygiene management. a teacher piloting learning competency level 3 and 4 life skills modules in camp b said ‘neatness and cleanliness, washing hands, health and hygiene’ were prioritised in lessons. she went on to explain: when i first came here, i found [rohingya pupils] didn’t wear shoes in toilets, they didn’t wash their hands with soap…for one boy, 1 month passed without bathing. i planned to resign from the job…then gradually everything has changed. now, everyone is neat and clean. although better self-care is a welcome change, life skills components only cover a limited portion of hre. moreover, the pending approval of learning competency advanced levels has resulted in ‘an alarming 83 percent of the [rohingya] adolescents and youth aged 15-24 years old [being without] access to any educational or skills development activities’ (iscg et al., 2020 p.70). although not following a set curriculum, ngos have set up classes and home-based learning to teach skills such human rights education review – vol 4(1) 38 as sewing and tailoring to older adolescents (olney, hague & mubarak, 2019). though this could help adolescents earn money in the camps, uptake remains low. indeed, our quantitative data finds that only 2.4% of adolescents benefitted from skills building and vocational training programmes. the programmes teach life skills (albeit with no explicit content to foster hre for global citizenship), communicate health messages and may lead to work opportunities with ngos operating in the camps. however, they are not intended to provide transferrable skills for outside the camps, reinforcing the fact that the rohingya are confined within their immediate communities and cannot leave their settlements (bakali & wasty, 2020). a 16-yearold girl from camp c explained: ‘we didn’t have any chance to go to school [in host communities]. we don’t go out. what will i do?’ education through human rights makani makani centres employ a learner-centred, participatory pedagogical approach aligned to education through human rights. in this regard, the overwhelming majority of adolescents in the qualitative sample contrasted the approach of makani facilitators with the authoritarian style of schoolteachers, who often rely on corporal punishment rather than a relationship based on communication, and fostering values of respect and responsibility. as a 12-year-old boy from a refugee camp noted: makani facilitators don’t hit students but they control the students…the facilitator at makani says ‘i am like your father and you should respect me’. the facilitator uses innovative lessons to develop close contact with the students and so students want to listen. similarly, a 15-year-old girl from a refugee camp emphasised that the teachers focus on explanations and learning, rather than on punishment: in makani, if you did something wrong or cause trouble, they will not punish you… they explain why it is wrong and will make you aware of the consequences. at school, they will punish you so that you do not want to repeat the same mistake again! multiple makani participants emphasised that they appreciated the opportunity to express their views and engage in a dialogue with the facilitators and participants, which was in stark contrast to their experience of non-interactive, unidirectional teaching in school. as a 16-year-old syrian girl from the host community explained: the first aim at school is to educate us what is in the books, but makani is different. they allow us to express our opinions and they give us a space to develop these skills… at school if we talk about any topic the teacher says ‘the session is not for discussion–i should only explain the lesson and then leave’. but at makani they educate us about dialogue methods. the importance of appreciating diversity and fostering social cohesion was also explicitly taught in makani classes, and identified as a positive benefit of the programme by participants. a 17-year-old syrian refugee girl from mafraq described m.devonald, n.jones, s. guglielmi, j.seager & s.baird 39 a valuable learning opportunity she experienced interacting with diverse nationalities at the centre: the activities in the beginning encouraged us to get to know new people from different countries. the girls weren’t only from my country – there were jordanians, somalis, egyptians…in the beginning the relations were formal, but when we cooperated together and did group activities – we learned to appreciate each other and recognise that there are few differences between us. in the quantitative data, younger makani participants also indicated stronger feelings of community togetherness compared to non-participants. other participants described learning about inclusion from interacting with people with disabilities, as one 18-year-old syrian refugee recalled: i drew a painting of a group of students studying, and one of them is a disabled student. the painting also has a girl who wears the hijab and another who does not. i captioned the painting ‘we should study with each other, regardless of clothing, religion or whether we have a disability’. the teacher told me: i am proud of you and your drawing. temporary learning centres although the life skills content in the syllabus for rohingya at levels 3, 4 and 5 has only been piloted, the teaching pedagogy and ethos delineated in curriculum blueprints is perhaps most closely aligned to hre processes. while all subject teaching is meant to mix direct instruction with independent learning, life skills teaching involves empowerment, reflection and teamwork (cox’s bazar education sector, 2019a). according to the education sector’s education strategy, life skills teaching is overtly learner-centred and aims to develop a student’s observational and analytical skills, instilling ‘do no harm’ principles. evidence of the translation of empowerment and ‘do no harm’ into adolescent behaviour is reflected in the quantitative data, which shows that adolescents attending ngo-run education centres are 14.1 and 12.3 percentage points more likely to talk to their fathers and mothers, respectively, about bullying they experience compared to those not attending, after controlling for household characteristics. whereas 52% of adolescents in ngo-run programmes reported talking to their fathers about bullying, only 33.5% of non-participants do; likewise, 40% of adolescents in education programmes talk to their mothers about bullying compared to 25% of non-participants (see table 3). human rights education review – vol 4(1) 40 table 3. current ngo and no ngo, bangladesh however, although basics like how to report bullying are being learnt, there are limits to how much depth the teachers can bring to discussions, due to their own limited training. some inexperienced teachers have received as little as five days’ training on the learning competency framework agreement (unicef, 2020b). as a teacher in camp b explained: no, [i have never taught before]. i had training in chittagong – an eight-day basic training and monthly refreshers. after one year of teaching, i had another five-day basic training. while the rohingya overwhelmingly perceive learning centre teachers as kind, the sentiment is that they lack qualifications. during a focus group discussion (fgd) in camp b, one adolescent boy explained: ‘some teachers know only [the] alphabet i think… they don’t teach well.’ another boy participating in an fgd in camp c stated: ‘yes, both boys and girls are treated well. [but teachers] are always busy with [social media apps]. they don’t [teach well]…especially when there are no field officers to check on the staff.’ education for human rights makani hre’s third pillar fosters skills for active citizenship, broadly defined as empowering individuals to exercise their rights and respect the rights of others. here, makani social innovation labs teach technology to older (15+) adolescents and young people. sessions are typically run by engineering or computer science graduates equipped to teach hard and soft skills, such as leadership and team building. adolescents are then encouraged to apply their learning to problems they want to tackle in the community. examples range from sensors in clothing to enhance the mobility of people with visual impairments, to female-only mobile phone repair services, to tree planting to improve local air quality. while participants spoke enthusiastically about the m.devonald, n.jones, s. guglielmi, j.seager & s.baird 41 technical skills they learned, they were equally passionate about soft skills. for example, a 15-year-old jordanian girl from a host community explained: i was hoping to be a leader in my community, but i didn’t know what a good leader was. when i received the training, they taught us what the characteristics of a leader are and how he or she behaves in different situations. similarly, a 17-year-old syrian refugee girl living in a host community in irbid said she had learned the importance of young people contributing and volunteering for the greater good of the community: ‘young men and women must be self-reliant. they must have ideas for the development of society and use their skills to improve the community around them…’ for younger adolescents, active citizenship can be observed in increased confidence in talking to older people and the fostering of problem-solving skills. although not directly linked to human rights, such a development can build the capabilities needed to contribute to social change in their communities. a 12-yearold syrian girl from a refugee camp explained: they taught us how to deal with problems. we participated in raising awareness campaigns, wrote people’s problems, and suggested solutions. we could solve the verbal harassment in the street by strengthening our personalities. importantly, given the early childhood violence and trauma that many displaced young people have experienced, the makani curriculum also covers conflict resolution techniques which can indirectly influence adolescents’ ability to act in their community in ways that align with human rights values. a number of older adolescents highlighted how much they valued this aspect of the sessions. a 17-yearold girl living in a host community in irbid explained how she used her conflict resolution skills with quarrelling friends: one day my friends had a fight…it looked as though it was impossible to intervene, but i remembered what we had learned about interfering in a quiet, positive way…i went to one of the girls and told her that the other girl cares for her irrespective of how she behaved. i talked to her in this way and then after that they went back to being good friends. this was because of my strengthened confidence. improved conflict resolution skills are also evident in the quantitative data with younger adolescents; 76% of makani participants feel comfortable expressing opinions to people older than themselves, compared to 65% of non-participants. controlling for other factors in regression analysis, this corresponds to a 7 percentage point increase. moreover, makani participants are 5.6 percentage points more likely to have a friend they trust and have higher levels of resilience and improved mental health, two factors that may be influenced by learning negotiation and conflict resolution skills (bordone, 2018). human rights education review – vol 4(1) 42 temporary learning centres by contrast, education for human rights appears lacking in the education offered to rohingya refugees. while the education strategy seeks to foster social cohesion by enhancing education systems in the host community and including host community members in implementing activities in the camps, the reality is quite different. rohingya adolescents remain segregated from neighbouring communities and risk becoming a lost generation with no progression towards active global citizenship. this sentiment was crystallised by a 17-year-old boy in camp b: ‘if any country takes any step for educating us, i [would] go abroad.’ discussion this article highlights the stark differences in the integration of hre in two nonformal education programmes in refugee settings. in jordan, the makani programme provides an example of a promising practice of hre, incorporating human rights, either explicitly or indirectly, throughout the three pillars of the un framework: education about, through and for human rights. the use of this framework allowed the study to analyse multiple programme components, including the content, process and support for adolescent empowerment. the curriculum ensures adolescents are aware of their rights, and teaching methodologies are participatory in nature to allow open dialogue between students and teachers. although the programme promotes the skills needed by adolescents to be involved in social change in their communities, it did not include focused human rights action and more work could be done to link adolescents to youth human rights initiatives. in contrast, for rohingya refugees in bangladesh, although education policies and strategies aim to employ a human rights approach, the reality on the ground does not reflect this. in particular, human rights content is lacking throughout the curriculum and adolescents are not encouraged to develop the skills necessary for active global citizenship. nevertheless, tlcs did appear to produce positive impacts on reporting incidences of bullying to parents, pointing to adolescents’ increased awareness of their right to be free from violence. the findings draw attention to the inherent value of hre in humanitarian responses. in jordan, the makani programme aligns closely with bajaj’s (2011a) theory of hre for coexistence–focusing on multi-ethnic or post-conflict states and aiming to foster social cohesion–as the programme brings together participants from different nationalities and backgrounds and supports peaceful cohabitation. it provides examples of participants acting as mediators in their community thanks to their skills in conflict resolution and engaging actively in society through community awareness projects, consequently encouraging future participation and integration in their host country. in bangladesh, the separation of refugees in programming reinforces their segregation and hinders social cohesion. this reflects the current refugee response in bangladesh, which focuses on humanitarian assistance rather than sustainable integration into the host community. in contrast to studies of hre by solem (2017) and russell (2018), who found programmes that avoided challenging dimensions of human rights, the makani programme in jordan directly addresses culturally sensitive and difficult topics such as child marriage and gender-based violence. adolescents were given the tools to acknowledge their own human rights and report the human rights abuses they observe in the community (such as instances of child marriage and violence). this is m.devonald, n.jones, s. guglielmi, j.seager & s.baird 43 most probably due to the integration of awareness sessions with parents and the establishment of strong reporting mechanisms. these findings highlight the essential role of thorough teacher training in ensuring a human rights approach is integrated into programmes. in jordan, facilitators are provided with in-depth child protection training and this translates into positive results in the teaching and learning process. in bangladesh, due to their limited training, teachers struggle to provide in-depth tuition and there is a need for more investment at the input level if the ambitious goals in the design documentation are to be realised. this research highlights the importance of both non-formal education and wider life skills that are centred on human rights for refugees, especially given that schools in many low-and middle-income countries only teach academic subjects in a non-interactive way. the findings point to implications of the adoption of a human rights approach in non-formal education in humanitarian settings. to provide appropriate support to adolescents, programmes must be properly resourced, particularly with regard to facilitator training (given the low levels of education among volunteer teachers and low literacy rates among adolescent participants). in addition, programmes should promote social cohesion and, where possible, include both host and refugee populations to encourage participants of different nationalities to work together. it is equally important to guarantee enabling environments with strong reporting mechanisms where participants feel safe to talk about potential rights violations. finally, owing to the sensitive nature of some human rights topics, programmes need to be adapted to each context and cater to the target population’s specific needs. in sum, non-formal programmes with hre components – such as makani in jordan–can allow refugee children, who are often in situations where their rights are denied, to gain awareness of their rights and develop the skills needed to become empowered community members and can, in turn, support social cohesion. acknowledgements the authors wish to acknowledge that the gage programme is funded by the foreign, commonwealth & development office (fcdo). however, the views and information expressed in this article are not endorsed by fcdo, which accepts no responsibility for such views or information or any reliance placed on 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(2018). culture, context and mental health of rohingya refugees: a review for staff in mental health and psychosocial support programmes for rohingya refugees. geneva: united nations high commissioner for refugees. retrieved from https://www.unhcr.org/5bbc6f014.pdf tibbitts, f. (2017). evolution of human rights education models. in m. bajaj (eds.), human rights education: theory, research, praxis, (pp.69–95). philadelphia: university of pennsylvania press. united nations high commissioner for refugees. (2018). report of the united nations high commissioner for refugees, part ii global compact on refugees. retrieved from https://www.unhcr.org/gcr/gcr_english.pdf united nations high commissioner for refugees. (2019a). summary of the first global refugee forum by the co-convenors. retrieved from https://www.unhcr.org/uk/events/conferences/5dfa70e24/summaryfirst-global-refugee-forum-co-convenors.html united nations high commissioner for refugees. 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(2020b) bangladesh humanitarian situation report no. 53: reporting period 01 january 2019-31 december 2019. retrieved from https://reliefweb.int/report/bangladesh/bangladesh-humanitarian situation-report-no-53-1-january-31-december-2019 https://www.unhcr.org/5bbc6f014.pdf https://www.unhcr.org/gcr/gcr_english.pdf https://www.unhcr.org/uk/events/conferences/5dfa70e24/summary-first-global-refugee-forum-co-convenors.html https://www.unhcr.org/uk/events/conferences/5dfa70e24/summary-first-global-refugee-forum-co-convenors.html https://reliefweb.int/report/jordan/education-jordan-2019-0 https://www.unhcr.org/uk/figures-at-a-glance.html https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000154861 https://www.unicef.org/jordan/media/1816/file/jordan-reports.pdf https://www.unicef.org/rosa/stories/expanding-education-rohingya-refugee-children-bangladesh#:~:text=following%20a%20landmark%20decision%20by,from%20grades%20six%20to%20nine https://www.unicef.org/rosa/stories/expanding-education-rohingya-refugee-children-bangladesh#:~:text=following%20a%20landmark%20decision%20by,from%20grades%20six%20to%20nine https://www.unicef.org/rosa/stories/expanding-education-rohingya-refugee-children-bangladesh#:~:text=following%20a%20landmark%20decision%20by,from%20grades%20six%20to%20nine https://www.unicef.org/rosa/stories/expanding-education-rohingya-refugee-children-bangladesh#:~:text=following%20a%20landmark%20decision%20by,from%20grades%20six%20to%20nine https://reliefweb.int/report/bangladesh/bangladesh-humanitarian-%20%09situation-report-no-53-1-january-31-december-2019 https://reliefweb.int/report/bangladesh/bangladesh-humanitarian-%20%09situation-report-no-53-1-january-31-december-2019 human rights education review – vol 4(1) 48 united nations children’s fund mena. (2017). analytical mapping of life skills and citizenship education in the middle east and north africa. amman: unicef mena. retrieved from https://www.unicef.org/mena/reports/analytical-mapping-life-skills-and citizenship-education-mena united nations. (1948). universal declaration of human rights. (a/res/217(iii). retrieved from https://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/ united nations. (1966). international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights. retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/cescr.aspx. united nations. (1989). united nations convention on the rights of the child. (a/res/44/25.) retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx united nations. (2011). united nations declaration on human rights education and training (a/res/66/137). new york: united nations. retrieved from http://www.hre2020.org/un-declaration-on-human-rights-educationand-training united nations. (2016). committee on the rights of the child. general comment no. 20.on the implementation of the rights of the child during adolescence. crc/c/gc/20. retrieved from https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/855544?ln=en viner, r. m., ross, d., hardy, r., kuh, d., power, c., johnson, a., & batty, g. d. (2015). life course epidemiology: recognising the importance of adolescence. journal of epidemiology and community health, 69(8), 719-720. https://doi.org/10.1136/jech-2014-205300 https://www.unicef.org/mena/reports/analytical-mapping-life-skills-and-citizenship-education-mena https://www.unicef.org/mena/reports/analytical-mapping-life-skills-and-citizenship-education-mena https://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/ https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/cescr.aspx https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx http://www.hre2020.org/un-declaration-on-human-rights-education-and-training http://www.hre2020.org/un-declaration-on-human-rights-education-and-training https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/855544?ln=en https://doi.org/10.1136/jech-2014-205300 legal knowledge, rights, and students’ lived experiences in hre issn: 2535-5406 vol 5, no 2 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4941 date of publication 08-06-2022 © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org editorial legal knowledge, rights, and students’ lived experiences in hre audrey osler, university of south-eastern norway, norway, university of leeds, uk suzanne egan university college dublin, ireland rachel shanks university of aberdeen, united kingdom christian stokke university of south-eastern norway, norway this volume brings human rights education (hre) alive by tying it to a range of key issues facing schools and educators in different national contexts; these include lgbti+ rights, the rights of religious minorities, child sexual abuse, and bullying and harassment. we are delighted to include the contributions of legal scholars paula gerber and phoebe irving lindner from australia and dawn watkins from the uk and, perhaps not surprisingly, we have a particularly strong focus here on the role of legal knowledge and legal processes in enhancing hre in schools. in their article addressing australia’s recent record on educating children about sexual orientation and gender identity, paula gerber and phoebe irving lindner reflect on the impact of the government’s decision to survey citizens’ attitudes to same-sex marriage, prior to the introduction of legislation enabling marriage equality in 2017. the authors consider the legacy of the ‘no’ campaign, which included tv advertisements alleging marriage equality would damage children’s education. the authors conclude that not only have lgbti+ students become more vulnerable to discrimination, but that since marriage equality there has been less hre addressing diverse sexual orientations and gender identities. such a counter-intuitive http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4941 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ human rights education review–volume 5(2) 2 development raises important questions about the impact of political choices on children’s human rights when rights legislation is strengthened and the necessity to raise public awareness of human rights and equality principles and practices. gerber and lindner remind us of council of europe and unesco (2018) guidance on homophobic and transphobic bullying. they argue for a comprehensive action plan at national level that provides for inclusive curricula, training and support for teachers, support for students and families, school-civil society partnerships, monitoring of discrimination, and evaluation of the strategies adopted. kjersti draugedalen and audrey osler1 explore the role of teachers in defending children’s human rights, with specific reference to safeguarding and the prevention of child sexual abuse. building on the work of nel noddings (2013), they argue that hre theory can be strengthened by rooting teachers’ practice in care-based ethics and equipping them with the skills to recognise and act on potential harmful sexual behaviour. the authors caution against an over-reliance on children’s human rights knowledge in safeguarding practices, given the asymmetrical power relations at play in cases of sexual abuse. teachers have a key role to play in enabling transformative hre, not only by equipping students with rights-based knowledge and providing them with opportunities to consider how rights are protected, but also by enabling them to engage in a critical examination of injustice in their own lives and wider society. the authors argue that in the field of sexual abuse and safeguarding, teachers have a key role as human rights defenders of vulnerable students. taking the case of pakistan, farid panjwani and camilla hadi chaudhary examine how the rights of religious minorities are accommodated in the country’s religious education policy. islamic education continues to play a key role in the pakistani school system, and the authors explain how it is used to manage public morality and promote national identity. a current reform proposes to include five selected minority religions as curriculum options. using content analysis of the draft curricula and interviews with state officials and spokespersons from different minority religions, the article examines the reform’s improvements and shortcomings in terms of children’s and parents’ human rights. in an article focusing on the nordic folk high school, johan lövgren discusses how hre can be understood as a key aspect of the pedagogy of such schools. folk high schools historically played a central role in empowering people to become active citizens during 19th century democratisation processes. the article traces this historical development and examines, through an empirical analysis of texts produced by students in folk high schools, how these schools have recently reoriented their national ideological focus towards global citizenship and how this change of focus opens up opportunities for hre. the author contends that contemporary nordic folk high schools may be understood as a regional adaptation of hre practice. a. osler, s. egan, r. shanks & c. stokke 3 returning to the role of law in hre, an issue raised in an earlier volume of hrer by laura lundy and gabriela martinez-sainz (2018), dawn watkins explores how the inclusion of domestic law and domestic legal processes in children’s learning might better inform and enhance hre in schools. in particular, she argues that knowledge of domestic law, albeit potentially ‘complicated’, at the same time enables children to reach a critical understanding of the context-dependent nature of rights and the limitations and challenges that might be experienced in enforcing them. additionally, knowledge of domestic law may strengthen children’s capacity to address such violations, whether on an informal or formal basis. drawing on the framework of english domestic law applicable to bullying, she illustrates how knowledge about the strengths and limitations of domestic law (including the question of justiciability) can serve to inform and empower children to pursue complaints regarding violations of their rights involved in bullying. in this way, watkins’ article returns to the theme of the first two articles in this volume, of how a curriculum that links rights-based learning to children’s lived experience may enhance such learning. references council of europe & unesco (2018). safe at school: education sector responses to violence based on sexual orientation, gender identity/expression or sex characteristics in europe. strasbourg: council of europe. retrieved from https://rm.coe.int/prems-125718-gbr-2575safe-at-school-a4-web/16809024f5 lundy, l., & martínez sainz, g. (2018). the role of law and legal knowledge for a transformative human rights education: addressing violations of children’s rights in formal education. human rights education review, 1(2), 04–24. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2560 noddings, n. (2013). caring: a relational approach to ethics and moral education. university of california press, oakland, ca. https://doi.org/10.1525/9780520957343 1 the editors confirm that this article has been subject to a process of double-blind peer review and that hrer editor-in chief audrey osler has not been involved in the peer review process. https://rm.coe.int/prems-125718-gbr-2575-safe-at-school-a4-web/16809024f5 https://rm.coe.int/prems-125718-gbr-2575-safe-at-school-a4-web/16809024f5 https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2560 https://doi.org/10.1525/9780520957343 legal knowledge, rights, and students’ lived experiences in hre references majority rights and minority responsibilities: young people’s negotiations with human rights issn 2535-5406 vol 4, no 3 (2021) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4606 date of publication 29-10-2021 © 2021 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org editorial theorising and contextualising human rights education audrey osler university of south-eastern norway, norway & university of leeds, united kingdom, a.h.osler@leeds.co.uk christian stokke university of south-eastern norway, norway it is a cause for celebration and an indication of a journal’s development and maturation when a growing number of strong submissions enables the editors to increase the annual number of issues. we are proud to confirm, with the publication of volume 4(3), that human rights education review is moving from two to three issues per year. this development takes place alongside other initiatives. in cooperation with the world educational research association (wera) international research network on human rights education, this summer hrer launched a dedicated youtube channel that shares recordings of the wera/hrer webinars that have taken place throughout the past year. our youtube channel also features an invited international symposium on hre at the 2021 wera virtual focal meeting hosted in santiago de compostela, spain with contributions from japan and europe that include presentations from members of the hrer editorial team and international editorial advisory board. we are grateful to the many volunteers who have given us both practical support and expert advice, and to line jenssen, hrer managing editor, for the work they have put into this initiative. we invite readers to take a look and subscribe at: https://www.youtube.com/channel/ucsvmqibuyd77i2wjwivvvxw importantly, we welcome the additional editors and associate editors joining our core team this autumn: suzanne egan, rachel shanks, marta stachurska-kounta, sylvie condette, and http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4606 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:a.h.osler@leeds.co.uk https://www.youtube.com/channel/ucsvmqibuyd77i2wjwivvvxw human rights education review – volume 4(3) 2 helen hanna. we look forward to strengthening partnerships with you and your universities. as hrer matures, so does the field of human rights education research and, with this, a closer focus on theorising and contextualising work in the field. this issue features two such contributions. contributing to the discussion on human rights knowledge initiated by parker (2018) and since explored by jerome et al. (2021) as well as discussions of coloniality and decoloniality in human rights education explored in this journal (becker, 2021; blanchard & nix, 2019) and elsewhere (for example, coysh, 2014; keet, & zembylas, 2019; moghli, 2020; osler, 2015a, 2015b), rebecca adami considers how we might ensure epistemic justice in human rights education by retelling the history of the united nations to include the contributions of indian and pakistani freedom fighters and latin american feminists who were obliged to negotiate human rights against the colonial, patriarchal and racist discourses of the post-world war two era. she asserts the possibility of a pluralistic universalism of human rights and argues that the monistic universalism that is today critiqued can be avoided by extending the knowledge of human rights scholars to include the counternarratives of postcolonial subjects whose positive conception of rights centred on reducing injustice. in an article that also draws on feminist scholarship, iida pyy makes the case that political compassion is a necessary disposition for engaging with human rights principles such as racial injustice. pyy draws on martha nussbaum’s theory of political emotions, stressing the need to understand compassion as connected to cognition and practical reasoning. pyy further draws on nussbaum’s concept of narrative imagination, drawing on critical hre scholarship, including that of adami, that stresses the importance of counternarratives, multiperspectivity and reflective interpretation of stories. in situating nussbaum’s work on compassion and narrative imagination alongside that of critical hre scholars, pyy offers fresh insights into the relationship between human rights, emotions and social justice that might inform hre theory and practice. this issue also illustrates how hre practices might be developed in innovative ways, so as to protect children and enhance school safeguarding. building on earlier scholarship in hrer asserting that for child rights education to be effective it must recognise and respond to children’s lived injustices (lundy & martínez sainz, 2018), alison struthers explores the potential of hre to protect children and enhance school safeguarding practices. observing that the current safeguarding training and delivery processes for adults working with children in england assume the child to be a somewhat passive subject, struthers highlights how hre for adults built into mandatory safeguarding training might support and enable children to better recognise violations of their human rights and reorientate a safeguarding model that currently relies overly on a passive system of adult observation. a. osler & c. stokke 3 authors nassia choleva, antonis lenakakis and myrto pigkou-repousi explore the potential of educational drama as a vehicle for human rights education. both hre and drama have a restricted place in the contemporary greek primary school curriculum, with drama included for children in the first four grades and human rights incorporated into the curriculum for citizenship and democracy in the upper primary school. the study focuses on a teachers’ drama-training workshop, where participants engage in role-play to practice intercultural dialogue skills such as empathy, expression of feelings, and taking others’ perspectives. drawing on questionnaire data and statistical analysis, the authors conclude that the workshop significantly enhanced teachers’ knowledge, readiness and skills concerning human rights and refugees. they assert that drama’s focus on active, participative learning makes it a ready arena for learning about, through and for human rights. in the final article in this issue, kerenina dansholm investigates norwegian tenth-graders’ perceptions of human rights in relation to ethnic minorities. she analyses data from group discussions about inclusive citizenship, rights and responsibilities, among middle school students with a majority background. the study finds that these students tend to equate human rights with national values and with the rights of norwegian citizens, and that they draw a dichotomy between the rights of the majority and the responsibilities of minorities. dansholm concludes that this indicates a need for a deeper level of human rights education in norwegian schools. references becker, a. (2021). decolonial human rights education: changing the terms and content of conversations on human rights. human rights education review, 4(2), 49–68. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3989 blanchard, l., & nix, m. (2019). creating spaces for radical pedagogy in higher education. human rights education review, 2(2), 65-83. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3363 coysh, j. (2014). the dominant discourse of human rights education: a critique. journal of human rights practice, 6(1), 89–114. https://doi.org/10.1093/jhuman/hut033 jerome, l., liddle, a., & young, h. (2021). talking about rights without talking about rights: on the absence of knowledge in classroom discussions. human rights education review, 4(1), 8–26. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3979 keet, a., & zembylas, m. (2019). decolonial strategies and pedagogical/curricular possibilities. in m. zembylas & a. keet (eds.), critical human rights education. advancing social-justice-oriented educational praxes (pp. 131-147). cham, switzerland: springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-27198-5_10 https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3989 https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3363 https://doi.org/10.1093/jhuman/hut033 https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3979 https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-27198-5_10 human rights education review – volume 4(3) 4 lundy, l., & martínez sainz, g. (2018). the role of law and legal knowledge for a transformative human rights education: addressing violations of children’s rights in formal education. human rights education review, 1(2), 4-24. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2560 moghli, a. m. (2020). re-conceptualising human rights education: from the global to the occupied. international journal of human rights education, 4(1). https://repository.usfca.edu/ijhre/vol4/iss1/5 osler, a. (2015a). human rights education, postcolonial scholarship, and action for social justice. theory & research in social education, 43(2), 244–274. https://doi.org/10.1080/00933104.2015.1034393 osler, a. (2015b). the stories we tell: exploring narrative in education for justice and equality in multicultural contexts. multicultural education review (1-2), 12-25. https://doi.org/10.1080/2005615x.2015.1048605 parker, w. c. (2018). human rights education’s curriculum problem. human rights education review, 1(1), 5–24. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2450 https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2560 https://repository.usfca.edu/ijhre/vol4/iss1/5 https://doi.org/10.1080/00933104.2015.1034393 https://doi.org/10.1080/2005615x.2015.1048605 https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2450 making education rights accessible for educators and schools issn: 2535-5406 http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4913 date of publication 07-09-2022 © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org book and media reviews making education rights accessible for educators and schools strømmen lile, h. (2021). international law on the aims of education: the convention on the rights of the child as a legal framework for school curriculums. london and new york: routledge. 220pp., £36.99 (paperback) isbn: 978-0-3676-8232-3; £120.00 (hardback) isbn: 978-03673-5870-9; £33.29 (e-book) isbn: 978-0-4293-4594-4. reviewed by jenna gillett-swan queensland university of technology, australia, jenna.gillettswan@qut.edu.au education related rights are infrequently known and understood in full by those working within education contexts, despite their direct relevance for schools and those working within them. recognising the need for all relevant rules of international law to be brought into the discussion, strømmen lile undertakes the ambitious task of analysing crc article 29(1) and ‘encompassing the entirety of international law on the aims of education’ in the process (p.39). international law on the aims of education: the convention on the rights of the child as a legal framework for school curriculums provides an accessible, valuable, and clear deconstruction of what the aims of education, as articulated through the united nations convention on the rights of the child (united nations, 1989) are, and what this means for school practice. the text’s main analytical focus is on the scope of the legal aims of article 29(1), but it also draws upon other relevant treaties and examples to illustrate key points, tensions, and potential inconsistencies in interpretation and implementation. the central premise of the book is that international law on the aims of education comprises ‘legally valid laws that must be respected and fulfilled’ (p. 4), and ‘although education is a right, it is also a duty…’ (p.20). http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4913 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:jenna.gillettswan@qut.edu.au hrer book and media reviews 2 these points, while familiar to those well versed in rights, may be lesser known by those with an emerging understanding, especially those working in schools or training to become teachers. the book addresses three main questions: these relate to 1) identifying international law and its scope and validity as a legal obligation; 2) unpacking the content of the aims of education; and 3) articulating the legal obligations of teachers in relation to international law on the aims of education. the text is divided into eight content chapters (plus an introduction and conclusion) that dive into the content, scope, and role of international law. the book's greatest value is its deconstruction of the aims of education into logical, meaningful chunks for focused discussion in its different chapters. in the introductory chapters, the author picks up on the issues of terminology, translation and interpretation, particularly as they relate to how the concept of education is defined and understood. these aspects are increasingly being acknowledged more widely in the field and do indeed require more attention as they speak to the realities of varied interpretations in practice. the author highlights the lack of neutrality in conceptualising the aims of education, as they represent internationally agreed morals and philosophies rather than universal truths. the importance of education is underscored by the powerful assertion that ‘rights would just be empty words unless generations to come were educated to respect the rights of all human beings, not just some’ (p. 12). in several chapters, the author objectively navigates certain aspects of rights that are espoused in ambiguity or tension, areas that often also receive less empirical focus in general educational rights research. for example, there tends to be less focus in educational rights research on accessibility of educational content and ensuring respect for culture and children’s right to education in their own language. this is an accessibility issue that particularly concerns indigenous children and children from linguistic minorities. strømmen lile rightly questions where the line is drawn in relation how many children belonging to a national minority are required before the state has an obligation to provide education in their own language. such provocations throughout the text may engage the reader to think more critically about some of the everyday practices in local contexts that remain unquestioned and unproblematised from a rights perspective, through the lens of the aims of education. while some readers may be looking for more coverage of areas of tension or contested areas within the scope of the aims of education, the issues that are covered are covered well. the issues discussed broadly introduce some potentially contested or controversial topics in the field, while focusing on realistically discussing their likely court outcomes. an engaging feature of the text is that the author makes transparent their thinking and logic as they progress through the critical interrogation of the text and meaning of each part of article 29. there are hrer book and media reviews 3 several parts of the text that are ripe for lively discussion, whether the reader has an emergent or developed understanding of children’s rights and education. an important thread throughout the text is that which connects each part of the detailed and multifaceted aims of education to the importance of duty bearers such as teachers not only knowing, but adhering to the minimum standards of rights put forward by the convention. this dual emphasis on both international law on the aims of education, and implementation obligations articulated through knowledge of the convention and its mandates is an important, yet often overlooked aspect of assuring children’s education rights. this book offers a unique contribution, with few other texts covering the aims of education as extensively and accessibly for a wide readership. while some sections include more detail than is probably needed for most teachers or educational researchers, the legal context is nonetheless interesting, informative and useful. a particular strength is in how the author sometimes makes dense legal jargon accessible for a diverse potential readership. given the broad intended audience, spanning both academics and practitioners, there is perhaps a missed opportunity for practical strategies to be woven throughout the text to give further practical support to those working in schools or training to do so. while the author provides solid coverage of the theoretical and historical background and context, some readers may want to know more than the what and why of the legal obligations associated with the aims of education. they may also appreciate examples of how to incorporate these in their own work – the practical implications. this being said, the book provides a solid foundation for a deep understanding of the aims of education and makes a laudable contribution to the field. it is a must-read for those with a personal or professional interest in children and young people, child rights or education, including initial teacher education. the text has something for all readers: teachers, policy makers, initial teacher education students, researchers, and academics. why should teachers and those interested in education care about the aims of education? at the end of the day, as the author so aptly puts it, because ‘education without any purpose (aims) seems a bit pointless’ (p.44). references united nations (un) (1989, november 20). convention on the rights of the child (treaty series, 1577). adopted and opened for signature, ratification and accession by general assembly resolution 44/25. retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx making education rights accessible for educators and schools references volume 2, no 2 (2019) date received: 28-04-2019 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3363 date accepted: 24-10-2019 issn 2535-5406 creating spaces for radical pedagogy in higher education. lynda-ann blanchard university of sydney, australia. mike nix chuo university, japan. abstract: this paper tells stories from a higher education study abroad collaboration entitled investigating diversity, human rights and civil society in japan and australia. starting from a pedagogical focus on students’ active learning about human rights, this project has come to value relationship building—between academic institutions, civil society and community groups, and individuals. we ask ‘what is human rights education?’, and argue for a radical pedagogy in which knowledge about human rights and diversity is negotiated in ‘third spaces’ (bhabha). in an attempt to address the ‘im/possibility of engaging with alterity outside of a pedagogic relationship of appropriation or domination’ (sharma), learners ‘become border crossers in order to understand otherness on its own terms’ (giroux). as the stories demonstrate, active learning also requires active unlearning (spivak). pivotal to our radical pedagogy is a conception of human rights education as dialogic and that creates the conditions for ethical encounters with otherness. keywords: human rights, pedagogy, diversity, research, storytelling, ethical relationships lynda-ann blanchard: lynda.blanchard@sydney.edu.au mike nix: mikenix1@tamacc.chuo-u.ac.jp http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3363 mailto:lynda.blanchard@sydney.edu.au mailto:mikenix1@tamacc.chuo-u.ac.jp l. blanchard & m. nix 65 creating spaces for radical pedagogy in higher education doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3363 issn 2535-5406 lynda-ann blanchard mike nix lynda.blanchard@sydney.edu.au mikenix1@tamacc.chuo-u.ac.jp university of sydney, australia. chuo university, japan. abstract: this paper tells stories from a higher education study abroad collaboration entitled investigating diversity, human rights and civil society in japan and australia. starting from a pedagogical focus on students’ active learning about human rights, this project has come to value relationship building—between academic institutions, civil society and community groups, and individuals. we ask ‘what is human rights education?’, and argue for a radical pedagogy in which knowledge about human rights and diversity is negotiated in ‘third spaces’ (bhabha). in an attempt to address the ‘im/possibility of engaging with alterity outside of a pedagogic relationship of appropriation or domination’ (sharma), learners ‘become border crossers in order to understand otherness on its own terms’ (giroux). as the stories demonstrate, active learning also requires active unlearning (spivak). pivotal to our radical pedagogy is a conception of human rights education as dialogic and that creates the conditions for ethical encounters with otherness. keywords: human rights, pedagogy, diversity, research, storytelling, ethical relationships in search of radical human rights education in their ‘introduction to radical teaching about human rights,’ editors michael bennett and susan o’malley (2015, pp. 2-4) raise the question: what is human rights education (hre)? they observe that human rights educators may engage in condemning human rights violations and ‘point the finger at others for violating human rights’ without critical self-reflection on their own contexts, for example, their involvement in an ‘imperializing settler colonial state.’ this critique resonates with us as a starting point to reflect on the development of a study abroad programme—the central subject of this paper—we initiated for undergraduate students to investigate diversity and the human rights of minoritised groups. we recognize that students engaged in hre learning/research become more aware of injustice and more motivated to act against it. however, we also ask in what ways does it, at the same time, reproduce dominant discourses about the problems faced by ‘minorities’ and reinforce students’ mainstream positioning within hierarchies of ‘us’ and ‘them’? the issue is, as sanjay sharma (2006, p. 204) puts it, ‘the im/possiblity of engaging with alterity, outside of a pedagogic relationship of appropriation or domination.’ the question posed by us in confronting this issue becomes: what would a (radical) pedagogy of hre, that creates the conditions for an ‘ethical encounter’ with otherness (sharma, 2006, p. 204), look like? mailto:lynda.blanchard@sydney.edu.au mailto:mikenix1@tamacc.chuo-u.ac.jp human rights education review – volume 2(2) 66 we have approached this question from different but interconnected intellectual and pedagogical locations: one of the authors, from a peace studies perspective and teaching/research roles within the centre/department for peace and conflict studies at the university of sydney in australia; the other, from the perspective of teaching english and cultural studies within the law faculty at chuo university in japan. we draw on several converging strands of critical thought that dissect the interrelationships of power and knowledge (davis, 2004, p. 9) in relation to learning/researching about diversity and human rights with marginalised groups of people. in particular, we have found compelling the call in aboriginal/indigenous studies to decolonise methods of research (smith, 1999). as lynne davis (2004, p. 5) explains: [w]ith ‘research’ and ‘representation’ so deeply implicated in replicating relationships of dominance rooted in our shared colonial past, contemporary researchers striving to engage in an ethical relationship with indigenous communities are challenged to decolonize their thinking and research practice. borrowing from these ideas, we take this challenge to be equally important for human rights educators and their students, in the work they do with all marginalised communities (see briskman, latham & goddard 2008; cislaghi, 2018; ife, 2009; zembylas & keet, 2018). working with japanese colleagues and students, we particularly note the importance of addressing the ‘residual effects manifest in many obvious and subtle ways to this day’ of japan’s colonisation of territories in asia, including the lands of the ainu people in hokkaido and the ryukyu kingdom (including okinawa), both of which have been incorporated into the japanese state (mason and lee, 2012, pp. 56.). in this process of colonisation, ‘[c]ore narratives of progress and civilization’ became part of popular knowledge and ‘the ainu were gradually constructed as a primitive and racially immature “other” [and] ainu inferiority was contrasted with japanese modernity’ (weiner, 2009, pp. 15-16). the japanese government has refused until recently to recognise the indigenous status of the ainu and new legislation passed in 2019 continues to deny them rights to their land or to acknowledge the historical injustices they have experienced (higashimura, 2019). like jim ife (2018), we believe that hre should not start from a top-down teaching of the un declaration of human rights but with learning from below about the hopes, needs and experiences of human beings in specific situations. following radical educators such as paulo freire and bell hooks, we suggest this requires a critical pedagogy in which learners engage actively with lived experience—and a pedagogy of hope. furthermore, we concur with audrey osler (2015, pp. 30-32) that hre should be ‘an emancipatory or transformatory form of education where learners get to study justice/injustice and equality/inequality… to support greater justice and equality in learners’ lives and to promote solidarity with others to achieve these ends in the wider society’; this involves a pedagogy that addresses ‘asymmetrical power relations’ and recognises that human rights can ‘become part of a hegemonic discourse used to control, if rights and principles are applied without dialogue and without consideration of people’s specific needs.’ in this paper, we argue for a ‘radical pedagogy’ at undergraduate level that can create the conditions for more ethical relations in human rights research with l. blanchard & m. nix 67 marginalised groups. we draw on the fields of cultural studies, post-colonialism and critical-multiculturalism as we consider how knowledge about diversity can be negotiated at the borders or in ‘third spaces’ (bhabha, 1990; sharma, 2006, p. 204) and what it means for learners to ‘unlearn their privilege’ (spivak, 1990, p. 9) and become ‘border crossers in order to understand otherness on its own terms’ (giroux, 1992a, p. 28). we explore the impact that rethinking ‘research as storytelling’ (davis, 2004; see also phillips & bunda, 2018) can have on more ethical or ‘dialogic’ research relationships. ‘radical pedagogy’, for us, means creating the conditions for more ethical relations in human rights research in two distinct ways. firstly, shifting from information gathering around (human rights) ‘problems to be solved’ to enabling relationships in which listening to (human rights) issues identified by ‘marginalised others’ is key (see also ife, 2009). secondly, shifting locations from fieldwork in formal spaces to also include informal spaces enhances the potential for the sharing of stories and the creation of more equal research relationships (see also briskman et al., 2008). furthermore, active learning also involves students discerning how their questions about human rights come from their own motivations, preconceptions and experiences. this creates ‘risky’ spaces within hre—in bringing together groups and individuals from very different backgrounds and with students taking control over the learning experience/research encounter. a surprising insight from the programme under analysis here is that although always ‘risky’, these spaces create possibilities for students to connect more ethically with ‘otherness’ when investigating diversity, human rights and civil society—as the research encounter is highly contextual and continually in negotiation (davis, 2004). in this spirit of research as storytelling, we engage with the possibilities and challenges of our ‘radical pedagogy’ through stories. we start by telling the story of how our thinking about research and relationships has changed over the five years since the sydney active learning programme (salp) began the salp story is the tale of an experiment in hre. we then tell three additional stories. sho’s story tells of the challenges for learners in crossing borders, unlearning dominant discourses and encountering otherness on its own terms. this is followed by the story of our relationship with the blue mountains refugee support group, an illustration of how we have tried, in collaboration with partner organisations, to create new ‘third spaces’ for learning about ‘difference’ on its own terms. our final narrative is eri’s story, which tells of her struggle with relationships of appropriation and domination; this story suggests both the possibilities and limits for more equal and ethical research relationships in the field of human rights in higher education. the salp story: an experiment in hre the sydney active learning programme was born in 2014, emerging out of conversations between colleagues at the centre for peace and conflict studies (cpacs) at the university of sydney and the faculty of law at chuo university in tokyo, japan.1 entitled investigating diversity, human rights and civil society in japan and australia, the pilot project saw four japanese undergraduate students visit sydney for a week.2 with the support and collaboration of a growing network of academic institutions, civil society organisations (csos) and community groups, the programme has now engaged close to fifty undergraduate students from japan and created ongoing project relationships and partnerships in australia. in the story of salp we give here, we highlight two essential threads that mark this experiment in human rights education review – volume 2(2) 68 hre: firstly, a shift in our thinking about what it means to learn about diversity, human rights and minoritised groups through research and fieldwork; and secondly, a growing understanding of the importance of relationships within the programme. these threads interweave to form the fabric of our radical pedagogy in which researching/learning is understood as developing ethical relationships. from the start, the programme has emphasised the value of student-centred learning, self-directed research and meetings with actors ‘in the field.’ as we explained back in 2015, the programme explores ‘a praxis for learning about and building “peace with justice”3 based on the principles of agency, engagement and dialogue’ (nix, kodama, ito, so & kawashima, 2015). each year, the programme begins with a semester of self-directed, mostly internet-based research by the undergraduate student participants at chuo university. after learning about the programme’s three broad diversity themes—indigenous rights, refugee and migrant issues, and sexual diversity / gender equality—each student develops an individual research project on a specific interest or concern. as inaugural salp2014 participant sho kodama (nix et al., 2015, pp. 135-136) explains: at the start of my research, i was interested in the legal aspects of the repatriation of ancestral remains, because in japan, more than 1,600 ainu remains are kept by universities, and, in one case, several ainu people have taken legal action for the return of their ancestral remains from hokkaido university (scott, 2013). in australia, by contrast, more than 7,200 indigenous remains are being or have been repatriated. i wanted to know why aboriginal people have been able to negotiate with museums and universities without taking legal action and to learn from the australian situation how ainu people can also have their remains returned. this focus on individual research projects, beginning in tokyo and culminating in fieldwork in sydney, has been very valuable for many students and has often transformed their understandings of diversity and the human rights issues or situations they have been learning about. sho kodama continues: [a]rranging interviews was challenging for me but i could exchange information with three repatriation experts about the aboriginal and ainu situations, and learn many points about repatriation in australia, which i couldn’t find from secondary research. i also learnt a lot from conversations [with my phd student mentor] at cpacs sydney university, [who] supported me in all of my interviews. and the fieldwork enabled me to learn in unexpected places as well, such as a conversation with young aboriginal men on a bus. contested learning about diversity and human rights however, this approach to learning about diversity and human rights has also raised questions. students often enter the programme with the belief that learning about ‘minority’ groups means finding out about the problems they assume those groups have, investigating how ‘we’ can help ‘them’ and deciding solutions on their behalf. an active learning approach encourages learners to assume the responsibility for identifying and investigating research issues and questions for themselves, and this l. blanchard & m. nix 69 may reinforce orthodox information-gathering, problem-solving approaches to doing research. during fieldwork students may fall into interview mode, pen and notebook in hand. their focus might be on gathering the information they need to answer their research questions, and not on understanding how their interlocutors see the situations and issues. students may also give less value to the views and experiences of minoritised groups than to more ‘authoritative’ sources such as government websites, agency reports, and academics or experts; they may overlook – or not even hear– accounts in fieldwork that they can’t integrate easily into their research ‘question’ or framework. at the same time, learners are often anxious to include many fieldwork meetings in their sydney schedules, without having the time to reflect on those adequately, nor to engage with discordant viewpoints in ways that can open their thinking to the possibility of transformation. as discussed in theoretical detail below, we see the difficulties here of breaking with relations of domination and assimilation, and positioning themselves as ‘outsiders’, when student researchers engage with ‘otherness’, even when they do so with good intentions (sharma, 2006; davis, 2004, pp. 4-7). we started with a focus on agency, engagement and dialogue (blanchard & nix, 2015). initially we thought that to help students engage in dialogue meant helping them become ‘experts’ in their research area for japan by gathering information that they could share with the people they met in australia. as it became apparent that a focus on research as information-gathering could actually reduce engagement and dialogue in fieldwork meetings and reproduce relations of domination and assimilation, we responded by putting an emphasis on sharing stories in the research process. one aspect of this was that students minimised the ‘interview method’ and developed their research stories to share with the people they met in australia; this included sharing information about the human rights situation in japan. a second aspect was to encourage the confidence to ‘listen’ to the stories of their interlocutors and learn from those stories about how members of minoritised groups and their supporters, understood the issues. a third aspect was for students to incorporate the disruptions to, and reframing of, research questions/assumptions in their own research story. furthermore, it became gradually obvious to us that more informal spaces for ‘encounters with alterity’ (sharma, 2006)—such as participation in the community kitchen at auburn centre for community, in which we are one group amongst many participants—encouraged the exchange of stories, or ‘yarning,’4 and enabled the development of more relaxed, attentive and equal relationships than was the case in formal fieldwork meetings. as a consequence of all of this reflective thinking about salp and what it means to do research with others, we have come to see ourselves, and to encourage our students to see, that the quality of the research we are doing depends very much on the nature of the relationships we construct. creating hybrid spaces for ethical relationship-building right from the pilot salp2014 project, in which we initiated relationships with the refugee art project, blue mountains refugee support group (bmrsg) and tribal warrior corporation, an emphasis on relationship-building has been key to salp praxis. reflecting the authors’ early concern with creating a collaborative framework for the programme between their home institutions, as well as the possibilities we human rights education review – volume 2(2) 70 saw in the pilot project for working with community and civil society organisations, we initially understood relationship-building in mainly institutional terms. in the first two years, the programme was run as a collaboration between chuo university and the university of sydney with the students based mainly at cpacs during their time in sydney. 5 however, we soon built a network of connections with other sydney universities, and from its third year the programme has been hosted by the law faculty at the university of new south wales.6 we once thought of the programme reaching out to a network of institutions and organisations to create connections and partnerships. however, a rhizomatic model (sharma 2006, p. 11-12) of how the programme grows, spreads and pops up in different locations and contexts may now be more appropriate. for example, from our first involvement with tribal warrior corporation as guests on their sydney harbour cultural cruise for salp2014, we have subsequently been invited to participate in their early morning boxing mentoring programme at the national centre for indigenous excellence in redfern. tribal warrior have in turn connected us with donna ingram, whose walking tour of redfern we now participate in. in turn, she has introduced us to mudgin gal, the aboriginal women’s support centre, and taken us to biri biri café an aboriginal start-up, where we have met aunty beryl oploo who leads the koori job ready programme. we now meet many people in salp in multiple locations. let us take the example of a group of refugees and asylum seekers we have known since the start of the programme, through the bmrsg. we meet at the refugee art project, have dinner in auburn, take trips to the beach, and visit the gay and lesbian mardi gras parade together. while the programme can only run because of the incredible hospitality of a large number of partners in sydney, some relationships have also become more reciprocal. for example, staff and practical legal training students at anti-slavery australia deliver a workshop about human trafficking, and we invite them to join the tribal warrior harbour cruise and aboriginal kinship workshop in return. similarly, we were able to offer places on the 2019 cruise to students from the koori club at cabramatta high school in response to the school’s welcome to salp students over the past couple of years. we have also hosted asylum seekers from the refugee language programme on the cultural cruise. in this way, the tribal warrior cruise— which we now commission every year as a part of the programme—has become a hybrid space where our project partners, students, academics, schoolkids, graduate law students, asylum seekers and other people can meet, talk and share stories in diversity and hre. as the bmrsg story explains later in this paper, we now also organise a party together in the blue mountains for which we cook some japanese food and other guests also bring food to share. we have become participants, not just guests, at the community kitchen, with our salp2019 students teaching how to fold paper cranes for peace. these informal, unexpected places for learning (as sho kodama describes them above) have become more important in the programme as our relationships with organisations and individuals develop. spaces have been created where we are both hosts and guests, where learning through conversations and the sharing of stories seems more natural than interviewing (though the desire to gather information for research may remain), and where people can relate to each other more (although maybe not entirely) as individuals rather than in their roles as ‘researcher’ or ‘activist’ or ‘refugee’ or ‘representative of a particular minority group.’ l. blanchard & m. nix 71 these hybrid spaces offer learners the possibility of creating new relationships, and even friendships, instead of playing out the roles of researcher or outsider or visitor. they are spaces in which relations of dominance and appropriation in research can become contested. they re-configure ‘research-inaction’ (davis, 2004) as a process of enabling relationships, and they foreground the issue of what ethical relationships and ways of doing research might look like. reflecting on this salp story and engaging in a theoretical discussion is a useful next step for this paper—as it is this understanding of research as a reflexive process of trying to construct more ethical relationships that has come to characterise our ‘radical pedagogy’ for hre. elements of a radical pedagogy for hre in developing this pedagogy, we are taking seriously a key starting point in research about human rights: ‘[i]n the context of decolonizing research, contemporary researchers must create a flexible practice that disrupts power relations inherent in a multitude of decisions, processes, and interactions that define research-in-action’ (davis, 2004, p. 1). linda tuhiwai smith (1999, p. 120) has produced a set of principles in her maori-centred approach to performing research (kaupapa maori): ‘a respect for people; the seen face (that is, presenting oneself to people face to face); look, listen, speak; share and host people, be generous; be cautious; do not trample over mana of people; do not flaunt knowledge.’ we see storytelling, or storying, in the sense of sitting down and making meaning together through sharing stories—rather than gathering data in narrative form (phillips & bunda, 2018) — as crucial to such attempts to decolonize research processes and relationships. we are also interested in davis’ (2004, p. 17) claim that ethical practice in ‘research as storytelling’ has a high degree of ‘contextuality,’ meaning that the research process is constantly in negotiation: over and above efforts to codify ethics through protocols and codes, ethics finds its ultimate expression in the multitude of practices, decisions and interactions that define research in action. ethics has spirit. it is this spirit of ethics that needs to break free to create ethical relationships that escape colonization’s bonds. these ideas from indigenous studies scholarship provide the inspiration and challenge for us to articulate the key elements of our radical pedagogy: border crossing; unlearning privilege; third spaces; research as storytelling; dialogic research. border crossing and negotiating ‘outside’/‘insider’ identities in his work on developing a ‘border pedagogy,’ henry giroux (1992a, 1992b) refers to ‘the need to create pedagogical conditions in which students become border crossers in order to understand otherness in its own terms’ (1992b, pp. 23-24). this idea succinctly articulates the challenge of helping students to listen and understand the perspectives and analyses of others, especially when they don’t fit neatly with the students’ own framing of the ‘problem.’ but what does it mean to become a border crosser? for us, this is not a question of crossing the border between one categorically defined cultural entity or identity into another. it is not, for example, about non-indigenous students becoming in some way indigenous students—it is human rights education review – volume 2(2) 72 rather about negotiating the borders between ‘outsider’/’insider’ positions in research (davis, 2004, pp. 6-7). ‘border pedagogy’ then helps students not just to analyse texts, ‘but also how they “read” themselves intellectually and affectively into those cultural identities and subject positions offered by dominant and oppositional representational practices’ (giroux, 1992b, p. 25) and ‘border pedagogy points to the need for conditions that allow students to write, speak and listen in a language in which meaning becomes multi-accented … a language in which one speaks with, rather than exclusively for others’ (giroux, 1992b, p. 24). as giroux explains: [s]tudents engage knowledge as border crossers by moving in and out of borders constructed around coordinates of difference and power. as students cross borders, they are increasingly being negotiated and rewritten as the codes and regulations which organize them become destabilised and reshaped. border pedagogy decenters as it remaps (giroux, 1992b, p. 25). unlearning privilege for giroux, border pedagogy requires ‘deconstructing forms of privilege’ that are a legacy of colonialism and which allow some to assume authority and agency and prevent others from speaking (giroux, 1992b, p. 19). this involves more than a disengaged critique of dominant discourses by those with the authority to act and speak on behalf of others. it requires what spivak has called, ‘the unlearning of one’s own privilege. so that, not only does one become able to listen to that other constituency, but one learns to speak in such a way that one will be taken seriously by that other constituency’ (spivak, quoted in giroux, 1992b, p. 19). understood in this way, unlearning privilege is one of the conditions for creating relations in which students as researchers can attend to and value the views of others and also share their own stories. spivak’s approach to unlearning privilege also suggests the importance of opening ourselves up to the heterogeneity of a field of enquiry and recognising discourses and interpretations beyond the dominant ones imposed by imperialism (spivak, 1990, p. 9). spivak sees this as ‘the necessity of unlearning one’s learning,’ not just by stepping outside of dominant paradigms of knowledge, but by ‘trying to learn outside of the traditional instruments of learning’ and asking what it means to learn (see also hooks, 1994). indeed, spivak refers to the importance of ‘just sort of hanging out’ with people who articulate different possibilities to the dominant discourses, suggesting the need is to re-configure relationships, practices and locations of learning, not just find other texts to read (danius, jonsson & spivak, 1993, pp. 24-25). so unlearning privilege also requires unlearning the authority to conduct research as a process of information-gathering and problem-solving on behalf of others (see also porter, 2004). storytelling in third spaces – creating spaces for ethical research thus, border crossing as a form of critique involves creating new spaces in which the encounter with ‘otherness’ is no longer ‘us’ reaching out from our positions of authority (giroux 1992b, p. 13). this claim draws on ideas from homi bhabha (1990, p. 20; 1994, p. 211), who contends that the discourse of ‘cultural diversity’ that seeks to contain ‘cultural difference’ creates the necessity for a ‘third space’, which can disrupt existing modes of knowledge and representation. for example, how can l. blanchard & m. nix 73 undergraduate students of hre be encouraged to engage with storytelling, especially when they may cling to orthodox notions of research as information-gathering through interviews? one approach to encouraging ‘research as storytelling’ may be to create spaces for learning through encounters with others, spaces that do not feel like formal fieldwork venues or trigger the roles of researcher and researched. for example, louise phillips (2016) characterises storytelling as ‘performative accounts’ that involve ‘thinking, observing and theorizing as practices of engagement with, and as part of, the world in which we have our being’ (citing barad, 2007, p. 133). phillips argues that a ‘performative account’ advocates ‘relationality between specific material (re)configurings of the world through which boundaries, properties and meanings are differentially enacted…’ (citing barad, 2007, p.139 – italics as per original). this suggests a link with third spaces, in which performative storytelling engages us with the world in the materiality of encounters with others rather than viewing them from the dominant discursive position of the ‘outsider.’ this makes possible a reconfiguring of the borders of difference. from dialogue to dialogic research one clear feature of the salp story is a shift in our understanding of the dialogic. our early concern was with ‘communicative dialogue’ (ellsworth, quoted in burbules, 2010, p. 265) in which the ‘aim of dialogue [is] to speak and understand across differences’ (burbules, 2010, p. 259) and the principle of reciprocity is key. reflecting after salp2015, we wrote about the importance of preparing students, to be ready to engage with the people they meet during fieldwork, not just to interview and gather information from them…. students need to build knowledge about their human rights issue in japan so as to share this knowledge with professionals and activists in australia; and to thus enable a genuine exchange of information and dialogue (blanchard & nix, 2015, p. 17). at this point, our concern was to equip undergraduate students with the language and literacy skills and knowledge for them to participate on an equal footing with the ‘experts’ they met in australia. notions of dialogue as a rational, equitable, even democratic exchange, which are central to much critical pedagogy, have been trenchantly critiqued by feminist writers such as elizabeth ellsworth who have pointed to the dynamics of power that unequally structure ‘dialogic’ encounters between people from different social groups and can make reciprocity and mutual understanding impossible (ellsworth, 1992, pp. 106-108). nicholas burbules (2010, pp. 260-261) asserts that ‘dialogue is not just speaking across given positions of difference, but a relation in which those very positions can be (need to be) questioned.’ and drawing on bhabha’s (1994) critique of cultural diversity, he argues that traditional approaches to dialogue can ‘domesticate’ difference. this reduces difference to degrees of variation (or diversity) on a continuum, preventing a recognition of more radical conceptions of difference— such as incommensurability—emerging in dialogue (burbules, 2010, pp. 260-261). we have seen this in our students’ work when, on occasion, they deny the value of what interlocutors have told them—or even fail to hear it—because of a preoccupation with their research questions and assumptions. human rights education review – volume 2(2) 74 this has led us to take a bakhtinian approach (lillis, 2003) to the importance of the dialogic in fieldwork and research. this approach foregrounds the constant tension in discourse and learning between the monologic (one truth, one voice, one authoritative position) and the dialogic (many truths, voices and positions). such an approach emphasises that dialogue needs to go beyond a dialectical synthesis of two voices or positions into a single truth by keeping multiple differences in play and attending to actual utterances rather than abstracting them into a unitary understanding of a problem (lillis, 2003, pp. 198-199). such a dialogic approach enables us to listen more fully to multiple and disparate accounts and to recognise complexity rather than try to reduce research to neat answers. this helps create the conditions for students to encounter ‘otherness’ on its own terms, rather than within their self-initiated frames of reference. together, these elements of our radical pedagogy aim to address sharma’s claim about the ‘im/possibility’ of escaping relations of domination and assimilation and the three stories that follow shed light on the productive possibilities and limits of this position. sho’s story: the challenge of ‘border crossing’ sho was a second year undergraduate law student when he joined salp2018 and wrote in his learning journal, ‘...the main reason that i wanted to [join this programme] is to “recognize” how important human rights [are] for civilians like me.’ he was specifically interested in indigenous rights and, early in his research, was alarmed to learn about the levels of violence experienced by aboriginal people in australia. he asked in his research journal, ‘why does physical violence to indigenous people tend to happen, rather than to non-indigenous people?’ sho explained this focus on the problems faced by aboriginal people in australia by referring to previous volunteer work he had done in an indigenous community in malaysia: ‘i lived with indigenous people whose names were “ibans.” maybe because the duration of time was too short to understand them, it seemed that there were no problems for themselves to live. so, i had a prejudice that all indigenous people in the world must have no problem around their lives.’ in his attempt to better understand why aboriginal communities experience violence, sho did some research into the experience of the stolen generations, and subsequently intergenerational trauma. he then researched the child protection service because, as he reported in his journal, ‘there was a document which indicated that child protection services which exists today is quite similar to stolen generations… child protection services is the action which is done by the department of community service to remove children from families if they are at risk of significant harm.’ sho next turned in his research to the experiences of ainu people in japan, hypothesising that ‘the fact like “stolen generations” must [have] happened in japan.’ however, at charanke matsuri, an indigenous festival in tokyo, he learnt from a man with ainu ancestors that the ‘ancestors moved from hokkaido not because they had [an] experience like [the] “stolen generations”, but because they wanted to [escape] from discrimination in hokkaido in terms of employment, culture. so, my hypothesis was not correct.’ in preparation for fieldwork in sydney, sho’s internet research included aboriginal organisations and programmes concerned with community empowerment and the promotion of human rights, several of which we had developed relationships with over the previous years. reading and listening to these l. blanchard & m. nix 75 sources, sho wrote in his learning journal: ‘[i] settle my research question as—what makes it possible to overcome cutting connection between culture and identity?’ a break he had learnt was another aspect of the experiences of stolen generations. in sydney, sho’s fieldwork included participation in the tribal warrior corporation mentoring programme for ‘aboriginal and torres strait islander youth of all ages [which is] all about forming good habits, guiding by example, acknowledging our achievements and including everyone’ (tribalwarrior.org). many mornings sho would make his way to redfern by 6.00am to join the early morning boxing programme which is ‘designed to help recidivism rates in jail – meaning we want our youth to stay out of jail through commitment to the program and learning discipline during physical training– the program is so successful that the local police have reported a decrease of 70% in crime in the area!’ (tribalwarrior.org). sho was able to engage in informal discussions after the boxing sessions with tribal warrior mentors such as bert and jacob, and with tribal warrior ceo, shane phillips, who had started the mentoring programme. he also observed the language classes for indigenous youth, and realised from this that ‘empowerment by discipline and revitalization of aboriginal language’ were keywords in the tribal warrior approach. sho also planned a visit to mudgin-gal women’s centre—identified from his research as offering ‘support for women, girls and their young families,’ with a key project acknowledged as a best practice model for addressing family violence in urban aboriginal communities. at mudgin-gal women’s centre sho introduced himself, ‘hello… i am from japan and i am interested in indigenous peoples because i once visited an indigenous community in malaysia. what i want to know is about why there is violence in aboriginal communities.’ the mudgin-gal project coordinator then introduced herself: ‘welcome everyone… actually, last year, my daughter went to japan as an exchange student and she had a wonderful time.’ the coordinator then talked with the students about the important work of the mudgingal organisation to support the human rights of aboriginal women— including its interventions in ‘birth alerts’, which give medical staff the power to remove indigenous babies from their mothers. this experience had a significant impact on sho, who recorded in his learning journal: i visited mudgin-gal because i thought that i could deepen my analysis about why cutting the connection between culture and identity can happen because of the stolen generation, by asking questions to people concerned. in fact, i could listen [to] the reason which seems to have a deep connection to my motivation to visit mudgin-gal. …also, i could listen to the story about why ‘child protection service’ is not good. because ‘birth alerts’ enables nonaboriginal people to judge whether [to remove] the baby [from] aboriginal women, the break between baby and parents can happen... the biggest reasons why the break between culture and identity happened because of stolen generations, is the deprivation of kinship. we see from sho’s story that there is always a tension in his research between wanting to take up indigenous perspectives—that is, to learn about the stolen generations, people’s experiences of intergenerational trauma and the cutting of connections with culture and identity—and the ‘authoritative’ view of dominant discourse (for example, that of the child protection service) which assumes the problem lies with indigenous people. this sets up a border between ‘majority’ and human rights education review – volume 2(2) 76 ‘minority’ populations, with the problem located with the latter. interwoven with this are other tensions, between identifying ‘violence’ as a feature of aboriginal communities and as something that has been visited on these communities as a legacy of colonisation; and between a focus on the problems that indigenous communities face and the actions these communities are taking to empower themselves. we also see how it has proved much easier for students like sho to build ethical research relationships within informal spaces, such as the early morning boxing programme, than in more formal field visits, to mudgin gal for example, which was more fraught for the ‘nervous’ researcher. this was despite learning, prior to doing fieldwork, about building ethical research relationships through role play practice with peers, including introducing themselves by sharing their research about japan. however, because we have developed prior relationships with our host organisations, the research partner feels able to take back the initiative. as we see in sho’s story above, the mudgin gal coordinator reclaims the space and the students could sense the relationship building, as the ‘insider/outsider’ border is renegotiated to create more equal relations. sho’s story is an example of how students can deal with the challenges of complex issues in human rights research and fieldwork and how they can work to actively unlearn dominant discourses and, with motivation and reflection, become border crossers. however, along the way there is a constant struggle to escape the appropriation and domination associated with the researcher role. this is especially the case for undergraduate students working in an additional language and in unfamiliar cultural settings, as sho suggests after reading the first draft of this story: i am really sure about the fact that i had a lot of problems to participate in [salp]… in terms of the ‘impossibility of engaging in alterity’; changing the attitude of asking questions, changing the words i use, being more confident in myself, avoiding questions which are uncomfortable to listeners, my communication skills, adjusting [to] different circumstances7 however, sho’s struggle to understand ‘violence’ in aboriginal communities or ‘violence’ on aboriginal communities, crosses that border. he is finally able to listen to what ‘violence’ might mean—from mudgin gal’s perspective— and how that affects and impacts the human rights of aboriginal peoples. beginning to engage with difference, as sho does here, is also a theme in the bmrsg story. the bmrsg story: engaging with ‘difference’ on its own terms our relationship with the bmrsg is one of the longest and most characteristic of the salp programme. in its development, we can see how important relationships have become and how the development of reciprocal relationships and hybrid spaces have transformed our understanding of what it means to do research. the relationship began back in february 2014, on the pilot programme. two of the four students were researching issues facing asylum seekers and refugees: one student wanted to know more about the medical situation of people seeking asylum and the other wanted to visit a detention centre in australia to compare it with what she had seen of japanese detention centres as an intern with the japan association for refugees. we knew that getting access to detention centres is very difficult, and we were worried about having no connections with the detainees; however, we had l. blanchard & m. nix 77 discovered the bmrsg made weekly visits to villawood detention centre and so we asked them if we could join a visit. our contact in the bmrsg, grant, was initially positive about helping us but, after discussing our request, a meeting of the volunteers decided they couldn’t take us with them to villawood. his email explained, ‘…the volunteers already feel under enough pressure organizing weekly visits for themselves and dealing with the bleak and inhumane conditions for the men they are visiting.’ they were concerned for the well-being of the detained men, whose mood was very low due to their treatment by the immigration authorities and the threats of forced deportation. ‘the men feel like they are under constant observation and stress levels move constantly up and down. we don't want to add to their anguish and distress.’ and grant further explained that they were ‘concerned that the visit could add to the “fishbowl” effect and have an unintended negative outcome.’ our disappointment at this ‘rejection’ was mixed with a feeling that we had been naive about the ethics of ‘researching’ people held in immigration detention, and already under surveillance, and had allowed our research instincts to over-rule our humanity a little bit. we felt, though, we had learnt something about the difficulty, perhaps impossibility, of doing research with a group of people as marginalised as asylum seekers in detention in australia, when our relationship with them is so unequal. then grant got back to us with a remarkably generous invitation to meet with the bmrsg members and ‘refugee friends’ in a situation that would be much less unequal and ‘fishbowl-like’. he wrote: [o]ur plans are well under way for the get-together between your japanese exchange students and our refugee friends….one of our members has agreed to host the lunch …. one of our refugee friends will cook a selection of afghani food for our lunch… fourteen men have accepted the invitation. we have known them from villawood over many years and now they are all in the community working. all have remarkable stories to tell. when we arrived at the party, most of the refugees had been there since 7am cooking up an amazing meal of afghan curries for us. we spent three or four hours there talking with refugees from iran, afghanistan and burma about food, about their lives in australia and our lives in japan, about the countries they had come from and, perhaps most passionately, about our favourite football teams! at this party we first got to know refugees like murtaza, who we have met again on all of our subsequent visits to sydney. and a ‘welcome’ party with the bmrsg has now become an integral part of our programme and one of the highlights for students, according to their feedback. gradually, our role in the organization of the party has changed as our relationship with the group has developed. at first we were outsiders and guests, enjoying the hospitality of the group; but from the second year we made a donation of $300 to cover the cost of food while the bmrsg did all the organising and preparations as hosts, which made us feel more like partners in the event. from the fourth year of the programme, we became insiders, taking on the role of joint-hosts for the party alongside the bmrsg, inviting refugee friends and supporters to the blue mountains youth hostel as our guests, cooking food, playing games and music, and listening to stories. human rights education review – volume 2(2) 78 this sense of co-ownership and shared responsibility for the party, as well as the individual conversations between our japanese students, our refugee friends and the refugee supporters and advocates, creates a learning space that includes all the principles of research posited in smith’s (1999) kaupapa maori approach. in this milieu insider/outsider identities are blurred and it seems to be more possible to engage difference on its own terms. as we shall hear in eri’s story below, it is these regular informal meetings that had such a complex impact on her engagement with human rights. eri’s story: struggling with relationships of appropriation and domination eri was in her first year as an undergraduate politics major in the law faculty at chuo when she joined salp2017. she was in a first-year seminar class on gender issues but quickly developed an interest in learning about refugees, seeing early in her research how the potential of refugees in australia is thwarted, noting: ‘despite eagerness to work and experience, many refugees are unemployed.’ in november 2018, she talked with us about her current refugee support activities in japan, and how her experiences in salp had influenced her involvement in these. in an email before meeting us, eri had said she was happy to discuss this because, ‘salp is the very first step for me to be interested in refugee issues.’ eri explained to us that she was doing an internship with a refugee support organisation in tokyo, setting up a programming school for people who are seeking asylum. she wanted to help refugees become more independent because she thought they shouldn’t be dependent on support organisations which could only provide limited support and sometimes had to refuse support for those who wanted their help— and programming skills could help refugees find employment. eri said that in the future she wanted to create a company that would provide refugees with support and training for finding jobs, again to help support their independence. however, eri had spent a year worrying about whether these activities were the right thing to do. she had been trying to find what she called a right ‘relation’— or ‘feeling’—between herself and refugees, one which wasn’t based on sympathy. eri said her worry was sparked by her friendship with murtaza, the hazara asylum seeker from afghanistan. eri and other salp students had met murtaza several times during their three-week visit to sydney in february-march 2017 at various informal events: a party organised with the bmrsg; a dinner in auburn; a trip to the beach at la perouse; and even a visit to the sydney lesbian and gay mardi gras parade. eri said that meeting and talking with murtaza several times in these informal settings had been the most important experience of salp for her—more significant than fieldwork meetings such as an interview at the refugee advisory and casework service. she talked about how murtaza still kept in touch on facebook. as eri explained, however, the moment in the meetings that most affected and really saddened her came near the end of our sydney visit. murtaza said that although he enjoyed meeting students like eri and appreciated that the programme came back to visit him each year, in the end the programme could only help the students, not him. the students could go back to japan having learnt from the programme, but he couldn’t leave. and, for a year, this signalled for eri the impossibility of escaping from a broader unequal relationship in which the characteristic ‘feeling’ was sympathy. eri then explained how she finally came to find a ‘feeling’ or ‘relation’ that made it right for her to start actively supporting refugees. she came to this realisation l. blanchard & m. nix 79 through recalling the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disaster in tohoku in march 2011. she is from fukushima and so was close to the effects of the disaster. she explained that soon after the disaster she met school friends who had lost everything. those friends had come to her junior high school as 'transfer students'. she realized that her support and solidarity at that time had been for people who had ‘lost everything’, as people seeking asylum in australia had also ‘lost everything.’ this made her ‘feel’ it was right to embark on her activities to support refugees in tokyo and now, nine months after we talked, eri has taken a semester off university to focus full-time on her work with refugees and asylum seekers. listening to eri’s story, we are struck by how important the relationships she has with refugees are for her. for her, there are two key issues: the kind of relationship between refugees and their allies that any activity is based on or constructs; and the possibility of refugees escaping a dependence on support organisations. the encounters with murtaza that she describes seem to have created a more equitable and dialogic research relationship, and it has become possible, in some ways, for eri and murtaza to establish a friendship that goes beyond the dominance and appropriation of a formal researcher-researched relation. but we also see how eri was faced with the impossibility of escaping from an unequal relationship: she and other students could take what they had learned from their visit to australia and from meeting murtaza back to japan with them, and these experiences might enrich or change their lives; however, as murtaza says, his situation would not be fundamentally affected by this encounter. to move beyond this realisation, it was important for eri to break out of the frame of domination which locates her within mainstream society, where she is motivated by feelings of sympathy for ‘others’ who can’t help themselves. she needed to cross a border and feel a connection with the people she wanted to support. postscript: reflections on a radical pedagogy so, what can we learn from listening to these stories? within salp, the students’ selfdirected research projects have the potential to both reinforce and challenge the idea that learning about human rights and diversity means understanding how mainstream society can help ‘minority’ groups. eri’s story in particular suggests the ‘radical’ potential for hre in higher education to create the possibility for students to move beyond relations of appropriation or domination, and to (provisionally) create more equal relationships with the people they are learning from. like sho, she finds ways to temporarily negotiate the im/possibility of engaging difference on its own terms, especially in the kinds of third spaces that emerge in the relationship with the bmrsg. however, their stories also indicate this possibility is always shadowed by the impossibility of fully and permanently crossing the borders of appropriation and domination, and unlearning the privilege of the researcher. this is especially the case when relations between the students and the people they are learning from are structured by fundamental social and economic inequalities of the kind that eri encountered—there are limits to how much difference can be negotiated away, or borders decentred, by sharing stories in third spaces. reflecting on these tensions in the stories and the programme—the oscillation between the possibility and impossibility of negotiating power dimensions within hre—points to further directions for research. indeed, returning to the argument that davis (2004, p.5) makes at the start of this paper—that both ‘research’ and ‘representation’ have played a part in human rights education review – volume 2(2) 80 recreating relationships of dominance from the colonial past—helps us realise that we have only addressed part of the problem. in our ‘radical’ pedagogy we are interested in creating the conditions for more ethical relationships in the process of research, but we have not engaged with the issue of how our students represent the people they have learnt from when they share their research. perhaps our attempts at re-imagining research/learning about human rights as the process of developing ethical relationships are just first steps in creating a radical pedagogy for hre in higher education.8 for davis (2004), control over how research is disseminated, to whom, and for what purposes, is key to developing ethical research practices and relationships that do not marginalise those being researched. this raises new challenges for a radical hre pedagogy around how undergraduate students can involve the people they are learning with, not just in storytelling and dialogue, but in negotiating the shared ownership of the research itself. our story of the search for more ethical relationships in learning and researching about human rights goes on. l. blanchard & m. nix 81 notes 1 we particularly wish to acknowledge the work of saeko nagashima and ryota nishi at chuo university who have been collaborators in the development of the programme. 2 the pilot was made possible by the generous support of the australia-japan foundation (dfat), which provided $14,500.00 of seed funding to cpacs to initiate the project. 3 see rees (2003, pp. 186-221), who links ‘peace with justice’ with defining and attaining human rights. 4 see geia, hayes & usher (2013, p.15) who discuss the contribution from indigenous studies of ‘yarning…an informal and relaxed discussion; a journey both the researcher and the participant share as they build a relationship and visit topics of interest to the research’. 5 cpacs community involvement includes homestay hosts during salp2015 jane fulton, marty morison, ben oh; and cpacs student mentors mujib abid, juliet bennett, tim bryar, viviana rodriquez carreon, punam yadav. 6 we gratefully acknowledge the collegial support we have received from gabrielle appleby, lucas lixinski, and colin picker at unsw law. 7 listening to sho’s feedback about his story helped us to reflect on our position of domination and appropriation as researchers in relation to the students we write about here, something we wish to address in any further research we do about salp. 8 this point is also made by one of the peer reviewers for this paper who contends that our pedagogy ‘is not radical from the perspective of community organizers who subscribe to social research that puts importance on the role of the people being researched.’ this reviewer suggests we consider the value of a co-generative approach to research in which knowledge is co-created or shared with local stakeholders to increase their control over their situation. we find this an interesting critique to address in the future. human rights education review – volume 2(2) 82 references barad, k. 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(2018). critical human rights, citizenship, and democracy education. entanglements and regenerations. london: bloomsbury. https://doi.org/10.1080/09500780308666848 https://doi.org/10.1080/00933104.2015.1034393 https://doi.org/10.1108/qrj-09-2015-0084 https://doi.org/10.1080/1464935042000204222 https://www.japantimes.co.jp/community/2013/08/12/issues/ainu-fight-for-return-of-plundered-ancestral-remains/#.xk6-razs-s4 https://www.japantimes.co.jp/community/2013/08/12/issues/ainu-fight-for-return-of-plundered-ancestral-remains/#.xk6-razs-s4 https://doi.org/10.2304/pfie.2006.4.2.203 creating spaces for radical pedagogy in higher education. in search of radical human rights education the salp story: an experiment in hre contested learning about diversity and human rights creating hybrid spaces for ethical relationship-building notes references human rights education—a republican perspective issn 2535-5406 http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4443 date received: 06-05-2021 date accepted: 12-01-2022 peer reviewed article © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles human rights education—a republican perspective ole henrik borchgrevink hansen østfold university college, norway, ohh@hiof.no abstract the concept of freedom is at the moral core of human rights and human rights education. in the liberal tradition, the prevalent understanding of freedom is non-interference. in the republican tradition, however, freedom is primarily conceived of as non-domination rather than non-interference. this article discusses whether the republican ideal of freedom is conducive to the ambition of human rights education to strengthen and develop respect for human rights, and to build and promote a culture of human rights. the article argues that a republican perspective, although challenging, is important, because it identifies central aspects of freedom that are vital to the fundamental standing of persons and to living a life in dignity, and because it emphasises active citizenship and civic virtue as important for realising freedom. it further argues that a republican perspective requires a multidisciplinary approach to human rights education. keywords human rights education, civic republicanism, freedom, non-domination, non-interference http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4443 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ human rights education review 2 introduction human rights are a part of the legal framework for all educational activities in states that have ratified the relevant conventions. human rights are also integrated in public education in the sense that all persons have a right to access to human rights education (hre) as part of their right to education. as both the international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights (icescr), article 13 and the convention on the rights of the child (crc), article 29 express, the main goal of human rights education is to strengthen and develop respect for human rights and freedoms. the united nations declaration on human rights education and training (undhret), which follows up on the vienna declaration’s (1993) ambition of strengthening human rights education, reiterates in article 2.1 the ambition of strengthening and developing respect for human rights and freedoms and substantiates it with a more thorough account of what human rights education should contain. although not legally binding, the undhret is a significant guiding document for human rights education (lile, 2019). particularly important in the declaration is the guideline to empower persons to contribute to building and promoting a culture of human rights. even though knowledge about the legal dimension of human rights is central to human rights education, it is first and foremost the ethical and political dimensions that are considered the core of human rights education. this is an ambitious but important undertaking. at the moral core of this undertaking we find the concept of freedom. in the liberal tradition, the prevalent understanding of freedom is that of non-interference. although the concept of freedom is not unequivocally defined within the field of human rights, the understanding of freedom as ‘not being interfered with’ seems to capture one very important aspect of human rights—in the sense that the idea of rights is suited for sanctioning acts of interference (laborde & maynor, 2008, p. 16), and because claiming a right often implies seeking protection from some kind of interference. there is also a sense in which human rights can express, as richard bellamy (2013, p. 256) points out, that there are things that no one should be allowed to do to another person. there are, however, alternative understandings of freedom. in what is generally referred to as the republican tradition, which in recent decades has seen a revival within political theory, freedom is primarily understood as non-domination instead of non-interference. in contrast to freedom as non-interference, freedom as non-domination implies that a person is free if that person is not dominated by or under the arbitrary will of someone else. one can, in other words, be unfree without being interfered with. according to republicans, this represents a distinctive concept of freedom, which captures an important aspect of what it means to be a free person. given the pivotal position of freedom within human rights, an interesting question is whether a republican understanding of freedom can provide a constructive perspective on human rights education. although not straightforward, my argument will be in the affirmative. including the republican notion of freedom as non-domination in human rights education may o. h. borchgrevink hansen 3 have an advantage over freedom as non-interference when it comes to identifying and articulating important aspects of freedom that are vital to the fundamental standing of persons and to living a life in dignity. a republican perspective can also be conducive to human rights education because it justifies and encourages active citizenship and civic virtue as important for the realisation of freedom as non-domination in society. however, including republican freedom in human rights education, as a part of public education, is also potentially problematic. first, the normative value of freedom as non-domination, which is regarded as a precondition for living a good life, may, when operationalised, infringe on the interests of parents to raise their children in conformity with their own convictions. second, it is challenging because of the ambivalent status of human rights in the republican tradition, which risks undermining the objectives of human rights education to promote respect for and build and promote a culture of human rights. i shall argue that civic republican human rights education properly interpreted is able to meet these challenges, but that this requires a multidisciplinary approach. i shall first provide an account of the republican concept of freedom, as defended by civic republican theory. second, i suggest two possible ways of operationalising republican freedom in hre. finally, i discuss these suggestions critically. republican freedom the republican tradition is long and too complex for a swift characterisation. it draws on both ancient athenian and roman republican ideals of freedom as independence, civic virtue, political participation and a commitment to the common good. i shall primarily focus on an influential contemporary interpretation of republicanism, which is commonly referred to as either civic republicanism or neo-republicanism, and which is associated with such theorists as quentin skinner (1998, 2009), philip pettit (1997, 2001, 2012), cass sunstein (1988), maurizio viroli (1999) and john maynor (2003). what characterises civic republicanism as a political theory, and what distinguishes it from liberalism, is, according to skinner and pettit, the concept of freedom. freedom in the liberal tradition has primarily been understood in negative terms, as in non-interference. negative freedom is most famously articulated by isiah berlin as describing ‘the degree to which no man or body of men interferes with my activity’ (berlin, 1997, p. 369). according to berlin, negative freedom is involved in the answer to the question: ‘what is the area within which the subject—a person or a group of persons—is or should be left to do or be what he is able to do or be, without interference by other persons?’ (1997, p. 369). historically, this understanding of freedom is typically and paradigmatically seen in hobbes’ leviathan, but it also came to permeate much of the liberal tradition, for instance the works of jeremy bentham, william paley and john stuart mill. it continues to be prominent among more contemporary liberals, such as isiah berlin (1997), as well as ian carter (2008), mathew kramer (2003, 2008) and, to some extent, john rawls (1999). human rights education review 4 civic republicans also conceive freedom in negative terms. this conception differs from a liberal account in that ‘negative’ does not refer to non-interference, but rather nondomination. in civic republican theory, freedom—understood as being independent from arbitrary power, or by the absence of arbitrary dominance or mastery by others (pettit, 1997, pp. 22–27)—is the normative basis. the renewed interest in this concept of freedom is connected to, and to a large extent a result of, the genealogical work done particularly by intellectual historians and founders of the so-called cambridge school, john pocock and quentin skinner, in such seminal works as the machiavellian moment (1975) and liberty before liberalism (1998). genealogy, however, often involves critique, in that by presenting different and rivalling aspects and understandings of a given concept through time, other aspects and understandings are challenged. in short, this work concludes that the liberal tradition, as it developed from the last half of the18th century and onwards, gradually came to replace the republican concept of freedom as non-domination with an ideal of freedom as non-interference (skinner, 1998). in the post-revolutionary modern world there was a realisation that the liberty of ‘the ancients’, which consisted in and was characterised by active and constant political participation, was no longer possible; it had to be complemented by an understanding of freedom as private enjoyment of security and non-interference, as benjamin constant (1988, p. 316) argued. shifting from a descriptive historical analysis to a more normative political landscape, skinner argues that something valuable was lost in this process, namely a republican notion of freedom as independence from arbitrary power (skinner, 1998). the civic republican argument is that this notion of freedom deserves to be revisited and revived because it has an important part to play in identifying different forms of unfreedom in contemporary society. the republican theory of freedom was later developed into a cohesive fully-fledged political theory, most elaborately by philip pettit (1997, 2001, 2012). like skinner, pettit is eager to emphasise that this understanding of freedom constitutes a third theory that is conceptually and normatively distinct from both freedom as noninterference and from positive freedom. freedom as non-domination differs from positive freedom in the sense it is an opportunity-concept that describes conditions for freedom, whereas positive freedom is an exercise-concept describing an ideal of how people should live their lives; that is, an autonomous life or a life of self-mastery (pettit, 1997, pp. 17–126; skinner, 2009, pp. 15–60). the paradigmatic example of unfreedom is captured in the relationship between master and slave: it does not matter if one’s master does not interfere with one’s choices, republicans argue. one is unfree if the master has the power to do so, regardless of whether he actually interferes or not. the same is true, for example, if the state, a religious leader, an employer or an authoritarian parent largely lets one go about one’s business without interference if they can still, at their own discretion and without cost, choose to do so. arbitrary power therefore o. h. borchgrevink hansen 5 pertains to both the relationship between the state and its citizens, that is, the power of the imperium, but also to private relations—to what in the roman republic was called dominium (pettit, 1997, pp. 129–171). the problem of being under someone’s arbitrary power is that it alters one’s behaviour. it can produce servility, exaggerated humbleness and self-censorship, all of which are traits of a submissive personality. being under someone’s arbitrary power means, in pettit’s words, that one remains ‘under the thumb of another person’ (1997, p. 139) and that one is afraid to ‘look others in the eye’ (2012, pp. 84–87). civic republicans contend that this identifies and brings to light an important aspect of freedom, which at least part of liberal tradition has been blind to (friis-nilsen, 2014, p. 28), and which can also be applied to structures and relationships of domination in contemporary society. some republican-minded scholars, such as eoin daly (2019, p. 5), argue that if freedom is understood only in terms of non-interference, and rights as protection from such interference, this may be ‘ineffective against, and possibly serve to entrench those complex forms of domination that are embedded in various social and symbolical hierarchies’, thus representing an illusion of freedom. there is considerable scholarly disagreement about whether republican freedom is a distinctive concept (skinner, 2009; pettit, 1997, 2012; lovett, 2016) or whether its concerns about domination can be encompassed by freedom understood as non-interference and thus best conceived of as a version of liberalism (kramer, 2003, 2008; carter, 1999, 2008; patten, 1996). this discussion is interesting, but cannot be resolved here. suffice to say that it would be a simplification to claim that the whole of the liberal tradition neglects or overlooks domination as an aspect of freedom. not only liberals, like charles larmore (2001, pp. 235– 239), but also republicans pettit (2011, pp. 712–713) and john maynor (2003, p. 91) acknowledge that several liberals—such as john locke and benjamin constant as well as john rawls (2001, p. 131) and berlin himself—are aware of the problems of domination. civic republicanism therefore has structural kinship with the egalitarian constitutional liberalism of john rawls (1996) and ronald dworkin (2002). the main difference, however, seems to be that egalitarian constitutional liberals do not automatically give freedom primacy over other values, as civic republicans do. pettit even refers to freedom as a ‘supreme political value’ (1997, p. 80). instead, these liberals complement and balance freedom with such values as equality and respect, and emphasise that it is through a system of basic rights and liberties that a just society with equal freedom for all is best realised and ensured. even though these values and ideals are incompatible with a society where someone has extensive arbitrary power over others (costa, 2011, p. 81; larmore, 2001, p. 237; rawls 2001, p. 131), an interesting question is whether civic republicans, by placing freedom as non-domination at the centre of the theory, may have an advantage over the liberal account. it could be that the vocabulary of rights is better suited to address acts of interference, but that the language of human rights education review 6 non-domination has an advantage when it comes to addressing, articulating and targeting structures and relationships of particularly private domination, as laborde and maynor (2008, p. 16) argue. it would be interesting, therefore, to discuss whether and how a republican understanding of freedom can provide an important perspective for human rights education. republicanism and human rights education unfortunately, one receives little assistance from either skinner or pettit when it comes to fleshing out the educational implications of republican freedom; they do not devote much time or resources to education. however, other civic republicans, who also subscribe to freedom as non-domination as the central political value, recognise the intimate connection between republican freedom and education and stress the importance of a robust civic education (maynor, 2003; snir & eylon, 2016; costa, 2011; peterson, 2011; honohan, 2005, 2017). andrew peterson is perhaps the civic republican who articulates most clearly that republican freedom requires cultivation and habituation through education from an early age, and that the republican vision in fact depends on education to do its part of the job (2011, p. 119, p. 146). supposing that this emphasis on the pivotal role of education is well-founded, what should be the priority for human rights education when interpreted through the lens of republican freedom? this is a complex question that requires a more thorough discussion than is possible within the confines of this article. i shall suggest two possible ways of operationalising republican freedom in hre, which i think merit further enquiry. both of these are important, but also potentially problematic. the first suggestion concerns raising pupil awareness about both the existence and consequences of structures and relations of arbitrary power. the second concerns the promotion of active citizenship and civic virtue as important contributions to realising republican freedom. the problematic aspects of these suggestions will be discussed in the final section. raising awareness from a human rights perspective, the problem of being under someone’s arbitrary power is that it undermines the ideal of the equal dignity of persons. this ideal is part of the ethical core and thrust of the universal declaration of human rights in the sense that it captures the essence of what it means to be a free, self-directing or self-governing person. the preamble of the universal declaration states that ‘recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world’. being under the arbitrary power of another not only undermines the ideal of equal dignity, but also reduces more directly one’s ability and chance to enjoy many rights and freedoms, such as freedom of speech, religion and assembly. it means that one is o. h. borchgrevink hansen 7 not one’s own person, or sui juris, as roman law expresses it (pettit, 2012, p. 7). in a democratic perspective, being under someone’s arbitrary power means refraining from acting or speaking one’s mind openly and honestly or participating freely in society and politics— not because of coercion, but for fear of possible repercussions. james bohman ties nondomination directly to human rights when he understands non-domination as a ‘primary good’. he puts this point succinctly: ‘if access to any primary good constitutes a prima facie human right, then freedom from nondomination is the most fundamental political human right (2004, p. 341). in light of this, and from the vantage point of human rights education, conceptualising freedom as non-domination seems beneficial. given that the explicit goal of human rights education is to foster and empower persons (including pupils) to contribute to the building and promoting of a universal culture of human rights (undhret, article 2.1), it is hard to envisage such contributions being possible if these persons are not independent of the arbitrary power of others. of course, human rights education need not be republican in order to emphasise that individuals are endowed with equal dignity and respect. indeed, these are generally considered hallmarks of liberal thought. however, we should be open to considering, as i have argued, whether the language of freedom as non-domination is particularly suited to detect and articulate these invisible bonds and structures of arbitrary power that may compromise human dignity. whereas freedom understood as noninterference is mostly concerned with and attuned to free actions and restrictions on individual freedom, the republican emphasis is rather on the free person, as kristjànsson (1998, p. 59) articulates it, and the existence of arbitrary power. in addition, a special attention is given to private domination. i suggest that operationalising republican freedom in hre in public education should imply that public education brings this very fact to our attention. this follows from the normative value of the republican concept of freedom as non-domination. one way to do this is by raising awareness in pupils about both the fact and the possibility that there are ways in which people, including themselves, can be unfree without necessarily being interfered with, threatened or coerced to act in a certain way. it involves bringing attention to the fact that if a person is subject to the arbitrary power of others, conditions that are important for being a free and self-directing person equal in dignity with others are weakened—and with it the possibility of enjoying fundamental human rights and contributing to developing a culture of human rights. such human rights education awareness-raising as a part of public education should be considered a shared responsibility between several school subjects, as well as incorporated into education as a whole. traditionally, hre is central to and particularly compatible with the educational aims and curricula of social sciences and citizenship education. this is expressed by the council of europe’s charter on education for democratic citizenship and human rights human rights education review 8 education, as well as in its guidelines for educators, which emphasises that ‘education for democratic citizenship and human rights education are closely inter-related and mutually supportive’, and should be part of the curricula and formal school education (council of europe, 2010, p. 7, 2013, p. 45). however, i shall argue that a civic republican perspective on hre would benefit from a more multidisciplinary approach, one that includes subjects such as history, philosophy as well an inclusive religious education. the main reason for this is that there are important historical, cultural and religious dimensions to arbitrary power. the ability to reflect upon its existence requires an understanding of the fact that the make-up and structures and relations of domination often have cultural, religious and historical roots, and that they are manifestations of corresponding developments. this concerns, for instance, asymmetrical power relations: between men and women; between the majority and minorities; or relations with various authority figures at work, within the family, or in voluntary religious or secular organisations. domination also manifests itself in a range of issues in the intersection between normative and lived religion, texts and interpretation, culture, history, tradition and inherited norms. including these issues in human rights education requires both a broad and balanced knowledge-base, where subjects such as philosophy or an inclusive form of religious education can play an important part. in addition, these subjects are needed to provide deliberative skills and a deliberative space where a critical engagement with the ethical dimensions of such relations and structures of domination can be facilitated. republican freedom, active citizenship and civic virtue the second suggestion for operationalising republican freedom concerns the promotion of active citizenship and civic virtue. the ideals of the free citizen, active citizenship, political participation, civic virtue and concern for the common good are central to the republican tradition. there are different perspectives among republicans, however, as to the status and function of political participation. a distinction is frequently made between intrinsic and instrumental republicanism (peterson, 2011, pp. 16–17; honohan, 2002, pp. 180–185; sandel, 1996, p. 26; maynor, 2003, pp. 11–13). intrinsic republicans, such as michael sandel and john pocock, who share affinities with communitarianism and draw on the aristotelian ideal of man as a political animal, value political participation for intrinsic reasons —that is, as an inherent part of living a full life (sandel, 1996, p. 26). instrumental republicans, on the other hand, associated with civic republicans such as skinner, pettit, sunstein and maynor, tend to consider active citizenship and political participation in a less comprehensive and perhaps less demanding manner. what characterises civic republicanism as a political theory is the instrumental connection between the realisation of freedom as non-domination on the one hand and active citizenship and civic virtue on the other (skinner, 1998, p. 70). this connection may have interesting implications for human rights education, and we therefore need to ask in what sense republican freedom requires active citizenship and civic virtue. o. h. borchgrevink hansen 9 pettit argues that a society of non-domination requires both a constitutional and a civic contribution. pettit calls the constitutional contribution a ‘mixed constitution’; this requires the state to satisfy a range of constitutional constraints, including the sharing and separation of power and the rule of law (2012, p. 5). in other words, arbitrary power is power that is not subject to sufficient democratic control. the civic contribution, which pettit calls ‘contestatory citizenry’, alludes to the importance of citizens exercising ‘contestatory vigilance’, which means that they have a controlling function vis-à-vis the authorities (2012, pp. 5, 225–229). realising freedom as non-domination requires not only free and fair elections, but also an active citizenship where citizens are alert to concentration of power, and take control of the authorities if they restrict the liberty of citizens or fail to restrict private domination. from a civic republican perspective, it is important that this is not just a matter of providing citizens with the possibilities of exercising such control through easily available mechanisms and channels (sunstein, 2019), but also that citizens feel a commitment and a disposition towards political participation with a sense of the common good in mind. this kind of internalising of responsibility can be called civic virtue (pettit, 1997, p. 245). if freedom somehow was disconnected from virtue when liberalism replaced republicanism during the enlightenment, viroli (1999, p. 103) may be right when he describes the recent republican revival as presenting a ‘political vision of a civic ethos that reconnects the words “liberty” and “responsibility”’. this does not imply that active citizenship, deliberative citizenry and civic virtue are exclusively republican ideals. indeed, the broad understanding of deliberative democracy as ‘a commitment to decision-making processes, which take into account, and permit, the reasoned dialogical interaction of citizens’ (peterson, 2011, p. 99), is not only a ‘characteristically republican belief’ (sunstein, 1988, p. 1539) supported by central contemporary republicans (skinner, 1997; pettit; 1997, 2012). it has also been propounded and developed by many liberal theorists (cohen, 1989; gutmann & thompson, 2004; habermas, 1994; rawls, 2001). the development from the ‘90s has also been called a ‘deliberative turn’ in democratic theory (dryzek & braithwaite, 2000, pp. 241–2). concerning ‘civic virtue’, it is fair to say that this ideal is not inherent in most liberal accounts of citizenship. at the same time, political virtues, understood as ‘duty of civility’ and ‘civic friendship’, appear as important for a well-functioning democracy in the writings of, for instance, rawls (1996, pp. 163, 205, 217, 236, 2001, pp. 102, 163, 165, 207). there are two main things that distinguish civic republicanism from an egalitarian constitutional liberal account of active citizenship. first, there is the particular connection to, and justification by, the normative value of freedom as non-domination. civic republicans offer hre both a philosophical foundation as well as a democratic theory for active citizenship by insisting that active citizenship and civic virtue are of vital importance for realising and human rights education review 10 protecting non-domination in society. this close instrumental connection between political participation and freedom means the deliberative element is more integrated in civic republicanism than in the egalitarian constitutional liberalism of rawls and dworkin, where political citizenship remains optional (rawls, 2001, p. 245). the civic republican perspective therefore provides a robust justification for promoting active citizenship through hre. second, for civic republicans active citizenship is primarily directed towards a concern for the common good of the community. whereas the deliberative element in egalitarian liberalism largely remains constitutionally and rationally justified, civic republicans emphasise ‘the deliberative interpretation of the common good’ (honohan, 2017, p. 93). in other words, they insist on making the general welfare of the political community central to the deliberative process (peterson, 2011, p. 69). it seems therefore as if a republican-inspired human rights education may be more mindful of community aspects when deliberating about human rights, articulating aspects of human rights that lie beyond self-interest or the aggregation of individual preferences. this reflects the ethical and political ambition of human rights education to build and promote a culture of human rights. discussion i have argued that the central normative position of freedom in civic republicanism can be seen as a strength for human rights education. however, operationalising republican ideas in hre does not come without difficulties. in the following i wish to address two challenges, both of which may jeopardise the ethical and political ambition of hre to promote and build a culture of human rights. the first concerns the risks of infringing on parents’ interests and hampering the toleration and accommodation of diversity. the second concerns the ambivalent status of human rights in the republican tradition as a means to realise freedom as non-domination. i shall argue that republicanism can be interpreted so as to meet both these challenges, but that this requires schools to have an awareness of them and to apply a multidisciplinary approach to hre. dangers of infringement operationalising republican freedom by raising awareness about the existence of relations and structures of domination can be contentious. facilitating a critical and inquiring perspective on the existence of, for instance, cultural and religious norms in hre along the lines suggested above—to the extent that they support or sustain relations and structures of domination—raises certain questions about the role of education versus the rights and interests of parents and pupils. the power relations underpinning such norms contain values that often enjoy wide support and which are, by many, considered to be of fundamental importance. these values are seen as central to preserving honour, personal salvation, family relations and societal stability, as well as being a bulwark against fragmentation and the disintegration of public morality. raising awareness about these issues in hre implies o. h. borchgrevink hansen 11 challenging, for instance, the more traditional norms that are present in a diverse multicultural classroom. this can be problematic, because it may infringe on parents’ liberty to ensure the moral and religious education of their children, and also create distrust as well as conflicting loyalties between pupils and the home (hansen, 2022). if this is the case, such a strategy for hre could be challenging when it comes to toleration and the accommodation of diversity (hansen, 2013, 2018). it could also put a strain on or jeopardise the ambition of building and promoting a culture of human rights. the underlying problem or question seems to be, as whitfield and lovett (2016) point out, whether civic republicanism, because of the normative value it ascribes to freedom as nondomination, is sufficiently neutral between different conceptions of the good. contrary to the liberal principle of neutrality, which requires the state and its educational institutions not to favour particular conceptions of the good (rawls, 1996, p. 199; dworkin, 1984, p. 64; larmore, 1987, p. 44) and focuses on the political dimension—that is, questions about the basic structures of society—civic republicanism has no such limitations or constraints (laborde 2013, p. 527). that means both that promoting the normative value of non-domination is a permissible educational objective, and that such promotion may include addressing arbitrary power in not only political, but also private relations. this lack of constraints does not automatically provide clear educational prescriptions, and civic republicans seem to have different views as to what kind of recommendations republican freedom requires when operationalised. maynor (2003, pp. 174, 181) argues that a modern republican civic education ‘must begin with the distinct concept of liberty as nondomination’ and ‘play an active role in the content of public education by educating citizens in the substance and forms of nondomination, and the necessary values and virtues that accompany it’. this position seems to suggest that a civic republican-inspired hre should actively promote this core value. however, it is far from clear what this entails. does it imply discouraging ways of life that support or are associated with cultural or religious structures and relations that are potentially dominating? it would certainly be problematic—also from the vantage point of civic republicanism—if human rights education had the elimination of all hierarchical social relations or structures and power relations as an educational objective, as blain neufeld (2019, p. 147) points out. that would constitute a perfectionist (and possibly paternalist) position, which itself could become a type of domination. pettit (1997, pp. 50, 273) argues that the ideal of non-domination requires the state to try to prevent people from dominating others, but at the same time points out the importance of the state not doing the same. it would be something of a paradox, and contrary to pettit’s ideal of non-domination, if hre, by trying to maximise republican freedom, in practice dominated pupils and parents who did not support or remained reticent towards all aspects of a republican ideal of freedom (hansen, 2022). an hre which insists on actively promoting the normative value of non-domination must also be human rights education review 12 mindful not to ultimately make an ideal of strong personal autonomy a guiding educational principle (hansen, 2018). however, promoting autonomy is not the same thing as promoting freedom as non-domination. freedom as non-domination is a negative opportunity concept rather than a positive exercise concept, as ‘it requires the absence of domination by others, not necessarily the presence of self-mastery’ (pettit, 1997, p. 51). civic republicanism is thus not committed to promoting positive freedom as autonomy or self-mastery. this is not to say that freedom as non-domination is detached from autonomy, or that gaining autonomy is unimportant as a way of empowering pupils and citizens to resist domination. indeed, pettit supports a kind of autonomy-ideal through what he calls ‘discursive control’, which he describes as a person’s ‘ratiocinative capacity to take part in a discourse, and the relational capacity that goes with enjoying relationships that are discourse-friendly’ (1997, pp. 81, 82, 2001, p. 71). a republican-inspired hre faces a quandary: to maintain a commitment to raising awareness about relations and structures of arbitrary power while at the same time to avoid sliding into promoting a comprehensive ideal of strong autonomy that discourages others´ ways of life, which (otherwise) may be considered reasonable. it must also be conscious of not infringing on the rights of parents or guardians to ensure the religious and moral education of their children in conformity with their own convictions (international convention on civil and political rights, article 18.4). this does not mean that children’s autonomy rights should be disregarded. children’s right to be heard and their freedom of religion, protected by article 12 and article 14 in the convention of the rights of the child, should clearly be integral to a sound hre. however, a hre which aspires to promote respect for and a culture of human rights also needs to recognise the interrelatedness of children’s and parent’s fundamental rights and consequently that they need to be interpreted in light of each other (bielefeldt, ghanea, wiener, 2016, p. 216). this is no easy task, but a balancing act which requires hreteachers to acknowledge the contested nature of these issues, be diligent and sensitive to the rights and interest of parents and engage in an open communication with parents and pupils about justifications and intention, as well as the specifics of related curricular activities. the ambivalent status of human rights the second challenge of operationalising republican freedom in human rights education concerns the ambivalent status of human rights within the republican tradition. i have argued that active citizenship may be beneficial for realising non-domination in society, that nondomination is essential to human dignity and consequently that civic republicanism provides an important perspective for hre. it may seem, therefore, paradoxical that civic republicans, making non-domination the focal point of their political theory, rarely have considered human rights to be a prominent part of the republican recipe for its achievement. instead, many republicans have been ambivalent about the role and status of human rights (sandel, 1982, 1996; skinner, 1991). including republican freedom in human rights education could thus be o. h. borchgrevink hansen 13 considered something of an odd marriage. the question is whether this ambivalent or sceptical stance may undermine or jeopardise the pedagogical enterprise of hre developing a positive attitude towards human rights and promoting respect for and building and promoting a culture of human rights. the ambivalent attitude towards human rights among many republicans relates to their perception of an inherent individualism underpinning the increased focus on individual human rights. instead of framing individual concerns as matters of rights, which takes priority over duties to the community, republicans have tended to emphasise, as we have seen, civic virtue and individual responsibility for realising the common good of the political community. this tension between primarily focusing on either the individual or the community resembles and is connected to the core of the liberal-communitarian debate during the ‘80s and ‘90s, in which both charles taylor and michael sandel—both having expressed affinities with republican ideals—have contributed (sandel, 1982, 1996; taylor, 1989). these thinkers and others, such as alasdair macintyre (1981), have raised concerns about what they take to be a misguided anthropological and ontological basis residing in the liberal, and particularly the libertarian, idea and ideal of a person as a rational chooser of his/her own ends, and as an ‘unencumbered self’, detached from the community (sandel, 1982, p. 62). extending this critique, the communitarian argument was that an exaggerated focus on individual rights may undermine civic virtue, public participation, and responsibility towards the community and the common good. civic republicans also share this concern. skinner, for instance, warns against insisting that our rights are trumps that always take priority over our duties and that such a focus is to ‘proclaim our corruption as citizens’ (1991, p. 307). he says that excessive claims of rights without responsibilities are self-destructive, and that those who are concerned with their private rights need to pay attention to their duties (1991, pp. 308–309). in a similar vein, pettit concedes that republicanism is not a tradition of rights in the same way as liberalism is, and instead emphasises political participation and a vigilant public as more important for realising freedom (pettit, 2012, 1997, p. 304). this does not mean in any way that a commitment to human rights is incompatible with civic republicanism, or that there is an inherent contradiction between accepting and committing to both human rights and to freedom as non-domination. in fact, several republican-oriented theorists have pointed out that republican freedom is fully compatible with rights and the moral standing of persons that rights express, and civic republicans endorse rights as expressions and realisations of fundamental freedoms (laborde & maynor, 2008, p. 16; ivision, 2010; bellamy, 2013; dagger, 1997). despite this compatibility, there is a difference and a tension between a civic republican and a dominant liberal account of human rights— which has interesting implications for hre. this difference pertains to the nature of the relationship between freedom and human rights. in the lockean liberal tradition, the account human rights education review 14 of human rights tends to emphasise that they are founded in natural rights. even if this does not imply that all liberals consider all human rights to be concretisations of natural rights, there is a strong tendency to frame central human rights as deontological, and as pre-political constraints on the state (jones, 1994, pp. 72–73). these deontological and transcendental aspects of human rights also reside in the preamble of the universal declaration’s claim that ‘recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world’, and they are the foundation of the natural rights school of human rights education (morsink, 2009; nussbaum, 2011). the civic republican view, on the other hand, has a different emphasis. instead of regarding human rights as antecedent or prior to politics (daily, 2019, pp. 3–4), civic republicans firmly root them within what albert weale (2007, pp. 12–18) and jeremy waldron (1999, pp. 107–113) have called the ‘circumstances of politics’, realised through a process of collective will-formation (ivison, 2010, p. 32). any attempt to abstract rights from politics is therefore problematic for civic republicans because this may devalue both the underlying political deliberation about rights’ content, and, most importantly, the central roles of civic virtue, active citizenship and political participation in this deliberative process. pettit’s perspective is instructive: even though he concedes that republicanism is not a tradition of rights as liberalism (1997, pp. 303–304), he maintains that this does not mean that rights do not matter. indeed, certain natural rights may even be essential to achieve freedom and maximise non-domination in society (1997, p. 101). rights can function as ‘resources that rights-bearers can have against interference by the powerful’. the point is that they cannot do the job alone, and perhaps only to a limited degree, according to pettit (1997, p. 304). this account is far from the legalistic culture of rights as trumps. instead, pettit emphasises that to enjoy non-domination in relation to both the government and other people requires a society where social movements prosper and where civic virtue is strong, and that gaining power is more important for the protection of non-domination than rights, however richly reconceived (1997, p. 304). the question is whether the republican, political account of the nature of human rights, as richard bellamy (2013, p. 256) asks, may subvert their traditional purpose. more precisely, it is whether this framing of human rights, because it expresses a sort of relativism on the part of human rights, puts their moral basis under pressure, which may undermine their promotion. this is an important question because it concerns issues of pupils’ motivation and pedagogical considerations. i do not expect that this is the case, however. it is granted that emphasising the inevitable political dimension of human rights will shed light on the fact that human rights are contested, disagreed upon, need interpretation and that their content is partially a part and product of negotiations. at the same time, framing human rights as a part of politics, as a civic republican perspective does, also facilitates more pragmatic-oriented o. h. borchgrevink hansen 15 discussions about how human rights can be protected and improved. most importantly, however, this framing goes hand in hand with the civic republican emphasis on the instrumental role of active citizenship and civic virtue. there is a good chance that this could strengthen the motivational force of human rights education and its ambition of developing a culture of human rights. this should not imply, however, that a republican political perspective on hre should be exclusive and deontological justifications of human rights be omitted. instead of seeing the tension between these two perspectives as a problem, human rights education should explore them, and make the concept of human rights itself, including its justifications and realisation, an object of inquiry for human rights education. further, i think a fruitful avenue for human rights education is to explore the alleged tension between a supposedly liberal individualism, self-interest and rights-focus on the one hand and the civic republican responsibility towards the common good of the community on the other. must it be the case, for instance, that appealing to rights comes at the expense of civic virtue, citizenship and commitment to the common good? is there a risk that an insistent rights-focus and increased rights-talk can weaken social relationships, as dagger (1997, pp. 23–24) asks? by extension, this spawns the question about what should constitute the common good, and whether such a quest is desirable, achievable or can be subject to consensus in a multicultural society. more precisely, it is important to deal with questions of whether the focus on rights, if it takes priority over duties, can undermine the very conditions for their realisation, as duncan ivison (2010, p. 39) puts it, or whether it should be possible to combine a respect for rights with a focus on civic virtue and public responsibilities, as richard dagger (1997, p. 131) argues in his attractive ‘hybrid’ position, republican liberalism. although these tensions mirror tangible differences, they do not, as i have tried to show, amount to mutually exclusive positions for or against human rights. rather, they reflect arguments and disagreements on a continuum that correspond to central political and ethical issues in modern societies and need to be reflected upon as part of hre. indeed, the very tension between rights and duties finds expression in and is inherent to the universal declaration of human rights, which emphasises not only equal individual rights, but also that ‘everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible’ (article 29). promoting a culture of human rights requires adopting a critical perspective on these tensions and dilemmas. an educational process which is unable to engage and interact critically with these tensions and dilemmas is not likely to ensure a resilient hre. in human rights education, these discussions have a clear political dimension, and making proper sense of them is no easy task, requiring the efforts of subjects such as social sciences and citizenship education, where active citizenship, deliberative skills, general knowledge about human rights and human rights institutions and mechanisms as well as the basics of human rights education review 16 democracy and democratic theories are already integral parts. however, the pronounced ethical dimension of issues relating to the nature of active citizenship, civic virtue and the different accounts and justifications of human rights calls for a multidisciplinary approach. corresponding with the ethical ambition of human rights education to persuade people to engage in the realisation of human rights, i would argue that philosophy and a nonconfessional religious education play an important part (jackson, 2018). it is beyond the scope of this article to spell out and discuss didactic operationalisations in detail. however, it might help us to make sense of these tensions if they are explored in the light of different ethical theories. kantian deontological ethics is prone to justifying human rights from a transcendental natural-rights perspective, whereas utilitarianism tends to focus on the overall impact of human rights. in addition, various religion-based ethics have developed faith-based arguments for human rights, which can be discussed, for instance, in light of the rawlsian idea of overlapping consensus (1996, pp. 133–172). ethical theory is also indispensable for a meaningful discussion of the tensions between ideals of individualism, self-interest and rightsfocus on the one hand, and civic virtue and commitment to the common good of the community on the other. finally, ethics is important because unpacking and exploring these tensions requires reflections on moral attitudes and values such as egoism, altruism, relativism and fundamentalism, as well as ethnocentrism and universalism. conclusion even though including civic republican perspectives in human rights education can be a challenge, i think it brings important perspectives that can be conducive to the ethical and political ambitions of human rights education to strengthen and develop respect for human rights, and to build and promote a culture of human rights. firstly, freedom understood as non-domination can help to identify important aspects of freedom that are vital to the fundamental standing of persons and to living a life in 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(2007). democracy (2nd ed.). basingstoke: palgrave. https://doi.org/10.1007/9780-230-37378-5 un general assembly (1948, december 10). universal declaration of human rights (217 [iii] a). paris. retrieved from https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-ofhuman-rights un general assembly (1959, november 20). declaration of the rights of the child. a/res/1386(xiv). retrieved from https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b38e3.html un general assembly (1966a, december 16). international covenant on civil and political rights. united nations, treaty series, 999, p. 171. retrieved from https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b3aa0.html un general assembly (1966b, december 16). international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights. united nations, treaty series, 993. retrieved from https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b36c0.html un general assembly (1993, july 12). vienna declaration and programme of action. a/conf.157/23. retrieved from https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b39ec.html un human rights council (2011, april 8). united nations declaration on human rights education and training. resolution adopted by the human rights council, a/hrc/res/16/1. retrieved from https://www.refworld.org/docid/4db95b0a2.html https://doi.org/10.2307/796540 https://doi.org/10.4159/harvard.9780674864443.c13 https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198262138.001.0001 https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-230-37378-5 https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-230-37378-5 https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b38e3.html https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b3aa0.html https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b36c0.html https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b39ec.html https://www.refworld.org/docid/4db95b0a2.html human rights education—a republican perspective abstract keywords introduction republican freedom republicanism and human rights education raising awareness republican freedom, active citizenship and civic virtue discussion dangers of infringement the ambivalent status of human rights conclusion references revisiting ‘voice’ in early childhood education issn: 2535-5406 http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.5024 date of publication xx-xx-2023 © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org book and media reviews revisiting ‘voice’ in early childhood education arnott, l. and wall, k. (eds.) (2022). the theory and practice of voice in early childhood: an international exploration. abingdon: routledge. 240pp., £22.99 (paperback) isbn: 978-0-36720-109-8; £120.00 (hardback) isbn: 978-0-36720-108-1; £20.69 (ebook) isbn: 978-0-42925963-0. reviewed by carmel ward queen's university belfast, uk, cfaulkner07@qub.ac.uk positioned in a rights-based perspective, the theory and practice of voice in early childhood offers readers multiple ideas to inspire their own journey in the practice of eliciting voice with young children from birth to 8. the book is structured around eight talking-point posters which illustrate elements of voice work: voice, democracy, culture, listen with purpose, space and place, skills and tools, enable, and build capacity (wall et al., 2019). these eight factors are subsequently organised into pairs to form four interconnected sections: 1) voice and democracy; 2) culture of voice and listening; 3) spaces, places, skills and tools for voice; and 4) enabling and building capacity. each of the sections synthesises theory and practice, moving fluidly from abstract theorisations of voice concepts to concrete case studies illustrating diverse 'voice work’ practices in early childhood education. in total, 16 international practicebased case studies with children, including three with babies, are presented. notably, anderson and rautman’s case study explores how to involve infants in ethical decision-making processes. this book adds to the expansive body of literature about children’s participation rights in early childhood—frequently articulated as children’s ‘voices’—that has considered multimodal http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.5024 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ hrer book and media reviews 2 forms of communication to ensure that all children, including babies and those with special needs, are recognised as having a voice. by drawing together complex theoretical dialogue with practical ideas for eliciting young children’s voices in one book, written in accessible language that will be familiar to those working in early childhood, the authors offer a valuable contribution for the intended practice-based audience. the diversity of authors and multifaceted content, as the authors point out, affords strength to the book through sensitively demonstrating the complexities, nuances and at times tensions in discourses on voice. in section 1, cassidy and robinson situate the significance of children’s voices as an element of participation within the united nations convention on the rights of the child (uncrc) (un, 1989). here, they connect voice work to education for human rights, attending to the complex and contested constructs of children’s agency and capacity. thereafter, relational understandings of voice in practice continue throughout the narratives. in this respect, two sections are worth highlighting. arnott and wall open section 2 with an exploration of ‘the route to a culture of voice’ in practice by connecting ‘cultures of listening with purpose’ and ‘cultures of compassion’ to relational pedagogies. blaisdell begins section 3 with a critique of the limitations of task-based tools for eliciting children’s voices, then considers the role of space, place and time in creating opportunities and obstacles for children to express voice. both chapters emphasise the significance of relationships between adults and children as tools for eliciting voice. salient interpretations of voice and power dynamics are interwoven throughout the volume. at times, however, inconsistencies appear across the author's perspectives. in chapter one, cassidy and robinson discuss the need for adults not only to relinquish power in relationships with children but to acknowledge with transparency where power lies in decision-making. an alternative perspective is presented in chapter six by arnott and wall, who view power as a dynamic feature of social contexts rather than being fixed or being held by one person at a time. they argue, therefore, that addressing power imbalances is dependent on specific adultchild relationships. the editors themselves acknowledge the authors' divergent interpretations but consider this to be an opportunity for the readers to reflect on the complexities of voice and their own positions. another important component is wall and arnott’s consideration of voice work as a cumulative process whereby practitioners bravely initiate their ‘voice journey’ then work to sustain it through ongoing capacity building with children, adults and communities. the case studies in section 4 illustrate different phases of the journey to embedding ‘voice work’ in a range of international contexts. by presenting ideas to inspire practitioners to begin and develop their own practice the authors reassure readers that eliciting young children’s voices is possible and in doing so contribute to addressing concerns that children’s participation has hrer book and media reviews 3 become somewhat unattainable and intimidating (lundy, 2018). helpfully, the book concludes with resources that provoke reflective practice and conversations among practitioners. pondering on the meaning of ‘voice’, cassidy and robinson point out that the uncrc does not reference ‘voice’ and caution that the right to express views freely as articulated in article 12 (un, 1989) could be interpreted as meaning only children’s spoken views. however, the same critique can be directed to the application of the term ‘voice’. firstly, this critique overlooks the committee’s recognition of how young children 'communicate their feelings, ideas and wishes in numerous ways’ before they communicate through spoken language (un, 2006, para. 11). secondly, by reinforcing theories and practices of ‘voice’ the authors miss an opportunity to reimagine the application of ‘voice’ within early childhood narratives in a way that could avoid limited interpretations of participation rights that marginalise children’s unvoiced forms of expression. tisdall and punch (2012) have described the focus on children’s ‘voice’ in childhood studies as a recurring mantra in literature which precludes space for alternative ideas (p. 259). considering how the content within the book successfully illuminates ways of listening to children from birth, it could have been even more compelling had the authors interrogated or attempted to rephrase the powerful mantra of ‘voice’. however, the authors certainly create space for readers to critically reflect on the meaning or reimagining of children’s voices for the children they encounter in their specific contexts. ultimately, this book provides provocations for professionals working with children from birth to reflect on how to translate complex theories of children’s voice into meaningful practice that can contribute to the realisation of education through and for rights in early childhood spaces. references lundy, l. (2018). in defence of tokenism? implementing children’s right to participate in collective decision-making. childhood, 25(3), 340-354. https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568218777292 tisdall, k., and punch, s. (2012). not so ‘new’? looking critically at childhood studies, children's geographies, 10:3, 249-264. https://doi.org/10.1080/14733285.2012.693376 united nations (un) (1989, november 20). convention on the rights of the child (treaty series, 1577). adopted and opened for signature, ratification and accession by general assembly resolution 44/25. retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx united nations (un) (2006). general comment no. 7 on children’s rights in early childhood, crc/c/gc/7. geneva: united nations. https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568218777292 https://doi.org/10.1080/14733285.2012.693376 https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx hrer book and media reviews 4 wall, k., cassidy, c., robinson, c., hall, e., beaton, m., kanyal, m., & mitra, d. (2019). look who’s talking: factors for considering the facilitation of very young children’s voices. journal of early childhood research, 17(4), 263–278. https://doi.org/10.1177/1476718x19875767 https://doi.org/10.1177/1476718x19875767 majority rights and minority responsibilities: young people’s negotiations with human rights issn 2535-5406 vol 4, no 3 (2021) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4186 date received: 16-02-2021 date accepted: 22-09-2021 peer reviewed article © 2021 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles communicating vessels: drama and human rights education in in-service teacher training nassia choleva aristotle university of thessaloniki, greece, acholeva@nured.auth.gr antonis lenakakis aristotle university of thessaloniki, greece myrto pigkou-repousi aristotle university of thessaloniki, greece abstract this paper supports the contention that the methodologies of human rights education and educational drama share a common ground and that that the three fundamental dimensions of human rights education (hre) (learning about, through and for human rights) can be addressed through drama. our quantitative research is focused on an educational drama workshop for in-service teachers that dealt with human rights and refugees. the data was collected through questionnaires and analysed with reference to six hypotheses. these hypotheses were about how highly motivated teachers assessed their knowledge of human rights and their readiness for teaching human rights by using educational drama methodologies. the data showed statistically significant increase on all of the above hypotheses after the teachers had been trained. their levels of readiness were also found to be significantly higher after the end of the school year. this indicates that the drama training had an impact on teachers’ human rights education. keywords educational drama, classroom methodologies, in-service training, quantitative research, greece http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4186 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:acholeva@nured.auth.gr human rights education review – volume 4(3) 66 introduction following global tendencies, in greek schools there is a demand for a holistic education which takes into account the body and mind, as well as the spirit of every student. such education, which addresses wider societal issues, is not only desirable but a prerequisite. greece has been recently challenged by a great wave of refugees, and there have been violations of refugee rights (albawaba, 2021; united nations high commissioner for refugees [unhcr], 2021), as well as the rise of a neo-nazi, alt-right pseudo-political party which the courts have found to be a criminal organisation (smith, 2020). these developments have brought back to the forefront of education key concerns—such as the inclusion of all students and respect for democracy and human rights. at the same time, it has gradually become more difficult for teachers to address social issues or include a social angle in the subjects they teach. they face multiple challenges: neoliberal approaches in the greek education system; the abolition of subjects like the arts and sociology in upper secondary education according to an educational law—one voted on during the pandemic lockdown, no less (government gazette [greece], 2020); their restricted presence in high schools and their fragmented presence in primary education. furthermore, human rights education (hre) is largely absent from greek curricula; the only traces to be found are in the remaining social studies subjects (pantazis & papageorgiou, 2013). as in many other countries, greek teachers are forced to serve a suffocating curriculum, which is assessmentorientated with little regard for critical thought, creative expression and inter-disciplinary approaches. within all these constraints, adjacent fields of education which have proposed more holistic, interdisciplinary approaches to knowledge must meet and be given space to function. educational drama pedagogy and hre are both based on experiential, participatory and active learning. for this reason, the present study proposes there can be a positive interplay between these two fields, on the in-service training of teachers who work in formal education. theoretical background human rights education and educational drama: communicating vessels according to the united nations declaration on human rights education, hre shall contain learning ‘about’, ‘through’ and ‘for’ human rights (united nations [un], 2011, article 2). it is also considered a ‘lifelong process that concerns all ages’, which shall ‘use languages and methods suited to target groups, taking into account their specific needs and conditions’ (article 3). the document defines the states’ responsibility for training teachers in human rights (article 7), and specifically mentions the arts as a desirable and suitable language of training and raising awareness, which should be encouraged for use (article 6). over the last n. choleva, a. lenakakis, m. pigkou-repousi 67 25 years scholars have experimented with, observed and defined the fundamental elements of hre. there is much agreement that this is a flexible field which can take different shapes and forms in different circumstances in order to serve its purposes, which are knowledge, democratic procedures, and emancipation (bajaj, 2018; flowers, 2017; tibbitts, 2002, 2017). educational drama (also often referred to as drama in education, creative drama, process drama, drama method, or simply drama, for the purpose of this paper) can serve all three mandatory dimensions of human rights education. it is a distinct educational field, separate from professional theatre or acting education and, as far as this paper is concerned, by no means related to it. it combines aesthetic and artistic elements from the practice of theatre, specifically within an educational framework and through pedagogical procedures (neelands & goode, 2015). drama draws from pedagogies that are student-centered, arts-based, and experiential. it enforces inquiry-based learning, active learning and critical thinking. its roots can be traced in the pedagogies of educators such as piaget, dewey, vygotsky, bruner, as well as freire. drama can be found in formal education as a subject in its own right or as a general methodology for teaching any other subject. it is applicable to students of all ages, and its primary aim is not the artistic outcome but rather the process of collaborative work. at the same time as their aesthetic sense, imaginations and creativity are cultivated, students can explore a vast variety of real issues through imaginary given frameworks (e.g., social, artistic, historic, and subject-related ones). through the use of theatrical methodologies and techniques, a number of skills can be exercised: empathy; communication; active participation; multiple perspectives; critical thinking; expression of feelings, thoughts, and fears; negotiation of ideas; group dynamics; dialogue through speech, body or creation, collaboration, etc (lenakakis & paroussi, 2019). by definition, the educational drama workshop offers an opportunity for ideas to be tested without censorship (the respect of team members is always protected, of course) and there are no real consequences for the participants, other than reflection and re-negotiation (neelands 2004). the drama workshop allows for real, intercultural dialogue, where diversity and polyphony are not obstacles, but rather constitute a request and a treasure (kondoyianni, lenakakis, & tsiotsos, 2013; pammenter, 2008; sting, köhler, hoffmann, weiße, & grießbach, 2010). in this democratic, inclusive and intercultural pedagogical approach, the role of the teacher is quite crucial: he/she is a democratic facilitator, as opposed to a decisive figure, such as a theatre director. he/she is responsible for ensuring there is space and safety for all voices to be heard and for encouraging students’ individual and collective growth, at their own pace (gallagher & ntelioglou 2013; lenakakis, 2004; übereinkommen (internationales) über das verhalten und zur ethik von theaterpädagoginnen und theaterpädagogen [üvet], 2011). in human rights education review – volume 4(3) 68 this sense, the drama workshop can function as a field of exercise of human rights, of trial and apprenticeship in democratic values and procedures, an ideal model for education through human rights in school. furthermore, it has long been established that, through a holistic involvement (body, mind and feeling), drama/theatre pedagogy can be a very useful methodology for bringing about a deeper, more critical understanding of a variety of subjects and a more active commitment to the betterment of our world (dice consortium, 2010; giotaki & lenakakis, 2016; hentschel, 2010; kompiadou, lenakakis, & tsokalidou, 2017; pigkou-repousi, 2020). in this way, educational drama can serve education about human rights, enabling participants to make critical, insightful, tangible connections between the vague, symbolic and rigid language used in un documents and the human suffering and real stories of oppressed peoples (zembylas, 2017). finally, the cultivation of values and knowledge within the drama class encourages participants to actively claim human rights, and they can be empowered to apply these values to their own lives (boal, 1979; pigkou-repousi, 2012). freire’s suggestions of codification and decodification in order to read the world (1970) have been transferred to the language of theatre by his student augusto boal and his theatre of the oppressed (1979). in boal’s image theatre, body images constitute the freirean ‘word’, and provide procedures of theatrical decodifications; interpretations; non-verbal communications; and collective creations; in a life rehearsal procedure (boal, 1992). forum and image theatre are common pedagogical vehicles in educational drama, where social conditions can be addressed through an artistic lens which also has a strong societal focus. in this sense, an active, participatory educational drama workshop may be the model that most closely resonates with freire’s ideas of empowerment, emancipation and social action; in other words, education for human rights. the common ground that drama education and hre share has led to various pedagogical experimentations, with different combinations of their elements. empowering students through hre, through theatre, performance arts and educational drama, has been the focus of numerous studies (cahill, 2014; gallagher & rivière, 2007; pigkou-repousi, 2016; upton & grossman, 2019; winston, 2007). they have also been documented based on long term educational projects, state or independent, such as ‘the world as it could be’ in the united states (katz & spero, 2015) and ‘it could be me; it could be you’ in greece (govas, savvopoulou, & dionysopoulou, 2021). as far as prospective and in-service teachers are concerned, pedagogical methods that utilise drama, the theatre of the oppressed and applied theatre have been related to a number of topics: human rights knowledge (marin, 2014; mcgaughey et al., 2019); democratic teaching that respects human rights (choleva, lenakakis, & pigkou-repousi, 2021; desai, 2017; ulubey & aykaç, 2016); human rights exploration and n. choleva, a. lenakakis, m. pigkou-repousi 69 deeper understanding as a prerequisite for action (banki, valiente-riedland, & duffill, 2013; choleva & lenakakis, 2021; szasz, 2017; tuncel & i̇çen, 2016; ulubey & gözütok, 2015). although these studies are only part of the existing discourse, there is room for more research on this common ground. the greek educational context in greece, human rights are currently only part of subjects such as citizenship and democracy, in upper primary school. drama has only been on the curriculum for the last two decades, and is only taught in four primary school grades. in the recent educational law of spring 2020 (government gazette, 2020) subjects such as sociology and theatre were completely taken out of upper high secondary education (lyceum). content-wise, these subjects certainly have a lot to offer but although they had the acceptance and interest of the educational community (teachers, parents and certainly students) official educational policy does not seem to have a corresponding respect (pantazis & papageorgiou, 2013; paroussi & tselfes, 2018). as for tertiary education, there are four theatre/drama university departments that offer bachelor studies as well as postgraduate programmes that focus on theatre/drama and education. there is also an early childhood studies department that offers a postgraduate course in hre. some early childhood education and primary education departments have started to include drama and/or human rights courses in the last decade. teachers and in-service teacher training teachers around the world are expected to grapple with fragmented educational frameworks, and greece is no exception to this. these frameworks frequently overlook the role of emotion and ethics in the processes of teaching and learning. experiential, active learning is seen as a luxury or even a waste of time in a system of exam-centered approaches, assessment restrictions and limited time for real communication and the expression of views, fears and opinions. and, of course, there is little space for debate or productive, creative dialogue. if greece is to have a robust hre curriculum, based on human rights knowledge, (osler, 2016; parker, 2018), it should have an adequate time frame; at present this is non-existent and difficult to implement (parker, 2018; sirota, 2017). moreover, like their colleagues in the rest of the world, greek teachers of all disciplines and educational levels lack a solid grasp of the specifics of human rights education (sirota, 2017). neither do they have knowledge about drama education and facilitation skills. on the one hand, they were never specifically taught these subjects (flowers, 2017). on the other hand, any in-service training often has a limited impact on teachers’ practice (as opposed to subjects or topics taught at university). teachers express hesitation in including paradigm-shifting practices such as experiential learning, the inclusion of body and feelings in education, and human rights education review – volume 4(3) 70 human rights in their teaching (jerome, 2018; rinaldi, 2017). greek teachers lack state-initiated, thorough, systematic in-service training. educators who wish to fill these gaps and pursue professional growth must individually search for ways of acquiring in-depth training. much in-service training is offered by a number of private sector agencies, scientific associations or ngos. it takes place after school hours, usually with a fee that must come out of the participants’ own pockets. given these circumstances, many teachers regard their ongoing training as a shift from a state of just teaching a subject to developing a more intellectual, critical approach of their role (lenakakis & paroussi, 2019). they are personally motivated to create opportunities to communicate with colleagues, challenge their practice, seek new paths, and create communities through which they can develop professionally and personally (aronowitz & giroux, 1986). a degree of personal exposure is expected of participants in a drama training workshop, and they are also required to challenge assumptions about their teaching practice. they are also committed to exploring ways of implementing drama and human rights elements in their teaching, even though there is minimal time or no time at all for this. they are often willing to work simultaneously on different levels (serving the official curriculum while working critically on human rights issues). there is no doubt that these educators can be defined as ‘heroic teachers’ (jerome, 2018). and the very action of including hre elements in teaching (any of its three dimensions), let alone drama methodology, can be considered as actual human rights activism on the part of the teacher. in an attempt to contribute some quantitative data to international research on teachers’ inservice training, this study focuses on drama training in hre and its impact on teachers’ knowledge and readiness for action. the paper tests six research hypotheses (these are assessed by the participants themselves): h1) the drama training helps teachers to acquire an increased knowledge of human rights. h2) the drama training helps teachers to acquire an increased knowledge of drama methodologies. h3) the drama training empowers the participant teachers to practice human rights-related teaching. h4) the drama training empowers the participant teachers to adopt drama methodologies in human rights-related teaching. h5) the resulting level of participants’ empowerment, in terms of human rights related teaching, remains high after the completion of the school year. n. choleva, a. lenakakis, m. pigkou-repousi 71 h6) the resulting level of participants’ empowerment, in terms of adopting drama methodologies in human rights-related teaching, remains high after the completion of the school year. method participants the research was conducted on a group of in-service teachers in greece who were motivated to address human rights in their teaching through using drama pedagogy. the sample was selected through a convenience sampling technique. the sample consisted of 170 teachers, the vast majority of whom were females (88.3%). just under half of the group (41.3%) were between 45-54 years old, with the group of 35-44-year-olds being the second largest one (24.6%). less than 20% belonged to younger or older age groups. over half of the sample (53.9%) had already taught for over 15 years at the time of the research, and 20.6% had taught for 10-15 years. over one third of the sample (36.2%) were primary school teachers, 19% were high school teachers, 15.3% were kindergarten teachers, while 11.7% taught in upper secondary education (lyceum), and 10.4% in a combination of education levels. there were also participants who taught in tertiary or adult education (3.1%) or worked as school advisors (4.3%). research design the one-group pre-test/post-test design was chosen as a starting point for our research. this design model allows for observation and measurement of a target group before and after the implementation of the experiment (fraenkel, wallen, & hyun, 2012). the research team, however, proceeded with an enriched research design, where time would also be a moderator, in an additional third phase of testing (‘post-test plus’). moreover, the research team proceeded with multiple applications of the experiment on eight different occasions, in different cities and with different groups of participants. the above procedures produced an enriched research design (pre-test/post-test/post-test plus) with added built-in controls for possible threats to the internal validity of the collected data. the research framework the research was built around a 20-hour educational drama workshop on human rights, focusing mainly on refugees. the workshop was created in 2015 by the scientific, non-profit association hellenic theatre/drama and education network, under the mandate of the greek office of the united nations high commissioner for refugees. it is the core element of a joint project of the two institutions, entitled ‘it could be me; it could be you’ (govas et al., 2021). the workshop training was offered for free, outside school hours (friday, saturday and sunday). participation in our research was voluntary and anonymous, and teachers were not required to take part in order to undergo training. the research took place in eight different human rights education review – volume 4(3) 72 greek cities (namely: thessaloniki, athens, livadia, zante, agrinio, larissa, serres, crete) between october 2019 and february 2020. out research was co-financed by greece and the european union (european social fund esf) through the operational programme ‘human resources development, education and lifelong learning 2014-2020’ in the context of the project ‘education with theatre/drama teachers, students and human rights’ (mis 5047891). description of the intervention the drama workshop was based on experiential and learner-centred learning pedagogies (blake & pope, 2008; dewey, 1933), critical pedagogy (freire, 1970), structure of knowledge (bruner, 1963), and intercultural education (cummins, 2001). the participants engaged in team-building activities and were gradually initiated in the training’s theme through games, narrations and improvisations. through a series of image theatre techniques (boal, 1992) they were divided into subgroups and given documents such as photographs, folk songs, and statistical charts on global refugee flows. they proceeded with freirian codifications and decodifications through the creation of short stories. a repetitive spiral procedure of creation then followed: plenary sharing, feedback, recreation, resharing, etc. (bruner, 1963). theatrical elements (mainly body work, but also speech, sound, movement, props) were combined with educational drama techniques (role playing, hotseating, alley of consciousness, etc.) and boal’s games (still images, cop in the head, etc.). through working with these activities, participants gradually deepened their understandings (choleva, karaviti, & govas, 2021). the participants also engaged in a series of specialised educational activities on the theme, such as the roleplay game ‘passages’ (unhcr, 1995). the narratives that arose from this game’s fictional characters led to in-depth discussions about respect, support or violation of human rights under different circumstances, and these were related to a close examination of the universal declaration of human rights [udhr] (un, 1948). thorough discussions also took place between the teachers and experts in human rights and refugee rights, as well as staff from asylum centers in greece (lawyers, educators, coordinators). participants were given information about the historical background and global context and took part in a discussion about the un, the udhr, legal commitments in relation to refugees, as well as data about the current situation of refugees in greece. in the final part of the training, teachers made attempts to design schemes of work on human rights that used drama methodologies, for which they received feedback. the workshop ended with group reflection circles and winding-down activities. measurement and data collection our research is based upon three questionnaires that were used to collect data from the in n. choleva, a. lenakakis, m. pigkou-repousi 73 service teachers. the first two questionnaires were distributed and filled in by hand, both before and after the drama workshop training, by (n) 170 participants. a third, online questionnaire was distributed automatically to the participants after the end of the school year and was filled in by (n) 122 of them. the questionnaires contained demographic questions, as well as closed-ended ones where respondents could answer on a five-point likert scale. this paper focuses on three scales, concerning the participants’ motivation to participate (before training), sense of their knowledge of human rights (before and after training); and their sense of readiness for teaching human rights and drama methodologies (before and after training; after the end of the school year). the reliability of the three scales was tested by using cronbach’s a coefficient, and this gave satisfactory results (table 1). table 1 scale cronbach’s α motivation to participate – 8 items .82 knowledge levels (pre-test) – 4 items .70 knowledge levels (post-test) .83 readiness for action (pretest) – 5 items .86 readiness for action (posttest) .87 readiness for action (posttest plus) .82 reliability control data analysis plan the above scales constitute the variables of the research analysis. they are dependent on the experiment (drama training workshop), as well as the factor of time, and are thus measured and tested between three research stages (fraenkel et al., 2012). the data collected were analysed by spss 23 software. the data analysis report given below follows two steps. firstly, a descriptive statistical analysis of the scales is performed for the three research phases. secondly, the six research hypotheses are tested. additional correlation tests are applied in relation to the participants’ sex, age, years of teaching experience and teaching level. due to the non-normal distribution of the collected data, a series of non-parametric tests was selected (namely: wilcoxon, mann-whitney, spearman coefficient). the general null human rights education review – volume 4(3) 74 hypotheses (h0) are that measurements of different phases of the same group or different subgroups do not show statistically significant variance; the alternative hypotheses (h1) are that measurements do show statistically significant variance. the confidence interval for the hypothesis tests was set at 95%. results descriptive statistics in the 5-point likert scales, the possible answers were: 1: not at all, 2: a little/ limited/not enough, 3: so and so/average, 4: much/enough, 5: very much/a lot /very high. the ‘motivation to participate’ scale: a high motivation was mentioned by the majority of the participants for the entire list of items, with ‘to find suitable resources for drama activities about human rights’, ‘to train in drama methodologies and ‘training in human rights/refugees’ being the items for which there was strongest motivation. table 2 the ‘participation motivations’ scale (percentages and means) participation motivations 1 (%) 2 (%) 3 (%) 4 (%) 5 (%) mean to find suitable resources for drama methodologies about human rights 06 2.4 21.7 75.3 4.72 to train in drama methodologies 1.2 2.4 25.7 70.7 4.66 training in human rights/refugees 1.2 4.2 25.9 68.7 4.62 to integrate elements of training in my teaching subject 1.2 4.2 26.3 68.3 4.62 to enhance human rights actions in my school 1.9 2.4 6.6 34.9 54.2 4.37 to communicate with peer colleagues on drama methodologies 0.6 2.4 11.4 38.3 47.3 4.29 to communicate with other colleagues on hr and refugees 3 18 35.3 43.7 4.20 to organise a human rights-related school project 1.8 3.6 21 34.7 38.9 4.05 n. choleva, a. lenakakis, m. pigkou-repousi 75 the ‘sense of knowledge’ scale. before training: when they assessed their knowledge before training, the vast majority of the subjects responded that they had an adequate (‘enough’) (43.4%) or average (38.6%) level of knowledge of human rights, with only 11.4% saying they had a higher level of knowledge. the majority considered they had average (40.4%) or enough (33.2%) knowledge about the udhr, while 13.2% of them considered their knowledge nonexistent or limited. when it came to refugee-related issues, about half of the sample (48.2%) considered they had an average knowledge, 32.5% considered they had enough knowledge, and only 9.6% considered they had a very high level of knowledge. finally, 38.6% responded that they had an average knowledge of how to incorporate drama methodologies in their teaching, with an additional 29.5% saying they had enough knowledge; 3.6% said they had no knowledge whatsoever, while 16.9% reported that they had limited knowledge (see table 3). after training: when it came to their self-assessment of knowledge levels after training, more specifically their knowledge of human rights, the vast majority of participants ranged well above average. over half of the sample felt they had acquired enough knowledge (55.6%) and over a third (34.6%) reported they had a very high knowledge. this meant that under 1% said they only had a limited knowledge. the subjects demonstrated similar tendencies when it came to the udhr, with 49.4% saying their knowledge was ‘enough’ and 36.9% saying they had a ‘very high’ level of knowledge. when it came to refugees’ national and global conditions, more than half of teachers assessed their knowledge as ‘enough’ (53.1%) while another 30.2% rated it as ‘very high’, with less than 1% reporting a limited level of knowledge. finally, when it came to their knowledge of ‘drama methodologies in teaching’, half of the subjects’ (50.9%) responses were at the highest level, while another 37.4% responded ‘enough’. no respondents assessed themselves as having no or limited knowledge (table 3). human rights education review – volume 4(3) 76 table 3 the ‘sense of knowledge’ scale (percentages and means) βefore training (t1) αfter training (t2) knowledge levels 1 (%) 2 (%) 3 (%) 4 (%) 5 (%) mean 1 (%) 2 (%) 3 (%) 4 (%) 5 (%) mean human rights 0.6 6 38.6 43.4 11.4 3.57 0.6 9.3 55.6 34.6 4.23 un declaration of human rights 1.8 11,4 40.4 33.1 13.3 3.45 1.3 12.5 49.4 36.9 4.22 refugees’ conditions (greece, globally) 1.2 8,4 48.2 32.5 9.6 3.41 0.6 0.6 15.4 53.1 30.2 4.12 use of drama methodologies in teaching 3.6 16.9 38.6 29.5 11.4 3.28 11.7 37.4 50.9 4.39 the ‘sense of readiness’ scale: as far as the sense of readiness of teachers to teach (about, through, for) human rights, the same sequence of tests was applied and we received data from three phases of the research: before training, after training, and after the end of the school year. participants responded to five items about their readiness to incorporate human rights-related activities in their teaching and to adopt drama pedagogies. before training: when it came to their pre-training (phase a) readiness to engage in teaching related to hr, about half of the responding teachers (46.4%) mentioned an average sense of preparedness while only 23.5% expressed they felt well-enough prepared and only 6% expressed a very high sense of preparedness. similarly, almost half of the participant teachers said they had an average sense of preparedness in approaching refugee-related issues with their students (43.7%), with an additional 22.2% feeling strong enough to do so, and 9% feeling a very high sense of readiness. however, 40.4% said they felt prepared enough to encourage their students to actively participate in human rights-supporting actions while 28.1% mentioned an average level of readiness and 17.4% a very high sense of readiness. as far as drama was concerned, 72.3% of the teachers mentioned an average to adequate sense of preparedness in finding drama/experiential resources for human rights education, while an additional 15.7% of participants mentioned a very high sense of readiness. in terms of their preparedness in employing drama methodologies in human rights-related teaching, 36.7% of participants stated an average sense of preparedness, while another 26.5% stated an adequate sense. only 15.1% responded they felt a high level of preparedness (see table 4). after training: following the same order of items for phase (b), that is after the training session was completed, just under half of the participant teachers (48.2%) stated a strong enough sense of preparedness to teach human rights, while another 28.7% had a very high sense of n. choleva, a. lenakakis, m. pigkou-repousi 77 preparedness. the ‘not at all ready’ level was completely eliminated and the ‘not enough’ level was as little as 1.8%. just under half of the sample (49.4%) stated a strong enough sense of preparedness in approaching refugee-related issues with their students, and another 31.1% stated a very high level of preparedness. again, the ‘not at all’ level of readiness was completely eliminated. in addition, the majority of teachers (47.9%) declared a very high sense of preparedness in encouraging their students to actively participate in human rightssupporting actions, with another 39.9% having a high enough sense of preparedness. the majority of the sample (60.7%) mentioned a very high sense of preparedness when it came to finding drama/experiential resources for human rights education, with another 35.6% stating a strong enough level of preparedness, completely eliminating levels of ‘not at all’ and not enough’. lastly, when it came to employing drama methodologies in human rights-related teaching, the vast majority appeared to have a very high sense of preparedness (46.3%) or a high enough (42.1%) sense of preparedness (see table 4). after the end of the school year: again, after the school year was completed, the sample answered the same scale. when it came to their sense of readiness to teach human rights, 43.3% stated a high enough level, while another 37.5% mentioned an average level. in approaching refugee-related issues with their students, over a third of the sample felt they were well enough prepared (39.3%) and another 37.7% mentioned an average level of readiness. however, when it came to encouraging their students to actively participate in human rights-supporting actions, the majority (45.1%) mentioned a high enough sense of preparedness, and another 26.2% mentioned a very high level. finding drama resources and activities for teaching human rights did not seem to be a great difficulty for most participants, as 45.9% stated they were well enough prepared to do so, and another 36.1% stated a very high sense of preparedness. additionally, the majority (46.7%) felt prepared enough to employ drama methodologies in human rights-related teaching while another 27.5% mentioned average levels of preparedness. there were no ‘not at all prepared’ responses (see table 4, which shows the most popular values and means in boldface). lastly, it is worth mentioning that the question ‘have you managed to actually apply elements of the training to your work this year?’ was answered positively by a good 74.6% of participant teachers. human rights education review – volume 4(3) 78 table 4 the ‘sense of readiness’ scale (percentages and means) hypotheses tests sense of knowledgebefore and after training: the same sample wilcoxon test was used in order to test the variance of the values between two phases of the same sample. as far as research hypothesis 1 is concerned, the rank test shows that the mean score of the sample regarding knowledge of human rights is (t1) 3.48 before training, and (t2) 4.19 after training. the wilcoxon test (p <.001%) confirms the rejection of the null hypothesis, showing a statistically significant increase in the sample’s knowledge level between before and after training. this result confirms research hypothesis 1. regarding the second research hypothesis, the rank test shows that the mean score of the sample regarding knowledge of drama methodologies in teaching is (t1) 3.28 before training and (t2) 4.39 after training. the wilcoxon test (p <.001%) confirms the rejection of the null hypothesis, showing a statistically significant variance in the sample’s knowledge level between before and after training. this result confirms research hypothesis 2. sense of readiness before and after training, as well as after the end of school year: research hypotheses 3 and 4 study possible shifts in the sense of readiness teachers have when it comes to teaching human rights and in using drama methodologies for this purpose. in order to test these hypotheses, the wilcoxon test was again applied. as far as research hypothesis 3 is concerned, the rank test shows that the mean score of the sample when it comes to a sense of preparedness in teaching human rights is (t1) 3.253 before training and (t2) 4.155 after training. the wilcoxon test (p <.001%) rejects the null hypothesis, showing a statistically n. choleva, a. lenakakis, m. pigkou-repousi 79 significant variance in the sample’s sense of preparedness, favouring the case of ‘after the training’. research hypothesis 3 is thus confirmed, as the sample clearly shows an increased readiness to teach human rights after training. as far as research hypothesis 4 is concerned, the rank test shows that the mean score of the sample regarding a sense of readiness to employ drama methodologies and resources is (t1) 3.406 before training and (t2) 4.454 after training. the wilcoxon test (p <.001%) rejects the null hypothesis, showing a statistically significant variance in the sample’s sense of preparedness, favouring the case of ‘after training’. research hypothesis 4 is thus confirmed, as the sample shows a clear increase of preparedness in employing drama methodologies in teaching human rights after training. research hypotheses 5 & 6 focus on the time factor, and possible shifts in the sample’s sense of readiness in teaching human rights and in employing drama methodologies in doing so after the school year has ended. in order to examine this aspect, the mean scores of the sample were submitted to two comparison tests: i) before training (t1) and after the end of the school year (t3); and ii) after training (t2) and after the end of the school year (t3). when it comes to research hypothesis 5, the rank test shows that the mean score of the sample regarding a sense of preparedness in employing drama methodologies and resources is (t1) 3.253 before training and (t3) 3.786 after the end of the school year. the wilcoxon test (p <.001%) rejects the null hypothesis, showing a statistically significant increase in levels of workshop participants’ sense of preparedness in teaching human rights after the end of the school year. for the second part of the test, the mean score of the sample after training (t2) 4.155 and the mean score (t3) 3.786 after the end of school year were compared. the wilcoxon test result (p <.001%) showed a statistically significant difference between the two, in favour of (t2); in other words, the sense of preparedness the teachers showed after training seems to drop significantly by the end of the school year. the two tests reveal that the high levels of empowerment teachers feel in teaching human rights after training, seem to drop significantly by the end of the school year. they do, however, remain significantly high in comparison with where they were before training took place. research hypothesis 5 is thus confirmed. as far as research hypothesis 6 is concerned, the rank test shows that the mean score of the sample regarding sense of preparedness in employing drama methodologies and resources is (t1) 3.406 before training and (t3) 4.025 after the end of the school year. the wilcoxon test (p <.001%) rejects the null hypothesis, showing a statistically significant increase in the levels of drama workshop participants’ sense of preparedness in adopting drama methodologies in human rights-related teaching after the end of the school year. for the second part of the test, the mean score of the sample after training (t2) 4.454 and the mean score (t3) 4.025 after the human rights education review – volume 4(3) 80 end of school year were compared. the wilcoxon test result (p <.001%) showed a statistically significant difference between the two, in favour of (t2); in other words, the sense of preparedness the teachers showed after training seems to drop significantly by the end of the school year. the two tests reveal that the high levels of empowerment teachers feel in adopting drama methodologies in human rights-related teaching after training seem to drop significantly by the end of the school year. they do, however, remain significantly high in comparison with their state before training took place. research hypothesis 6 is thus confirmed. the variables of knowledge and sense of readiness were additionally tested for possible correlations with the participants’ sex, age, years of teaching experience and teaching level. for the moderator of sex, the non-parametric mann-whitney test was used. knowledge levels before training were a 103.18 mean rank for men and 78.62 for women. the mann-whitney test result (p=2.9%) rejected the null hypothesis, showing that men had significantly higher knowledge levels about human rights than women. all other applications of the test (knowledge levels after training; sense of readiness in the three phases of the research) resulted in p>5%, showing there were no significant variances between male and female participants. the spearman coefficient ρ was explored for the moderators of participants’ age, experience and teaching level. all applications of the coefficient resulted in p>5% values in tests between subgroups, showing no evidence of correlation between the tested variables and these moderators. discussion and conclusion in our main body of research we tried to measure the impact that drama training can have on in-service teachers, in terms of knowledge and readiness to actively engage with hre. the teachers participated in a 20-hour drama workshop that addressed human rights and the situation of refugees. this training was implemented in eight cities in greece with different groups, during the 2019-2020 school year. from these groups, a sample of 170 teachers was taken. the participants were mainly female and the vast majority was over 35 years of age with solid working experience of well over 10 years. all educational levels were represented in the research. participating teachers were very strongly motivated to receive drama training that was related to human rights and refugees. their motivations were related to the wish to communicate with their peers, but their main motivations were related to the methodologies and theme of the training. they signed up voluntarily, and their participation was not related to any professional accreditation. the high level of participants’ motivation should be the filter through which the research results are interpreted. n. choleva, a. lenakakis, m. pigkou-repousi 81 the statistical analysis of our research highlights that prior to training the teachers had average levels of knowledge about both human rights and drama methodologies. this comes as no surprise, as these fields are not well established in greek education (pantazis & papageorgiou, 2013; paroussi & tselfes, 2018), as is the case in many other countries (drama improves lisbon key competences in education [dice] consortium, 2010; flowers, 2017; sirota, 2017; ulubey & gözütok, 2015). our research pinpoints that, according to the participants, levels of knowledge about both human rights and drama methodologies increased significantly after training, thus strongly confirming our 1st and 2nd research hypotheses. these results are consonant with other recent findings (banki et al., 2013; marin, 2014; mcgaughey et al., 2019), as well as with a large-scale meta-analysis study conducted by ulubey (2018). additional tests showed that men showed a statistically significant variance of increased knowledge about human rights compared to women before training took place. however, knowledge levels do not seem to vary between them after training. furthermore, no evidence of variances was found when knowledge levels were related to participants’ ages, years of teaching experience or the teaching level at any stage of the research. similarly, participant teachers report an initial fear about applying experiential, drama methodologies in their teaching, and an even greater reluctance to work with hre elements. this hesitation is noted by numerous researchers (choleva, lenakakis et al., 2021; jerome, 2018; parker, 2018; rinaldi, 2017). the participants do, however, consider it easier to encourage their students to participate in actions that support human rights. the statistical analysis shows that levels of readiness increase significantly after they have received training. the teachers appear much more confident in all indicators after having experimented with new pedagogical approaches and the procedures which educational drama offers for the expression of ideas, negotiation of inputs and collective creation. these findings confirm research hypotheses 3 & 4, and are in accordance with recent smalland large-scale research (banki et al., 2013; choleva & lenakakis, 2019, 2021; desai, 2017; tuncel & i̇çen, 2016; ulubey, 2018). although these levels of confidence drop significantly by the end of the school year, the increase in teachers’ sense of preparedness for action for human rights, as well as for undertaking drama methodologies, remains statistically substantially high, even 8 months after training. the research results confirm research hypotheses 5 & 6. additional tests showed no variances in sense of readiness between men and women, or variance related to participants’ age, level of service or teaching experience. the results of this research are related to a more general study group of educators with a high motivation to deal with human rights in their teaching, no matter their subject, and who wish to embed experiential, arts-based (drama) methodologies in doing so. as the selected research design was exclusively quantitative, no deeper information could be given in the respondents’ answers. and as research findings were based on a convenience sample of human rights education review – volume 4(3) 82 teachers who voluntary participated in both training and the research, the results cannot be generalised to educators who do not have these characteristics. however, the size of the sample, as well as the fact it accords with international research, give the encouraging message that other motivated, restless and heroic teachers who wish to tackle human rights issues in their class could benefit from a drama training workshop. additional, qualitative data on the participants’ views, shifts, experience and actual experimentations would certainly provide fruitful, in-depth information. there should be more thorough follow-up research, particularly that which utilises qualitative designs and measures. results could then be combined and compared, in order to highlight elements and parameters of the findings that are impossible for the current study to grasp. the authors would certainly support such a direction being taken. in conclusion, the experiment and results of our research suggest that drama training of inservice teachers can contribute to their competence in three essential dimensions of human rights education: their level of education about human rights; their exploration of procedures respecting human rights (through human rights) with drama methodologies; and their preparedness to empower their students through hre (for human rights). we would therefore strongly suggest that more extensive research is conducted into this common ground, so that we gain more systematic qualitative and quantitative evidence. references albawaba. 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(2017). emotions, critical pedagogy, and human rights education. in m. bajaj (ed.), human rights education: theory, research, praxis (pp. 41-59). philadelphia: university of pennsylvania press. https://doi.org/10.9783/9780812293890-004 https://www.unhcr.org/publications/books/473dc1772/passages.html https://tinyurl.com/y5tbcggb https://doi.org/10.1386/atr_00005_1 https://doi.org/10.1080/13569780701559596 https://doi.org/10.1080/13569780701559596 https://doi.org/10.1080/13569780701559596 https://doi.org/10.9783/9780812293890-004 volume 4, no 1 (2021) date received: 13-09-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3997 date accepted: 15-12-2020 issn 2535-5406 human rights and global citizenship in social studies standards in the united states anatoli rapoport purdue university college of education, usa. abstract: there is a synergetic complementary relationship between human rights education (hre) and global citizenship education (gce). historically, however, hre began to develop earlier than gce. the purpose of this study is to investigate whether and to what degree a human rights narrative in the social studies standards of individual us states facilitates the introduction of the concept of global citizenship, and whether social studies standards connect human rights and global citizenship, contextually or thematically. the analysis demonstrates that despite an increased visibility of both concepts, state standards still fall short of demonstrating a clear connection between human rights and global citizenship or utilising a human rights discourse and paradigm to advocate for a broader exposure and acceptance of global citizenship. key words: united states, human rights education, global citizenship education, social studies, content standards. anatoli rapoport: rapoport@purdue.edu mailto:rapoport@purdue.edu human rights education review – vol 4(1) 112 human rights and global citizenship in social studies standards in the united states doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3997 issn 2535-5406 anatoli rapoport rapoport@purdue.edu purdue university college of education, usa. abstract: there is a synergetic complementary relationship between human rights education (hre) and global citizenship education (gce). historically, however, hre began to develop earlier than gce. the purpose of this study is to investigate whether and to what degree a human rights narrative in the social studies standards of individual us states facilitates the introduction of the concept of global citizenship, and whether social studies standards connect human rights and global citizenship, contextually or thematically. the analysis demonstrates that despite an increased visibility of both concepts, state standards still fall short of demonstrating a clear connection between human rights and global citizenship or utilising a human rights discourse and paradigm to advocate for a broader exposure and acceptance of global citizenship keywords: united states, human rights education, global citizenship education, social studies, content standards. introduction human rights education (hre) is a lifelong process aimed at promoting universal respect for and observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms. it contributes to the prevention of human rights violation and abuses by providing persons with knowledge and skills to develop behaviours that empower them to contribute to the building and promotion of a universal culture of human rights (united nations, 2011). the growing interest in hre is a positive sign of the gradual expansion of global civil society. traditional views of globalisation as a predominantly economic, political, and cultural phenomenon are shifting and people understand that globalisation impacts their personal lives and wellbeing; it is no longer an abstract concept. personalisation of the global gives an additional impulse to a growing understanding that membership in a community can no longer be limited to a province or a nation but now encompasses a broader and more diverse global community (gaudelli, 2016). thus, the millennia-old idea of global citizenship is now approaching universal acceptance and generating an understanding that equality is possible and human rights are universal, that an individual person, rather than a state, should be the centre of attention, and that education should play a role in the development of global civic society and intercultural dialogue (ramirez, suárez, & meyer, 2007). mailto:rapoport@purdue.edu a. rapoport 113 literature review one of the significant effects of globalisation on education has been a surge of several frameworks or models of inquiry (banks, 2008; fernekes, 2016; suárez-orozco, m. & qin-hilliard, d., 2004). initially, inquiry into social constructs, such as rights or citizenship, focussed on their meaning. we now try to understand them in terms of their impact, or how they intersect with other social constructs. many constructs, regardless of whether they were clearly defined (e.g. rights) or not (e.g. citizenship), have come to be viewed in broad global contexts rather than in narrow national milieu. the increased attention to human rights after world war ii, and to global citizenship during the transition to a global infosphere in the 1980s, advanced new education frameworks, namely hre and gce (bowden, 2003; heater, 1990; kingston, 2014; osler, 2015; pike, 2008). since their emergence, the relation between these two frameworks has been symbiotic. all suggested typologies of gce include hre as its instrumental component, and all analyses of hre outline various forms of education for supranational citizenship, including gce, as its ultimate context or goal (abdi & shultz, 2008; gaudelli, 2009; osler, 2016; oxley & morris, 2013; roman, 2003; tibbitts, 2002). historically and institutionally, however, the concept of human rights came to the fore earlier than that of global citizenship (meyer, bromley, & ramirez, 2010; kingston, 2014). although not legally binding, the universal declaration of human rights (united nations, 1948) identified and codified human rights and freedoms and created a solid foundation for incorporating those rights and freedoms in national legal systems. the vienna declaration, adopted by the world conference on human rights in 1993, further advanced the institutionalisation of human rights by recommending that nations develop specific programmes and strategies for ensuring the widest human rights education and the dissemination of public information about human rights abuses (united nations, 1993). globalisation in all spheres of political, economic, social, and cultural life, technological progress, and ease of crossborder communication and movement have resulted in a growing interest and support for various areas of global education, including human rights education and global citizenship education. this interest has translated into a slow but steady incorporation of elements of hre and gce into school curricula on various levels (cassidy, brunner, & webster 2014; united nations educational, scientific and cultural organization [unesco], 2018). unlike human rights, the codification and institutionalisation of global citizenship has taken a steeper road. acknowledging that the definition of global citizenship is yet to be developed, unesco (2013) declared that transformative gce ‘aims to empower learners to engage and assume active roles both locally and globally to face and resolve global challenges and … to become proactive contributors to a more just, peaceful, tolerant, inclusive, secure and sustainable world’ (p. 4). the september 2013 unesco outcome document of the technical consultation on gce was still calling gce ‘an emerging perspective’ (unesco, 2013, p. 1), although a number of national and local curricula had already included recommendations to incorporate elements of gce. in 2015, global citizenship was declared one of the most important targets of the 2030 sustainable development goals in education (unesco, 2015). gce, as a process of educating informed and responsible members of the global community, is not, however, devoid of internal contradictions. traditional ‘soft’ gce (andreotti, 2006) has been criticised for its west-centred epistemological rationale, emphasis on neoliberal values, and globalisation from above (pashby, human rights education review – vol 4(1) 114 2012; pashby & de oliveira andreotti, 2015), elitism (goren & yemini, 2017), and indifference to ‘new imperialism’ (pashby, 2012). a critical transformative gce (banks, 2008; johnson & morris, 2010; rapoport, 2020), on the other hand, addresses the most urgent issues of social and economic inequality on a global level by promoting critical assessment and re-evaluation of knowledge, discourses, contexts, and experiences with the help of tools provided by critical and post-colonial theories. critical transformative gce problematises global issues through deliberative inquiry and reflexivity and challenges globalisation as a proxy of unequal power relations. it should be noted that hre is a key component of the critical gce that challenges various forms of inequality and injustice. political and ideological contexts play an important role in defining the place of global education in national or local curricula. in southern africa, gce has the potential to become a critical component of the value-based democratic citizenship education that emerged from political and cultural exclusion and is grounded in part in local and regional philosophies and indigenous knowledge (kubow, 2019; quaynor, 2019; waghid, 2018). curricula in east asian countries follow what lo and kingman-chong (2015) have called ‘globally-oriented nationalism/localism’ (p. 157) in trying to preserve a fragile balance between the aspiration to become leaders on the global stage and adherence to deeply rooted national traditions (alviar-martin & baildon, 2016; kennedy & fairbrother, 2004). the introduction of gce and other global education frameworks in school curricula in europe faces the rising tide of populist nationalism, isolationism, and anti-immigrant sentiments that threaten to interrupt and even reverse democratic processes in both established and new democratic states (osler & starkey, 2018). hre, if used alongside with gce or other global education frameworks, has a potential to strengthen a critical stance and serve as a link between the global and the national/local. although global citizenship and human rights are rooted in the respect for human nature and a belief in human beings, historically they developed differently. the concept of a global citizen has existed for centuries, even millennia, but as a framework for comprehensive public education, global citizenship has a much shorter history. human rights, on the other hand, although historically newer, are conceptually clearer, better defined, and more visible, which makes them more acceptable for school curricula. ironically, despite their relative novelty, ideas of human rights, their status, definitions, examples of violence, and the need for protection were institutionalized and codified much earlier than global or world citizenship (carson, 2019; toukan, 2018; united nations, 1948; unesco 2015). the horrors of world war ii and the holocaust urged the world community to adopt the 1948 universal declaration of human rights, which, along with other universally recognised documents, has served as a critical epistemological component of human rights education. all this, however, was not enough to develop lasting human rights curricula in the united states (parker, 2017, 2018). due to multiple obstacles that will be addressed below, hre is still a ‘curricular wannabe’ (parker, 2018, p. 16) that has failed to generate epistemological and pedagogical stability (barton, 2019; parker, 2017, 2018) or administrative interest (tibbitts, 2015). in the virtual absence of human rights curricula in schools, the incorporation of human rights discourse in existing social studies curricula has become the only way for schools to advance the knowledge and practice of human rights. in the united states, hre and gce face similar well-documented obstacles. first and foremost, there is the fear of the perceived biased political nature of hre a. rapoport 115 and gce (gaudelli & fernekes, 2004; kingston 2014). american society, particularly its conservative part, is usually very suspicious of anything that either sounds or means global (myers, 2006; tibbitts, 2015). political and, more rarely, ideological resistance to ‘global’ is nothing new. one of the education officials in indiana who participated in the revision of state social studies standards and whom i interviewed several years ago, told me that he and his colleagues were strongly recommended to avoid the word ‘global’ in the revised standards because it reminded them of the tragic black hawk down incident in october 1993 in mogadishu, somalia. state legislatures that approve state standards, the principal curricular documents, or state boards of education that control textbook adoption, are elected political agencies that have levers to control curricular content. the limits of this paper do not allow a deeper analysis of the impact of local, sometimes parochial, policies on curricula (erekson, 2012; howell, 2005; myers, 2006). the remnants of the antiglobalist and isolationist tradition in american education can also be found in an opposition to including more non-us-centred content in many social studies or language arts curricula (standish, 2012). hre, however, is in a better position here than global studies or gce because the hre framework includes both international and domestic issues. the second obstacle for both hre and gce is curricular insecurity or lack of ‘disciplinary heritage’ (gaudelli, 2009). the result is the absence of a proper, adequate curriculum: like any curriculum (e.g., courses in biology, music, or history), a human rights curriculum needs to be based on a theory of knowledge (an idea of what is meant by knowledge). further, it needs a pedagogical theory about how to organize that knowledge for learning by children and young people of different ages and stages. this will include, among other things, a framework explicating beginning, intermediate, and advanced understandings of human rights. (parker, 2018, 12) this is where all inter-and multidisciplinary areas stumble. most curricula in us schools are designed on a disciplinary basis. although the bases are broad and inclusive, they follow the idea of traditional disciplines: physics, chemistry, and biology in science; history, economics, geography, and civics in social studies. in this environment, interdisciplinary areas such as human rights education or citizenship education are not particularly welcome in any cluster, which, in turn, makes them unattractive for teacher education programmes. despite the obvious similarity in obstacles for hre and gce in us schools, each of these areas also experiences its own particular challenges. the unique challenge for a broader presentation of hre is that the rights discourse has historically focused on civil rights (carson, 2019; parker, 2017). the civil rights discourse in the us is based on a long-run historical narrative placing civil rights in the chronological continuum spanning from the very foundation of the nation through all major steps in american history up to the most recent black lives matter movement (parker, 2017). because of its unique nature and place, the civil rights narrative has been framed as a predominantly national narrative that eventually precluded the attention of global and cosmopolitan human rights (stone, 2002; parker, 2018). coupled with sometimes hidden and sometimes open resistance from conservatives and anti-globalists to avoid as much global narrative as possible in human rights education review – vol 4(1) 116 schools, the civil rights narrative conveniently filled in the spaces reserved for rights discourse in curricula, effectively pushing human rights and related topics to the content periphery. gce faces another more normative challenge: its principal concept of global citizenship is elusive, ephemeral, and not easy to comprehend without real life examples (koyama, 2015; standish, 2012; wood, 2008). despite progress in the development of gce and global education in general, many educators in the united states are still sceptical about global citizenship-related issues or oblivious to the concept and how to incorporate it in their curricula (gallavan, 2008; robbins, francis, & elliott, 2003). the principal reasons for scepticism are the absence of a global government, the perception of citizenship as a predominantly nation-related phenomenon, lack of exposure to global education courses in teacher education, and a false perception of patriotism (osler & starkey, 2010; rapoport, 2010). human rights and global citizenship in state social studies standards the third obstacle is the lack of centralised administrative support for hre and gce and the virtual absence of curricular mandate (beltramo & duncheon, 2013; rapoport, 2015; tibbitts, 2014). classroom teachers, as curriculum gatekeepers, make curricular decisions based on multiple factors that include time, content, personal knowledge, and experience (thornton, 1991). in the era of teacher and school accountability, without proper knowledge about or experience in teaching human rights or global citizenship, and in circumstances in which a lot of content must be covered in a limited amount of time, administrative mandates and support play a critical role (rapoport, 2015; stone, 2002; tibbitts, 2014, 2015). teachers must make hard choices, and if a certain concept is not required by curricular documents such as academic or content standards, us educators do not have a real incentive to include these concepts in their instruction (bottery, 2006; engler & hunt, 2004). thus, the inclusion of human rights and global citizenship and a specific vocabulary related to these concepts in regulatory documents such as standards is particularly important for the advancement of hre and gce. in the us educational system, academic standards serve as rigorous goals for teaching and learning and specify what students should know and be able to do at each grade level. the idea to standardise education in the united states dates back to the early 1980s, when the national commission for excellence in education (ncee) issued a report that stated the nation was losing its competitive edge due to the erosion of its educational foundations (ncee, 1983). one of the remedies suggested was a new content reform that included the introduction of a basic common curriculum, performance standards for students and teachers, and a set of shared values (cogan, 1996/1997). the publication of national curriculum standards by the national council for the social studies (ncss), expectations of excellence: curriculum standards for social studies (ncss, 1994) and their revised version (ncss, 2010), encouraged individual states to follow suit and use them as a framework for curriculum alignment and development. this provided a blueprint for thematic conceptualisation of various areas of social studies. state standards serve as a legal regulatory mechanism to control curricular content, and outline what students in individual states are expected to know and be able to do (beltramo & duncheon, 2013). despite concern that standards can impact teachers’ creativity through the enforcement of prescribed curricula, testing, and the notorious teacher accountability (hyslop-margison & sears, 2006), state standards a. rapoport 117 are universally regarded as content guides that outline and emphasise the most important concepts and facts that construct a knowledge base for a given course. this is particularly important reference to concepts that are relatively new to social studies teachers. as research demonstrates, human rights, globalisation, global citizenship, or world citizenship are among such concepts (gallavan, 2008; osler & starkey, 2010; robbins, francis, & elliott, 2003; schweisfurth, 2006). analysing the results of the 2000 national survey of human rights education in the u.s., banks (2000) wrote that the concept of human rights was mentioned in the social studies standards of 17 states. in his updated results in 2007, he reported that human rights were mentioned in the standards of 36 states, but he also corrected his previous number: 14 states instead of 17 (banks, 2007). commending the progress that had been made in seven years, authors of the survey noted that with human rights language, concepts and topics being included in at least 36 state documents, ‘the potential is there to increase hre programming … a wide range of options are available. we are no longer invisible and need to take full advantage of the momentum’ (banks, 2007, updating section). in human rights education: a necessity for effective social and civic learning, the 2014 position statement of the national council for the social studies, the largest organisation of social studies professionals in the united states, it was reported that ‘at least 35 states include human rights content and/or references to human rights in their social studies standards’ (ncss, 2014). in the same year, the human rights education network (hre usa) reported that ‘only 39 states even mention hr in their social studies standards and among them only 22 contain the udhr’, and recommended that ‘hre should be incorporated within the curriculum standards of key subject areas such as social studies’ (tibbitts, 2014, p. 133). the network’s recommendation was not particularly effective because by 2019, only 36 states included some 100 references to human rights in their standards (carson, 2019). due to the challenges described earlier, the term global citizen, unlike human rights, appeared in state social studies standards much later. in 2009, social studies standards of only two states, maryland and mississippi, mentioned the term global citizen (rapoport, 2009). some standards mentioned such terms and phrases as informed, responsible, and participating citizens at the … international level, responsible citizens and active participants in … global society, global stewardship, members of the world community, citizen in an interdependent world, or citizens and participants in an increasingly connected world economy. most of these terms, although semantically close, failed to convey the idea of global citizenship. it is also noteworthy that even globalisation, which has been one of the most important defining phenomena for the last several decades, was mentioned in the social studies standards of only 15 states in 2009 (rapoport, 2009). a recent study of the impact of the c3 framework (national commission for excellence in education, 2013), a new inquiry-based framework for state standards, found that the concept of global citizenship was directly referred to in the standards of eight of the nine states that applied the c3 framework. the study found, however, that despite a growing number of states mentioning global citizenship in social studies standards, the alignment with the c3 framework and use of the inquiry design model have had a limited impact on the advancement of gce, particularly transformative critical gce (rapoport, 2020). considering that human rights is indisputably a critical component of the global citizenship paradigm and has a longer and more consistent representation in human rights education review – vol 4(1) 118 state social studies standards, it would be logical to assume that human rights discourse could be used as a catalyst to increase and improve the visibility of global citizenship in state standards. do standards developers use a more familiar and better defined concept of human rights as a vehicle to better introduce the concept of global citizenship? do standards connect the two interconnected concepts? the purpose of this study was to investigate whether and to what degree the presence of a human rights narrative in state social studies standards facilitates the introduction of the concept of global citizenship, and whether social studies standards connect human rights and global citizenship contextually or thematically. methodology electronic versions of the social studies content standards (sometimes called frameworks) of 50 us states and the district of columbia were downloaded from respective state department of education (sde) websites. if separate content area/discipline (civics, economics, geography, and history) or grade (kindergarten12) standards were posted on sdes, all these standards were also downloaded. all downloaded standards and frameworks were scanned to find phrases: human rights, global citizen(ship), world citizen(ship), citizen of the world, member of a global community. the segments that contained those phrases were then analysed using the conceptual content analysis technique (ccat), a research technique for making replicable and valid inferences from texts and narratives (krippendorf, 2004). ccat is based on the assumption that if authors intend to deliver a specific message, idea, or concept, they introduce or display linguistic symbols of this concept more often. thus, the frequency of word use in a text is employed as a technique to determine the importance of a specific content (drisco & maschi, 2015). two concepts are the focus of this study: human rights and global citizenship. therefore, phrases like human rights, international human rights, or universal declaration of human rights were grouped into the category/code ‘human rights’, while phrases like global citizenship, global citizen, world citizen, or citizen of the world were grouped into the category/code ‘global citizenship’. all instances of each category were counted. findings human rights although social studies content standards in all 50 states and washington, d.c. mentioned, in one form or another, human rights as listed in the universal declaration of human rights, 13 states do not use the term human rights in their social studies standards. standards of the 38 states and d.c. that include the term mention it to different degrees. for example, unlike the california standards that mention human rights 81 times or the new jersey standards that use the term 88 times, the state standards of florida, georgia, illinois, iowa, missouri, montana, new mexico, tennessee, vermont, and virginia only mention it once. not only do the standards of these 10 states mention human rights only once, some standards do not require direct operationalisation of the term, using it instead in an auxiliary role. for example, virginia standards mention the term once, as a part of the universal declaration of human rights: ‘the student will apply social science skills to understand world war ii and its worldwide impact by …e) examining …the creation of international cooperative organisations and the universal declaration of human rights’ (virginia, 2015, n/p, whii.11 ). in the georgia 2nd grade standards for a. rapoport 119 excellence we find ‘describe the lives and contributions of historical figures in georgia history … . jimmy carter (leadership and human rights)’ (georgia, 2016, p. 13, ss2h1). in the standards of three states, alabama, arizona, and iowa, the term is mentioned in the introduction or glossary but no individual standard refers to human rights: in seventh grade, students will explore global perspectives on contemporary issues and worldwide interdependence. the interconnected world we live in today requires that iowa students be well-educated about worldwide issues to cultivate diplomacy, effective citizenship, and global competitiveness. students could examine challenges facing the world community such as hunger, population, conflict, global environmental challenges, human rights, poverty, energy scarcity, global health, education, immigration, globalization, and other political, economic, social, and ecological concerns. (iowa, n/d, p. 28) state standards differ significantly not only in the number of times the term human rights is mentioned but also in the way social studies teachers are expected to use this concept. some states’ requirements are limited to very basic learning activities that aim to introduce human rights: describe the response of the world community to human rights violations, including the response to apartheid in south africa. (the world after world war ii: 1950-1989). for example: cambodia, rwanda, darfur. (minnesota, 2011, p. 135) the student is expected to: … (d) identify the influence of ideas such as separation of powers, checks and balances, liberty, equality, democracy, popular sovereignty, human rights, constitutionalism, and nationalism on political revolutions. (texas, 2018 n/p) explain how international rules and laws protect individual rights and protect the common good, such as the u.n. declaration of human rights, european union membership, geneva convention. (maryland, p. 2) most states, however, expect students to be engaged in learning activities that develop high-level thinking and critical thinking skills when they study human rights: global human rights: content standard-analyse human rights violations and propose solutions to them: human rights issues: child soldiers, forced migration, gender inequality, genocide, human trafficking, political refugees. (hawaii, 2018, p. 10. ss.wh.8.7.2) assess human rights policies of the united states and other countries. (florida, 2014, p. 48, ss.912.c.4.3) assess the state of human rights around the world as described in the 1948 universal declaration of human rights. (minnesota, 2011, p. 95) human rights education review – vol 4(1) 120 construct an argument to explain how the expansion of slavery violated human rights and contradicted american ideals. (new jersey, 2020, p. 486, 1.8.civicshr.3.c) evaluate the impact of perspectives, civic virtues, democratic principles, constitutional rights, and human rights on addressing issues and problems in society. (oklahoma, n/d, p, 731. a.9-12.2) no standards identify the study of human rights as a separate discipline or curriculum. the most recent new jersey standards of 2020, however, introduced the course that looks closest to a human rights curriculum. the multilevel multidisciplinary curriculum civic, government and human rights explains that: human rights are universal, inalienable, and interdependent claims that derive from the inherent worth of every individual. they are the birthright of every human being regardless of race, sex, nationality, ethnicity, language, religion, or any other status. human rights include the right to life and liberty, freedom from slavery and torture, freedom of opinion and expression, the right to work and education, and many more. these universal rights are not granted by states or governments but are inherent to every person. (new jersey, 2020, 8) according to this curriculum, students are expected to demonstrate understandings that:  individuals may be different, but all have the same basic human rights-by the end of grade 2;  it is the responsibility of individuals and institutions at the state, national, and international levels to promote human rights-by the end of grade 5;  social and political systems have protected and denied human rights (to varying degrees) throughout time-by the end of–by the end of grade 8;  human rights serve as a foundation for democratic beliefs and practices-by the end of grade 12. at the time of the study, 19 states explicitly identified in the texts of their standards or in supplementary materials that they are applying the c3 framework for social studies state standards (2013). the most important innovative aspect of the framework is the emphasis on informed disciplined inquiry as the primary approach in social studies instruction. although limited, the obvious impact of the new framework on recommendations of how to teach about human rights is demonstrated in the south carolina social studies college-and career-ready standards (2019): global interdependence compare the global movements that resulted in the advancement or limitation of human rights during the 20th and 21st centuries. a. rapoport 121 this indicator was developed to encourage inquiry into the changes in human rights and social hierarchies. this indicator also prompts inquiry into the women’s suffrage movement, the civil rights movement, the independence movements in africa, asia, and india, and the end of apartheid in south africa. (p. 58. 6.5.co.) in 2000, researchers attributed the lack of exposure to human rights education in the united states to the fact that the concept of human rights was not culturally related to domestic issues: human rights violations were thought of as something that occurred in other countries, not inside the us (banks, 2000). despite the increased coverage, state standards still refer to human rights issues, particularly human rights violations, as things that happened long ago and mostly outside of the united states. sometimes, however, the specific context is blurred, and human rights are referred to as an abstract construct: a. analyze causes and patterns of human rights violations and genocide and suggest resolutions for current and future conflicts. (missouri, n/d, p. 9, 9 12.wh.5.pc) evaluate standards, conflicts and issues related to universal human rights and their impact on public policy. (new mexico, 2009, p. 8) human rights and global citizenship i found references to the idea of global citizenship in the social studies standards of 15 states. the concept was expressed by the use of such phrases as global citizen, global citizenship, world citizen, citizen of the world, and the member of the world community. distinguish and apply the powers and responsibilities of global citizens, interest groups and the media in a variety of governmental and nongovernmental contexts. (21st century skills). (iowa, n/d, p. 29, ss.7.15) analyze the importance of civic participation as a citizen of the world: …b. analyze the concept of a global citizen and how the awareness and responsibilities have changed during the information age. (maryland, n/d, p. 2) educators want students to care deeply about the quality of life in their community, the nation, and their world. the desire of educators is to have students recognize their responsibility as members of the global community to participate ethically and with humanity in their interactions with various nations, cultures, and peoples. (california, 2016, p. 15) in most cases when the phrase that conveys the idea of global citizenship was used, there was minimal or no explanation of the concept. the only example in which the standards developers made efforts to provide an explanation of the term was in the south carolina social studies college-and career-ready standards (2019) for 3rd grade: human rights education review – vol 4(1) 122 enduring understanding: global citizenship begins with the initial understanding of earth’s major features and how geographic information is used to learn about those features. (p. 24) gr. 3. global citizenship–the global citizenship theme encourages the study of the roles and responsibilities of being an active member in a global society. responsible global citizens understand global issues, understand perspectives of global interconnectedness, and advocate for cultural understanding to create international cooperation. (p. 97) only 10 states mention human rights and global citizenship (or related phrases) in their standards: arizona, california, connecticut, iowa, maryland, mississippi, new jersey, new york, south carolina, and vermont. although there are attempts to connect global citizenship to discourses beyond economics, culture, or diversity (for example, the sociology section of the 2018 mississippi standards asks students to formulate and explain the values associated with global citizenship in regard to political action), all reviewed standards except those in maryland failed to demonstrate or encourage connections between human rights and global citizenship. no explanation, description or clarification of the term human rights includes or refers to global citizenship or related terms. by the same token, the term global citizenship is deprived of its human rights component. the only state whose standards demonstrate a clear connection between human rights and global citizenship is maryland. in the ‘protecting rights and maintaining order’ subsection of the maryland social studies standards and framework for grades 6-8, students are tasked with the following: 1. examine the rights and responsibilities of being a citizen of the world. a. justify the responsibilities associated with certain human rights in a global society such as a commitment to world peace and the elimination of poverty. b. explain how international rules and laws protect individual rights and protect the common good, such as the u.n. declaration of human rights, european union membership, geneva convention. (n/d, p. 2) a formal connection between global citizenship and human rights can be observed in the vermont standards, titled vermont global citizenship-college, career and civic life (c3) framework for social studies state standards (2018); everything in the standards is formally connected to the idea of global citizenship, including a graduation indicator that says that by the end of grade 12, students will be able to ‘analyze the impact and the appropriate roles of personal interests and perspectives on the application of civic virtues, democratic principles, constitutional rights, and human rights’ (p. 5). it is also important to note that however formal this connection is, the fact that the concept of human rights is included in a graduation indicator means that this concept or its components in the form of various rights listed in the universal declaration must be studied to meet the requirements of this indicator. discussion the purpose of this paper is to examine the connections between human rights and global citizenship in state social studies standards. more specifically, the study investigated whether and to what extent state standards used the human rights a. rapoport 123 framework and context to advance the idea of global citizenship in social studies curricula. in 2020, social studies standards of 38 states and d.c. mentioned the term human rights in their standards. this is disappointing, but an improvement on 2019, when human rights were mentioned in the standards of 36 states (carson, 2019). although the number of mentions does not necessarily correspond with the real exposure of social studies curricula to a human rights narrative in class, even this small amount of progress demonstrates the efforts that curriculum developers are making to advance a human rights framework in their states. new jersey standards, which are aligned with the c3 framework, mention human rights 88 times, introducing the concept in all disciplines and using it as a connecting theme throughout the text. similarly, the california history social studies framework mentions human rights 81 times and dedicates several pages to an explanation of the importance of human rights and hre in everyday life. although several states bring up human rights as a part of a curricular topic or a separate curricular topic in middle or high school social studies (‘diversity, human rights, and social justice’ in connecticut, ‘civil rights, human rights, and civil liberties’ in massachusetts, ‘human rights violations’ in new york, ‘civil and human rights’ in ohio), only new jersey mentions human rights in the title of its course: civics, government, and human rights: civic and political institutions (new jersey, 2018). this is the clearest indication of a potential human rights curriculum. almost half of the states do not mention human rights or mention them only once. more substantial analysis is needed. is it this lack of interest in a human rights paradigm that disincentivises the development of a hre epistemology or pedagogy? or is it a lack of knowledge and specific methodology that discourages education stakeholders from advancing robust, sustainable human rights curricula? the analysis demonstrates a trend in using a human rights discourse to engage students in critical thinking and learning activities. this trend is particularly observable in social studies standards of the states that are applying the inquirybased c3 framework. this is a significant development not only for the advancement of a more robust transformative human rights education but also for the advancement of transformative critical global citizenship education. research shows that teachers treat global citizenship as a controversial issue, using the inquiry approach, comparative techniques, discussions, and debates to teach about global citizenship in class (kirkwood-tucker, 2012; kopish, 2017; leduc, 2013; merryfield, 2008; rapoport, 2013). a broader use of inquiry, critical analysis and synthesis, evaluative comparison and other research-based techniques in teaching about human rights can potentially have a positive effect on teaching critical global citizenship. the gradually increasing visibility of human rights and the expanding human rights discourse in standards also signal a shift toward an acceptance of the view that human rights violation is still a problem in the united states. it also signals a recognition of the need for a broader global perspective in teaching citizenship: this was observed and described in the 2019 study (carson, 2019). this promising trend, however, did not produce a significant beneficial effect on the broader inclusion of global citizenship or global citizenship-related concepts in standards. fifteen states include the concept of global citizenship (also termed global citizen, world citizen, or citizen of the world) in their social studies standards. clear progress has been made since 2009, when only two states included this concept (rapoport, 2009). vermont social studies standards developers even included global citizenship in the title of human rights education review – vol 4(1) 124 their standards (vermont, 2018). arizona (2018) and california (2016) standards expect students to recognise and practice their roles and responsibilities as both american and global citizens; this is a significant declaration, one that stands in contrast to one of the oldest prejudices against global citizenship as something unamerican, unpatriotic, or part of the subversive agenda of international organisations (myers, 2006). some standards recommend using global citizenship to engage students in learning activities that focus on the development of critical thinking skills. south carolina standards provide an explanation of who a global citizen is, a significant step in overcoming one of the major obstacles that many educators complained about: an unclear definition of global citizens (koyama, 2015; wood, 2008). the analysis demonstrates, however, that standards still fall short of demonstrating a clear connection between human rights and global citizenship or utilizing a human rights discourse and paradigm to advocate for a broader exposure and acceptance of global citizenship. out of 10 states that use both concepts in their standards, only maryland social studies standards for grade 7 connect human rights and global citizenship, asking students to examine the rights and responsibilities of a citizen of the world by justifying the responsibilities associated with human rights in a global society (maryland, n/d, p. 2). why did other standards fail to demonstrate a connection between human rights and global citizenship? in some cases (arizona, 2018; iowa, 2015) these two terms were placed so close to each other that it seemed that any specialist in global education would seize the opportunity. the reason the opportunity has not yet been seized is probably the failure of standards developers to fully comprehend the nature and extent of global citizenship, and to provide not only an ethical but also a normative framework to apply human rights beyond national citizenship (abdi & shultz, 2008). in other words, human rights is seen as a relatively narrow topic that only applies to specific nations with dictatorial regimes or events (for example, the holocaust) but does not transcend this. by the same token, global citizenship is not operationalised as a real citizenship that gives membership status to individuals, grants individuals an identity, encourages a degree of participation and provides an individual with rights and obligations (abowitz & harnish, 2006), but only as a construct that carries some emotional or ethical value. even when standards expect students to recognise rights and responsibilities of a global citizen (new jersey, 2020; south carolina, 2019), rights are interpreted as something granted by a national government without reference to human rights or documents like the 1948 universal declaration of human rights. conclusion historically, social studies remains an area that includes global education. several states are introducing elective world/global studies courses, but the vast majority of us students learn about global issues in traditional social studies classes. without connecting elements of global education, such as human rights education, peace education, or global citizenship education, social studies, curricula fail to develop students’ global-mindedness or problematise local, regional, or national issues through the optics of the global. by not connecting human rights and global citizenship, standards decontextualise both. it is particularly harmful for gce, a much less developed area than hre in the country’s social studies programmes. schools in the united states were late to introduce a global perspective in their curricula. the decentralised system of education makes it very difficult, a. rapoport 125 sometimes impossible, to coordinate any initiatives, let alone an initiative that looks politically and ideologically suspicious. despite progress in incorporating a global perspective in school curricula over the last 10-15 years, a number of critical elements, such as the two discussed in this article, are still treated as separate entities that are rarely intertwined in the global education paradigm. although we keep using the term ‘framework’ in relation to human rights and global citizenship, it is sometimes difficult to define these frameworks as combinations of specific content and pedagogies, particularly in the latter case. content standards remain principal curricular documents in individual states. school district curriculum developers and teachers use them for everyday instructions. what is not in the standards rarely finds its way to a classroom. underrepresentation of a concept or failure to systematise several related concepts into a workable framework not only makes it harder to advance the framework itself but also minimises the effect of teaching individual concepts. global education in the united states can only benefit if all its elements, including human rights education and global citizenship education, are adequately presented in state standards. human rights education review – vol 4(1) 126 references abdi, a., & shultz. l. 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(2008). the impossibility of global citizenship. brock education, 17, 22-37. https://doi.org/10.26522/brocked.v17i1.99 references to the following social studies standards were used in this article: arizona history and social science standards (2018). retrieved from https://www.azed.gov/standards-practices/k-12standards/standardssocial-studies california history social science framework (2016). retrieved from https://www.cde.ca.gov/ci/hs/cf/documents/hssframeworkwhole.pdf florida next generation sunshine state standards – social studies (2014). retrieved from http://www.fldoe.org/academics/standards/subjectareas/social-studies.stml https://doi.org/10.1177%2f1746197917700909 http://www.ohchr.org/en/udhr/pages/language.aspx?langid=eng https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/vienna.aspx https://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/compilation/page%09s/unitednationsdeclarationonhumanrightseducationandtraining(2011).a%09spx 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studies collegeand career-ready standards (2019). retrieved from https://ed.sc.gov/index.cfm?linkservid=9677e07b-cffe6a5c-aa47f98625149abc texas essential knowledge and skills for social studies (2018). retrieved from http://ritter.tea.state.tx.us/rules/tac/chapter113/index.html vermont global citizenship-college, career and civic life (c3) framework for social studies state standards (2018). retrieved from https://education.vermont.gov/student-learning/content-areas/globalcitizenship/social-studies virginia: history and social science standards of learning for virginia public schools (2015). retrieved from https://www.doe.virginia.gov/testing/sol/standards_docs/history_socialsci ence/ https://www.georgiastandards.org/georgia-standards http://www.hawaiipublicschools.org/teachingandlearning/studentlearning/pages/standards.aspx http://www.hawaiipublicschools.org/teachingandlearning/studentlearning/pages/standards.aspx https://iowacore.gov/sites/default/files/k-12_socialstudies_508.pdf http://marylandpublicschools.org/about/pages/dcaa/social-studies/msss.aspx http://marylandpublicschools.org/about/pages/dcaa/social-studies/msss.aspx https://dese.mo.gov/college-career-readiness/curriculum/social-studies https://education.mn.gov/mde/dse/stds/soc https://www.state.nj.us/education/aps/cccs/ss/ https://webnew.ped.state.nm.us/bureaus/instructional-materials/new-mexico-content-standards/ https://webnew.ped.state.nm.us/bureaus/instructional-materials/new-mexico-content-standards/ http://oksocialstudies.pbworks.com/w/page/135493116/oklahoma%20social%20studies%20framework http://oksocialstudies.pbworks.com/w/page/135493116/oklahoma%20social%20studies%20framework https://ed.sc.gov/index.cfm?linkservid=9677e07b-cffe-6a5c-aa47f98625149abc https://ed.sc.gov/index.cfm?linkservid=9677e07b-cffe-6a5c-aa47f98625149abc http://ritter.tea.state.tx.us/rules/tac/chapter113/index.html https://education.vermont.gov/student-learning/content-areas/global-citizenship/social-studies https://education.vermont.gov/student-learning/content-areas/global-citizenship/social-studies https://www.doe.virginia.gov/testing/sol/standards_docs/history_socialscience/ https://www.doe.virginia.gov/testing/sol/standards_docs/history_socialscience/ volume 3, no 1 (2020) date received: 13-02-2020 peer-reviewed article doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3743 date accepted: 24-04-2020 issn 2535-5406 art, human rights activism and a pedagogy of sensibility: the são paulo human rights short films festival-entretodos eduardo c. b. bittar university of são paulo, brazil. abstract: this article discusses ways in which the são paulo human rights short film festival-entretodos developed between 2013 and 2016. it considers the festival from the perspective of a coordinator and promoter, discussing its achievements within the socio-political context of this global city, and of brazil more broadly, where there has been resistance to advances in human rights culture (hrc). data from the festival gave rise to an analysis of the relationship between art and emancipation, which is presented here from a philosophical perspective. the author illustrates how the experience of hosting a human rights short film festival in são paulo has led to the development of a municipal human rights education (hre) policy and to the conviction that art and citizenship, including learning for citizenship, human right and conviviality, can go hand-in-hand. the article argues for a pedagogy of sensibility, which centres learners’ humanity, as an approach to hre. keywords: art, film festival; pedagogy of sensibility; são paulo, brazil; human rights education; human rights culture eduardo c. b. bittar: edubittar@uol.com.br http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3743 mailto:edubittar@uol.com.br human rights education review – volume 3(1) 70 art, human rights activism and a pedagogy of sensibility: the são paulo human rights short films festival-entretodos1 doi: http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3743 issn 2535-5406 eduardo c. b. bittar edubittar@uol.com.br university of são paulo, brazil. abstract: this article discusses ways in which the são paulo human rights short film festival-entretodos developed between 2013 and 2016. it considers the festival from the perspective of a coordinator and promoter, discussing its achievements within the socio-political context of this global city, and of brazil more broadly, where there has been resistance to advances in human rights culture (hrc). data from the festival gave rise to an analysis of the relationship between art and emancipation, which is presented here from a philosophical perspective. the author illustrates how the experience of hosting a human rights short film festival in são paulo has led to the development of a municipal human rights education (hre) policy and to the conviction that art and citizenship, including learning for citizenship, human right and conviviality, can go hand-in-hand. the article argues for a pedagogy of sensibility, which centres learners’ humanity, as an approach to hre. keywords: art, film festival; pedagogy of sensibility; são paulo, brazil; human rights education; human rights culture introduction from the perspective of douzinas and nead (1999), there is a powerful relationship between law and art; it is the domain of justice, citizenship and art that is the context for this reflection. we examine the role that short films can play in human rights education (hre) processes, from the perspective of a hands-on experience of coordinating four human rights short films festivals entretodos (the 6th to the 9th, from 2013 to 2016). these festivals were organized under the auspices of são paulo’s municipal secretariat of human rights and citizenship (smdhc, são paulo, brazil). this experience was unique, creative and innovative, both in terms of its impact and in what it achieved for the culture of human rights. it is now possible to take this experience to a theoretical-philosophical level, and consider the importance of uniting practice with theory, and experience with reflection. art is an important key in promoting citizenship and a culture of rights. we must always remind ourselves of what art, image and culture can mean to many fields of enquiry, such as communications, semiotics, education and, no less importantly, philosophy and law. we have chosen a comprehensive approach that recognizes this. this paper follows previous books and papers (bittar, 2018, 2017a, 2017b, 2011), in which the strong link between art and hre is established, and in which sensibility and sensory experience are compelling premises for the creation of dialogical venues in which to discuss such issues. mailto:edubittar@uol.com.br e. c. b. bittar 71 methodology and aims this article has two main parts. the first part presents concrete empirical experience from the implementation of public policy in the city of são paulo, where the human rights short films festival – entretodos is held. the focus here is on the data and on discussing how the festival was received by the public. the second part formulates and discusses the philosophical concepts of art and emancipation. the special contribution of french philosopher jacques rancière is considered, and there is a discussion of how the concept of a pedagogy of sensibility can be applied to hre. the article’s two main parts constitute an organic whole. they connect an empirical dimension and a theoretical dimension, and these two dimensions converge in supporting a human rights culture (hrc). thus, the festival is not only presented in terms of concrete data and practical results. it is subjected to an analysis which reinforces the philosophical concepts, and makes it possible to correlate them into categories. this enables us to create a pedagogy of sensibility for hre. the main aim of this article is to demonstrate that the language of short films can contain aesthetic elements that foster a public knowledge of human rights. this knowledge is stimulated by an aesthetic sensibility that opens up to the understandings, comprehension and conviviality that we associate with human rights. we see that art has formative power; it mobilises and is capable of fostering humanization. humanization is no more than the self-knowledge of the human condition, and its issues and dilemmas. the social contexts that create violations of human rights require ongoing vigilance by citizens in order to protect and secure these rights. the language of short films can be a stimulus to creating an environment that develops and strengthens hrc. this article builds upon the belief that such cultural initiatives can help to secure hrc and to disseminate essential values of conviviality in plural and democratic societies. in writing this article, the two roles that i have played have been very important. on the one hand, i am an associate professor of the department of philosophy and general theory of law of the faculty of law, at the university of são paulo. i lecture on the philosophy of law, and research hre. on the other hand, i was human rights coordinator for são paulo’s municipal secretariat of human rights and citizenship (city hall of são paulo, smdhc, são paulo, brazil). i held this position from 2013 until 2016. here i was able to devote myself to transforming philosophical ideas and academic concepts into a public policy of hre. this work was especially aimed at the city’s public school educators. during this period (2013-2016), the data that i collected was part of the task of organizing municipal hre policy. it was important to ensure transparency and make available all the content of the short films at the human rights education portal (city hall of são paulo, 2016b). this created a hre reference source for anyone interested in accessing and reproducing free materials in an educational format. so, with all this material at hand, there was much to gain from examining it, revisiting the short films no longer as a coordinator, but as an academic, in order to study the results, their effects on the population and to better understand the significance of the whole experience. this double involvement has enabled me to reflect upon this concrete experience and its social results. thus, this article considers theory before practice, and then, practice after theory, and finally, theory. in this way, a connection is made between both dimensions. since it is impossible to analyse all of the short films from the four years of the festival (2013-2016), i decided to concentrate on the selected group of award human rights education review – volume 3(1) 72 winning films at the 6th, 7th and 8th festivals and the various thematic films selected for the 10 entretodos dvds (city hall of são paulo, 2015b) that contain the best short films from 2013 to 2015. the work of analysing and articulating my reflections about the whole experience took three years. after my role of coordinator at the são paulo city hall, i worked as a researcher at the council for national research (cnpq, brazil), where i focused on a research project entitled justice, citizenship and art (cnpq, brazil, 2017-2020). the implementation of this municipal public policy provides the context for linking theory to a concrete realisation of human rights, citizenship, democracy and education. the concepts discussed in the first part of this article are the results of the theoretical academic research, while the data provided in the last part are extracted from the empirical execution of municipal public policy, implemented in the period 2013-2016, from data collected from the site of the city hall of são paulo (city hall of são paulo, 2016b). the meeting of these two dimensions is not only a meeting between the theoretical and the practical, between theoretical research and empirical research. it is to be hoped that this article can contribute to stimulate further reflections that go beyond the specific documentation that is presented here. context and the brazilian reality: the question of human rights in brazil the question of human rights continues to be a serious challenge for brazil. since the end of the civil-military dictatorship (1964-1985), brazil has been progressively leaning towards the adoption of human rights, moving towards an alignment of internal legislation with the international demands of human rights. we see this especially in the federal constitution of 1988 (constituição federal, 1988). however, there is still a strong cultural resistance to human rights. in the current debate, for precisely this reason, there is a tense and problematic relation between the legal validity of human rights and the concrete lack of human rights. in spite of democracy having been restored to the country, we have seen tensions over the last three decades. instead of an expansion of a culture of human rights, facilitating human rights in daily life, we find opposing attitudes and mentalities. we see a predominance of social practices of authoritarianism and violence (schwarcz, 2019), as well as disrespect and sub-citizenship (souza, 2006). these tendencies deny social practices that recognise the dignity of the human being. therefore, central values in a culture of human rights, such as freedom, diversity, equality and solidarity, are continually under attack. it is not unusual that social media, traditional media and political actors deny, disregard or show contempt for human rights. thus, we see a dual social trend; on the one hand, human rights are valued but, on the other, they are denied. it is increasingly difficult to make any progress. brazil is 79th position in an onu global ranking of human development (united nations development programme, 2019); it has a human development index of 0,761. it is a country marked by injustice, social-economic inequality and various forms of violence, where a denial of rights prevents the development of citizenship (carvalho, 2016). the society still has traces of coloniality, and this marks the nature of social conviviality that is found in modern brazil. the facts discussed in the previous paragraph suggest a lacuna with respect to the fulfilment of human rights. there is concrete and alarming data found in brazilian government sources that can serve as examples of the situation of human rights in the country: i) the channel of complaints of human rights of the brazilian government has recorded, e. c. b. bittar 73 in the last 15 years, a total of 1,133,000 complaints, with more than 1,700,000 victims, especially children, teenagers, the elderly and the disabled (national human rights ombudsman, 2019); ii) the convergence of data allows us to conclude that lgbt phobia has dramatic and fatal consequences over the whole country, and brazil is thought to have more transsexual and transvestite murders than any other country in the world (national human rights report, 2018); iii) lethal violence dramatically affects the young black male population in the outskirts of brazil’s big urban centres (atlas da violência, 2019). the rate of human rights violations is the highest in latin america, and is well above the global average. in may 2017, this outrageous situation led to brazil receiving 169 recommendations in the 2nd cycle of the universal periodical review 2012-2016 of the onu. in may 2018, this was followed by the country receiving 246 new onu recommendations. these addressed various dimensions and spheres of human rights (poverty; inequality; gender discrimination; ethnicity; religion; disability; sexual orientation; protection of children against violence, sexual exploitation, child labour; right to land; indigenous peoples and quimbolas; excessive use of force; torture; human rights defenders). brazil has to react by the year 2021, by the end of the 3rd cycle of the universal periodical review 2017-2021 (ministry of human rights, 2017). the city of são paulo: challenges for the development of a culture of human rights são paulo is brazil’s most populated city, with 11.8 million people. it is famous for the scale of its commercial and industrial activities, which produce immense wealth. for this reason, são paulo experiences the contradictions of the brazilian reality more intensely than other parts of the country. it is a city that has been a magnet for brazil’s diverse population. on a global scale, são paulo is the 8th most populated city on the planet, and its metropolitan region has 21 million inhabitants, making it the world’s 10th largest urban agglomeration. this means that the challenges for the development of a culture of human rights are huge. a map of the city of são paulo shows a division between the central region (centre) and the outskirts (north, south, east, west). poverty, social inequality, a lack of public services and violence increase the further one is from the central area. parts of the city are very impressive – geospatially, economically and politically. however, other parts stand in stark contrast to this magnificence. what we see in são paulo are the contradictions that we find, on a larger scale, in the country as a whole. the city of são paulo is a privileged stage for the birth and development of the human rights short films festival – entretodos. this festival has been held since 2007. the public policy of the city hall of são paulo, from 2013 until 2016, was to transform the festival so that it could meet cultural, educational and democratic challenges (city hall of são paulo, 2016b). it was in this context, in which the importance of dedicated, innovative and creative work was recognized, that public policies were implemented. these policies, which were aimed at the intersection between education and culture, are analysed later in the article. during the process of implementing these public policies, the importance of cinema in spreading and consolidating human rights values was recognised. cinema has an ability to mobilise verbal and non-verbal signs. it is easily accepted by large audiences and it deals with topical human rights themes. it has a particular effect on audiences and is capable of sensitising a non-specialist public. and it can reach those who are most affected by human rights education review – volume 3(1) 74 the denial of human rights in their daily lives, the individuals who live in the outskirts of large urban centres such as são paulo. it was these people that were targeted in the 6th to the 9th entretodos festivals. municipal public policies concerning human rights culture in the city of são paulo the development of public human rights policy in the city of são paulo, between 2013 and 2016, involved various initiatives, and the festival was one of them. the festival has been held since 2007, and the period that i examine here is related to my personal experience, when i was hre coordinator for the municipal secretariat of human rights and citizenship in the city of são paulo (city hall of são paulo, 2016b). the whole experience showed there was a gap between theory and practice which, however, can be overcome if there is an effort to develop a coherent hre public policy whose methods, techniques and objectives are directed to enhancing human rights, citizenship, democracy and education. theory alone is insufficient, and practice alone cannot give us a basis for formulating good policies. from this perspective, the complementary way of linking these two dimensions was the turning point in realising the public policy aims. because of this, the experience was both exciting and fulfilling. it implied the possibility of materialising hre as systematic and consistent public policy in são paulo, and this included the task of mobilising art as part of the work team’s strategic plan. it is only over time that the processes of absorption, acceptance, legitimacy and audience involvement can be coordinated with the aims of the festival. the work of coordinating human rights for the municipal secretariat of human rights and citizenship (smdhc, são paulo, brazil) revolves around a number of axes. these include educational, public safety and cultural ones. the human rights short films festival relates primarily to the cultural axis and will, in time, involve the other axes by providing a medium for all actions involved in coordinating hre. the entire pilot project of human rights cinema has been, therefore, a process of further transforming the intertwined perspectives of the festival in the city of são paulo. this envisions making a greater impact in the municipal public arena, in which art is engaged in the process of developing citizenship. curiously, the short films festival and the coordination of hre came into existence independently of each another. the festival was firstly held in 2007. it was the brainchild of jorge grinspum and manuela sobral, who were supported by the municipal human rights commission (cmdh). it was organized by the foundation school of sociology and politics of são paulo (fespsp). on the other hand, the municipal human rights commission was established and structured by the municipal human rights and citizenship department. this was a fortuitous, yet happy coincidence. after the establishment of the municipal secretariat of human rights and citizenship (smdhc), a number of policies were reassessed, including the entretodos festival, which had been inherited from a former administration and was in a state of limbo in the smdhc. what is most interesting is that the entretodos festival was not initially aimed at educating the public, and had never had much of a focus on the municipal public schools. the festival has existed since 2007, and the task of converting it into a powerful instrument for the benefit of education in municipal public schools became a central aim from 2013 until 2016. in the beginning, filmmakers were only regarded as artists and there was no expectation that they should interact with educators, e. c. b. bittar 75 while educators were seen only as education professionals, without artistic knowledge. the organisers of the festival were in the artistic camp, and the functioning of educational institutions was not one of their concerns. therefore, after 2013 there was a huge amount of discussion and dialogue, during which the walls between art and education were broken down. this created a heritage where artists, filmmakers and educators entered a state of dialogue and reciprocal collaboration. and this tradition established itself, slowly, over the initial period of work, especially between 2013 and 2015. this heritage was turned into a powerful artistic instrument. it was from this point that the true potential of the festival began to be understood as legitimate public policy and incorporated into the daily life of the city of são paulo, reaching a wider audience every year. depending on the formative and sensitizing power of their images, short films were shown in a number of contexts to a wide range of audiences to foster a cultural and dialogical venue for human rights. this was successfully mirrored in the festival’s profile, as is stated in the 6th festival catalogue: … actions to form and foster the culture of respect for rights, promoting knowledge and the establishment of means of fighting violence and prejudice, discrimination, oppression, inequalities, intolerance, are all at the heart of initiatives. (city hall of são paulo, 2013, p. 13) a new perspective came into play after the festival came under the auspices of the coordination of hre. there was now a focus on hre content in all projects, which were now spread over the city. what was once restricted to the central area of the city now reached five regions (north, south, east, west and centre). a much broader audience was engaged and there was a focus on education in schools, especially those located in the outskirts of the city in low-income areas. the public schools situated in these parts of the city are those that, generally, serve a significant part of the poorer population who live in areas affected by lower rates of development. for this reason, municipal public policy was designed to specifically reach this public, empowering them and sustaining public policies to confront the problem of violence. the films presented at the festival were adopted for collective and collaborative projects and have contributed to public education, public safety and culture discourses. gradually, gaps were bridged: between the centre and the outskirts; between education and culture; between filmmakers and informal producers; between educators and students; and between short films and human rights. when the festival started, it was an event for the centre of the city. it became converted into an event for all of são paulo, from the centre to the outskirts (north, south, east, west and centre). thus, the aesthetic experience associated with the short film, with its specific language and strong messages, was made available in screening venues across the city. from a single isolated human rights cultural project (culture hub), the festival grew to become a systematic part of interdepartmental public policy on human rights, a policy that was important for the whole city of são paulo. with this new selfawareness on the part of the coordination of hre in its relationship with other municipal departments, and through the festival curatorship, the festival began to take on new functions. it intersected with other projects and lines of action, human rights education review – volume 3(1) 76 promoting numerous experiences throughout the city. these could be short films produced by students, award-winning reflections and practices of human rights education involving film, or autonomous and spontaneous local actions inspired by the power of culture. the human rights short films festival in the city of são paulo the main themes chosen each year, from 2013 to 2016, were primarily those most closely related to the real problems and challenges of human rights in são paulo. all of the dimensions of human rights were elaborated on, discussed and transformed into artistic language. these included themes such as the elderly, migrants, the young, children and adolescents, the right to memory and truth, urban violence, lgbt, media and human rights, decent work, the right to the city, social participation, homelessness, alcohol and drugs. material related to these topics was freely available at the portal of human rights education (city hall of são paulo, 2016b). the broad nature of debates relating to human rights and the immense diversity of the population in a large city such as são paulo, meant that many themes were addressed, and clear information and objectives were provided for all cultural events. in choosing and presenting the different themes, the profiles of the public, their local needs, and what they wanted to discuss were taken into consideration. as part of the municipal secretariat of human rights and citizenship (smdhc), as mentioned above, the human rights education coordinator was in charge of the entretodos short films festival. são paulo’s administration came under pressure to address a number of strategic goals, in particular goal 63 (‘implementing human rights education in the municipal education network’) and goal 39 (‘training 6,000 metropolitan civil guard officers in human rights and 2,000 in conflict mediation’). despite the administrative pressures and difficulties inherent in municipal management, the implementation strategy of hre kept its transformative and socializing aspects, those that empower art as an additional strategy to achieve goals and to expand hrc. there were also varying degrees of outside support (municipal secretariat of culture; municipal education secretariat; spcine). in each of the four human rights short film festivals (2013-2016), artistic freedom and autonomy of curatorship were both respected. there was complete independence in the choice of themes, and these varied from year to year, to allow several central contemporary issues to be addressed (2013, transformations; 2014, cultural citizenship; 2015, educating the city; 2016, refugees). the festival included a warm-up schedule, which was followed by the actual activities. the real merit of the festival lies in its free format, which was present from the very beginning. there was considerable freedom when it came to film-making techniques, formats, and the professional/amateur backgrounds of those involved in the projects. all projects were assessed equally, regardless of equipment or the professional competence of casts and crews. the tendering process was open and accessible, and 450 independent projects were invited to apply and participate. the short films were recorded over a set period and pre-selected by the curators (jorge grinspum and manuela sobral) for subsequent discussion and approval by members of the official jury. each festival had a well-qualified official jury composed of artists, educators, curators, activists, cultural managers and journalists, and these played a crucial role in publicizing, preparing and empowering the festival. the official jury assisted in the selection, evaluation and judging of the aesthetic quality of the short films e. c. b. bittar 77 submitted for the competitive exhibition. once the short films were selected, there was a week of competitions in which the films were divided into categories. the 6th festival had 39 short films and six thematic categories: affections; discoveries; my place; the other; streets; for children. the 7th festival had 29 short films and five thematic categories: urban voices; possibilities; straight up; fires; insider view. the 8th festival had 47 short films and five thematic categories: diversities; distances; looks; dualities; extremes. the festival succeeded in reaching out to all areas of the city despite the great distance between them, and preparatory activities were organized by the human rights education coordinator, generally in collaboration with local teams. these preparatory activities included communication and the installation of exhibition venues for public education, local actions to promote the festival, and the technical infrastructure for the end-of-year screenings. thus, each festival was preceded by human rights education workshops, which brought educational and culture actors up to speed. the core guidelines concerning the competitive exhibition were disseminated and, together with the public authorities, meeting places for dialogue, conversation, exhibition and debates were arranged. in this way, exhibitors and educators received guidance about the meaning and practice of the sessions, and about human rights in general. prizes for the designated categories were awarded after all of the films had been screened, through a democratic voting process which also involved the audience, who thus also had a say in the final outcome of the festival. all sessions were designed to be participatory, and the public was encouraged to engage in structured activities. the types of awards given varied from festival to festival, according to choices made, audience, theme and municipal policy guidelines. in the 6th festival the following awards were given: best short film audience award, best short film, social vision, best screenplay, best educational short film, best foreign film. the 7th festival had the following ones: best short film audience award, best short film, best screenplay, cultural citizenship, social vision, human rights education. the 8th festival had these ones: best national short film, best short film audience award, best foreign short film, best direction, urban education, human rights education. a wide range of formative activities concerning ‘audio-visual media and human rights’ involved 2,062 people and an estimated public audience of 32,000. these were held in exhibition venues (cultural and educational) spread across the city, especially in its outskirts (6th festival, december 9th 13th, 2013 – 43 exhibition venues; 7th festival, november 3rd 7th, 2014 – 43 exhibition venues; 8th festival, october 5th 9th, 2015 – 78 exhibition venues; 9th festival 20 exhibition venues). awards were given to a total of 22 film directors and cultural producers. exhibitions were spread across different cultural arenas in a complex and extensive network of venues, reaching audiences of different age groups in schools, cultural and educational centres, open spaces, and street events (6th festival, 201 exhibitions at cultural, educational and street venues; 7th festival, 277 exhibitions at cultural, educational and street venues; 8th festival, 291 exhibition sessions at cultural, educational and street venues). the positive impact of the festival spread throughout são paulo, reaching target 63 of the coordination of hre (100%) as well as target 39 (exceeding stipulations – 167.2%). the human rights themes are intrinsically diverse and an aesthetic patchwork of concrete, contemporary and polemic issues has emerged from the human rights education review – volume 3(1) 78 different festivals. some of these deserve mention: (i) the situation of bolivian immigrants in the centre of são paulo (100% boliviano, mano!, 6th festival, sp-brazil, 2013, 13 min., directed by alice riffe & luciano onça); (ii) reality and social exclusion in the outskirts of são paulo (canto periferia, 6th festival, sp-brasil, 2013, 04:15min, directed by rodrigo souza & rodrigo ciríaco); (iii) male chauvinism (lady burka, 7th festival, sp-brazil, 2014, 8 min., directed by pablo morales de los rios); (iv) the condition of convicts and rights violations inside prisons (colônia penal, 8th festival, sp-brazil, 2015, directed by marco escrivão); (v) the loss of land and the situation of indigenous populations in brazil (terra sem males, 9th festival, italy, 2016, directed by enrico masi). the above short films are those that created the most impact. they were chosen by both official juries and audiences, the opinions of everyone who watched them being democratically taken into account. the outcomes of the human rights short films festival: participation, democracy, citizenship and education the festival outcomes have been very positive. there were many achievements, during the period from 2013 to 2016: i) continuity and consolidation; ii) public loyalty; iii) internationalization; iv) expansion of the audience; v) incorporation of the public in the area of municipal public education; vi) the production of short films for students of municipal public school; vii) the creation of award categories aimed at educators and students; viii) the production of permanently archived pedagogical materials for public schools; ix) training of educators, leaders, students and public servants; x) the creation of dialogical environments, where there are debates and discussions that can spread human rights values. these points are concrete indicators of the internal transformation of the festival. firstly, the festival has changed; it now has cultural and educational perspectives, both of which attract people. secondly, the festival holds a different significance for the city of são paulo; people no longer view it as something that just interests filmmakers and it is now more popular than it has ever been. moreover, it is important to recognise that the festival has fully taken on board the strategy by which public cultural and educational policies converge to foster a humanization of the real issues of citizenship in são paulo, brazil and the world. in addressing universal issues, the short films have broken down local, national and international barriers. all of this played a decisive part in in the process whereby the city of são paulo converted these initiatives into public law (decree no. 57.503, 06.12.2016) at the end of the government period, in 2016 (city hall of são paulo, 2016c). if we go one step further, it is possible to affirm that the city of são paulo created a powerful tool for citizenship and for hrc. each session of short films was followed by debates led by educators and mediators, and it became possible to consolidate a model of approximation between hrc and hre. this has four fundamental pillars: i) participation; ii) democracy; iii) citizenship; iv) education. the gap between hrc and hre was narrowed, through the compelling strategic and pedagogic power of the many short films and the formative processes that they generated. young viewers participated in film-related extracurricular activities in public schools, and there were informed discussions. these included: i) sessions with teachers, students and families in four human rights educational centres (city hall of são paulo, 2016a), where the content of the short films was discussed; ii) training e. c. b. bittar 79 in cultural centres (city hall of são paulo, 2016b), where films that take up themes concerning young people were discussed, e.g. no es mi problema (césar fuenzalida guzmán, chile (2013, 17 min.); iii) teacher training in the municipal school system (city hall of são paulo, 2016b), addressing the contents of the films and discussions with teachers and educational professionals using, for example, short films with themes concerning children and teenagers, such as número zero (cláuia nunes, brasil, 2010, 22 min.); iv) training of officers of the municipal police (city hall of são paulo, 2016b), addressing the content of the short films and discussions with officers about protecting rather than violating human rights; v) the screening of short film festivals in cinemas (city hall of são paulo, 2016b), addressing the content of the short films, in which there were discussions with cultural agents; vi) outdoor screenings in the human rights festival to celebrate the declaration of universal human rights day, on december 10th (city hall of são paulo, 2016b), where the films were discussed with the citizens of são paulo. since this public policy only ran as long as the governmental period, the human rights education coordinator made sure that pedagogical material was produced that could be a permanent heritage. this was donated to libraries and to specialised centres, empowering all interested parties. copies of the original films from the 1st to the 9th festival, including all editions, were kept and catalogued. such material is instrumental in formative processes (audio-visual open, public and free) at the human rights education portal (city hall of são paulo, 2016b), and can be used by diverse audiences (teachers, public servants, police officers, film and cultural agents). aesthetics, citizenship and emancipation when we leave the area of concrete and empirical research, and begin to reflect on and analyse this experience, certain philosophical concepts emerge. the categories utilised by french philosopher jacques rancière can be mobilised in support of this task. in the attempt to develop and spread a culture of human rights in an unfavourable socio-economic reality, the entretodos festival of short films in human rights was mobilised in order to develop citizenship through culture. the aim was to build bridges between culture, art, education and citizenship, and, in doing so, to contribute to extending the formative practices of schools and cultural spaces, returning them to emancipation, justice, citizenship and human rights. this concern is centrally situated within the thinking of jacques rancière. the concepts elaborated by the french philosopher (rancière, 2009b, p. 12), such as the concept of régime esthétique and the comprehension of art as materialisation of thought (rancière, 2009b, pp. 12-13) have a practical power. there is a meeting between philosophical concepts and concrete experience. concrete experience serves to confirm rancière’s philosophical notions. jacques rancière writes that if art contains thought, it is a language, and if art is a form of thought, then aesthetics is the field dedicated to the understanding of the role of art (rancière, 2009b) in the materialization of this thought (rancière, 2009b). art and aesthetics form their own dialogue with their own objectives and, through the medium of the short film, we clearly engage with a syncretic language that encompasses images, words and sound; three linguistic dimensions that join forces to awaken sensibility. short films are crossroads of languages, within an artistic framework. they operate, through unpretentious cinematic approaches and human rights education review – volume 3(1) 80 everyday narratives, to influence audiences through ephemerality of image, uniformity of form and close-to-home thematic approaches. the malleable properties of art allow it to represent an infinite number of purposes. in the words of jacques rancière, the indeterminate character of art exempts it from adhering to any specific rules (rancière, 2009a, p. 34), and allows a freedom that represents and reflects social drives for empowerment. it possesses, therefore, the power to express social aspirations, through conscious actions and effective language. it is where the mundane adopts new forms to mirror feelings, thoughts and pain; art becomes a critical emissary for the mission of culture. however, this may create expectations as to the revolutionary aspect of art, its discussion of social themes or its transformative social role. this goes along with demands that it should take on a political role, and as such, react to the anti-politics of institutionalized politics. art must, however, not just become an instrument for causes, issues or problems. it should simply exist as art, something more than just avant-garde, and it should be freed from the responsibility of promoting empowerment, since, in the history of art, the avant-garde is but one of many possible directions that art can take (rancière, 2009a, p. 36). nonetheless, art continues to be present in the avant-garde and in the anti-avant-garde. the departure from established aesthetics promoted by the avant-garde does not summarize what art can do in terms of empowerment. so, it is not on the forefront of a new artistic form that we will find the power of art, but in the fact that art embodies what jacques rancière calls the ‘aesthetic regime’ (régime esthétique) (rancière, 2009a, p. 37). the aesthetic philosophy of jacques rancière is centred on the idea of an ‘aesthetic regime’. however, the term aesthetic is a controversial one within the theoretical spectrum of rancière: it not only evokes discipline in respect of ‘beautiful’ but also a vocation to make a difference. thus, aesthetics is to think of art as thought. this means that, in the universe of languages, art makes itself present in the concrete exercise of cinema, theatre, dance, folklore, painting, and opening spaces and new grooves in reality. thus, aesthetics has the task of thinking about what the languages of art are capable of doing, to put in place a different universe than that of reality. for this reason, art is seen here as a way of suspending reality. art becomes an open border to freedom, capable of transporting, creating and transforming, and, in this, it opens for new capabilities, abilities and mentalities. in trying to grasp the role of art as a means for sharing our perceptions, we are invited to explore common ground. in fact, art is not considered in terms of its emancipatory capability but for its capability to promote sharing (partage du sensible), and thus art may or may not be associated with socially relevant processes, such as education and training for citizenship. the freedom to explore form and content is where the strength of art lies, essentially in the way in which it is a language. art inspires the search for options, creates new worlds within our world and makes all conversions possible. it can therefore be both political or apolitical. art suggest new forms of being and of doing things, eliciting time, forms and visions that are influenced by symbolic elements within the entire universe. the work of art in itself is central and autonomous, due to the simple fact that it is art. it should not be judged for its social responsibilities or even for its critical capability. this brings us to an important connection between the aesthetics of jacques rancière and herbert marcuse (marcuse, 2007, p. 19). the studies of both e. c. b. bittar 81 philosophers indicate that the exercise of art is more important than its social function, and it is for this reason that art should continue to be cultivated. the ideas of rancière and of marcuse, in this sense, point to the same meaning. thus, if the efforts of the frankfurt school as a theoretical movement of contra-modernity, in the vision of jacques rancière (rancière, 2009b) already pointed to the processes of technification and desublimation (benjamin, 1996) of the works of art in the modernity of the ‘industrial culture’, then the aesthetic philosophy takes on the task of recovering the place of thought of the works of art, through sensitisation and the creation of conditions for the freedom of meaning. here, rancière marks his distance from marxist aesthetics (vieillescazes, 2016). however, at the core of all perception it is the sensorial experience that opens new possibilities, inspiring changes through art (whether political or not) (rancière, 2011a, p. 44) and validating the rebellion of art against political and emancipatory agents, determined to convert it into a simple instrument for their agendas. art can be manipulated for political ends and it can even become an instrument of propaganda for certain interests; it is for this reason that its autonomy should be guaranteed. thus, art is not political in this sense. in the exercise of its creative autonomy, through new expressions and practices, art inspires new ways of acting and behaving (rancière, 2009a, p. 17). if citizenship can be developed through art, it will be through the integration of art as a form of life (rancière, 2011a, p. 49). there is great promise in the understanding that the aesthetic regime is the regime of sensibility. herein resides the revolutionary character of the work of art: the potential to share the partage du sensible. this revolutionary aspect of art is predominantly important when we realize that the public sphere in contemporary societies has become weaker and that a lack of understanding has become the political status quo (rancière, 1996, p. 14). empty words are directed to those most in need of meaningful ones and common symbols are abandoned by the wayside. politics has come into the domain of the police (rancière, 1996, p. 49) and democratic venues have come under the exclusive control of the state, to the detriment of its citizens. the aesthetic experience within the festival: the partage du sensible in a concrete situation given these theoretical-philosophical concepts, what one notices is that when art is mobilised, as in the festival, it is possible to go in the opposite direction to where predominant social meanings usually take us. if we take, for example, the short film terra sem males (9th festival, italy, 2016, directed by enrico masi), we notice that the film, although produced by an italian director, portrays the situation of the fight of indigenous brazilians for respect for their land, traditions and culture. when the film was shown, it was apparent that brazilians living in a megalopolis like são paulo could come closer to the ‘distant reality’ of the problems experienced by their own indigenous communities. this example taken from the set of screenings of the festival enables us to notice that film can make us see, feel and perceive. in this respect it validates the etymological message of the term aesthetics, as understood by rancière. if we return to the etymological meaning of the word (aisthésis, gr.), one notices that it refers to perceptible sensations (santaella, 2007). however, in rancière’s meaning, it implies feeling-with-another; in other words, a way of sharing the experience of the sensible human rights education review – volume 3(1) 82 (partage du sensible) (rancière, 2011b). for rancière, the aesthetic experience contains a constructive dimension of life in common. from the perspective of the festival, which emphasised discussions about human rights (of indigenous people, women, migrants, etc.), this implied in the experience promoted by the city hall of são paulo the valuable task of making the short films language-instruments for the construction of the common values that are essential for the construction of a common-citizenship. this is what art can do – it can help to transform environments. thus, in a city divided between the centre (centre) and its outskirts (north, south, east, west), rancière’s notion of a régime esthétique helps us to register that the festival brought about a common experience. in other words, the language of art united the people of são paulo. they became aware of what linked them, through a dialogical, democratic, open and shared process. the struggle for human rights is a common struggle, something we learn to build and share in the spaces of urban life. as a result, hre in the city of são paulo was developed further and more deeply. there was a merging of the horizons of art and education, of experience and reflection. this made possible the construction of a language of pedagogical possibilities, and established what will be analysed in the next two sections of this article the pedagogy of sensibility. the pedagogy of sensibility as a methodological pillar of human rights education (hre) if we look beyond debates about the instrumental use of art, there is no doubt that art is employed as a learning tool by educators in their everyday practice. the vision that art, culture and education can and should walk hand-in-hand existed long before art was inserted into hre. in brazil (barbosa, 2012; benevides, 2015) and in the rest of the world (congdon, 1993; tibitts, 2002), many voices have fought for the notions of art-education and education for citizenship over the last two decades. here, thus, the task is to unite these two notions, so as to strengthen hre. the use of film images can be a stimulus to hre and the creation of hrc. this is especially the case in the socio-historical reality of latin-america and particularly in brazil, with its privation of rights, social exclusion, human rights violations, poverty and violence. the rate of human rights violations, presented in the second section of this article, clearly shows how serious the situation is in brazil. for example, the short film canto periferia (6th festival, sp-brasil, 2013, 04:15min, directed by rodrigo souza & rodrigo ciríaco) denounces the violence and other problems that plague the outskirts of são paulo. cinematic images are powerful tools in the process of sensitizing, humanizing and creating respect for our fellow citizens. image is instrumental, therefore, in the teaching-learning dichotomy, in that it opens our eyes and stimulates feelings and thoughts. from the semiotic point of view, the language of art is capable of making us feel, and this is an important aspect of formative processes. images act as motivational triggers and stimuli, in raising curiosity about themes, issues, dilemmas, concepts, visions, and everyday personal and social experiences. short films are powerful aids to teaching and learning and hence important in the fostering of hre. there are a number of ways in which they can play a role: i) in bringing together abstract themes through concrete situations from everyday life, where the audience can relate to characters and actors; ii) in deconstructing human rights, by exposing their universality in the contexts of family life, the city, school e. c. b. bittar 83 environments, etc.; ii.) in materializing images (sounds and words) and philosophical thoughts that narrow the gap from public-reader to public-spectator; iv) in making psycho-affective and logopathic presentations of human rights violations, and not only rational or intellectual ones that demand prerequisites not available to audiences; v) in disturbing profound convictions (douzinas and nead, 1999, p. 7) through strong images, and intensifying real-life actions and feelings (cabrera, 2006, p. 28); vi) in providing a broad access, which avoids the technical language of rights or legal language, in order to foster rights and citizenship, regardless of age, social condition or education; vii) in giving the audience a chance to walk in someone else’s shoes and to understand the diversity of typically human issues, problems, situations and dilemmas (bittar, 2011, p. 135); viii) in creating a playful and dialogical mediation of human rights issues, one that can engage a very eclectic and diverse audience, regardless of level of education, age or any other factor. the description above is analytical, and shows all of the potentialities of using short films in teaching-learning. one concrete example taken from the festival – can provide a clear illustration. the short film dia sim, dia não, directed by eveline costa (brazil, 2008, 09 min.), had a deep and powerful effect on the audience. it was filmed very informally, with a simple mobile phone camera on a noisy street. it presents an everyday scene which could have passed unnoticed, but which is turned into an incredibly sensitive work of art. it portrays the life of a poor individual, living in the outskirts of rio de janeiro, who survives by collecting tin cans that are resold for recycling. the film follows his journey from one side of the city to the other as he pushes a wooden cart, risking his life in the nervy traffic. at the end of the day he receives less than one dollar ($1) to survive on, and he makes this money last in order to buy alcohol. in only nine minutes, the film delivers a really dramatic narrative of the situation of a portion of the brazilian population, who live in conditions of what the academic jessé souza refers to as sub-citizenship (souza, 2006). this short film is one of the most powerful that has been shown at the festival when it comes to depicting the challenges of democracy and development. it has both cultural and educational relevance. such a film does not only make human rights issues more familiar; it also has the power to engage the audience. therefore, hre, through the pedagogy of sensibility, has an interesting function. it is able to unite the horizons of art and education, justice and social peace, citizenship and human rights in order to promote respect for human dignity. in contemporary brazil and in many other countries this task has a vital importance, especially when we see the weakening of social bonds, the growth of intolerance, the derision of discourses of human rights, political polarisation, and the substitution of politics by policing. hre can achieve the goals and tasks set out in the national plan of human rights education of brazil: the creation of spaces for dialogue; the formation of identities; the spread of knowledge; ludic connections; an awareness of social themes; and a mobilisation of linguistic and non-linguistic signs in transforming awareness (national human rights education commission, 2003). the pedagogy of sensibility and humanization processes after having examined the previous topics, it is now time to reflect on them, and to present the concept of the pedagogy of sensibility. the pedagogy of sensibility is constructed on the basis of artistic language, and mobilises aesthetic signs in order to enable the central values of hrc. humanization is a result of the pedagogy of human rights education review – volume 3(1) 84 sensibility; this is a form of socialization structured upon the basis of the partage du sensible, as proposed by jacques rancière. the pedagogy of sensibility can be seen, therefore, as the sensory methodology of hre. the real challenge of hre seems to be that of translating the contents and values of human rights contained in the universal human rights declaration (un, 1948) into social action, social practice and everyday interactions between citizens. this task of ‘translation’ can be accomplished through the plural, open, stimulating, fertile and sensory channels provided by the arts. there are various strategies for hre, and merely teaching human rights legislation is not enough. the arts enable citizens to communicate with each other intelligently, directly and broadly. it is here we find thought-provoking ways to promote justice, citizenship, equality, solidarity, tolerance, diversity and peace, and to powerfully denounce violence, corruption, injustice, poverty, oppression and sub-citizenship. such mental emancipation is brought about by conscience rather than scholarship, and by sensitivity rather than reason. the pedagogy of sensibility can be understood as a methodology for hre. this means that one can use the sensibility of artistic language to facilitate the ability to transmit, communicate and conduct dialogues about human rights themes such as social injustice, poverty, inequality, violence, drugs, migrants, and refugees. the language of art is used strategically in hre in order to sensitize learners. the efficacy of this method is based on the notion that it is important to open the sensitive heart, in order that it may talk to the rational mind. messages are clearer and more powerful if they are addressed to people’s feelings. conclusions art freely engages the senses. the language of art has both verbal and non-verbal signs and, for this reason, it is capable of fostering thought. there are complex patterns that link artistic experience with the pedagogy of sensibility and emancipation. art cannot be held ransom by political agendas, though it intrinsically lives and breathes politics and promotes diversity. it is not the role of art to chart the course that emancipation should take; it will, however, provide a venue for emancipation for diverse audiences. this became evident during the 6th, 7th, 8th and 9th human rights short films festivals in the city of são paulo, between 2013 and 2016. the power of the language of short films instigated discussions about hre issues. the hands-on experience of structuring the festival brought about synergistic moments, many of them unexpected. the network of venues, covering different areas of the city, transformed the festival and established it as an organic part of são paulo’s official calendar. the festival changed, as art changed our lives and participants prepared, produced and developed their projects. in this sense, art affected education, transforming it, as much as education affected and transformed art. this whole process has produced a hre that is the result of sensibility, where jacques rancière’s partage du sensible has been realised in the implementation of municipal public policy. for the audiences of the festival, art took a central place, prompting discussion, teaching and debate in public spaces, movie theatres and classrooms. art broke down cultural and educational barriers and distances; there was a shared arena of possibilities, in which everyone could participate. the short films were powerful facilitators in this process. e. c. b. bittar 85 this concrete experience shows that art has an enormous formative and disseminative power, especially when it comes to short films, whose fast messages and simple narrative structures can be used to explore human rights issues. in the wake of the festival human rights education policies have gradually taken root. today, the são paulo festival is in its 13th year (2020). in this context, we may quote from the catalogue of the 8th festival: it is understood that education and culture transform the perspective of people and, therefore, they walk hand-in-hand within the sensitive and aesthetic process of spreading the aims of citizenship contained in the national human rights education plan (pnedh) (city hall of são paulo, 2015a, p. 19). this engagement with sensory forms brings about a greater sensitivity towards issues of human dignity, equality, diversity, justice and citizenship. the mission of hre is continuous, permanent and global; it seeks to humanize, sensitize and emancipate. its gradual progress towards consolidation, implementation and expansion is of the utmost importance for the construction of a society that is fairer, freer, and more solidaric, diverse and non-violent. our experience shows that short films can provide snappy dialogues with strong messages. short films have the powerful capacity to use unpretentious cinematic approaches and everyday narratives to raise sensibility towards human rights issues. the causes of human rights are not identical with the causes of art, but when the two realities walk hand in hand, hre can be improved. to the extent that short films may act as the messenger, and may help in the process of socialization for citizenship, we are reminded of the reflections of jacques rancière (rancière, 1996, 2009a, 2009b, 2011a, 2011b), when he says that politics opens for singular subjectivation of those who are victimized or excluded by inegalitarian social orders when they attempt to assert themselves as the equals of those with privilege and power. we believe that the language of short films has the power to reach and move audiences. individuals involved in the cinematic process actors, artists and cinematographers can express and expose suffering, injustice, violence and pain. the flashing projections and spectrum of images, seen in the darkness of movie theatres, can shed light on the worlds of real people and common, shared problems. the law, with its abstract or technical discourses, often fails to transmit, spread and communicate human rights issues to the public. it may well be that the language of art is a better means of socialization. art, according to jacques rancière (rancière, 1996, 2009a, 2009b, 2011a, 2011b), has the power to create new realities, and these can help to bring about hrc. when we consider the positive results, it can be seen that much more has been achieved than just successfully organising a festival or implementing local government policy. what has been constructed is a model of experience, one that has brought together art, education and culture. the festival has become a powerful tool for improving hre. hre is usually understood as a teaching-learning process that takes place in the classroom. however, when we see the results of the festival, it does not need to be confined within the walls of the school; the movie theatre can also be an education space. cinematic images, sounds and meanings can facilitate discussions that are human rights education review – volume 3(1) 86 usually held in the classroom and audio-visual language can help to bring about new understandings and interactions, especially for younger audiences. thus, the whole experience that has been discussed here shows that hre can benefit if it exploits the power of this artistic language. it may be that this model of experience – there are no prerequisites for implementing it and it can be adopted in any country or context – has an enormous potential. this model can be used in many parts of the world and with many focus groups. the results from são paulo indicate it is a tool that is easy to use in hre. in this sense, it is a more complete pedagogical strategy than the one of just teaching pupils and students about human rights legislation. we also believe that the results demonstrate that the concepts behind the practical activity were able to sustain a practice that is in perfect coherence with a main aim of hre – the transformation of mentalities. the empirical experience not only consolidated the usefulness of the theoretical-philosophical concepts that provided a starting point for the structuring of construction of são paulo’s municipal public policy. we also see the effectiveness of a methodology of hre – the pedagogy of sensibility – and its capability to bring about humanization. in this process, the power of a form (the language of art) cannot be distinguished from the power of content (human rights); there is a continuum between form and content, and this is of benefit to hre. on the basis of the language of art, practices of hre were created that enabled the development of hrc. this empirical experience exemplifies how theoretical concepts may be applied to political action, and it should be made known, shared and reproduced. we see how art and politics can be linked in cultural and educational practices, and we see that there are measurable concrete effects. these processes involve effective pedagogical techniques that are beneficial to hre. e. c. b. bittar 87 notes 1 this paper was translated by norman michael rodi and kavita lamba. it was presented at the 9th international conference on human rights education – ichre, at the western sydney university (28 november 2018, sydney, australia). human rights education review – volume 3(1) 88 references barbosa, a. m. 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(2016). l´impasse esthético-politique de jacques rancière. période. retrieved from http://revueperiode.net/limpasse-esthetico-politique-dejacques-ranciere/ http://www.mdh.gov.br/biblioteca/consultorias/lgbt/violencia-lgbtfobicas-no-brasil-dados-da-violencia http://www.mdh.gov.br/biblioteca/consultorias/lgbt/violencia-lgbtfobicas-no-brasil-dados-da-violencia http://hdr.undp.org/en/countries/profiles/bra https://nacoesunidas.org/revisao-periodica-universal-brasil-recebe-mais-de-240-recomendacoes-de-direitos-humanos-na-onu/ https://nacoesunidas.org/revisao-periodica-universal-brasil-recebe-mais-de-240-recomendacoes-de-direitos-humanos-na-onu/ https://nacoesunidas.org/revisao-periodica-universal-brasil-recebe-mais-de-240-recomendacoes-de-direitos-humanos-na-onu/ http://revueperiode.net/limpasse-esthetico-politique-de-jacques-ranciere/ http://revueperiode.net/limpasse-esthetico-politique-de-jacques-ranciere/ appraising youth participation in ireland issn: 2535-5406 http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4982 date of publication 03-05-2023 © 2023 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org book and media reviews appraising youth participation in ireland horgan, d. and kennan, d. (eds.) (2022). child and youth participation in policy, practice and research. abingdon: routledge. 220pp., £36.99 (paperback) isbn: 978-0-3676-8232-3; £130.00 (hardback) isbn: 978-03673-5870-9; £27.29 (ebook) isbn: 978-0-4293-4594-4. reviewed by amy hanna queen's university belfast, uk, amy.hanna@strath.ac.uk legal and policy commitment to children’s rights if, as nelson mandela proclaims, there can be no keener revelation of a society’s soul than the way in which it treats its children, then there can, perhaps, be no sharper an indication of a government’s commitment to children’s rights than a strong legal and policy framework. this edited collection takes on the challenge of showcasing rights-based participatory approaches across the domains of policy making, practice and research with children and young people, and probes the complexities of transforming such approaches into children’s everyday lives. overview of the collection divided into three parts, the collection begins by setting out the policy framework in ireland that supports youth participation; the national framework for children and young people’s participation in decision-making (2021), which is built upon the national strategy on children and young people’s participation in decision-making 2015-2020. the first part of the book goes on to present this policy implementation in a range of governmental and ngo organisations, including, amongst others: the department of children and youth affairs (chapter 1); foróige (ireland’s largest youth organisation) (chapter 2), tusla (the child and http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4982 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ hrer book and media reviews 2 family agency) (chapter 2); the ark (ireland’s cultural centre for children) (chapter 3); and comhairle na nóg (ireland’s nationwide system of youth councils, attached to local county councils) (see chapters 4 & 5). part ii of the book presents multi-disciplinary practitioner case studies of rights-based participation in practice with organisations. these include barnardo’s (chapter 6), jigsaw – the national centre for youth mental health (chapter 8), tusla (chapter 9), and the national gallery of ireland (chapter 10). the collection concludes in part iii with a focus on methodological research on participation, emphasising the need for researcher reflexivity in the research process (chapters 11 & 12) and recognition of forms of power such as race, gender and sexuality which need further examination (chapter 13). other childhood experiences such as parental separation and divorce feature in chapter 14. the section closes with youth coresearcher accounts of designing a survey for a cross-national research project on health (chapter 15). this edited collection is a welcome and refreshing exposition of how the social worlds of children and the young are characterised by networks and intergenerational dependence. horgan and kennan’s approach takes an ‘and/both’ lens which views children as rights-holders whilst acknowledging the frequently individualist approach to understanding children’s rights. whilst horgan and kennan identify seven themes in enabling and embedding rights-based participatory approaches, i will comment upon three themes that i find particularly striking in this collection: allyship; marginalised youth; and feedback. participation allies chapter 1 emphasises the role of policy in getting ‘buy-in’ for children’s participation, highlighting a shift away from the ‘begging letter’ to government agencies towards the strategic selection of people who want to work in this area, individuals who will set the bar high for participation and carry others along with them. allyship is one of the crucial components in the relational dimension of children’s participation, and it is one that recognises horgan and kennan’s ‘and/both’ lens. chapter 5 focuses on the importance of intergenerational allies, including parents, to bridge the youth and adult worlds. this is especially the case for seldom-heard and marginalised young people, such as those who identify as lgbti+. the collection makes a welcome argument that such allyship must be about ‘issues’ and intersections, instead of about ‘individuals’. the potential for institutional allyship in driving social change is essential, as is the role of adult allies, in ensuring children and young people’s access to youth-friendly information (see also chapters 4 and 8); a clear challenge highlighted in chapter 7. this chapter astutely points out that the way in which much information is shared is sometimes based on whether a child is hrer book and media reviews 3 seen as uninterested or unable to cope with information, highlighting that this is problematic because if young people do not have access to youth-friendly information, they may not indicate interest. in this sense, adults can operate as ‘gatekeepers’, instead of allies for youth participation. seldom heard and silent one of the many things this collection does exceptionally well is to prioritise debates about how particular groups of children face significant barriers to participation, including cultural participation (chapter 3). chapter 6 highlights the critical role of adults in facilitating young people’s participation when existing structures of participation do not take a holistic approach—a state of affairs that can explain the absence of marginalised children’s voices. seldom-heard young people have intersecting identities and therefore the inclusion and nondiscriminatory principles of rights-based practice are essential: this is elucidated by the collection. this more nuanced aspect of participation is further developed in chapter 13, which highlights that there are other axes of intersectional power aside from age—such as race, gender and sexuality—with which to evaluate broader social and structural barriers to participation. it is these barriers that maintain the silences of marginalised children from ethnic minorities and marginalised groups. the feedback loop feedback (lundy, 2018) is identified in this collection as essential in embedding institutional allyships within policy-making processes (chapter 5); youth participation can only be realised when the young understand the outcomes of sharing their views and opinions. notably, this is a crucial component of lundy’s (2007) model that is not traditionally done well, and this receives sustained attention in this edited collection. youth advisory panels have often moved on before feedback can be given at the end of a project and young advisors do not witness the influence of their input; a challenge also highlighted in chapter 4 where young people are ‘aged out’ (p. 68) of research settings, or where there is no long-term structure for this (chapter 10). planning for closure is therefore an essential part of project design (chapter 6). in a research setting, advisory groups often end abruptly when the project concludes, occluding the possibility of using feedback to enable further dissemination and impact activities. high quality feedback (lundy, 2018) helps to secure influence, and this also demands the partnership and allyship highlighted throughout the text. hrer book and media reviews 4 conclusion this edited collection showcases both right-based participatory guidance, whilst acknowledging the complexities and challenges of youth participation across the domains of policy making, practice and research. a strong emphasis on lesser-heard voices is a welcome contribution to the issue of children’s participation, and the volume highlights how change and transformation in youth participation lies not only in adult allyship, but in legal and policy commitment to children’s right to participate. this is an important and welcome addition to the literature because it provokes a nuanced consideration of the intricacies of participation in children’s lives and asks how we move beyond ‘voice’ to meaningfully involve children in decision-making. references department of children, equality, disability, integration and youth affairs (2021). national framework for children and young people’s participation in decision-making. dublin: government publications. department of children and youth affairs (2015). the national strategy on children and young people’s participation in decision-making 2015-2020. dublin: government publications. lundy, l. (2007). ‘voice’ is not enough: conceptualising article 12 of the united nations convention on the rights of the child. british educational research journal, 33(6), 927942. https://doi.org/10.1080/01411920701657033 lundy, l. (2018) in defence of tokenism? implementing children’s right to participate in collective decision-making. childhood, 25(3), 340-354. https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568218777292 https://doi.org/10.1080/01411920701657033 https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568218777292 issn 2535-5406 vol 5, no 1 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4451 date received: 09-05-2021 date accepted: 30-09-2021 peer reviewed article © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles mediatised human rights education: the (challenging) role of the norwegian broadcasting corporation ole henrik borchgrevink hansen østfold university college, norway, ohh@hiof.no audun toft mf norwegian school of theology, religion and society, norway abstract the purpose of this article is to analyse and discuss selma and the quest for the perfect faith, a tv series made by the norwegian broadcasting corporation and promoted for use in schools, and the accompanying teaching material about freedom of religion made by save the children. we discuss the series and material critically from a human rights and a human rights education perspective, and evaluate their suitability for use in religious education. the article is informed by mediatisation theory and argues that freedom of religion is primarily operationalised in accordance with journalistic criteria for presenting religion, and that it does not sufficiently balance the rights of children and the liberty of parents. this is inconsistent with sound human rights education and highlights the need for critical awareness when operationalising educational material produced and distributed by media actors for use in the classroom. keywords human rights, human rights education, mediatisation, freedom of religion, religious education, media actor http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4451 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:ohh@hiof.no o.h.b.hansen & a.toft 29 introduction in january 2021, nrk super (the norwegian broadcasting corporation’s channel for children) hosted what they called ‘theme days’ on the subject of religion. a series of tv programmes and a music video were released that focused on children’s freedom of religion. the norwegian broadcasting corporation (nrk) is the public service broadcaster in norway. on the nrk website, the programmes about religion are explicitly promoted for use in schools and include several learning resources developed in cooperation with the save the children organisation. the focus of this article is on the series called selma and the quest for the perfect faith. this consists of five episodes, each of about 20 minutes, that follow 25-year-old programme leader selma as she visits and engages with children who adhere to different religions and life stances, with the explicit purpose of finding the perfect faith for her. detailed educational resources for lower secondary school accompany the episodes (and specific lesson plans accompany each episode). these resources are presented as a ‘didactic design addressing freedom of religion’ under the headline ‘religion. free to believe what you want’ (save the children, 2021a). the stated objectives of this material are to help pupils ‘increase understanding and respect for other’s religions, life stances or ways of life’, ‘get to know the challenges and positive aspects of faith and doubt’, and ‘to have a deep knowledge of their own right to think and believe what they want’ (save the children, 2021a). in this article, we set out to analyse this didactic design and its suitability for religious education (re) and human rights education (hre). the term didactic design denotes a detailed plan for one or more lessons, normally including assignments and resources aimed at reaching at specific learning goals. we use didactic design as an inclusive term referring to the totality of the episodes (made by nrk) and the teaching material (made by save the children). in the article, we will frequently distinguish between these two, and specify this accordingly. as a state-owned public service broadcasting company (cf. lundby, hjarvard, lövheim & abdel-fadil, 2018), nrk is an important media actor in norway and has considerable influence on educational practice. 77.2 % of norwegian teachers report that they use general content from nrk as part of their teaching, and 75.4 % say they use educational material promoted by nrk (dahle, hodøl, kro & økland, 2020, p. 45). educational material produced and promoted by nrk is therefore likely to be used in norwegian schools. we want to discuss the cooperation between such a major public service media producer and non-profit organisations in making educational material, as well as possible considerations of re teachers when making use of such material. this discussion is informed by institutional mediatisation theory, emphasising a) how media institutions will format and shape their messages according to their own norms and standards and b) how other institutions may come to be influenced by, and in some human rights education review – volume 5(1) 30 instances adopt, the formats of the media (cf. hjarvard 2008; 2014). in the didactic design based on selma and the quest for the perfect faith, we argue that freedom of religion is primarily operationalised in accordance with journalistic criteria for presenting religion. we also contend that this ‘journalistic’ operationalisation of freedom of religion displays a strong focus on an individualised right to choose, which is a governing idea of the series and design. this is problematic from a human rights perspective, both because it fails to take parental rights into consideration, but also because it discredits the role of the family as an important condition and context for children’s own enjoyment of their freedom of religion. we argue that this operationalisation therefore also is inconsistent with a professionally sound human rights education. on a more general level, this highlights the need for teachers to be critically aware when choosing, planning, and operationalising educational material produced and distributed by media actors for use in the classroom. in the following, we shall first present and discuss children’s freedom of religion within a human rights framework. second, based on these perspectives, we critically analyse selma and the quest for the perfect faith, and spell out the individualistic and autonomy-oriented focus of the didactic design. third, we discuss this operationalisation from a mediatisation perspective, drawing upon interviews with representatives from both nrk super and save the children. finally, we discuss the need for critical awareness among re teachers and schools when making use of such educational material. freedom of religion and interrelated rights freedom of religion is an important human right, and an integral part of human rights education. it is therefore not surprising that when children’s freedom of religion is put on the educational agenda and educational material and resources for use in religious education aimed at children from 9-12 years old is produced, it is the convention of the rights of the child (crc) which is in focus. unlike the other human rights conventions, the crc specifically takes the child’s perspective on human rights. concerning freedom of religion, article 14 of the convention clearly states that ‘states parties shall respect the right of the child to freedom of thought, conscience and religion’ (united nations, 1989). the crc also obliges the state, upon ratification and according to article 42, to ‘make the principles and provisions of the convention widely known, by appropriate means, to adults and children alike’. additional political pressure on strengthening the crc in education also comes from the committee on the rights of the child. in the concluding observations to the combined fifth and sixth periodic reports of norway in 2018, the committee points out that, despite improvements since the last report, knowledge about the convention of the rights of the child is still inadequate and not systematically implemented in the training and education of teachers and other relevant professional groups working with and for children. the committee specifically suggests that o.h.b.hansen & a.toft 31 teaching about crc should be a part of curriculum plans at all levels (united nations committee on the rights of the child, 2018, paragraph 10). children’s freedom of religion is a general educational concern and a relevant topic in several subjects, including re. when engaging with children’s freedom of religion, however, one should also be aware that parents have rights in this area. most importantly, parents have the liberty to ensure the moral and religious and moral education of their children. from a human rights perspective, this means that children’s freedom of religion and parents’ liberties are interrelated. this relationship can sometimes be complicated, as there may be cases where parents’ rights and children’s rights are in tension or pull in different directions. traditionally, the liberty of parents concerning the religious and moral education of their children has had a strong position in international human rights law. to raise a child in accordance with your own convictions is, as william galston (2011, p. 287) and eamonn callan (1997, p. 143) point out, generally considered to be a central meaning-giving task in parents’ lives, and thus inherent to a meaningful life. this liberty is considered important for intimacy and for the relationship between parents and children, as well as being an integral part of the socialisation process. these general arguments are also reflected in the preparation and development of the conventions. accordingly, several important conventions protect parental rights, sui generis, in the sense that they are unique and independent rights. most notably, we have the international convention on civil and political rights (iccpr) (united nations, 1966a), article 18.4, which states that ‘the states parties to the present covenant undertake to have respect for the liberty of parents and, when applicable, legal guardians to ensure the religious and moral education of their children in conformity with their own convictions’ (united nations, 1966a). the international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights (icescr) (united nations, 1966b), article 13.3 has an almost identical wording as has article 2 of protocol no. 1 of the european convention on human rights (echr) (council of europe, 1950), concerning the right to education. individually and in conjunction with each other, these articles grant parents a strong mandate when it comes to influencing their children’s religious and moral education. although only accessory to the child’s rights, article 14 in the crc nevertheless represents, as former un special rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief heiner bielefeldt (2015, p. 9) points out, an element of continuity with article 18.4 of the iccpr when it states that ‘states parties shall respect the rights and duties of the parents and, when applicable, legal guardians, to provide direction to the child in the exercise of his or her right in a manner consistent with the evolving capacities of the child’. an important question is how the liberty of parents affects children’s freedom of religion. in one sense, it would seem to restrict it severely, but this assumption is premature. the impression that parental rights automatically trump children’s rights changes when we look human rights education review – volume 5(1) 32 at children’s freedom of religion in conjunction with crc article 12 on the child’s right to be heard, which states that their views should be ‘given due weight in accordance with the age and maturity’. the last part of article 14.2, which emphasises that parental direction should be given ‘in a manner consistent with the evolving capacity of the child’ corroborates this. a glance at general comment nr. 12 (74), which is the children’s committee’s interpretation of article 12, may also be instructive. this general comment connects the right to be heard with the best interest of the child (crc, article 3), by emphasising that the principle of the best interest of the child is not applied correctly if children are not given a chance to express their views. that it is in the best interest of the child to be heard, and their opinion be given due consideration also in matters of religion, is confirmed by the travaux préparatoires (official preparatory work) of the convention. what are we to make of this? from an overall perspective, it seems as if the specific nature of the child’s right to freedom of religion is not something that is objectively given. it is, in fact, relative both to age and maturity and thus under constant development. and it is also related to parents’ rights. for instance, it is not clear when children or adolescents are mature enough for their views to be given due weight in questions about religion. although the committee on the rights of the child does not say anything specific about age, indications might be given through different practices in different countries for when a person is allowed to sign up or sign out of a religious or life stance community (switzerland, 16 years; germany, 14 years; norway 15 years). this does not mean, however, that the views of younger children, as for instance those between nine and twelve (the designated age group for the didactic design examined here), should not be given due weight when it comes to membership in religious organisations or other issues relating to their freedom of religion if they are mature enough. there is, in other words, an inevitably subjective element to this equation, which gives ample room for interpretation. unfortunately, there is no singular interpretation that enjoys universal support. instead, there is disagreement among legal scholars which reflects different positions on this relationship, and these stances seem to go in different directions. one position leans towards prioritising the rights of the child, giving considerable weight to children’s opinions from an early age (brems, 2006; köhler-olsen, 2012); another emphasises the liberty of parents, and is more reticent when it comes to granting younger children influence (ahdar & leigh, 2005). these interpretive positions reflect different priorities, and not infrequently, different cultural and religious values regarding the best way to raise children, as well as the relationship between parents and children. the contentious nature of children’s freedom of religion is also seen in the many reservations to article 14 (cali & montoya, 2017). despite such disagreements, and a tendency towards an increased emphasis in favour of children’s rights, particularly by the committee on the rights of the child (øystese, 2016), all sound human rights-based interpretations nevertheless recognise the interrelatedness of children’s freedom of religion o.h.b.hansen & a.toft 33 and parental liberty to ensure the moral and religious education of their children. this interrelatedness implies that both children’s freedom of religion and parent’s liberty, in order to be taken seriously, must be interpreted in light of each other. this means that a balance or reconciliation where neither rights-holder can automatically trump the other must be the guiding principle (bielefeldt, ghanea & wiener, 2016, p. 216). selma and the quest for the perfect faith in this section, we shall critically analyse selma and the quest for the perfect faith and the supporting teaching material. we argue that this didactic design only balances the aforementioned rights to a small degree. instead, it has a clear emphasis on children’s freedom of religion at the expense of the liberty of parents, who are constructed as the primary obstacle to their offspring’s religious freedom. the plot running through the episodes of selma and the quest for the perfect faith is that selma, a non-believer, sets out to find the faith that perfectly suits her; she is afraid she is missing out by not believing. in the series, children are for the most part presented as unencumbered selves, ideally finding their own paths independently of others. throughout the series, we find that independent choice unaffected by others is presented as a panacea for the good life, thus expressing an ideal of strong, comprehensive autonomy. the following examples from the lyrics of the theme music video most clearly expresses this autonomyoriented agenda, one that is in opposition to both parents and others. selma sings: you can choose your own path. a different path than your grandmother. for a short second, sailing on a wind. faith is free, and the truth is wide. you, who are about to set off on a journey, do not need to believe the same as others. (…) if someone should put pressure on you, don’t let them stress you. for life is your own journey. others are weaving their cloth. (…) you are going your own way. your life, your dance. your faith, your way. do what is right for you. your way, your path. forget the others. your own journey. life is your own game. you can believe what you want. (nrk, 2021a) the final episode of the show, which concludes the narrative, confirms the autonomy-oriented perspective on religion and faith, as selma concludes that she is not able choose one religion, but needs more time. she says that ‘the perfect faith does not exist’ and ‘what is perfect for one is not perfect for another’. that this insight does not allude to or include cultural or community bonds is clear from the follow-up: ‘the most important thing is that it suits you’. the final conversation in the last episode corroborates this by stressing the importance of ‘not listening to others’, and that the ‘nicest thing is to take a little bit of everything and be inspired’. in the didactic design, this operationalisation of freedom of religion is justified by article 14.2 of the crc. as argued previously, it is not surprising that the crc takes centre human rights education review – volume 5(1) 34 stage when introducing freedom of religion to pupils in primary school, as this convention specifically takes the child’s perspective on human rights. in the didactic design, article 14.2 figures both explicitly in the teaching material and in the episodes. it is referred to in the accompanying theme music video, where selma sings: ‘there is a law, a convention, about freedom in a faith-dimension’. in the teaching material, however, we do not find the original version of article 14.2, but a simplified or adapted one. the original text reads: ‘states parties shall respect the rights and duties of the parents and, when applicable, legal guardians, to provide direction to the child in the exercise of his or her right in a manner consistent with the evolving capacities of the child’. on the other hand, the simplified version in the teaching material—which originates from the homepage of the ombudsperson for children in norway (barneombudet) and is authored by the ombudsperson and norwegian unicef—states that ‘all children have the right to think and believe what they want. parents have a right to give them advice’. most frequently, however (three out of five mentions), it is only the first part of the article—concerning the child’s freedom or religion—that the material refers to, and the parental right to give advice is left out (save the children, 2021b). one can appreciate the need for simplifying matters, particularly for children in this age group, but it is striking that neither the tv programmes nor the teaching material mention the official text. the important requirement of ‘respecting the rights of parents’ in the original text gives rise to the aforementioned legal and philosophical dilemmas and discussion about how to understand and interpret the nature of ‘direction’ as well as the coordination and balancing of children’s and parent’s rights. this dilemma is underplayed in the sense that the phrase ‘right to give advice’ creates an image of a ‘neutral adviser’, an image confirmed throughout the teaching material. the complex relationship between the rights of children and the liberty of parents, discussed previously, is not given much attention. this impression is strengthened by the fact that there is no mention of the rights of parents to ensure the religious and moral education of their children in conformity with their own convictions, as supported in the iccpr, article 18.4, icescr, article 13. 3 or article 2 of protocol no. 1 of the echr. rather than confirming the rights of parents, we find that the didactic design constructs parents, family, and religious groups as the main potential obstacles to children’s freedom of religion. this is most clearly displayed in episode 3. in this episode, which bears the title ‘freedom of religion’, the focus is on not believing and on breaking free from the faith of your family. in this episode, selma firstly meets a boy who is not religious. she then talks to a woman who had to break with her family after growing up as a jehovah’s witness and a woman brought up as a muslim, who has since stopped believing. the episode ends with an interview with a representative of the ombudsperson. she briefly mentions the rights of the parents by saying that ‘when the child is under the age of 15, parents can decide to some extent’ when it comes to signing in and out of religious communities. the scene then o.h.b.hansen & a.toft 35 immediately cuts to the representative saying: ‘if you disagree with your parents, you try to find a solution you all can agree on. if you experience something which is not ok, it is important that you speak to an adult you can trust’. the interview (and the episode) ends with the display of an information poster informing the viewer that it is possible to call the ‘alarm phone’—a phone service for children and youths who experience violence, abuse and neglect—and displays its number. this focus is confirmed and reinforced by the teaching material, both in the lesson plans meant for pupils and in the background material provided for teachers. although the teaching material briefly acknowledges the rights and responsibilities of parents to provide guidance (save the children, 2021b, p.9), this is not developed further. instead, attention is drawn towards religious parents as counterparts and obstacles or possible threats to children’s freedom of religion, and that if the parents’ role becomes coercive, the government is required to intervene. the background material refers at length to organisations, help-phones, help-services, and specific web pages children can consult which combat coercion in religious communities, social control, female mutilation, etc (save the children, 2021b, p.11). overall, the teaching material follows the series closely, mirroring and to some degree reinforcing the analysed operationalisation of freedom of religion. the didactic design thus uniformly expresses a clear narrative that represents the individual’s free choice to pick and choose from religious elements as positive. at the same time it portrays families, religious communities and creeds that impose restrictions on individual choice and on peoples’ lives as problematic. on one occasion, though, there is an interesting tension between ‘educational intention’ and the core plot of the show as a ‘quest for the perfect faith’. in the explanation of the teaching material, the advisory comments suggest the following: it is ok to point out that people do not usually choose their beliefs as a type of quest, but that we become part of the religion or life stance we are born into. for many, the right thing to do will be to stay; for others it will feel more right to change our beliefs (save the children, 2021b, p. 3) the fact that save the children finds it pertinent to advise teachers to convey to pupils that belief is not normally the result of a quest is somewhat paradoxical, given the choice of title, song, narrative and individualistic emplotment throughout the show. there is evidence to suggest, as we shall see, that this tension can be ascribed to the journalistic logic and the relations between nrk and save the children. the journalistic take on freedom of religion – and the ambivalent role of the norwegian broadcasting corporation in this section, which is based on mediatisation theory and draws on interviews with human rights education review – volume 5(1) 36 representatives from nrk super and save the children, we argue that the individualistic conceptualisation and operationalisation of freedom of religion and the subsequent downplaying of parental rights and community aspect of faith is a (natural) consequence of institutional standards. these standards pertain to a journalistic formatting of religion, rather than being focussed on educational considerations. to substantiate this argument, a brief account of the role and mandate of nrk is useful. as a tax-funded public service broadcast company, nrk is mandated to offer a broad range of content. part of this mandate is to ‘contribute to education and learning, hereunder offer content suited for schools’ (nrk 2019, §44). this goal is primarily handled through the nrk skole service (nrk school) which organises and promotes various media material from nrks catalogue and archives. for the purposes of this article, it is important to point out that nrk skole mainly functions as a portal, relaying material from nrk as a whole. this means that although media content is promoted as relevant for educational purposes through the webpages of nrk skole and specifically aimed at subject-specific learning outcomes in the norwegian curriculum, such media material is mostly developed and produced by other divisions of nrk. this means that educational considerations are not, to any significant degree, part of the production process. that this also applies to the production of selma is confirmed by nrk super, who are the ‘owners’ and producers of the series, and who initiated the partnership with save the children in developing the didactic design. the journalistic take on freedom of religion is clear: even though we have theme days about religion, we are journalists making them. and we need to make, well, it does sound off to say entertainment, but we need to make people want to watch this. at the same time, we are not pedagogues or experts. we are good at telling stories. that does not mean that we are sloppy, but this is first and foremost what we do (interview with the project leader of nrk super’s theme days about religion). nrk super has been very forthcoming, giving us unique insights into the process of developing and producing the different media products included in the theme days. about two weeks after the material was aired for the first time, project leader frank sivertsen and journalist dang trinh agreed to give us an interview. part of this interview will here be used to illustrate an important point about using media material in education; that the selection and presentation of content are formatted according to standards appropriate for the specific medium and genre involved. in this particular case, content about religion and freedom of religion is to a large degree formatted according to news journalistic standards, and this has a strong influence on the educational material promoted for schools. there has been a significant amount of research on religion in scandinavian news media in the o.h.b.hansen & a.toft 37 last decade (furseth, 2018; lundby, 2018, 2021). although religion is not uniformly represented across media, some patterns of representation are prominent. overall, religion comes across as something contested and controversial (lundby, 2018). due to the nature of journalistic media, conflict and controversies are generally given more coverage, and thus religion is mostly visible when it is seen in relation to various societal problem areas (hjelm, 2011; lundby and gresaker, 2015). a focus on uncovering such problematic areas is seen to be part of the societal mandate of journalists. døving and kraft call news journalists in norway watchdogs of secularity, in the sense that there is a hegemonic understanding of the public sphere as a secular space, and that religious ‘trespassing’ must be addressed (2013, p. 10-11). although different religions are given different coverage, religion is commonly represented according to what we can call a master narrative of individualism (toft, 2019, p. 93-94). nrk super’s theme days have had the explicit aim of addressing difficult issues and religion is seen as one of them (nrk, 2021b). other issues addressed earlier have been mental health, violence towards children, and alcohol and drug abuse. the theme days are thus understood as part of the broader societal mandate of nrk to, among other things, put a focus on problematic areas. when developing theme days, they work from a given project mandate. regarding the theme days about religion, this mandate already included a strong focus on the problematic aspects of growing up in religious environments. the theme days are one of our most important tools to address the things it is difficult and important to talk to kids about (…) at the same time we want to highlight problem areas related to growing up in religious environments (…). children need to learn that they have freedom of religion and do not need to believe the same as their parents. ref. the convention on the rights of the child articles 14 and 30. (project mandate, internal document) project leader sivertsen confirmed that this has been an important focus throughout the project. in addition to ‘creating respect for religion’, he told us that the driving force behind the project was to show that ‘you can choose for yourself, you don’t need to believe even if your parents do’. selma and the quest for the perfect faith presents children of different faiths and the viewer encounters a rich variety of religions. selma, the hostess of the series, is warm and genuinely interested in learning about beliefs and practices. the show is professionally produced by people who know their target group well. however, that this primarily is a journalistic product becomes clear during the interview. the journalist in charge of the series told us that balance had been important for them. ‘if we are to include very positive things about religion’, he said, ‘then we need to show the dark side as well’. this focus guided the process of making the series, and this is particularly visible in the episode named ‘freedom of religion’, where an human rights education review – volume 5(1) 38 adult woman tells us about her bad experiences growing up in the jehovah’s witnesses faith community. when asked why this particular group had been chosen, sivertsen told us that it could have been any religious group, but ‘there’s something about examples of children being denied celebrating the national day or birthdays. this hits the target group. this is something children can recognise’. sivertsen summed up the strong journalistic approach very precisely when he talked about how they chose whom to include in the show. if you watch the selma show, you see those that are very fond of religion. however, we would like to see tenor twelve-year-olds in the middle of it, whether it is christianity, islam or whatever, saying ‘i am forced to go to church and i don’t want to’ and telling us about that. however, we did not find that, although i am sure children in norway experience this. not necessarily only churches, but different faith communities. this was what we really wanted. that would have been a scoop for us. instead, they needed to use adults in order to show the difficult aspects of growing up in religious communities. in order to get across the point that children have the right to choose differently, the message would need to be simplified. in the interview, we talked about the fact that the rights of parents were under-communicated in the series. this choice also followed from journalistic considerations centred on nrk super’s role as a channel for children. as sivertsen said, nrk super’s main goal is to give children a voice and to ‘make their rights visible’. in order to do this, the message needs to be simplified so that the ‘receiver doesn’t miss it’. this is a conscious choice because the message is so important that it is better to sharpen it and risk over-simplifying it than to make it ‘all fuzzy so we’re left with nothing’. save the children – making the teaching material the journalistic take on freedom of religion, with its strong focus on individual choice and the danger of religious parents’ strong influence, is a governing idea of the finished product. as this product is made to be shown as part of the channel’s own theme days, this is only natural. however, we would argue that this focus also ‘spills over’ to the teaching material promoted for use in re classes. save the children was in charge of developing the educational part of the didactic design. this organisation specialises in making educational material aimed at schools and has both pedagogical experience and educational competence. however, emilie forbes holmen, who works as senior consultant for schools in save the children and was in charge of the project, tells us that save the children has no special competence regarding religion. this was clear from the outset of the project, and the premise for the partnership was that save the children would not be involved in deciding the content of the shows. their role was limited to the teaching material based on the media products produced by nrk super. there are two areas in which the journalistic approach to the right to freedom of religion has a strong influence on the finished teaching material: a) the choice of save the children in the o.h.b.hansen & a.toft 39 first place, and b) the way the produced series set the premises for what could be included in the didactic design. concerning the choice of save the children as partner in the project, sivertsen told us that he talked with several organisations. however, the only organisations considered were those that specialise in helping vulnerable children. save the children was primarily chosen because of its competence in this area. forbes holmen confirmed this: it was first and foremost nrk super who thought it was important to address this in the series. to show those that grow up in a faith where their rights are suppressed, so they can’t live to their full potential so to speak. and this is also something we in save the children find very important. (…) this is a very important issue for us. everything to do with, well themes like forced marriage, genital mutilation, and negative social control of course. so, it was important for us to help put a focus on the importance for children growing up in strict religious environments, that they have a right to get help to get away from it. thus, the journalistic focus on the potential problematic aspects of growing up in religious environments was prominent from the outset. this focus also influenced the final didactic design in another way. as save the children had little influence on the production of the series, the teaching material developed had to be based on the episodes they received from nrk super. forbes holmen told us that the resource group of religious education teachers and researchers wanted to nuance the way freedom of religion was presented. however, she says, ‘we needed to relate to the actual content of the series’. although they did consider this, ‘it would be strange to make educational material which deviated from the content of the series’. the premises were thus set and there was little room for other approaches to freedom of religion in the teaching material. thus, although save the children actively worked to present a nuanced view on freedom of religion, supported and supplemented by input from a group of re professionals and human rights experts, the journalistic approach prevails in the final didactic design. media-shaped freedom of religion, a mediatisation perspective it is clear from the above analysis that although the final didactic design presented to schools through nrk skole is partly created by pedagogically trained professionals, there are other considerations that shape its focus and content. the significant result is that freedom of religion is formatted according to journalistic standards. to explain this formatting, institutional mediatisation theory may be a useful analytical tool. according to this approach, various media have come to permeate most areas of modern society as most institutions rely on networked communication technology. mediatisation occurs when the established standards and practices of media institutions come to overlap and partly shape the practices of these other institutions (hjarvard, 2018). studies have shown that such tendencies impact human rights education review – volume 5(1) 40 on re (toft & broberg, 2018; toft, 2021) as media technology, platforms, material and discourses form an important part of the educational activities of the subject (cf. lied & toft, 2018). we do not argue that this is an example of actual mediatisation of religious education and human rights education, as we do not have the empirical data to analyse how the didactic design is used in the classroom. however, the strong position of nrk and nrk skole makes it prudent to highlight their ambivalent role as producers and distributors of educational material for use in schools. this ambivalence stems from the overlap of different divisions and editorial levels involved. in this case, we have seen that there were (at least) three different actors involved: a) nrk super, which produced the series according to journalistic standards; b) save the children, which developed the teaching material according to pedagogical standards and their own stated aims of helping vulnerable children; and c) nrk skole, which distributed and presented the complete didactic design as specifically relevant for re in norwegian schools. in evaluating selma and the quest for the perfect faith it is important to acknowledge the overlap of editorial and institutional considerations which results in this specific formatting of freedom of religion, and the risk of importing this into the classroom. nrk skole has earlier faced criticism for the content of various media products they have promoted as relevant to religious education. an episode of the comic tv series ‘på tro og are’ has faced severe criticism from the norwegian buddhist society for portraying buddhism in a negative and erroneous manner. this series is heavily promoted on nrk skole and has been extensively used in norwegian classrooms (toft, 2021). in this case, the spokesperson from nrk skole stated clearly that it is not the role of nrk skole to critically evaluate the content they promote, except for ensuring that it is relevant for specific curricular learning outcomes and if it is age appropriate. the pedagogical responsibility lies with the teachers who choose to use the material. in this article, we have shown that it is not only specific media products such as series and videos that should be critically examined. we also find that when complete didactic designs are offered and promoted as directly suited for use in schools, it is the journalistic formatting of religion and freedom of religion that prevails, even when the design is developed in cooperation with other, more pedagogically oriented, actors. thus, it is important for teachers to have a critical awareness of these dynamics if such designs are to be used as part of religious education. balancing rights in human rights education and religious education in this final section we discuss the role of the re teacher, and the importance of a critical awareness when teaching about religion and freedom of religion. in the first section, we o.h.b.hansen & a.toft 41 argued that from the perspective of human rights jurisprudence, children’s and parents’ rights are interrelated, and consequently needed to be interpreted in light of each other. this interrelatedness has implications for hre, as well as for re and the role of re teachers. according to the united nations declaration on human rights education and training (undret), article 2.1, the main objective of hre is to ‘promote respect for and observance of all human rights and fundamental freedoms’ and to ‘contribute to the building and promotion of a universal culture of human rights’ (united nations, 2011). this objective is also central to the council of europe’s charter on education for democratic citizenship and human rights education (2013). it seems reasonable to assert that a professionally sound hre means strengthening respect for all human rights and, consequently, that both children’s and parents’ perspectives must be taken seriously. since human rights are a part of the legal framework for (public) education, these requirements also apply to re teachers and should therefore serve as a guiding principle for their professional practice. this means that when re teachers are planning teaching activities about both religion and freedom of religion in schools, they need to recognise and take both children’s and parent’s rights and interests into consideration. this does not mean taking children’s freedom of religion off the educational agenda in order to respect the liberty of parents. clearly, children’s and parents’ interests are not always identical and making children aware of their rights in this area is an important part of empowering them to become self-governing autonomous persons, and thus a central part of human rights education (howe & covell, 2020). there are, however, a number of ways of operationalising children’s freedom of religion, and some of these have pitfalls. choosing to promote children’s freedom of religion in a spirit of strong autonomy, as we have shown to be the case in selma and the quest for the perfect faith, is problematic for several reasons. the first of these reasons is that it undermines respect for parents’ rights to give direction to their children, and to educate them according to their own convictions. secondly, and perhaps more importantly, it discredits the family and community as the natural context for children’s religious socialisation, which in turn may also prove to have negative consequences for the children’s prospects of enjoying their own freedom of religion. in fact, the preamble to the crc clearly emphasises the family as the natural context and necessary condition for children’s freedom of religion. in the fifth paragraph, the family is defined as ‘the fundamental group of society and the natural environment for the growth and well-being of all its members and particularly children’ (united nations, 1989). so, even if freedom of religion is an individual right, the crc recognises that the collective environment in which children live and the family and the group to which they belong are important in shaping identity and safety (øystese, 2016, p. 276; sundin, 2016, p. 70). the community-aspect of freedom of religion is presupposed also in the other articles in crc where religion is treated, such as articles 20 and human rights education review – volume 5(1) 42 30. this means that if re teachers are to take both perspectives seriously, they should not forget the importance of parents and the community when it comes to children’s rights. as bielefeldt, ghanea & wiener (2016, p. 221) point out, as a word of caution, human rights is not only an individualistic project and ‘children’s human rights can never be conceptualised in a spirit of “narrow individualism”’. children’s rights therefore clearly presuppose community ties and, above all, family ties without which the rights of the child cannot be realised. children’s individual right to freedom of religion and parent’s rights to provide direction do not indicate parents’ ownership of their children, but rather a partnership in which the child’s evolving capacity is a guiding principle. finally, failing to balance the rights of both children and parents in re is not only problematic from the vantage point of human rights, but also (arguably) at odds with core objectives of religious education itself. a religious education which aims to promote understanding, toleration, and respect for religious and life-stance diversity—as signposts (council of europe, 2014) also emphasises—may easily find itself undermining these objectives if the role of the family as an (important) arena for religious socialisation is discredited or marginalised. this may in turn also jeopardise the all-important parental trust (hansen, 2018). as re teachers, we need to put children’s freedom of religion on the agenda. however, at the same time we must avoid a default position whereby the family and religious communities and creeds are seen as problematic, imposing restrictions on individual choice and peoples’ lives. re needs to embrace the complexity of identity formation and the family and community as an integral part of that formation process. therefore, re teachers should be wary of a didactic design which puts children’s religious freedom in opposition to the wishes of their parents. conclusion there is a myriad of different actors promoting their material for use in schools. increased availability through new digital solutions contributes to what is now a wide range of educational resources developed by actors that format content related to religion and human rights according to their own standards, aims and norms. their own formatting, however, although often legitimate in itself, might not actually conform to the didactical standards of sound re and hre. this, as we have argued, is also the case for a media institution like nrk. generally considered to be objective and trustworthy, educational material from nrk skole is widely used. however, although nrk produces and promotes material for use in schools, it is first and foremost a journalistic institution and this has a profound impact on its educational material. as several studies show, the public face of religion in norway is increasingly formatted according to the standards of the media, as they increasingly take over as a primary source of information and as the main arena for engaging with questions of religion (furseth, 2018; lundby, 2018, 2021). by taking an ambivalent role as both a media producer and a tax o.h.b.hansen & a.toft 43 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(2021). først engasjement, så innhold. bruk av serien på tro og are i religionsundervisning i videregående skole [commitment first, then content. use of the tv-series «på tro og are» in re in upper secondary school]. prismet 72(1), 23-37. toft, a. & broberg, m. (2018). perspectives: mediatized religious education. in k. lundby (ed.), contesting religion: the media dynamics of cultural conflicts in scandinavia (pp. 225-241). berlin: de gruyter. united nations committee on the rights of the child. (2018). united nations committee on the rights of the child: concluding observations, norway, co/nor/5-6. 6. june, 2018. retrieved from https://www.regjeringen.no/contentassets/87e11af6044b4c45923d2830d2d6b144/co ncluding-obervations-crc_c_nor_co_5-6_31367_e.pdf united nations. (1959). declaration of the rights of the child. a/res/1386 (xiv). retrieved from https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b38e3.html [accessed 2. may 2021] united nations. 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(2016). barns rett til religionsfrihet [children’s freedom of religion]. prismet forskning, 67/4, 273-287. https://doi.org/10.5617/pri.4479 https://www.regjeringen.no/contentassets/87e11af6044b4c45923d2830d2d6b144/concluding-obervations-crc_c_nor_co_5-6_31367_e.pdf https://www.regjeringen.no/contentassets/87e11af6044b4c45923d2830d2d6b144/concluding-obervations-crc_c_nor_co_5-6_31367_e.pdf https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b38e3.html https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b3aa0.html https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b36c0.html https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/undoc/gen/n11/467/04/pdf/n1146704.pdf?openelement https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/undoc/gen/n11/467/04/pdf/n1146704.pdf?openelement https://doi.org/10.5617/pri.4479 mediatised human rights education: the (challenging) role of the norwegian broadcasting corporation abstract keywords introduction freedom of religion and interrelated rights selma and the quest for the perfect faith the journalistic take on freedom of religion – and the ambivalent role of the norwegian broadcasting corporation save the children – making the teaching material media-shaped freedom of religion, a mediatisation perspective balancing rights in human rights education and religious education conclusion references issn 2535-5406 vol 5, no 1(2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4487 date received: 09-06-2021 date accepted: 12-11-2021 peer reviewed article © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles measuring competences for democratic culture: teaching human rights through religious education marios koukounaras liagkis national and kapodistrian university of athens, greece, makoulia@theol.uoa.gr michalis skordoulis democritus university of thrace, greece vasiliki geronikou national and kapodistrian university of athens, greece abstract this paper aims to present research on measuring competences for democratic culture. it describes the development of a multiple-item scale that measures competences in teaching democratic citizenship and human rights through religious education. a principal component analysis based on the 135 items of the council of europe’s reference framework of competences for democratic culture was carried out in two phases, in order to construct and refine the scale. the result was a 52-item scale divided into six components. this was tested for its reliability, factor structure and validity; firstly on a sample of 123, and secondly on a sample of 403 secondary re teachers (2018-19). the research scrutinises the concept of democratic competences as being the ability to mobilise and deploy relevant values, attitudes, skills, knowledge and/or understanding. it concludes that these competences are more complex structures than has been assumed. keywords democratic culture scale, education for democratic citizenship, scale development, religious education teachers, human rights education http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4487 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:makoulia@theol.uoa.gr m. koukounaras liagkis, m. skordoulis & v. geronikou 113 introduction in a world that is increasingly socially, economically and environmentally interdependent and where covid-19 has significantly weakened the political, financial and social capacities of nation-states and nation-unions, it is incumbent on democratic education and religious education (re) to develop the consciousness of a diverse and, at the same time, shared world (heater, 2004, pp. 240-246). this paper focuses on an education that moves forward from just teaching citizenship to one where, within the curriculum, democracy is taught and learned (biesta & lawy, 2006; dewey, [1916] 2002). in this way, schools and humanities subjects can develop young people's capabilities and facilitate critical thinking, world citizenship, and imaginative understanding (nussbaum, 2006). and re, as a humanities subject, can contribute to the development of liberal, open-minded and respectful mindsets by studying world religions and worldviews from different points of view (jackson, 2014; heilbronn, 2021, pp.2730). the paper focuses on re teachers, the measurement of their ‘competences for democratic culture’ (cdc), and how these impact on teaching and learning democracy within the curriculum. the faith and beliefs of re teachers, as well as their secular and non-religious positions, seem to play a role in how ‘otherness’ is experienced in the classroom; it is important that these teachers examine themselves and their own stereotypes and prejudices (everington, 2013; lundie & conroy, 2015; franken & loobuyck, 2016; kittelmann flensner, 2018; vince, 2020; mpisi, groenewald, & barnett, 2020; nixon, smith, & fraser-pearce, 2021). religion and diversity in schools and classrooms, as well as dialogue between different standpoints and the dialogical approach to re, are at the core of european research (skeie, 2009; erricker, 2010, pp. 94-121; norman & gallagher, 2011; barnes, 2012; weisse, amirpur, körs, & vieregge, 2014; klutz, 2016; shanneik, 2016; arweck, 2017; schreiner, 2018; ipgrave, knauth, körs, vieregge, & von der lippe, 2018; franken, 2017; 2021). there is a radically growing diversity in the populations of most european countries and a need, firstly, to become acquainted with and learn respect for ‘otherness’ and, secondly, to take part in a dialogue where the plurality of cultures, experiences, actions and faiths is positively addressed (ipgrave, 2001; 2004; o'grady & jackson, 2020). the ‘religion in education. a contribution to dialogue or a factor of conflict in transforming societies of european countries’ (redco) study stresses that ‘…most [young people] were convinced that respecting the religion of others is a way to cope with differences’ (valk, 2009, p. 425), and that re classrooms can provide the ‘safe space’ to discuss such topics (leganger-krogstad, 2003), even though in some cases understanding may be difficult (conroy, wenell, & lundie, 2013, pp. 119-124; weisse, 2011). moreover, the relation of re to citizenship is highlighted in numerous pieces of research (conroy, wenell, & lundie, 2013, pp. 117-140; østberg, 2013; kjelden, 2016). stern, in an analysis of research on re and human rights, values and citizenship, concludes that ‘re needs all the researchers it human rights education review – volume 5(1) 114 can get in the classroom’ (stern, 2006, p. 94). council of europe’s reference framework of competences for democratic culture and teaching professionalism in the european context, it is recognised that education plays the essential role in building the world in which future generations will live. this acknowledgement is the key foundation of the council of europe’s ‘reference framework of competences for democratic culture’ (rfcdc) (council of europe, 2018a;b;c) and the starting point for current research within the re community. the council of europe has focused on human rights, democracy, and the rule of law in maintaining and fostering the political systems of the member countries as well as promoting citizenship education. in recommendation cm/rec (2007)6 a vision of education is defined by four main aims: preparation for the labour market preparation for life as active citizens in democratic societies personal development the development and maintenance of a broad, advanced knowledge base. (council of europe, 2007) these aims literally visualise the development of a rapidly changing world where citizens live independent and active lives. on this basis, approaches and materials such as education for democratic citizenship (edc) and human rights education (hre) have been developed. in 2010, the ‘charter on edc/hre’ depicted the central concepts and areas where edc/hre should be implemented. the aim of democratic citizenship is defined as follows: to empower them to exercise and defend their democratic rights and responsibilities in society, to value diversity and to play an active part in democratic life, with a view to the promotion and protection of democracy and the rule of law. (council of europe, 2010) furthermore, the aim of human rights education is defined as: to empower learners to contribute to the building and defence of a universal culture of human rights in society, with a view to the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms. (council of europe, 2010) it is clear that these aims address the competences, knowledge, skills, values, and attitudes that citizens need to develop and acquire in order to actively participate in democratic processes. m. koukounaras liagkis, m. skordoulis & v. geronikou 115 when re interconnects with democratic citizenship (dc) the same competences can be taught. this means that teachers must possess the competences (council of europe, 2008, jackson, 2014) to teach students to act as democratic and intercultural citizens (council of europe, 2010, p. 38) (figure 1). competences are defined as: abilities to mobilise and deploy relevant values, attitudes, skills, knowledge and/or understanding, in order to respond appropriately and effectively to the demands, challenges and opportunities that are presented by a given type of context. (council of europe, 2018a p.32) figure 1: the 20 competences of the model. the 20 competences are subdivided into four groups: 1. values; 2. attitudes; 3. skills; 4. knowledge and critical understanding. values are deemed to be general beliefs about life goals which, as principles, guide individuals. they give qualitative meaning to their actions and offer standards or criteria for evaluating and justifying them. they are psychological resources that enable individuals to manage democratic and intercultural situations. human rights education review – volume 5(1) 116 attitudes are defined as beliefs or opinions, emotions or feelings, evaluations, and tendencies to behave towards someone or something (e.g., a person or an issue). skills are defined as capacities to accomplish complex procedures of thinking or behaving in order to achieve simple or difficult set targets. knowledge, finally, consists of facts or ideas acquired by individuals which enable them to give comprehensive and appreciative meanings to their experiences—here, in the context of democratic processes (council of europe, 2018a, pp. 38-52). of course: the model proposes that, within the context of democratic culture and intercultural dialogue, an individual is deemed to be acting competently when he or she meets the demands, challenges and opportunities that are presented by democratic and intercultural situations appropriately and effectively by mobilising and deploying some or all of these 20 competences. (council of europe, 2018a, p. 38) the aim is that the publication be used by national educational systems: to evaluate existing courses or study programmes; to design and develop curricula and pedagogies; and, of most interest in the current study, to develop assessments of teachers’ competencies. clusters of descriptors are provided by the rfcdc for teachers’ self-reflection and self-assessment. they are proposed as: statements that describe observable behaviours which indicate that the person concerned has achieved a certain level of proficiency with regard to a competence. (council of europe, 2018a, p. 59) the 135 key descriptors are the result of a procedure in which 3,094 educators from across europe participated. 2,085 draft descriptors were firstly produced, which became 447 after feedback, rating tasks, validation tasks and scaling tasks. the 135 most useful were then identified. the participants followed specific criteria to devise the descriptors and then to evaluate them: 1. wording (as learning outcomes), 2. brevity (<25 words), 3. positivity, 4. clarity, 5. independence (of all the other descriptors), and 6. definiteness. the descriptors are scaled to three levels of proficiency: 1. basic, 2. intermediate, 3. advanced. they were then published by using these categories. researchers have questioned the conception of the four groups of 20 competences. in a recent article, jónsson and rodriguez (2019) suggest a different conceptualisation. their study builds on the aristotelian concept of democratic competences as virtues, and on the deweyan conception of democracy and what it means for a citizen to live in a democracy and lead a m. koukounaras liagkis, m. skordoulis & v. geronikou 117 democratic life. while pointing out that the rfcdc (2018) provides a brief discussion of the concept of democracy, the authors then provide a theorising of democratic capacities involving three specific conditions: 1. political conditions; 2. moral conditions; 3. conditions of individualisation (p. 4). thus, they define seven complex competences instead of four ‘simple’ ones; 1. discursive competence, 2. competence for conflict resolution, 3. competence for critical re-evaluation, 4. competence for communal living. 5. competence for resilience, 6. competence for forming a conception of a good life, and 7. competence for respecting the natural boundaries of human living. they argue that the 20 competences of the rfcdc: are so general and basic that they should figure in any complex competence such as the seven we defined…although some of the simple competences are more central for certain complex competences… however, none of the simple ones will be completely absent (whatever that might mean) from any of the complex ones. (jónsson & rodriguez, 2019, p. 11) in fact, the democratic competences are complex structural concerns in a social context (biesta & lawy, 2006) rather than individuals’ skills and capabilities to behave in one particular way. when the competences are so general, and figure in so many aspects of individuals’ lives and learning processes, the majority of educators may claim to be working towards one, or more, or all of them; teachers follow the curriculum in the classroom and claim that they work on the competence of listening and observing. that does not mean that there is no value in listing 20 competences. on the contrary, they provide the basis of the democratic competences which must always be conceptualised and analysed by using the 135 descriptors. these can lead to more complex but recognisable competences. the descriptors are provided to help to operationalise the competences in terms of the observable behaviours of democratic culture (council of europe, 2018a, p. 59). although a number of researchers challenge the efficacy and the morality of educating ‘good citizens’ in schools (merry, 2020; francis & mills, 2012; eksner & nur chemma, 2017; gillborn, 2006; apple, 2013), education is literally the crucial component in democratic empowerment. thus, properly educated and trained teachers are necessary since it is their practice that can promote democratic culture, as the edc/hre charter states: teaching and learning practices and activities should follow and promote democratic and human rights values and principles (council of europe, 2010). this requires competent teaching professionals, educated and politically astute, who can develop the cdc themselves and, at the same time, be ready to tackle a range of challenges in their communities, schools, and classrooms. it is these individuals who have the task of educating children to be socially active and responsible citizens (sachs, 2003, p. 154; salema, human rights education review – volume 5(1) 118 2005; brett, mompoint-gaillard, & salema, 2009; european commission, 2017; nieuwelink, dekker, & ten dam, 2019). it is known that the powerful relationships which result from the interactions in the community between students and educators can transform disadvantaged students and schools. the transformative dynamic of student-educator interactions is visible when educators have already been transformed by education and training in reflection, openness, flexibility, adaptability, civic mindedness, empathy, and tolerance of ambiguity (council of europe, 2018b; organisation for economic co-operation and development (oecd), 2016; barrett, byram, lázár, mompoint-gaillard, & philippou, 2014). educators learn to challenge dominant notions of education and curricula with active and democratic ones (garratt & piper, 2012), and they learn to contextualise notions of democracy and human rights in different cultural and political contexts (zembylas, charalambous, charalambous, & lesta, 2017). thus, the school, the curriculum and teaching can form democratic citizens (print & lange, 2012; council of europe, 2016) as long as educators are active professionals who embody democratic culture. this means that the epicentre of the transformation process within education is the transformation of educators. these teachers are called to re-orientate their work under a transformative-intercultural-inclusive-democratic framework, one based on the values of equity, inclusion, solidarity, justice, autonomy, critical understanding, communication, emancipation and, above all, humanism. it is apparent from the above that it is of the upmost importance for re teachers to possess a critical perception, a ‘knowledge and critical understanding of the self’ and ‘knowledge and critical understanding of the world’. these competences can be described in terms of observable behaviours: a) critically examining values and beliefs; b) critically examining prejudices and stereotypes, as well as everything behind them; c) critically examining the deeper causes of human rights violations, such as the role played by stereotypes and prejudices in human rights abuses; and d), recognising the religious symbols, religious rituals, and religious uses of language (council of europe, 2018). the examination of the interconnections between beliefs and religion with stereotypes and prejudices but, above all, with human rights, highlights the essential commitment of different dimensions of self— ‘rational, affective, somatic, spiritual, and sociocultural’ (tolliver & tisdell, 2006, p.39). the logical dimension of self is a presupposition for a critical understanding of the self and the world to manage the internal interplay between the personal religious beliefs, conditions of education and different social contexts, as well as the external interplay between the interests of stakeholders (state, local authorities, religious communities, etc.) (christopher, 2020; jackson & everington, 2016). this external interplay changes as the politicisation and secularisation of re has a different impact in different contexts (zembylas, loukaidis, & antoniou, 2019). to conclude, the issue is that both contemporary conditions and educational demands require re teachers who are competent to transmit democratic culture. this m. koukounaras liagkis, m. skordoulis & v. geronikou 119 inevitably means a change of paradigm for most of them, and it is well known that teachers resist changes of paradigm (zimmerman, 2006; clement, 2014; hargreaves, 2004; mutch, 2012; zembylas, 2003). even though this is the case, re teachers individually initiate processes of (self-) reflection and (self-) evaluation when research puts them in a position of responsibility for educating students about, through and for, human rights (burridge, et al., 2013; tibbitts, 2002; jennings, 2006; robinson, phillips, & quennerstedt, 2020). teaching ‘manifests itself as a gift that occurs beyond learning’ (biesta, 2020, p. 39). therefore, there is an urgent need for a scale that can challenge teachers to reflect on and evaluate their values, attitudes, skills, and the critical understanding required for democratic culture. such a scale, based on particular descriptors of competences, will also measure their cdc. this is the starting point of the current research. the development of a tool to measure cdc, however, construes ‘competences’ as not just ‘performative virtues or instrumental character traits’, but also as aristotelian virtues with a moral dimension (jónsson & rodriguez, 2019). these virtues are also interconnected with religious and non-religious beliefs, and this is vital for the development of re teachers’ competences. this is particularly the case in greece, where secondary re teachers are all graduates from two schools of (orthodox) theology who have not even received limited (2-5 courses) pre-service teacher education. in greece re is a compulsory subject in primary and secondary education for ten years. under the constitution (art. 16) it remains mono-religious, although world religions and worldviews are also taught (2/10 years). since 2011 there has been an ongoing debate about the content of re and its pedagogy and the high court’s decisions (2016-19) have brought about changes to more confessional approaches (koukounaras liagkis, 2015; 2019; 2021). methodology aim our research is based on the 135 descriptors of the competencies for democratic culture, as defined by the council of europe (2018b). the core concept is that since the descriptors are observable democratic behaviours they can be a concise, reliable and meaningful instrument to indicate the degree to which a culture is democratic. thus, the aim of this research is to develop a scale that measures cdc in education and in educators. it also has possible applications, since educators’ competences can be the basis for the development of a democratic culture in schools and, most importantly, for the education of democratic citizens. it is of upmost international importance that schools be laboratories of democracy which prepare coming generations of citizens with democratic pedagogies that are implemented by equipped educators. although the teaching of religions and worldviews (jackson, 2014) is a controversial issue (koukounaras liagkis, 2019), knowledge and respect for religions is a human rights education review – volume 5(1) 120 necessary element of democratic culture. that is why the research sample consisted of religious education teachers. religion and re are still on the curriculum in most european countries, and so re teachers have an important role to play: their life-experiences, outlooks and teaching practices seem to influence the development of their students’ characters (arthur, moulin-stozek, metcalfe, & moller, 2019). materials and methods in order to ensure that the development of the scale is valid and reliable and to scrutinise the components/categories, the research was carried out in two stages. in the first stage, 123 secondary re teachers from all around greece were called upon to assess their attitudes to the 135 items of the competences for democratic culture, as defined by the council of europe. to do so, an electronic questionnaire was distributed between february 2019 to may 2019. all questions were based on a 5-point likert scale where 1 referred to ‘never’ and 5 referred to ‘always’. the items were initially categorised into four components (values, attitudes, skills, and knowledge and understanding) according to rfcdc (council of europe, 2018a; 2018b). based on the conceptualisation of parasuraman, zeithaml, & berry (1988), the four categories were scrutinised to a degree in order to refine the 135 items instrument by analysing the data. an initial components analysis was carried out and, in order to ensure the extracted components’ reliability, cronbach’s alpha was used. in the second stage of the research, there were responses from 403 randomly selected re teachers from all around greece, between september 2019 and may 2020. this sample is considered sufficient, since in similar studies where the aim is to develop and evaluate a scale for measuring attitudes and opinions, desired samples range from 200 to 400 people (churchill jr, ford, & walker jr, 1974; saxe & weitz, 1982; parasuraman, zeithaml, & berry, 1988). in both stages, the collected data was analysed using spss v.26 and inductive statistical methods, including principal components analysis and reliability analysis. results first stage the collected data was initially analysed using principal components analysis. this aims to reduce the number of variables to a few specific components that correspond to new variables and thus explain a large part of the variation in the data. varimax rotation, which minimises the number of items that have high loadings and makes the extracted components more interpretable, was used in the analysis. the correlation coefficients and the partial correlation coefficients were calculated. the relative sizes of the correlation coefficients were then compared with the partial correlation coefficients. the measure that gives the value of this comparison is the kaiser-meyer-olkin, where values higher than 0.750 are considered to be m. koukounaras liagkis, m. skordoulis & v. geronikou 121 satisfactory. indeed, for the questions examined using the above method, the kaiser-meyerolkin value is equal to 0.835. another way to evaluate the suitability of the model is the bartlett test of sphericity. the test rejects the null hypothesis (sig. = 0.000), which means that the statistical significance of the statistical chi-square indicates that the variables are correlated with each other and therefore the components analysis model is appropriate. table 1: kaiser-meyer-olkin and bartlett’s test results concerning the first stage of the research. kaiser-meyer-olkin measure of sampling adequacy 0.835 bartlett’s test of sphericity sig. 0.000 having ensured that the model was a satisfactory fit, the next step was to identify the number of the extracted components. based on the kaiser rule, six components were identified (kaufman & dunlap, 2000). next, the items were categorised into the extracted components. to do this, the items’ loadings are used. more specifically, if an item’s loading modulus is higher than 0.5, this item can be categorised into a specific component. if the loading of an item is higher than 0.5 in two or more components, then it is categorised into the component with its highest loading. in our extracted model, the loading moduli of 83 items were lower than 0.5, which meant that they could be excluded from the analysis. thus, 52 items were categorised into six components. the extracted components are provided below, while the items are provided in appendix 1.  component 1: democratic values  component 2: respect for the other  component 3: intercultural awareness  component 4: communication skills and emotional intelligence  component 5: critical perception  component 6: political understanding the six components contain behaviours of thinking, reflecting, and acting. the first one, ‘democratic values’, refers to a set of values that enables individuals as citizens to value human rights, pluralism, and the rule of law. it is a common and basic conceptual basis of the democratic ethos for a democratic community whose members have a deep feeling that all, individually and collectively, are responsible for justice which is beyond the law to impose. it involves thinking and reflecting. human rights education review – volume 5(1) 122 ‘respect for the other’ is more a matter of reflecting on and acting out of respect of other people and their beliefs in order to live peacefully and honestly in a community with others, regardless of that community’s diversity. this is the standard of a community not just of individuals but of personhoods who maintain their identities by accepting the cosmopolitandialogical self (habermas, 1990). this is clearly of great importance for re teachers. ‘intercultural awareness’ is also important for re teachers. it is about thinking and reflecting on personal and cultural conceptions and acting within a continual self-conception. it is a matter of whether and to what extent individuals perceive their tradition/religion as the only central one of their realities or whether they experience their own beliefs and behaviour as one reality among other sustainable possibilities (bennett, 2004, pp. 62-63). ‘communication skills and emotional intelligence’ focus on the components of communication skills in a democratic and intercultural context. skills such as empathy, active listening, selfcontrol, resilience, conflict resolution (at the level of interaction relationships), the ability to know and understand oneself and to know and understand language and communication (on an individual and intra-person level) are required in order for individuals to achieve selfawareness, and therefore to communicate and behave democratically (deardorff, 2009, p. 479). ‘critical perception’ concerns oneself, others, and the whole world. it refers to how individuals identify their own and others’ behaviour, feelings and actions. it is also a matter of questioning what is right and wrong and recognising what motivates one’s own and others’ actions. it also involves an everyday willingness to think, reflect and act critically within a reasonable plurality (rawls, 2001), and this is the reason why, for re teachers, this component is more than just a stipulation for the other components. it is a premise on which the others can be developed. ‘political understanding’ is individuals’ ability to analyse and interpret the social reality of their own lives and of their communities and therefore to take action. it is about empowering individuals to have a cognitive and intuitive understanding of politics and its power in their lives, as well as to grapple with the interconnection between private and public life. in order to ensure the scale’s reliability, the cronbach’s alpha was calculated. based on churchill’s analysis (churchill jr, ford, & walker jr, 1974), the desired value of the coefficient is between 0.75 and 0.9. in the following table we see that the cronbach’s alpha values for all the extracted components are between the desired values. m. koukounaras liagkis, m. skordoulis & v. geronikou 123 table 2: cronbach’s alpha values concerning the first stage of the research. items cronbach’s alpha component 1 8 0.817 component 2 7 0.856 component 3 12 0.858 component 4 10 0.852 component 5 11 0.888 component 6 4 0.857 second stage in this stage of the research 403 responses to the final scale were analysed. initially, a principal components analysis was carried out. as in the first stage of the research, the model was evaluated using the kaiser-meyer-olkin measure of sampling adequacy and bartlett’s test of sphericity. based on the data provided in the following table, the components analysis model is appropriate. table 3: kaiser-meyer-olkin and bartlett’s test results concerning the second stage of the research. kaiser-meyer-olkin measure of sampling adequacy 0.812 bartlett’s test of sphericity sig. 0.000 having ensured the model was a good fit, the principal components analysis was carried out. based on the results of this analysis, the results of the first stage of the research were confirmed. in order to ensure the scale’s reliability, the cronbach’s alpha was calculated for the new sample as well. in the following table we see that the cronbach’s alpha value for all extracted components is between the desired values. table 4: cronbach’s reliability factor results. items cronbach’s alpha component 1 8 0.717 component 2 7 0.756 component 3 12 0.858 component 4 10 0.867 component 5 11 0.857 component 6 4 0.814 human rights education review – volume 5(1) 124 it is apparent that a concise, reliable and meaningful ‘scale for measurement of competences for democratic culture’ was developed and tested in two large samples to help educators to recognise for themselves which qualities and competences are practiced, and which descriptors are implemented. discussion and conclusion the study presents a ‘scale for measurement of competences for democratic culture’ (smcdc) which has been effectively tested on a representative sample (ν=526) of a total population of 3,000 secondary re teachers in greece. the development of the scale was based on the council of europe’s rfcdc—its twenty competences and their 135 descriptors. from the first phase of the study the four categories of the rfcdc (values, attitudes, skills, knowledge and critical understanding) were questioned, in line with other research (jónsson and rodriguez, 2019). the analysis of the data indicated six components. each one of these represents a specific dimension of democratic competence in terms of knowledge, attitudes, values and skills. both phases of the research show that the scale is reliable and that all its parts maintain an interactive, interconnected, inter-complementary relationship, and holistically compose a set of democratic competences of a democratic, intercultural nature. they therefore engender a reflective, active and thoughtfully critical citizen. that means that the scale can be used in educational contexts to measure educators’ cdc when they are called to teach dc as an educational aim or as part of the subject curriculum. it is apparent that in order to confirm the scale’s reliability, further research should be carried out that builds upon the findings of this article. future studies can focus on re teachers from other countries or other religious contexts, or on teachers of other subjects (e.g., science or social studies) in different national and educational systems. future research on a multicultural/religious sample is needed since the sample of this study is mono-religious (orthodox). the literature and the development of the six new components of the competences/categories of democratic culture highlight that it is individuals, particularly the teachers and their conceptions, that determine the competences that rfcdc attempts to describe. there is an interconnection between beliefs and religion with stereotypes and prejudices and this is connected the individuals’ attitudes towards human rights. that interplay highlights the essential commitment of different dimensions of the ‘rational, affective, somatic, spiritual, and sociocultural’ self (tolliver & tisdell, 2006). the rational dimension of self is a presupposition of critical understanding of the self and the world to manage the internal interplay between personal religious beliefs, conditions of education and different social m. koukounaras liagkis, m. skordoulis & v. geronikou 125 contexts as well as the external interplay between the interests of stakeholders (state, local authorities, religious communities, etc.) (christopher, 2020; jackson & everington, 2016). this external interplay changes, according to the degree of politicisation and secularisation of re in different contexts (zembylas, loukaidis, & antoniou, 2019). in conclusion, the issue for re teachers is that contemporary conditions and educational demands, require well-equipped cdc teachers to teach edc/hre through re, and this inevitably means a change of paradigm for most of them. self-development and professional development related to rfcdc are needed to confirm research evidence that the humanities can develop the critical thinking and imaginative understanding that will enable young people to be citizens of the world (nussbaum, 2006). to this end, this study marks a step forward by providing an instrument tested on re teachers (it is seldom that a tool for all teachers is tested on re teachers) and measures the impact of their competence in teaching and learning democracy within the curriculum. this does not concern the competences of the re teachers (this is dealt with in the second part of the research) but the development of a scale to measure cdc. this scale can be used on re teachers not only because they teach a subject that concerns religious and non-religious convictions but because they are also pedagogues in the state education system who can develop students’ competences and culture. the literature highlights this need, since populations in most european countries are increasingly diverse. human rights and democracy can be taught by re teachers as long as religion has an importance in political, social and national contexts and, above all, impacts on the lives and behaviour of many people. the council of europe’s rfcdc and its background documents (recommendations, projects and literature) created the environment in which the first stage could be safely developed. of course, concepts such as the four categories of competences or definitions of values or other terms are contested and should always be clearly stated. therefore, this research focused on developing a set of components/categories of competences that represent cdc. thus, first and foremost, the scale and the procedure scrutinised the concept of democratic competences and the way in which they the rfcdc conceives them (2018a). although competences in rfcdc are defined as ‘abilities to mobilise and deploy relevant values, attitudes, skills, knowledge and/or understanding’ (council of europe, 2018a, p.32), it seems that, after the analysis, the competences are more complex structures. on the one hand, they are constituent elements of an aristotelian ethos pre-existing or even shaped through the development of democratic competences. on the other, they are complex and flexible predispositions-for-action—as biesta (2014) redefines dewey ‘habits’. as jónsson and rodriguez (2019, p.13) point out, ‘attitudes, skills and knowledge do not make a person better or more democratic unless the values, attitudes, and knowledge from which the person acts are already good or conducive to democracy’. moreover, the individual’s ethos can be founded on a democratic ethos which comprises the competences for democratic culture, human rights education review – volume 5(1) 126 which are both moral and performative virtues. learning is, therefore, the axis that relates the two ethe, since both are the results of knowing—which means thinking, reflecting, and acting (dewey, [1916] 2002). for this, it is crucial to have the cdc scale for individuals’ (self-) reflection and (self-) evaluation as a component of change and transformation, especially for those who teach democratic culture and religion. references apple, m. w. 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(2013). diverisity and citizenship in a context of islamophobia. in j. miller, k. o'grady, & u. mckenna (eds.), religion in education. innovation in international research (pp. 58-71). new york: routledge. appendix: measurement of competences for democratic culture of religious education teachers responses were invited to each item on a 5-point scale from ‘strongly disagree’ to ‘strongly agree’. a. democratic values 1. i always appreciate the quality of my work 2. i pay attention to the gestures and body language of others so that i can understand the meaning of what they are saying 3. i always listen carefully in order to decipher the meaning and intentions of my interlocutor 4. i pay attention to what the others mean, but they do not say 5. i notice that people from different cultural backgrounds react differently to the same situation 6. i try to better understand my friends, trying to imagine things from their own perspective 7. i can accurately understand the feelings of others, even when they do not show them 8. i adapt to new situations, using a new skill 9. i mediate linguistically in intercultural compromises by translating, interpreting, or explaining 10. i regularly take communication initiatives to help resolve interpersonal disputes b. respect for the other 11. i believe that intercultural dialogue must be used in order to be able to recognise our different identities and cultural affiliations 12. i am interested in learning about other people’s beliefs, values, traditions, and worldviews https://doi.org/10.1177/1474904118788990 https://doi.org/10.1080/00220272.2016.1188156 https://doi.org/10.1177/0192636506291521 human rights education review – volume 5(1) 134 13. i am curious about the beliefs and interpretations of other cultural orientations and relationships 14. i am positive about the opportunity to get to know other cultures 15. i always seek and welcome opportunities to meet people with different values, cultures, and behaviours 16. i really seek to get in touch with other people in order to get to know their culture 17. i am always willing to work and cooperate with others 18. i always listen carefully to different points of view 19. i always listen carefully to other people 20. i accept that my worldview is just a worldview among many others 21. i believe that history is often presented and taught through an ethnocentric perspective 22. i enjoy the challenge of dealing with ambiguous problems c. intercultural awareness 23. i explicitly respect all people as equal 24. i treat everyone with respect regardless of their culture 25. i explicitly respect people who have a different socio-economic status than me 26. i explicitly respect every religious differentiation 27. i explicitly respect people who have different political views than me 28. when i make someone upset, i apologize 29. i explicitly accept the relationship between human rights, democracy, peace, and security in a globalised world d. communication skills and emotional intelligence 30. human rights should be always protected and respected 31. all public services must respect, protect and enforce human rights 32. the laws must comply with international human rights, rules and standards 33. we must be tolerant of the different beliefs that other people have in society 34. schools must teach their students democracy and how to behave as democratic citizens 35. all citizens must be treated equally and impartially by the law 36. the laws must be applied impartially in every case 37. the people in charge of the legislature must be subject to the law and constitutional control e. critical perception 38. i describe the effects of propaganda on the modern world 39. i explain the ways in which people can be protected from propaganda 40. i describe the various ways in which citizens can influence policy 41. i am essentially interested in the development of the human rights framework and the ongoing development of human rights in different parts of the world f. political understanding 42. i describe my motivations 43. i describe the ways in which my thoughts and feelings affect my behaviour 44. i critically examine my values and beliefs 45. i critically examine myself from different perspectives. m. koukounaras liagkis, m. skordoulis & v. geronikou 135 46. i critically examine my prejudices and stereotypes, as well as everything behind them 47. i critically examine my feelings and emotions in a wide range of situations 48. i explain how tone of voice, eye contact, and body language can help communication 49. when i work in a team, i inform the other members about any relevant or useful information 50. i encourage the parties involved to listen carefully to each other and share the issues and problems that concern them 51. i critically examine the deeper causes of human rights violations, such as the role played by stereotypes and prejudices in human rights abuses 52. i recognise the religious symbols, religious rituals, and religious uses of language measuring competences for democratic culture: teaching human rights through religious education abstract keywords introduction council of europe’s reference framework of competences for democratic culture and teaching professionalism methodology aim materials and methods results first stage second stage discussion and conclusion references appendix: measurement of competences for democratic culture of religious education teachers giving future generations human rights issn: 2535-5406 http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.5106 date of publication 03-05-2023 © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org book and media reviews giving future generations human rights linehan, j. and lawrence, p. (eds.) (2021). giving future generations a voice: normative frameworks, institutions and practice. cheltenham: edward edgar publishing. 232 pp., £85.00 (hard cover) isbn: 978-183910-824-2; £25.00 (ebook) isbn: 978-1-83910-825-9. reviewed by rhian croke observatory on human rights of children and children's legal centre wales, swansea university school of law, uk, rhian.croke@swansea.ac.uk this thought-provoking book considers how newly formed institutions are giving future generations a voice. the book presents case studies from around the globe, demonstrating diverse approaches to tackling the limitations of short-term thinking that is biased against the interests of future generations. it is a timely publication, given the devastating impacts and implications of the covid-19 pandemic, global food insecurity and poverty, climate change, and biodiversity loss. the case studies brought together by jan linehan and peter lawrence present both the strengths and the limitations of institutions that play a role in addressing these significant threats to future generations, contributing essential knowledge regarding how we can better embed future-orientated thinking. the book addresses its topic from different perspectives: from human rights to administrative law, intergenerational justice, ethics, and sustainable development. the text will be a helpful reference for those seeking an introduction to the field, either academically or as policy makers and civil society practitioners. chapter 1 presents a helpful introduction, setting the scene for the substantive chapters. the first group of chapters contemplates the normative underpinnings of institutions for future http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.5106 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ hrer book and media reviews 2 generations, considering why such institutions should be established and how they should be evaluated. lawrence explains that institutions for future generations (ifgs): can take different forms, ranging from rules and procedures, norms and organisations – including, for example, simple auditing processes which highlight long term impacts – to bricks and mortar-type institutions which highlight the interest of future generations, such as commissioners or ombudspersons or legislative committees (p.22). lawrence, in chapter 2, focusses on commissioners and ombudspersons and how they can act as proxy representatives and ‘agents of justice’ to mitigate bias against future generations. this approach is grounded in a concept of intergenerational justice, embedded in core human rights. nicky van dijk (chapter 3) adopts a ‘capability approach’, using the ‘self-proclaimed’ interests of the current generation to create a capability set for future generations (p. 49). drawing on un instruments and empirical research into the physical needs of humans, she argues that this set of capabilities should be utilised by ifgs when considering the interests of future generations. bridget lewis (chapter 4) draws directly from human rights law and jurisprudence to examine how human rights approaches can support intergenerational solidarity between current and future generations. she considers the importance of going beyond the limitations of economic and environmental sustainability and promotes the importance of the protection of the full range of civil, political, social, economic and cultural rights. she argues for the establishment of ifgs that incorporate the human rights of future generations and encompass advisory, supervisory, complaints-hearing, and legislative scrutiny functions. lewis also pushes beyond the boundaries of existing ifgs and proposes standards of performance in relation to, for example, standing and evidence. she promotes the importance of more nations establishing such bodies and of their global interconnectedness. the second part of the book addresses the mandate and operating principles of ifgs. jonathon boston (chapter 5) discusses ‘commitment devices’: institutional approaches that ‘seek to bind a person, organisation or government to an agreed course of action, or agreed norm or rule’ (p.87). his evaluation is pragmatic, recognising the inherent bias against future generations in liberal democracies. he argues that such devices must be presented as costly to override and designed with detailed consideration in order to incentivise senior policy makers to adhere to long-term targets. boston refers to the example of child poverty, where children have been failed from one generation to the next, with intergenerational impacts devastating and far-reaching, despite legislative targets having been set to eliminate it. friedrich soltau (chapter 6) counters criticism of the sustainable development goals being time-limited to 15 years, citing examples of how the achievement of many of the goals within this time frame will contribute to a flow of actions protecting future generations. hrer book and media reviews 3 incorporation in governmental and ifg processes, and critically, he argues, sustainability education will help embed the interests of future generations in societies. part 3 of the book draws on lessons from practice. phillipa mccormack and cleo hansenlohrey (chapter 7) present a critique from administrative law principles, suggesting that ifgs could act as a proxy or legal guardian for future generations, holding decision makers to account. to that end, ifgs would be mandated with powers—similar to an ombudsman— embracing investigation, research and education, and would themselves be accountable to parliament rather than the executive arm of government. alan netherwood and andrew flynn (chapter 8) analyse the well-being of future generations (wales) act 2015 (wbfga), legislation that has been described as ground-breaking. the act establishes the office of the future generations commissioner (fgc), with a remit framed by 7 well-being goals. the fgc has powers to advise and scrutinise welsh public service boards and the welsh government on action to deliver the 7 well-being goals. netherwood and flynn’s analysis of the first 5 years of implementation of the act indicates that public bodies have, however, been struggling to address the long-term thinking required as a way of working under the act. they suggest that strong political leadership and more support to public bodies is required to achieve this. jan linehan (chapter 9), examining reform approaches, considers deliberative or citizen assemblies that capture diverse voices, arguing that these models help to combat short-term thinking rooted in time-limited electoral cycles, partisan politics, and executive dominance. finally, elizabeth dirth (chapter 10), presents a systematic account of the characteristics of different ifgs in europe. she argues that we must move beyond the systemic failures of existing institutions and reconceptualise institutions as ‘just future making’ (p. 206). instead of being restricted to a narrow view of the future or conservationist standpoints, ifgs must be framed by processes that are ‘participatory and imaginative, rather than static’ (p.208). dirth also highlights the importance of participatory processes and the engagement of young people. dirth points towards a limitation not just of ifgs but of this book, in that space has not been given to children having a voice. children will have valuable and indeed essential insights in protecting and promoting the interests of future generations. indeed, the climate protest movement, driven for the most part by young climate activists, has seized opportunities for climate litigation and justice and raised the profile of the threat to future generations (daly, 2022). if we are truly to imagine and create futures that consider a diversity of interests, then their voice must be heard and not excluded, and become integral to ifgs (croke et al 2021). the book as a whole ultimately argues that a multi-faceted approach is required to give future generations a voice. however, several authors suggest we must give greater protection to the hrer book and media reviews 4 interests of future generations by firmly placing the full range of human rights and individual administrative justice rights into law, so there is enhanced legal accountability. in other words, instead of just ‘voice’, we must give future generations ‘human rights’, with ifgs empowered to act as a ‘proxies’ or guardians to ensure they are respected, protected, and fulfilled. the book is well-timed. globally, a recently adopted un resolution on access to a clean and healthy environment (un n.d) and the forthcoming maastricht principles on the human rights of future generations, provide a context in which the book is clearly relevant. in wales (this author’s ‘locality’) it will aid reflection on what has been achieved by what has been seen as ground-breaking legislation on future generations, at a time when a new fgc will soon be appointed, and a welsh human rights bill is being considered (welsh government 2022). the book’s interrogation of the role and functions of ifgs will be helpful to such offices that exist and to the people who are charged with creating new ones. references daly, a., & leviner, p. (2022, june 28). un convention on the rights of the child, article 2 and discrimination on the basis of childhood: the crc paradox? http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4148537 croke, r., dale, h., dunhill, a., roberts, a., unnithan, m., & williams, j. (2021). integrating sustainable development and children’s rights: a case study on wales. social sciences, 10(3), 100. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci10030100 un news, ‘un general assembly declares access to clean and healthy environment a universal human right’. retrieved september 11, 2022 from https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/07/1123482 welsh government (2022). welsh government response to the ‘strengthening and advancing equality and human rights in wales’ research report. retrieved september 11, 2022 from https://gov.wales/sites/default/files/publications/2022-05/responsereport.pdf http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4148537 https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci10030100 https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/07/1123482 https://gov.wales/sites/default/files/publications/2022-05/response-report.pdf https://gov.wales/sites/default/files/publications/2022-05/response-report.pdf exploring the role of domestic law in human rights education issn 2535-5406 vol 5, no 2 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4578 date received: 20-09-2021 date accepted: 16-05-2022 peer reviewed article © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles exploring the role of domestic law in human rights education dawn watkins university of sheffield, uk, d.watkins@sheffield.ac.uk abstract the research underpinning this article has taken place in the context of a research project that seeks to improve children’s legal capability. discussions concerning the place of children’s rights in this project led the author to engage with the hre literature, where they discovered an affinity between the aims of the project and so-called ‘transformative’ hre. this led to the central question this article explores: how might domestic law and domestic legal processes benefit or inform hre? basing its discussion around the familiar notion of hre being education about, through and for human rights, the article recognises that the radically transformative approach it advocates may be considered too radical by some. nevertheless, taking the topic of bullying in school as an example, it seeks to demonstrate that knowledge of domestic law and legal processes is essential to addressing the rights violations children experience in their everyday lives. keywords domestic law, human rights education, legal capability, bullying, legal literacy, children’s rights education, human rights literacy, human rights violations http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4470 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:d.watkins@sheffield.ac.uk d. watkins 99 introduction the research underpinning this article has been carried out during the foundational stage of project fortitude, funded by the european research council. the project aims to improve children’s legal capability. in other words, it aims to improve children’s ability to deal effectively with law-related situations they encounter in their day-to-day lives. hitherto research into legal capability has focused on adults or those nearing adulthood, so the project’s focus on children in this context breaks new ground (denvir, balmer & pleasence, 2013; parle, 2009). the project is based in england and considers the child’s legal position in this jurisdictional context. however, a secondary aim of the project is to provide a framework for applying this research in other geographical contexts internationally. this means that england is being used as an example, rather than defining the case, both in this article and in our wider research activities. a notable aspect of legal capability scholarship is its focus on ‘justiciable’ issues (those for which it is possible to seek a legal remedy by issuing proceedings in court). although a child (or a group of children) is not permitted to issue proceedings themselves, they can do this via an adult (e.g., a parent or a solicitor) who is acting as their ‘litigation friend’ (uk government, 2022). this prompted discussions among the research team as to whether children’s rights under the un convention on the rights of the child (uncrc) should be included in its activities, since for a child in england the uncrc offers no direct legal remedy for a rights violation. for reasons explained further below, we concluded children’s rights under the uncrc should be included. but equally important for the purpose of this article, these discussions prompted the author to engage with the literature on human rights education (hre), which in turn led to the central question which this article explores; the role of domestic law in hre. the article begins by providing some information concerning the context of this research and explains how the discussion concerning the relevance (or not) of the uncrc was resolved. it then goes on to explore the role of domestic law in hre, focusing on the common description of hre as encompassing education and training about, for and through human rights (united nations, 2011). readers familiar with hre will note the order of this description differs from the usual one ‘about, through and for human rights’. this deliberate disruption reflects the shape of the overall argument of this article, which focuses on exploring the role of domestic law in education about and for human rights, but which recognises (in the broader context of education through human rights) that the radically transformative approach it advocates may be considered too radical by some. the topic of bullying is used to illustrate aspects of the discussion, particularly in relation to education for human rights. human rights education review volume 5(2) 100 the context as stated in the introduction, project fortitude aims to improve children’s ability to deal effectively with law-related situations they encounter in their day-to-day lives. this aim will be achieved by working with children and young people aged 15 years and under to co-create a range of game-based interventions (digital and non-digital) which both measure and improve aspects of their legal capability. theories of play are central to these aims and this approach represents a generalisation of a successful game-based intervention created in the law in children’s lives esrc-funded research project, where we created a digital game called ‘adventures with lex’ as a research tool to explore the everyday legal understandings of children aged 8-11 years (watkins, lai-chong law, barwick & kirk, 2016, 2018; barwick, watkins, kirk & lai-chong law, 2018; lai-chong law, watkins, barwick & kirk, 2016). three broad elements knowledge, skills and attitudes provide the conceptual framework for determining what we will both measure and seek to improve in the course of the project. this ‘troika of knowledge, skills and attitudes’ (jones, 2010, p. 4) was adopted by the public legal education network (plenet) in 2010 and its influence remains evident in the more complex frameworks of legal capability which have been developed since then (e.g., collard, demming, wintersteiger, jones & seargeant, 2011; mackie, 2013; community legal education ontario, 2016; balmer, pleasence, hagland & mcrae, 2019). this tripart approach emphasises the aim of public legal education (ple) in facilitating access to justice; not only by making people aware of their legal rights, but also by developing the ‘confidence and skills to assert them’ (law for life, 2022). as already stated, the traditional focus on justiciable issues in legal capability scholarship and ple activities prompted discussions among the research team as to whether children’s rights under the uncrc should be included in our activities. a fortunate consequence of this discussion was that it prompted the author to engage with the hre literature, where they discovered an affinity between the aims of project fortitude and so-called ‘transformational’ or ‘transformative’ hre (tibbitts 2002 and 2017), influenced by the pedagogy of paolo freire (1921-1997) (tibbitts, 2017; bajaj, cislaghi & mackie, 2016). this literature suggests that regardless of whether any direct legal remedy is available, increasing children’s awareness of their human rights, when combined with opportunities to talk and think about their lived experiences (that which freire termed ‘praxis’ [1970, p. 25]), can be instrumental in them recognising situations where their subjective reality is objectively unjust. for example, reflecting on their efforts to raise students’ critical awareness of social justice issues in mexico and the united states, gibson and grant (2017, p. 226) report positively on ‘the power of a human rights framework’ in developing students’ consciousness and describe how students moved from a state of accepting ‘normalised oppression’ to raising questions concerning hitherto unquestioned practices within their communities. d. watkins 101 in addition to helping learners identify ‘gaps between rights and actual realities’, transformative hre seeks to provoke learners into discussing and considering ‘the concrete actions necessary to close these gaps’ (bajaj et al., 2016, p. 3). in her study of the impact of hre in india, bajaj provides numerous accounts of school students taking direct action to confront human rights violations, drawing just on their knowledge of basic rights. the following extract from a student’s first-hand account provides a striking example: ... we learnt about the basic right to food, right to clothing, right to have clean water… one day… we got the food from the cook. we brought the food to her and said, ‘see this food, insects and stones are there, how can one eat this food? we won’t have this food; we also have rights. we should have clean food and water. but you are not providing clean or good food for us.’ then, what she told us was, ‘i am working for the past 27 years. no one has ever asked me any single question. you children are asking me like this?’ we told her, ‘yes, we have the right. see this [hre] book.’ we also complained to the headmaster. she had to realize the mistake she was doing. now… we are having good meals. (bajaj, 2012, p. 89) drawing on this literature, we determined that for project fortitude, whilst they are not justiciable, children’s rights under the uncrc represent an accessible means by which children can begin to reflect critically on their lived experiences and identify situations where their rights have been violated. likewise, they provide legitimate grounds for challenging these violations through informal, non-legal means. furthermore, considering our intention to provide a framework for applying this research internationally, we recognise the uncrc is incorporated into the domestic law of very many countries, emphasising its relevance to our broader aims. exploring the role of domestic law in hre – education about human rights in this section it is argued that including information concerning domestic law and domestic legal processes in education and training about human rights can serve to counteract the ‘rosy’ or ‘chicken-soup’ approach to children’s rights which some commentators (notably lundy & martinez sainz, 2018) identify as being problematic. when lundy and sainz make their point concerning the ‘rosiness’ of some hre programmes and policies, they do so in the context of emphasising that although international human rights standards ‘are intended to promote positive approaches to the treatment of children… equally, and arguably more importantly, they exist to expose breaches of those standards and to enable states to be held to account for their actions.’ so, for lundy and sainz children need to be made aware that their rights can be ‘sources of conflict and tension’ as well as the bases for their protection and empowerment (2018, p. 15). this view is not disputed in this article. indeed, it has already been acknowledged that human human rights education review volume 5(2) 102 rights can play an instrumental role in alerting children to rights violations. however, the point made in this article concerning the need to counteract a rosy view of human rights is slightly different. it is suggested that a realistic or even perhaps a more honest account of human rights needs to include an explanation of when and how these rights are (and are not) justiciable, as well as the important role of domestic law in both situations. the issue of justiciability the issue of justiciability can be illustrated with reference to three highly significant human rights instruments: the universal declaration of human rights (udhr), adopted in 1948; the uncrc, adopted in 1991; and the european convention on human rights (echr), adopted in 1951. the importance and influence of the udhr cannot be questioned; it is described as ‘the first international agreement on the basic principles of human rights’ which ‘laid the foundation for the human rights protections that we have in the uk today’ (equality and human rights commission, 2021). however, because it is declaratory in nature the udhr offers no direct remedy for a person whose rights have been violated. and, as already stated, there is no direct legal remedy available for children in england who claim their uncrc rights have been violated. rather, the extent to which england (as part of the uk) is meeting its obligations under the convention is assessed at regular intervals by the committee on the rights of the child. by contrast, the echr does include a mechanism through which a person can seek redress against the state for a breach of their echr rights, as proceedings can be issued in the european court of human rights (ecthr) in strasbourg. an important point to note here is that in this situation, where an international legal remedy is available and legal redress is sought, it is expected that the process will commence in a domestic court, drawing on domestic law. this is recognised by the human rights education associates which, in response to the faq ‘i think my human rights have been violated. where can i get help?’ states: the regional and international mechanisms for human rights protections are based on the assumption that ‘domestic remedies have been exhausted’. often local agencies can be of more immediate help in determining whether or not your rights have been violated and what steps should be undertaken. we suggest you contact a human rights organization in your community, your local human rights commission or social service agency for assistance. (hrea, n.d.) as indicated here, domestic remedies must have been exhausted before a claim can be brought to the european court of human rights, and ‘usually this will mean an application to the appropriate court, followed by an appeal, where applicable, and even a further appeal to a higher court such as the supreme court or constitutional court, if there is one’ (council of europe, 2021, p. 6). if the domestic appeals process is followed and exhausted, then the good d. watkins 103 news is that cases brought to the ecthr are dealt with free of charge, and there is no need for legal representation until the government is notified of the proceedings. however, this needs to be weighed against the fact that it is highly likely that legal representation will be required to pursue a claim through the domestic appeals process, and that where they do eventually reach the ecthr ‘the great majority of applications are… declared inadmissible without being notified to the government’ (council of europe, 2021, p. 9). the picture painted here is deliberately bleak, to emphasise just how challenging it is to bring a claim for a violation of a human right, even where an international human rights remedy is available. the better news is that the possibility for seeking redress for a breach of the echr increased significantly when much of the convention was incorporated into uk law under the human rights act 1998. this makes it is possible for a person to seek redress for a violation of an echr right through an english domestic court. this will be discussed further in the following section (education for human rights). the important point for this section, which explores the role of domestic law in education about human rights, is that here domestic law played a crucial role in ‘bringing rights home’ (house of commons, 1997) and the ongoing availability of this legal remedy is dependent on this domestic law remaining in force. the limits of justiciability it is important to note that even where human rights breaches are justiciable, claims can only be brought against a public authority (e.g., government departments, local councils, national health service trusts and the police), or against a private person or organisation which is carrying out a public function (human rights act 1998, s. 6). this does not mean that a person whose human rights are violated has no means of redress against a private person, but it does mean that they will need to rely on other domestic law provisions to take legal action directly against them. as tibbitts notes, governments which are signatories to human rights treaties agree to uphold the principles enshrined in them, and to prevent human rights violations, ‘both through their own behaviour and through their ability to influence the actions of citizens whose conduct may be negatively affecting the rights of others’ (2017, p. 73). so, whilst it may not be possible to identify a justiciable human right in its purest form in domestic law, it may well be possible to discern its influence within a body of domestic law, comprising of multiple sources. strenuous efforts by a former uk government to demonstrate how domestic legislation and policy have underpinned the implementation of the uncrc in england provide a good example of this, with numerous legislative provisions set out against articles of the uncrc in a very lengthy report (department for education, 2010). the ‘complicatedness’ of justiciability all of this is, of course, quite complicated. and especially when compared to the much more straightforward example provided earlier of children pointing to their rights in a hre textbook human rights education review volume 5(2) 104 and persuading the school cook to change her behaviour as a result. nevertheless, it is argued that this ‘complicatedness’ concerning the justiciability of human rights is an essential and unavoidable feature of them. where this is acknowledged in education and training about human rights, this offers children the opportunity to gain a realistic and critical understanding of the nature of their rights, particularly regarding the extent of their enforceability. a more critical understanding of the nature of human rights may also assist children in gaining an understanding that the opportunities open to other children to enjoy and exercise their rights will vary widely according to their social, political and/or geographical contexts, as well as their legal jurisdiction. whilst it is true to say that domestic law plays a crucial role in facilitating action to assist those whose rights have been violated in the uk, or in another liberal democracy, of course this is by no means the situation for children globally. exploring the role of domestic law in hre – education for human rights as argued by lundy and martinez sainz, children’s experiences of injustice can be ‘key opportunities for children to develop the legal knowledge required to identify, handle and act on violations and breaches of their rights within and beyond school’ (2018, p. 16). and whereas a consideration of basic human rights can help children to appreciate or recognise a violation of their rights in general terms, an understanding of the relevant domestic law can then help them to ‘concretise’ the nature of this violation in specific legal terms. in turn, this presents them with opportunities to consider what actions may be taken to bring about change. as will be illustrated below, knowledge of relevant domestic law is important not only because it provides the basis for a legal claim to remedy an injustice, but because it signals the real potential or power to do so. bullying as an example in the following discussion, the topic of bullying in school is used as a means to explore the role domestic law can and arguably must play in education for human rights. the topic is chosen because bullying ‘affects children everywhere’ (unesco institute for statistics, 2018). it has been shown that hre can have a positive impact on the prevalence of bullying in schools (sebba & robinson 2010, p. 22; greene 2006, p. 54). nevertheless, bullying remains a global phenomenon and the literature suggests that even in contexts where hre is actively promoted, bullying can continue to be recognised as a problem (osler & solhaug 2018, p. 279; obiagu 2020, p. 7). imagine a scenario where an 11-year-old child has recently joined a senior school. on several occasions, during break times, they have been punched and kicked by another school pupil, but have not disclosed this to anyone. as kolstrein and jofré (2013, p. 47) observe, bullying behaviours such as these violate multiple human rights principles, including the fundamental d. watkins 105 principle set out in article 1 of the udhr; ‘all human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. they are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.’ if we now suppose that fortunately, as a result of engaging in hre, this victim of bullying becomes aware that their human rights are being violated. the following discussion envisages the steps that may be taken in response to this situation, highlighting the role of domestic law throughout. speaking up where a victim of bullying becomes aware that their human rights are being violated, our first hope would be that they speak to a trusted adult (e.g., a schoolteacher, or their parent or carer). where this happens, it is possible they or their trusted adult might point to the right or rights concerned (e.g., article 1 of the udhr, cited above, or article 3 of the echr ‘no one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment’) and request that steps are taken in school to stop the bullying. like the example given by bajaj, cited earlier, this could be enough to resolve the situation. however, unfortunately, not all stories end this way. as bajaj also reports, in another case where children brought a complaint about their food, ‘the headmaster, rather than supporting the student’s demands against the cook, beat the children who were complaining and threatened to expel them’ (2012, p. 89). although it is unlikely that a child in an english school will be beaten for expressing concern that their rights are being violated, it is entirely possible that even where a school is notified about bullying, it may fail to adequately address the problem and the bullying will continue. drawing on domestic law to strengthen a complaint where an informal complaint is made to a trusted person, but no action is taken, then further steps will need to be taken, such as making a complaint to the school or its board of governors, requesting that adequate steps are taken to remedy the problem (coram children’s legal centre, 2021; family lives, 2021). even though the complaint remains informal at this stage, possessing knowledge that a school’s failure to act is a legal issue, and reminding the headteacher or governing body of its legal responsibilities, can act to strengthen the position of the child making the complaint. being involved in litigation is both time-consuming and expensive, and a school (or its legal advisors) will certainly want to avoid it. this potential ‘strengthening’ role of legal knowledge is implied in online sources of advice to children and parents, which state ‘your school must, by law, have an anti-bullying policy… schools are required by law to protect and promote the welfare of children’ (coram children’s legal centre, 2021) and ‘schools have a duty of care, and allowing a child to be continually bullied when the school has been alerted to the problem could be seen as a breach of that duty’ (family lives, 2021). the specific domestic legal provisions are not cited in this advice, but they most likely refer to the education and human rights education review volume 5(2) 106 inspections act 2006, ss. 88 and 89 (setting out the responsibilities of school governors and headteachers regarding behaviour policies), the education act 2002, s. 175 (setting out duties to safeguard and promote the welfare of children), the education (independent school standards) regulations 2014 (relating to the responsibilities of independent schools to have effective anti-bullying strategies), and to the common law tort of negligence. taking legal action given the time and potential expense involved, nobody would be advised to issue court proceedings without having first fully explored all of the non-legal ways to resolve the problem. however, where a school is reminded of its legal obligations, but still fails to take effective action to address the bullying, then legal action may be taken. of course, this significantly escalates the matter, and it is likely that if legal proceedings are issued, the school will be required to respond to the claim by a certain date, and both parties will be required to provide and exchange evidence in accordance with a timetable set by the court. importantly, it remains open to the school (or its legal representative) to communicate with the person bringing the claim to find a way to resolve or settle the issue out of court. the court’s externally imposed timetable can act as significant motivation towards achieving this outcome. cases are frequently settled out of court. indeed, analyses of court statistics confirm ‘most civil claims are settled without a hearing’ (sturge, 2021, p. 12). some cases do, however, proceed to trial, and reported cases indicate that claims brought in relation to bullying have been based primarily in the tort of negligence; where the remedy is money (called ‘damages’ in the context of a civil court claim) to compensate the child for psychiatric or physical harm suffered as a result of the school’s breach of its duty of care. for example, in h v isle of wight council [2001] all er (d) 315 a mother brought a claim against her local council, asserting that the headteacher of her daughter’s former school (for which the council was responsible) had failed to protect her from being harassed and bullied by a group of girls who were also pupils at the school. similarly, action was taken against a local council in bradford-smart v west sussex county council [2002] all er (d) 167), where it was claimed that a school had failed to take action to address bullying which was taking place both inside and outside of school. both of these claims were unsuccessful, and they demonstrate how challenging it is to evidence all of the discrete elements required to establish the tort of negligence. for example, it is necessary for the person making the claim to establish that a duty of care existed towards the pupil, that the school breached this duty of care, and that this breach caused the harm which the pupil suffered (bradford-smart v west sussex county council para. 38). and because this relates to school staff carrying out their professional duties, the standard they will be judged by is the so-called bolam test ‘whether a responsible body of professional opinion would have taken that course’ (para. 27). d. watkins 107 as already noted, where a child is subject to bullying at school, then this is also potentially a breach of article 3 of the echr (‘no one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment’). as explained earlier in this article, much of the echr was incorporated into the human rights act 1998; meaning that a person can now seek redress for a violation of an echr right through a domestic court. an example is webster v ridgeway foundation school [2010] all er (d) 52, where a claim was brought against a state school, following an incident when a 15-year-old boy, henry webster, was seriously assaulted on school grounds. henry had argued with another school pupil that day and they agreed to have a fight on the school tennis courts after school. unknown to henry, the other pupil had called his brother, who also came to the tennis courts, together with other friends and relatives, some of whom were adults. one of them attacked henry with a hammer, causing him significant head injuries. the claim was again based primarily in negligence, arguing the school had breached its duty of care to take reasonable care to keep henry safe while he was on the school’s premises. it was further argued, under the human rights act 1998, that the school was a public authority (as required by s.6 of the act) and it had failed to protect henry from the treatment prohibited in article 3. neither element of the claim was successful. the court decided, based on the complex facts of the case, that the elements to establish negligence on the part of the school had not been established. for the school to have breached its positive obligation to protect henry from the treatment prohibited in article 3, it would have been necessary for it to have known (or ought to have known) that there was a real and immediate risk of the attack taking place – which, on the facts, it did not. additional complications arise when we consider the position of independent, fee-paying schools. where a child is subject to bullying at such a school, they are able to bring a claim based in negligence against the school – just as described in the cases already discussed. however, regarding article 3 claims under the human rights act 1998, fee-paying schools are private organisations and so arguably do not fall within the definition of a ‘public authority’ under s. 6. nevertheless, case law from the ecthr indicates that the uk government could still be held liable for a breach of article 3 in this situation. campbell and cosans v uk (1982) 4 ehrr 293 and costello-roberts v. uk (1993) 19 ehrr 112 led to the uk government banning corporal punishment in state schools in 1987, and in fee-paying schools in 1999. in costelloroberts, the court emphasised ‘the state cannot absolve itself from responsibility by delegating its obligations to private bodies or individuals’ (para. 27). arguably then, just as the state could be responsible for the acts of a headmaster inflicting corporal punishment in a feepaying school, the state could be held responsible for a breach of article 3 arising from its failure to protect a child from bullying in this environment. but is domestic law actually effective here? the cases discussed above indicate that where a child suffers psychiatric or physical harm from human rights education review volume 5(2) 108 bullying, and they (via a litigation friend) bring a claim based in negligence against a school, they face some very significant challenges in establishing the necessary elements of their claim. at first sight this seems counter-productive to the argument put forward in the article; domestic law is being advocated as a solution, but the reported claims have been largely unsuccessful. three points can be made in response to this. firstly, as already stated, most civil claims are settled out of court. although they are certainly relevant and influential as precedents, the reported cases discussed here are not necessarily representative of how all claims are dealt with. secondly, even if these cases are representative, then middlemiss argues this lack of an effective remedy for children who are bullied in itself ‘breaches their human rights and their rights under the un convention on the rights of the child 1989.’ as a solution, he proposes ‘the introduction of a new statute that provides civil remedies for victims of bullying’ (2012, p. 253). in other words, domestic law is proposed here to resolve the insufficiency of the current domestic law to address this wide scale rights violation. lastly, as will be discussed further below, domestic law provides the bases for other forms of legal action which children may not currently be aware of but can become aware of through hre. other forms of legal action in its advice concerning informal steps that can be taken to address a problem of bullying in school, one organisation advises that ‘bullying someone because of their gender, gender identity, sexuality, religious beliefs, race, skin colour or because they have a disability, is hate crime and against the law’ (nspcc, 2021). in these circumstances, this organisation recommends that a child or their parent report this to the police or contact citizen's advice or childline for further advice and support (nspcc, 2021). this is good advice, but arguably it should not be confined to incidents of hate crime. as this author has noted elsewhere (watkins, 2016) the wide range of behaviours which constitute bullying (including cyberbullying) give rise to a correspondingly wide range of sanctions under criminal law, provided the person carrying out these behaviours is aged 10 years or over (the age of criminal responsibility under english law). in light of the seriousness of the assault, readers may not be surprised that those involved in the attack on henry webster were convicted of causing grievous bodily harm with intent contrary to s. 18 of the offences against the person act 1861; and the person who wielded the hammer was sentenced to 8 years in a young offenders institution. however, readers unfamiliar with criminal law may be surprised to know that it is possible to commit a criminal offence (known as ‘common assault’) with or without using physical violence. this is described succinctly as follows: common assault is when a person inflicts violence on someone else or makes them think they are going to be attacked. it does not have to involve physical violence. d. watkins 109 threatening words or a raised fist is enough for the crime to have been committed provided the victim thinks that they are about to be attacked. spitting at someone is another example. (sentencing council, 2022) importantly, this can be a single incident. the ‘criterion of repetition’ which is inherent in definitions of bullying (greene, 2006, p. 64) is a social construct rather than a legal one. so apart from prosecutions brought under the protection from harassment act 1997, there is no need for bullying behaviours to form a pattern, or to be repeated, in order for the criminal law to apply to them (middlemiss, 2012, p. 244). domestic law can also be relied on to bring a civil claim for damages (money) against the bully or bullies themselves, as in english tort law children are regarded both as being ‘capable of owing and being owed legal duties’ (bagshaw, 2001, p. 148). for example, mullin v richards [1998] 1 wlr 1304 involved a claim brought in negligence on behalf of a 15-year-old school pupil, teresa mullin, against heidi richards, who was also aged 15. they had been involved in a play fight with plastic rulers at school. heidi’s ruler snapped, and a piece of plastic flew into teresa's eye, causing her serious injury. although some elements of negligence were established (including, importantly, that a duty of care arose between the two pupils), the claim was not successful, as the court decided that the injury teresa suffered was not ‘reasonably foreseeable’. the test applied was not whether heidi’s actions ‘were such as an ordinarily prudent and reasonable adult… would have realised gave rise to a risk of injury’ but whether ‘an ordinarily prudent and reasonable 15-year-old schoolgirl in heidi’s situation would have realised as much’ (mullin v richards, per hutchison lj). this same test would apply in the context of any claim in negligence brought against a child, including a case where an injury has been caused as a result of bullying. it is not suggested that in order to address the problem of bullying, all children who bully should be sued or criminalised. however, it is suggested that alongside a knowledge of their human rights, knowledge of the wide applicability of domestic law here could play a role in hre, emphasising for children that all forms of bullying behaviour are potentially criminal acts or may give rise to civil liabilities, even where only a single incident occurs. in turn, it is hoped that rather than seeing bullying as something that ‘just happens’, children will speak up, raise new questions and take action to confront situations which they might otherwise have accepted as inevitable. importantly, it is argued here that ‘taking action’ includes taking legal action, where necessary. exploring the role of domestic law in hre – education through human rights the description of hre as being through human rights relates to hre practice and recognises that ‘the context and the way human rights learning is organised and imparted has to be human rights education review volume 5(2) 110 consistent with human rights values’ (council of europe, 2020, p. 19). clearly, hre is expected to take place in an environment where children’s rights (including their participatory rights) are respected. on one level this can simply mean we design hre activities in a way that fosters discussion and debate. some of the domestic laws discussed in this article represent rich resources for these types of activities. however, when we educate children about the steps that they can take to remedy an injustice, drawing on domestic law, we do so with the intention of making them more likely to act. this can result in disruption to the context where the learning takes place. as mejias and starkey observe, transformative hre which takes place in a school can ‘challenge many of the premises on which schools operate’ (2012, p. 126), and it can become apparent that the school will need to make significant changes to its operations and culture for the human rights of all members of the school to be realised. again, in the context of school, rinaldi (2017) reports teachers’ concerns about the disruption which may ensue if students are encouraged to act when they recognise a rights violation. mejias’ (2017) account of a student protest at a uk human rights friendly school provides an example of this. admittedly then, the idea that transformative hre should include educating children and young people to initiate domestic legal proceedings may be considered too radical by some, and perhaps inappropriate to some contexts. nevertheless, this article has sought to demonstrate that there are contexts where this approach is not only appropriate but necessary. as lundy and martinez observe, ‘rather than providing protection, for many children school is a place where they are beaten, abused, bullied or attacked’ (2018, p. 16) and, as struthers (2021) has also emphasised recently in the context of hre, we know that many children suffer abuse and neglect in their home environments. as struthers concludes, ‘only through equipping children with accurate, detailed and comprehensive knowledge and understanding of their rights –and the protection mechanisms for those rights – will they be able to recognise and address violations of rights in their lived experiences’ (2021, p. 58). conclusion this article concludes by acknowledging that for scholars in hre, the foregrounding of domestic law and domestic legal processes proposed in this article represents a significant challenge to the status quo. for those in the field of legal capability, with its traditional focus on justiciability and domestic law, the incorporation of children’s rights under the uncrc may be equally unsettling. nevertheless, it is suggested that for scholars working in both fields, these challenges might be considered positively disruptive, or at least potentially beneficial. as already discussed, an important element of transformative hre is supporting learners to come to a realisation that their subjective reality is objectively unjust. this is also considered d. watkins 111 an essential dimension in legal capability, although expressed in different terms (recognising a problem as a problem, and then as a problem with legal dimensions). gibson and grant describe this process as ‘get[ting] our students to see the water in which they swim’ (2017, p. 225) and this provides a useful illustration for the final point of this article. gibson and grant are referring here to a parable written by david foster wallace (19622008). the full parable is as follows: there are these two young fish swimming along, and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says, ‘morning, boys. how’s the water?’ and the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes, ‘what the hell is water?’ (wallace, 2005) the parable reminds us that it is those practices we currently consider normal or ‘the way things are done around here’ require our constant critical attention. indeed, the way the parable is written offers a further reminder of this. the term ‘morning, boys’ may well have unsettled the reader, as it seems to indicate an assumption that the protagonists in the story are male. perhaps if he were writing this today, wallace might choose more gender-neutral language to describe the young fish; or at least we might hope so. just as wallace said of himself, we are not the wise old fish in this parable (wallace, 2005). we need to question the apparently unquestionable aspects of our thinking and our practice, and an underlying aim of the arguments set out in this article is to provide a basis for doing so. acknowledgements project fortitude has received funding from the european research council under the european union’s horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement no. 818457). the author thanks and acknowledges the contributions of dr sophia gowers, dr naomi lott and professor pascoe pleasence to discussions concerning the relevance (or not) of children’s rights under the uncrc in the early stages of the 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(2018). exploring children’s understanding of law in their everyday lives. legal studies, 38(1), 59-78. https://doi.org/10.1017/lst.2017.8 https://www.familylaw.co.uk/docs/pdf-files/2016_01_cflq_025.pdf https://doi.org/10.1017/lst.2017.8 exploring the role of domestic law in human rights education abstract keywords introduction the context exploring the role of domestic law in hre – education about human rights the issue of justiciability the limits of justiciability the ‘complicatedness’ of justiciability exploring the role of domestic law in hre – education for human rights bullying as an example speaking up drawing on domestic law to strengthen a complaint taking legal action but is domestic law actually effective here? other forms of legal action exploring the role of domestic law in hre – education through human rights conclusion acknowledgements references issn 2535-5406 vol 5, no 1 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4549 date received: 15-08-2021 date accepted: 22-11-2021 peer reviewed article © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles human rights education and the conscience of mankind: developing didactics of perplexity lakshmi sigurdsson university college copenhagen, denmark, las@kp.dk kirsten m. andersen. university college south denmark, denmark abstract the preamble of the universal declaration of human rights (udhr) states that ‘disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind’. from this point of departure, we argue that philosophical, political, and religious reflections on core concepts such as conscience, freedom, equality, dignity, justice, and peace can help to create an appropriate balance between a normative framework and a non-affirmative approach to human rights education. teacher students can benefit from philosophical reflection, critical thinking, and individual judgement, as this will enhance the authoritativeness and self-determination of both teachers and learners. in terms of didactics, we consider the potentials of a concept-based approach inspired by the political philosophy of hannah arendt and her critical discussion of the perplexities of the rights of man. keywords human rights, religious education, concept-oriented didactics, worldliness, conscience http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4549 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:las@kp.dk l. sigurdsson & k. andersen 71 human rights education in denmark and didactic challenges in the current political situation in europe there is an urgent need to teach human rights, human solidarity, peace, and security (osler, 2016) as populist ideas and tendencies towards polarisation and radicalisation seem to be growing. although denmark has generally had a high standard for protecting human rights, in recent years we have seen several policy measures that have led to citizens losing some of their procedural guarantees. in its annual report for 2020, the danish institute of human rights (2020) remarks that ‘with this trend, denmark is moving away from the fundamental values on which we have built our society,’ and it calls for ‘political measures to ensure the protection of human rights and the fundamental rights of citizens.’ in recent times some political and legal voices have expressed reservations about human rights. the dialogue on human rights is difficult and easily polarised between those who stress universality and binding legal obligations, and those who want to test the limits of international conventions. the danish institute for human rights, which continuously publishes reports, policy papers and fact sheets on current issues, makes recommendations by weighing different articles and looking at various legal practices. in other words, human rights are not a list of facts but are rooted both in the worldliness of human life and in principles. human rights can never be taken for granted but are reflected by differences of formalism, idealism, and pragmatism (christoffersen, 2018). considering the issue of whether people have human rights, freeman argues that this may give the impression that rights are a kind of thing with a puzzling quality. but human rights, he argues, are just claims and entitlements derived from moral and legal rules. believing in human rights is not a matter of whether they exist, but if there are good reasons to uphold them. and if one ought to have respect for human rights, an ongoing rigour is needed to find sufficiently good reasons for them, as well as a justificatory philosophical theory (freeman, 2017). a possible strengthening of human rights education (hre) may be addressed at several levels of the curriculum: societal, institutional, instructional, and personal/experiential (afdal, 2006; goodlad, 1979). whereas the priority of hre in policy frameworks is a primary condition for a stronger emphasis on human rights in education (osler, 2016), the objective of this article is to consider the didactic challenges of teaching human rights in teacher education and schools. parker sees a need for clarification and strengthening of the hre curriculum and argues that disciplinary concepts such as universal rights, universal respect, human dignity, peaceful coexistence, dissent, and activism should be at the core of the curriculum (parker, 2018, p. 13). in alignment with the united nations (un) declaration on human rights education and training (2011), such concepts fall into the category of education about human rights. parker further emphasises the need for a recontextualisation of knowledge on human rights based on bernstein’s terms, with consideration of the subjects (children and young people), settings (schools) and purposes (general education) (parker, 2018, p.13, bernstein, 2000). this is human rights education review – volume 5(1) 72 related to the level of instruction and how teachers teach the curriculum and relate it to students. depending on the actual context, there may be a need for clarification of the hre curriculum, but we also want to stress that the formal curriculum is not the educational reality, as there may be some distance between policy frameworks and actual classrooms (afdal, 2006). possible conflicts, dilemmas or paradoxes may not be included in the formal curricula but will be part of the actual experiences in the classroom (krukow, 2020), so recontextualisation implies that student teachers need to learn how they can encompass and address the paradoxes and dilemmas as well as the principles and ideals of human rights (see also the reflections in krukow, 2020 based on voluntary hre for amnesty). the formal curriculum for danish teacher education has specified goals for realising human rights and the provisions of the convention of the rights of the child (crc) it addresses the history of ideas concerning rights as well as the dynamics between human rights, religion, and democracy. (ministry of education and research, 2015). the formal aims for the danish folkeskole (municipal primary and lower secondary education) states: ‘the daily activities of the school must be conducted in a spirit of intellectual freedom, equality and democracy.’ (ministry of children and education, 2018). one of the didactic challenges for teachers is to balance hre with democratic formation and the principle of åndsfrihed (intellectual freedom – or rather freedom of mind). the aims for comprehensive schools reflect values of high political and public priority. denmark has a long tradition of emphasising freedom of mind as a central democratic and educational principle. although it is a contested concept, there is a broad consensus on the right to dissent, as freedom of mind includes the freedom to criticise democracy and express anti-democratic views (ank & toft jakobsen, 2020). a central point of reference from the history of ideas is kant’s ‘motto’ that enlightenment means having the courage to use one’s own reasoning. for biesta this implies a democratic educational orientation that will encourage everyone ‘to think for themselves, draw their own conclusions and act upon them, rather than following other people’s orders’ (biesta, 2021, p. 14). in hre, as well as in education at large, the teacher is confronted with the pedagogical paradox of education: ‘how do i cultivate freedom by coercion?’ we follow biesta in considering dietrich benner’s understanding of educational work as helpful in addressing this paradox (biesta, 2021, p. 14; benner, 2015). as education about, for, and through human rights includes ethics, moral education, and critical thinking (osler, 2016), our aim is to consider how a concept-oriented approach (parker, 2018; lenz, 2019; andersen & sigurdsson, 2020) can stimulate learners to reflect on the multiple, equivocal, and historically contingent trajectories of human rights (göndogdu 2011, p. 6). we approach hre from a pedagogical angle based on dietrich benner’s (2005; 2008) non-affirmative theory of formation, while our philosophical analysis builds on the political thinking of hannah arendt. from this dual approach we discuss the qualification of teachers l. sigurdsson & k. andersen 73 to address didactic challenges and dilemmas in the overlapping areas of re and hre (lilja & osbeck, 2020; osler and starkey, 2018). we place this in relation to the pedagogical paradox and argue that teacher students learning about human rights as a legal and normative framework should also have the possibility of a deeper philosophical understanding of and reflection on the basic values that underpin them. the questions we address are the following: how can methodologies based on philosophical reflection, critical thinking, and individual judgement help to qualify teacher students to address paradoxes and dilemmas in hre, as well as in the interplay between hre and re? how might arendt’s analysis of the perplexities of the rights of man contribute to a consideration of the pedagogical paradox in hre? what are the possibilities of a concept-oriented didactic approach in the interplay between hre and re? concept based didactics and the 1948 preamble. two starting points for hre are the universal declaration of human rights (udhr) (united nations, 1948) and the crc (united nations, 1989), and a curriculum for teacher education will include knowledge on core international conventions as well as international law. the didactic approach is often defined as encompassing learning about rights, through rights and for rights (osler & starkey, 2018). the basic idea is to consider hre as a means of transformation but also as a mechanism for transmitting a ‘core of shared values on which just and peaceful democratic societies may be built’ (osler & starkey 2018). the threefold approach to hre has similarities with the traditional structure of citizenship education (ce), encompassing knowledge (learning about), skills (learning through), and values (learning for). but whereas ce is primarily framed within the nation state, hre has a universal scope that is related to a cosmopolitan ideal (kemp 2011; nussbaum, 2019; parker, 2018). recent research has documented how teachers in denmark are generally concerned with the transmission of values and the formation of future citizens (pedersen, böwadt & vaaben, 2020, p.37). but the transmission of values is at the core of the pedagogical paradox, with a possible tension or conflict between normativity and freedom of mind. a common challenge for hre as well as for democratic formation is that human rights and democratic values must be acquired by free consent. this challenge leaves an ambivalence at the core of the pedagogical task. kant defined the challenge of upbringing when he considered how we can combine submission under law with the ability to make use of one’s freedom. the pedagogical paradox is the question of cultivating freedom under coercion (kant, 1803/2000). more recently, benner has argued this paradox to be the basic structure of the pedagogical human rights education review – volume 5(1) 74 interaction (benner, 2005). the moral duty to respect the other as a goal and not a as means entails that even though the relation of teacher and pupil is not an equal one, respect for the other must take the form of recognition. in the pedagogical interaction the teacher as a grownup and the pupil as a growing child share a common cause despite the asymmetric relation. in this common cause lies the possibility of a free and mutual recognition regardless of class or any kind of predetermination of a particular function in society. the requirement of the teacher is to step out of his self-inflicted incapacity and relate to the child as not responsible for its natural incapacity (benner, 2005, pp. 101-105). it is the teacher’s responsibility to address and take care of the open possibility of formation. the practice of the school is to meet the child’s need for learning. human life is a reflective practice, and the teacher must consider the basic paradox that external influence leads to pupil self-reflection (benner 2005). in benner’s view it is characteristic for humans that we come into being through practice. practice is not defined by sheer action. practice as a distinctly human activity requires two criteria. first, practice means doing something with a purpose; second, any kind of practice is always a substantial answer to a need. education is one sphere of practice among others: work, politics, ethics, art, and religion. every sphere meets these two criteria, as different kinds of practice are passed on culturally and not biologically. education is an answer to this need, but teaching neither repairs nor removes the need, once and for all. one can look at the newborn child as incomplete with such open possibility (benner, 1980). as the main task of school is to take care of and challenge the unique and open possibility of formation, the ongoing pedagogical practice of the teacher is to watch out for the moment when the pupil can take over, and the teacher can step aside and become redundant. the aim of the school is to teach the pupils a reflective and critical practice. a non-affirmative formation needs the pedagogical paradox in the basic structure of teaching. the teacher must be aware— particularly when it comes to ethical, political, and religious issues—that much can only come to the mind of the child if the school creates exercises with opportunities for freely encountering matters of the world which the child does not get to know naturally (oettingen 2011, pp 70; 92-110). the paradoxical structure of the pedagogical practice reflects the basic vulnerability of human rights, which is expressed in the political writings of hannah arendt: that all men are created equal is not self-evident, nor can it be proved. we hold this opinion because freedom is possible only among equals, and we believe that the joys and gratifications of free company are to be preferred to the doubtful pleasures of holding dominion. …. their validity depends upon free agreement and consent; they are arrived at by discursive, representative thinking; and they are communicated by l. sigurdsson & k. andersen 75 means of persuasion and dissuasion. (arendt, 1961/1993, p. 247) in addition to the threefold (about – through – for) approach to hre, osler has highlighted the potential of narratives to ‘link legal and ethical frameworks with learners’ own struggles’ and argued that narratives need to be placed centrally within hre (osler, 2016, p. 74). this includes three key elements: (1) information about and experience of democracy and human rights in theory and practice; (2) opportunities to explore and reflect on various identities and cultural attributes, to create personal narratives, and to develop processes of self-learning; and (3) cooperative practice, teamwork, and the development of collective narratives, and study of cognitive models that enable learners as a group to make sense of the world (osler, 2016, p. 75). whereas this approach to hre is comprehensive and multifaceted, we suggest that a concept-based methodology can develop and further support the cognitive element, especially when we address the paradoxes and perplexities of hre. as a point of departure for the didactic reflection, we will outline some central points from the political philosophy of hannah arendt, with special attention to her investigation of thinking in the life of the mind (1971/1978) and the critical reflection on what she calls the perplexities of the rights of man (arendt, 1951/1979; göndogdu, 2011). göndogdu (2011) has convincingly argued that arendt’s critique of human rights is of an aporetic nature, as it is centered on the perplexities and paradoxes of these rights: ‘the rights of man, supposedly inalienable, proved to be unenforceable – even in countries whose constitutions were based upon them – whenever people appeared who were no longer citizens of any sovereign state’ (arendt, 1951/1979, p. 294). aporetic derives its meaning from the greek aporos—an impassable path or unsolvable problem. however, for arendt aporetic becomes a methodological orientation that does not paralyse but rather paves the way for ‘rearticulating human rights beyond the binaries that prevail in the conventional understanding of these rights’ (göndogdu, 2011, p. 7) – binaries such as man/citizen; universal/particular; nature/history. in the life of the mind arendt describes how plato’s socratic dialogues are aporetic in the sense that ‘the argument either leads nowhere or goes around in circles’ (arendt, 1971/1978, p. 168). it is characteristic for concepts that ‘when we try to define them, they get slippery.’ therefore, the important point is not that socrates discovered the concept, but that we ask what he did when he discovered it (arendt, 1971/1978, p. 170). arendt characterises the socratic approach to concept-dialogue through three ‘similes’ (metaphors) that he applied to himself: the gadfly, the midwife and the ‘electric ray’ (a fish that paralyses and numbs by contact) (arendt, 1971/1978, p. 172). the gadfly represents a sting that will arouse the citizens from a condition of sleeping to thinking and examination. human rights education review – volume 5(1) 76 the midwife represents the ability to purge people of those unexamined pre-judgements that would prevent them from thinking and help them get rid of bad opinions without giving them truth. finally, socrates ‘remains steadfast in his own perplexities, and like the electric ray, paralyzed himself, paralyzes anyone he comes into contact with’ (arendt, 1971/1978, p. 173). but what seems to be paralysing from the outside can, according to arendt, be ‘felt as the highest state of being active and alive’ and, as such, indeed be a very productive moment (göndogdu, 2011, p. 8). the aporias and the perplexities they cause appear in two ways in arendt’s analysis of human rights. first, they are ultimately groundless, as is expressed in the statement that the claimed equality is neither self-evident, nor can it be proved (göndogdu, 2011, p. 5). as göndogdu elaborates: ‘despite endless search for normative foundations to clarify their subject, scope, and ground, they continue to be defined in terms of tensions between man/citizen, universal/particular, natural/history’ (göndogdu, 2011, p. 9). second, there is an often tense, and at times even conflictual, relationship between human rights and the institutional structures established to protect them. arendt traces the source of this perplexity to ‘the unbridgeable abyss … between living in solitude and living together’ (arendt, 2005, p. 85), the very condition of plurality among humans. this abyss is apparent in plato’s definition of politics as different from labour, on the one hand, and philosophy, on the other. either sheer utility or rationality defines the human area of politics. in a historical perspective arendt explains how the church transformed this reservation and made solitude a possibility for everybody, not something limited to a few. the search for truth in solitude, whether this search is a contemplation of the idea of ideas, or if it cares for the salvation of the soul, confines the political space (arendt, 2005, pp. 137-139). within this distinction, the unbridgeable abyss, arendt defines the limits of politics. in relation to this second perplexity of human rights, issues concerning religion, culture, and identity make it particularly complex to teach in the interplay between re and hre. but the analysis and discussion of human rights in arendt’s work also reflects the historical context of the 1948 declaration. a central concept for arendt, as well as for the udhr, is conscience. the conscience of mankind the preamble of the udhr calls upon the conscience of mankind. arendt witnessed the collapse of human rights the moment large groups of people in the nineteen-thirties became refugees in the heart of europe. with no state to secure their rights, there were millions who did not even have a minimum of rights. in the collapse of politics, she turned to the promise of politics, claiming at the same time that there were limits. ‘it is the question whether conscience can exist in a secular society and play a role in secular politics’ (arendt, 2005, p. 22). it is central that politics deals with the coexistence and association of different people, l. sigurdsson & k. andersen 77 whereas ‘man, as philosophy and theology know him, exists – in politics only in the equal rights that those who are most different guarantee for each other’ (arendt, 2005, p. 94). man, for arendt, is synonymous with human being. it is an apolitical concept because politics arises in what lies between men and is thus outside of man. this emphasises the relational nature of politics and implies a critical approach to the western tradition of substituting history for politics: ‘in the idea of world history, the multiplicity of men is melted into one human individual, which is then also called humanity. this is the source of the monstrous and inhuman aspect of history, which first accomplishes its full and brutal end in politics.’ thus, politics and legal institutions are needed to secure plurality in the world of humans and to avoid a deterioration to a right of sameness for every individual. arendt is critical of the idea of natural law as found in hobbes and rousseau and prefers montesquieu. she is a pragmatist who is less suspicious of prejudice than of ideology. whereas prejudice in the form of prejudgment lies behind all judgements, ideologies pretend to understand all historical and political reality. however, prejudices, the inherited common sense of a bygone context, must be examined and replaced by judgement and dedication. prejudices easily turn into pseudotheories according to arendt, the promise of politics lies in the unfolding of the core concepts of human rights, freedom, and equality. ‘freedom exists only in the unique intermediary space of politics’ (arendt, 2005, pp. 102-103). in line with socratic methodology, arendt looks at the conventional accounts of human rights and shows how—just like the everyday concepts of socrates—the term has become ‘slippery’. her goal is not to demonstrate that human rights are void or without meaning, but rather to ‘open a critical space for their evaluation’ (göndogdu, 2011, p.9). the critical concept-based investigation helps to avoid two problematic approaches to human rights: 1) drawing arguments for human rights from binary thinking, which ultimately leads to abstractions; 2) the temptation to turn to absolutes in a process of foundation-giving (a transcendent or metaphysical source of authority). from this analysis of the implicit perplexities of human rights and the socratic approach to concept-dialogue, we will turn to the connection between critical thinking and concept-based learning. concept-based learning in line with socratic methodology, an education based on critical thinking should not seek to give final answers to questions of definition, but ‘enable learners to investigate the possible meanings of concepts, reflect on the conditions that inform their own and others’ way of understanding, and negotiate reasonable and adequate definitions with others’ (lenz, 2019 p. 73). concept-based learning is often included in school subjects such as history, religious studies, and ethics. didactic tools for concept exploration can also be found in the methodologies of philosophy for children (martens, 1999; kallesøe & groth, 2016). lenz has human rights education review – volume 5(1) 78 presented a methodology for concept-learning, drawing on the conceptual history of koselleck (lenz, 2019) and the phenomenological notion of worldliness in arendt’s political thinking (lenz, 2019). koselleck argued that a history of concepts must investigate the interplay between social structures and concepts, seeing these as ‘containers of historical experience’ (lenz, 2019; koselleck, 2007). lenz suggests that the exploration of concepts can ‘become a source of worldliness and contribute to the learner’s capacity to take part in and build the realm of common affairs’, and that such exploration of the differing meanings that concepts have in different contexts can ‘become a source of critical thinking, mutual understanding, and political agency’ (lenz, 2019, p. 67). the methodology includes three aspects of concept exploration: (1) reflecting on individual pre-assumptions, (2) synchronic analysis, (3) diachronic analysis (p. 74). the methodology of lenz is exemplified through a division and diversity workshop for teachers and teacher trainers, based on participatory and collaborative group work where the concepts of normality, minority and multiculturality are examined. this methodology is very appropriate for workshop activities and the explorative approach to concepts is also relevant in the qualification of student teachers for hre. but we suggest a further development for teacher education; one that includes more philosophical, historical, and didactic reflection on basic hr concepts and facilitates reflection on the differences between learning about rights, through rights and for rights. we would like to investigate how concept-oriented didactics for student teachers can be informed by the analysis of thinking and the relationship between the faculties of thinking, willing and judgement in arendt’s last major treatise, life of the mind, published after her death in 1975. in the next section we will briefly introduce some basic features of arendt’s complex work on thinking which will provide the foundation of a conceptual didactic model. thinking and the banality of evil the question of thinking runs through most of arendt’s work, from the origins of totalitarianism (1951) and the human condition (1958), through her report from the trial of adolf eichmann in jerusalem in 1961, which she covered for the new yorker, as well as a number of essays and articles. she controversially described eichmann as a banal rather than an intentionally evil figure. banality is for arendt not stupidity, but rather a sheer thoughtlessness and a total lack of imagination, and what the court demanded was that human beings must be capable of ‘telling right from wrong, even when all they have to guide them is their own judgement, which moreover, happens to be completely at odds with what they must regard as the unanimous opinion of all those around them.’ (arendt, 1963/1994, p. 295). l. sigurdsson & k. andersen 79 arendt analyses the relationship between the faculty of judgement, the use of imagination and the quality of thinking through questions that have profound implication for education, questions such as ‘how is it possible for a person living in a totalitarian system to tell right from wrong?’ when public communication, education, and respectable society have turned ethics upside-down and established norms and values that contradict human dignity and diversity, and when discrimination and dehumanisation are legalised and criminal acts are sanctioned and demanded by the government how then is it possible for the individual human being to trust his own judgement and conscience and go against the stream? even in democratic societies these questions may challenge us to critically consider the meaning of freedom in education as well as the distinction between teaching what to think and how to think (council of europe, 2016). politics for arendt is related to the fact of human plurality, as it deals with the coexistence and association of different individuals (arendt, 2005, p. 93). politics arises between these individuals and is established in relationships. human plurality has the twofold character of equality and distinction: ‘just as there exists no human being as such, but only men and women who in their absolute distinctness are the same, that is human, so this shared human sameness is the equality that in turn manifests itself only in the absolute distinction from another’ (arendt, 2005, p. 62). this principle of equality-in-difference (benhabib, 1996) contrasts with totalitarian attempts to erase human plurality and freedom and eliminate all spontaneity, thus transforming the human personality into a mere thing (arendt, 1951/2000, p. 119). the fundamental view of human existence is not the lonely subject but the self-disclosure of the individual in speech and action. ‘with words and deeds, we insert ourselves into the human world, and this insertion is like a second birth, in which we confirm and take upon ourselves the naked fact of our original physical appearance’ (arendt, 1958/1998, pp. 176177). arendt calls this second birth ‘natality’. natality is the ability to begin something new, which is inherent in the constant influx of newcomers into the world. and natality is connected to the principle of freedom and the unpredictability of human action—both of which totalitarian ideologies attempt to control and suppress. as mentioned above, consciousness is a central concept in the udhr preamble of 1948. arendt’s analytical methodology is anchored in philosophical phenomenology and her argumentation reflects a socratic conceptorientation. in relation to hre it is relevant to look at the concept of consciousness and the way she relates this concept to thinking. later we will unfold possible implications of this analysis for the structure of concept-based hre. human rights education review – volume 5(1) 80 consciousness and conscience the process of thinking is connected to, but not the same as, consciousness. the act of thinking is dialectical and proceeds in the form of a silent dialogue: ‘the inner duality of myself with myself that makes thinking a true activity, in which i am both the one who asks and the one who answers.’ (arendt, 1971/1978, p. 186). this inner plurality is founded in the socratic criterion of inner agreement: being consistent within oneself. through the discourse of the soul, man is two-in-one, and thinking is both dialectical and critical as it goes through a process of questioning and answering (arendt, 1971/1978, p. 191). without consciousness in the sense of self-awareness, thinking would not be possible. and consciousness is connected to conscience in the sense that each of us has an inner witness who awaits us and will pose critical questions, ‘if and when you come home’ (arendt, 1971/ 1978, p. 191). thus, conscience becomes an afterthought; it does not give positive prescriptions but states the claim of self-examination. its criterion for action will not be ‘the usual rules, recognised by multitudes and agreed upon by society, but whether i shall be able to live with myself in peace when the time has come to think about my deeds and words.’ (arendt, 1971/1978, p. 191) in this sense, the banality of evil, eichmann’s sheer thoughtlessness, refers to a lack of thinking. conscience is not a matter of wickedness or goodness as it is not a matter of intelligence or stupidity. the inability to think has nothing to do with a lack of brain power, but ‘everybody may come to shun that intercourse with oneself’—and against that background arendt points to the relation between thinking and ethical judgement: ‘is our ability to judge, to tell right from wrong, beautiful from ugly, dependent upon our faculty of thought? do the inability to think and a disastrous failure of what we commonly call conscience coincide?’ (arendt, 1966/2003, p. 160). the practice of judgement is then related to two—or three—interconnected aspects: (1) first, common sense as understood by kant in critique of judgement as ‘a sense which fits us into a community with others, makes us members of it and enables us to communicate things given by our private five senses’ (arendt, 1966/2003, p. 139). common sense works through the imaginative capacity, the enlarged mentality whereby we can create representations of other people in our minds. when judging, we take others into account, considering, but not necessarily conforming to, their judgements. thus, judgement is not entirely subjective but rather intersubjective. but the practice of judgement gets more complicated in times of historical crises, when facing ‘a total collapse of moral and religious standards’, as there is really nothing to hold on to when we are called upon to decide that this is right and that is wrong (arendt, 1966/2003, pp. 142 l. sigurdsson & k. andersen 81 143). in such situations arendt proposes (2) the use of examples or ‘exemplary thought’. examples are the ‘go-carts’ of all judging activities (as kant expressed it) and the guideposts of moral thought. examples are linked to narratives and stories: achilles exemplifies courage, solon insight, and jesus of nazareth goodness (arendt, 1989, p. 84). storytelling is a fundamental human activity, and in arendt’s interpretation of the human condition narrativity is constitutive of identity. action as well as human identity has a narrative structure as we take part in a constant retelling, re-evaluation, and reconfiguration of the past. thinking and judgement are thus connected to the inner plurality, the use of imagination in the enlarged mentality, and the use of examples. but it is also the nature of thinking (3) ‘to undo, unfreeze, as it were, what language, the medium of thinking, has frozen into thought – words’ (arendt, 1971/1978, p. 175). the ‘wind of thought’ is (in line with socrates) a purging that can undermine all established criteria, values, measurements, and prejudgements. and this destructive aspect of thinking has political implications because the destruction has a liberating effect on the faculty of judgement: ‘the manifestation of this wind of thought is no knowledge, it is the ability to tell right from wrong, beautiful from ugly. and this indeed may prevent catastrophes, at least for myself, in the rare moments when the chips are down’ (arendt, 1971/1978, p. 189). in teacher education, we find that concepts like plurality, equality, rights, freedom, conscience, and judgement can be investigated and discussed through a didactic methodology based on arendt’s interpretation of thinking. this involves a combination of three elements: (1) individual preconceptions and thinking (previous knowledge, experience, and ideas); (2) an imaginative approach to history, ethics, religion, and political philosophy in relation to human rights; and (3) cooperative and participatory activities based on dialogue, active listening, and negotiation (sigurdsson, 2019). the didactic model below (figure 1) structures an exploration of concepts through a combination of three interconnected dimensions: (a) individual reflection on a given concept. each student should have time to think and take notes, and possibly draw a mind-map of the concept. this creates a space for uncovering preconceptions and everyday language, but also for exploring how these can be questioned in a socratic manner; (b) dialogue in groups or in the whole class. this can be structured in different ways (concept-exploration, taking different roles, dialogical methodology for active listening and explorative questioning, etc.); (c) use of examples, narratives and definitions from the history of ideas, religious traditions, literature, or history. the teacher will need to find relevant sources—such as longer texts, thought-provoking quotes, cases from history, media-clips, or stories—to inspire and qualify the concept-exploration. the dynamic of the model is illustrated by the two-way arrows, as the teacher(s) may choose to start from any of the three points. however, all three dimensions should be included to stimulate connections between them. human rights education review – volume 5(1) 82 the exploration can be supported by questions such as: where and how do we find this concept in the history of ideas or in specific religious traditions? when and how has it been an object of conflict and paved the way for new interpretations? what is my own understanding of this value or concept? how do i relate to it? which questions or hesitations does it raise? finally, the use of cases or questions can facilitate dialogue and negotiation and ability to engage in communities of disagreement (iversen, 2019) on current dilemmas and challenges in relation to the chosen concept. in hre, relevant concepts for such investigation can be introduced through selections from the udhr preamble: e.g., inherent dignity; equal and inalienable rights; freedom, justice, peace, and the conscience of mankind. another relevant starting point would be the crc (united nations, 1989), with concepts such as culture, religion, family, protection, and responsibility. figure 1: (sigurdsson, 2019) as part of their training for teaching human rights, student teachers must learn to address the complex and demanding political and ethical dilemmas that are shaped by historically contingent events and conditions, and which can enable or undermine democratic struggles for rights (göndogdu, 2011, p. 15). this includes an honest approach to the perplexities of human rights, but also an introduction to the history of human rights which can illuminate how political actors negotiate these perplexities and how historical events shape and transform human rights politics. examining the history of ideas as well as the relation between human rights and religion l. sigurdsson & k. andersen 83 should not be structured as a search for absolutes but rather be inspired by the image of pearldiving. arendt used this picture to describe how the thinking of the present can work with the ‘thought fragments’ of the past: ‘like a pearl diver who descends to the bottom of the sea, not to excavate the bottom and bring it to light but to pry loose the rich and strange, the pearls and the corals in the depths and to carry them to the surface, the thinking delves into the depths of the past’ (arendt, 1983, p. 206). the purpose is not to conserve the past, but to let these strange, beautiful, crystallised thought fragments disturb, renew, and transform the present—and in this way also allow the pearls and corals we have found to unfreeze our subjective preconceptions, thoughts, and doctrines (arendt, 1968). in the following we will further develop the concept-oriented approach in the interplay between hre and re. didactic examples of the interplay between religious education and human rights education one of the core concepts of politics, as well as of hre, is freedom. the concept of freedom of religion is not that easy to define (freeman, 2017). according to the udhr articles 1 and 18, all human beings are equal and free in dignity and rights, and everyone has the freedom of thought, the freedom to have a religion and the freedom to change one’s religion. but what if a religious group condemns those who want to leave the religion or convert to another? the freedom to condemn violates the right of the individual to convert. how can one make sense of human rights if one article violates another one? these articles are potentially contradictory (freeman, 2017), and it is important that a concept-based approach includes reflection on any possible incompatibility. when we look at the judeo-christian tradition, freedom is also at the core of the narratives of the books of genesis and exodus (bibelen. autoriseret. det danske bibelselskab [the bible, authorised. the danish bible company], 1992). the understanding of freedom is played out in a web of narratives that combine the pact of abraham with the sign of male circumcision (gen 12, 1-3; 17,1-14), the escape from slavery through the desert under the guidance of moses, and god giving the law on sinai prior to entry into the promised land (ex.) religious rituals are rooted in ancient traditions and, in some respects, they may seem to conflict with human rights while at the same time they are a source of morality and identity. in recent times, male circumcision has become a controversial issue in society as well as in teaching. over the last few decades, with less and less knowledge of the judeo-christian tradition and biblical narratives and a general lack of religious literacy, the context in which male circumcision is evaluated has changed. currently, ideas of an atheistic rationality and individual health issues hold promises of a better life. in the classroom the dilemmas are religious, philosophical, ethical, and political. the current situation seems to be a case of sound rationality over and against a tradition. in public debate this may be sidelined by accusations of child abuse or human rights education review – volume 5(1) 84 defended as a prophylactic intervention for health reasons. thus, it takes an extra effort for students to understand the context of religious narrative and ritual. the danish institute of human rights recently published a report and a policy paper (2020) showing how both sides, arguing for and against prohibition of male circumcision, claim to have human rights on their side. internationally, interpretations of human rights are not identical, but all states support parents’ choice to pass on the religious tradition when it comes to male circumcision. this role of the family is articulated in the preamble of the crc. it is the ‘fundamental group of society and the natural environment for growth and well-being’ and the child ‘should grow up in a family environment, in an atmosphere of happiness, love and understanding’, and at the same time be ‘brought up … in the spirit of peace, dignity, tolerance, freedom, equality and solidarity’ (united nations, 1989). both art. 14 & 29 consider the rights of the child in relation to parents and the surrounding society, and both open more possibilities for interpreting the concept of freedom and religious freedom. art 14.1: ‘states parties shall respect the right of the child to freedom of thought, conscience and religion’. art 29 1(c): ‘respect for the child's parents, his or her own cultural identity, language, and values’. male circumcision is a case where the concept-based approach will allow space for investigating different concepts of freedom. history can be looked into in order to interpret biblical and other religious narratives, testimonials, and symbols of cultural memory, and to consider the importance of belonging, and reflect on different worldviews. in comparison with specific core concepts of human rights—such as inherent dignity, equal and inalienable rights, freedom, justice, peace, and the conscience of mankind—cross-examination could open up for a discussion of different value systems that exist side by side in today’s liberal and plural society. working out the concepts according to the model, the students could deepen their reflection on how human rights differ from other kinds of rights. how do human rights differ from legal rights or desirable social objectives (freeman, 2017)? other relevant starting points would be concepts such as culture, religion, family, protection, and responsibility. the concept of freedom should be approached from as many angles as possible such as investigating personal experiences of freedom, reading different accounts and interpretations of the practice, discussing how some political decisions led to emancipation, while others led to restriction of freedom of mind. this would also include how freedom of religion relates to the sharing of memory and rituals and reflects questions of ultimate concern in human life. to teach in a non-affirmative way is to present obstacles, create discussions and give assignments that will encourage critical thinking. pupils should reflect on different kinds of freedom and consider what kind of legal institutions it takes to manage dilemmas in the field of human action. l. sigurdsson & k. andersen 85 another obvious point of departure for a concept-based approach to hre is to invite teacher students to reflect on the preamble of the udhr of 1948. the reference to the barbarous acts of world war ii is apparent in the preamble, and there is a very distinct formulation—‘which have outraged the conscience of mankind’. what is the conscience of mankind? what is the difference between, or maybe rather the connection between the agent and conscience of a single human being and the conscience of mankind? a preliminary dialogue with teacher students could take the concept of conscience as a starting point. is the feeling of what is right or wrong an intuition, an internal dialogue, or a reflection which offers guidance on how to respond in action and thinking? does it make sense to talk about a collective conscience? is conscience empathic or socially adaptable? in such a dialogue the use of different similes can be focused on, and the conversation can be deepened. the conscience of mankind could reflect the boundless will to communicate, the common and plural reference of memory as a gesture of a retrospective conscience, and the will to imagine and act politically by legislation on a prospective conscience. koselleck’s concept-based approach to history and social science relies on the hermeneutical principle that focusing on concepts creates the possibility to become contemporary with the uncontemporary, with situations, decisions, and human acts of another time (nevers, 2007). for teacher students the concept-based approach opens for other possible didactics when they prepare their own teaching. concept-based didactics will allow for a combination of examples from a wide range of contemporary and historical contexts, inner dialogue, imagination, and interaction between the pupils in groups and in pairs. maintaining the courage to grapple with the perplexities of the rights of man can help student teachers to understand how these are manifested in ‘new forms of rightlessness as well as new struggles for equality that can reinvent the meaning of human rights’ (göndogdu, 2011, p. 19), and to consider the paradoxical structure of pedagogy as they engage in the complex 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(2018). human rights education’s curriculum problem. human rights education review, 1(1), 05–24. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2450 pedersen, r., böwadt, p. r. & vaaben, n. (2019). på tærsklen til at blive lærer. studerendes overvejelser om deres kommende arbejdsliv [on the threshold of becoming teacher. student’s considerations of their future work life]. copenhagen: københavns professionshøjskole. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctvw04kj6.8 https://doi.org/10.1080/03057240.2019.1678462 https://eng.uvm.dk/primary-and-lower-secondary-education/the-folkeskole/the-aims-of-the-folkeskole https://eng.uvm.dk/primary-and-lower-secondary-education/the-folkeskole/the-aims-of-the-folkeskole https://www.retsinformation.dk/eli/lta/2015/1068 https://doi.org/10.4159/9780674242975 https://doi.org/10.1080/00131911.2018.1388616 https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2450 l. sigurdsson & k. andersen 89 sigurdsson, l. (2019). citizenship and religion in troublesome times. in e. amnå (ed.), nordic education in a democratically troublesome time: threats and opportunities (pp. 30-33). retrieved from https://www.divaportal.org/smash/get/diva2:1346483/fulltext01.pdf united nations. (1948). universal declaration of human rights. 10 december 1948, res/217a (iii). retrieved from https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declarationof-human-rights united nations. (1989). convention on the rights of the child. united nations, treaty series, vol. 1577, p. 3. retrieved from https://treaties.un.org/pages/viewdetails.aspx?src=ind&mtdsg_no=iv-11&chapter=4 united nations. (2011). united nations declaration on human rights education and training. res/66/137. retrieved from https://documents-ddsny.un.org/doc/undoc/gen/n11/467/04/pdf/n1146704.pdf?openelement https://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:1346483/fulltext01.pdf https://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:1346483/fulltext01.pdf https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights https://treaties.un.org/pages/viewdetails.aspx?src=ind&mtdsg_no=iv-11&chapter=4 https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/undoc/gen/n11/467/04/pdf/n1146704.pdf?openelement https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/undoc/gen/n11/467/04/pdf/n1146704.pdf?openelement human rights education and the conscience of mankind: developing didactics of perplexity abstract keywords human rights education in denmark and didactic challenges concept based didactics and the 1948 preamble. the conscience of mankind concept-based learning thinking and the banality of evil consciousness and conscience didactic examples of the interplay between religious education and human rights education references issn 2535-5406 vol 5, no 1 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4452 date received: 09-05-2021 date accepted: 17-11-2021 peer reviewed article © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles human rights education as a framework for transmitting religion as cultural heritage eva lindhardt university college copenhagen, denmark, evli@kp.dk abstract the child’s right to freedom of religion and belief and fundamental principles such as equality and non-discrimination constitute an international frame for religious education (re). however, these rights might be challenged when re is allocated a major role in transmitting the majority religion as national cultural heritage and national identity. this article will explore and discuss this issue. it is based on an analysis of the transmission of christianity as cultural heritage in the national re curriculum for primary and lower secondary schools in denmark. the article argues that principles from human rights education could provide a basis for a more pluralistic, objective, and critical approach to re, thus enabling the classroom to function as a community of disagreement. keywords human rights education, religious education, cultural heritage, freedom of religion and belief, non-discrimination, national identity http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4452 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ human rights education review – volume 5(1) 6 introduction the increase in support for national conservative parties in europe has re-launched the debate on the relation between religion and national identity. with reference to migration-related religious diversity this position argues for a monoculturalism where a stable community depends on shared values (iversen, 2014; erdal & strømsø, 2018), often considering these values to be founded on christianity. some national conservatives even advocate withdrawing from certain human rights conventions, seeing such international obligations as a threat to national sovereignty (jackson, 2018; christoffersen, 2016). the linking of religion and national narratives is widespread and has a long history. historically, the public school has served as a crucial platform for the inculcation of both national and religious identity (jensen, 2005; kjeldsen, 2019a), and religious education (re) has in particular implied an enculturation of the dogma, norms and practices of the majority religion. in spite of supranational factors such as increasing plurality, secularisation and globalisation challenging the role of re in nation building, recent european research shows how the new social patterns meet ‘old’ institutional structures, and that church-state relations in national contexts still have a major effect on how re is structured (bråten, 2014; franken, 2021). even though transmitting cultural heritage is still part of subjects such as history and re in most public schools in europe, it is challenged by today’s pluralistic and religiously diverse societies. for an analytic purpose, the attempt to meet these challenges can be divided into two very general approaches. firstly, a monocultural approach emphasising social cohesion which promotes the majority religion’s values and traditions as the basis of a cultural citizenship. this approach can make it difficult for religious minorities to be recognised as equal members of society (erdal & stømsø, 2018; nestby, 2019). secondly, a critical multicultural approach to re focusing on social diversity. this position emphasises intercultural understanding and knowledge of religious diversity and is critical of the relation between nation and church. it educates for a democratic citizenship based on human rights norms and is often linked to global and cosmopolitan citizenship (osler, 2015; osler & starkey, 2018; iversen, 2017). the structuring of re in different national contexts reveals different solutions to the problem of balancing transmission of the majority religion as cultural heritage with the inclusion of other outlooks and religious diversity (franken, 2021; bråten, 2014). to secure minority rights and pluralism, international human rights obligations such as the right to freedom of religion and belief (forb) and non-discrimination form a legal framework for the state’s interest in re. recent research reveals how human rights education (hre) can contribute to an impartial and inclusive re (zembylas, 2014; jackson, 2018; andreassen, 2013). to contribute to this discussion, this article illuminates some of the human rights challenges related to the state’s e. lindhardt 7 reproduction of specific religio-cultural traditions and norms in a pluralistic and democratic society by analysing how national narratives are integrated into re in denmark. the analysis will focus on two key questions: 1. how is the child’s right to forb and the parents’ right to raise their child in their own faith safeguarded when re includes transmission of the majority religion as cultural heritage? 2. how can hre principles promote an inclusive pedagogical re approach that provides a basis for the classroom as a community of disagreement? narratives and imagined communities in nation-building nation-building through schooling is based on a cultural approach to citizenship and, in many cases, the assumption that stable communities need shared values (jerome, liddle & young., 2021; osler, 2015; iversen, 2014). although modernity and pluralism have challenged society’s shared values, the relation between state and church still influences the structure and content of re in european countries (bråten, 2014; franken, 2021). re scholar oddrun bråten, uses the concept of national imaginary: ‘a national imaginary is the most common ideas about a nation’s culture and history. this is important to many people’s (national) identity and may be a central ingredient of social cohesion.’ (bråten, 2014, p. 306). the national imaginary is often transmitted as cultural narratives. according to paul ricoeur’s theory of narrative identity, humans experience time, both past and future, by mentally organising it into a coherent narrative structure. explaining this process, ricoeur presents a threefold conceptualisation of mimesis: prefiguration, configuration, and refiguration (ricoeur, 2017). this conceptualisation illustrates how narrativisation is related to cognition, structuration, and hermeneutics. hermeneutics concerns the intersection between narratives and a person’s own world, which is particularly interesting when cultural heritage is transmitted as collective narratives. religion in itself can be seen as a narrative phenomenon (jensen, 2008, p. 13), as written and unwritten narratives are used to create not only myths, but also common values, identities, and patterns of consciousness (bogisch & lindhardt, 2020, p. 46). according to scholar of religion armin geertz, ‘narratives regulate behaviour and organise moments of experience, so that the body is connected to and anchored in a temporal course’ (geertz, 2004, p. 53). this applies not only to religion, but to other domains as well, such as narratives about national culture. the rise of nations is closely connected to the decline of religion as a socio-political power. according to benedict anderson, ‘it would be short-sighted, however, to think of the imagined communities of nations as simply growing out of and replacing religious communities and dynastic realms’ (anderson, 2016, p. 22). anderson defines a ‘nation’ as an imagined community whose members are generally unacquainted and ‘yet in the minds of each lives the image of their communion’ (p. 6). the printing press and the publication of books in local human rights education review – volume 5(1) 8 languages served to standardise the vernacular. a common language fostered the image of a community connected to a particular territory with a common history, customs, values, and attitudes (pp. 43–46). anderson emphasises that defining the nation as an imagined community does not imply that the nation is false or its political effect any less real (p. 6). the public school is a central place for constructing the narrative of an imagined national community (iversen, 2014; osler, 2015; jerome et al., 2021), and re is often expected to contribute to this. transmitting cultural heritage and nation-building through schooling implies a perspective of power and ‘the right to narrate’ and is linked to the relation between majority and minority as well as to the relation between collective narratives and individual ones. in a school context these relations should entail a pedagogical awareness, as including the learners’ own narratives may increase their chances of finding their own places within an inclusive, collective history (osler, 2015, p. 14; erdal & stømsø 2018). this pedagogical awareness includes attention to human rights issues in re. human rights issues related to transmitting religion as cultural heritage the power aspect of transmitting the majority religion as cultural heritage in re raises issues concerning the state as the legislator of the educational system, the safeguarding of parents’ right to raise their child in their own faith, and the child’s right to forb. human rights as an international framework for re traditionally regulate three spheres related to the intersection of human rights and re: 1) the parents’ right to choose education for their children in accordance with their own religion and philosophical convictions 2) the child’s freedom of thought, conscience, and religion 3) the educational goals of the full development of the human personality and the strengthening of respect for human rights based on the right to forb, these perspectives express human rights norms and principles such as non-discrimination and equal treatment and reflect a view of respect for and tolerance of others (lindhardt & decara, in press). later in the article, when introducing hre as a pedagogical approach, we will address the third sphere. let us firstly address the first two ones. as a fundamental human right forb is guaranteed in several human rights documents: e.g., the universal declaration of human rights (udhr), article 18 (united nations, 1948); the international covenant on civil and political rights (iccpr), article 18 (united nations, 1966a) and the european convention of human rights (echr), article 9 (council of europe, 1950). the child’s right to forb is explicitly mentioned in the un convention on the rights of the e. lindhardt 9 child (crc): states parties shall respect the right of the child to freedom of thought, conscience and religion…states parties shall respect the rights and duties of the parents and, when applicable, legal guardians, to provide direction to the child in the exercise of his or her right in a manner consistent with the evolving capacities of the child. (united nations, 1989, article 14) by integrating the rights to freedom of thought and conscience the general comment no 22, article 18 emphasises that forb includes not just theistic but nontheistic and atheistic beliefs as well as the right not to process any religion or belief (united nations human rights committee, 1993). this is an important addition, in view of the increasing numbers of ‘nones’—persons with no religious affiliation (pew research center, 2018). the parent’s right to choose education for their children in accordance with their own religious and philosophical convictions is guaranteed in human rights conventions such as the international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights (icescr), article 13.3; and iccpr, article 18.4). in a european context, the most important instrument pertaining to forb, re and the rights of parents is article 2 of the council of europe protocol no. 1 to echr: no person shall be denied the right to education. in the exercise of any functions which it assumes in relation to education and to teaching, the state shall respect the right of parents to ensure such education and teaching in conformity with their own religious and philosophical convictions. (council of europe, 1950, p. 34) a case brought against norway at the european court of human rights (ecthr) illustrates how the state’s interest in teaching majority religion is a potential source of conflict between the state and the parents’ and child’s rights. the case concerned the subject of christianity, religion and philosophy (known as krl), instituted in 1997 and from which only partial exemption was allowed (folgerø and others v. norway, 2007). members of the norwegian humanist association claimed the subject contained christian preaching, and took their case to the ecthr, they argued that krl violated the right to forb (council of europe, 1950, p. 14) and that, since the subject breached article 2 of protocol no.1, the state violated the right of parents. in 2007, ecthr ruled that denying full exemption from krl violated the applicant’s rights: against this background, notwithstanding the many laudable legislative purposes stated in the connection with the introduction of krl in the ordinary primary and lower secondary schools, it does not appear that the respondent state took sufficient care that information and knowledge included in the curriculum be conveyed in an objective, critical and pluralistic manner for the purpose of article 2 of protocol no. 1. human rights education review – volume 5(1) 10 accordingly, the court finds that the refusal to grant the applicant parents full exemption from the krl subject for their children gave rise to a violation of article 2 of protocol no.1. (folgerø and others v. norway, 2007) although the subject was intended to encompass diversity and include different worldviews, the ecthr emphasised the ‘qualitative’ difference between the teaching of christianity and the teaching of other religions and philosophies in krl (lindhardt & decara, in press; see also jawoniyi, 2012; andreassen, 2013; von der lippe 2017). according to ecthr re caselaw, two main principles stand out: re must respect parents’ religious and philosophical convictions; at the same time, it must ‘meet the criteria of objectivity, criticality [and] pluralism’ (jawoniyi, 2012, p. 350; see also hasan and eylem zengin v. turkey, 2007; appel-irrgang v. germany, 2009). even though the subject content may conflict with some parents' convictions, it is not a breach of echr if the curriculum and tuition are objective and pluralistic (appel-irrgang v. germany, 2009). thus, the state is not obliged to offer an education in accordance with the parents' outlooks, but parents have the right to appeal if the school's re instructs the child to adopt one particular outlook and exemption is not possible (von der lippe, 2017, pp. 90-91). these principles are further elaborated in the toledo guiding principles on teaching about religions and beliefs in public schools (organization for security and co-operation in europe [osce], 2007, p. 72). the case from norway illustrates that even when re is formally nonconfessional, as in the scandinavian countries (franken, 2021), there might be a grey zone between the transmission of religion as cultural heritage and a confessional education. to address this issue, the un special rapporteur on forb has in the rapporteur’s digest on freedom of religion and belief made a distinction between ‘information about religions or beliefs on the one hand and religious instruction on the other’ (un special rapporteur on forb, 2011, p. 35). religious instruction is defined as confessional teaching based on a religion’s tenets, whereas information about religions is non-confessional. however, the special rapporteur notes that if re contains not only learning about religion but also learning from religion, it risks overlapping with religious instruction (p. 35; see also lindhardt & decara, in press). the distinction between learning about and from religion was made by re scholar michael grimmitt (1987, pp. 225–226). while learning about religion concerns knowledge and understanding of religion, learning from religion implies an existential dimension, where knowledge is related to the student’s own experiences and lifeworld (see also osce, 2007, pp. 45–46). learning from religion has been criticised for lacking an academically objective approach to religion (kjeldsen, 2019a, p. 17; see also buchardt, 2008; andreassen, 2013) and for causing religions to be approached qualitatively differently when the majority religion is the main religion the students should be learning from. this links the question of narrativity and transmission of cultural heritage with a pedagogical discussion about, not just what to e. lindhardt 11 transmit but how and to whom. pedagogical approaches to transmitting cultural heritage the scholar of pedagogy and education dietrich benner has elaborated a useful theoretical perspective on bildung (‘formation’) that uncovers dilemmas related to transmitting cultural heritage and national values. benner distinguishes two kinds of bildung theories: affirmative and non-affirmative. affirmative theories consider the aim of education is to transfer preformed doctrines to the next generation. whether these doctrines are expressions of old traditions (e.g., religion) or new concepts (e.g., multiculturalism), an affirmative approach results in a normative-prescriptive teaching where predetermined objectives serve as a normative guideline (benner, 2005, p. 22; bogisch & lindhardt, 2020). affirmative education involves direct lecturing, rather than facilitating formation as a self-activity (benner, 2005, p. 25). by contrast, the non-affirmative position focuses on the didactic educational process itself, stressing that there is no direct path from ignorance to knowledge, from inability to ability. learning is never a simple affirmative action of acquiring predefined answers or values; it must allow the learners to raise new questions (p. 29). transmitting religious traditions remains essential, but teaching must encourage a reflexive interaction with tradition, based on self-activity (p. 124). the question of how transmission of collective narratives is linked to the formation of identity is closely connected to the pedagogical paradox: how can the child learn an intrinsic autonomy through external help (von oettingen, 2001, pp. 143–144)? the scholar of pedagogy and education gert j.j. biesta illustrates this dialectic between socialisation and autonomy by characterising education as ‘the beautiful risk’ (2014), emphasising that education must never become a simple reproduction and that the interaction between teacher, students and content cannot be predetermined. like benner, biesta advocates for the learner’s self-activity and the development of critical thinking, but simultaneously underlines the school’s part in socialisation by defining three important educational domains: • qualification: the students gain knowledge, skills, and dispositions that will enable them to act in society––as workers, as citizens, and as part of a community. • socialisation: the students become part of existing social, political, cultural, and perhaps religious orders, and they learn to act properly within these contexts. • subjectification: the students develop autonomous and independent thinking and action. (biesta, 2011, pp. 30-34) qualification and socialisation operate with a notion of human beings as culture-created, and subjectification of human beings as culture-creative. if education is to be more than simple human rights education review – volume 5(1) 12 reproduction, one must take a dialectic approach integrating all three domains. applying the threefold prism to re, biesta unfolds how re in the domain of qualification ‘has an important role to play in providing pupils and students with knowledge and understanding about religion, religions and the religious, and with the skills to use such knowledge and understanding wisely’ (biesta, 2021, pp. 12-13). socialisation in re is a more complex domain, related to the discussion of inculturation, nation-building and national identity. ‘socialisation can be understood in a rather ‘strong’ sense, where the point of socialisation is not that of providing children and young people with orientation into existing religious cultures, traditions and practices or religions.’ (p. 13). biesta finds this affirmative approach problematic as it ‘treats students only as objects to be recruited not as subjects in their own right’ (p. 13) thus, advocating for a ‘weak’ sense of socialisation instead. the concept of qualification concerns ‘religion(s) from the outside’ (p.13), or what we might define as learning about religion. socialisation does however, according to biesta, also encounter perspectives from the ‘inside’ on meaning and experiences that relate to learning from religion, although he acknowledges that some prefer to exclude this perspective (p.13). to avoid an affirmative approach biesta’s last domain of subjectification must be included; students must be addressed as subjects, not objects, and encouraged to take a questioning and critical stance when cultural heritage is transmitted (p. 15). the below analysis will focus on the organisation and curriculum content in re in danish primary and secondary schools. it seeks to illuminate key issues related to the parents’ and child’s forb and the state’s interest in dissemination of and enculturation to national narratives. the church-state relation has significance for the role religion is assigned in these national narratives. human rights issues related to the organisation of religious education in denmark in a study of the relation between church, state and re in europe, the scholar of philosophy leni franken shows how church-state models affect the organisation of re. while france, with its tradition of laïcité, has no specific re subject, most states with a mutual independence between church and state have a denominational re. in countries with state churches ‘re has become mainly deconfessionalized – and is thus organized in a non-denominational way in lutheran and anglican nations.’ (franken, 2021, p. 3). one reason for this deconfessionalisation of re is that churches in these states have functioned as state actors, and not as autonomous and independent organisations, making the shift to a nondenominational re easier (franken, 2021, p. 9). in sweden and norway, the church and state have recently been separated or partly separated, while the church-state model in denmark e. lindhardt 13 has not changed. the evangelical lutheran church, church of denmark is supported by the state (the constitutional act of denmark’ § 4) and approximately 75% of the population are members. however, 48% of the population say they never or less than once a year go to church and 10 % go to church frequently (andersen et al., 2019, p. 237). in 1975 a non-confessional re subject was introduced in denmark, called kristendomskundskab (knowledge about christianity), referring to christianity but emphasising the subject’s content to be knowledge rather than religious instruction. today kristendomskundskab is taught in grades 1-9 except when the church of denmark offers confirmation classes; this underlines the close tie between state and church. the danish education act (§ 6), states that the main subject content is evangelical lutheran christianity (2021). in grades 7-9, other religions and outlooks are also included. an exemption clause allows parents to withdraw their child from the class on condition that they teach re themselves (§ 6). the danish state does not systematically record the number of exemptions, but a study from 2006 revealed that only a minority of students, about 0.5 %, opt out (the children’s and education committee, 2016). the opt-out may be justified by religious as well as secular reasons. an exemption clause in a non-confessional subject seems at first sight unnecessary, but it might be seen as providing additional protection against violating the child’s and the parents’ forb. no education is neutral, but questions of normativity, values and identity formation are posed in re, since dilemmas of existential formation can occur. the toledo guiding principles on teaching about religions and beliefs in public schools summarises the issue: in short, the basic principle under international standards appears to be that teaching about religions and beliefs is permissible even if it is compulsory, so long as it is given ‘in a neutral and objective way.’ moreover, non-neutral religious instruction is permissible if there are adequate opt-out provisions. the difficult questions, of course, are when is instruction sufficiently ‘neutral’, when are opt-out provisions adequate or necessary, and how should the opt-out requirements be structured. (osce 2007, p. 70) however, the use of the exemption clause might also imply protection not of the child and parents, but of the state. danish politicians have explicitly used the possibility of having to face a lawsuit at the ecthr as an argument for preserving an re exemption clause. in 2009, when several political parties proposed the exemption clause be removed, a former minister for education, bertel haarder, declared: it is the enemies of kristendomskundskab who want to ban hymn singing and prayers from the teaching. i can only imagine what the humanist association will do. they will immediately sue and say that then you must not do this and that. the exemption clause human rights education review – volume 5(1) 14 is thus the safety valve that gives teachers of kristendomskundskab the freedom to teach the children hymns and say the lord’s prayer. (søgaard, 2009) despite this quote not being representative of danish politicians, and religious instruction not being allowed in the re curriculum at the time, the stance shows how an old structure, the exemption clause, imposed to safeguard the rights of the child and the parents, can be used for other purposes. from a human rights perspective, the question thus becomes what and, not least whom, an exemption clause protects and how to ensure the protection of minorities, not the majority. debates on the exemption clause in denmark are quite polarised. some people, politicians as well as educators, advocate for abolishing it, arguing that re is already a non-confessional subject based on knowledge, not preaching. others defend the current structure, as it gives the possibility of keeping a subject mainly focused on christianity. yet others criticise the subject for assigning christianity a special status and prefer an exemption clause until the subject is genuinely neutral and pluralistic (strøm-hansen, 2020). this stance is aligned with the principle from the ecthr. the above examples reveal that an exemption clause can serve different interests and does not necessarily promote an re based on non-discrimination and religious diversity. furthermore, it raises the question of how forb and non-discrimination are guaranteed in the national curriculum. human rights issues related to the curriculum content in religious education in denmark evangelical-lutheran christianity is defined as the main content of re in primary and secondary school (danish education act, 2021, § 6). the re curriculum includes aims related to biesta’s domain of qualification, such as’ knowledge about christianity, other religions and outlooks and biblical narratives’ as well as ‘personal stance, co-responsibility and action in a democratic society’ (ministry of children and education, 2019, p. 7.), with the term ‘personal stance’ also opening for subjectification. the biblical narrative’s role in socialisation is stressed and related to ‘fundamental values in our cultural sphere’ (p.7), thus emphasising the transmission of common values in re. personal formation is a key issue, as students should be able to ‘understand and relate to the significance of the religious dimension to the individual’s outlook and relationship to others’ (p. 7.). the religious dimension is, in the guidelines, defined as humankind’s inquiry into the basic human condition (p. 25) which links to children’s attempts to find meaning in life experiences and the surrounding world (p. 25) and their perceptions and thoughts about existence, ethics, and religions. hence, at first sight the guidelines express a non-affirmative approach that takes a pluralistic and multicultural society into account. in terms of the curriculum objectives, however, christianity, including biblical narratives, is the only content for grade 1-6 and, in being so, the only religion to learn from. e. lindhardt 15 the guidelines suggest a more multireligious approach where the teaching of biblical narratives includes judaism in grades 1–3 and islam in grades 4–6 (ministry of children and education, 2019, pp. 33, 37), and provides the scope for including other religions at all grades: students gain throughout school gradually more and more detailed knowledge and understanding of the religious dimension through, inter alia, the work on fundamental values, main ideas and main features of christianity and other religions. this gives them opportunities to compare across different religions and outlooks and opportunities to put their own thoughts and considerations into play. (ministry of children and education, 2019, p. 28) the discrepancy between curriculum objectives and guidelines reveals both a monocultural, national approach and a multicultural approach. the politically approved objectives reflect an understanding of evangelical lutheran christianity as cultural heritage related to identity formation. however, guidelines and teaching materials written by educators include more religions and outlooks at all grade levels (kjeldsen 2019b, pp. 138–151), thus reflecting the current religious diversity. as mentioned above, ecthr caselaw reveals two principles: 1) to practice respect for parents’ religious and philosophical convictions; and 2) to meet the criteria of objectivity, criticality, and pluralism. danish re mainly addresses the first principle by offering the possibility of exemption, as the subject content objectives for primary school do not reflect a pluralistic approach. when it comes to objectivity, current danish research problematises that the basic human condition is linked to christian values and concepts and not to other religions (kjeldsen, 2019b; böwadt, 2009; lindhardt & decara, in press). consequently, christianity is given not only a quantitatively larger role in re but also a qualitatively different one. the study of different religions in grades 7-9 is related to an etic approach, focusing on learning about religion using comparative categories such as myth, rituals, salvation, sacredprofane and pure-impure. in contrast, the study of christianity reveals a more emic approach, focusing on christian concepts like creation, sin, guilt, doubt, faith, hope, forgiveness, and the kingdom of god (ministry of children and education, 2019, pp. 42–43). several re teaching materials show the same tendency (kjeldsen, 2019b). the purpose of teaching biblical narratives is related to reflection on life issues, while the teaching of other religions is primarily aimed at creating a mutual understanding and an awareness of diversity and dynamic interpretive communities (ministry of children and education, 2019, p. 43). the discrepancy between curriculum objectives and guidelines is an expression of how ‘new social patterns’ such as plurality and religious diversity are dealt with in ‘old structures’ (bråten, 2014). although recent research questions the lack of religious diversity and the qualitatively different approach to religions in danish re (kjeldsen 2019b, buchardt 2014, human rights education review – volume 5(1) 16 böwadt 2009), there has been no political will to include other religions in the objectives for grades 1-6. a human rights perspective on transmitting majority religion as cultural heritage the analysis of the danish re curriculum reveals some key issues. the first concerns the safeguarding of parents’ and child’s rights to forb and learning from religion when the majority religion is the only mandatory religion taught. the second concerns treating religions as qualitatively equal, even though they are not necessarily quantitatively equal, and the intersection between a monocultural and a multicultural approach. hre scholar audrey osler advocates for an education based on critical multiculturalism, emphasising how even a multicultural approach may pose the risk of promoting an essentialist understanding of minorities: in the context of schooling, students may be ascribed an identity by teachers or education policymakers. this has happened all too often, in the context of multicultural education, when children have found themselves in classrooms where the teacher is expounding their cultures, from the mainstream educator’s perspective. (osler, 2015, p. 21–22) instead, osler suggests educating for a cosmopolitan citizenship where people have the capacity to act in diverse communities at the local, national, and global levels (osler & starkey, 2018). addressing the same issues, the scholar of religion lars laird iversen criticises both monoculturalism and multiculturalism for presuming shared values as constitutive of communities (iversen, 2014, p. 79; see also jerome et al., 2021). in contrast, iversen introduces the concept of a community of disagreement; this is a group of people whose opinions differ but who share a common challenge or problem (iversen, 2014, p. 12). thus, iversen argues that shared challenges rather than shared values are constitutive of communities. according to iversen, the concept communities of disagreement can be considered an ideal type that is useful at three levels in re: 1) to nuance underlying premises for re’s political legitimation 2) to represent religions in a way that safeguards their inner diversity 3) to describe a pedagogical ideal for the classroom. (iversen, 2017, p. 101) the first level deals with the subject aim and its connection to political agendas as nationbuilding: ‘when concrete values are reduced to examples, and particular traditions are lifted up as the “fundamental values” of the school, this can be interpreted as part of a national identity policy’ (iversen, 2017, p. 106). the argument is frequently heard that participants in a e. lindhardt 17 well-functioning multicultural society need a stable cultural identity before they are ready to meet other cultures (p. 106). although iversen is sceptical of this understanding of culture, he criticises the concept of imagined communities, underlining that cultures are not just imaginary but real (p. 106). even though iversen is not explicitly referencing anderson, it should be emphasised that anderson’s concept entails imagined––not imaginary–– communities, as the term ‘imagined’ refers not to false, but to created, or what one might call socially constructed ones (anderson, 2016, p. 6; see also hylland eriksen in breuilly, 2016, p. 4). thus, anderson seeks to problematise an essentialist understanding of culture and religion, the same problematisation as iversen’s second point concerning the danger of teaching portraying religions as homogeneous phenomena. the scholar of re robert jackson claims that we always meet religion as something already interpreted: ‘thus, terms such as “hinduism” or “christianity” as examples of “religions” should not be taken as referring to bounded and incontestable systems, but to the various construction of each religious tradition made by different insiders and outsiders’ (jackson, 2004, p. 64). iversen further focuses on the relationship between representation and reality, describing religions as communities of disagreement held together by elements other than agreement on morality and values. they may be liturgical communities, ritual communities, discussion communities, social communities, or have many other sources of community (iversen, 2017, p. 111). in addition, iversen describes a pedagogical ideal by regarding the classroom as a community of disagreement, attempting to avoid both the assimilatory approach of monoculturalism and an essentialist multiculturalism (iversen, 2020, p. 3). the question is whether human rights and hre can function as a pedagogical frame for the classroom as a community of disagreement. human rights education and religious education in article 26, the udhr mentions the right to education and stresses, by extension, how education should include central human rights norms and principles. in addition, some un legally binding instruments, such as the icescr, express a similarly worded obligation in article 13.1: the states parties … agree that education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and the sense of its dignity, and shall strengthen the respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. they further agree that education shall enable all persons to participate effectively in a free society, promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations and all racial, ethnic or religious groups, and further the activities of the united nations for the maintenance of peace. (united nations, 1966,b) human rights education review – volume 5(1) 18 later, the un declaration on human rights education and training (dhret) elaborated and further specified this obligation. divided into three dimensions, the declaration addresses: 1) what should be learned: education about human rights, with knowledge and understanding of human rights norms and principles as the main content. 2) how it should be learned: education through human rights, with a focus on a learning environment where both the learners’ and educators’ rights are respected. 3) why it is important: education for human rights, which includes empowering persons to enjoy and exercise their rights and to respect and uphold the rights of others (united nations, 2011, article 2.2, 2011, article 2.2). although the three dimensions are connected and, in practice, can only be separated artificially, examining them separately may be analytically beneficial. recent research in several countries has shown that primary and secondary schools especially lack the knowledge dimension, i.e., teaching about human rights, both in the curriculum and in the concrete teaching (struthers, 2015, pp. 57–58; jerome et al., 2021, p. 9). moreover, it is unclear ‘what we should expect to be sufficient knowledge, nor indeed what an informed student should understand about human rights’ (jerome et al., 2021, p. 9). although schools may implement teaching through and for human rights, at least in an abstract manner to emphasise nondiscrimination and tolerance, students are often left unaware of how these concepts are linked to human rights norms and principles and the human rights system. this lack of knowledge could also impact their ability to claim their rights and promote rights in society. relating hre ‘to the “deep knowledge” of personal reality as well as the “hard knowledge” of factual content’ is fundamental for ensuring that learners view hre not as ‘the discrete, theoretical concepts of some abstraction known as “human rights”, but as the integral aspects of their lives’. (struthers, 2015, pp. 57–58). an obvious way to link ‘deep knowledge’ to ‘hard knowledge’ in re is to include forb both as a field of knowledge and as a framework for classroom conversations. as jackson argues, ‘students need to understand that the principle of freedom of religion or belief gives individuals the right to hold a particular belief, even if others do not share it’ (jackson, 2014, p. 56). this implies that teaching about human rights in re must contain a consideration of the importance of religious identification and include a historical and political perspective (zembylas, 2014). the principle of non-discrimination mentioned in several human rights conventions could similarly be applied and used to focus on the intersections between forb and nondiscrimination in terms of gender, sexual orientation, outlook, etc. this is not an easy task, as there might be tensions between the values of human rights and some interpretations of religion, and the teacher needs to be aware of the diverse relationships between human rights and religious positions (zembylas 2014; nestby 2019). in addition, the teacher needs to e. lindhardt 19 consider the pedagogical approach—how to teach in a way that respects both the rights of the students and the teacher. education through human rights involves establishing learning environments characterised by respect for each child’s dignity and rights. it includes promoting equal opportunities for all, inclusion, non-discrimination, and equal treatment, as stated in the dhret, 2011, article 4 (united nations, 2011). to prevent these ideals from simply remaining abstract, they must be incorporated in didactic planning. with regard to re, this impacts the choice of didactical activities as well as content. particular areas of attention include the possibility of student involvement in the activities, educational differentiation to promote equal treatment, and a non-affirmative approach allowing students to raise questions and improve their critical thinking skills. yet another area of attention is the subject content and how the texts and perspectives selected enhance students’ understanding of the diversity among different religions as well as within each religious tradition. as robert jackson stresses in his interpretive approach, this entails being critical of simplistic representations of religions and other outlooks, and demands awareness in the selection of subject content (jackson, 2004). as seen in the preamble of the dhret, education for human rights is closely related to teaching that contributes to the ‘full development of the human personality and the sense of its dignity’ (united nations, 2011). echoing the language of the udhr, the latter aims to educate the child to have the ability to enjoy his or her human rights, as well as to promote human rights and prevent human rights violations. the understanding of teaching for human rights is further elaborated in crc, article 29.1, d: ‘the preparation of the child for responsible life in a free society, in the spirit of understanding, peace, tolerance, equality of sexes, and friendship among all peoples, ethnic, national and religious groups and persons of indigenous origin’(united nations, 1989). more than specific competencies, this presents a vision of an ideal society, a vision made even clearer in the dhret, article 4 which states: developing a universal culture of human rights, in which everyone is aware of their own rights and responsibilities in respect of the rights of others, and promoting the development of the individual as a responsible member of a free, peaceful, pluralist and inclusive society. (united nations, 2011) the meaning of the ‘universal culture’ concept is not further clarified, but the wording addresses a central issue related to the status of human rights in education as such and in re in particular. in short, the issue concerns a maximalist or minimalist approach to human rights, which is to say, whether human rights should be the aim of or only the frame for re. human rights education review – volume 5(1) 20 human rights as the frame or the aim introducing human rights as a new universal culture is an appealing vision, albeit a vision that also carries a risk of becoming yet another expression of monoculturalism. it is dangerous for the democratic debate if the idea of the individual’s absolute human rights is constantly made the last and decisive argument (hørning, 2004, p. 100). where a maximalist approach to human rights perceives human rights as yet another collective narrative about common values, a minimalistic approach delimits human rights as dealing with basic human conditions. a minimalistic approach allows a distinction to be made between what we have in common as human beings, the universal, and what relates to specific communities and societies, the particular (hørning, 2004, p. 97). where the line between the universal and the particular runs must remain a continuing discussion, both when it comes to understanding international obligations as such and when, say, the child’s right to religious freedom is to be translated into an re curriculum and teaching (jackson, 2018, s. 95). such a demarcation involves having an awareness that ‘human rights and human identity itself need to be understood in a culturally mediated manner, without detracting from some fundamental principles of equality and justice which underpin those rights’ (osler, 2015, p. 18, see also zembylas, 2014). in addition, it implies a non-affirmative approach, where teaching not only about human rights, but also through human rights is on the agenda. here, human rights may function to frame the classroom as a community of disagreement, in the sense that fundamental human rights, norms and principles such as forb and non-discrimination provide a backdrop for a non-consensus-seeking conversation. the consensus-seeking classroom does not productively prepare students for human rights and for living in a democracy (iversen, 2014; jerome et al., 2021; erdal & strømsø, 2018) as it neglects the learner’s ability to take a critical stance and engage in counter-narratives. an hre perspective on re can help engender teaching that does not aim to eliminate diversity and opposing opinions but tries to promote mutual understanding by creating a space for disagreement in the classroom. conclusions this article has analysed and discussed human rights issues when majority religion is transmitted as cultural heritage by focusing on two main questions. first, how is the child’s right to forb and the parents’ right to raise their child in their own faith safeguarded? second, how can hre principles promote an inclusive pedagogical approach in re by providing a basis for a community of disagreement in the classroom? to answer these questions an awareness of content as well as of pedagogical approach is needed and both policy and practice levels must be taken into account. these are the main conclusions: although an exemption clause is intended to safeguard the child’s and parents’ rights, it might e. lindhardt 21 be used to preserve a national re curriculum centred on the majority religion, which in turn is treated qualitatively differently from other religions. attention should be paid to what the exemption clause mainly protects––the child’s and parents’ rights or the state. a mono-religious curriculum content only focusing on the majority religion is not sufficient to prepare the students to live and act in a diverse and pluralistic society. furthermore, it implies a risk of ‘othering’ minorities if the diversity of religions and outlooks in the society is not reflected in the curriculum. transmitting cultural heritage is a basic educational and cross curricular task. if not disseminated as simple reproduction of a national narrative, it may contribute to students’ understanding of the society and themselves as historically conditioned. diverse conceptions and narratives of the relation between religion and culture should be represented and the students’ own narratives included, as students should be regarded as not only ‘culturecreated’ but also as ‘culture-creative’. teaching should include an awareness of the (re)presentation of religions. this entails a double focus on introducing the diversity of the individual religion and on approaching majority and minority religions qualitatively equally. however, to achieve this, well-educated teachers are needed, as well as high quality teaching materials. consensus-seeking teaching may limit students’ interaction with the content as well as the motivation to express their views. implementing teaching through human rights could enable the classroom to function as a community of disagreement. however, there may be a risk that polarisations from the surrounding society manifest themselves as fixed positions in the classroom. to build a safe learning space is a prerequisite for a trustful dialogue in which conflicting views can be exchanged. promoting a community of disagreement implies that human rights should frame re, but not be its goal: human rights should not function as a new common outlook, but rather give room for different outlooks in the classroom. hre principles of teaching about, through and for human rights explicate such a frame, where the teaching through and for human rights in re is based on knowledge about forb and fundamental human rights norm and principles such as human dignity, non-discrimination, and equal treatment. references andersen, p. b., erkmen, j. & gundelach, p. 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(2014). human rights and religious education in the contentious context of conflict-troubled societies: perspectives from human rights education. journal of beliefs & values, 35(3), 303-314. https://doi.org/10.1080/13617672.2014.980118 https://www.refworld.org/docid/453883fb22.html https://www.ohchr.org/documents/issues/religion/rapporteursdigestfreedomreligionbelief.pdf https://www.ohchr.org/documents/issues/religion/rapporteursdigestfreedomreligionbelief.pdf https://doi.org/10.1080/13617672.2014.980118 human rights education as a framework for transmitting religion as cultural heritage abstract keywords introduction narratives and imagined communities in nation-building human rights issues related to transmitting religion as cultural heritage pedagogical approaches to transmitting cultural heritage human rights issues related to the organisation of religious education in denmark human rights issues related to the curriculum content in religious education in denmark a human rights perspective on transmitting majority religion as cultural heritage human rights education and religious education human rights as the frame or the aim conclusions references celebrating innovation in human rights education issn: 2535-5406 vol 5, no 3 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.5193 date of publication 19-12-2022 © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org editorial celebrating innovation in human rights education audrey osler, university of south-eastern norway, norway, university of leeds, uk rachel shanks university of aberdeen, united kingdom christian stokke university of south-eastern norway, norway here in northern europe, as winter holidays and festivities fast approach, your editors have another reason to celebrate. december 2022 marks five years of human rights education review. we are celebrating all our authors and book reviewers. with five full volumes, 12 editions and 53 research articles behind us, we believe we have taken important foundational steps in fulfilling the journal’s mission to extend and deepen the specialist field of human rights education (hre) by publishing high-quality research from across the globe. we wish to thank our international editorial advisory board and all our reviewers for the hard work they have put in to ensure high-quality articles of which authors can be proud. we work hard to be international in scope. over the past 5 years, we are particularly proud to have included articles and perspectives on hre from brazil, chile, india, vietnam, south africa, and especially from nigeria where we published what we believe to be the first ever nigerian research contribution on human rights education, from enugu state. we are also pleased to feature contributions from australia and new zealand, canada, and the united states. as an open access journal our content is available to all, not just students and academics with access to a university library, but policy-makers, activists and politicians, whether in highincome or low-income countries. we aim to make more research available from the global south and ensure that dissemination of ideas in human rights education is not unidirectional. http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.5193 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ human rights education review–volume 5(3) 2 from 2018 to 2022, around seven out of ten research articles published have been from authors based in european universities. despite this bias towards europe, where the core editorial team is based, this statistic masks a high degree of diversity of both authors and topics. our european authors are based in 10 different countries with hugely varying constitutional, legal, educational and cultural contexts that influence the way hre has developed. a number have transnational backgrounds and are researching distant regions and countries, including bangladesh, iran, and pakistan. the articles in hrer cover all stages of education, from early childhood through to higher education and community-based learning. at first sight, readers might expect a journal entitled human rights education review to have a narrow range of research topics. however, articles address a variety of issues: various aspects of human rights-based curricula, including social studies, citizenship, language learning, drama and the arts, religious education and history education; policy development; child rights and child safeguarding; equity-orientated questions such as the impact of covid-19, representations of indigenous people, racial justice, gender equity, sexual orientation and gender identity; post-conflict learning; academic freedom; learning methodologies; and a lot more. we invite you to browse. and, if you are engaging in research addressing human rights learning, to consider hrer as a possible home for your work. this edition celebrates innovation and has a number of firsts. it opens with challenges and possibilities for transformative human rights education in icelandic upper secondary schools by sue e. gollifer. not only is this the first piece of research on hre in iceland, but it also identifies a set of principles the author sees as prerequisites for transformative hre. gollifer is effectively highlighting the inadequacy of the permissive icelandic educational policy framework for hre, since it is not accompanied by appropriate professional support for teachers. drawing from the narratives of upper secondary school teachers concerning their hre practices, gollifer makes a number of suggestions for teachers: they need to have an explicit pedagogic intention; be ready to engage critically with education policy and the purposes of education; develop a strong human rights knowledge base and a holistic actionorientated approach to human rights and schooling; and develop cosmopolitan perspectives. effectively, she is arguing for change in teacher education to enable hre and thereby support teachers in ‘the courageous act of education’. concerns about a disconnect between hre policy and policy implementation are picked up in the following article by radhika lakshminarayanan and dolly thomas: from vision to transformation: integrating human rights courses in higher education in india. their article represents the first of what we hope will be many articles we publish from india. the authors, inspired by the thoughts of legal scholar and human rights activist upendra baxi, see hre as a means by which guarantees of human rights can be realised so as to achieve social a. osler, r. shanks & c. stokke 3 transformation that will empower individuals and communities ‘to resist colonization of the mind’. having mapped the stated provision of human rights content in syllabi across higher education institutions in tamil nadu, they note the discrepancies between intended provision and the on-the-ground perceptions of teaching staff. among the barriers to effective hre the authors identify are inadequate staff training and resources, students’ lack of awareness of the relevance of human rights to their future professions (for example, medicine), and difficulties in ensuring student safety in ngo and community placements. an increasing number of countries are incorporating the 1989 un convention on the rights of the child (crc) into domestic law. stephen daniels’ article, incorporating the convention on the rights of the child in scottish education, provides us with a timely and valuable snapshot of hre in scotland at the moment when efforts to achieve incorporation have been postponed by a uk supreme court ruling. the author examines the progress of the 2020 united nations convention on the rights of the child (incorporation)(scotland) bill which would have made all aspects of the crc justiciable within scottish courts, thereby strengthening child rights. following the supreme court ruling, the scottish government has declared its intention to amend the bill to ensure that its provisions are in keeping with uk constitutional arrangements. looking forward, daniels explores opportunities and potential avenues for hre, particularly in relation to teacher professional standards. he makes recommendations for how the right to education and the right to hre might be reinforced in scotland. in her article, unicef’s rights respecting schools award as children’s human rights education, ann quennerstedt reflects on the role of external organisations working with schools and teachers. drawing on material from unicef uk’s website and selected research studies, she asks whether the rights respecting schools award (rrsa), has met its aims. from these sources, she concludes that while there is potential for the programme to support successful hre for children in school, it does not provide a comprehensive curriculum. the article raises questions, both implicit and explicit, about the complementary roles of the state, schools, and teachers in developing hre and about collaboration between schools and external actors. in human rights education – a republican perspective, ole henrik borchgrevink hansen contrasts the liberal idea of freedom as non-interference with the civic republican one, which understands freedom as non-domination. in this philosophical article, the author makes the case that this republican conception of freedom is central to human rights education. he then discusses how this ideal of freedom may strengthen respect for human rights and promote a human rights culture. the author concludes that the republican perspective may contribute with an understanding of human dignity, active citizenship, and civic virtue, but that this requires a multidisciplinary approach to human rights education. celebrating innovation in human rights education majority rights and minority responsibilities: young people’s negotiations with human rights issn 2535-5406 vol 4, no 3 (2021) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4486 date received: 08-06-2021 date accepted: 08-09-2021 peer reviewed article © 2021 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles revisiting the past: human rights education and epistemic justice rebecca adami stockholm university, sweden, rebecca.adami@edu.su.se abstract epistemic injustice in human rights education (hre) can be found in a colonial historical trajectory of human rights that rests on accounts of western agency only. such narratives overshadow the legacy of indian and pakistani freedom fighters and latin american feminists who negotiated human rights against colonial, patriarchal and racist discourses after the second world war. without their contribution a united nations (un) rights concept risked being limited to a western trajectory of the ‘rights of man’ that represents a monistic universalism. the paper revisits the history of the united nations, unearthing historical counternarratives of what a pluralistic universalism of human rights means by adding knowledge about postcolonial feminist subjects who spoke of a positive conception that could reduce injustice. keywords hermeneutical injustice, united nations history, women’s history, miranda fricker http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4486 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:rebecca.adami@edu.su.se human rights education review – volume 4(3) 6 introduction this paper addresses a gap in a human rights discourse that has been blind to the normshaping of women delegates to the united nations (un) from india, pakistan, ghana, nigeria, the philippines and other countries. throughout the creation of key un international human rights documents, these women’s claims for universal human rights challenged colonialism and patriarchal structures (see adami, 2022). this paper refers to three cases: efforts by indian and pakistani women delegates to make the universal declaration of human rights (udhr) more inclusive in its wording and recognise women as rights-holders; efforts by women from the global south to defend the universality of human rights against colonialism in the 1950s; and the voice of the southern feminists on the need for international economic reorganisation at the 1975 conference on women. the term ‘global south’, as used by amitav acharya (2018) in a much-needed shift toward global international relations, serves to confront western dominance, although admitting that any categories that set the continents of africa, latin america and asia apart from eurocentric narratives represent diverse contexts that cannot be captured under a simplified unity. acharya notes that the agency and norm-setting of non-western actors have been underrepresented in the history of international relations, especially in the narratives of global governance institutions. acharya suggests that the diversity of the global south can be regarded as a ‘unity in diversity’, through its critiques of eurocentric universalism as monistic. along with acharya, i argue it is important to explore a pluralistic universalism that respects diversity in the search for a common ground. ‘the global south’ is, in this paper, used when referring to the agency in international norm-setting of female un delegates from latin america, asia and africa. the paper attempts to advance new knowledge in human rights education (hre) by re-visiting the history of human rights. the theorisation of acharya, stemming from international relations through the concepts of pluralistic universalism and global ir, resonates with the attempt to decolonise hre; namely the need to confront how the voices, experiences and contributions of non-western actors have been marginalised, and the need to have a global historical framing rather than a western historical one (see further acharya, 2018; acharya & buzan, 2007). the aim of the paper is to rectify the misconception that the universality of human rights rests on western imperialism rather than on pluralistic universalism, and it is guided by the question of how these women argued for the universality of human rights against colonial and patriarchal interests. we find a discursive split in efforts to decolonise the field of hre— between self-determination and anti-racism on the one hand and human rights as eurocentric and imperialistic on the other (see, for example, yang, 2015 pp. 235-236). this split is made possible if we ignore key conflicts among un delegates at its founding and take for granted the dominant historicising of human rights. r. adami 7 the challenging of colonialism and racism through the discourse of human rights was not a new phenomenon that emerged in the 1970s, as samuel moyn (2012) argues. even though similar arguments are reified in the postcolonial critique of the udhr, as found in the work of katz and mcenvoy spero (2015), efforts to decolonise were crucial in discussions at the drafting of the udhr in 1946-48. this is apparent if we study un meeting protocols from this period. the argument in this paper is based on both primary sources (from my earlier archival studies into the drafting of the udhr, (adami, 2019)) and secondary sources of archival material and un meeting protocols (burke, 2022; o'donoghue and rowe, 2022; singh rathore, 2022). the sources referenced in relation to the indian and pakistani women delegates of the un in this paper are meeting protocols between 1947-48 of the un commission on human rights meetings 1-61 (e/cn.4/sr.1-61) and the third committee of the general assembly november-december in 1948 meetings 88-178 (a/c.3/sr.88-178), as well as autobiographies by hansa mehta (1981) and shaista ikramullah (1998). the ‘universal’ versus the ‘particular’ as a question of power the main argument put forth in this paper is that power seems to have obscured accounts of history. there has been a neglect of the role that diverse women have played in the international norm-shaping of gender equality and human rights, and this undermines universal claims in hre today. the reason why universality of human rights has been discussed so much among hre scholars is because the validity of human rights is found in its universal applicability (adami, 2015a, 2017; keet, 2012; roux, 2012; zembylas & keet, 2018). universality lends a raison d’être to hre, in contrast to citizenship education. citizenship education (ce) should not be conflated here with global citizenship education (gce); the latter is more aligned to the normative aims of peace education, cosmopolitan education and hre. a number of scholars have more closely examined the correlations with hre (rapoport, 2021; osler and starkey, 2003; todd, 2010; marks, 1997). the facets of dignity, equality and non-discrimination become meaningful if learners in different contexts feel addressed and included as rights-bearers in the historical and present-day narratives of human rights (adami, 2014; rapoport, 2021; robinson, phillips & quennerstedt, 2020). as hre generally clashes with the nationalistic framework of ce, hre demands an additional motivation beyond identifying oneself as a citizen of a certain country (sen, 2020). citizenship is particularistic but human rights principles of gender equality, nondiscrimination and dignity also become identified as particularistic and eurocentric when there are hermeneutical gaps between what is written, experienced and lived. while being born a human is a universal experience, material realities of power frame gender equality as a western feminist project, widen the gap between the idea of non-discrimination and the lived experiences of marginalised groups, and tie dignity to economic and social status at birth. human rights education review – volume 4(3) 8 the problem encountered in hre is thus how historical narratives of human rights only address western subjects and how present-day narratives of human rights only locate their urgency in other countries—human rights used as trump cards by governments in international relations—while ignoring violations ‘at home’. the dominant, and particularistic, historical and present-day narratives of human rights are a result of, and a continuation of, epistemic injustice in hre (lupin townsend & townsend, 2021; werkheiser, 2020). while efforts to decolonise hre aim to rectify social injustice, its success rests on the extent to which such knowledge is based on decolonising the historical and present-day human rights narratives that challenge the dominant particularistic ones (see earlier work that addresses the silencing of women in the history of the un: adami, 2015b; waterman, 1993), while simultaneously advancing a more pluralistic universalism of human rights. the critique of the western imperialistic notion of human rights challenges the biased representation of human rights in the history of the un (see acharya & buzan, 2007; acharya & plesch, 2020). this bias, as i understand it, is related to two forms of epistemic injustice: testimonial injustice— subjectivity and agency in international norm-shifting has been credited to certain individuals and human rights movements and not others; and hermeneutical injustice—collective knowledge gaps in historical and present-day narratives of human rights have resulted in and become a continuation of hegemonic nationalistic representations. recent studies give a new history of international human rights (adami, 2019; adami, 2022; burke, 2010; marino, 2019), one which constitutes much-needed decolonising knowledge in the field of hre (see for example becker, 2021) and provides a more inclusive notion of agency in international norm-shifting. this paper focuses mainly on the crafting of an international framework of human rights at the united nations, hence adding layers to studies such as those of barthélémy and casledine (2016; 2008) that recognise the part played by diverse local movements in the history of human rights. hre – overlooking parts of its history proposing decolonial methodology in hre implies discussing the ways in which the writing of history and the creation of knowledge has excluded non-western knowledges and marginalised non-western historical trajectories of human rights. a decolonising methodology, according to tuhiwai smith, needs to ‘pose, contest and struggle for the legitimacy of oppositional or alternative histories, theories and ways of writing’ (tuhiwai smith, 2012, p. 40). tuhiwai smith is concerned with how the othering of the ‘non-western’ in academic writing has generated a marginalisation of knowledge and a silencing of the voice of colonised peoples. by recognising the pivotal part a diverse body of women played in the creation of international human rights, epistemological foundations for the universality of r. adami 9 human rights that are based on pluralism are recovered. working toward greater epistemic strength in hre, as parker suggests, means rectifying the history of the united nations by recognising the role that women from the global south had in developing the international framework of human rights. the knowledge-blindness in hre is a result of the ways in which scholars and practitioners continue to overlook the part that diverse women have played in history. the false assumption that only western women delegates to the united nations had agency in setting the norms on gender equality has overshadowed how the universality of human rights and gender equality were asserted by women who also fought for independence against colonial powers, and who argued against patriarchal and racist discourses that would otherwise devalue women in the declarations and conventions of the un. the continued neglect of this history constitutes hermeneutical injustice, and the decolonising of hre thus needs to recognise the critique levelled against the colonial powers in the un by women from india, pakistan, ghana and namibia, a critique that has resulted in the human rights framework we know today. when based on research that aims to rectify the epistemic injustice caused by colonial and racist discourses that disregard non-western agency, hre can reclaim itself as a cosmopolitan project that is not trapped in a western epistemic hierarchy. in women and the udhr (adami, 2019) and women and the un (adami and plesch, 2022), scholars from different disciplines (adami, 2019; chesler, 2022; burke; 2022; marino, 2022) revisit some of the crucial un documents that shaped human rights into a universal language of gender equality and nondiscrimination. this new history of international human rights demonstrates how human rights and gender equality were inscribed in the core documents of the un thanks to women delegates from the global south. ‘real human rights’— the struggle of indian and pakistani women freedom fighters the dynamic in the united nations would shift during its founding years, when the universal declaration of human rights was drafted in the commission on human rights and adopted in december 1948 in the general assembly. ‘as former colonies of the united kingdom and france gain[ed] their independence in the postwar years, new member states to the united nations sen[t] their delegations to participate—challenging dominant narratives’ (adami, 2019, p. 63): india had already been a member of the united nations by 1945 and had voted for the charter that same year, but, while gaining full independence in 1947, india sends a delegate to the commission on human rights famous for having presented the “national flag” that same year on behalf of the women of india—hansa mehta. (adami, 2019, p. 64) human rights education review – volume 4(3) 10 hansa mehta had led boycotts of british merchandise and all-women demonstrations vital for the indian independence movement. she was jailed twice ‘for her active involvement in 1930 and 1932’ as non-violent strategies of boycotting campaigns against economic exploitation by the united kingdom were declared illegal by the british administration (adami, 2019, p. 67). in 1945-46 hansa mehta was president of the all indian women’s conference (aiwc), which was ‘the first organization that succeeded best in representing the diversity of indian women’ (adami, 2019, p. 67). the aiwc heralded a campaign for the sarada act against child marriages, which they saw as a major hindrance to girls’ right to education. when the government tried to divide the women’s movement by stating that the act should not include muslim women, the aiwc wrote a petition to the government stating that ‘the act affects girls and women far more than it affects men’ and that the women ‘deny their right to speak on our behalf’ (adami, 2019, p. 69; forbes, 1996, p. 89). hansa mehta was part of the draft committee of the constituent assembly of india in 1946, advocating, with a number of other women, for women’s right to divorce and to inherit property under a unified civil code, in contrast to the laws that had divided the country during the colonial period (adami, 2019, p. 69). hansa mehta was the first delegate in the un human rights commission in 1947 to object to the wording ‘all men’ in the draft declaration on human rights. she explained that the wording ‘all men’, if kept in the udhr, would not apply to women in india, as it would be read as excluding them as rights-holders (un commission on human rights, 1948, p. 24). mehta, along with lakshmi menon, who was the delegate to the un general assembly, continued to advocate for the importance of adopting a legally binding convention on human rights, so that the un could hold member states accountable for human rights violations, by stressing the need for human rights to apply to all human beings living in non-self-governing territories (i.e. under occupation or colonial rule) (un general assembly, 1948, pp. 893–895). in november 1948 pakistan sent begum shaista ikramullah to the third committee, in which the udhr would be debated after the draft declaration had been forwarded on from the un human rights commission (un third committee, 1948, p. 373). shaista ikramullah was one of the few delegates who supported the amendment of bodil begtrup, from denmark, on the right to education for minorities (adami, 2019, p. 130). ikramullah envisioned that education in pakistan after colonial rule should ‘embody the values of democracy.’ during colonisation, the primary objective of education had been ‘to qualify or rather train one to be good civil servants in the lower grade of government service’ and she felt that after independence nothing had changed on that front (adami, 2019, p. 130). ikramullah had left the first legislature of pakistan in protest against what she viewed as an undemocratic resolution which stated that no law would be enacted that was repugnant to the holy koran and the sunnah. ikramullah was alone in her dissent, being only one out of two women in the legislature; she had retorted that if the r. adami 11 members of the constituent assembly, who had gone through untold suffering to establish pakistan with an overwhelmingly muslim majority ‘by some inexplicable reason’ would pass such a resolution, ‘what could prevent them from doing so?’ (adami, 2019, p. 117; ikramullah, 1998, p. 198). in the un third committee, ikramullah argued for women’s right to divorce in article 16 of the udhr, stating that non-discrimination based on sex needed to be explicit in the article, and that although these rights were ensured through islam, human rights protection was needed so that countries with laws discriminating against women would not continue applying them (adami, 2019, p. 137). khushi rathore has written about ‘the forgotten envoys, begum shareefah hamid ali and lakshmi menon’. ali questioned the use of the term ‘equal rights’ for women, as women would be equal to men without rights under slavery: ‘ali prodded women to strive for “real rights” instead,’ as ‘what “equality” would mean for one section of women would not be applicable to another’ (singh rathore, 2022, p. 47). women from the global south who defended the universality of human rights against colonialism roland burke examines what is generally an overlooked part of un history—the ‘first two decades of un human rights endeavors around traditional, social and cultural practices, principally those which prevented the realization of the udhr for women’(burke, 2022, p. 72). one of the first binding treaties ‘on human rights protection passed by the un’ was the convention on consent, minimum age, and registration for marriage (burke, 2022, p. 72). when the member states of the un started the work of turning the human rights set forth in the udhr into international law, ‘supposed deference to local customs was a plausible, and somewhat respectable, defensive claim against universal application of various draft human rights measures’ (burke, 2022, p. 75).‘these claims were encapsulated in a proposed colonial application clause, which allowed metropolitan power to exempt their colonies from treaties’ (burke, 2022, p. 75). this was a priority for european powers and was backed by australia, canada and the us, ‘who had their own federal state provisions which they sought to inscribe on the various texts’ (burke, 2022, p. 75). badia afnan (iraq) opposed rené cassin’s colonial rationale against universality, and the clause was not included in the two covenants. the exemption from universality, with reference to custom, was used again during the drafting of the convention on the political rights of women (cpw) in the 1950s, another un convention on women’s rights that preceded the convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women (cedaw). begum rana liaquat ali khan (pakistan) and badia afnan (iraq) met this critique against the universal application of equality by drawing from their own experiences of women’s pivotal role in national politics and in national independence movements (burke, 2022). when the united nations commission on the status of women (csw) debated the clash over tradition in the attainment of women’s international human rights education review – volume 4(3) 12 human rights in 1954, aziza hussein (egypt), artati marzuki (indonesia) and carmela aguilar (peru) ‘contested essentialized ideas on tradition and religious custom’ used to undermine human rights universalism (burke, 2022, p. 78). aguilar argued: ‘women should not be deprived of fundamental rights merely because of prejudice and tradition’, and that ‘practices prejudicial to the human dignity of women should therefore be eradicated’ (burke, 2022, p. 78). when the convention on marriage was debated in the un general assembly, marie sivomey (togo), jaiyeola aduke moore (nigeria) and jeanne martin cissé (guinea) had to defend the idea, against the views of male representatives from their own countries, that the convention applied to women under colonial rule and in the ‘third world’ [sic] (burke, 2022). southern feminists on the need for international economic reorganisation aoife o’donoghue and adam rowe (2022) examine the intersectional complexities during debates at the 1975 conference on women in which ‘critical disagreements amongst the feminists of the global south and socialist blocs with the feminists of the global north’ arose in the context of ‘the new international economic order’ (o’donoghue & rowe, 2022, p. 88). they argue strikingly that ‘rather than recognize that the global south formed a distinct group with unique interests, their perspective has often been suppressed into the cold war divide’ (o’donoghue & rowe, 2022, p. 91). an ngo tribune, initiated by marcia-ximena bravo (educador) and mildred persinger (us), met outside of the main conference. this constituted ‘an open space for wider debate amongst feminists unconstrained by the structure of un thematic conferences and critically would not seek to speak with one voice’ (o’donoghue & rowe, 2022, p. 93). tensions between ‘the west and the recently decolonized states allied to the non-aligned group, became manifest’ in these parallel conferences (o’donoghue & rowe, 2022, p. 94). domitila barrios de chungara (bolivia), ‘coming from a bolivian tin-mining community (…) expected the conference and tribune to be a space where women from economically depressed backgrounds could combine to campaign for substantial international economic reorganization’ (o’donoghue & rowe, 2022, p. 94). domitila observed that the issues ‘facing women from less industrialized economies and rural areas were being marginalized’ (o’donoghue & rowe, 2022, p. 96). o’donoghue and rowe note that the disagreements between east and west, as well as the utterances of the vocal representatives of the global south, were used by international media to cast negative attention on the conference, overlooking the ‘genuine achievement that the conference represented’ (o’donoghue & rowe, 2022, p. 97). the declaration of mexico on the equality of women and their contribution to development and peace was adopted in addition to the world plan of action, which was a proposal by the non-aligned movement ‘and represents their particular concern of realizing a more equitable economic order’ (o’donoghue & rowe, 2022, p. 98). the hope that was placed after the second world war by newly independent states, such as india and pakistan, in a universal idea of human rights to force colonial powers to support r. adami 13 processes toward self-determination under the influence of an international body such as the un deserves more acknowledgement in critical hre. a knowledge-blindness of southern women’s agency in the history of the un adds to the widespread scepticism towards the international human rights framework today. hermeneutical knowledge gaps in hre a decolonising hre that confronts imperialist interpretations and challenges ‘common knowledge’ would turn our attention to how power obscures the voices of marginalised people in the history of human rights movements. there is an inherent tension in hre: it is a normative education on values and core concepts that stem from un conventions (robinson et al., 2020), but at the same time there is an appreciation that academic knowledge is not neutral (sen, 2020). knowledge production is situated within dominant historical and ideological narratives that shape understandings and interpretations of facts and ideas (adami, 2015a, 2017). walter c. parker (2018) suggests that we need to work towards giving hre greater epistemic strength (parker, 2018, p. 14). history, reasons parker, is a school subject that has succeeded in creating a disciplinary integrity that hre also needs. the first step to achieving such disciplinary integrity for hre, according to parker, ‘is to identify hre’s knowledge base: its disciplinary concepts, cases, history, literature, and skills’ (parker, 2018, p. 15). merely reading articles from un human rights conventions and declarations may say little about the colonial and patriarchal conflicts between those who took part in formulating them—the principles that these articles contain should not be de-contextualised. the notion of ‘human rights’ as claimed by the latin american feminists at the founding of the un in 1945 (for the latin american feminists' contribution to gender equality at the un in 1945, see dietrichson & sator, 2022; marino, 2019, 2022), and the indian women freedom fighters’ argumentation at the general assembly in 1948 (see further adami, 2019) aimed to confront the patriarchal exclusion of women as rights subjects, and to address the need for an international framework, through the united nations, that could hold colonial powers responsible for human rights atrocities in non-self-governing territories. delving into the complex history of core un documents that define ‘human rights’ was, and continues to be, a contested international effort to conceptualise rights beyond limited notions of citizen rights. in the 1940s and 50s, those who argued for the universality of human rights had to confront the colonial powers that wanted to exclude women and men living in non-self-governing territories. un meeting protocols provide an entrance into debates between the representatives from colonial powers and those from newly independent countries who were involved in the process of defining the articles in the un declaration and conventions that are human rights education review – volume 4(3) 14 today referred to as the un human rights framework. disciplinary knowledge is an epistemological resource enabling us to think about the world in abstract or context-independent ways (parker, 2018, p. 12). however, hre suffers from an epistemological problem, one that walter parker refers to as ‘knowledge blindness’. such ‘knowledge blindness’ in hre is a form of epistemic injustice. due to hermeneutical injustice— knowledge gaps in the history of human rights due to colonialism, racism and patriarchy— some people will not feel addressed by human rights. by reading fricker’s ‘hermeneutical injustice [as] a kind of structural discrimination’ (fricker, 2007, p. 161) resulting from ‘prejudicial exclusion from participation in the spread of knowledge’ (fricker, 2007, p. 162), decolonising methodologies can serve to rectify gaps in our hermeneutical horizons. in order to reflect on our own situatedness in this world we relate rights-entitlements to particular notions of belonging and there are both gains and risks when human rights become articulated in terms of particular histories depending on how power constrain these. parker (2018) points out that hre in the us has not gained much attention, and when integrated in school curricula the concept of human rights is generally traced back through the national historical trajectory—in this case the us bill of rights, the civil rights movement, and the struggle for the equal rights amendment (katz & mcenvoy spero, 2015). this is not unique to the us (reilly, 2018): countries will connect their own history of rights and possible expansion of citizen rights to the notion of international human rights, or fail to mention a whole generation of ‘human rights’ in curricula. hre in chinese curricula (liang, 2017, 2020) emphasises economic rights, while the us emphasises political rights—neither of these limited interpretations captures the interrelatedness between political and civil rights with economic and social ones. however, such emphases are understandable in the light of nationalistic political and ideological historical trajectories. history is a subject that contains competing narratives and, as with knowledge about human rights in hre, it will reflect acts of selection and bias. the complexities found in hre and peace education when it comes to the selection and bias of competing and conflicting historical narratives have been explored in depth by iordanou, kendeou, and zembylas 2020; bekerman and zembylas 2013; zembylas charalambous, charalambous, & lesta, 2017. ‘knowledge blindness’, understood as epistemic injustice, is caused by oppressive systems like colonialism. british educational policy will mention ‘british values’ in connection with hre (struthers & mansuy, 2020) while ignoring problematisation of how human rights were suppressed under its colonial rule—and how political and economic rights might continue to be marginalised through legislation and economic ties with former colonies through the r. adami 15 commonwealth and in current british ‘overseas territories’. in sweden, human rights in the national curriculum will be permeated by an attempt to create an understanding of core swedish values and the country’s peaceful relations with other nations (swedish national agency for education, 2018). however, in swedish history classes some things are not mentioned: the colonial practice of extracting natural resources from the indigenous population; the segregation of sami children; the drawing up of laws and regulations that discriminated against the sami and ignored their political and indigenous land rights; the forced movement of people to make space for international coal companies (for similar critiques of other nordic countries see eriksen, 2018). hre in national curricula thus becomes particularistic, due to dominant nationalistic historical and present-day narratives. audrey osler similarly notes the importance of ‘the processes of denationalization or decolonization of the curriculum’, as these stand in the way of hre as a cosmopolitan project (osler, 2015, p. 245). in this sense, the school subject of history is not based on ‘solid knowledge’, as parker seems to suggest; neither is its content open to debate in national curricula that serve to educate patriotic citizens. a decolonising of human rights knowledge and concepts that transcends national borders, therefore, has a revolutionary potential if rights have only been partially granted to some groups of people in a country. is epistemic justice possible through hre? hre seems trapped in ‘the intellectual tradition of the western academy [that] has produced, within a global context, pervasive and implicit epistemic hierarchies’ (woldeyes & offord, 2018, p. 25). however, decolonising efforts that question imperialistic notions of universality can still strengthen pluralistic universalism by recognising the revolutionary potential of human rights that newly independent states saw in the post-second world war years. a problematisation of universality in hre may ‘expose how power operates through the production of meaning’ (andreotti, 2011, p. 88); however, there is a risk that such problematisations de-legitimise hre. relativistic arguments against the universality of human rights risk feeding into continued power interests that exclude certain groups of people as rights-bearers. while colonial powers openly questioned the universality of human rights at the founding of the un, present-day postcolonial and postmodern rejections of universal human rights claims would, i assume, not be directed against the idea of human rights but against the particularistic western narratives upon which understandings of human rights have been built. an outright rejection of international human rights because of their universal aspirations, however, would align with the colonial opposition against extending rights-claims to people living under colonial rule. at the founding of the un, this opposition was based on racist discourses about a ‘natural’ inequality in society. again, moyn’s criticism against the human rights education review – volume 4(3) 16 existence of a revolutionary potential of human rights before the 1970s is largely focused on the discrepancy between the right to self-determination on the one hand and the notion of human rights on the other; it overlooks the fact that people living under colonial rule used the latter in order to question unjust laws between metropolitan citizens and people in the overseas territories of france and britain. moyn’s argument is valid if women’s history at the founding of the united nations is overlooked and if people living under colonial rule in the late 40s and early 50s—when the udhr had been adopted in the united nations while a majority of the african states were still under british, french, belgian and portuguese colonial administrations—are presumed to lack agency or to not know about human rights and the discrepancy between the moral existence of human rights in international diplomacy and the continuation of colonialism. both presumptions are forms of epistemic injustice. frederick cooper and ann laura stoler have explored the dichotomic concepts of colony and revolutionary potential in rights claims, by showing how labourers in french and british africa during the colonial era in the late 40s went on strike to demand the same rights that were universalised by the united nations. during strike waves in 1947 and 1948 in ‘british and french africa’ [sic] labour organisations claimed equal pay for equal work. ‘the continued strikes in africa were both a disruption of the economic project and an embarrassment to the ideological one’ (cooper, 1997, p. 412). both france and the uk were represented in the united nations in 1947 and 1948, asserting the universality of human rights and rebutting criticism from the ussr that economic rights and political rights were non-existent in their overseas territories. epistemic justice through decolonising hre would confront and challenge colonial practices that have limited people’s lived experiences of human rights, ignored claims for human rights by individuals living under colonial rule and historically overlooked international norm-shaping by individuals who have, at different points in time, represented new member states at the united nations. the limitations placed on universality of human rights by colonialism are a continued lived reality for people in french, us, and uk ‘oversee territories’ through colonial forms of constraints on political and economic rights in these dependent territories, and for people living in sovereign states where democratic accountability is strained by the influence of foreign powers. overcoming hegemonic representations and decolonising knowledge in the field of hre requires acknowledging the epistemic inconsistency and contradictions in how ‘human rights’ have been described and reified in eurocentric discourses. this situation was largely created by the former colonial powers, who initially legitimised a split between the rights subject and the ‘other’. the double stance of un member states such as britain and france was openly questioned in the post-war years when it came to issues such as suffrage, the right to r. adami 17 education and the right of labour unions to freely bargain with employers. ‘colonial projects also showed up the fundamental contradictions inherent in bourgeois projects and the way universal claims were bound up in particularistic assertions’ (stoler & cooper, 1997, p. 3). to address western hegemonic epistemic hierarchies is to confront and challenge colonial practices that have delegitimised agency from the global south and resulted in epistemic injustices such as hermeneutical injustice. if we are to decolonise hre, we need to unearth different trajectories than the dominant nationalistic and western imperialistic ones. as sikkink (2017) argues, such an affirmative lens would defend the legitimacy of human rights by demonstrating their diverse origins. the ways in which power continues to silence women from former dependent territories in the history of the un can be linked to how their agency challenged, and continues to challenge, the self-image of colonial powers as norm-setters of international values and rights. epistemic justice in hre is felt in the apparent clash between the claims for the universality of human rights, made throughout the history of the un by delegates from the global south, with the colonial idea that, historically, only metropolitan citizens could make universally valid political claims. in this vein, and in light of recent critiques of the udhr as representing ideas that disregard the right to self-determination, it should be noted that its 1948 preamble states that people have the right to rebel against tyranny and oppression. the revolutionary potential of human rights seems to have been lost in theoretical debates. these debates overlook the need to re-consider the historical role of women from former colonies in un history; women who claimed the universality of human rights. a recognition of the part these women played will also lend empirical strength to amitav acharya’s concept of pluralistic universalism. concluding discussion by considering other trajectories of the history of international human rights at the un, we recast the narrative of the universality of human rights from a western imperialist one to a counternarrative which owes its universality to the agency of the global south. indian and pakistani women freedom fighters were pivotal in advancing human rights as an inclusive concept in the udhr. these women had to contend with male and western delegates in their struggle to get recognition for women’s private rights and the right of people to revolt against oppression. in the 1950s, women from iraq, indonesia, egypt, togo, guinea and the philippines helped to ensure that no colonial clause was inserted in the first binding human rights conventions on women’s political and civil rights and their marriage rights. and in 1975 women made an human rights education review – volume 4(3) 18 intersectional critique of the oppressive colonial economic world order that limits women’s rights and affects social conditions in different parts of the world. such efforts have recast the idea of the universality of feminist and international human rights: these are not solely the result of the work of western actors; diverse women’s movements have also played an important role. just as ‘history is about power’ (tuhiwai smith, 2012) so is hre a selection, arrangement and presentation of knowledge that can both lead to and continue epistemic injustice, historical and present-day narratives on human rights can give legitimacy to pluralistic universalism if based on diverse origins and application ‘at home’, or they can reify a western particularistic narrative through nationalistic rejections of universality or imperialistic tendencies that neglect the need for the contextualisation and problematisation of dominant narratives. an alternative reading of the history of international human rights recognises their defenders as women freedom fighters who argued that ‘the rights of man’ had to become more inclusive, and rights claims had to be extended to people living under colonial rule and women living under the domestication of male guardianship. this alternative reading aims to upset the hermeneutical injustice in a historical narrative of human rights that overlooks the agency and knowledge of women living under colonial rule and those from the newly independent countries that became official members of the un. these women filled human rights with a revolutionary meaning—while contributing to a fragment of a narrative that challenges limited notions of agency in international relations today. acknowledgements i want to acknowledge the thoughtful and critical help provided in the review process of this paper. an earlier version of this 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(2017). toward a critical hermeneutical approach of human rights education: universal ideals, contextual realities and teachers’ difficulties. journal of curriculum studies, 49(4), 497–517. https://doi.org/10.1080/00220272.2016.1188156 zembylas, m., & keet, a. (eds.) (2018). critical human rights, citizenship, and democracy education: entanglements and regenerations. london: bloomsbury https://doi.org/10.1111/sjp.12354 https://doi.org/10.1080/00220272.2016.1188156 issn 2535-5406 vol 5, no 1 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4480 date received: 30-05-2021 date accepted: 22-09-2021 peer reviewed article © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles a matrix for assessing mutual impacts of human rights education and religious education jasmine suhner university of zurich, switzerland, jasmine.suhner@theol.uzh.ch abstract to address the societal challenges of global solidarity and sustainable societies there is clearly a need for human rights education (hre). the question arises as to which school subject is capable of contributing to hre in which way – and how different disciplines may ideally collaborate. the situation is particularly challenging for religious education in public schools. here there is an inherent potential for hre, but there are specific didactic issues related to civil rights and liberties. this article presents a ‘matrix for human rights awareness’ that is based on a systematic and multi-perspective analysis. the matrix can be used to categorise current hre approaches. it can also serve the self-assessment of the various reference disciplines for hre, while promoting and supporting mutual communication and collaboration among them. furthermore, it may serve as a reference framework to map the field of different models of public religious education, establishing their specific potentials for hre. keywords human rights awareness, public religious education, interdisciplinary human rights education, interdisciplinary thinking, complex social challenges, switzerland http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4480 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ j. suhner 91 introduction at the beginning of the third millennium, we are faced with complex socio-political challenges: conflicts over justice and distribution, ecological crises, cultural struggles, and migration are mutually intertwined, in turn igniting other socio-political problems. globalisation and digitalisation lead to an explosive plurality of values, magnifying these issues even further. not only have these challenges grown exponentially in the past decades, they also tend to become increasingly complex to understand and to tackle. in these contexts, human dignity and human rights as global orientation marks for peaceful coexistence are as necessary as they are endangered. based on this premise, we argue that interdisciplinary human rights education (hre) is a normative necessity. this is the first societal departure point of this article. the other societal departure point is the current virulent debate on the role of religion in the public realm of democratic states and, consequently, the relevance of religious education in public schools. actors in the field of public religious education are tasked with examining, justifying, and communicating the relevance of religious education from various perspectives. some countries address this question more urgently than others. as an example, we will be discussing the case of switzerland, where recent developments may be deemed paradigmatic for developments in europe as a whole. this article starts with the insight that there is a need for interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary hre and identifies the disadvantages of unrelated monodisciplinary approaches, both in research and in practice (1). the current need for hre is intertwined with the debate on the future profile of public religious education. this article marks the mutual learning potential (germ. erkenntnis-potenzial) pertaining to questions of public religious education on the one hand and the necessity of interdisciplinary categories of hre on the other (2). a recent research project was dedicated to this complex issue and the mutually enlightening potential arising from it. for this purpose, a ‘matrix for human rights awareness’ was developed. this can be understood as a theoretical framework for reflection, one that takes up the didactic questions of public religious education. its different dimensions allow for a nuanced comparison of different public religious education profiles and this will enable us to outline and articulate them. on this basis, examples from the current swiss debate on public religious education are offered. furthermore, the explanations reveal basic reciprocal impulses and outcomes in the didactics of religion and human rights, and this may serve to illuminate the educational context in other countries as well (3). the article concludes by arguing for increased interdisciplinarity, both in hre (research) and in public religious education (research) (4). human rights education review – volume 5(1) 92 human rights education as an interdisciplinary endeavour potential and challenges ‘as a simple fact, interdisciplinarity responds to the failure of expertise to live up to its own hype.’ (frodeman, 2017, p.3) today’s societies face complex socio-political challenges. issues related to the environment, migration and justice are intertwined, intricate and ambivalent. dynamics such as globalisation and digitalisation have led to increasingly diverse societies in terms of culture, religion and values, further complicating these issues. socio-political tensions between religions and cultures are, in turn, politically instrumentalised and staged by the media. complexity, particularity and a plurality of values lead public bodies to search for unifying and binding fundamental values. in the complex fabric of the global discourse on norms and values, the principles and language of human rights have a central place (mihr, 2009; bahr, reichmann & schowalter, 2018): they are both a condition and a consequence of the differentiation and pluralisation of cultures and of the global interlinking of the different public spheres. ‘human rights are the most presentable piece of ideology we have to deal with global justice. we are much inclined, if only initially, to take an argument based on human rights seriously’ (pogge, 2013, p. 28). whether we look at historic or postmodern social orders, human rights are neither obvious nor permanent features. they always depend on the commitment of the responsible social groups and the support of individuals. however, within the context of modernisation and its inherent growth of freedom of choice and action, the skills and intrinsic motivation for moral orientation and ethical appraisal do not increase automatically as well. it follows that the question of universal and binding norms is not just a matter for the law, politics and economics, but also education: ‘human rights cannot be defended and promoted by legal instruments alone. human rights education – learning about, learning through and learning for human rights – is essential to make sure that they are understood, upheld and promoted by everyone’ (council of europe, 2020, p.10). beyond specific hre initiatives, this need is also underlined by key european and global education initiatives. for example, the sustainable development goals (sdgs) (united nations, 2015) are comprehensively based on human rights and therefore on corresponding education (pogge & segupta, 2016). given the complex challenges to human rights, as well as their legal, political and moral character, they are regularly invoked from the perspective of different academic disciplines: ‘the study of human rights is an inherently multidisciplinary enterprise’ (donnelly, 2013, p. 2; j. suhner 93 bendel, bielefeldt, frewer & pirner, 2016). it is therefore only natural that hre is an important endeavour in a variety of educational fields of activity, one which cannot be delegated to one single discipline in a monopolistic fashion but must, on the contrary, ‘redefine the basic orientation of the educational system’ (krappmann, 2016, p. 145). when we look at the players involved, this multidisciplinary character also stands out. we see this in the plan of action for the united nations (un) decade for human rights education (1995-2004), which highlights the particular importance of various professions: police and law enforcement officials; the military and members of un peace-keeping missions; medical personnel; jurists; teachers; development workers; scientists; media workers; and parliamentarians. interestingly, there is no mention of theologians or other actors in the field of religion (office of the high commissioner for human rights [ohchr], n.d.). as a prominent example from the german-speaking context, lenhart classifies hre primarily as international and intercultural comparative education and, in a broader sense, refers to a number of other fields: law, political science, economics, philosophy, sociology, psychology, history, and cultural anthropology or ethnology. again, both theology and religious studies are missing from the list (lenhart, 2006, p. 235). this leads us to two pragmatic questions. how can we teach and understand human rights in an interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary fashion (mihr, 2016, p. 106; klein, 2018)? and where and how do theology and religious studies relate to this question? hre clearly requires ties with many professional disciplines and school subjects if it is to present a basic challenge to educational theory. bearing this in mind, we can find numerous research projects involving countless educational approaches and many different teaching materials on various subjects. the didactics of history, for instance, naturally tend to focus on the historic development of human rights, while the didactics of philosophy address philosophical patterns of justification and the didactics of politics concentrate on the appropriate tools of enforcement, etc. special school events such as transdisciplinary project days on human rights may well embrace the different perspectives in the short term, but they do not fundamentally alter the overall context outlined above, and we are left with an ‘unproductive tension’. hre clearly appears to be an inter-disciplinary topic yet, at the same time, this very fact leads to the unrelated and parallel existence of monodisciplinary research and didactic concepts in various settings. inter-disciplinary connections and collaborations are made even more difficult because the core meaning of human rights remains ambiguous. a great variety of disciplines and actors regularly invoke human rights, but due to differences between language systems and perspectives this often leads to divergent appraisals and conclusions. as a consequence, the terminology and content of human rights and of hre is discussed from various—and human rights education review – volume 5(1) 94 sometimes even contradictory—perspectives at different levels (suhner, 2021, pp. 338-339). this means that we do not only put at risk the potentials inherent in inter-disciplinary knowledge transfer and collaboration, but also the possibilities for self-reflection and accountability and, generally speaking, the targeted and continued development of hre. not least because of this, hre is less capable of dealing with current complex human rights challenges than it could and should be. if we do aim for targeted connections and interdisciplinary collaboration, each hre reference discipline (e.g., history education, citizenship education, religious education) primarily needs to reflect on its very own potential for hre. this self-reflection on how and to what extent individual disciplines and educational concepts may contribute to hre can only be communicated on the basis of common categories. these categories must be both differentiated and abstract, and applicable to different didactics. the tasks of public religious education: self-limitation, self-articulation, selftranscendence the question of what particular contribution a subject didactics may offer to hre is particularly challenging for public religious education, which has a great potential for hre. however, at the same time there are specific didactic issues related to civil rights and liberties (richardson 2015; organization for security and cooperation in europe [osce] & office for democratic institutions and human rights [odihr], 2007). this challenge is even more pronounced in the light of current debates on different profiles of public religious education and their specific contribution to general education: ‘of all the subjects in the school curriculum, religion is surely the most contested’ (jackson, 2018, p. vii). this brings us to the second societal departure point of this article: the current—and in many countries virulent—debate on the role of religion in the public realm of democratic nations. and this leads us to the debate on the relevance of religious education in public schools (berglund, shanneik & bocking 2016; davis & miroshnikova, 2017; jackson, 2018; jackson, miedema, weisse, & willaime, 2007; rothgangel, jäggle, & schlag, 2013). against the backdrop of an increasingly interconnected world and the rise in religious diversity, religion occupies a prominent place in the public sphere. today, no state, no company, no educational institution can think of tackling problems related to migration, international relations, intercultural cooperation—to name just a few—without taking religion into account (cf. haynes, 2021). this is one of the key reasons why the connection between religion, the public sphere and education has become increasingly complex in recent years. there clearly is a need to work on ways of developing appropriate, plural public religious education: ‘children need to be given the tools to understand the role of religion in their j. suhner 95 society and in the world, but they must be protected from indoctrination by their teachers or school officials’ (evans, 2008, p. 449). the task is not only to foster knowledge about religions, but also to foster the abilities of students to ‘recognize, understand, and appreciate the perspectives and world views of others’, as well as to ‘communicate ideas effectively with diverse audiences by engaging in open, appropriate, and effective interactions across cultures’ (oecd & asia society, 2018, p. 5). therefore, the question is not so much if, but rather how public schools in europe (and, indeed, in liberal democracies in general) should introduce religion into the classroom. this article seeks to shed light on this debate, by focussing on the situation in switzerland, where recent developments may be deemed paradigmatic for developments in europe. in switzerland, the basic premises and general orientation of public religious education have been revisited and developed in recent years. the framework for this evolution in the germanspeaking part of the country is ‘curriculum 21’, the product of a largely secular educational policy (bietenhard, helbling, & schmid, 2015). hence, religion, together with other related disciplines, is part of a subject called ‘ethics, religions, community’ (erg). this subject provides a distinct perspective among courses dedicated to natural and social sciences and the humanities (helbling, 2015). in erg, religion is understood as publicly relevant. this approach is further accentuated ‘by the fact, that contrary to other models of religious competence, it does not intend to foster personal religiosity’ (helbling, & kilchsperger, 2013, p. 58). in erg, religion is routinely included and implemented in the swiss educational context for the first time. this has a number of consequences: an apparent acceptance of the public importance of religion; the need to consider the public didactics of religion; and a need for the basic and continued training of teachers of religion (the religious-ideological heterogeneity of erg teachers has rapidly increased due to the plural ideological orientation of erg). as a crucial consequence, affective, performative, instrumental approaches must be carefully applied in the classroom. in terms of religious freedom, cognitive and religious studies approaches are considered ‘safest’. in this framework, a number of important questions on public religious education remain unanswered: the question of trusteeship and responsibility in contributing and creating didactic materials; the question of teacher training; the question of concrete didactic possibilities and limitations; and the question of reference disciplines for public religious education. these very questions now arise within the framework of a secular policy towards public religious education. there is a comparable situation in many countries, related to various fields: academic theology(s), religious studies, theories of religious education, educational policy-making. this is not only a matter of justifying the contribution of public religious education to public education as a whole, nor merely a question of financial and substantial human rights education review – volume 5(1) 96 responsibility. it also involves the question of successful communication between the various stakeholders of public religious education. in switzerland, a rather small country, these dynamics can be observed as if in a laboratory setting. for theologians and theological faculties in the rest of the world, the following facts may also be of particular interest. in switzerland, the debate on the didactics of religion takes on a slightly different form than in other german-speaking countries like austria or germany. here, the discipline of religious studies plays a significant role in shaping the debate of public re. theology tends to be seen as primarily responsible for denominational re and is marginalised in the public re discourse. this is why, in recent times and in switzerland especially, the task and self-understanding of theology with regard to public re requires a fundamental self-reflection and self-positioning (suhner, 2021, pp. 185-221 and pp. 260-268). aspects of public religious education: self-limitation, self-articulation, selftranscendence to communicate and substantiate the public relevance of the (partial) subject discipline of religion, we shall use the concept and term ‘public religious education’, in keeping with the notion of ‘public theology’ (pirner, lähnemann, haussmann, & schwarz, 2018, 2019; smit, 2013). the focus on the public aspect of religious education leads to different conditions and provisions for public religious education. this calls for ‘a change in the line of thought of religious education: it no longer develops its theological and educational arguments primarily in the interest of the reference religions, but in light of their plausibility for the public and its constituent members’ (schröder, 2013, p. 130). the main criteria for public religious education can be simplified to include the following three aspects (pirner, 2018; suhner, 2021, pp. 168183). self-limitation: any public religious education must accept the limitations of its own sphere of influence. in principle, it must affirm religious and ideological plurality—though not without completely foregoing its critical relationship with this. in other words, public religious education must evolve within the framework of human rights, upholding the principles of equality, liberty, rationality, and universality. the task of public religious education is not least demanded by human rights and the other side of the coin—human duties (interaction council, 1997, art. 15). this holds true for the theoretical debate, as well as for the practice of teaching and corresponding educational contents, didactic concepts, and methods. self-articulation: to be public is to communicate (schröder, 2013, p. 128; suhner, 2021, pp. 32-52). this second aspect refers to the necessity of open dialogue and critical confrontation with different religious as well as non-religious language systems. it is a matter of opening up to criticism and reacting in a thoughtful manner. this brings the challenge that any evaluation j. suhner 97 of or reflection on our own or another religion or ideology must never be solely based on our own logic. we must, on the contrary, confront other publicly relevant ideologies of educational theory, while referring to a third point of reference we hold in common (suhner, 2021). here too the semantics, pragmatics, and hermeneutics of human rights—a ‘common language of humanity’, in the words of un secretary-general kofi annan (un, 1998)—are obvious (roux, 2010). hence, public religious education can neither be conceived formally (corresponding to the first aspect) nor substantively and therefore linguistically without its human rights dimension. self-transcendence: lastly, public religious education must contribute to the debate on education itself, adding a specific perspective in a productive yet critical, comforting, cautionary, transformative and hopeful way. in short, it must bring to the fore its specific contribution to the common good. again, this can be formulated and exemplified with reference to human rights (education) (jäger & lohmann, 2019). two interrelated questions all things considered, the debate between public religious education and hre gives the clear possibility of expressing and legitimising religious education in all its public relevance in a unique way. indeed, thanks to its wide semantic rootedness in philosophical, educational, and theological traditions, hre may serve as a focal point for public religious education, thus becoming the basis and tertium comparationis (‘the third [part] of a comparison’ which is the quality that two things which are being compared have in common) for public religious education and related issues. this does not automatically imply instrumentalisation or functionalisation; on the contrary, religious education can and must be legitimised in the secular and plural public sphere only within the framework of human rights. this is even more essential, as human rights violations are often committed in the name of religion (bielefeldt, 2017). there is however a challenge: the fact that public religious education can contribute to hre is hardly questioned in (educational) policy. but, there has been little study of the way in which this might be done, or with which model of public religious education this might be achieved, even though this could be of significant interest to educational policy and to stakeholders in the field of hre and public religious education. it is thus a matter of illustrating that public religious education evolves within the framework established by human rights; how it structurally and implicitly promotes human rights; and to what extent it can contribute to hre. once again, it is clear that such a differentiated frame of reference for hre calls for concrete and specific categorisation. human rights education review – volume 5(1) 98 a ‘matrix of human rights awareness’: human rights education and religious education connecting lines the majority of public debates and frequently quoted hre publications cite religious elements and ways of thinking as influencing factors, whilst only mentioning potential links between religious education and hre in passing, if at all. though the un world programme for human rights education (united nations economic, scientific and cultural organisation [unesco], 2006) rates religion as a potential educational content, religious education—let alone its potential for hre—is not referred to at all. the potential relevance of religious education for hre does not appear in fundamental hre works in english-speaking and german-speaking contexts either (lenhart, 2006; fritzsche, 2009; fritzsche, kirchschläger, & kirchschläger, 2017, pp. 92,123-126, 141). this lacking awareness of correspondences between hre and re should not be judged as factually wrong, but it is insufficient in view of understanding the links between religion, ethics and the public sphere: with regard to the universal declaration of human rights (udhr), there are many ‘tasks and challenges that now, as then, are posed by the interpretation and realization of human rights in the diverse cultures, social structures, conflict situations and topic areas’ (pirner, lähnemann, & bielefeldt, 2016, p. 3). at the level of politics and education policy, numerous official documents do refer to the contribution of religious education to hre. the osce, for instance, has been leading fundamental discussions on the relevance of public religious education from the 1970s onwards. the ‘toledo guiding principles’ explicitly call for the integration of religious education in democracy education and hre (osce & odihr, 2007; jackson, 2010; richardson, 2015). comparable recommendations can also be seen on the part of the council of europe, such as: ‘recommendation on religious tolerance’ (1993), ‘religion and democracy’ (1999), ‘education and religion’ (2005), and ‘state, religion, secularity and human rights’ (2007) (schreiner, 2016; jackson, 2010). central teaching material for hre: the extended edition of ‘compass’—one of the most prominent international manuals for people involved in hre—explicitly mentions the need to offer more space to the subject of religion, referring to the possibilities of religious education (council of europe, 2020). the necessity to connect religious education with hre is also reflected in empirical findings on the relationship between religion and human rights. these point out that though there are not direct correlations between formal religious affiliation and individual value orientation, personal religious convictions may turn out to be quite significant (ziebertz & sterkens, 2017; arweck, 2018; roux & becker, 2019). last, but not least, the distinction between a supposedly neutral hre and religious education is problematic insofar as it promotes the view that religious education must j. suhner 99 maintain a low profile with regard to issues pertaining to the public realm, civil society or politics. this must be questioned from a theological point of view. the perception of human rights topics and the promotion of human rights awareness in public religious education thus align with the more recent debate in religious education, which focusses on its political dimension (skeie, 2006; grümme, 2009; engebretson, de souza, durka & gearon, 2010). at the level of teaching practice, the issue of human rights in religious education has received special attention in the german-speaking context for many years and, more often than not, individual human rights topics are given special consideration (altmeyer et al., 2017; suhner, 2021, pp. 463-471). the ‘comprehensive issue of what hre means for religious education and teaching and vice versa, must be put in a larger context’ (schweitzer, 2017, p. 122). we must embark on a fundamental examination linked to didactic clarification and figure out ‘in which way religious teaching may deal with human rights issues in practice, while avoiding simply repeating and stating seemingly evident propositions such as the idea that all human beings are endowed with the same rights. what exactly does hre worthy of its name look like? and what could be the essence of a specific approach in religious teaching?’ (altmeyer et al., 2017, p. 10). from the perspective of public religious education, this starting position can be likened to an invitation to face these fundamental questions for oneself, but it can also be a basis for discussion with other hre-related disciplines. in doing so, one must be cautious about making connections too quickly; neither a hurried linking nor an artificial separation is appropriate. what is appropriate is a differentiated view, rather than instrumentalisations or one-way deductions. moreover, this mutual reference is only viable since hre is not a supplement to religious education. an intrinsic connection between religious education and hre emerges from theological and religious studies approaches to religious education (suhner, 2021, pp. 429-478). a matrix for assessing the mutual impact of human rights education and religious education to make hre tangible to related reference fields, its manifold aspects must be systematically presented. for this purpose, i would like to introduce the term ‘human rights awareness’—by this i mean the comprehensive awareness of individual and public societal reality in its human rights-related dimensions. the matrix is based on fundamental differentiations in hre. these can be found in numerous international and national documents (for details see suhner, 2021, pp. 411-416), and can be considered in a number of ways: in terms of the tri-dimensionality inherent in almost any values education, namely the human rights education review – volume 5(1) 100 cognitive, affective and instrumental dimensions (flowers, 2004); with regard to their contents, which can be divided into legal, political and moral aspects; with respect to their explicit and implicit educational possibilities; with respect to the understanding that any educational system has to remain within the framework of a legal space which is defined by the boundaries of human rights. in this sense, human rights-related education must be understood in the dual sense of education in accordance with human rights and hre (lenhart, 2006, p. 171). through a systematic and multi-perspective analysis these different dimensions have been concretised, assigned to respective education policies, and differentiated according to the type of education involved. the reason for adopting this systematic (rather than empirical) approach is that the question of whether and to what extent religious education can contribute to hre cannot only be related to the concrete school context—what is actually taught in school is only a momentary ‘snapshot’. another inductive approach (e.g., a systematic review of curricula and curricular materials) does not allow for a differentiated understanding of educational policy and theological, religious education and hre debates, let alone correlate these with each other. but it is precisely these theoretical and justificatory foundations that are significant for educational policy actors and religious education. the guiding interest of the research was therefore to explore the potential of public religious education for hre. this must be discussed on the basis of systematic investigation (suhner, 2021, p. 8). these differentiations are simply explained in the following diagram (table 1). on the x-axis, we find the fundamental differentiation between the implicit and explicit possibilities of hre. the y-axis presents the three-way split resulting from the different aspects of human rights (legal, political, moral), as well as the differentiation of hre into cognitive, affective and instrumental dimensions, the two latter aspects not being shown in relation to each other. the disadvantage of this systematisation, as with any systematisation, is that it simplifies the various aspects of hre. a further disadvantage, which in my opinion can be ignored here, is that in this two-dimensional systematisation the linkages between cognitive-affectiveinstrumental on the one hand and legal-political-moral on the other cannot be shown. these linkages exist in every possible combination, and concrete examples will be found in teaching practice (suhner, 2021, p. 414). j. suhner 101 table 1: matrix for human rights awareness of course, the formal aspect of hre must firstly be answered positively—the didactic challenge consists in actively advancing hre in a way which respects the very framework of human rights, thus keeping educational processes in formal accordance with human rights. applying this matrix means shifting through curricula or through school subject materials, as well as through other hre documents or projects. hence, one realises that the material aspects of hre may be further divided into eclectic inclusions, selective references, and conceptional-didactic referencing (cf. suhner, 2021, pp. 453-478): eclectic inclusions: these are ‘inclusions’ rather than references. they result from the simple naming of human rights topics in different disciplines, as well as in corresponding teaching materials. selective references: these are also frequently seen. they are more detailed references, rather than just passing mentions of topics. they often intend to protect human rights and hre from one-dimensionality, and thus productively question their usual perceptions and generate constructive impulses. such references can mostly be assigned one of three key concepts: ‘human dignity’; ‘freedom’ or ‘equality’. they may also refer to human rights history. conceptional-didactic referencing: the purpose of this aspect is to appreciate the insights and potentials of hre in general, and to make them categorically and hermeneutically relevant. this leads to more comprehensive didactic-conceptual considerations and enables concrete pedagogical orientations (e.g., culture of remembrance or compassion). human rights education review – volume 5(1) 102 analysis and insights – an example we now come to the point where the discussion between public religious education and hre may commence. we propose the following two approaches: a) impulses from hre for religious education; b) impulses from religious education for the interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary debate on hre. impulses from human rights education for public religious education within this matrix for human rights awareness, approaches to public religious education as well as concrete teaching materials have a differentiated framework, and this allows them to better define themselves against the horizon of the public realm. the different categories of human rights awareness are heuristic in nature and serve to coordinate and collect the concrete and practical possibilities religious education may offer hre. the matrix goes beyond individual practices and provides a shared framework for the hermeneutics of religious education. as such, the matrix primarily serves the level of theory in religious education, which, in turn, reflects on the practical level. here—at the macro-level—human rights awareness shows a potential for analysis, communication, and further development in specialist debates on religious education, in educational policy discussions on public religious education, and in didactic debates with other human rights-related reference disciplines. naturally, it is not in the interest of public religious education to explicitly promote human rights awareness in all respects. but it is certainly in the interest of public religious education and every other discipline close to human rights to be aware of what the respective potential may be and to be able to communicate it in a differentiated manner. furthermore, the matrix of human rights awareness could be useful on the meso-level—the level of the teaching materials, the selection of the respective contents, etc.—as a didactic visualisation of religion-related discourses. finally, on the micro-level, human rights awareness could serve as a guide for students in terms of which category of hre their own (learning) perspective supports (suhner, 2021, pp. 497-498). the matrix may now be applied to the german-speaking context. here we may discern implicit and explicit fields of reference in different concepts of religious education. in terms of concrete content, we distinguish the moral, political, and legal foci. and finally, in terms of content, didactics and methodology, we distinguish the cognitive, affective, and instrumental dimensions. below we find the matrix illustrating the swiss school subject erg and relevant material, either curriculum competences or teaching suggestions, from the official erg website (association ethics-religions-community (n.d) (table 2). the different approaches are left blank here: the framework for erg allows (at least) the cognitive and the affective approach; this distinction must result from concrete examples in teaching practice. j. suhner 103 table 2: matrix for human rights awareness, applied to the swiss school subject erg overall, this matrix allows us to support the leading thesis in a differentiated way, illustrating the manner in which public religious education may specifically support hre. (due to space limitations, the entire range of approaches to the didactics of religion cannot be shown in this reference framework. however, the matrix now exists and the contents or potentials of specific projects, teaching materials, and didactic approaches may be entered. thus, a kind of heat map is generated, which shows specific hre potentials, makes them comparable, and clarifies gaps, etc.) from such detailed analysis, consequences may be found that are relevant to questions of religious didactics in public schools. these concern which categories of this matrix there can and should be found room for, and the profile of public religious education. if we place religious teaching materials and public religious education approaches from the germanspeaking area in the matrix, we see a clear focus on affective approaches and moral aspects (this includes the point about ‘selective references’ explained on page 101) in particular (cf. suhner, 2021, pp. 453-478). compared to other public school subjects, religious education holds a specific potential regarding these moral and affective dimensions. thus, from a hre human rights education review – volume 5(1) 104 perspective, the moral and affective dimensions should not only be allowed in public religious education but space should be given for their emergence and articulation. the public school must encourage reflection on the existential dimensions and consequences of religious and secular world views. pedagogically, this calls for a balancing act. the ‘cheap way’ would be to offer denominational existential education outside of the public school and/or culturallyoriented public religious education in public school. the ‘costly way’ requires theological, political and pedagogical knowledge and skills from all stakeholders: although there is no lack of creativity in the different ways in which scholars have tried to articulate how religion might be studied hermeneutically, anthropologically, conceptually, and so on – what is easily lost in this ‘turn’, as already mentioned, is religion itself, that is, the 'lived experience' of religion, of being religious and existing religiously. (biesta, & hannam, 2019) it is precisely the interlinking of hre and public religious education that shows the added value of permanently striving for this balance. impulses from public religious education for human rights eduation conversely, we may also expose in a differentiated fashion how hre which is sensitive towards religion not only makes sense, but also seems quite appropriate. there are systematic reasons for this. for one thing, the moral dimension of human rights is not a given from the start. omitting the religious aspect from hre would therefore only be possible if we only gave it scant moral, cultural and political significance. this would accord with the thesis of secularisation. however, such an attitude would mean it would be robbed from the start of the possibility to acknowledge and, possibly, make an indirect contribution to the intrinsic potentials of religion for the realisation of dignity and freedom. not to mention that this kind of mindset would be contrary to religious freedom. if hre were to consider itself areligious, this would be a contradiction in terms. furthermore, public religious education illustrates the fact that the context of public education is also always the primary public context in which the sense, the traditional references and reasonings of these values are subjected to scrutiny. in this respect, it is not only the motivational impetus for human rights that is strengthened. also heightened is the confrontation between individual and public value systems and the consequent debate. public religious education thus specifically clarifies the need for hre which is aware of different perspectives. j. suhner 105 last but not least, reflecting on the relationship between religious education and hre reminds us that hre must also wonder how humans and humanity may manage and want to create a world and an environment which is good and what this might imply—from an absolutely selfcritical point of view—for the further development of an education worthy of human beings. in other words, hre without public religious education is possible, but it is far from complete. conclusion the relationship between hre and public religious education is a complex topic, but a necessary one in both hre and religious education discourses. this article presents a matrix for clarifying categories of hre. as an example, it can be used to explore the relationship between hre and public religious education. figure 1: visualisation of this article on the whole, the matrix for human rights awareness may serve, among other possibilities, for the self-orientation and articulation of public religious education and didactics. moreover, it may allow other disciplines related to hre to situate themselves, thus encouraging communication and cooperation between them. in this way, the complexity-oriented, interconnected thinking that is necessary can also be more adequately facilitated. particularly in view of increasing interdisciplinary cooperation and research—e.g., the international research network (irn) on hre and the world educational research network (wera) (osler, starkey, stokke & flatås, 2021)—such basic categories are crucial. they must and can be further developed through interdisciplinary exchange. not least in the light of increasing digital cooperation and research options as well as ever more numerous digital teaching formats, specific (inter-/transdisciplinary) options arise for applied research. distinct categories are essential, especially for digital research formats and for collecting and human rights education review – volume 5(1) 106 classifying large amounts of data. the combination of various perspectives bodes well for bottom-up answers to interesting (meta-) theological questions related to both human rights and religion, such as that on the relationship between postcolonial approaches and universal human rights. this article therefore concludes by arguing for increased interdisciplinarity, both in hre (research) and in public religious education (research). references altmeyer, s., englert, r., kohler-spiegel, h., naurath, e., schröder, b., & schweitzer, f. 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(2017). religion and civil human rights in empirical perspective. international empirical research. cham: springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-59285-5 https://doi.org/10.30965/9783657704989 https://www.un.org/press/en/1998/19980130.sgsm6450.html https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000147853 https://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=a/res/70/1&lang=e https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-59285-5 a matrix for assessing mutual impacts of human rights education and religious education abstract keywords introduction human rights education as an interdisciplinary endeavour potential and challenges the tasks of public religious education: self-limitation, self-articulation, self-transcendence aspects of public religious education: self-limitation, self-articulation, self-transcendence two interrelated questions a ‘matrix of human rights awareness’: human rights education and religious education connecting lines a matrix for assessing the mutual impact of human rights education and religious education analysis and insights – an example impulses from human rights education for public religious education impulses from public religious education for human rights eduation conclusion references from nation building to global citizenship: human rights education in the nordic folk high schools issn 2535-5406 vol 5, no 2 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4470 date received: 25-05-2021 date accepted: 19-02-2022 peer reviewed article © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles from nation building to global citizenship: human rights education in the nordic folk high schools johan lövgren university of south-eastern norway, norway, johan.lovgren@usn.no abstract citizenship education played a crucial role in the 19th century transition from royal sovereignty to democracy in the nordic region, with folk high schools (fhs) playing an important role. while established to empower the people (folk) for active participation in society, the contemporary folk high schools have reoriented from their initial national focus to emphasise global citizenship education. the paper traces this development and asks how the identity and practice of the fhs reflect the ideals of human rights education. the article outlines the ideology and history of the nordic folk high schools and builds an analytical framework for two empirical studies of student texts. the final discussion applies the presented material to shed light on the research question and concludes by suggesting that the nordic folk high schools can be seen as a regional adaption of human rights education. keywords nordic adult education, folk high schools, global citizenship education, human rights education http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4470 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:johan.lovgren@usn.no human rights education review – volume 5(2) 78 introduction the nordic folk high schools (fhs) evolved as an answer to the 19th century challenge of establishing a representative democracy in the nordic countries (korsgaard, 2000; lövgren, 2017). the fhs became a cornerstone in an educational strategy where the people (folk) changed from being subjects to becoming citizens in a democratic state (straume, 2013; korsgaard, 2011). the educational model of the fhs was designed to enable the common people to take their place in these evolving democracies. these educational institutions represented ‘... a philosophy of education emphasising self-determination, self-activation and freedom’ (korsgaard, 2011, p.14). in the 175 years since the establishment of the nordic fhs, the challenges facing democracy have changed (lysgaard, 2020). the establishment of the united nations (1945), the universal declaration of human rights (1948) and the process leading up to the united nations declaration on human rights education and training (2011) reflect the increasing need for a global human rights education. from the nordic fhs's initial challenge of upholding national democracy, citizenship education must now face issues such as international human rights (osler, 2018) and human-induced climate change (ipcc, 2021). this paper connects research on the nordic fhs with the growing field of human rights education (hre) research to explore the role of the nordic fhs in facing contemporary global challenges. the research question of the paper is: how do the identity and practices of the nordic folk high schools reflect the ideals of human rights education? the first part of this article builds a framework for answering this question by first presenting an historical and ideological overview of the nordic fhs. by outlining a few examples of hreoriented projects in contemporary fhs, the historical perspectives are connected to practice. to further develop the analytical framework of the article, theoretical concepts from central hre research are presented. this is followed by a development of etienne wenger's social learning theory (wenger, 1998; depalma, 2009; lövgren, 2019). the second part of the article presents material from two connected studies; a 12-month field study performed in 2014-2015 (lövgren, 2017) and a supplementary empirical study conducted in 2021. in the final discussion, material from the introductory overview and the two empirical studies are connected to analyse how the identity and practice of the nordic fhs reflect the ideals of hre. the nordic folk high schools the nordic fhs have their roots in 19th century popular scandinavian movements. the danish philosopher, politician and theologian n.f.s. grundtvig initiated the fhs with the vision of a j. lövgren 79 school where the pedagogy would not be ‘book learning’ but rather one where students would attain a ‘fitness for life’ (grundtvig, 2011). in contrast to the elitist 19th century latin-based educational system of denmark, grundtvig painted a vision of the fhs as a ‘school for life’ (westerman, 2009, p. 541). the fhs were the cornerstone in grundtvig's educational strategy for the whole ‘folk’, from peasants to factory workers, to gain the personal development and knowledge needed to become active citizens in the evolving nordic democratic model (straume, 2013, p. 41; bagley & rust, 2009). grundtvig’s writings are continually translated (broadridge, jonas & warren, 2011) and the enduring relevance of his pedagogical philosophy can be seen in the fact that the eu commission’s lifelong learning programme was named after him (eu, 2022). the central principle in grundtvig's pedagogical philosophy is captured in the concept of ‘living interaction’ (korsgaard, 2011, p. 35; knutas & solhaug, 2010). this term has a twofold meaning, indicating firstly a pedagogical ideal where the teacher should aim not at lecturing, but at creating a dialogue where the students and teacher learn together (korsgaard, 2002; weiss, 2017). these dialogues, or ‘conversations in pursuit of the truth’, were to be the predominant activity of the fhs. korsgaard comments: ‘placing conversation at the heart of the matter entails the rejection of institutions such as the church or the state, or even a book such as the bible, as the guarantor of truth.’ (korsgaard, 2011, p. 17). grundtvig’s second use of the term ‘living interaction’ connects to his interpretation of enlightenment. grundtvig defended the view that true enlightenment can never only aim at developing students’ understandings of themselves but must always have an outward focus as well. living interaction, then, comes to describe the way learners relate to fellow students as equals, as well as their active involvement in political issues concerning the common rights of all people in the nation, and in the world (korsgaard, 2000). if grundtvig formulated the pedagogical ideals that were central to the emergence of the folk high school movement, it was kristen kold (1816-1870) who put these ideals into practice (skovmand, 1983, p. 19). during his lifetime he was involved the establishment of more than one hundred danish schools (korsgaard 2011, p. 33). the folk high schools established by kold were close-knit communities where teachers and students shared not only classes and studies but also meals and living quarters. the focus on building a close community with everyday relations between staff and students is described as a common trait throughout the history of the nordic fhs (lövgren & nordvall, 2017). fhs built on grundtvig's ideas were established in all nordic countries during the second half of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. in 1953, there were 56 fhs in denmark, 78 in norway, 77 in sweden and 87 in finland. the influence that the fhs had on human rights education review – volume 5(2) 80 the nordic democracies can be seen in surveys that map the educational background of parliamentary politicians in the nordic region. in 1967, a study was conducted of the educational background of members of parliament in the scandinavian countries (helldén, 1968). the percentage of mps having their main education from the fhs was as high as 20% in the danish parliament (37 out of 179), 17% in the norwegian parliament (26 out of 150) and 19% in the swedish parliament (74 out of 382). today, there are over 400 fhs in the nordic region. though the schools have a common pedagogical identity, there are major differences in national legal frameworks, as well as the role the schools are given in national educational systems (lövgren & nordvall, 2017). the fhs development towards a global citizenship education is described in a report from the nordic folk high school council (landström, 2008). in the report, human rights and global citizenship education are defined as constitutive parts of the pedagogical identity of the fhs and a central element in the future identity and practice of the schools. the pedagogical model represented by the nordic fhs has had an impact beyond the nordic region (holm, 2019; nordvall & åberg, 2011). a danish survey registers 695 regional adaptions of grundtvigian pedagogy in european countries such as holland, germany, hungary and poland, as well as in north america, south america, asia and africa (bugge, 2013). an example of the international impact of grundtvigian pedagogy is the highlander folk school, started by miles horton after his visit to denmark and the danish fhs in 1931 (holm, 2019-224). westermann (2005) describes the impact of highlander as follows: ...it was in the education and training of activists for integration wherein highlander came to national prominence, as the cradle of the civil rights movement. rosa parks, john lewis and martin luther king, jr. were among the most prominent of hundreds of civil rights activists who received training at highlander. (p. 546) global citizenship education in contemporary fhs the research behind this paper includes a study of documents describing hr-related projects in the nordic fhs. these documents were found in dialogue with national fhs organisations and retrieved from national websites and the homepages of local schools. the findings from the document study are exemplified here by two current national projects and four local initiatives to show the different categories found in the material. peoples future lab, initiated in 2021 by ffd (the association of folk high schools in denmark), is a cooperative project involving eleven danish fhs and eleven schools that represent global fhs. in this programme, two teachers from each of the participating schools take part in a dialogue-based training programme. the schools work in pairs to develop, perform, analyse j. lövgren 81 and revise an intervention for sustainable development in their local community. after the project, the plan is for the intervention to continue, and to be led by the students at the local schools (association of folk high schools in denmark, n.d.). in sweden, national fhs organisations cooperate with a swedish national hr organisation in dialogue-based courses. the aim of this cooperation is to use experiences from the fhs to further develop hre as a means for meeting challenges (ordfront, 2021). bajaj and wahl (2016, pp. 154-156) define two ways in which hre can be present in an educational institution. the first is a whole school approach, where hre is infused into the school's operations. in the fhs, this could be exemplified by sund folkehøgskole (2022) in norway or röda korsets folkhögskola (2022) in sweden. both schools are founded on the values of hr; in their online presentations they describe hre as fundamental for all school activities. the second way in which bajaj and wahl identify the presence of hr in an educational institution (2016, pp.156-158) is that of integrated school-based programmes run by external organisations. the document study shows this is a frequent form of hre in the nordic fhs. fana folkehøgskule (2021) in norway is one of several fhs with a close connection to the united nations association (una) in the nordic countries. una plays a central role in the programmes of these schools through hre-related seminars and courses. the nansen academy stands out among the nordic fhs for its hr initiatives, nationally as well as internationally. inge eidsvåg, former principal of the nansen academy, was the founder of a programme to create dialogues between different religious and ethnic groups in norway. the project has received both national and international attention as an example of the embedding of hr in a nordic setting (eidsvåg, lindholm & sveen, 2004). the nansen academy's global commitment can be seen in the project ‘democracy, human rights and peaceful conflict resolution’. the project established ten dialogue centres in the balkans from 1999 to 2004 (milas, 2005). the programme also included inviting conflicting groups from the balkans to dialogue retreats at the nansen academy in lillehammer (bryn, eidsvåg og trosholmen, 2015). related research and theoretical perspectives contemporary fhs a contribution to democracy? historically, the fhs are seen as making a central contribution to the national development of democracy (gustavsson, 2011; tøsse, 2005). they have focussed on citizen education and democracy as well as designing an alternative way of learning that goes beyond that of the public school system (dahlstedt & nordvall, 2011, p. 245; bagley & rust, 2009, p. 283-284). human rights education review – volume 5(2) 82 furuland (1991) describes the nordic fhs as: ‘the nordic countries’ strongest common cultural manifestation and their most independent contribution to the fields of pedagogy and adult education.’ (p. 468, author's translation). while the historical influence of the nordic fhs is borne out by research, questions about the contemporary role of the fhs in nordic society have also been raised (nordvall & fridolfson, 2019; larsson, 2013; knutas, 2013). johansson & bergstedt outline the historical task of the fhs in building nordic democracy (2015, p. 47) and go on to describe how after world war ii this task was taken over by the public school system. the researchers show how concepts that the fhs ‘had used and aimed for over the course of decades had been incorporated in the visions of the state and the formal educational institutions’ (2015, p. 53). this question of the role and identity of the fhs in contemporary nordic society is discussed in national fhs organisations (riis-søndergaard, 2021). the question is also raised by the norwegian government in commissioning an official report into the future role of the norwegian fhs (kunnskapsdepartementet, 2021). research on human rights education the limitations of an article format provide room for only a very condensed overview of research on hre and of the un declaration of human rights education and training (dhret). this overview follows the three central themes outlined in the second article of dhret (u.n., 2011, art. 2.2), connecting these to material from the wider text of the declaration and referring to core hre research that has analysed and discussed these themes. the first central theme in the second article of dhret focuses on learning about human rights. while this refers to the acquisition of knowledge of hr (osler & yahya, 2017, p. 128), researchers have pointed out that the implied learning reaches wider than concrete learning (al-daraweesh & snauwaert, 2018). the phrase ‘understanding ... of the values that underpin them’ broadens the implied learning to include a wider learning that addresses not only knowledge but also affects the value system of the student (tibbitts, 2017, p. 71; osler, 2016, p. 5). the second central theme describes hre as learning through human rights. the dhret reaffirms that the goal for hre is ‘the full development of the human personality’ (becker, 2020). teaching should be implemented in a way that reflects hr (bajaj, cislaghi & mackie, 2016). article 4 adds that hre should aspire to develop ‘a universal culture of hr’ and to foster the student as a ‘responsible member of a free, peaceful, pluralist and inclusive society’ (u.n., 2011, art. 4(b); osler, 2008, p. 456). leading hre researchers emphasise the need for hre to be adapted and shaped to each national, social and cultural setting (osler 2016). j. lövgren 83 the third central theme describes hre as learning for human rights. hre research gives numerous examples of practices aimed at empowering students to ‘promote, protect and effectively realize hr’ (zembylas & keet, 2018). hre should enable participants to promote ‘understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations and all racial, ethnic or religious groups’ (bajaj, 2017). the education should ‘embrace and enrich, as well as draw inspiration from the diversity of civilizations, religions, cultures and traditions of different countries, as it is reflected in the universality of human rights’ (sjöborg & ziebertz, 2017). a critical perspective on the future of hre is implicit in hopgood's ‘the endtimes of human rights’ (2013). hopgood predicts that political and economic developments will create ‘a neowestphalian world’ where there is no longer a global consensus on hr. a development of social learning theory the theoretical framework for our analysis builds on etienne wenger's social learning theory (wenger, 1998; wenger-trayner & wenger-trayner, 2015). for the purposes of this paper a few central concepts are employed; more elaborate accounts of the redesign are presented elsewhere (lövgren, 2019). according to wenger, the members of a community learn through the practices they perform and through the negotiation of the meaning of these practices (1998, pp. 52-55). for wenger, ‘human engagement in the world is first and foremost a process of negotiating meaning’ (1998, p. 53). the negotiation process is both social (negotiating practices) and individual (negotiating identity). renée depalma (2009) develops the concept of a transformative community of practice as a critique of the limitations of wenger's theory. a transformative community invites members to share in the negotiation of meaning (p. 365) and peripheral members are seen as an asset for their ability to see the community with fresh eyes (p. 367). in 2015 wenger presented a revision of the earlier theory with a focus on the negotiating of identity (wenger-trayner & wenger-trayner, 2015, pp. 19-26). wenger describes learning in the 21st century as increasingly individualised (2015, p. 13). he uses the concept of identity work to describe the intense learning that takes place in boundary meetings. wenger argues that education should develop a boundary-oriented pedagogy that leads students to new insights through boundary meetings and boundary crossings. such a pedagogy shows how: ‘combining multiple voices can produce a two-way critical stance through a mutual process of critique and engagement in reflection.’ (2015, p. 19). the concepts of community, negotiation of meaning, transformative community of practice and boundary-oriented pedagogy will be developed further in the analysis of the empirical human rights education review – volume 5(2) 84 material. empirical study the central empirical material of this paper is taken from a field study conducted during the 2014-2015 school year at two norwegian fhs. the design for the field study included an initial student questionnaire, observations, video recordings, interviews and reflective texts (lövgren, 2017). in this paper the analysis will focus on a specific part of this empirical material: reflective texts written by 60 students. the two schools were found through a process of purposive sampling to represent different contextual factors such as location, age and size of the fhs. while one school was newly established and among the largest fhs, set in urban surroundings, the other was among the smaller and older fhs, set in in rural surroundings. for the writing of the reflective texts no sampling was needed to acquire informants in the smaller school; all students were included in the material. in the larger school, where this was not possible, a case sampling was used to locate courses which were attended by students from all the school's main programmes (miles & huberman, 1994, p. 29). in the instructions given to the informants before they wrote their texts, open-ended questions were used to capture the wider context of their total learning experience. students were asked to describe: what are the most important things that happened to you this year? what have you experienced? describe events, situations and people that have meant a lot to you. as the material from the 2015 field study was analysed in preparation for this article, the need for supplementary empirical material with a focus on global citizenship and hre became evident. this was achieved by adding a new study which was done in april 2021. as the study was to supplement the initial field study with a focus on hre, a non-probability or purposeful sampling of informants became necessary. by entering the words ‘human rights’ in the national database of the norwegian fhs, three classes with a hre focus from different schools were sampled. to gather the data, the method used in the 2015 study was given a more focused design; students were guided through a process of writing reflective texts. the instructions were built around three themes; these ranged from the very open-ended (‘what have you experienced at your fhs?’) to asking the students to finish sentences like ‘the fhs has inspired me to...’. the 2021 study produced 54 reflective texts. in the initial research as well as in the j. lövgren 85 supplementary study, students were given the option not to take part in the writing of reflective texts as well as the option to drop out of the session if they wanted to. in both studies, the analysis of the documents was initiated as an abductive process (afdal, 2015, p. 260). the student texts were read inductively to locate patterns in the material and find possible categories (boréus & bergström, 2005). this was followed by a content analysis (franzosi, 2009), where words perceived as representing factors in global citizenship and hre were identified. the following section presents the reflective texts written by fhs students, divided into three main categories. their captions represent three overarching themes of learning at the fhs (lövgren, 2019): community is the context of learning where self is developed through identity work and the other is the focus. community the context of learning a common theme for students from all the five schools in the study is the many different social backgrounds that come together at the fhs. the schools are open to all, without any need for academic accomplishments or prior studies. the nordic systems for state-funded stipends and student loans make the courses available for students with very different social and economic family backgrounds. this is reflected in the students’ narratives of experiences of diversity within the student body. as students identify with the newly established community at the fhs, close relations are built and differences of social status, economic resources or religious upbringing become less relevant. the following quote paints a picture of such learning: the people, the atmosphere, and the values that i have experienced here are indescribable. i have met, talked to, and got to know people that i would never have had a relationship with otherwise. it is awesome to relate to people from the upperclass areas of oslo while at the same time including people from the opposite background, those who have really struggled. there have been so many good conversations that embrace everybody in a way i’ve never experienced anywhere else. students describe having gone through an intense period of boundary meetings in their initial identification with the community at the fhs. the boundary meetings lead to a process of learning where social walls and prejudices are challenged. some informants characterise the social experience in the fhs and the learning it induces as fundamentally life-changing. one girl describes her learning like this: i have learned to work together with all kinds of people. my roommate from bolivia comes from a totally different cultural background than mine. this year i have been human rights education review – volume 5(2) 86 in love. i have danced at a ball. i have become more christian. i have learned that many, too many, struggle with heavy burdens from their former life. i have learned that many of the things i thought i knew well, i don’t know at all. a central element in the classes and seminars offered at the fhs are learning practices designed to activate processes towards global citizenship. these events include sessions in a more traditional school setting with subjects connected to hr and international involvement. however, students’ accounts suggest that these processes happen most effectively outside the classroom. one example is students arranging social activities together with newly arrived refugees to norway, an area where all the five schools in the study were involved. the learning and respect that these meetings engender are described as vital ingredients in students' development of a global consciousness. one girl writes: i've learned a lot about people. i have learned about many different cultures and challenges that people face all over the world. i have also learned how people learn new things, and how strong individuals can be important to society. another central theme in a majority of the 2014-2015 texts (before the covid-19 limitations of 2020-2022) is that of directly experiencing global injustice through travel. all five schools in the study include international travel as a central element in their pedagogical programmes, emphasising that the aim of these journeys is to enhance global consciousness. teachers in charge of these study tours are either from the country visited by the students or have close connections to the local community where the group stays. the aim is that the programmes should be designed in dialogue with the local hosts to create meetings based on mutual dialogue and respect. the personal meetings with global injustice and the boundary meetings that the travel involves are given much room in the students’ account of their year. the experience of meeting ‘the global other’ is described like this by one student: throughout our travels, we have met a whole bunch of different people, either instructors or friends of our teacher. each person we have met has qualities that i look up to and admire. self-development through identity work the second main feature the students highlight in their reflective texts is that of personal development through negotiation of identity. this theme covers dimensions of increased selfreliance, becoming socialised into a community and seeing oneself as a part of a global humanity. a male student is one of many who uses the phrase ‘to be myself 100%’: i’ve become more confident in myself. i have finally dared to be myself 100%. i also j. lövgren 87 feel i’m more part of a community, at a folk high school you never stand alone. i have friends around me all the time who support me. we make each other better. the student quoted above describes how his experience of finding a more confident identity is closely related to being part of the community that develops through the year. the fhs experience is described as laying the groundwork for the strengthening of self-reliance. the reflective texts often give descriptions of staff and teachers at the fhs. one student describes her experience of: ...having encountered equality. that everyone has the right to be heard and to express themselves, regardless of age and role here at school.... i feel i am taken seriously and treated as an adult and as a part of the community. this is because the staff are not authoritarian at all. several students ascribe their motivation for learning at the fhs to freedom from grades and exams. one student writes of learning at fhs as an experience ‘where you simply are left to be free and learn a lot about yourself and others.’ another student puts it this way: ‘it's pretty awesome when you do your utmost and use 100% of yourself, not because you want good grades, but because you really want to...’ the relationship between staff and students, as well as the teaching methods and learning experiences reflected in the student texts, establish a basis for an open process of personal development. the student texts provide a picture of a community where staff and students share in learning experiences. the learning practices introduced by the staff, as well as morning assemblies and even religious services, are described by students as open for questioning the values represented by the respective fhs. people are motivated, committed and interested in what you do, and you want to learn and do as much as possible. we also get to be involved in deciding what we want to learn about. the other the focus of learning the third section connects to students' descriptions of the fhs boundary-oriented pedagogy. the personal development described in the previous theme is the aim of this section. one student describes this: i have gained a lot more self-confidence and have really been given the chance to express my opinions and use my freedom of speech. i’m no longer afraid to use my voice and i have become very confident in myself... the folk high school has inspired me to take more responsibility and to get involved in things that happen around me. human rights education review – volume 5(2) 88 the experience of belonging to a community where global values are a part of the fellowship is described as decisive for some: i have always been involved in the world around me, but what the folk high school has given me is the belief that we can do something about it. there’s something about joining other people who are committed to the same things that you are. it gives you hope that we actually have a chance to make a difference. this was the main reason why i wanted to go to folk high school in the first place. i felt that the world had so many problems, and more were on their way, at the same time as i felt alone about the despair that we didn’t do enough to fix it. therefore, it was extremely important for my commitment to come to a place where we fight for the same things. the analysis shows how students’ engagement in global citizenship is focused on sustainable development and ecology. an understanding of human rights is often voiced as central to the implementation of sustainable development. one student defines a sustainable society: we create a sustainable society by taking care of each other and the world around us. we must therefore ensure that our planet is healthy, so that we have a basis for life. and that the people on it are also taken care of, so that we don’t create destructive patterns of action for ourselves and the planet. human rights are therefore very important. and another succinctly concludes: i believe that we create a sustainable society by, among other things, getting human rights carried out, and keep working from there. the third theme of empowering students to uphold the rights of others links to the learning aims of the nordic fhs. the empirical study maps the students' description of community as the centre of their year as fhs students. in the context of the community the student’s self develops through boundary meetings where the other is the focus of learning. discussion in the discussion, empirical material from the presented studies will be further analysed by combining concepts from our theoretical perspectives and our introductory description of the nordic fhs. the aim of this section is to answer the question: ‘how do the identity and practices of the nordic folk high schools reflect the ideals of human rights education?’ community the internalisation of hr values in the introduction to this paper, the term living interaction is described as representing the central element in grundtvig's pedagogical vision for the fhs. the term describes the process j. lövgren 89 of internalisation of democratic values, the goal of the 19th century fhs (korsgaard, 2011, p. 35). in the field study, contemporary fhs students describe their experience of ‘so many good conversations that embrace everybody in a way i’ve never experienced anywhere else.’ the frequency of such references in the student texts indicates that boundary meetings between students are an integral part of the pedagogy of the nordic fhs (wenger-trayner & wengertrayner, 2015). community as a pedagogical value is closely connected to the historical identity of the fhs, both in grundtvig's central concept of a living interaction and in the practices of the initial schools established in denmark by kold (skovmand, 1983). in the field study this can be seen in what the informants describe as the most important learning experience at their fhs, the deepened understanding and respect that come from boundary meetings with the other. these experiences occur with fellow students as well as with the global contacts of the fhs. a close reading of the narratives presented by the fhs students discloses a boundary-oriented pedagogy that leads to identity work based on boundary meetings and boundary crossings (wenger-trayner & wenger-trayner, 2015). in hre literature, the internalisation of hr values is referred to as a decisive part of ‘learning about’ hr (tibbitts, 2017; osler, 2016). this internalisation is closely related to the processes embedded in grundtvig's term, ‘living interaction’. this suggests that the learning described reflects the aim undhret sets for hre to create a community defined by ‘a universal culture of hr’ (u.n., 2011, art. 2.2). the empirical material describes a community where the negotiation of meaning is not dominated by the authorities, as implied by the student comment: ‘the staff is not authoritarian at all’. another student writes: ‘everyone has the right to be heard and express themselves, regardless of age and role’. depalma defines ‘a shared negotiation of meaning’ as the primary indicator of a transformative community of practice (2009, p. 357). the responsibility of the self for the rights of the other dhret uses the phrase ‘developing a universal culture of human rights, in which everyone is aware of their own rights and responsibilities in respect of the rights of others.’ a community that builds such a culture of hr will bring about ‘the development of the individual as a responsible member of a free, peaceful, pluralist and inclusive society.’ (u.n., 2011, art.4; osler, 2008) the second most prevalent theme or category in student texts is connected to the experience of finding greater self-value and self-confidence. in student descriptions of this development, there is a direct connection to a growing understanding and respect for the other. the informants describe this increased awareness of ‘their own rights and responsibilities in respect of the rights of others’ in meetings with students and teachers on campus, but also in human rights education review – volume 5(2) 90 classes on global issues and in experiences of travel. the descriptions of international boundary meetings are characterised by intense identity work as students are brought into boundary meetings with an unknown cultural and political setting. in these narratives the informants describe a learning experience that leads to an enhanced responsibility for the local and global realisation of hr. when grundtvig discusses enlightenment, he defines true enlightenment as a process that affects not only the learner's inner life, but must also include engagement in the local community, the nation and the world. grundtvig's notion of enlightenment indicates both a call for social activism and a vision of global responsibility that were not common in his time (korsgaard, 2000). contemporary publications from central fhs organisations define global citizenship and global contacts as integral to the identity of the movement (folkehøgskolerådet, 2017). the present analysis indicates that there are elements in the pedagogical ideals represented by hre that are reflected in the fhs. i would argue that research towards a development of this connection could strengthen the contemporary fhs' understanding of their identity and help define their role in nordic society. the findings reveal a development whereby the focus of the fhs has moved from nation building to global citizenship education. johanson & bergstedt (2015) question the schools' contemporary role in a society where the national state has incorporated the initial project of the fhs. the analysis suggests that the primary focus of the fhs has moved from national to global hr-related issues. the present analysis also describes the nordic fhs as providing support for the upholding of a global consensus on hr. the nordic fhs were initiated to build and protect society at a time when democracy was established and endangered (westerman, 2009). although hopgood's (2013) predictions must be questioned, the developments he describes should be respected as a threat to hr. the introduction to this article gives a picture of the potential influence a movement such as the nordic fhs can have. if this study is correct, the nordic fhs are educational institutions with a value base and a pedagogical practice that in many ways reflects the ideals represented by hre. i would suggest that it could also be of interest for hre to promote further research into the theme of this article with the possible outcome of identifying the nordic fhs as a regional adaption of hre. conclusion this paper asks how the identity and practices of the nordic folk high schools reflect the ideals of human rights education. the introduction to the article consists of an introduction to the history, ideology and pedagogical identity of the nordic folk high schools. grundtvig's vision of a living interaction has been characterised as the central element in the pedagogical identity j. lövgren 91 of the nordic fhs. the term describes a twofold aim: teaching as a living dialogue between teacher and student, and students’ development towards a living relationship with the community, the nation and the world (korsgaard, 2011). the second part of the article established links between relevant research from the fields of hre and fhs. after the introduction of social learning as a theoretical perspective (wenger, 1998; depalma, 2009; lövgren, 2019) two empirical studies were presented. empirical material consisting of reflective texts written by fhs students was analysed under three overarching categories: community as the context of learning where self is developed through identity work, and the other is the focus. the analysis and discussion suggest a number of correlations between hre and the identity and practice of the nordic fhs. the students describe their fhs as transformative communities of practice (depalma, 2009) where their voices are heard and the negotiation of meaning is shared between staff and students. the term ‘a universal culture of hr’ from dhret and the development of the term in hre research (osler, 2008) describe a learning situation similar to the one presented in the student texts. in the empirical material students also describe an experience of self-development towards a greater self-value and selfreliance. dhret affirms that hre should ‘be directed to the full development of the human personality’ (un, 2011). this direction is given a goal in article 4 for the student to become a ‘responsible member of a free, peaceful, pluralist and inclusive society’. in the narratives of the fhs students, self-development is described as an outward movement characterised by an enhanced responsibility for the local and global realisation of hr. in my work with this article, i have found no empirical research on the connection between hre and the nordic fhs. by necessity, the project and the article that it has produced has been shaped by this. i have many times thought of the project as the mapping of an uncharted field of research. the article is written in the hope that future research will explore the field further. the historical and ideological links between hre and the nordic tradition of folkbildning can be developed in many directions that are worthy of further empirical research. references al-daraweesh, f., & snauwaert, d. t. (2018). the hermeneutics of human rights education for deliberative democratic citizenship. in m. zembylas, & a. keet (eds.). critical human rights, citizenship and democracy education: entanglements and regenerations, (pp. 85-99). london: bloomsbury. afdal, g. (2015). modes of learning in religious education. british journal of religious education, 37(3), 256-272. https://doi.org/10.1080/01416200.2014.944095 https://doi.org/10.1080/01416200.2014.944095 human rights education review – volume 5(2) 92 andersson, d.e. (2017). teaching the history of human rights. in a. sjöborg, & h.g. ziebertz. (eds.). religion, education and human rights. theoretical and empirical perspectives. vol 1. (pp. 91-100). springer, cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-54069-6_7 association of folk high schools in denmark (n.d.). peoples future lab. retrieved from: https://danishfolkhighschools.com/global-folk-high-school-movement/peoples-futurelab bagley, s. s., & rust, v. d. 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(2017). human rights education: theory, research, praxis. philadelphia, pa: university of pennsylvania press. https://doi.org/10.9783/9780812293890-005 united nations (2011). declaration on human rights education and training. adopted by the general assembly, resolution 66/137, a/res/66/137, 19 december. retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/en/resources/educators/human-rights-education-training/11united-nations-declaration-human-rights-education-and-training-2011 weiss, m.n. (2017): with life as curriculum: on the relevance of the socratic method in norwegian folk high schools. journal of the american philosophical practitioners association, 12(3), 2005-2027. wenger, e. (1998). communities of practice: learning, meaning, and identity. cambridge university press. https://doi.org/10.1017/cbo9780511803932 wenger-trayner, e. & wenger-trayner, b. (2015). learning in the landscape of practice: a framework (pp. 13-30). in e. wenger-trayner, m. fenton-o’creevy, s. hutchinson, c. chris kubiak, b. wenger-traynor (eds.) learning in landscapes of practice: boundaries, identity, and knowledgeability in practice-based learning. london: routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315777122-3 westerman, w. (2005). folk schools, popular education, and a pedagogy of community action. in e. ewing (ed.). revolution and pedagogy: interdisciplinary and transnational perspectives on educational foundations, (pp. 107-132). london: palgrave macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781403980137_6 zembylas, m., & keet, a. (eds.). (2018). critical human rights, citizenship, and democracy education: entanglements and regenerations. london: bloomsbury. https://doi.org/10.9783/9780812293890-005 https://www.ohchr.org/en/resources/educators/human-rights-education-training/11-united-nations-declaration-human-rights-education-and-training-2011 https://www.ohchr.org/en/resources/educators/human-rights-education-training/11-united-nations-declaration-human-rights-education-and-training-2011 https://doi.org/10.1017/cbo9780511803932 https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315777122-3 https://doi.org/10.1057/9781403980137_6 from nation building to global citizenship: human rights education in the nordic folk high schools abstract keywords introduction the nordic folk high schools global citizenship education in contemporary fhs related research and theoretical perspectives contemporary fhs a contribution to democracy? research on human rights education a development of social learning theory empirical study community the context of learning self-development through identity work the other the focus of learning discussion community the internalisation of hr values the responsibility of the self for the rights of the other conclusion references issn 2535-5406 vol 5, no 1 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4466 date received: 09-05-2021 date accepted: 30-09-2021 peer reviewed article © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles indigeneity versus diversity renate banschbach eggen norwegian university of science and technology, norway, renate.eggen@ntnu.no abstract the article deals with the representation of the sámi in the new national curriculum for primary and lower secondary education in norway. more precisely, it focuses on a specific formulation in the fourth core element of the curriculum for religious education, in which an awareness of sámi perspectives is presented as part of the diversity competence which pupils are supposed to acquire. based on a critical analysis of governmental documents dealing with education it is argued that the term ‘diversity’ as it is used in the fourth core element addresses sámi perspectives in a way that may induce readers to think of the sámi as one of an increasing number of minorities in an originally norwegian society. this implication, even if unintended, is highly problematic. it can be interpreted as a violation of both ilo 169, article 31 and crc, article 29 (1), especially since the sámi are a people indigenous to norway. keywords human rights education, sámi, indigenous people, curriculum, diversity, decolonisation. http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4466 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:renate.eggen@ntnu.no r. eggen 137 introduction ‘the norwegian state is founded on the territories of two peoples – the norwegians and the sámi’ (mellgren, 1997). this statement made by the king of norway, harald v, in opening the third sámi parliament in 1997, points at a fundamental feature of norway: it is a nation consisting of and belonging to two peoples whose initial equality seems unquestionable. the history of the norwegian state, however, is a history of two peoples of which one is the coloniser and the other the colonised. today the injustice inflicted on the sámi people is acknowledged by the norwegian government. in 1990 the norwegian state ratified international labour organisation (ilo) convention 169—the indigenous and tribal peoples convention. norway thus both recognised the sámi as an indigenous people and acknowledged the state’s responsibility to promote the full realisation of their social, economic, and cultural rights and to take measures to facilitate the revitalisation, maintenance and development of sámi languages, culture, and traditions. education plays a vital role in this process of decolonisation. education policy documents, especially curricula, provide essential tools for building up a collective identity based on equality and mutual acknowledgement (vesterdal, 2019). in norway the process of decolonisation has had a short history compared to the long-lasting process of assimilation and humiliation of the sámi. it is still the case that many norwegians are unfamiliar with this part of norwegian history and there is still a considerable lack of knowledge about sámi history and culture. it is therefore important that sámi history and sámi issues are sufficiently represented in the curriculum. furthermore, the way in which they are presented may be even more important. the severe humiliation and denunciation of the sámi in governmental documents up to the 1960s (andresen, evjen & ryymin, 2021) calls for great care and a complete lack of ambiguity whenever sámi issues are dealt with in today’s governmental documents. the choice of terms and formulations in those parts of the curriculum dealing with sámi history, culture, and perspectives is therefore of particular significance. against this background the article focuses on a specific formulation within the new national curriculum, which applies from 2020 (norwegian directory for education and training, 2020). in the following i will discuss a passage in the new curriculum for knowledge of christianity, religion, philosophies of life and ethics (norwegian directorate for education and training, 2020), which is the curriculum for the subject of religious education (re) in norwegian primary and lower secondary schools. in all subject-specific curricula in the new national curriculum (norwegian directory of education and training, 2020), the most essential content, perspectives and methods are presented as core elements in the first part of the document. the re curriculum contains five core elements: (1) knowledge of religions and philosophies of life, (2) exploring religions and philosophies of life using different methods, (3) exploring existential questions and answers, (4) being able to take the other’s perspective, (5) ethical human rights education review – volume 5(1) 138 reflection. indigenous perspectives are mentioned in the first core element and sámi perspectives in the fourth. in the first core element, diversity is one of the topics in focus. it is mentioned in the immediate context of indigenous perspectives, but indigenous perspectives are not explicitly linked to diversity. in the fourth core element (being able to take the other’s perspective), however, sámi perspectives are explicitly linked to diversity competence: the subject shall support pupils in developing diversity competence. sámi perspectives are included. topics related to gender and functional ability are also included. (norwegian directorate of education and training, 2020, p. 3) the categorisation of sámi perspectives as diversity competence is highly problematic. the main objective of this article is to explain why. sámi history the sámi were living in sápmi/sábme/saepmie—an area which today covers substantial parts of norway, sweden, finland, and russia—long before national borders were drawn. they have been present as long as any of the other peoples living in this area. from the middle of the 1600s, danish-norwegian kings’ efforts to gain sovereignty over sámi settlement areas led to an aggressive christianisation of the sámi. in lutheran denmark-norway, in which the monarch was also head of the church, the building of churches and christianisation were effective ways of marking sovereignty (henriksen, 2020). the sámi were forced to dissociate themselves from their religion and, consequently, from an essential part of their culture. practising sámi religion was condemned as witchcraft and sorcery, and accordingly persecuted and punished. sámi drums, which in addition to being key religious objects are expressions of sámi culture, were either burned or confiscated (hansen & olsen, 2004; rydving, 1993). during the 1700s the sámi’s basis of existence was more and more affected by tax regulations and other changes to the legal framework (hansen & olsen, 2004). at the same time, missionary work was mainly carried out in sámi. priests were supposed to preach in sámi, spiritual literature and hymns were translated and in the beginning of the 1800s the process of translating the bible into northern sámi was started (henriksen, 2020). thus, the missionary offensive led to a considerable strengthening of the sámi language. this changed in the middle of the 1800s. in 1814 norway left the union with denmark and entered a union with sweden in which it had extensive internal political freedom. from 1850 to 1970, norwegianisation was official government policy (minde, 2003). more than one hundred years of forced assimilation of the sámi into a culturally uniform norwegian population resulted in the disparagement and near extinction of sámi culture. norwegianisation, which was pursued by both the norwegian government and the norwegian state church, aimed to wipe out the sámi religion, culture r. eggen 139 and languages within the borders of norway (there were similar processes in sweden, finland, and russia). norwegianisation meant that the sámi had to disown their sámi identity to avoid punishment, social exclusion, and shame (minde, 2003; eidheim, 1996). many stopped using their sámi language and considered it to be better for their descendants not to be recognised as sámi or even to know they were sámi. boarding schools for indigenous pupils, a means of assimilation in many countries (stavenhagen, 2015), were also established, separating sámi youths from their families and cultural roots. consequently, the natural process of learning and developing sámi languages, sámi culture and traditional knowledge was interrupted. this has led to the current situation in which the revitalisation of sámi languages and culture must be safeguarded through national legislation and educational measures (bull & gaski, 1994; lile, 2008, p.36). the so-called alta conflict, a controversy over the construction of a power plant in the alta river, was essential to sámi resistance against the government’s norwegianisation policy (andresen, evjen & ryymin, 2021). it led to a massive people´s movement in which sámi and non-sámi stood together. the norwegian state’s use of force to remove the protesters received massive international attention and was strongly criticised (minde, 2008). the alta conflict (1968 -1984) undoubtedly put sámi indigenous rights onto the political agenda. in 1988, the right of sámi citizens to secure and develop their language, culture and social life was included in the norwegian constitution (§110 later changed to §108). with the sámi parliament, established in 1989, the sámi people got their own political body. this meant that the right of indigenous people to participate in decision-making in matters concerning their own cultural development, language, and education—as laid down in ilo convention 169 and in the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (article 18) (united nations, 2007) —became a reality for the sámi in norway. the ilo indigenous and tribal peoples convention 169 (international labour organization, 1989) was adopted in 1989 and in 1990 norway was the first nation to ratify it. the convention includes crucial obligations concerning sámi children’s right to an education that ensures they can maintain or regain and develop their sámi identity. in accordance with the convention the norwegian education act (1998) contains a specific section (§6) on sámi education, which establishes sámi children’s right to receive education in sámi and through the medium of sámi. curricula for instruction in the sámi language and curricula for specific sámi subjects are issued by the sámi parliament. since 1997 new curricula are always published in both norwegian and sámi versions. the sámi version is for use in the sámi administrative area, which encompasses 13 municipalities where sámi languages have the same legal status as norwegian. it emphasises sámi traditional knowledge and sámi perspectives, and is also available in norwegian. even though there is still a long way to go, over the last 30 years essential measures have been taken to facilitate a revitalisation of sámi language and culture (andresen, evjen & ryymin, 2021). human rights education review – volume 5(1) 140 norwegianisation, however, not only affected the sámi: it had a profound impact on the entire population. a devastating effect of norwegianisation was the negative attitude towards the sámi that was planted in the minds of everyone who grew up and lived in norway. this was nurtured by the way in which the sámi part of the population was treated by institutions, government officials and in schools, and how the sámi were presented in government documents. norwegianisation was a political program aimed at extinguishing the sámi culture, the sámi way of life and any sámi consciousness through convincing not only the sámi but also the norwegian population that the sámi were culturally and mentally underdeveloped. the prejudice that was officially spread and, over many decades, allowed to take root in the population takes time to eliminate (lile, 2019b). this is a challenge many indigenous peoples face. accordingly, a central claim in the ilo convention no. 169 indigenous and tribal peoples convention is that educational measures should be taken in order to eliminate prejudice. it is emphasised that ‘… efforts shall be made to ensure that history textbooks and other educational materials provide a fair, accurate and informative portrayal of the societies and cultures of these peoples’ (ilo 1989, article 31). a corresponding claim is also found in the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (united nations, 2007, article 15). stavenhagen, the former united nations special rapporteur for the human rights of indigenous peoples, points out that inappropriate and disrespectful representation of their cultures in educational texts and materials has been a considerable problem for indigenous peoples in different countries (stavenhagen, 2015). a critical analysis of the way in which sámi perspectives are presented in the norwegian national curriculum is therefore both justified and imperative. previous research and the concept of diversity decolonial critique in both indigenous research and research in general has raised questions concerning the way in which reality is presented in academic research and official documents. in her ground-breaking book decolonizing methodologies. research and indigenous peoples, smith casts light on the ways in which academic research is dominated by western thought and how imperialistic perspectives influence research methods and contribute to maintaining established power relations (smith, 2012). a central concern of decolonial approaches to education is how indigenous perspectives, values and cultural knowledge are or should be represented in teaching materials and curricula and taught about at school or university (e.g., yumagulova et al, 2020; smith, tuck & yang, 2018; nutti, 2016). an overarching goal is to ensure that indigenous people are given the possibility to regain and develop their indigenous identity and dignity through education. one of the things discussed is whether the transfer of indigenous knowledge to indigenous students should mainly take place in indigenous-based schools or be integrated into mainstream education (gjerpe, 2018). r. eggen 141 in her comparative study of norway and aotearoa/new zealand, gjerpe points out that norway—like aotearoa/new zealand—has established indigenous-based education within the national education system (the sámi-based curriculum for use in the sámi administrative area). however, most sámi students attend mainstream schools. on this basis she argues that an indigenisation of mainstream education is essential—not only to ensure culturally appropriate education for sámi students but also for non-sámi students. based on this perspective, the mainstream curriculum must satisfy the two criteria required by ilo 169: on the one hand it has to ensure that sámi students get the possibility to gain sámi cultural knowledge and develop their sámi identity (ilo, 1989, article 2,2(b); 27,1; 28,1; 33); on the other hand, it must ensure that all students learn about the sámi and their culture (ilo, 1989, article 5(a), 5(b); 31). the way in which the sámi are represented in the national mainstream curriculum affects both sámi students’ self-image and the way in which non-sámi students conceive the sámi and their culture. this must be kept in mind when we discuss the specific passage in the re curriculum. discussion of the curriculum’s representation of the sámi should be placed within a decolonisation discourse, not least since it concerns the relation between the sámi and the non-sámi parts of the population. the norwegian studies of andreassen and olsen (andreassen & olsen, 2020b; olsen & andreassen, 2018; olsen & andreassen, 2016) and eriksen (eriksen, 2018) as well as the swedish study of svonni (svonni, 2015) are examples of research on the representation of the sámi or sámi issues in national curricula. all these studies are related to the decolonisation discourse. the text passage in the fourth core element of the re curriculum, however, categorises sámi perspectives in terms of ‘diversity competence’ and thereby places them in a diversity discourse. discussing sámi issues from a diversity perspective means that the focus is on anti-discrimination and the empowerment of minority groups in general. the dimension of indigeneity is left out. considering that the text passage in question addresses sámi perspectives, this is problematic. there is good reason why international legislation singles out indigenous people as a group needing specific protection, as wiessner underlines: this differentia specifica of indigenous peoples, the collective spiritual relationship to their land, is what separates them also from other groups generally, and diffusely, denominated ‘minorities’, and what has created the need for a special legal regime transcending the general human rights rules on the universal and regional planes. (wiessner, 2011, p. 129) the fact that implementation of indigenous rights in norway to a great extent is linked to the question of self-determination (weigård, 2018; henriksen, 2008) shows a fundamental difference between indigenous rights and human rights and highlights the context of human rights education review – volume 5(1) 142 colonialism. to discuss representations of the sámi in the curriculum within a diversity discourse, therefore, is incorrect. however, in order to better understand what is implied when the term diversity is used in national educational documents it is necessary to consider how the word has been used. in norway, ‘diversity’ (norw. mangfold) is increasingly used in the field of education to describe the heterogeneity of a population (åberg, 2020); the word has frequently occurred in political documents on education over the last decade. at the same time, the term and the way in which it is used has been subject to discussion. from a critical point of view, it has been pointed out that the term diversity casts a veil over a complex and challenging subject, its positive basic tone making it difficult to address specific challenges and subject them to critical discussion (borchgrevink & brochmann, 2008). with reference to a 2013-2017 national campaign called ‘competence for diversity’ (norw. kompetanse for mangfold), westrheim & hagatun (2015) point out the inadequacy of the term diversity in critical discussions on education in a multicultural society. according to their analyses it provides an overarching perspective on minorities that is defined by the majority, a perspective that makes the affected groups invisible. åberg concludes in her study of the term in two main education policy documents that diversity is ‘… an unfit tool to conceptualise difference, and therefore to discuss equity and social justice in education.’ (åberg 2020, p. 169) given the critical voices of these researchers, we see it is problematic to categorise awareness of sámi perspectives as diversity competence and make questions on the relationship between the sámi and nonsámi population part of the diversity discourse. however, there are other, less critical voices which consider diversity competence to be a term which is well-suited for discussions on multiculturality and education. røthing argues that diversity is a term which opens new possibilities. accordingly, her approach to diversity is to provide a new definition. she considers diversity, or more precisely the term diversity competence that is used in the current re curriculum, to be a concept which enables critical consciousness and reflections on power relations (røthing, 2020). referring to røthing’s conception of diversity competence, olsen & andreassen point to the inner variety of sámi culture and identity and argue for an understanding of diversity that also covers this inner variety of being sámi. in røthing’s and olsen & andreassen’s approach diversity stands out as a term which, when filled with the right content, functions as a tool for promoting equity and social justice in education. based on this approach the actual formulation in the curriculum (‘sámi perspectives are included. topics related to gender and functional ability are also included.’) may be read as an explanation of the term diversity competence, a more precise definition of the term being given by including a list of topics. however, the definition of diversity competence is only one part of the message conveyed. by categorising topics as diversity competence, the sentences inevitably also say something about these topics. in the r. eggen 143 present study the focus is on what the text passage communicates about sámi perspectives. the question that must be answered in the following is, therefore, what is the meaning of the text with respect to the sámi and their perspectives. method an answer to the question above must be based on an analysis of the text passage itself: ‘the subject shall support pupils in developing diversity competence. sámi perspectives are included.’ the meaning of this passage, however, depends to a great extent on the meaning of the term diversity competence, and this meaning cannot be retrieved from analyses restricted to the use of diversity in this text. since the national curriculum is a key governmental document on education, it belongs to a group of education policy documents which constitute a larger context, sharing the same technical terminology. therefore, an examination of the meaning of diversity in the actual text passage must rely on analyses of the term in a wider range of official educational documents. these analyses focus on the meaning of texts, which, being part of governmental documents, construct a certain understanding of reality which is meant to be normative. accordingly, fairclough’s critical discourse analysis (fairclough, 2003), based on a conception of texts as parts of social events, is a suitable methodological approach. fairclough points out that ‘… meaning-making depends upon not only what is explicit in a text but also what is implicit – what is assumed.’ (fairclough, 2003, p. 11). implicitness is an essential feature in the curriculum text, given the fact that the norwegian national curriculum is both a key educational steering document and, at the same time, meant to give working instructions to teachers. this means the curriculum is an ideological document meant to communicate the government’s conception of education and society which, at the same time, must be of a limited size. in order to keep the text short, meaning-making cannot rest on explicit elements but must to a considerable extent rely on implications anchored in adjacent governmental texts, which are usually much longer. consequently, how the term diversity is understood in the actual text passage in the curriculum depends on the meaning ascribed to the term diversity in contemporary governmental documents on education. according to fairclough (2003), meaning is, among other things, the result of implications, assumptions, and semantic and lexical relations in texts. in the following analyses of governmental texts on education i will use fairclough’s discourse analysis approach to identify and explain the meanings of diversity in these texts. i will focus on logical implications, value assumptions, semantic relations between sentences and clauses, and internal semantic and lexical relations as measures of meaning-making. before analysing other governmental documents, we must take a closer look at the texthuman rights education review – volume 5(1) 144 passage in the re curriculum itself: ‘the subject shall support pupils in developing diversity competence. sámi perspectives are included.’ applying fairclough’s categories one can identify a positive value assumption of diversity competence: triggered by the presentation of diversity competence as an objective of re lessons, diversity competence stands out as something desirable. one can also point to a logical implication concerning the term diversity itself. the fact that the term diversity constitutes the first part of the compound expression diversity competence implies that the meaning of diversity includes the notion that it is something that one must be enabled to handle. accordingly, in the following analyses of governmental documents the focus will be on passages in which diversity appears to be something that must be handled. material the governmental documents analysed consist of official norwegian reports (norw. norges offentlige utredninger) (nou) and white papers (norw. meld.st) published by the ministry of education and research from 2015 to 2018 which the database labels as ‘dealing with education’. since this study focuses on diversity in the population as something that must be addressed, only documents that dealt with this issue were of interest. therefore, searches were made by using the noun ‘diversity’ (norw. mangfold) and the adjective ‘diverse’ (norw. mangfoldig) in order to extract passages relevant to the research. the search resulted in the three official reports and five white papers listed below. the document titles are presented in english with the original norwegian text in brackets. due to the lack of official translations for most of the documents many of the titles and quotes from the documents are based on my translation. nou 2018:15: official norwegian reports. qualified, prepared and motivated. – a knowledge base of structure and content in upper secondary education and training (kvalifisert, forberedt og motivert — et kunnskapsgrunnlag om struktur og innhold i videregående opplæring). nou 2017:2: official norwegian reports. integration and trust — long-term consequences of high levels of immigration (integrasjon og tillit. langsiktige konsekvenser av høy innvandring). nou 2015:8: official norwegian reports. the school of the future. renewing subjects and competences (fremtidens skole. fornyelse av fag og kompetanser). meld.st. 4 (2018 –2019): (white paper). long-term plan for research and higher education 2019–2028. (langtidsplan for forskning og høyere utdanning 2019–2028). meld.st. 25 (2016 –2017): (white paper). the humanities in norway (humaniora i norge). meld.st. 28 (2015 –2016): (white paper). subjects and in-depth subject study – a renewal of the knowledge promotion reform [fag – fordypning – forståelse — en fornyelse av r. eggen 145 kunnskapsløftet]. meld.st. 19 (2015–2016): (white paper). time for play and learning. improving the content in the kindergarten [tid for lek og læring. bedre innhold i barnehagen]. meld.st. 16 (2015–2016): (white paper). from outsiderness to a new chance. coordinating adult learning [fra utenforskap til ny sjanse. samordnet innsats for voksnes læring]. analysis and findings in these eight documents, passages found to contain either the noun ‘diversity’ (norw. mangfold) or the adjective ‘diverse’ (norw. mangfoldig), referring to variety in the population as well as to something that must or should be addressed, were analysed. the aim of the analyses has been to identify meanings of the term ‘diversity’ that are relevant for understanding the term ‘diversity competence’, as used in the re curriculum. using fairclough’s critical discourse analysis, three characteristics/features of diversity could be identified in most of the analysed texts: firstly, diversity is something that is increasing or has increased; secondly, diversity represents a challenge; and thirdly, diversity is linked to immigration. the first mentioned feature of diversity is communicated both explicitly through the present and past participles increasing and increased, and implicitly through the adjectives more and larger, which due to their comparative forms express increase. the feature of diversity being a challenge is expressed explicitly only twice, once through the subject and once through the verb challenge. however, the implicit presentation of diversity as something that requires measures to be taken can be said to be strong, since it is based on quite clear logical implications: diversity is presented as something that needs to be handled—it creates a need for something or places greater demands on something. the third feature of diversity—that of it being a consequence of immigration—is mainly presented explicitly in the documents. diversity is connected to immigration; either straightforwardly in the same sentence, in two paratactical sentences sharing the same subject, or in two paratactical clauses with an underlying causal relation between them. the table below shows the specific occurrences in the eight governmental documents which were analysed. in the columns the occurrences within each of the nous and white papers are quoted, followed by the actual page number in the actual document. in cases where the same linguistic representation occurs several times in the same document, each page number represents a separate occurrence. human rights education review – volume 5(1) 146 table 1 occurrences of diversity/diverse in eight education policy documents 1.) diversity as increasing or having increased 2.) diversity as a challenge: 3.) diversity as a consequence of immigration nou 2018:15 ‘more diverse’ (pp. 41, 57, 204) ‘larger diversity’ (pp. 114, 157) ‘increased diversity’ (p. 248) nou 2017:2 ‘increased diversity’ (pp. 16, 28) ‘more diverse’ (pp. 147, 166) ‘increasing diversity’ (p. 168) ‘… handling the challenges attached to cultural diversity’ (p. 16) ‘the norwegian society’s ability to handle diversity …’ (p. 24). ‘cultural diversity and valueconflicts as a consequence of immigration …’ (p. 16) ‘immigration leads to increased diversity in society …’ (p. 28) ‘…work immigration … gives them a more diverse population to employ from.’ (p. 147) ‘cultural and value diversity as a consequence of immigration …’ (p. 168). nou 2015:8 ‘larger diversity’ (pp. 8, 17) ‘increased diversity’ (pp. 19, 20, 21, 31, 50) ‘social changes attached to … increased diversity … lead to the need for …’ (p. 20) ‘features of development such as increased diversity … lead to the need for …’ (p. 21). ‘the immigrants’ part of the population is presumed to increase. this contributes to an increased ethnic, religious and cultural diversity in the norwegian society’ (p. 19). meld.st 4 (20182019) ‘increased diversity’ (pp. 26, 72) ‘we have got increased cultural diversity, and norway has received many immigrants with competence that is valuable for the country.’ (p. 26) ‘in recent generations immigration to norway has increased …. this is enriching and has brought about an increased diversity.’ (p. 72) meld.st. 25 (20162017) ‘increased diversity’ (p. 71) ‘a democratic society which is supposed to function in a global reality characterized r. eggen 147 1.) diversity as increasing or having increased 2.) diversity as a challenge: 3.) diversity as a consequence of immigration by … increased diversity, must develop …’ (p. 71) ‘… in a time marked by diversity …, it will not be possible to prepare for the future by ‘(p. 89). meld.st. 28 (20152016 ‘increasing diversity’ (p. 6) ‘more diverse’ (pp. 6, 21) ‘society’s increasing diversity and new forms of communication challenge the education system in different ways.’ (p. 6) meld.st. 19 (20152016) ‘more diverse’ (p. 26) ‘increased diversity’ (p. 39) ‘larger diversity’ (p. 43) ‘increased ethnic, religious and cultural diversity will lead to an increased need for …’ (p. 39) meld.st. 16 (20152016) ‘more diverse’ (pp. 14, 29) ‘a more diverse population makes higher demands on …’ (p. 14). the meanings carried by ‘diversity’ in these governmental education documents are that diversity is increasing, that it represents a challenge, and that it is a consequence of immigration. accordingly, the term ‘diversity competence’ in the curriculum may be interpreted as referring to having enough knowledge, judgement, or skills to handle the challenge which diversity as the result of increased immigration represents. including sámi perspectives in this competence means putting them in conjunction with immigration, and the challenges caused by immigration. the formulation ‘the subject shall support pupils in developing diversity competence. sámi perspectives are included’ may therefore easily lead to an understanding of the sámi being one of an increasing number of minorities in an originally norwegian society. this is also supported by åberg’s findings in her study of the conceptions of diversity in two of the same documents. her conclusion is: ‘the implications are that notions of norwegianness and otherness are reproduced along cultural lines’ (åberg 2020, p.169). discussion fairclough’s focus is on the social effects of texts, or more precisely on the social effects of meaning, because, as he points out, ‘… it is the meanings that have social effects’ (fairclough, 2003, p. 11). the social effects of the meaning of diversity competence in the re curriculum human rights education review – volume 5(1) 148 may be devastating, depending on how the text is interpreted by the people who read it and by their individual processes of meaning-making. considering that erroneous immigration theories developed by norwegian historians around 1850 wrongly stamped the sámi as immigrants and both deprived them of their land rights and provided a foundation for defining them as culturally and intellectually underdeveloped, categorising awareness of sámi perspectives as diversity competence may be considered to verge on a violation of the ilo convention’s regulations. it even may be seen as a violation of the united nations convention of the rights of the child (crc) art 29 (1) if we consider sámi children in norway (lile, 2019a), and it communicates disrespect for the rights of the sámi as an indigenous people of norway. lile points out: teaching respect for the rights of groups that are subject to prejudice in society is genuinely difficult. there is this attitude component attached to prejudice, that functions as a shield against information and new knowledge that can threaten that prejudice. (lile, 2019b, p.160) prejudice against the sámi is still a problem in norway (andresen, evjen & ryymin, 2021). texts which present or discuss sámi issues or perspectives should therefore be thoroughly scrutinised and formulated with precision and care, without any room for ambiguity. the way in which the majority school system addresses indigenous issues must respect the human rights of indigenous peoples and, in the context of the crc art 29 (1) (united nations, 1989), there are concerns for human rights education in norway. the implications outlined above are not only to be found in governmental documents but also in public usage. an example is the name of a five-year national campaign (2013-2017) initiated by the ministry of education and research—competence for diversity (norw. kompetanse for mangfold). the evaluation report states: ‘the aim of the diversity competence initiative is to enable staff in kindergartens and schools to support children, students and adults from minority backgrounds in such a way that, as far as possible, they complete their formal education’ (lødding, rønsen & wollscheid 2017, p.12). it can be logically inferred from the formulation ‘complete their formal education’ that the persons in question have not been living in norway, where there is a statutory right to education. a logical implication is therefore that the children, students, and adults referred to are immigrants. in public usage, the term diversity is not only connected to immigration but is also explicitly linked to integration. the name of the directorate for integration and diversity (integrerings og mangfoldsdirektoratet) exemplifies public usage, especially since it is frequently mentioned in the norwegian media. this organ is ‘a specialist directorate, an administrative body and the national competence centre responsible for the integration field’ and its key responsibilities include the resettlement of refugees and facilitating immigrant participation in the labour r. eggen 149 force and in local communities (directorate of integration and diversity, n.d). the connection between diversity and immigration implied in governmental documents and in public usage, together with the explicit connection between diversity and integration in official usage, justifies characterising the text in the fourth core element of the re curriculum as a colonial approach. the concept of integration is contradictory to the aims of recognising and protecting the social, cultural, religious, and spiritual values and practices of an indigenous people and of respecting the integrity of their values, practices, and institutions (ilo 169, article 5). these are obligations which the norwegian state has bound itself to by ratifying ilo convention 169. the impression of the re curriculum’s text’s colonial nature is strengthened if we compare it to a formulation found in an official document from 1930. in his article on sámi history, pedersen (2015) draws attention to a category applied by the central bureau of statistics in the 1930 census: ‘sámi and kven – citizens of other countries. blind, deaf mute, imbeciles, and lunatics’ [samer og kvener. – andre lands statsborgere. blinde, døvstumme, åndssvake og sinnsyke] (central bureau of statistics, 1930). keeping in mind that diversity in the analysed governmental documents is connected to immigration, the text in the fourth core element of the re curriculum is alarmingly similar: ‘the subject shall support pupils in developing diversity competence. sámi perspectives are included. topics such as gender and functional ability are also included’. conclusion the main objective of this article has been to explain why the way in which sámi perspectives are presented within the re curriculum is highly problematic. in order to explain what the curriculum’s categorisation of sámi perspectives as diversity competence may communicate about the sámi it was necessary to make visible the meaning of diversity in other governmental documents dealing with education. based on an analysis of three nous and five white papers i have argued that the text passage, ‘the subject shall support pupils in developing diversity competence. sámi perspectives are included’, may induce readers to think of the sámi as one of a growing number of minorities in an originally norwegian society: this conflicts with the ilo 169 indigenous and tribal peoples convention. in addition, the study has drawn attention to the fact that the utmost clarity and unambiguousness in governmental documents and official usage are essential whenever sámi issues are addressed. a critical discussion of the text passage in focus has also a place in human rights education which, for sámi children and young people, implies empowering them to regain and develop their own cultural identity and to exercise and rely on their own sámi perspectives. the way in which sámi perspectives are presented in the curriculum may play a significant role in either human rights education review – volume 5(1) 150 supporting or counteracting this process. the formulation ‘the subject shall support pupils in developing diversity competence. sámi perspectives are included’ is particularly relevant in this respect, since it is the only place in the core elements of the re curriculum where the term sámi is used, or the sámi are explicitly mentioned. references andreassen, b.-o. & olsen, t. 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(2020). diversity is the others: a critical investigation of ‘diversity’ in two recent education policy documents. intercultural education, 31(2), 157-172. https://doi.org/10.1080/14675986.2019.1702294 https://doi.org/10.1093/ejil/chr007 https://doi.org/10.7577/njcie.3626 https://doi.org/10.1080/14675986.2019.1702294 indigeneity versus diversity abstract keywords introduction sámi history previous research and the concept of diversity method material analysis and findings discussion conclusion references majority rights and minority responsibilities: young people’s negotiations with human rights issn 2535-5406 vol 4, no 3 (2021) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4473 date received: 25-05-2021 date accepted: 02-09-2021 peer reviewed article © 2021 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles protecting invisible children in england: how human rights education could improve school safeguarding alison e.c. struthers university of warwick, united kingdom, a.struthers@warwick.ac.uk abstract this article brings together two distinct but interrelated fields: human rights education (hre) and safeguarding. it endeavours to show that the former can be beneficial for the efficacy of the latter. by extending an argument put forward recently that for hre to be effective it must enable children to recognise and respond to lived human rights injustices, the article places this important issue within the existing framework and processes associated with safeguarding young people in formal education. it attempts to both elucidate and consolidate the connection between hre and safeguarding, arguing that if hre were to become an integral part of safeguarding training and delivery, children may be better equipped to recognise and speak up about violations of their human rights, rather than relying on a passive system of adult observation. keywords human rights education, safeguarding, child protection, participation, empowerment http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4473 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:a.struthers@warwick.ac.uk human rights education review – volume 4(3) 46 introduction this article brings together two distinct but interrelated fields: human rights education (hre) and safeguarding. the former seeks to guarantee that through teaching and learning that equips learners with the tools to understand, promote and defend human rights, these rights will be secured for current and future generations. this will allow people to identify rights violations in their own lives, whilst also equipping them with the knowledge, values and skills required to accept and defend human rights more broadly. the latter field operates to promote the welfare of children by keeping them safe and protecting them from harm. in educational settings, these two concepts tend to operate in different spheres and, whilst there is some recognition in the relevant literature of the overlap between the two, they remain fields of distinct practice and academic interest. this article endeavours to show how their greater interrelation could help to better protect children. it is not my intention to rehash the familiar arguments in support of hre being included to a greater extent within formal educational settings. rather, this article endeavours to argue that hre should be considered as beneficial to safeguarding and child protection. by extending the argument made by laura lundy and gabriela martínez sainz that for hre to be effective, it must enable children to recognise and respond to lived human rights injustices (lundy & martínez sainz, 2018), this article places this important issue within the existing framework and processes associated with safeguarding young people in formal education in england. little has been made to date of the obvious interaction between teaching children about human rights and protecting them from serious harm; it perhaps seems too obvious a point to make, yet it is one that is often danced around, at best, in the existing literature. this article attempts to both elucidate and consolidate the connection between hre and safeguarding. with this in mind, the article is divided into five sections. the next section suggests that there is not only a widespread paucity of hre implementation, but also an insufficiency in implementation where it is currently being adopted. drawing upon the work of lundy and martínez sainz (2018), it is argued that within existing programmes of hre, there can be an unhelpful focus on lofty ideals of human rights to the detriment of considering what shape actual violations of human rights might take. following on from this, section three draws upon existing literature and my previous empirical research to suggest that when children are taught what breaches of human rights actually look like, they are better able to recognise and report rights violations in their own lives. this, therefore, is where existing safeguarding processes become of considerable relevance, with section four reinforcing the point that whilst all teachers in england receive training in safeguarding and child protection, the system remains one largely based on teachers’ observations of abuse or neglect. this section explores why this status quo can be deeply problematic. section five argues that if hre were to become an integral part of safeguarding training and delivery, children may be better equipped to a.e.c. struthers 47 recognise and speak up about violations of their human rights, rather than relying on a passive system of adults noticing when something is amiss. it is also suggested that by including hre within safeguarding processes, a number of the recognised practical and attitudinal barriers to its provision may be alleviated. some concluding remarks are offered in section six. the omission of law from hre in formal schooling amongst academics, it is well established that in most education systems hre is currently not being taught in a uniform manner (tibbits & kirschlaeger, 2010, pp. 9-11; zembylas, charalambous, lesta, & charalambous, 2015). in england, for example, i have carried out detailed empirical study into teachers’ perceived barriers to educating about, through and for human rights (struthers, 2020). hre has a tripartite framework: education about human rights covers the provision of contextually and culturally relevant human rights knowledge; education through human rights entails the creation of a human rights culture that respects the rights of both teachers and learners within educational settings; and education for human rights aims to equip learners with the skills for promoting and defending human rights more broadly (struthers, 2015). my research identified teachers’ practical concerns around the provision of holistic hre; these concerns included a lack of available time, resources and relevant training. additionally, however, the research revealed attitudinal anxieties around the appropriateness of human rights as a topic for young learners, the potential loss of control in a rights-respecting learning environment, and the complexity and irrelevance of certain empowerment-related skills (struthers, 2020). it is also fundamentally the case that in england, as in many other countries, there is insufficient impetus or mandate at government level for hre to be included to any meaningful extent within national curricula (struthers, 2020). the problems facing hre as a discipline may not lie exclusively in the dearth of its provision, however, but also in the nature of its implementation. lundy and martínez sainz (2018) argue, for example, that for hre to be effective, it must address, rather than neglect, violations of human rights. the authors recognise that there is a tendency for hre, particularly within formal education settings, to focus on positive descriptions of the significance of human rights to people’s lives, and to imbue learners with knowledge of the values, principles and theories associated with the human rights framework. their argument is that in doing so, hre overlooks the importance of young people understanding negative lived experiences of injustice, exclusion or discrimination as a way to build their capacity and ‘develop the legal knowledge and skills that will enable them to identify and challenge breaches of their own rights and the rights of others’ (p. 6). they utilise various examples of violations of children’s rights in school settings, including those related to access to education, curricular content and discipline, to reiterate the need for learners to be equipped with the capacity to both identify human rights education review – volume 4(3) 48 and respond to lived human rights injustices. the authors emphasise that by encouraging learners to recognise only the moral aspects of their human rights, hre often fails to present human rights as legal entitlements with concrete legal consequences. indeed, one of the principal aims of hre, as outlined in article 4 of the 2012 united nations declaration on hre and training, is to contribute ‘to the prevention of human rights violations and abuses and to the combating and eradication of all forms of discrimination, racism, stereotyping and incitement to hatred, and the harmful attitudes and prejudices that underlie them’ (united nations general assembly, 2012). for this to be possible, children must be able to recognise and act upon breaches of human rights in their own lives. they should be equipped with the necessary tools for understanding human rights law and its relevant legal instruments, and for translating that knowledge into action for the protection of their own rights. lundy and martínez sainz’s article reveals that there are numerous and varied breaches of children’s human rights happening in schools across the globe, yet hre as a discipline and movement tends to underplay the importance of legal literacy. the authors advise that: injustice, discrimination and exclusion are already part of children’s lived experiences; thus, rather than neglecting the breaches of children’s rights, hre should use them as learning opportunities to teach children about law. children must become legally literate and develop the legal knowledge and skills necessary to identify breaches of rights, recognise them as such and, where appropriate, seek legal means to enforce them. (lundy & martínez sainz, 2020, p. 17) whilst hre is a burgeoning field of policy, advocacy and academic interest, the translation of holistic education about, through and for human rights into classroom practice has been slow. studies from around the world have revealed shortcomings in its provision at all levels of formal education (tibbits & kirschlaeger, 2010, pp. 9-11; united nations general assembly, 2010) and, as lundy and martínez sainz (2018) have shown, existing hre practices are often insufficient in equipping learners with the necessary tools for recognising breaches of human rights. it is ostensibly the case, however, that when children are taught about their rights in practical – rather than aspirational – terms, they are better able to apply a human rights lens to their own lived experiences. hre as a means of understanding lived human rights violations it feels rather like stating the obvious to suggest that if you show someone what violations of human rights look like, they will be better able to recognise these in their own lives. and to take it one step further, if you show them what human rights violations look like and tell them what they can do to challenge or remedy these, they will be better equipped to recognise and a.e.c. struthers 49 address rights breaches in their lived experiences. obvious, yes? however, this basic premise is something that has often been overlooked in the discourse on why teaching hre in an ageappropriate manner at all stages of formal education is of considerable importance. the existing literature going back decades advocates the benefits of hre for instilling empathy for the situations of those less fortunate (covell & howe, 2001, p. 31; howe & covell, 2010, pp. 99-100), for nurturing rights-respecting attitudes within school and beyond (alderson, 1999; covell & howe, 2001, pp. 38-39), and for encouraging the taking of action to promote and defend human rights (howe & covell, 2010, p. 100; jennings, 1994). however, there is not much focus on the particular issue of facilitating children’s recognition of rights violations that happen to them. monisha bajaj is perhaps the most notable exception to this, having written extensively on the transformative potential of hre. in her book schooling for social change, she reports that the provision of hre with young people in india resulted in children identifying abuse in their own lives, and either confronting their abusers or threatening to do so (2012, pp. 81, 86). the book contains some powerful quotes from children in the study who recognised abusive situations after receiving hre, including the following: i learned about my rights and that there are so many boys and girls around the world whose rights are being violated. i realized we should not keep quiet. i used to think that nobody was there to help me and whatever torture i was facing in my family, i thought that it was my fate and i deserved it. but once i started reading the human rights education books, i knew i had to stand up and fight for my rights. so one day i told my stepfather to stop and showed him the books, saying that i would report him to the authorities listed in there. he got scared and my teacher helped find a residential home for abused girls for me to go live in. (bajaj, 2012, p. 86) some other studies have also touched upon the issue of hre enabling children to recognise and address rights violations in their lived experiences. for example, susan roberta katz and andrea mcevoy spero found that through hre, students in the us with experiences of poverty, violence and discrimination were better able to connect human rights with the experiences of their lives (2015, p. 17). and the link between hre and rights recognition had similarly not gone unnoticed by some of the teachers that i interviewed for the qualitative aspect of a previous socio-legal empirical project (struthers, 2020). this project explored english primary teachers’ perceived barriers to hre provision through data gathered in 760 quantitative surveys and 98 qualitative interviews in two tranches of data collection in 2014 and 2017. one interviewee in particular was forthcoming, with an example of a learner in her class recognising and speaking out about human rights violations in her home life after receiving hre at school: human rights education review – volume 4(3) 50 children don’t know if they’re being abused, because that’s their family life…but when we’re feeding that information that it’s your right to be treated well, i’m hoping that children are less likely to be abused… i get really upset about it, because…my family went through it. my husband did it to me and my boys, and you just don’t think you dare say to anybody, because nobody will believe you… [s]o…[we have to keep]…planting the seed,…[and] telling…them ‘this is your right to be treated well’… [w]e had a year 6 child who left us last year, and she was able to say something... all of a sudden she just…said ‘so if somebody is doing x, this isn’t right, is it?’ and i said ‘no, it’s not love, so what are you going to do about it? you have a choice and we’ll support you’. (struthers, 2020, p. 1) other interviewees in this study similarly stressed the importance of hre as integral to safeguarding children in schools: from a safeguarding point of view, i think it should be introduced really early… [e]ven toddlers should know of the right to say no if something makes you feel awful… [i]thelps them to understand maybe some of the things that happen to them that possibly shouldn’t be, and giving them that vehicle to help themselves out of certain situations if they can, but also to know that the adults in the school…have a knowledge of it and can help them. (p. 83) and some teachers in particular considered that empowering children to stand up for their rights through the provision of hre was of considerable importance: there’s a boy in my class who’s challenging and a girl who adores him, but he can bully her… one time he pushed her up against the wall and she pushed him back, and she was made to feel it was partly her fault by management… [i]f she’s being told that…, i know it’s quite extreme thinking, but you never know what’s going to happen. what if she gets into an abusive relationship and thinks ‘it’s my fault’… i definitely say ‘you need to stand up for yourself’. (struthers, 2020, p. 150) [i]t’s about empowering…[learners] to take charge of what they do in life,…but to also recognise when they’re feeling a bit uncomfortable with situations. [t]here’s one thing i always teach them from day one: if someone does something you don’t like, it’s fine to say ‘stop it, i don’t like it’ and tell an adult… [t]his is the basis of…[empowerment]. (struthers, 2020, p. 150) informal conversations with academics working in the field of human rights in education and with former and current teachers have further revealed numerous anecdotal examples of a.e.c. struthers 51 children recognising and speaking out about rights violations after receiving hre. it follows, therefore, that if through the provision of hre children are better able to recognise and act upon human rights violations in their own lives, then hre arguably has a beneficial role to play in school safeguarding processes. why, then, is the connection between hre and safeguarding not more readily made either in the academic literature in this area or in education policy in england? the inherent passivity of current safeguarding training and delivery safeguarding referrals in england have increased considerably over the past two decades. between 2007 and 2018, for example, there was a 78% increase in initial contacts made to children’s social care, and a 22% increase in referrals to social care (association of directors of children’s services: leading children’s services [adcs] 2018 p.8). and the covid-19 pandemic has resulted in family stresses and children’s vulnerability further increasing at a time when protective services have been at their weakest (national society for the prevention of cruelty to children [nspcc], 2020). it is perhaps unsurprising, therefore, that following a number of high-profile tragedies resulting partially from perceived failures of relevant services to appropriately protect children from serious harm (including victoria climbe [lord laming, 2003] and peter connelly [haringey serious case reviews, 2008]), safeguarding training and procedures are mandatory in english schools (department for education [dfe], 2021, p. 3). local authorities and maintained schools are under a duty to ensure that their functions are exercised with a view to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children (education act 2002, section 175, and regulations made under section 157), and independent schools similarly must make arrangements to safeguard and promote the welfare of pupils (education [independent school standards] regulations 2014, part 3). most schools will therefore have implemented measures: a designated safeguarding lead; internal school guidance and policies on identifying and monitoring safeguarding concerns; and regular staff training on safeguarding. such training is often provided through independent trainers or external contractors, with the nature and extent of safeguarding training varying depending on the type of school and its location (baginsky, driscoll, manthorpe & purcell, 2019, p. 476). the patchwork nature of safeguarding training means that whilst some schools or professional trainers (including ngos such as the nspcc) may be offering instruction that includes discussion of human rights, many, if not most, will not. there are two government publications relevant to safeguarding in schools. the first, ‘working together to safeguard children’, is a guide to inter-agency working for safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children but applies in its entirely to all schools (hm government, 2018), and the second, ‘keeping children safe in education’, contains detailed advice and human rights education review – volume 4(3) 52 information specifically for all schools, whether maintained, non-maintained or independent (dfe, 2021). safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children is defined in both documents as: protecting children from maltreatment; preventing impairment of children’s mental and physical health or development; ensuring that children grow up in circumstances consistent with the provision of safe and effective care; and taking action to enable all children to have the best outcomes (dfe, 2021, p. 7; hm government, 2018, p. 7). ‘working together to safeguard children’ guidance applies more broadly. it advises that schools, colleges and other educational providers have a pivotal role to play in wider interagency safeguarding arrangements, but does not contain direct instructions to schools in this regard (hm government, 2018, p. 79). ‘keeping children safe in education’, on the other hand, includes detailed safeguarding advice for schools and colleges, advising that staff should receive appropriate safeguarding and child protection training that is regularly updated (‘as required, and at least annually’) (dfe, 2021, p. 9). the guidance explains that safeguarding is the responsibility of everyone who comes into contact with children and their families, and that they have a role to play in identifying concerns, sharing information and taking prompt action (p. 7). it advises that school staff be in a position to identify concerns early, provide help for children, and prevent concerns from escalating (p. 7), and that they should be prepared to recognise children who may benefit from early help (p. 8). there is an instruction that all staff should know what to do if a child tells them that they are being abused or neglected (p. 9), and it is made clear that knowing what to look for is vital for early identification of abuse and neglect (p. 10). whilst ‘working together to safeguard children’ mandates that ‘anyone working with children should see and speak to the child: listen to what they say; take their views seriously; and work with them and their families collaboratively when deciding how to support their needs’ (hm government, 2018, p. 10), the emphasis in ‘keeping children safe in education’ is largely on early recognition of signs of abuse and neglect. some sections do reference children’s voice, including an example of poor safeguarding practice being identified as the failure to listen to the views of the child (p. 21) and advice that systems should be in place for children to ‘safely express their views and give feedback’ (p.25). however, the guidance does not require that children’s views be actively sought or encouraged throughout the safeguarding process, thus ostensibly failing to reflect a more holistic approach to the child’s right to be heard under article 12 of the uncrc (lundy, 2007). nor does it advise that children be empowered to recognise and report safeguarding issues in their home or school lives. the a.e.c. struthers 53 guidance overall can be described as passive or reactive, with teachers instructed to identify and act upon safeguarding concerns, but without any requirement for them to equip children with the language and understanding for recognising abuse and neglect in their own lives and being able to vocalise that recognition. and it is not just at this stage of the safeguarding process that children’s voices may not be encouraged. where abuse or neglect of a child is known or suspected and that child has either died or has been seriously harmed, a serious case review (scr) will be carried out if there is cause for concern regarding the way in which relevant authorities worked together in the safeguarding process (dfe, 2020, p. 12). in the dfe’s triennial analysis of scrs from 2014 to 2017, it is noted that very few of the scr reports analysed captured the lived or day-to-day experiences of any of the children (2020, p. 78), further emphasising that: one of the crucial aspects of all safeguarding work…is to understand the lived experience of the child. children of all ages need to be empowered to express their experiences, and make their voices heard, even when they are not able to verbalise their stories. (dfe, 2020, p. 74) it is unfortunately the case that the elements of passivity inherent in the current school safeguarding procedures in this country have too often failed children. this is less a reflection on the competency of teachers or other school staff and more a reflection on the reactive nature of safeguarding processes. some high profile child protection cases have revealed shortcomings in the abilities of staff to identify cases of abuse or neglect before they escalate to tragedy. for example, school staff in the tragic case of daniel pelka, murdered in 2012 at age four by his mother and her partner, had observed injuries to daniel’s face and neck and were troubled by his obsessive nature around food. however, they neither consistently recorded his injuries nor reported their concerns to the police or social services (coventry safeguarding children board [cscb], 2013, pp. 5, 26). whilst daniel and his older sibling did not fit the image typical of neglected children (they were clean, well-presented and had packed lunches, albeit very frugal ones in daniel’s case) (cscb, 2013, p. 45), the case underscored that reliance on passive teacher observation in safeguarding processes can be problematic. various injuries were observed by teachers at different times during daniel’s short time at school, but inconsistent recording meant that neither the frequency nor the severity of the injuries was appreciated. the scr into daniel’s death noted that ‘the school did not have clear protocols to enable the compilation of information and concerns’, resulting in ‘a lack of clarity about when exactly injuries were seen, how many there were, and of the response to them’ (cscb, 2013, p. 59). it emphasised that ‘no professional tried sufficiently hard enough to engage him to enable him to talk about his experiences at home’ (p. 32), and he is described as having been ‘”invisible” as a needy child against the backdrop of his human rights education review – volume 4(3) 54 mother’s controlling behaviour’ (p. 6). daniel’s case is unfortunately not unique. the nspcc’s database of recently published serious case reviews contains numerous examples of signs of abuse and neglect being missed and of failures by professionals, including school staff, to encourage or support the exercise of children’s voices in safeguarding processes (nspcc, n.d.). the case of child j, for example, is another particularly stark example of various injuries being noticed over time by school staff, but a lack of consistent recording and reporting, combined with a failure to elicit the child’s voice, resulting in tragedy (wiffin, 2017, section 3). another scr reveals that ‘despite all the potential signs of abuse, no professional gave isobel the opportunity or space to describe what was happening in her world’, and the report highlights that professionals ‘do not always recognise when they needed to ask questions, share information or follow up with colleagues about a child’s wellbeing’ (stobart, 2017, pp. 4, 8). what these cases emphasise is that current reactive safeguarding processes, that rely on adults observing and actioning signs of abuse and neglect, can be insufficient. as evidenced by daniel’s case and others, pupils may not show symptoms typical of abused or neglected children (north east lincolnshire local safeguarding children board, 2017, p. 8); indeed, daniel’s mother went to great lengths to portray herself as a caring mother with concern for her son’s wellbeing. academic commentators, myself included, have observed that hre can be efficacious for safeguarding, by enabling children to understand their rights, identify violations of those rights and be empowered to take action in response to this recognition. yet the link between hre and safeguarding is not one that appears to have gained any traction at policy level in england. the next section outlines why this is likely to be counterproductive for the protection of vulnerable young people. why hre should be included within safeguarding training and delivery lundy and martínez sainz acknowledge in their 2018 article that there are few legal scholars working in the field of hre. indeed, it could be said that there is little interaction between the disciplines of law and education more generally, and we particularly see this when it comes to the issue of educating children on the legal aspects of their rights. whilst there is academic scholarship on legal education within formal school settings, and of course on the importance of young people receiving comprehensive education about, through and for human rights, what is missing is consideration of the importance of both of these for the purpose of enabling young people to recognise violations of their human rights within the school walls and beyond. children need an understanding not just of legal mechanisms for rights protection, but also of the reality of human rights violations. lundy and martínez sainz observe that ‘it appears less acceptable to identify and label a.e.c. struthers 55 injustices and inequities as breaches of children’s rights’ (2018, p. 16), and it certainly seems to be the case that some teachers are reluctant to utilise human rights language in this way in their classrooms. this is, arguably, particularly true in the context of using that language to identify and address matters of human rights in practice in the school setting. teachers in my previous socio-legal empirical study suggested that whilst children may be likely to understand the concept of rights at the level of how they ought to be treated in the classroom, they might not fully grasp the relevance and significance of human rights to their own lives (struthers, 2020, p. 131). other teachers in the study considered the language of human rights to be inappropriate or adversarial, potentially leading to a loss of teacher control and authority in the classroom (pp. 128-131). when teachers receive little or no education on human rights within their own teacher training or continued professional development (cpd), it is understandable that they may be uncomfortable utilising rights in the sense of identifying and addressing human rights issues in the classroom or encouraging young people to be able to recognise violations of rights in their own lives (struthers, 2020, pp. 185-192). there is a tendency in education to locate denials of human rights in distant, less democratic lands (osler, 2015, p. 250), despite the fact that ‘human rights are obviously rooted in values, but are at the same time something different; rights claims can be asserted in both national and international courts of justice, whereas values cannot’ (vesterdal, 2019, p. 15). and my existing research has shown that teachers are more comfortable framing human rights in the context of values (struthers, 2020, pp. 84-89). as lundy and martínez sainz identify, however, ‘adherence to a body of safe human rights “values” can dissipate as soon as it emerges that children’s rights clash with the rights of others (such as their parents) or cost money or promote their self-autonomy’ (2018, p. 15). learning only about human rights values is likely to be of scant use to children who are suffering rights violations at home or elsewhere, and thus it is perhaps nowhere more important that children are aware of their human rights than in the realm of safeguarding and child protection. in safeguarding situations, understanding values such as dignity, respect and tolerance, whilst important, is in itself insufficient to enable children to take action to address rights violations in their lived experiences. understanding human rights values must therefore be accompanied by an awareness of the specific rights to which children are entitled, as well as of the protection mechanisms available to assist in any situations of rights denial. to borrow the terminology of the tripartite framework mentioned above, understanding of particular human rights as per education about human rights, must be accompanied not only by respect for rights in the classroom environment through human rights, but importantly also by a realisation on the part of young people that they are empowered to take action to address breaches of their rights in the form of education for human rights. each of these aspects would have a significantly beneficial role human rights education review – volume 4(3) 56 if embedded in safeguarding training and delivery. as outlined above in section four, the current safeguarding guidance for schools in england is based more on reactivity than proactivity. it proceeds on the assumption that relying almost exclusively on teachers identifying signs of abuse and neglect is the most appropriate way to keep children safe. the system has been criticised on many occasions for neglecting to take into account the voices and lived experiences of the children it is designed to protect, yet the safeguarding guidance directed at schools does not adequately instruct teachers to do this. for safeguarding processes to truly reflect the lived experiences of those they are designed to protect, a transformation in the system is required. this is where hre could be beneficial: what if safeguarding training and delivery in schools could be utilised more effectively to equip young people with the means to recognise when their human rights are being violated and to understand how to seek help if this is the case? safeguarding is taken seriously, for good reasons, both at policy level and in educational settings. training in this area is mandatory, regular, and often comprehensive, and the relevant government guidance is detailed and routinely updated. with the most recent review of scrs by the dfe recognising that ‘teachers spend considerable time with school-aged children and the development of a trusting relationship enables children to talk about what is happening to them’ (2020, p. 80), it would be efficacious for hre to support and reinforce school safeguarding processes. mandatory safeguarding education during teacher training and safeguarding training sessions at school prepare teachers to recognise signs of abuse and neglect. however, such instruction could also equip teachers with the tools to empower children to recognise and address breaches of rights in their own lives. this would be true of any safeguarding processes in countries where passive teacher observation is currently the norm and would be efficacious for ensuring that children’s article 3 right within the united nations convention on the rights of the child (uncrc) to have their best interests taken into account would be better protected in school settings. it would also necessitate teachers themselves being familiar enough with human rights to be able to equip the learners in their classroom with the tools for recognising when their rights are being breached and for taking action in response. if teachers were equipped with detailed knowledge about the rights contained within the uncrc, for example, children in their classrooms would understand that they have rights. these include protection from all forms of physical or mental violence, abuse, neglect, maltreatment or exploitation while in the care of parents or other carers (article 19), an adequate standard of living (article 27), good quality healthcare, and nutritious food (both article 24). children would also recognise that they have the right, under article 12, to express their views in matters affecting them. in other words, they would appreciate that they have a voice that is relevant and significant, and that they will a.e.c. struthers 57 be listened to if they speak out (lundy, 2007). this last point is important for, as identified by bajaj in schooling for social change, children were empowered to speak out about lived experiences of rights violations after receiving hre only if reassured that adults were willing and able to intervene in situations of maltreatment (2012, p. 92). child-friendly versions of existing human rights documents could assist teachers in explaining rights to children in ageappropriate ways (council of europe, n.d.; queens university belfast, n.d. united nations children’s fund & child rights connect, n.d.). in the aforementioned dfe review of scrs, it is reported that neglect is one of the most pressing concerns in safeguarding and child protection in the uk. there was, for example, evidence of neglect in 75% of the scr reports examined (208 out of 278 scr reports) and the report reiterates that ‘how we respond to and protect children from the harmful effects of neglect is one of the most pressing and challenging aspects of safeguarding work in this country’ (dfe, 2020, p. 54). it notes that three particular issues stood out in the cases of neglect studied: ‘poverty; the complex and cumulative nature of neglect; and the invisibility of some children and young people to the system’ (p. 58). what the report also recognised, however, is that there is often a stigma around naming mistreatment as neglect, or around identifying poverty as an underlying issue for families where neglect is a problem. equipping children with the language and understanding necessary to identify that they are experiencing neglect through, for example, insufficient food, housing or healthcare, and to vocalise their experiences and concerns, encourages their active participation in the recognition of their situation. if discussion of human rights in the classroom as a key component of safeguarding in schools were to happen regularly, this may prevent safeguarding cases from escalating to the point where teachers are observing visible signs of abuse and neglect. such a change in approach may also prevent children who are experiencing breaches of their rights from feeling they are being singled out by teachers or being treated differently to their peers when observations of safeguarding issues are made. children would ideally be equipped with the requisite knowledge and understanding of rights to speak in confidence to a member of school staff before they are observed to be at risk; though of course, many children who are subject to abuse or neglect will never feel empowered to speak out about their experiences for a number of reasons, including fear of reprisals from their abuser, of not being believed, or through not knowing that certain behaviours are abusive (royal commission into institutional responses to child sexual abuse, 2017, pp. 10-11). including hre as an element of safeguarding would also be likely to have the additional benefit of overcoming some of the current barriers to the provision of hre with primary school-aged children. as mentioned in section two, teachers in my empirical study identified both practical and attitudinal concerns about hre: these included a lack of time, relevant training, and attitudinal anxieties around the appropriateness of human rights as a topic for young learners. human rights education review – volume 4(3) 58 many identified, however, that they would be more likely to teach about human rights in their classrooms if they were better trained in the topic and if they felt there was a mandate at governmental level for them to do so (struthers, 2020, chapter 7). one interviewee expressly recognised that safeguarding training is continuously reinforced and that if the same could be said for hre, then teachers would be more confident in its provision (p. 193). including hre within existing safeguarding training at both initial teacher education and cpd levels would therefore be likely to offer the subject the space and legitimacy necessary for it to be taken seriously by schools and for education about, through and for human rights to be able to make a difference to the lives of vulnerable young people. concluding remarks in england, hre and school safeguarding currently exist in two distinct spheres. it is true that some of the existing human rights literature has danced around the issue of hre being of relevance to child protection concerns, but this aspect of the current discourse has not been explored in depth, either in the uk or beyond. yet in this area, across the globe, children’s knowledge of human rights and their empowerment in the face of human rights violations are of monumental significance. only through equipping children with accurate, detailed and comprehensive knowledge and understanding of their rights – and the protection mechanisms for those rights – will they be able to recognise and address violations of rights in their lived experiences. lundy and martínez sainz acknowledge the controversial nature of their proposals on the use of hre to empower children to identify rights violations in their own lives, recognising teachers’ fears about such education being disruptive to the learning environment, and they accept that their approach is in many ways radical (2018, p. 18). yet, they remain keen to stress that this is fundamentally the point: ‘giving children the legal knowledge and tools to address breaches and violations of their rights wherever they arise is not just a right itself but a seemingly undervalued way of educating them in human rights for transformation’ (p. 18). and indeed, looking beyond the english context, improving the practice and processes of school safeguarding is itself likely to be an important means by which states recognise and respond to their duty under article 19 of the uncrc to protect children from ‘all forms of physical or mental violence, injury or abuse, neglect or negligent treatment, maltreatment or exploitation, including sexual abuse, while in the care of parent(s), legal guardian(s) or any other person who has the care of the child.’ too often, children have been failed by the english safeguarding system. a system that relies on the observations of those who come into contact with children assumes that each link in the chain connects effortlessly to the next; that every teacher who notices an unusual bruise a.e.c. struthers 59 on a child will be suspicious enough of that isolated incident to record or report it, and thus help to identify a pattern of abuse. this did not happen in the case of daniel pelka, not through the fault of any one member of staff but through the failing of a system that relies predominantly on reactivity in the face of suspected abuse or neglect. in cases such as daniel’s, where a number of staff members witness different injuries over time, each teacher in isolation may not consider his or her observations significant enough to merit escalation. this is where children fall through the cracks, and this will happen in any safeguarding system that relies on passive teacher observation. whilst not a panacea, providing teachers with comprehensive education on hre – that covers in detail each element of education about, through and for human rights – as part of their safeguarding training, both at the stage of their initial teacher training and during ongoing cpd, could inject an element of proactivity into the system. schools could also involve children in drafting their safeguarding policies from a rights-based perspective (as is currently sometimes done with bullying and/or discipline policies), which would further alter the dynamic in safeguarding processes to one that actively involves children as participants. by equipping teachers with a fundamental legal understanding of the human rights to which everyone, including children, is entitled, as well as the mechanisms for their protection, and encouraging them to empower children to recognise and address rights violations in their own lives, the inherent passivity of certain school safeguarding systems may be challenged. this is unlikely to be a straightforward shift; practical and attitudinal teacher barriers will remain problematic, at least initially. however, even small changes in this direction would be positive. it has been observed recently with regard to safeguarding in the american school system that ‘most training programmes in education, (i.e., teacher preparation…) include some coverage of mandated reporting and child abuse; however, no empirical data exists that demonstrates that this training is adequate to prepare professionals for reporting child abuse’ (hall, runion & perkins, 2017, p. 375). and a recent study in norway reported that teachers do not feel their teacher-training adequately prepares them to address harmful sexual behaviour between pupils (draugedalen, kleive & grov, 2021, p. 5). these findings are likely to reflect the situation in other countries, including at initial teacher education and cpd levels in england where each higher education institution and school, respectively, offers its own training programme, principally enabling teachers to understand risk factors and recognise signs of abuse and neglect. educating school staff in how to empower children to recognise and speak out about rights violations would give both themselves and their pupils improved opportunities to understand and act upon hidden maltreatment issues. and this is arguably particularly important in england, given that the number of young people in need of child protection is far greater than official data indicates (bentley et al., 2016). if these silent voices could be empowered to speak up about the harm they are experiencing, then hre will have served an human rights education review – volume 4(3) 60 important purpose. it almost seems too obvious a point to make that everything possible should be done at the level of school safeguarding to prevent cases either escalating to the point where multiple agencies become involved or ending in gut-wrenching tragedy where children have slipped through the net. even prior to the covid-19 pandemic, the strains upon child protection agencies in england were all too apparent. high caseloads and staff turnover combined with deep spending cuts had significantly impacted upon the sector, leading in particular to a shift from early intervention services, such as family support, to spending on late intervention services, such as children in care (action for children et al., 2020). and with these problems exacerbated by the pandemic, there ought to be as many opportunities as possible at other stages in the safeguarding process to prevent children from becoming invisible to those entrusted with their care and protection. it is here that there is definitely scope for hre to better support and strengthen passive school safeguarding processes. acknowledgements the author would like to thank ruth brittle, laura lundy and andrew williams for their helpful comments on earlier drafts of this article. with specific thanks to ruth for her suggestion that children should be involved in drafting safeguarding policies from a rights-based perspective. references action for children., national children’s bureau., national society for the prevention of cruelty to children., the children’s society., & barnardo’s. 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https://library.nspcc.org.uk/heritagescripts/hapi.dll/filetransfer/2017nottinghamcitychildjoverview.pdf?filename=aa58f75cede68892a73fb681fe246b8371684f102152f0aa780a14959d3bce5767137b3b2a935011cbaec3068664ff681aa6d2524e357bab96c006752ccd756759ad77bd1e389823a55cfaae74b2ee64f46c611ad1724be1ac50776135e4aaaffecacf7bee2b7ae73ea1318156e511cf7033fb72dea435ef72d3ca58b9776536cb72bcdd762020b1745580b927e218a1ed57669876cb48ceb62ed71e48&datasetname=livedata https://doi.org/10.1007/s12142-014-0331-5 majority rights and minority responsibilities: young people’s negotiations with human rights issn: 2535-5406 vol 4, no 3 (2021) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4482 date received: 02-06-2021 date accepted: 02-10-2021 peer reviewed article © 2021 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles developing political compassion through narrative imagination in human rights education iida pyy university of helsinki, finland, iida.pyy@helsinki.fi abstract this paper argues that political compassion is a necessary disposition for engaging with human rights principles and combatting social injustices such as racial discrimination. drawing from martha nussbaum’s theory of political emotions, the paper concentrates on the need to understand compassion as connected to cognition and practical reasoning. moreover, the paper offers suggestions of how to educate towards political compassion in human rights education (hre) through nussbaum’s notion of narrative imagination. to capture the multiperspectival and partial dimensions of hre, the paper further employs the work of critical hre scholars and emphasises the importance of counter-narratives and reflective interpretation of narratives. refined by critical considerations, nussbaum’s work on compassion and narrative imagination provides a new and important perspective for understanding the relation between human rights, emotions and social justice in the context of contemporary hre theory and practice. keywords human rights education, nussbaum, compassion, narrative imagination, political emotions http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4482 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:iida.pyy@helsinki.fi i. pyy 25 ‘you never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view—' ‘sir?’ ‘—until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.’ (harper lee, to kill a mockingbird, 1960/1997, p. 33) introduction narrative imagination, as martha nussbaum (1996) calls it, refers to the ability to be an intelligent reader of another person’s story, striving to understand the lives, emotions and wishes of others (pp. 10-11). narrative imagination requires not only logical reasoning and knowledge but also compassion and love – the two emotions that in their political form, nussbaum (2013) argues, are crucial to democracy. i have a reason for beginning this article with an extract from to kill a mockingbird. this widely debated novel, set in the deep south of the united states in the early 1930s, addresses blatant human rights violations such as rape and racial discrimination, and how they are handled in the criminal justice system. it also hints at more subtle, intertwined issues of class, gender, and stigma. the extract is from a conversation between the first-person narrator, ‘scout’ finch, a confident and hot-headed wild child, and her father, who is discouraging scout from judging her new teacher and encouraging her to always imagine the individual perspectives of others. young scout’s journey towards becoming a more empathetic interpreter of other characters’ stories becomes a recurring theme in the novel, and it is accentuated by her reactions during the tom robinson trial. tom is a virtuous character, a black man wrongfully convicted of rape and later lynched while trying to escape prison. in my view, the book is concerned with compassion as much as the loss of innocence, and is essentially about the main character practising narrative imagination. what is more, the book urges its reader to join in the practice. compassion, human rights and justice across social categories are still called for today. the black lives matter movement aims to solve the very human rights problems to kill a mockingbird addressed in 1960. at the same time, the political culture is characterised by an ever-increasing polarisation in which compassion and the willingness to imagine the realities of people different from oneself are sometimes difficult to find. as educators there are questions we should ask: which capabilities should education develop to address human rights issues such as racial discrimination? how can these capabilities be taught in schools? although these matters cannot be fully addressed in one paper, i want to take on a small part of the task. my aim is to contribute to human rights education (hre) theorising by focusing on the role of political compassion in pursuing social justice through nussbaum’s concept of narrative imagination. at the same time, i need to be mindful of criticisms of this approach. human rights education review – volume 4(3) 26 nussbaum’s political philosophy, particularly her theory of political emotions, has not been adequately examined in the context of hre. as a theoretical lens, it provides an interesting perspective to hre in terms of understanding the relation between human rights, emotions and social justice. my point of departure is that political compassion—defined as active fellowfeeling—provides the motivational force needed for our struggle for human rights. accordingly, hre will benefit from a pedagogical approach that promotes a compassionate disposition. although prior hre literature has extensively discussed compassion, the nature of compassion as a particularly moral emotion, associated with a substantive understanding of justice, has not been comprehensively addressed. furthermore, this discussion has also lacked suggestions for how to educate towards political compassion. these suggestions will be my central focus in employing nussbaum’s notion of narrative imagination. to contextualise this paper and the premises of my arguments, it should be noted that my understanding of hre involves the normative principles of universal human rights, yet is relational and transformational in nature. put differently, even though i hold that human rights can have a universal foundation in the equal moral worth of persons, the interpretation and implementation of these rights need to be constantly re-negotiated in particular contexts, with all voices heard. in order to highlight the role of power and politics in hre, and to draw attention to the multiperspectival, historical, and partial dimensions of it (keet & zembylas, 2019), i employ critical hre research (zembylas, 2013), and especially the concepts of counternarratives (andrews & bamberg, 2004; osler 2015; scahffer & smith, 2004) and relationality (adami, 2014), to bring to light the aspects of hre that are not fully captured by nussbaum’s theory. one of the central aims of this paper is to suggest that nussbaum’s views are not necessary incompatible with the critical approaches; both are needed for correcting current injustices. with nussbaum, i argue that critical examination is integral to narrative imagination to ensure collective responses to injustice rather than generating empathy for individual and isolated cases. by transformational hre, i refer to hre’s potential for furthering justice through education, with its aim to ‘empower persons to enjoy and exercise their rights and to respect and uphold the rights of others’ (art 2. 2.c., united nations general assembly, 2011). further, it should be noted that racial discrimination is considered only one example of human rights issues that might be addressed in schools. when i refer to hre practice, i am primarily concerned with the formal learning that takes place in k12 schools as part of traditional school subjects or cross-curricular projects, although i am not neglecting the potentiality of cultivating compassion through narrative imagination in non-formal and informal hre. moreover, i discuss hre generally as opposed to, for instance, focusing on a specific national context. this paper is structured as follows. first, i briefly introduce some of the earlier discussions on i. pyy 27 the role of emotions and compassion in hre. i then present nussbaum’s theory of political emotions as the central theoretical framework of the article, concentrating especially on the need to understand emotional dispositions such as compassion as connected to cognition and practical reasoning. the subsequent section discusses nussbaum’s concept of narrative imagination as a potential method for awakening compassion, and introduces contested considerations of this method. i then draw from these considerations, when i offer my suggestions on how hre could be informed by nussbaum’s work. in the discussion, i revisit to kill a mockingbird to conclude my reflection on political compassion and narrative imagination, proposing that these concepts provide an interesting and important perspective on contemporary hre theory and practice. the role of political emotions and compassion in hre western philosophy has traditionally seen emotions as inferior to rationality (boler, 1997). however, paying attention to moral sentiments and mobilising these passions for democratic designs has been proposed throughout history by a vast number of scholars, including aristotle, smith, hume, rousseau, mill, adorno, and horkheimer. there has been increased discussion on the role of emotions in the political sphere in recent decades (ahmed, 2014; mouffe 2005; westen, 2007). in the context of education, david carr (2005) and nussbaum (1997, 2010) have highlighted the importance of emotions, as have scholars representing more critical (zembylas, 2013) or agonistic (ruitenberg, 2009; tryggvason, 2017) perspectives. in hre, richard rorty (1998) was one of the first scholars to argue for the relevance of emotions and the outdatedness of rationality in human rights discourses, proposing ‘sentimental education’ as a strategy to cultivate a human rights culture and moral sentiments during the time of postmodernity and contemporary battles for human rights. rorty’s approach is not without its critics, as it is questionable whether ‘sentimental education’ can address structural injustices and circumstances that lead to human hardship and suffering. for instance, in the context of using narratives, troy jollimore and sharon barrios (2006) have questioned the use of excessively sentimental texts advocated by the ‘sentimentalists’ that follow rorty. following nussbaum, they have argued for the pedagogical use of narrative art that presents the world in its complexities and considers divergent viewpoints. this pedagogy aims for a genuine understanding of the other, as opposed to advocating sentimental, ‘unthinking goodwill’ (jollimore & barrios, 2006, p. 381). however, josé manuel barreto (2006) has attempted to bring rorty’s pragmatistic ideas into discussions on adorno’s and horkheimer's more critical ones in formulating human rights ethics. he has stressed that the language of suffering should be included in the theory of human rights (barreto 2006, 2011) and that emotions should form the basis of the human rights ethos (2011, p. 13). both reason and emotion have been seen to play a key role in the processes of rights assertion and human rights education review – volume 4(3) 28 recognition, and in the experiences of those who perceive, mobilise or claim rights (abrams, 2011, p. 552). viewing emotion and reason—compassion and critical reflection—together is relevant also for understanding nussbaum’s work and for the argument of this paper. numerous studies from diverse disciplines and epistemological interests have explored emotional elements of suffering and the nature of compassion. in the field of education, scholars from varied theoretical backgrounds have stressed the value of teaching with and for compassion (barton & ho, 2020; noddings, 2005; zembylas, 2012). recently, in the context of hre, yuka kitayama and yoriko hashizaki (2018) have discussed the difference between pity and compassion, drawing from nel noddings’ (1984) conception of the ethics of care. nevertheless, more theoretical work is required to consider how particular political dispositions, such as solidarity, can be taught so that they will lead to compassionate action (zembylas, 2013, p. 505). zembylas (2012) has strongly advocated a more critical engagement with compassion, proposing ‘strategic empathy’ in critical pedagogy for hre. i engage with some of the critical considerations in terms of nussbaum’s work in the hope of elucidating how we might teach compassion reflectively. conceptualising compassion in the light of nussbaum’s theory of political emotions i wish to review nussbaum’s theorisation of political emotions (1990/1992, 1996, 2001, 2013, 2018) since i consider it beneficial for examining both the tensions and possibilities involved in education for compassion in order to strengthen democracy and human rights. appropriately adapted, nussbaum’s work could offer a theoretical perspective on the global principles of justice that underlie the declarations and conventions of hre. although a political liberalist (nussbaum 2013, p. 6), nussbaum has criticised the tradition for not adequately recognising the epistemological value of emotions in democratic politics (p. 4). her argument is that collaboration and attachment—basic human wants—have to be put into political practice and that this can be achieved through nurturing certain emotions in democratic societies (p.4). for nussbaum, emotions are closely associated with cognitive judgements: they tell us something about what is valuable to us. emotions reflect the experiencing person’s notion of a worthwhile life and, thus, guide political arguments and judgments. mere rational arguments or abstract principles are rarely enough to mobilise people politically (nussbaum, 2013, p. 11, 2001, p. 31). nussbaum (2013) argues that political emotions need to be informed by a vision of a good life that, albeit partial and redefinable, has to be founded in a shared ‘set of normative goals’ with a ‘definite moral content’ (p. 6). this contains a guarantee of equal respect, liberties of speech, association, and conscience, and a set of fundamental social and economic rights (p. 16). i i. pyy 29 understand this as a further development of nussbaum’s theory of global justice, the capabilities approach (ca), which serves as a backdrop for the theory of political emotions. ca is a partial and minimal account of social justice that perceives well-being in terms of capabilities—people’s actual opportunities to achieve important ‘functionings’ (nussbaum, 2006, pp. 69-71). nussbaum regards ca as a ‘species of a human rights approach’ (2007, p. 21) belonging to the family of liberal political conceptions of justice (2013, p. 118). however, ca is less centred on negative liberty and more concerned with states’ and other institutions’ responsibilities. to put the ideas presented in this paper in the context of nussbaum’s (2011) famous list of ten central capabilities, i am concerned with the capabilities listed as 4, 5 and 6: related to senses, imagination, and thought; emotions; and practical reasoning (pp. 33-34). for nussbaum (2013), the expression of certain public emotions (e.g., compassion) obtain their justification from the above-mentioned normative vision and can be considered worthwhile, whereas the expressions of others (e.g., disgust) do not (p. 2). nussbaum (2013) urges that we should acknowledge the potentially harmful and beneficial effects that emotions can have in political life (p. 256), and that emotions are not static but shaped by social norms and context, which is why we ought to enhance the formation of political emotions that can reinforce justice (nussbaum, 2013, pp. 201-202, 2018, pp. 12-13). nussbaum (1996, 2001, 2013) has examined compassion as both a personal emotion and a social and political construct. according to her, compassion is ‘a painful emotion directed at the serious suffering of another creature or creatures’ (nussbaum, 2013, p. 142). it contains a strong cognitive element and is thus a moral emotion. consistent with aristotle, she suggests that compassion involves the judgement of (1) the seriousness of another’s suffering, (2) the undeserved nature of the suffering, and (3) a perception that one could be in the same position as the suffering person. she equates this last feature with the recognition of one’s own vulnerability (nussbaum, 2001, pp. 305-316). nussbaum (1996) views compassion as a central ‘bridge to justice’ (p. 37) which connects the community and the individual. it should be practised in public life and politics, as it motivates a collective endeavour to move closer to a ‘good life’ and the sacrifices ultimately required for public welfare. it enables us to at least imagine the individuality, circumstances, and motives of other people, in order to be ‘less inclined to demonise the person, to think of him or her as purely evil and alien’ (nussbaum, 1997, p. 97). if we accept this, then compassion becomes highly relevant for our work against stigmatisation, cultural essentialism, and hate speech; the detrimental phenomena often fuelled by fear, disgust and anger. to use sarah ahmed’s (2014) words, compassion, like other emotions, is crucial in education as it can ‘open up lines of communication’ (pp. 181-182). human rights education review – volume 4(3) 30 importantly, we should not view compassion merely as a private sensation, but as a collective emotion. nussbaum (2013) is aware of the danger of partiality (p. 157) and hence differentiates between ‘extended’ and ‘limited’ compassion (p. 317). the former refers to civic compassion, which i have decided to refer to as ‘political compassion’ in this paper. limited compassion is generally awakened by an individual narrative of distress. although compassion that relies on encounters and everyday experiences of empathising with others’ distress is potentially powerful too, i recognise nussbaum’s caution that compassion provoked by individual stories can become narrow and misleading if it draws attention away from the generally recognised normative principles of justice. keith barton (2020) has made a similar remark about the insufficiency of empathising with individual cases in the context of hre. to overcome this pitfall of partiality, it is imperative that we widen our ‘circle of concern’ through education (nussbaum, 2013 p. 124; 1996, p. 50). further, compassion should be distinguished from pity and empathy. pity, for nussbaum (2001), creates a hierarchy between the subject and the object of pity (p. 301) whereas compassion does not. although closely related to empathy, compassion extends from it. nussbaum (2001) sees empathy as merely referring to understanding someone’s experience: this can occur without compassion for the other person’s troubles (pp. 301-302, pp. 327–329). the aristotelian notions that compassion stems from the recognition that the suffering is undeserved and that the same bad thing could happen to oneself are central to nussbaum’s conception of compassion. i, however, propose that this ought not to be taken too literally: a white person might be able to feel compassion towards the black community after the killing of george floyd, although there is little doubt that the same brutal thing could not have happened to them in the united states in 2020. perhaps this is what nussbaum (1996) means when she urges us to widen our circle of concern and to ask, ‘which creatures am i to count as my fellow-creatures, sharing possibilities with me?’ (p. 92). a white person can think: ‘that same thing could have happened to me, because where i was born, who my parents are, and the colour of my skin is nothing but an accident. the fact that anyone may be mistreated in this way is wrong.’ therefore, political compassion always has to be mindful of structural injustice, privilege and power. it also needs to be aware of human vulnerability (butler, 2004; zembylas 2013). both nussbaum and judith butler have urged that what we fear or find disgusting in the other is partly a projection of our own humanity, and that the acknowledgment of one’s own vulnerability may establish an effective starting point for developing compassion for the other’s vulnerability (butler 2004, nussbaum, 2013, 2018). zembylas (2013) has proposed that for developing political applications of compassion, there should be an epistemological shift of emphasis from suffering to vulnerability, since the idea of common human vulnerability highlights all of us as vulnerable, not just the suffering other who needs our compassion (pp. i. pyy 31 512-513). i propose that the widening of one’s sphere of compassion (relevant to hre as well) could be viewed in four steps: 1) realising one’s own vulnerability, which leads to 2) the recognition of common human fragility, which leads to 3) awareness of privilege and power asymmetries, which can then 4) spark solidarity and provide motivation to take substantial action for social justice. echoing zembylas (2013), i hold that ‘the critical awareness that others are vulnerable, too, is important in the struggle for action-oriented solidarity and the avoidance of egocentricity and cultural narcissism’ (pp. 513-514). however, the idea of cultivating compassion as a political emotion has also been contested. despite nussbaum’s deliberate attempt to avoid hierarchisation in her discussion of compassion, some critics question whether it can exist without pity and patronisation. compassion has been viewed as selective and unreliable (arendt, 1963/2016) and too passive an affect to create persistent commitment and to motivate protest against injustice (berlant, 2004; pedwell, 2014; weber, 2018), whereas negative emotions with a sense of outrage often function as crucial mobilising forces, especially in minority struggles (adkins, 2020; bell 2009; cherry 2019; srinivasan, 2018). ann-kathrin weber (2018), following hannah arendt’s political theory, warns us of the self-deceptive magic of feeling compassion (p. 57). nussbaum acknowledges this possible, passivising outcome of people thinking that they have done something morally good simply by virtue of feeling compassion. however, it does not follow from this that compassion itself is bad (nussbaum, 2001, p. 399). nussbaum (2013) also reminds us that cultivating compassion does not mean we need not strengthen societal institutions, as they should always be the backbone of democratic politics. some critics have associated compassion with unwanted responses such as anxiety, hopelessness or ‘compassion fatigue’ (moeller, 1999); an emotional overdose resulting in observer alienation, apathy or disinterest. indeed, research indicates that an excessive amount of information on suffering detaches spectators, and that anxiety can cause paralysis, leading to unproductive self-pity, or even a backlash against the problems (zembylas, 2013, pp. 509-510). this implies that an overload of narratives of human rights violations could lead to results in the classroom that are the opposite to those hoped for. weber (2018) has expressed her concern that, in the worst case, compassion might be ‘regarded as inflicted “from above” and thus fuel resentment of “the establishment”’ (p. 56). weber (2018) further questions whether nussbaum’s normative view of democracy leaves enough space for the expression of pluralistic views. nussbaum (2013), however, holds that ‘a culture of sympathy and imagination is fully compatible with, and indeed can reinforce, a liberal culture of experimentation and dissent’ (p. 105). to me it seems that some scholars (such as weber, 2018 and zembylas, 2013) who understand nussbaum’s conceptualisation of compassion as a passive mode of the spectator ‘feeling bad’ for the sufferer, overlook the distinction nussbaum (2001) has made between compassion and pity (p. 301). i view compassion as a human rights education review – volume 4(3) 32 collective and active emotion that need not be marked by condescension. in light of this reading, the aptness of many of the aforementioned critiques can be questioned. nevertheless, what remains to be done is to develop suggestions as to how compassion can be made socially productive while recognising its obscurities. nussbaum herself has explicitly turned to education, stating that ‘public education at every level should cultivate the ability to imagine the experiences of others and to participate in their sufferings’ (1996, p. 50). i next discuss this capacity, also known as narrative imagination, as a possible method for developing political compassion. bringing these two concepts into the context of hre will hopefully move us towards reflective, affective education that advances human rights without falling into the trap of ‘empty sentimentality’ (kaplan, 2005). the role of narrative imagination in developing political compassion narration is one of the most frequent modes of communication and humans have been called innate storytellers (flanagan, 1992, p. 198). recently, our societies have witnessed an expansion of instrumental storytelling prompted by civil rights movements, identity politics, and the narrative turn in the humanities and social sciences. at the same time, social media has been drastically altering our narrative environments (mäkelä, 2018, pp. 175-184). narratives can allegedly powerfully circulate knowledge, enforce co-operation, produce and spread new ideas, spark change, and present information in a favoured, accessible form (osler, 2016, p. 53). education can also be viewed as a narrative practice that constructs and reconstructs personal as well as social stories (connelly & clandinin, 1990, p. 2). a vast amount of literature on narratives in hre exists (some of which i shall introduce shortly), as narratives persist as ways in which to evoke feelings and share information about human rights successes and violations. i understand narrativity in its widest sense as the practice, art and subsequent interpretation of shared fictional, semi-fictional or nonfictional stories. it is found in all forms of human creativity, such as writing, art, drama, and the spoken word. i acknowledge that in her work, nussbaum has focused particularly on the role of literature (and the realistic novel as a specific genre) in developing narrative imagination. the interest of this paper lies less in the format of narratives and more in the way they are are discussed to develop political compassion. although i widen my scope to include other forms of art, i focus on narrative art’s role in cultivating political compassion, as opposed to the personal storytelling of ‘life narratives’ (schaffer & smith, 2004, pp.1-8). narratives rooted in real-world experiential history have been discussed in the context of hre before (osler, 2015; adami 2014; schaffer & smith, 2004), and contributing to this would require a study in its own right. however, the pedagogical suggestions presented in this paper could be of use in discussing real-life personal i. pyy 33 storytelling as well. a reader might wonder why narrative art is required for people to encounter each another in a pluralistic society. is it not enough for students to encounter ‘the other’ in schools? although i acknowledge that art is often curated, polished, and commercialised, i would argue that it has special benefits for the development of imaginative understanding. here i draw from nussbaum (1997), who views narrative imagination as an indispensable preparation for moral interaction (p. 90). her argument is that through narrative art we can live more than one life and understand groups that the media or other forces might portray as alien, since ‘differences of class, race, ethnicity, gender and national origin all shape people’s possibilities, and their psychology with them’ (nussbaum, 1997, p. 959). nussbaum (1997, 2010) is not alone in defending the role of the arts and humanities in supporting democracy (carr, 2005), as the nexus between literature and ‘pro-social behaviour’ is eminent in philosophy, psychology and discourses in higher education and popular culture (hammond & sue, 2014, p. 8). importantly, arguing that we need art to understand one another better is not to say that everyday encounters with others have no moral significance: it is more a question of our lives being limited. nussbaum (1990/1992) proposes that literature, for instance, expands our experience and moral imagination and operates as an ‘extension of life’ (p. 48). following aristotle, nussbaum (1990/1992) suggests that ‘we have never lived enough’, that our experience is ‘too confined and too parochial’ (p. 47). it can be difficult to attain an insight into the experience of another in daily life, particularly when ‘our world has constructed sharp separations between groups, and suspicions that make any encounter difficult’ (nussbaum 2010, p. 107). this is to say that there are various limitations to everyday encounters, even in pluralistic societies. i am tempted by the idea that via narrative art it might be possible for us to move beyond our identity positionings and our historic, socio-cultural, or local/national contexts. to kill a mockingbird, narrated from a white, privileged perspective, might not be the best choice for teaching anti-racism in today’s classrooms. however, scout’s first-person narration takes me, a modern-day adult reader, into a child’s mind and to a different society and age. encountering difference in the fictional world can teach me something about my own world, something that a mere conversation with a colleague might not be able to do. scout becoming more compassionate towards other people’s challenges enables readers to reflect on their own prejudices. narrative art is also limitless in that it does not present us with something that is or has been, but with everything imaginable: we are able to indirectly observe endless instances of someone else’s practical reasoning. nussbaum (1990/1992) suggests that one of the key aims human rights education review – volume 4(3) 34 of literature is to introduce us to moments in which ‘habit is cut through by the unexpected’ (p. 43), and she argues that this tests our ambition to live virtuously even when affected by uncontrolled events (p. 43). as spectators, we engage in a gradual process of moral education, discovering what happens in a story, reflecting, imagining, and seeking similarities in real-life stories and phenomena. furthermore, narrative art ‘explores both similarity and difference’ (nussbaum, 1997 p. 94). by engaging with stories, one can gain a position from which to examine situations profoundly yet from afar, one which is ‘both like and unlike the position we occupy in life’ (nussbaum 1990/1992, p. 48). this is especially the case with difficult topics in hre, where the goal is to become emotionally involved, but not too involved. as goldschmidt-gjerløw (2019) suggests, in the context of sexual abuse, ‘the great advantage of this approach is that young students learn through a story and characters that are not them, but with whom some might identify. it creates a common platform for discussing the content, which can form the basis of a democratic dialogue between teacher and pupils’ (p. 40). however, one cannot advocate narrative imagination in hre without addressing certain concerns. storytelling is an influential, yet disputable form of cultural production when it comes to human rights and social change, due to various possible interpretations (schaffer & smith, 2004, pp. 28-32). several scholars have called for critical re-evaluation of the risks associated with the use of narratives, regardless of how noble the intentions might be (mäkelä 2018; schuman 2005; presser 2018). one of these dangers is ‘radical storification – the focusing on individual experience instead of macro-level or complex phenomena’ (mäkelä 2018, p. 175). bearing this in mind, i would argue that as powerful as individual narratives can be in hre, it is important they transcend mere personal meaning. furthermore, i admit that nussbaum’s language (‘to be in the shoes of a person’ 1997, p. 11) almost implies that one has access to another person’s viewpoint and inner life, a troubling notion from radically local, feminist, or anti-racist perspectives, for instance. can one truly be in someone else’s shoes, or to quote scout’s father’s disturbing words, ‘climb into his skin and walk around in it’? i believe these critical questions also concern the underlying premises of the aristotelian-nussbaumian view of compassion: the ethos of shared vulnerability and common humanity appears too simple or universalistic for some scholars. these concerns quickly lead to predicaments of liberalism and to profound ontological questions regarding whether we can assume that there is (at least some level of) a universal, common humanity and experience that we can imagine. in hre, it is vital to critically and cautiously consider what it means to utilise other people’s stories (see schuman, 2005) and who has ‘the right to narrate’ (bhabha, 2003). do the stories we share—be they fictional or non-fictional— construct or re-construct harmful, dominant narratives (adami, 2014), master narratives (andrews & bamberg, 2004), or grand ones (linde & arthur, 2015)? and what is the role of historical and persisting power-relations in all of this? i come back to these contested i. pyy 35 considerations in the next section. practicing political compassion and narrative imagination in hre i next present my preliminary suggestions on what may be learned from nussbaum’s work. how can we enforce a human rights culture, rooted in political compassion, through narrative imagination in schools? i structure my suggestions so as to draw from the critical considerations presented in the previous sections, and stress these three imperatives: a safe learning environment including a capable pedagogue; critical reflection and humility in feeling compassion; and diversity of narratives. this is to ensure that we understand the locality and contextuality of hre, and that compassion teaching does not become dominated by a single perspective, articulated from a relative position of power. prerequisite: a safe learning environment firstly, educators should not recoil from even the most difficult human rights topics and their related emotions. it is imperative that we give space for the recognition and discussion of students’ values that underlie various emotional reactions (ojala, 2016, pp. 51-52). this strengthens students’ rights to participation, as by discussing values and emotions we are creating opportunities for cognitive and emotional voicing. furthermore, nussbaum’s theory of emotions provides tools for pondering where emotions come from, and for critically discussing students’ reactions. however, specific caution is required when turning to narrative imagination as a method in particular contexts (such as the pernicious issue of child sexual abuse). many human rights issues are fairly safe to discuss in schools using storification, but i strongly stress that human rights concepts need to be translated so that they become relevant for learners and that we consistently practise a pedagogy that is ethical and sensitive to the diversity of beliefs, values and backgrounds of students (flowers, 2017, p.321). if narrative imagination is practised in hre, it is crucial we adjust the model to meet age-specific capabilities; all the material and content, including the narratives, should be adapted to students’ development. with simple nursery rhymes, children can start learning to become more understanding of other beings from an early age, and as they develop, the social and moral features of the narratives should become progressively complex (nussbaum, 1997 pp. 89-90). it cannot be overemphasised that teachers must know their students and the classroom needs to be a safe space with a supportive atmosphere. classrooms exist in specific historical and global locations, as do the pupils entering the classrooms with positionings in terms of various privilege that the teacher ought to be au fait with. it is no surprise that educational research is primarily concerned with how to make learning environments safer, more inclusive and stimulating this is the prerequisite for any educational endeavour. students’ psychological human rights education review – volume 4(3) 36 safety is also the reason i am somewhat wary of students sharing their own stories of suffering and recognising them as human rights issues in the classroom. the ethics of this method are questionable, and students in all classrooms may not have even experienced suffering. as i argued earlier, practising narrative imagination with the help of fictional or semi-fictional stories can be useful and a safer place to start developing political compassion. zembylas, charalambous, charalambous and lesta (2017) found similar concerns regarding students’ psychological safety in their research on teachers’ attitudes towards hre in conflict-driven societies. some teachers mentioned the sensitivities associated with exploring human rights violations that students might experience in their everyday lives and worried about ‘exposing these students, stigmatizing them, damaging them emotionally, or invoking the pity of other students in the class’ (zembylas et al., 2017. p. 510). as researchers, we need to be mindful of the diverse classroom realities and the difficulties teachers might face in implementing hre approaches. reading the ‘other’s’ stories: a critical, reflective, compassionate approach in her educational account, nussbaum (1997, 2010) has focused on three interrelated capabilities: a mixture of 1) narrative imagination and 2) critical thinking is viewed essential for the cultivation of 3) mindful, democratic, world citizenship. the recognition of the synergy of compassion and criticality is present in nussbaum’s (1997) work, as ‘sympathetic reading and critical reading should go hand in hand, when we ask how our sympathy is being distributed and focused. one learns something about the text when one asks these critical questions’ (p. 101). critical thinking involves the ambitious work of self-examination and the search for diverse, serious arguments (nussbaum 2018, pp. 213-215). in practice, exercising critical self-examination involves students and teachers stepping out of their comfort zones and learning to recognise asymmetries of suffering, their possible privileges, and the limitations to participating in others’ suffering. zembylas (2013) has built on this; accepting nussbaum’s starting point that students should develop compassion towards other people’s lives and situations, he has noted that since this would entail exploring narratives of asylum-seeking, hunger, slavery, and abuse, it is imperative that students acknowledge the problem in claiming that they truly feel the pain of someone who has actually encountered these sufferings in their life (p. 517). he proposes a type of compassion that ‘requires a simultaneous identification and disidentification with the suffering of the other’ as it ‘removes the arrogance of claiming that we know and feel their pain’ (zembylas, 2013, p. 513). in this quest, utilising narrative art can be helpful. i suggest that without claiming that we can take the other’s position and truly know their pain, we can still feel compassion and highlight the shared nature of human suffering and human dignity. eventually, shifting the classroom discussion towards the gravity of human rights violations to a society as a whole is of crucial importance in order to move from the level of the personal i. pyy 37 and individual to the level of the societal and structural. critical reflection, however, does not emerge automatically. in this endeavour the role of the hre teacher is to guide students in their practice of narrative imagination and critical reflection and to make connections between narrative art and life. depending on the aforementioned context, group, and individual students’ safety, there are a number of question that can be discussed in class, in small groups, or reflected on individually after engaging with a narrative: do you understand/sympathise with the narrator? can you claim to understand the narrator exactly? what does it mean that one can be compassionate without fully taking the other’s position? can the students think of an example of this? can the teacher give one? has it ever happened that someone said they understood you, but you felt that they could/did not? how? how can we move closer to understanding without fully understanding? the goal here is that pupils will get an experience of engaging in a dialogical encounter that involves listening, learning, identifying and disidentifying. an intellectually humble, open-ended approach is key in this endeavour. minding the power: counter-narratives and the relational approach to hre what narrative art is presented in the classroom? whose stories are we hearing, who has historically had the ‘right to narrate’ (bhabha, 2003)? for too long the subject and the narrator has arguably been the white, non-disabled, heterosexual male, and this has also been the case when it comes to citizenship discourses (lister, 1997). counter-narratives refer to stories emerging from the outlook of the historically marginalised, where ‘counter-’ itself indicates resistance to traditional domination (andrews & bamberg, 2004). this is not merely about representation or telling stories located in the margins, but about the people who are not in positions of relative power owning their stories and claiming back their right to narrate them. schaffer and smith (2004) assert that counter-narratives from particular localities and differing cultures of moral understanding elaborate the language of human rights. in hre, solely learning the dominant narratives (in terms of nation-building and nationality, for instance) can overshadow alternative implications for identity shaping for the learners (adami, 2014) or, at worst, erase stories of past struggles from the public memory (osler, 2015, p.255). adami (2014) provides an important insight when she points out it is not merely about what stories are being told and how (albeit this is important), but also how we listen, read, interpret, and respond. narratives should not be seen as ‘representing a social myth of sameness’, and we should highlight the uniqueness of each tale and every person (p. 303). cautioning that nussbaum’s approach risks viewing ‘particularity as a collective identity of the other’ (p. 294), adami (2014) visions hre and classrooms as relational spaces where plurality and uniqueness can be expressed. she writes: human rights education review – volume 4(3) 38 we must ask ourselves if we, as educators, in our good intentions, reify relations of a plural ‘us’ and ‘others’ in pedagogical relations, or if we allow for students to bring in the new and unexpected that come with the open question of ‘who are you?’. (pp. 301) this is an excellent remark, and an attitude that can and should also be present when encountering the ‘other’ in a fictional world, and especially when these experiences are discussed in the classroom. learners need opportunities to engage with multifarious narratives, and they need a safe space to discuss their interpretations and the emotions the stories have provoked. although i understand why some scholars view nussbaum’s work as being in conflict with these considerations, i hold the usage of counter-narratives compatible with and, indeed, crucial for the practice of narrative imagination. i claim that it is possible to defend a shared humanity that respects difference without losing the sense of uniqueness of each person. for me, nussbaum’s work does not suggest that the narratives of the subaltern should be read as representing the total reality of ‘the collective other’, obfuscating the individuality of a human being. i believe she urges that individual narratives, at their best, can help us grasp parts of systemic injustice. the connection between the individual and the collective could in itself constitute an important topic of reflective discussion among students and allow them to consider each other as individuals as opposed to mere representatives of collective identities. when unpacking narratives in hre, the following questions could be raised in teaching discussions: what do you think this story is about, what is it trying to say? who is telling the story, who is not? imagine if one of the other characters told it, how might it change? what if the context of the story was different? who usually narrates; whose stories do we read, hear, see? do people who are ‘marginalised’ in some way or another always end up in certain roles, or if they are the narrators, what types of stories are they usually ‘allowed’ to narrate? a dialogical approach would be important here. if teachers consider it necessary to further highlight the uniqueness of each person’s narration and interpretation, they could ask the students to write about an event (e.g., a field trip) that the whole class has recently experienced together, and then compare their stories. this exercise can also be conducted so that two students, without hearing one another’s accounts, give a short narration of the same event or a story they have just heard, and the rest of the group reflects on the differences in the narratives. another way to underline the uniqueness of interpretation and narration would be an exercise where the teacher reads a story, and in small groups, students negotiate, write a script, direct, and perform their version of the story to the rest of the class. the various emphases and interpretations can then be reflected upon in plenum. i. pyy 39 discussion finally, i wish to return to mockingbird. while for one reader it is a story about scout becoming more understanding of other people’s perspectives and actions, for another it is an uncomfortable portrayal of black people from a white perspective. due to the topics of sex and rape, and the use of profanity and racial slurs, mockingbird is one of the most frequently contested books in the united states, and has again been banned from certain libraries and curricula. simultaneously, the novel is regarded as a pivotal fictional work of social justice. it is argued that the book can still inspire and challenge people today, since it addresses the painful history of systemic racism. schools should keep teaching it. i consider mockingbird in many ways too problematic a book to be discussed before upper secondary school or university. for anti-racist education, ralph ellison’s invisible man, as nussbaum (2018) suggests, or angie thomas’ or toni morrison’s works might be more suitable. mockingbird should certainly not be taught for any nostalgic reasons, but, if suitably used with appropriate groups of students, it can produce classroom discussions on human rights issues or on dominant narratives. if anything, it can open up the discussion of compassion and narrative imagination, and the questions raised in the previous section: can we ever truly understand another person? who is telling the story and who is not? i believe the solution is to introduce all narratives, including works such as mockingbird, in a nuanced manner, mindful of their context(s) and of the debates they have inspired. reading and teaching that oversimplifies life is not proper reading or teaching at all. the same need for critical reflection should apply to the utilisation of narratives, and to hre in general. compassion, too, can be examined, conceptualised and discussed as it is being taught – after all, how else do teachers know whether or not they are evoking pity, limited compassion, or compassion fatigue? i maintain that political compassion is required for our work for social justice, and that education plays a crucial role in its cultivation. building solidarity with others also requires certain emotional dynamics in a classroom (zembylas, 2013, pp. 508-509) and needs to be practised while addressing structural inequalities ( p. 505). certainly, oppression is more than emotions (no matter how eminent these might be in the [re]formation of political culture), and structures that lead to suffering need to be recognised and addressed. what i am proposing is a curious, reflective stance that nevertheless remains optimistic about the matters presented in this paper. i conclude that nussbaum’s work on political compassion and narrative imagination provides an important perspective for understanding the relation between human rights, emotions and social justice in the context of contemporary hre theory and practice. since emotions are human rights education review – volume 4(3) 40 deeply connected to our values and motivations, and compassion has consistently been seen as vital to democracy and pro-social behaviour, we should seek to cultivate it in hre. i propose that by practising the capability of narrative imagination, young learners can develop political compassion. however, in hre practice this would require 1) a safe learning environment, including a capable pedagogue, 2) critical reflection and humility when reading and trying to understand other people’s stories, and 3) counter-narratives and a relational approach mindful of the individuality/collectivity of the narratives presented. in nussbaum’s educational account, critical thinking and imaginative understanding are reconciled for a reason. together, emotion and examination should also inform our striving for social justice in hre. references abrams, k. 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(2017). toward a critical hermeneutical approach of human rights education: universal ideals, contextual realities and teachers’ difficulties. journal of curriculum studies, 49(4), 497-517. https://doi.org/10.1080/00220272.2016.1188156 https://doi.org/10.7202/1070610ar https://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/compilation/pages/unitednationsdeclarationonhumanrightseducationandtraining(2011).aspx https://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/compilation/pages/unitednationsdeclarationonhumanrightseducationandtraining(2011).aspx https://doi.org/10.17645/pag.v6i4.1393 https://doi.org/10.1080/13562517.2011.611869 https://doi.org/10.1080/00131946.2013.844148 https://doi.org/10.1080/00220272.2016.1188156 from vision to transformation: integrating human rights courses in higher education in india issn 2535-5406 http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4546 date received: 13-08-2021 date accepted: 10-05-2022 peer reviewed article © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles from vision to transformation: integrating human rights courses in higher education in india radhika lakshminarayanan american university of the middle east, kuwait, radlax123@gmail.com dolly thomas stella maris college, chennai, india, dollythomas@stellamariscollege.edu.in abstract human rights education (hre) is critical to human development and societal transformation. in india, although hre emerged in the 1980s, its incorporation in higher education has not yet reached its full potential. using the state of tamil nadu as our case study, this paper evaluates the integration of courses on human rights in universities and colleges, using a descriptive qualitative approach to analyse the nature and content of such courses, their compliance with india’s apex institutional directives, and the challenges faced. the researchers conclude that there is a disconnect between the vision of policy makers and actual implementation of hre in practice. it is suggested that wider holistic application of hre in higher education is needed, so that learning becomes a transformative force, empowering the young to develop attitudes of solidarity, tolerance, and respect for social justice. keywords human rights, higher education, tamil nadu, india, inequality, learning outcomes http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4546 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:radlax123@gmail.com mailto:dollythomas@stellamariscollege.edu.in human rights education review 2 introduction ideally, human rights as a comprehensive value system should be the guiding force of societies. however, millions of people all over the world continue to struggle for a dignified existence. this is further intensified in a heterogenous society like india, with diversity in language, region, race, caste, culture and religion (kosir & lakshminarayanan, 2021) contributing to blatant discrimination. considerably influenced by the universal declaration of human rights (un, 1948), the indian constitution aims to safeguard the rights of all citizens. it includes fundamental rights (part iii) that guarantee equality, freedom, rights against discrimination, freedom of religion, cultural and educational rights, and the right to constitutional remedies. a section on directive principles of state policy (part iv) to ensure socio-economic justice is also incorporated. following the passing of the protection of human rights act (national human rights commission, 1993), the national human rights commission (nhrc) and state human rights commissions (shrc) were created to promote and protect human rights. national commissions for protection of the rights of women, children, minorities, ‘backward classes’, scheduled castes, and tribes were also established. while the constitution and apex institutions provide a ‘stated vision’ for human rights practice in india, the actual transformation of society to reflect this vision has been slow and fragmented. real social transformation requires the fundamental acceptance that all human beings are entitled to a life of dignity and equal opportunity, which can only be achieved through education that endows ‘human beings with the power to resist colonization of the mind’ (baxi, 1994, p. 23). after independence, the indian government provided considerable impetus for higher education. the university grants commission (ugc) was established in 1956 for coordination and standardisation within universities and delineation of national policies on education. recently, in consonance with the global agenda for sustainable development 2030goal 4 (un, n.d.), the indian government adopted the national education policy (nep) (2020). it aimed to build a ‘knowledge society’, in which equity and inclusion would be ensured through sensitisation towards human values, empathy, tolerance, human rights, gender equality, and community participation. the nep envisages privatization of higher education, increased governmental financing, and multidisciplinary universities with holistic, flexible, imaginative, research-oriented curricula and active learning (ministry of human resource development, 2020). while the nep aims at structural, operational and financial reforms to the indian educational structure, critics question the absence of clear strategies on state funding for institutions and fear that privatization could further aggravate the socio-economic divide. the greatest challenge is to translate these ‘2d plans onto the 3d world’ (sarna, puri & kochar, 2020). such restructuring requires effective integration of the stated vision of policy makers with actual course content. r. lakshminarayanan & d. thomas 3 human rights education (hre) enables skills of advocacy through negotiation, mediation, and consensus building (andrepoulos, 1997, pp. 265-267). it facilitates ending the vicious cycle of ‘humiliation of humans by humans’ (mohanty, 2000, p. 64), by giving the oppressed an understanding of their rights, and the oppressors a consciousness of their wrongs. it is here that tamil nadu (tn), in south india, presents a dichotomy; despite many educational institutions and high literacy rates, human rights abuses continue to prevail, implying a disconnect between the vision of policy makers and the effective integration of hre in academic contexts. conceptual framework tamil nadu, a leading educational hub in india, has many educational institutions with programmes in technology, engineering, medicine, arts, sciences, and law. since social sciences aim to foster global citizenship and holistic values, hre is incorporated in political science, history, sociology, anthropology, economics, and law departments. this paper seeks to evaluate the incorporation of hre in arts and science institutions in tn. through comparison and correlation, the contents of these courses were analysed with reference to their compliance with recommendations of the nhrc-2007 and the ugc, x and xi plan guidelines for hre. we asked the following research questions; 1. what is the nature of the human rights courses and the focus of their syllabus content? 2. are the human rights courses offered in major colleges and universities in tn compliant with the recommendations of the nhrc and the ugc? 3. what are the challenges to the introduction and effective implementation of the recommended human rights curricula, courses and pedagogies in tn? methodology through collecting information directly from faculty or from institutional websites, we studied the syllabi of 11 universities and 158 arts and science colleges in tn. of the arts and science colleges, 27 were government or constituent colleges, 28 were government-aided and 103 were self-financing. these comprised some 20% of the existing arts and science colleges in tn. in our study, the syllabi content was analysed and compared with the original curriculum guidelines of the ugc and nhrc to make valid inferences regarding what was included or excluded and put forth recommendations that correlate with the grassroot social realities. the study used a qualitative, descriptive method to analyse the syllabi content and relevant documents, after which interviews were conducted through personal communication with select faculty members teaching human rights. forty faculty members were interviewed, of human rights education review 4 whom ten were male and thirty female. the interviewees had no hesitation in providing informed consent to use their responses as personal communication and, wherever cited, pseudonyms are used to maintain research confidentiality. the miles and huberman (1994, p. 11) model of data analysis was used, through the following stages: 1. data reduction (to sort, select, simplify, focus, and discard data so that final conclusions can be drawn); 2. data display (an organized, compressed, and meaningful assembly of information); 3. conclusion drawing and verification which involves stepping back to consider the meaning of the analysed data and assess their implications for the research questions. in qualitative inquiry and analysis, there is a crucial need for honesty and reflection on the analytic process on the part of the researcher. this human factor is the methodology’s greatest strength, as well as its fundamental weakness (patton, 1990, p. 372). in this study, the researchers began analysis in tandem with data collection, making regular field notes with comments and interpretations, independently at first and later correlating through discussion, which facilitated objective reflection and exchange. the most advantageous aspect of qualitative enquiry was that it enabled us to smoothly move on from drawing conclusions to making recommendations within the context of the study. human rights in india although the term ‘human rights’ originated in the west, conceptual rudiments of human dignity can be traced to ancient indian vedic texts which point to an ‘obligation-predicated society’ that advocated ‘compassion towards the weak’ (kumar & choudhury, 2021; baboo, 2016). later, rigid caste protocols emerged, creating an exploitative system of stratification wherein social status depended on caste (rawat, 2014; chakravarti, 1993; deshpande, 2010) and perpetuated unequal access to wealth and power (cox, 1945). by the 19th century, reformers like raja rammohan roy, gandhi, and ambedkar criticised religious bigotry, harassment of widows, and untouchability. however, caste, gender inequalities, and abuse of power continue to this day. although caste inequalities may not be overtly observed in everyday interactions in modern india and there is greater freedom of choice in education and careers (velassery, 2005, pp. 78), they are practiced in overt and nuanced contexts. in arranged marriages, caste adjustments are often made, commensurate with education, career, and financial standing (netting, 2010; rajadhyaksha & bhatnagar, 2000), or counterbalanced through ‘bridegroom price’, a veiled cash payment to the groom’s household (caplan, 1984). caste remains an ‘under-recognized marker of inequalities’, witnessed in slum eviction (ranganathan, 2021) and housing discrimination (bharathi et al., 2020). in rural india, overt discrimination is often seen in denied access to public wells, punishments, and ‘honour killings’. the government has a policy of r. lakshminarayanan & d. thomas 5 ‘reservations’, which is intended to increase the representation of under-represented groups in education, legislative assemblies, and employment (laskar, 2010). this policy is aimed to bring about socio-economic development. however, instead of privileged communities losing influence, the list of reserved communities has consistently swelled. gender inequalities: with rapid urbanisation, indian women aspire to academic and career advancement. however, they remain bound by societal constraints (chaturvedi & sahai, 2019) and the world bank (2020) estimates that female labour participation rate in india fell to 20.3% in 2019 from 26% in 2005. restrictive norms, a gender wage gap, and the lack of safe and flexible work choices impede the full realisation of indian women’s potential. abuse of power: blatant police brutality and extrajudicial killings are recorded in india, mainly in jammu and kashmir, the north eastern states, uttar pradesh, tamil nadu, and haryana (human rights watch, 2021). harassment of activists, social workers, lawyers, and journalists through draconian sedition and counter-terrorism laws restrict free expression (human rights watch, 2019). the increasing polarization triggered by hindutva politics has resulted in the targeting of vulnerable minorities (the politics of hindutva, 2020). human rights in tamil nadu in classical tamil sangam society, social justice was the responsibility of rulers, as validated by ancient texts. the thirrukkural urged kings to remain impartial (gautam, 2021). the tolkappiyam mentions a four-fold stratification of society: arasar (rulers), anthanar (priests), vaniyar (merchants), and vellalar (agriculturists). however, this was largely an occupational division (kuppuswamy, 1978). later, caste segregation and heredity norms elevated certain professions while denigrating others (dhanabal, 2018). under the chola rule, there existed vadangai (right hand) and idangai (left hand) groups, and some idangai castes were deprived of education, land rights, and temple entry (hanumanthan, 1976). this segregation was exploited by the british, who relegated natives to ‘black town’ in chennai (basu, 1993), where areas were demarcated on the basis of caste (srinivasachari, 1930). in tn, there are references to competent queens like lokamahadevi (mukund, 1992) and rani mangammal (bes, 2018), as well as educated women like andal (soundaryarajan, 2019), but this was rare. the devadasi system in chola and pallava times refers to talented women in temple service, but when temples lost their economic status, devadasis were often forced into prostitution (singhal, 2015; venkataraman, 2018). in the 20th century, the self-respect movement gained momentum and reformists like rettaimalai srinivasan, subramanya bharti, and m. c. rajah advocated against upper caste hegemony and discrimination against women (rajan, 2020). however, caste, gender inequalities, and abuse of power still prevail in tn. human rights education review 6 caste inequalities: tn has recorded atrocities against dalit castes, who constitute 21% of the population (prabhu, 2017; kannaiah, 2021). there were 192 ‘honour killings’ in tn between 2014 and 2019 (tamilarasu, 2019). the practice of the two-tumbler system (separate drinking glasses) and dalits being denied access to public water tanks have also been reported in villages (“we have separate tumbler”, 2019, june 16). gender inequalities: tn has recently witnessed a declining female sex ratio, an increase in domestic violence, and a decrease in female labour participation. there are records of female foeticide, infanticide, and disappearance of female children (‘female foeticide’, 2022, january 6). the national family health survey (2021) reported that 38.1% of women in tn in the 1849 age group had experienced domestic violence. the female labour force participation rate in tn declined to 35.1% (rural) and 23.6% (urban) in 2019, (iwwage, 2021), indicating major socio-economic challenges. abuse of power: according to the national crime records bureau (2018), 70 custodial deaths were reported in 2018, of which 12 were in tn. the recent custodial deaths of a father and son in sattankulam indicate grave violations by policepersons (vijay kumar & sudhakar, 2020). thus, abuse of power, societal intolerance, and rising xenophobia remain major concerns in tn. development of hre in india in a democracy where gender discrimination and caste-based atrocities continue despite legislation, hre is necessary to address the social, cultural and political factors that foster such discrimination (kapoor, 2007). however, in india a complex relationship exists between religious beliefs, cultural norms, and human rights practice, which adversely impacts effective hre (wahl, 2013). while there is considerable research on human rights violations in india (beer & mitchell, 2006; d'cruz & banerjee, 2020; kamboj, 1994; naik, 2018; saini, 2013), there is a limited focus on practices of hre. addressing human rights teaching in schools, panda (2001) and bajaj (2011a) highlight the role of teacher training and textbooks with contextualised content as prerequisites for effective hre in india. bajaj (2011b) highlights different adaptive instructional practices of hre in ngo models. studying the operation of hre in 4,000 schools, bajaj (2011c, pp. 28-49) suggests that international mandates and grassroots activism should work together for successful implementation of hre in policy, pedagogy and practice. these studies highlight the need for a rights-based approach based on collaboration between governmental and nongovernmental organizations (ashifa, 2021), and the extension of hre from the level of school into higher education for a transformative convergence of human rights policy and discourse (bajaj, 2017, p. 161). r. lakshminarayanan & d. thomas 7 some researchers focus on students’ knowledge of human rights (selvam, 2018) and reiterate that governmental efforts have not yielded adequate results, thus validating the need to build strong, inclusive systems (kohama, 2012) through interdisciplinary education (alam & halder, 2018; kaushik, kaushik & kaushik, 2006; sharma, 2002). nadkarni and sinha (2016) have studied curriculum design, research and field practice in social work departments and advocate additional human rights perspectives. while hre has largely been the monopoly of social work and social science programmes, some academics question the very future of social science (benjamin, 2009) and social work courses (nair, 2014, p. 253), since their sustainability is impeded by lack of adequate career opportunities, funding, and quality research in india. kumar (2019) has undertaken a comprehensive study on the status of hre in higher educational institutions in india and recommended the need for increased financing, revision of curricula, and updated training programmes. while most researchers emphasise the need for hre to redress abuses and there have been some studies on hre in schools, the detailed study of human rights courses in colleges and universities is limited, and there is a need for wider empirical research that will assist the strategic planning and implementation of hre, especially in some states. indian hre has been developed in tandem with the socio-political process of nation-building. in 1985, the ugc-appointed sikri commission (2007) released a blueprint for teaching human rights in colleges, universities, and adult educational centres. in the 1990s the indian institute of human rights was launched to disseminate awareness, training, and research in human rights and a national curriculum framework was recommended by nhrc to sensitise individuals involved in ngos, universities, and law enforcement sectors, through workshops (national human rights commission, 2008). in 1997, the ugc constituted the simhadri committee to develop a conceptual framework for hre in universities. this prompted many universities to incorporate hre. jawaharlal nehru university (n.d) started a centre for human rights teaching and research with elective courses at the pg level, jamia milia islamia (n.d) started an ma in human rights and duties, benaras hindu university (n.d) incorporated human rights in ba and ma law programmes, and indira gandhi national open university (n.d) established certificate courses in human rights. the ugc x plan guidelines (2002-2007) introduced two courses: human rights and duties education, and promotion of ethics and values. the ugc xi plan extended this into three courses: human rights and duties; human rights and values; and human rights and human development (university grants commission, 2002; 2007). ugc guidelines also identified a number of courses (at foundation, certificate, diploma, ug, and pg levels), workshops and publications for financial support. (university grants commission, 2011, pp. 260-262) although universities initiated many such courses, possibly due to ugc funding, there were human rights education review 8 wide disparities in their ideological and structural approaches (bajaj, 2017, pp. 162-164), particularly in their visions of critical pedagogy and the degree to which they emphasised tolerance, mutual respect, problem-solving, and critical thinking skills (cargas & mitoma, 2019). reviewing the syllabi, the nhrc observed that existing courses provided limited job prospects, lacked research elements, and were ‘law-centric rather than society-oriented’, with limited linkages with ground realities. it called for the inclusion of human rights courses across various disciplines (table 1) and provided a detailed curriculum (national human rights commission, 2007). table 1 nhrc and ugc recommendations for hre in universities. source: adapted from recommendations of national human rights commission (2007, 27-75) and ugc guidelines (university grants commission, 2002; 2017). programme suggestions content suggestions ug foundation course: human rights 7 units: values, norms, implementation, field work/project certificate/diploma: human rights international and national issues pg diploma: human rights human rights and duties, national and international perspectives, field work ba: human rights international dimensions, theoretical aspects, norms and mechanisms, rights and duties, field work, dissertation ma: human rights historical/philosophical, international/regional perspectives, societal issues, duties-india, research methodology, field work, dissertation, viva voce optional: human rights: science & technology, international obligations, trade, refugee laws, self-determination, women, children, aged, disabled, socially & economically disadvantaged, working class, minorities, criminal justice system, environment, social movements r. lakshminarayanan & d. thomas 9 table 1 evidences that nhrc suggested a foundational course in human rights and values, across all disciplines. certificate and diploma courses were recommended for lawyers, police, doctors, and teachers who could influence human rights practice. recommendations were also made to include theoretical and practical components in degree courses. in 2018, the ugc also prepared a learning outcomes curriculum framework (locf) for human rights (university grants commission, 2019, which advocated flexibility in learning and teaching pedagogies to enable students to apply theory and practice, through research and professional collaboration. it recommended a pg course in human rights, with an emphasis on historical and philosophical perspectives, research-based human rights advocacy, critical analysis, and digital literacy. thus, there has been a growing momentum to develop a long-term strategy for hre. findings higher education in tamil nadu a the tn department of higher education aims to transform young people by fostering access, equity, and global competencies through institutions of ‘innovation, excellence and development’ (government of tamil nadu, n.d.) (table 2 and table 3). table 2 statistics of higher education institutions. data correlated from all india survey on higher education 2019-2020 (ministry of education, 2020). category all india in tamil nadu number of universities 1043 59 number of colleges (private and government) 42343 2610 number of standalone institutions 11779 914 gross enrolment ratio (18-23 years) 27.1% males: 26.9% females 27.3% 51.4% males: 51.8% females: 51% table 2 reflects the existence of many higher educational institutions in tn and indicates the higher gross enrolment ratio and gender parity of enrolled students, compared to the national level. human rights education review 10 table 3 colleges per population and student enrolment (2016-2020). data correlated from all india survey on higher education 2019-2020 (ministry of education, 2020). year total colleges: tn total colleges: india colleges per 100,000 population: tn colleges per 100,000: india average enrolment per college: tn average enrolment per college: india 20162017 2368 40026 33 28 922 659 20172018 2472 39050 35 28 919 698 20182019 2466 39931 35 28 914 693 20192020 2610 42343 38 30 872 680 table 3 compares the number of colleges per head and average enrolment per college in tn against the national level. between 2016 and 2020 tn had a considerably higher number of colleges per population of 100,000 as well as higher average enrolment per college than the national average. this validated the greater impetus given to higher education in tn. the tn department of higher education is bifurcated: the directorate of collegiate education (n.d) aims to develop high-quality ethical professionals, while the directorate of technical education (n.d) seeks to produce ‘competent, dynamic and entrepreneurial technical manpower’. in 1992, the tamil nadu state council for higher education (n.d) (tansche) was established to coordinate between the ugc and state universities. apart from institutions for engineering, technology, teacher education and medical sciences, there are at present 784 arts and science colleges in tn, including 131 government and constituent colleges, 139 government-aided colleges and 514 self-financing ones (directorate of collegiate education, n.d), where hre has been partially initiated. development of hre in tamil nadu in reaction to grave violations and abuses recorded by ngos in tamil nadu, the human rights institute (chennai) was formed in 1993. its purpose was to link different groups: human rights academics, activists, government administrators, and citizens (human rights advocacy and research foundation, n.d). in 1995, people’s watch, (n.d), (madurai) was established; this organisation has engaged in direct action, legal support, and training and education against abuse and discrimination. in the 1990s, institutions like stella maris college (smc) and loyola college (chennai), holy r. lakshminarayanan & d. thomas 11 cross convent (trichy) and government arts college (salem) introduced human rights at the ug level. human rights was included in the ma international studies programme at smc and as an introductory course in the ba history programme at women’s christian college (wcc). subsequently, the social work departments at loyola college and smc introduced human rights in their ma programmes. ethiraj college was among the first institutions to initiate an ma in human rights and duties education (table 4). table 4 colleges with human rights-specific programmes in tn in 2020-2021. adapted from syllabi collected from colleges in the case study. college government arts college ethiraj college for women pachaiyappa’s college ug degree na na na pg degree ma human rights historical development, indian constitution, criminal justice administration, women’s rights, media, cyber issues, biomedical ethics, advocacy, grievances, group rights, environment project: dissertation and viva voce ma human rights historical perspectives, constitution, legislation-india, group rights, criminal justice grievances, 4th estate, women’s rights, research methodology, gender, ngos, trends, biomedical ethics, peace & security, environment, cyber issues, international obligations, civil society, project, field work ma human rights and duties education historical development, un and human rights, international bodies, rights of minorities, workers, children and consumers, project, field work human rights education review 12 table 5 universities with human rights-specific programmes in tn in 2020-2021. adapted from syllabi collected from universities in the case study. university annamalai univerity (distance learning) tamil nadu open university, (tnou) (distance learning) university of madras, (distance learning) ug degree ba human rights theories, societal issues-india, judiciary, media, culture, religion, protection, emerging trends ba human rights theories, social movements, indian constitution, global perspectives, environment, activism, ngos, judiciary, media, trade, police, criminal justice na pg degree ma human rights theories, global/regional, culture, religion research methodology, societal trends, international relations, judiciary, media, peace, nonviolence ma human rights theories, constitutionindia, global perspectives, education, research methodology, societal problems, globalization, themes & issues, environment. specialization: science, technology, marginalized, working class or project work ma human rights & duties meaning, development, theories, human rights in indian literature, statutory bodies, redressing violations, business, indian constitution, labour rights, cyber, environment media, research methodology, contemporary issues table 5 indicates that two universities (annamalai university and tn open university) offer a ba degree in human rights through distance learning and six institutions have introduced mas in human rights. analysis of the course contents indicates that ug-level courses contain no practical aspects. in three pg programmes (government arts college-salem, ethiraj college-chennai and pachaiyappas college-chennai) the project and field work components are mandatory, whereas they remain optional in tnou, and unspecified in annamalai and madras universities, probably as these are distance learning programmes (table 4). a few institutions also offer human rights as elective or core courses, in various degree programmes (table 6). r. lakshminarayanan & d. thomas 13 table 6 elective and core human rights courses in tn. adapted from syllabi collected from universities and colleges in the case study. institution major programme core/elective syllabus content ln government arts college, ponneri ma history core studies in human rights introduction, documents, india, minority rights government arts college, salem ma economics elective studies in human rights historical evolution, civil/political/economic rights, minorities, violation government arts college, rasipuram ma history, political science elective human rights definition, theories, international organizations, national/state commissions, minorities, challenges madurai kamaraj university ma political science core human rights definition, theories, un documents, rights of women, children, consumers, minorities ma criminal justice and victimology core human rights police, judiciary, correctional administration, victims, field visit am jain college ba tourism & travel management elective human rights and tourism evolution , un documents, tourism, environment ma tourism & travel management elective human rights and tourism evolution, un documents, tourism, environment ba defense & strategic studies core human rights meaning, rights and abuses, international norms, un, nhrc ba criminology & police administration core human rights and criminal justice administration definition, agencies, violations, custodial violence university of madras ma women’s studies, sociology core human rights and criminal justice administration human rights education review 14 institution major programme core/elective syllabus content msc. criminology & criminal justice definition, agencies, violations, custodial violence ma political science elective human rights in india theories, constitution, udhr, nhrc, shrc, issues university of madras (distance/regular) ma public administration, public policy, developmental administration core human rights administration theories, constitution, administration, issues, development university of madras (distance) ba criminology and police administration elective human rights and criminal justice administration definitions, legal instruments, protection, enforcement ba historical studies elective introduction to human rights definition, un docs, international organization, constitution ba political science core human rights in india origin, theories, constitution, administration, issues ba public administration core human rights administration meaning, theories, categories, legal mechanisms, international covenants bharti women’s college ma historical studies elective human rights definition, international documents, india, issues ethiraj college for women ma tourism & travel management core tourism and human rights definitions, international covenants, fundamental rights, tourism, environment madras christian college ma history core studies in human rights meaning, issues, india, women, child rights, ngos ma public administration elective human rights administration international legal framework, udhr, nhrc and shrc, rights – women/children/refugees/prisoners, ngos, media and judiciary r. lakshminarayanan & d. thomas 15 institution major programme core/elective syllabus content ma political science core human rights concepts, covenants, challenges, responses, case studies table 6 indicates that human rights are offered as elective or core courses in history, political science, and public administration. departments of women’s studies, criminology, police administration, defence and strategic studies, and travel and tourism also offer human rights courses, although their content is more attuned to their respective majors. while human rights is offered in ma programmes as either core or electives, only a few ba programmes offer it. the rationale for this is perhaps that human rights requires a level of critical thinking more suited to the pg level. challenges for hre in tamil nadu hre in tamil nadu is still at its nascent stage and faces immense challenges, as is evident from interviews with faculty members teaching these courses. non-majors and electives: although some institutions incorporated human rights courses in history, sociology, and international studies programmes, these have remained non-major electives and very few were mandated as core curriculum (e. p., personal communication, january 15, 2021). therefore, not all students will have been exposed to even basic human rights concepts when they graduate. syllabus restructure: the curriculum restructure mandated every three years by the government has pressurised institutions to remove existing human rights courses, as they are not ‘major core’ ones and therefore ‘expendable’ (r. v., personal communication, january 22, 2021; b. p., personal communication, january 22, 2021; k. v., personal communication, january 23, 2021). at a. m. jain college, the human rights course offered by the history department was removed during syllabus revision (s. a., personal communication, february 3, 2021). syllabus restructuring at loyola college, mcc and bharati women’s college resulted in a shelving of human rights to accommodate core history courses at the ug level. there was pressure on government colleges to include courses listed under tansche, which mandates that 75% of courses should be from their core disciplines and that only 25% can be allied courses such as human rights (b. p., personal communication, january 22, 2021; s. s., personal communication, february 3, 2021; k. b., personal communication, january 21, 2021). these shifts in the government’s curricular priorities adversely impacted private colleges; despite their good intentions, they were forced to either reduce human rights courses or completely abolish and replace them with ‘core relevant’ courses. human rights education review 16 funding and supervision: ugc initially provided some financial funding for hre. the government arts college (salem) received governmental funding for its ma in human rights and duties education and this study, launched in 2018, is reportedly popular among students (s. k., personal communication, january 23, 2021). the holy cross college initiated an ma in human rights, collaborating with henri tiphange, a leading human rights advocate. ethiraj college and holy cross college received initial ugc funding for five years, after which they became self-financing. this resulted in higher fees and a significant drop in student intake. in ethiraj college, since 2007, the average annual student intake for the human rights programme has been only 15-16. (r.m., personal communication, january 15, 2021), while in holy cross there has been very low to zero student enrolment in some years (m. v., personal communication, january 16, 2021; k.d., personal communication, february 2, 2021). thus, although most institutions introduced new courses when initial funding was allotted, these courses became unsustainable when funding ended. while the ugc had mandated six nodal centres of excellence to oversee hre, to date only two exist and there are none in tn. the absence of adequate supervision and quality control, and the lack of funding, impede effective hre. a dearth of trained professionals: the ugc allotted some funding for seminars, symposiums, workshops for curriculum development, training, and interdisciplinary programmes on human rights. while few institutions organise such events, attendance is not mandatory and therefore limited. it is seldom that specialised grassroot-level experts or researchers are at these workshops, and so, apart from providing theoretical input, their impact is negligible. (r. m., personal communication, november 20, 2021). the faculty teaching human rights are drawn from history, sociology, political science or public administration departments, mainly because these departments offer the courses. these faculty members lack practical field experience and related skill competencies, which limits a broader understanding of the human rights gamut. internship, field work and case studies: while a practical component is needed to ensure grassroot-level awareness, the mandatory ngo internships and field visits to police stations and detention centres were considered ‘too dangerous and unsuitable’ for girls by stakeholders at holy cross college, which resulted in negligible enrolment for their human rights ma (m.v., personal communication, january 15, 2021). courses offered by the social work department include an experiential dimension through collaboration with ngos that provides internships, and this exposure enables students to interact with marginalized communities and victims of abuse (l. m., personal communication, january 10, 2021, a. n., personal communication, january 12, 2021). ngos such as peoples watch and community health education society (chennai) provide internships for ma human rights students at ethiraj college. ngos that provide internships for students in the social work department r. lakshminarayanan & d. thomas 17 include the information and resource centre for the deprived urban communities, people’s union for civil liberties, the human rights and advocacy foundation, thozhamai, the human rights foundation (chennai), and the society for community organisation trust (madurai). thus, human rights courses with a practical component have mainly been restricted to social work programmes. discussion the dearth of focussed implementation of hre across higher education in tn presents a paradox – although the state is a leading educational hub, very few institutions offer human rights courses. this suggests that hre is not prioritised in tn, despite indications of unjust social practices and grave inequalities. it is this dichotomy that prompted this research on the incorporation of hre in colleges and universities in tn, and we have sought to address the following research questions; 1. what is the nature of the human rights courses and the focus of their syllabus content? 2. are the human rights courses offered in major colleges and universities in tn compliant with the recommendations of the nhrc and the ugc? 3. what are the challenges to the introduction and effective implementation of the recommended human rights curricula, courses and pedagogies in tn? if we address research question 1, it is observed that while tn has established many higher educational institutions, hre has a negligible presence in most campuses. in some colleges, courses were initiated as per ugc requirement; however, they have since been removed. while human rights-specific courses at the ug level are minimal, a few institutions have introduced them at the pg level. in most institutions, human rights is taught as an elective or core paper in the social science degree programmes. the syllabi focus of such courses is limited to basic global and national perspectives concerning historical evolution, constitutional rights, duties, and legislative safeguards. when we consider research question 2, we see that although the nhrc recommended the incorporation of human rights at various levels and the ugc advocated a learning-outcome based approach, our study attests that very few universities in tn offer human rights-specific courses and most of these are not adequately structured, indicating a discrepancy with prescribed guidelines. furthermore, human rights concepts are neither uniformly and holistically addressed nor adequately represented. the syllabi content reveals a lack of qualitative depth in terms of applicability and adaptability to contemporary contexts, as very few courses have research components, internships, fieldwork, or training. the nhrc guidelines mandate human rights as part of foundational value education (ve) programmes human rights education review 18 across disciplines. however, this research reveals that the only institutions incorporating human rights into their ve programmes were bharatiyar university, with a unit on values and human rights, bharatidasan university, with a unit on human rights and organizations, am jain college, with a unit on human rights, and smc, with a unit on rights-issues and challenges. further, due to increasing demands to complete the core curriculum for mathematics and sciences, the hours allotted for ve are often converted to tutorial hours, which undermines the relevance of studying human rights. when it comes to research question 3, there are innumerable challenges that impede the effective integration of human rights curricula, courses and pedagogies in tn. limited or lapsed funding after initial grants has often resulted in increased fees and, subsequently, lower enrolment. the mandatory syllabus restructuring has forced institutions to introduce newer courses, thus devaluing the importance of hre. while a few institutions introduced human rights as a major degree programme, in most it was relegated to a non-major elective. the practical component was mostly non-existent and in some cases where internships to juvenile centres and prisons were mandated, student enrolment was negligible due to security concerns. human rights are taught as core requirements in a few social science programmes at the pg level, while mostly relegated to electives at the ug level. the ugc mandate to incorporate human rights as ve has often been ignored. thus, hre is largely restricted to social sciences and is not part of foundational requirements across all programmes, as envisaged by the policy makers. unless more universities introduce specialised courses in human rights that foster greater awareness within socio-economic, political, constitutional and environmental contexts, effective social transformation cannot take place. a few institutions celebrate human rights day and have human rights centres on campus; lady doak college, madurai has formed a centre for rights-based activities and in smc the ‘unicef on campus’ and ‘girl up campaign’ promote human rights through creative and engaging activities. however, such efforts are only viewed as frivolous government mandates that detract from core courses. it is vital to expose students to hre at the ug level, as students in tn have a negligible awareness of human rights concepts or practice and, since most students do not opt for master’s level education, it is only a small percentage of them that has any knowledge of human rights. it is also necessary to balance hre content with employment prospects. professional courses like engineering and medicine are perceived as high value employment-generating courses, and there is less focus on the social sciences in general and human rights in particular (sharma & sharma, 2015). therefore, students need orientation—effective academic and career r. lakshminarayanan & d. thomas 19 counselling—to encourage them to register for human rights courses. conclusion the indian constitution provides fundamental rights for all, yet a plethora of human rights abuses stem from inherent socio-economic inequality and prejudice. sustaining a culture of human rights requires systemic hre, so that everyone becomes conscious not only of their own rights but also their duty and responsibility to uphold the human rights of others. within the indian ethos, such transformation is only possible if every human being is sensitized to injustice. it is necessary to provide ‘structures of accountability’ (sharma, 2002) to effectively integrate and implement hre, by linking stated objectives and guidelines to what is actually taught. this paper affirms that although the ugc and the nhrc have developed detailed guidelines, tn has failed to effectuate meaningful and transformational hre. a majority of students in tn is poorly oriented about the dimensions of human rights, due to gaps in the effective translation of government policies into actionable course content. a dearth of trained professionals, lack of government funding, limited collaboration between academic institutions and ngos, periodical syllabi restructuring, and a lack of career opportunities impede the sustainability of the human rights courses. these findings demonstrate the need for inclusion of human rights courses that meet qualitative content and assessment standards, across institutions. further, diversified content needs to be explored, in terms of grassroot functionality, career prospects, practical training through field work, incorporation of case studies and project work in specific human rights areas. it is imperative to strategize how and where hre can be incorporated and devise a mechanism to oversee its actual implementation. the researchers note the lacuna in academic research on the impact and challenges of hre. while this paper attempted to focus on the syllabi of human rights courses in arts and science institutions in tn, courses in law colleges, engineering, medical and teachers training colleges were not studied. in addition, prescribed textbooks and the content of teacher training programmes in hre lie beyond the scope of this paper. these related areas could be investigated in the interest of better strategising and planning for hre. human rights should be incorporated not only in social sciences but integrated in foundational interdisciplinary courses across higher education. only then can attitudes be transformed through a broader understanding of what human rights means and how it impacts. human rights education review 20 references alam, k., & halder, u. k. 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the case of pakistan issn 2535-5406 vol 5, no 2 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4506 date received: 28-06-2021 date accepted: 10-03-2022 peer reviewed article © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles towards a rights-based multi-religious curriculum? the case of pakistan farid panjwani aga khan university, pakistan, farid.panjwani@aku.edu camilla hadi chaudhary university of cambridge, uk, chc73@cam.ac.uk abstract islamic education is a central pivot of pakistan’s educational system; it is taught as a separate subject and purposefully included in many other subjects. the state uses islam to manage public morality and national identity and there is a ‘functionalisation’ (starrett, 1998) of religious education. a culturally lived tradition is transformed into a pedagogical practice based on narrow interpretations of sacred texts and religious doctrine. aligning religious and national identity necessarily others those who fall outside of this nexus. the current government prioritises curricular reform predicated on a political commitment to create a unified and inclusive education system. the proposed reforms include curricula for five other religions, potentially addressing some human rights demands for educational equality for religious minorities. unpacking the historical roots of education’s islamization and the sociopolitical motivations behind the current reforms, we conduct a content analysis of the draft curricula and interview stakeholders to situate the implications of these reforms for pakistan. keywords rights-based curriculum, identity, citizenship, religious minorities, religious education, islamic education, south asia http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4506 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:farid.panjwani@aku.edu mailto:chc73@cam.ac.uk f. panjwani & c. h. chaudhary 57 introduction pakistan is about to embark on an experiment. though there is many a slip twixt cup and lip, if things go as proclaimed by the government, there soon will be a new school subject – ‘religious education’ (re). here, students from minority religions (in demographic terms) will, for the first time, study their own traditions, rather than face a choice between studying islam (a subject called islamiat) and ethics (ikhlaqiat). the government has drafted religious curricula for students from five minority religions and expressed its commitment to promulgating this as part of the new single national curriculum (snc) (national curriculum council, 2020). though religious representation within education remains skewed towards islam in muslim-majority pakistan, this initiative has the potential to deliver on students’ constitutional right to study their own religions and new ground can be broken in symbolically recognising religious pluralism and equal citizenship for religious minorities. in this paper, we explore to what extent the proposed multi-religious curricula are a step towards a rightsbased education, viewing this development through the lens of pakistan’s constitutional obligations to its religious minorities and to international human rights conventions. the united nations (un) conceptualises a rights-based education in the following framework: 1. the right of access to education education throughout all stages of childhood and beyond availability and accessibility of education equality of opportunity 2. the right to quality education a broad, relevant and inclusive curriculum rights-based learning and assessment child-friendly, safe and healthy environments 3. the right to respect in the learning environment respect for identity respect for participation respect for integrity. (unicef & unesco, 2007, p. 28) applying the un framework presented above, we identify three areas of human rights-based concerns within pakistan’s education system. firstly, the commitment to the right of access to education, though embodied in the constitution, is severely undermined as millions of children do not go to school (aser, 2019). pakistan has the second-highest number of out-ofschool children in the world 22.7 million (as cited in hunter, 2020). many factors have contributed to this situation: a lack of schooling, the economic pull of child labour, a continued social acceptance of child marriages for girls, etc. (pirzado, 2019). human rights education review volume 5(2) 58 secondly, the education delivered to the majority of pakistan’s children under the umbrella of the national curriculum remains below expected standards, and this violates their right to an education that empowers them to be critical thinkers and socially productive agents (aslam et al., 2012). our paper focuses on the third violation of respect for identity and participation. in pakistan, this is imposed specifically on children of religious minorities. to date, the country’s national education system makes studying islam mandatory for muslims but does not have provision for children from other religions to learn their own tradition. furthermore, islam is taught both as a separate school subject and purposefully included in several other compulsory school subjects. this means that not only do students from minority religions not get to learn about their own religion, but they are also forced to learn about islam this violates article 22(1) of the constitution which states that: no person attending any educational institution shall be required to receive religious instruction, or take part in any religious ceremony, or attend religious worship, if such instruction, ceremony or worship relates to a religion other than his own. (constitution of the islamic republic of pakistan, 1973/2012) this also violates article 26-3 of the udhr, that ensures freedom of choice within education, and article 13-3 of icescr, that ensures religious and moral education is provided in conformity with parental (and student) convictions (un, 1976; un, 1948). while explicitly violating article 2 of the convention on the rights of the child (crc) in discriminating against children of religious minorities, it also violates article 14-1 of the same document by limiting pedagogical exposure to the critical thinking that is essential to cultivating freedom of thought (un, 1989). pakistan has a complicated engagement with human rights within education. article 25-a of the constitution guarantees free and compulsory education for children aged 5 to 16, while article 22-1 protects the right of religious communities to study their own religions and not be forced to study religions other than their own (constitution of the islamic republic of pakistan, 1973/2012; paul, 2014). furthermore, pakistan has signed and ratified a variety of international human rights-related treaties such as the universal declaration of human rights (udhr), the convention on the rights of the child (crc) and the international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights (icescr). the list of ratified treaties is tabulated below: f. panjwani & c. h. chaudhary 59 table 1 pakistan's ratification of key human rights instruments. source: the office of the high commissioner for human rights, united nations. treaty date ratified convention against torture and other cruel inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment june 23, 2010 optional protocol of the convention against torture international covenant on civil and political rights june 23, 2010 second optional protocol to the international covenant on civil and political rights aiming to the abolition of the death penalty convention for the protection of all persons from enforced disappearance interstate communication procedure under the international convention for the protection of all persons from enforced disappearance convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women march 12, 1996 international convention on the elimination of all forms of racial discrimination september 21, 1966 international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights april 17, 2008 international convention on the protection of rights of all migrant workers and members of their families convention on the rights of the child november 12, 1990 optional protocol of the convention on the rights of the child on the involvement of children in armed conflict november 17, 2016 optional protocol of the convention on the rights of the child on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography july 5, 2011 convention on the rights of persons with disability july 5, 2011 discussions with bureaucrats and legal experts also indicate that governmental frameworks for the implementation and evaluation of these covenants also exist. human rights education review volume 5(2) 60 however, while recent legal developments that explicitly protect the rights of the child have been incorporated—such as the law banning corporal punishment (baloch, 2021)—it is widely acknowledged that as far as practice is concerned, the rights of the child are not universally viewed or protected through a human rights lens. it is important to note that while international conventions and declarations are designed to be universally applicable, their values and objectives are underwritten by western epistemological and ontological reasoning. there is thus often a tension when global conceptions and commitments are pitched against local socio-cultural traditions and practices, and this is prevalent in other non-western societies (moinipour, 2021). underage marriage is an example of a practice that is illegal but still commonly accepted as a cultural norm (khan, 2021). another such contested space is the role of religion in education. methodology while the draft multi-religious curricula are a symbolic and preliminary step towards recognising the educational rights of pakistan’s religious minority students, the research question that guided our research is: to what extent do the proposed multi-religious curricula present a pluralistic functionalisation of religion in pakistan? our main sources of data were the publicly available religious education curricula on the website of the federal ministry of education (national curriculum council, 2020). using content analysis as the main method of data analysis, we analysed the curricula texts from the perspective of their symbolic and operational role in acknowledging and upholding religious minority rights. the curriculum for each religious tradition was analysed to see how these traditions are portrayed. the content of the texts was coded for religious beliefs and practices, the representation of internal diversity within religion and equity across religions, and the nature of value systems. through this lens we unpacked the curricular content and objectives of the draft curricula with a view to understanding how, if at all, they represent equity in terms of recognising the identity and participation of minority religion children. the religious education curricula were also compared to the islamiat curriculum, in order to explore similarities and differences in structure and style. since a curriculum document has both a policy and planning context as well as an implementation phase, we consider both. to understand the policy and planning context we interviewed two ministry officials involved in the drafting of the curricula as well as two civil society activists who have been campaigning for religious inclusion in education. stakeholder interviews and contextual knowledge of both authors involved in policy advocacy provided a critical discursive lens in analysing the data (taylor, 2006). for example, the interviewees f. panjwani & c. h. chaudhary 61 provided details of the negotiations between the ministry and religious leaders of various traditions that had led to acceptable curricula frameworks. however, the ultimate provision of rights does not come by developing curricula but by their operationalisation in schools. we foresee many challenges here and engage with them to assess their proclaimed transformative potential. religion in schools in pakistan across the world there are various models of religious education. arguably, the most important underlying distinction is between systems that provide religious instruction and those that provide education about religion(s) confessional and non-confessional approaches (franken & gent, 2021; willaime, 2007). the former aims at passing on or inculcating particular religious teachings, be it in an exclusionary or an inclusive way. this approach is essentially theological. the ontological status of religious teaching assumed here dictates separate teaching of religion to students from different religious traditions. an example of this approach is church school education in england, where catholic and church of england schools give religious instruction and hence prefer to have students from their own denominations. the other approach, the non-confessional one which involves teaching about religions, aims to help students learn about religions and their histories, teachings and ethics without wanting students to accept their truth. this assumes a dialectical approach that is grounded in viewing knowledge about religion as socially constructed and personalised to provide meaning to its recipients (grimmitt, 1973 as discussed in engebretson, 2009). a sociological and historical, rather than a theological, approach means that children from different religious traditions can be taught together. community schools in england, where all children are taught together about several religions, are a good example of this approach. in pakistan, religious education is in fact religious instruction. this requires, from a human rights perspective, the state to provide separate religious instruction to children from different backgrounds. but this is not the case. until now, islam has been the only religion taught in schools. students from other religions are expected to either join in the islamiat classes, which the majority do, or take a course on ethics. not only are students from other religious traditions not provided with their own religious instruction; they are also often made to learn about islam, as its teachings are embedded in other compulsory subjects. there is no single classification system that can capture the complexity of pakistan’s education system. with over 22.5 million children out of school, there is firstly a divide between those who have access to school, any school, and those who do not. of those going to school, a majority does not, by any standard, receive a quality education (aser, 2019; jerrard, 2016). if we think in terms of quality, one useful demarcation is between schools using pakistani human rights education review volume 5(2) 62 curricula of one type or another and those using international curricula. most schools, including public schools, madrassas and low-cost private schools, use pakistani curricula. a small percentage of children goes to expensive private schools that use foreign curricula, most commonly the cambridge assessment board, and there is a smattering of ib and us curricula schools (academy of educational planning and management, 2021). another way to classify schools is to distinguish between those that are devoted primarily to religious formation, the madrassa systems, and the rest, which have religion as part of their education but also take a lay approach to various degrees. more recently, a new single national curriculum (snc) has been introduced (about which more later) and schools can also be grouped as those adopting or not adopting the snc. regardless of the classification, a few comments can be made that cut across the system. the bifurcated and uneven nature of schooling has contributed to and sustained socio-economic and linguistic hierarchies. firstly, fluency in english functions as a repository of social and cultural capital, a leftover from the colonial education system that educated the bureaucrats who administered the post-partition subcontinent. these bureaucrats, beneficiaries of this educational system, were committed to maintaining it (rahman, 2005). secondly, religion plays an important part in all school systems, from being the underlying educational framework to being a compulsory subject that overflows into other subjects. finally, the system carries systemic bias against students from minority religions as far as religious education is concerned, as noted above. state and religious education in pakistan such educational design as noted above is an outcome of decades of the state ‘putting islam at work’ to build a national identity that is closely aligned with being muslim, both in order to justify the creation of pakistan and to manage the country’s ethnic, linguistic and socioeconomic diversity. starrett (1998) has called such use of islam ‘functionalisation’. in his landmark work on the relationship between islam and social change in the context of egypt, starrett observed that the egyptian state sought to use religion, in this case islam, to achieve its goals of ‘progress’ in material and moral terms. this was done by making islam a subject of academic study in schools through textbooks and examination and by controlling the media and how islamic values were circulated through it. the state’s aim was also helped by the work of people such as mawdudi (d. 1979) in south asia and sayyid qutb (d. 1966) in egypt who, in their writings, presented islam as a system that can help solve the problems of modern times by acting as the ideology of an islamic state. these various colonial and post-colonial developments resulted in an ‘objectification’ of islam: ‘the growing consciousness on the part of muslims that islam is a coherent system of practices and beliefs’ (starrett, 1998, pp. 8–9) rather than an unexamined collective and personally lived tradition. over time, this resulted f. panjwani & c. h. chaudhary 63 in movements such as the islamization of economics or education, or even the sciences, as a way forward for muslims. such ‘functionalisation’ of religious education (starrett, 1998) has been systematically implemented over pakistan’s history (chughtai, 2015; nayyar & salim, 2003). it was one thing to establish a new country in the name of islam, but another to create an ‘imagined community’ out of the rich diversity of ethnic and linguistic traditions within its geographical boundaries. the state chose to use islam to create such a national identity and to harness its potential for economic growth (hoodbhoy, 1998). the injection of religion into the foundational discourse of pakistan gave religious groups the opportunity to force a religionationalistic identity on the country. in the initial decades after independence, while there was some resistance to this trajectory and attempts to modernise various state institutions (for example the muslim family law ordinance of 1961), there remained an increasing thrust towards a more religious national identity, first through greater concessions to, and later through the co-option of religious groups. this trend was also visible in education, where the desire to see islamiat as a school subject was expressed by the first education minister of pakistan (fazlur rahman), who considered it to be an important subject within the edifice of a holistic education. during the country’s first period of military rule, under ayub khan (1958-69), islamiat was made compulsory at the elementary level. this was reinforced in the 1973 constitution, which also required the state to take steps to enable the muslims of pakistan to live a life in accordance with the teachings of islam. by 1980s both islamiat and pakistan studies were made compulsory throughout the education system. by 1980s both islamiat and pakistan studies were made compulsory throughout the education system. general zia ul haq imposed martial law in 1977 and became head of state in 1978, remaining so till his death in an airplane crash in 1988. during this time pakistan was a key us ally against the ussr’s invasion of afghanistan, which positioned the country in a key geopolitical role on the global stage. zia legitimised his government’s crossover from a military to a so-called civilian regime by using islam as a mantra. jurisprudence and education were the domains of choice for an islamisation policy that formalised exclusivist interpretations of islam as a central governing force (panjwani & khimani, 2017). it was at this time that the subject of ‘ethics’ was developed and offered as an alternative to islamiat for students from other religious traditions. grounded in broad value-based content, the subject was generally sidelined, and sometimes denigrated, by educators. the result was that many non-muslim students selected islamiat in the pursuit of better exam results (hussain et al., 2011; jacob & malik, 2020). a desire to foster a unifying national identity, closely aligned with a muslim identity, has thus played a pivotal and symbiotic role in the social, geopolitical, and educational development of human rights education review volume 5(2) 64 pakistan. over the country’s history, the priorities of the political, bureaucratic, and military arms of the state have merged in an effort to create an ‘ideology of pakistan’, one that is informed by internal political-social religiosity, geopolitical positioning and military concerns, and serves as a blueprint for national identity creation. the need to create and reinforce such an identity explicitly feeds into educational content. it is legitimised by the language of curriculum documents, and thus included in approved textbooks. the education system is thus used by the state to ‘functionalise’ islamic education (starrett, 1998) for the multi-layered purpose of identity formation. such functionalisation is visually presented below: figure 1 the ‘functionalisation’ of islamic education in pakistan educational reform has been highlighted by every government, with varying degrees of policy follow-up (siddiqui, 2016). significant curriculum changes were put in place between 2002 and 2006, as part of an agenda to improve the quality of education (chughtai, 2015; government of pakistan, 2006). the 2006 national curriculum was widely credited to be more inclusive and pluralistic in its language and learning objectives, with quantitatively less references to islamic doctrine. although the language of the curriculum documents and the ensuing education policy still foregrounded islamic ideology (aly, 2007) as essential to pakistani identity, documents and policy were informed by a more pluralistic and reformative philosophy that recognised the country’s demographic diversity (national education policy, 2009). critics argued that this policy was not reformative enough. they point to its uncritical acceptance of hegemonic global discourses that position pakistan as a radicalised state in binary terms without acknowledging complex underlying social causalities. as such the ensuing curriculum did not adequately address embedded social prejudices that can result in religious minorities in pakistan facing social segmentation and human rights abuses (lingard & ali, 2009). however, policymakers continue to view the policy and curriculum as reformative in outlook and use them as a foundation for subsequent curricular and policy revisions (n. lone & s. aziz, personal communication, may 8, 2021). ideology of pakistan merged national identity r eligious content in education political social religiosity eopolitical positioning military concerns f. panjwani & c. h. chaudhary 65 current reforms removing embedded inequalities within and by education is the proclaimed motivation for the reform measures of the current government, elected in 2018 (ministry of federal education and professional training, 2018). a key part of the reforms was a single national curriculum (snc), intended to replace all other national, international and religious curricula currently in place. nation-building is the prefaced aim of this exercise: it is a well-established fact that the educational curriculum plays a key role in nation building… development of the single national curriculum for pre1-5 is the fulfilment of the dream of ‘one nation, one curriculum’. (national curriculum council, 2020) the curriculum is ambitious in that it seeks to draw inspiration from a range of sources: religious guidance (the quran, for example); current educational trends such as climate change pedagogy and 21st century skills; international commitments such as the human rights and sustainable development goals as well as respect for societal goals and traditions. however, there is no explanation as to how demands from these various sources will be drawn upon and potential conflicts between them resolved. there is, for example, no reflection on the perennial issue of calibrating the need for a national identity and historical ethnic identities, no discourse responding to the fears of those who see snc as yet another attempt to bolster a singular identity. similarly, there is no reference to the ideological and material differences between various school systems and the ways in which these will be addressed through the curriculum. the government has created a broad stakeholder base of advisors and consultants to the national curriculum council (ncc) consisting of educators (both secular and religious, from elite and lower-cost private schools), members of civil society (including representatives of religious minority associations), and education bureaucrats (the express tribune, 2020). while the list of stakeholders received some criticism, as many members were like-minded public servants, having a broad-based ncc did help diffuse some concerns that had mired previous curriculum-making exercises (vazir, 2003). the initial drafts of the single national curriculum received stringent critiques from many in the educational fraternity (mahmood, 2020). these critiques can be divided broadly into two types: pedagogical critiques and rights-based critiques. the former highlighted the significant increase in learning materials in several subjects, especially in the islamiat curriculum. an aim of developing a single national curriculum was to incorporate the madrassa sector into the fold of mainstream education by including more secular subjects and learning material in their syllabi (currently only for years 1-5). such purposeful uniformity resulted in the continued pervasiveness of islamic teaching in all subjects, and a greater learning load in islamiat for human rights education review volume 5(2) 66 non-madrassa students (also for years 1-5) (rahman, 2020). this change generated a harsh public critique, polarising civil society and government policymakers. critics also pointed out that religious seminaries are likely to drag their feet; their general lack of participation in the first phase of implementation of the snc suggests that this is indeed the case. the rights-based criticism focused on a) children from religious minority groups not having their own religious education curricula and b) the continued inclusion of islamic religious content in subjects such as english, urdu and the social sciences that imposes such learning on religious minority students (hoodbhoy, 2020; razzaque, 2021). both elements of the rightsbased critique are seen by many as a violation of article 22-1 of the constitution of pakistan. in fact, it has been claimed that the education system has long been in violation of the constitution (paul, 2014). while no action has been taken yet to reduce the curricular load, or to move religious content out of other subjects, the ministry has agreed to the long-standing demand of minority religious groups to have their own curricula, thus mitigating a major source of human rights violation. this development will be the focus of the rest of this article. a new religious curriculum for religious minorities as noted above, students from religious minorities must choose between islamiat and ikhlaqiat. many advocates of equity in education, along with members of the minority religions, have been arguing for the need to rethink the relationship between education and religion, proposing that religious instruction should not be part of the education system. according to dr peter jacob (director of the centre for social justice), after decades of unsuccessfully struggling to achieve this aim, he and others advocated for educational parity for children of all religious traditions, a parity that would give them the opportunity to be taught their own religious traditions. as noted by a member of the national curriculum council, the body responsible for developing the snc, the council used to receive regular complaints about this lack of parity and appeals for redressing it. in 2006, a multi-religious curriculum was prepared but not implemented and ‘ethics’ remained the only choice for nonmuslims. interestingly, as the ethics curriculum included lessons about the history of religion and information about various religions, it was also in breach of article 22(1) of the constitution. the subject of ‘ethics’ was unpopular with students and parents, and this was confirmed by a study in 2019 by the centre for social justice. the findings showed that: i) only 0.07% students opted for ethics at grade 5 level, while 0.06% students at grade 8 studied ethics; ii) out of a total of 15,917 matriculation students belonging to religious minority groups, 80% studied islamiat and only 20% studied ethics; iii) out of 7,405 non-muslim students at intermediate f. panjwani & c. h. chaudhary 67 level, 90% studied islamiat and only 1.7% studied ethics, while 8.8% studied civics (jacob & malik, 2020). evidence that ethics as an alternative subject was not working created further pressure to develop dedicated curricula for various religions. the ministry finally agreed to these demands in 2020 and commissioned work on curricula for five religious traditions – christianity, hinduism, baha’i, kalasha and sikhism. the introduction section of ‘religious education’ in the snc tells us that the ‘purpose of developing a ‘religious education’ curriculum for the students belonging to minorities is to provide them an equal opportunity of learning about their own religions in line with the provisions of the constitution of pakistan’ (national curriculum council, 2020). there is an inherent tension when it comes to the idea of minority religions in a modern nation state. this tension alludes to the debates about the identity of pakistan – should it be an islamic state (which then makes all other religions minority ones) or a non-denominational one which treats all religions equally and where ‘religious minority’ is not a legal concept, only a sociological one? in the latter case, the law does not define minorities, as it does now. how were the five religions chosen and what work was done on creating their curricula? here we will draw extensively upon interviews with ministry personnel and representatives of the minority religions. the selection of religions and the development of curricula was an exercise in making possible what once seemed impossible. consensus building, compromise, and the promise to revisit the curricula periodically were the main policy tools that were used to bring people together and engage in the task of curriculum development. the five religions were chosen on the basis of political convenience and demography. according to the 2017 census, only 3.72% of the population belongs to minority religions (pakistan bureau of statistics, 2017). christianity was an obvious choice because of the community size (1.59%), educational organisation within the community and its critical role in advocating for the religious education curriculum. demography played a key role in the choice of hinduism (1.6%) as well, besides the fact that its absence would have been the most glaring omission when it comes to pakistan-india relations. kalasha was chosen because of its culturally distinct religious identity as well as its international fame. the baha’is were willing partners. it was not clear why the parsi (zoroastrians) and buddhist traditions were not chosen; members of the curriculum council indicated an ongoing process, and more religions will be added in the future. finally, the fact that ahmadiya was not included has much to do with sensitivities involved. since ahmadis self-identify as muslims, any curricula designed for them would undermine the very arguments that have led to their constitutional expulsion. the minority religions’ curricula were developed in their own unique ways. for example, in the case of the baha’i, their national body (national spiritual assembly of baha’is of pakistan) developed the curriculum in consultation with the community’s international headquarters. human rights education review volume 5(2) 68 in the case of christianity, because of the internal diversity of the community a long process of negotiation and compromise between four leading denominations—catholics, the church of pakistan, the salvation army, presbyterians—helped develop the curriculum. this may not have fully satisfied any one group but none was left too unhappy. in addition to managing internal diversity, yet another factor that informed curriculum development was islamic sensitivity to certain ideas, such as the trinity. regardless of process, all five curricula follow a uniform structure consisting of the following sections: introduction to beliefs and prayers, life of the religious leader(s), ethical values, sources of guidance/heroes and festivals. it should be noted that this structure broadly follows that of the islamiat curriculum already in place. one of the curriculum writers indicated this was done to ensure greater acceptability for the re curriculum. the emphasis on shared and common elements, both within and across religions, is evident. all the interviewees told us that this was by design. this is also articulated in the introduction to the re curriculum where it says: ‘the students will realise that their own religion like all other religions teaches similar values, and they have all reasons to have positive feelings for other faiths.’ there are thus hardly any references to differences within each of these religions. for example, internal diversity within the branches of islam and christianity are largely ignored. this limits the pedagogical and social resonance of the curricula. though the emphasis on shared aspects of religions is desirable, it is equally important to expose students to intraand inter-religious diversity: the main source of religious intolerance is the inability to accept and deal with difference – ikhtilaaf. such intolerance is more often shown towards the internal religious other than to the external other, who can simply be dismissed as misguided. the challenge of living together is inherently a challenge of living with differences (salmon & vivekanandan, 2014; sinclair, 2013). when asked, the members of the ncc claimed that there is an unprecedented stress on tolerance and respect for the other in the snc. throughout we give a message of tolerance through quranic verses and historical anecdotes. such messages are there in islamiat, in urdu, in social studies textbooks. for example, along with mosques, we also discuss other places of worship. we show diversity in festivals, inclusive representation in names used in the snc. in fact, we want to move to the appreciation of diversity – pluralism in higher levels. (n. lone & s. aziz, personal communication, may 8, 2021) under each section in the religious education curriculum there is a list of relevant elements from a religious tradition, but without any commentary about the rationale for their inclusion. for example, the lists of ethical values are repetitive and almost always consist of general moral values. this is in line with the desire to bring out shared features of religions. further, the values stressed seem to mostly emphasise accepting and bearing the circumstances one f. panjwani & c. h. chaudhary 69 faces in life – for example, obedience is listed three times, forgiveness (4), patience (5), acceptance (3), sacrifice (1), tolerance (1) – while those values that can inspire challenge to the status quo are few and far between – justice (3), equality (2). implementing the curriculum a curriculum is a statement of intent. its ultimate value lies in its implementation in the classrooms. in pakistan, responsibility for implementing curricula lies with the provinces as education delivery is, constitutionally, a provincial concern (government of pakistan, 2010). this fact creates challenges, as provinces differ in their enthusiasm as well as their capacity for implementing the new curriculum. in our discussion with the members of the ncc, there was a recognition of the challenges of implementation. next to bringing all the provincial units on board, the most important challenge noted was that of finding teachers to teach the re curriculum. the quality of teaching in all school types is critical when it comes to educational reform. research indicates that teachers often lack content knowledge and pedagogy is geared towards preparing for the exam rather than providing a holistic approach that will encourage lifelong learning (aslam & kingdon, 2011; idara-e-taleem-oaagahi, 2013; rawal et al., 2013). teacher motivation remains a concern (ali, 2014, 2018; aslam et al., 2019) and teacher quality is a critical bottleneck to student achievement in pakistan (alam & ahmad, 2017), a finding that is supported by global literature on the importance of pedagogy on critical learning (abercrombie, 2009; alcott, 2017; rawal et al., 2013). exacerbating this situation is majority muslim teachers’ lack of training and motivation to teach about other religions; in fact, the government has outlined that only members of the respective religious communities should teach the different curricula (n. lone & s. aziz, personal communication, may 8, 2021). this creates critical teacher supply concerns. in some parts of the country, with relatively high densities of one or more religious minorities, enough teachers may be found. with regard to the kalasha faith, practiced only in the region of chitral, finding local teachers may not be difficult. but in most places this is likely to be a challenge. one solution, suggested to us by a curriculum writer, proposes that islamiat teachers be trained to teach other religions. however, this ignores the fact that many schools do not even have a specialised islamiat teacher. furthermore, the issue is not just the availability of alternate teachers in the absence of teachers from minority religions; it is also about teachers’ attitudes towards teaching the content. teaching about a religion other than one’s own in an educationally sound manner requires empathy and a degree of impartiality. any teacher training will need to take this into account. the asymmetrical teaching provision for religious studies also has implications for assessment, particularly for any large-scale assessment. it may make sense to exclude religious education human rights education review volume 5(2) 70 from any such examination. this argument can also be made for islamiat; if students are free from examination stress, many of them might find the subject to be an avenue for thinking about and engaging with larger moral and existential issues. there is evidence of this happening in other countries (holt, 2018). there are other subtle implementation and impact issues that need to be considered and studied. presently, the only religion discussed in the classrooms is islam. once minority religion children have their own classes and texts, they are likely to discuss their learning and hence classroom discourse may become multi-religious. how will this shape a school’s culture? a sensitive pluralistic pedagogy could lead to fostering positive attitudes towards religious pluralism and informed civic discussion on controversial topics. pedagogical failures that end up privileging one religion over the others in class discussions could give rise to tensions among students from different religions. furthermore, even though all the curricula (including the one for islamiat) explicitly and repeatedly emphasize religious tolerance and pluralism and zero tolerance for any forms of religious disrespect to all faiths (national curriculum council, 2020), theological contradictions can give rise to greater social segmentation across religious grounds and education might embed the othering of minorities (mahmood, 2020). concluding remarks: curriculum change and societal implications the current reforms are being introduced into an environment of layered, structured intolerance towards freedom of religious expression. the spell of the blasphemy law has created an ethos of fear and self-censorship. although census data remains sketchy, pakistan has seen a decline in its minority populations, particularly of hindus and christians. this is primarily due to emigration as a result of discrimination and harassment, and this also permeates school culture (hoodbhoy, 2021). there are reports of bullying of children belonging to religious minorities in schools, and parental disapproval of non-muslim teachers. such social marginalisation represents a symbiotic relationship between school and society that mutually reinforces social beliefs and practices. given that religion is both rhetorically and practically very important in pakistani society and its diverse landscape, it can be argued that the role of the school should be to provide education about religion rather than religious instruction. however, this step seems a distant reality given the way the state has functionalised religion and the resulting emotional intensity and political sensitivity in society about all aspects of religion. hence, for now, drafting multireligious curricula carries a symbolic weight that recognizes the constitutional rights of religious minorities though it falls short of an equity-driven approach that critically acknowledges past curricular marginalisation and social prejudice against religious minorities. f. panjwani & c. h. chaudhary 71 furthermore, proposed religious curricula (including islamiat) address embedded social prejudice through privileging respect and religious tolerance (interpreted by zero tolerance for ‘hate speech’) but omit potentially contentious and conflicting viewpoints. while this limits the critical interpretive potential of the curricula that would enable a deeper engagement with how religions address human rights, it is designed to limit potential conflicts that may arise from alternative religious epistemologies. as such, the curriculum designers are arguably ‘functionalising’ religion purposefully to promote religious tolerance and social harmony. while this paper focuses on the political and historical evolution of the curriculum, future research will document its full social impact. the broader curricular reforms fall short of a proactive rights-based education that foregrounds critical pedagogy aimed at righting wrongs, and all the curricula (for religious education, islamiat and mainstream subjects) face structural bottlenecks in their implementation. furthermore, there are potential social implications, such as religious othering, that cannot be predicted, given the novelty of this initiative. however, given the socio-political context of pakistan, the introduction of non-islam based ‘religious education’ arguably represents a policy intent towards a functionalisation of religious education to create a more pluralistic and just society. references abercrombie, d. d. 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(1998). putting islam to work: education, politics, and religious transformation in egypt. berkeley, los angeles & london: university of california press. https://doi.org/10.1525/california/9780520209268.001.0001 taylor, s. (2006). critical policy analysis: exploring contexts, texts and consequences. discourse: studies in the cultural politics of education, 18(1), 23–35. https://doi.org/10.1080/0159630970180102 unicef & unesco (2007). a human rights-based approach to education for all. a framework for the realization of children’s right to education and rights within education. retrieved from https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/619078 united nations (un) (1948). universal declaration of human rights. general assembly in paris, dec. 10, 1948 (general assembly resolution 217a). retrieved from https://www.un.org/sites/un2.un.org/files/udhr.pdf united nations (un) (1976). international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights. adopted by general assembly resolution 2200a (xxi). retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/cescr.aspx united nations (un) (1989). convention on the rights of the child. adopted and opened for signature, ratification and accession by general assembly resolution 44/25. retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/documents/professionalinterest/crc.pdf vazir, n. (2003). curriculum as practiced in pakistan. journal of educational research, 6(1–2), 177–183. retrieved from https://ecommons.aku.edu/pakistan_ied_pdck/123 willaime, j. p. (2007). different models for religion and education in europe. in r. jackson, s. miedema, w. weisse & j. p. willaime (eds.), religion and education in europe (pp. 57– 66). munster: waxmann. https://doi.org/10.1525/california/9780520209268.001.0001 https://doi.org/10.1080/0159630970180102 https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/619078 https://www.un.org/sites/un2.un.org/files/udhr.pdf https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/cescr.aspx https://www.ohchr.org/documents/professionalinterest/crc.pdf https://ecommons.aku.edu/pakistan_ied_pdck/123 towards a rights-based multi-religious curriculum? the case of pakistan abstract keywords introduction methodology religion in schools in pakistan state and religious education in pakistan current reforms a new religious curriculum for religious minorities implementing the curriculum concluding remarks: curriculum change and societal implications references incorporating the convention on the rights of the child in scottish education issn 2535-5406 http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4771 date received: 23-01-2022 date accepted: 18-05-2022 peer reviewed article © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles incorporating the convention on the rights of the child in scottish education stephen daniels university of glasgow, uk, stephen.daniels@glasgow.ac.uk abstract the incorporation of the united nations convention on the rights of the child (uncrc) into scots law offers an unprecedented opportunity to improve the realisation of the right to education for all children and young people living in scotland. one feature of such a commitment ought to be clear and comprehensive policies on human rights education (hre) within scottish educational policy. this article explores what incorporation of the uncrc means in the scottish context and reflects on the current status of hre in scottish education. it also asks what role hre might play alongside incorporation and as part of wider proposed reforms in scottish education following the muir report. i argue that such an examination provides significant opportunities to ask and seek to answer key questions about how hre may be developed in scottish education, both conceptually and in classroom practice. keywords children’s rights, education policy, incorporation, uncrc, scottish education http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4546 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:stephen.daniels@glasgow.ac.uk human rights education review 2 introduction on the 30th anniversary of the adoption of the united nations convention on the rights of the child (uncrc), deputy first minister of scotland john swinney announced the intention to introduce a bill by 2021 to incorporate the uncrc into scots law. building on this political commitment, on september 1st, 2020 the scottish government introduced the united nations convention on the rights of the child (incorporation)(scotland) bill. this would, to the fullest extent possible under the powers devolved to the scottish parliament under the scotland act (1998), write the provisions of the uncrc directly into domestic law. for the first time this would make the uncrc justiciable within scottish courts, offering a significant and substantial step forward in domestic protection for children’s rights. as gadda et al. (2019) highlight, while the uk is bound by international law, ratification of the uncrc in 1991 does not permit rights in the uncrc itself to be justiciable nationally. this, undoubtedly, is an important milestone in the realisation of children’s rights in scotland and was welcomed enthusiastically, the bill itself receiving unanimous support from all political parties within the scottish parliament. it passed all stages of committee scrutiny and was subsequently put forward for royal assent to become part of scots law (see scottish parliament, 2022 for details of this process). however, objections raised by the uk government over the competence of the scottish parliament in relation to certain provisions in this bill have currently paused its progress into law (see brodies, 2021 for discussion). the question is whether all aspects of the bill are within the legislative competence of the scottish parliament (i.e., what is outlined in section 29 of the scotland act 1998). the united kingdom supreme court upheld the united kingdom government’s challenge on the basis that a number of provisions to be enacted in the bill were beyond the competence of the scottish parliament and violated a principle of uk parliamentary sovereignty under the uk’s constitutional arrangements. whatever the legal merits of this decision, the impression of the uk government as being politically unwilling to be bound by obligations relating to children’s rights is a powerful one. further, the uk government’s current proposals to repeal and replace the human rights act with a british bill of rights that is, prima facie, a substantial downgrade in terms of human rights protections remains a considerable threat to human rights protection in scotland and raises difficult constitutional questions, given the links between the scotland act and the human rights act. this growing divergence between the governments in westminster and edinburgh both in rhetoric and substance (see ferrie et al., 2018) lends credence to a perception that, if scotland is serious about realising rights for all scots, it must legislate as far as possible within its competence to do so, rather than rely on uk-wide legislation. the supreme court ruling led to delay, as the scottish parliament was required to look again at the bill and revise or remove a number of provisions. once the bill receives royal assent the articles of the un convention s. daniels 3 on the rights of the child (uncrc) will be enforceable in scots law. this temporary pause allows further time to reflect on the current state of human rights in scotland to ensure that scotland is prepared to maximise the impact of incorporation in driving forward children’s rights. in this article, i argue that incorporation presents a crucial opportunity for progression in a range of areas in scottish education, building on existing good practice. moreover, i argue that scottish education stands at a point of transition and possible commitment to significant reform across its entire breadth, following the publication of prof. ken muir’s report ‘putting learners at the centre: towards a future visions for scottish education’ in march 2022. taken together, there are considerable opportunities for the development of hre within scottish education as part of the proposed educational reforms and as a result of the incorporation of the uncrc. the crucial issue is how we may best realise this potential and what are the key questions to ask. these are international issues, but it is the scottish context that i focus on here. i will, therefore, begin with a brief overview of the scottish context relevant to this discussion and then examine human rights education itself. i will then detail what incorporating the uncrc into scots law amounts to, present some of the key features of the relevant legislation and make clear why incorporation matters. next, i will discuss the current status of hre within the scottish curriculum, before turning to consider the opportunities presented for reforming scottish education to better realise hre. finally, i conclude by offering several recommendations about how to make the most of the significant potential of the incorporation of the uncrc for realising children’s rights in education. the scottish context as part of the devolution settlement established by the scotland act (1998), education and training were devolved to the re-established scottish parliament. devolution ensures that the scottish parliament, rather than the uk government, has control over a range of areas of public policy. the uk government, however, ‘reserves’ powers in areas such as fiscal, economic, and monetary policy, national security, immigration, and illicit drugs. this stands as a potential barrier to the national priorities of the devolved governments and, necessarily, limits what the scottish government can do in key areas of public policy. since devolution, education legislation has often looked to draw directly on international human rights law, particularly the uncrc. increasingly, consideration of children’s wellbeing and rights has come to be a characteristic feature of all legislation passed in the scottish parliament. this has involved, amongst other things, consideration of ‘human rights budgeting’ and the use of child rights and wellbeing impact assessments (crwias) as part of human rights education review 4 implementing ministerial duties under the 2014 children and young people (scotland) act. from a legal perspective, scotland, as a constituent nation within the uk, has certain obligations in relation to human rights treaties that the uk has ratified. as things stand, the uk government signs and ratifies international conventions and as state party has the primary obligations in relation to them. however, schedule 5 of the scotland act (1998) empowers the scottish government to observe and implement international obligations. as mccall-smith (2019) notes, scotland is able to develop children’s rights laws and policies independently of the uk. further obligations under a variety of other international conventions and protocols also apply to scotland. at the current time, only those rights derived from the european convention on human rights (echr) have been given effect in domestic law. these rights are set out in the human rights act (hra) (1998) and form an important part of the scotland act (1998) which, inter alia, makes clear the devolved capabilities of the scottish parliament. in particular, the scottish government is prohibited from legislating in a way that is incompatible with echr rights incorporated through the human rights act. in the event of the incorporation of the uncrc, the scottish parliament would be prohibited from passing legislation incompatible with both echr rights and, uncrc rights. this is highly significant and will have wide-ranging implications for the development of legislation in scotland, including education law. human rights education following the definition outlined in the united nations declaration on human rights education and training (undhret), human rights education and training encompasses education: (a) about human rights, which includes providing knowledge and understanding of human rights norms and principles, the values that underpin them and the mechanisms for their protection; (b) through human rights, which includes learning and teaching in a way that respects the rights of both educators and learners; (c) for human rights, which includes empowering persons to enjoy and exercise their rights and to respect and uphold the rights of others. (un, 2011, art.2.2) human rights education (hre) must, therefore, include both ‘content and process’ relating to human rights (bajaj, 2011, p. 482); that is, it is not enough that children learn about their rights, but that education itself must be participatory and rights-respecting. however, it is important in considering how well-placed scotland is to deliver on the potential of uncrc incorporation as it relates to hre to be clear what successful implementation might look like. the un plan of action for hre (ohchr, 2014) identifies five key components for successful s. daniels 5 realisation of hre. using this as a guide, we can offer a non-exhaustive account of what successful realisation of hre within state education systems may involve. the five key components against which to judge a state’s progress would be: hre1) clear and comprehensive incorporation of hre into educational curricula; hre2) teachers must be aware of relevant rights legislation; hre3) states must promote adequate training in human rights for teachers; hre4) states must ensure rights-respecting learning environments; hre5) states must ensure teaching practices that reflect and promote human rights values. as i will later discuss, research has highlighted challenges in each of these areas within scotland. however, as i will argue, there are also considerable opportunities presented by incorporation to make explicit and meaningful progress. incorporating the united nations convention on the rights of the child the united nations convention on the rights of the child (incorporation) (scotland) bill (hereafter, ‘the bill’) represents the reiteration of the scottish government’s commitment to ‘fully realising the human rights of all people in scotland’ (scottish parliament, 2020b, p. 1). this is a commitment to building a scotland in which respect for human rights forms ‘the bedrock of society and the institutions which govern and deliver public services for the people of scotland’ (scottish parliament, 2020b, p. 1). the bill is, moreover, part of a commitment to a ‘revolution’ in children’s rights in scotland, while recognising the dual impacts of the covid19 pandemic and the united kingdom’s withdrawal from the european union. both of these events ‘underline the importance of human rights being built into the fabric of society’ (scottish parliament, 2020b, p. 2). this commitment continues a trend over the past several years where the government has repeatedly used the strapline ‘making rights real’ as part of its key policy commitments in a range of areas (gadda et al., 2019, p. 2). there is a significant body of legislation covering a range of areas in scotland that is explicitly underpinned by commitments to human rights. indeed, we can see at least as far back as 2013 (and certainly further) signs of the move in scotland in this direction and ferrie et al. (2018, p. 2) draw our attention to scotland’s emergence as a strong pro-rights voice within the uk over the period following devolution. lundy, kilkelly, and byrne (2014, p. 443) remind us that international human rights treaties do not, in general, ‘specify how state parties are to give effect to their obligations at the domestic level’. uncrc article 4, for example, makes plain that ‘states parties shall undertake all appropriate legislative, administrative, and other measures for the implementation of the rights recognised in the [uncrc].’ direct incorporation is, in the simplest terms, when the convention, either in full or in part, is incorporated directly into the domestic legal system. scotland will seek to take a ‘maximalist’ approach to incorporation (scottish government, human rights education review 6 2019a), with ‘maximalism’ to be understood here as the greatest extent possible within the constraints of the scottish parliament’s legislative competence. through the transformation or transposition of the international treaty (in this case the uncrc), part or all of the treaty will form part of national law, becoming binding on the public agencies of that state and enforceable in court (mccall-smith, 2019). while direct incorporation is often a very clear sign of commitment to children’s rights protection, it is also important to remember that direct incorporation ‘does not equate to consummate rights protection’ (mccall-smith, 2019, p. 432). incorporation, however, does matter. increasingly, the research and the experience of those working to promote and protect children’s rights internationally is offering a clearer sense of how and why. key to successful implementation of any sort is the development of a culture of support for children’s rights in civil society, the public, and in the media (kilkelly, 2019). as mccall-smith (2021, p. 18) puts it, incorporation in scotland is important ‘not only because it will legally entrench children’s rights on an unprecedented scale but also because the process itself is a driver of change’. the development of a human rights culture and the raising of awareness about children’s rights is both central to the uncrc generally and forms part of the goals of human rights education. indeed, a strong programme of hre seems necessary for the task of both educating children about their rights, but also in building a strong civil society with awareness and respect for children’s rights. one of the largest barriers to children’s rights progress generally—and scotland is no exception—is that there must be: [a] profound cultural transformation that requires changes in the relationship between parents, children, and the state, [that]…needs to be sustained by a legal framework as well as by the implementation of policies, plans, and institutions truly inspired by the crc—not a minor issue for policy-makers and for society at large. (mauras, 2011, p. 63) incorporation establishes a crucial legal framework but does not itself ensure that children’s rights to and in education are secured nor offer guidance about how programmes of hre ought to be developed and justified. incorporation can be an important symbol even beyond its legal implications but is only one of several steps that must be taken together in order to realise children’s educational rights and build a culture of human rights in scotland. united nations convention on the rights of the child (incorporation) (scotland) bill the united nations convention on the rights of the child (incorporation) (scotland) bill, as introduced, will incorporate the following articles of the uncrc and first and second optional protocols: s. daniels 7 articles 1 42 of the uncrc; articles 1 11 of the first optional protocol; articles 1 7 of the second optional protocol. it is crucial to recall here that the bill cannot incorporate rights and obligations within the articles of the uncrc and first and second optional protocols where ‘their inclusion would take the bill outside the legislative competence of the parliament’ (policy memorandum, 2020, p. 46). as the uk has not ratified optional protocol 3, for example, the scottish parliament does not have the power to incorporate it into scots law even if it so chose. the stated policy intention of the bill is, therefore, to achieve the ‘highest protection for children’s rights possible within the boundaries of the devolved settlement as provided for in the scotland act’ (scottish parliament, 2020b, p. 46). the scottish government outlines its preferred policy approach as requiring all legislation, past and future, to be compatible with the incorporated uncrc rights and obligations (scottish parliament, 2020b). in order to achieve this goal, the bill provides for courts having the power to ‘strike down’ incompatible provisions, including primary legislation. the uncrc is, we are reminded, the global ‘gold standard’ for children’s rights and by incorporating the uncrc, the bill will deliver a ‘fundamental shift in the way children’s rights are respected, protected and fulfilled in scotland’ (scottish parliament, 2020b, p. 2). significantly, the bill will ‘ensure that there is a proactive culture of everyday accountability for children’s rights across public services in scotland’ (scottish parliament, 2020b, p. 2). public authorities will be required to take proactive steps to ensure compliance with children’s rights in their decisionmaking and service delivery. as mccall-smith (2022, p. 91) details, section 6 of the bill imposes a duty of uncrc compliance on public authorities, with section 11 requiring ministers to publish a ‘children’s rights scheme’ to detail exactly how they are fulfilling these duties. in relation to articles 28 and 29 of the uncrc we might well wonder what might be said here about the incorporation of hre within scottish education. as i’anson (2021, p. 16) reminds us, article 29 presents a ‘distinctive vision’ of education along with ‘detailed expectations’ regarding its implementation. as i will argue shortly, as part of the process of making clearer how these requirements will be enacted, more must be said about the place of hre within the curriculum as well as how human rights are to be understood as something to be taught. having detailed why incorporation matters in a general sense, i will conclude this section by highlighting one particularly salient reason why incorporation matters in scotland. incorporation is important because there is strong evidence that it is what the children and young people of scotland want. children and young people’s desire for incorporation has been made clear through the work of the scottish youth parliament’s (syp) campaign right here, right now. the syp’s 2016-21 youth manifesto, lead the way, received more than 70,000 human rights education review 8 consultation responses, finding that 76 per cent of children and young people surveyed agreed that: the united national convention on the rights of the child (uncrc) should be fully incorporated into scots law, and the rights of children and young people should be protected and promoted. (syp, 2015, p. 13) children and young people have continued to make their voices heard on this matter through the syp and directly to ministers at their annual cabinet meeting with children and young people. human rights education in scotland as detailed above, it is the intention of the scottish government to incorporate the uncrc into scots law. one feature of such a commitment, we might reasonably posit, ought to be the realisation and implementation of human rights education (hre) within scottish educational policy and practice. this plausibly follows from the strength of the legal, political, and philosophical case for hre that has been developed over the last several decades and made clear in tomaševski’s influential work (2001b). nevertheless, questions have been raised in the literature about how successful current attempts to incorporate hre within the scottish education system have been (daniels, 2018, 2019; struthers, 2015a, 2015b, 2015c; cassidy et al., 2014; bemis, 2013, 2011). however, incorporation alongside the considerable progress made in embedding human rights throughout scottish education more generally provides a clear opportunity to strengthen guidance and more fully realise children’s right to education in this regard. human rights education and curriculum for excellence the scottish curriculum, curriculum for excellence (cfe), was developed as a flexible curriculum focusing on outcomes and experiences rather than centrally mandated content. the intention was to enable a wide range of teaching and learning strategies to be employed as well as to strengthen teacher autonomy. in relation to hre and human rights more generally, the scottish government considers human rights and a rights-based approach to education to be concepts relevant to the provision of education under cfe. indeed, getting it right for every child (girfec) is explicitly recognized as being founded on the principles of uncrc (scottish government, 2013). girfec is the scottish government’s national approach to improving the wellbeing of children and young people and underpins both the scottish curriculum and all wider policies relating to education and children and young people. i have previously examined the scottish curriculum for evidence that it is: 1) adequate to the task of supporting education about, for, and through human rights; and 2) explicit in its commitment to human rights values (daniels, 2018). i argue there that while there is some evidence of s. daniels 9 elements of the curriculum directed to teaching about rights in a generic sense, there is a distinct lack of detail or explicitness in cfe on human rights themselves (daniels, 2018, 2019). turning to the contents of cfe (and related supporting materials), research has shown that aspects of hre are found, to some extent, across the three teaching areas of: 1) interdisciplinary learning; 2) freestanding subjects; and 3) themes across learning (daniels, 2018; struthers, 2015c). although one finds few explicit requirements in cfe to educate about human rights themselves, several of the experiences and outcomes intended to be delivered through cfe reflect ideas relevant to the fulfilment of the undhret (2011) article 2(2). this point can be further elaborated by noting that religious and moral education’s (rme) express reference to ‘human rights’ is the only one within any freestanding subject in the curriculum. the current strategy in scotland has been for hre to be delivered through inter-disciplinary learning or as a cross-curricular theme, both approaches emphasised by the flexibility of the scottish curriculum which lends itself to, and requires, learning in key areas to be interconnected and spread across all subject areas. this has taken the guise of hre through global citizenship education but more recently as part of learning for sustainability (lfs). i have argued that the former is inadequate in many respects for this role, though primarily in respect of teaching about and for human rights rather than inconsistent as a pedagogical approach, given the strong evidence that rights-respecting educational practices are strongly emphasised (daniels, 2018). this, it should be noted, reflects the conception of hre that i think is best suited to the task at hand, an issue i will return to later. learning for sustainability is ‘an approach to life and learning which enables learners, educators, schools and their wider communities to build a socially-just, sustainable and equitable society’ (education scotland, 2022). learning for sustainability involves a clear direction for children and young people to explore a range of: perspectives on issues such as fairness, justice and equity. this can help them to understand that our actions have consequences for other human beings and the natural world, and that when we act we have responsibilities as well as rights – a core feature of citizenship. (scottish government, 2020) as struthers (2015c, p. 69) suggests, the lack of hre in scotland is ‘largely attributable’ to the lack of clear guidance within the curriculum. the major issue identified in research by bemis (2013), struthers (2015c), and daniels (2018, 2019) on hre in scotland is that nowhere in cfe is there a requirement that learners develop a basic understanding of human rights norms and principles, the values that underpin them, and the mechanisms for their protection as per undhret; that is, there is very little engagement on questions about what rights are, how they are protected and promoted, or what sort of values are associated with the human rights culture that is intended to be developed as a result of hre. above all else, with human rights and hre remaining conceptually contested, how to develop mature and comprehensive human rights education review 10 programmes of hre remains an open question, but one which we must seek to answer to continue to develop hre both within and outside of scotland. i have in mind here longstanding debates over ‘orthodox’ versus political conceptions, given the radically different ways one might conceive of the results of hre and, particularly, what one is licensed to teach as true about human rights. in connection with education about human rights, struthers (2020) asks how teachers’ theoretical conceptions of human rights affect their practice in the teaching of human rights values. as she argues, teacher’s conceptions of human rights have an important effect on how they present and teach about human rights. she suggests that the accuracy of any express teaching about specific human rights and their relevant instruments and protection mechanisms is likely to be ‘somewhat serendipitous’ if teachers lack clear guidance and training (struthers, 2020, p. 115). according to struthers (2020, p. 114), the complexities of hre practice make education about human rights a ‘challenging enterprise’. we know from tibbitts’s (2002, 2017) and bajaj’s (2011) work that there is a wide variation in how hre is developed and understood by its advocates, but we must also consider how hre as part of scottish education answers questions of ‘the appropriate relationship’ with the international human rights legal framework (phillips & gready, 2013). this relationship highlights considerable conceptional variation in understanding human rights and human rights education itself. moreover, we must grapple with how the incorporation of the uncrc makes a difference here by bringing both the provisions of the convention and the commitment to the promotion and realisation of human rights values into domestic culture and institutions. there is a potentially crucial difference in focus between, for example, teaching hre as part of wider efforts to inculcate various pro-social, democratic values in children and young people and teaching hre as transformative through engagement with the ‘dark side’ of human rights, the development of legal literacy, and an exploration of distinctive human rights values requiring specialist delivery (lundy & martinez sainz, 2018). in order to properly reflect the status of human rights protection in domestic law following incorporation, i suggest that a very strong case can be made that legal literacy, of the sort argued for by lundy and martinez sainz (2018), should become a central element of hre as it is developed in scotland. when the uncrc becomes part of scots law, the curricular focus in cfe on the development of ‘responsible citizens’ surely requires knowledge of these new legal protections as part of the standard legal and political education we think fundamental to citizenship education in general. this is not an insubstantial task in formal education and questions of how to provide such provision would need to be asked about required professional learning and appropriate content and pedagogies. responsible citizens in scotland must now, more than ever, know about their rights, the mechanisms for their protection, and the means to seek remedy for the violation of these rights. if we think this is important, the lack of a well-defined epistemic s. daniels 11 framework for hre will surely undermine our efforts (parker, 2018). in either case, hre of any form promotes some conception of human rights and we should further ask questions about the educational implications of this fact as we consider how to strengthen its place within the scottish curriculum. while there is much that is positive and explicit in relation to guidance surrounding pedagogy and taught content delivered through the lens of human rights in scottish educational policy, the lack of explicit focus on teaching about rights is a concern, and evidence that scotland is currently struggling to provide clear evidence of meeting the requirement for clear and comprehensive incorporation of hre within the curriculum (hre1) (daniels, 2018, 2019). questions remain about how clearly and comprehensively hre is incorporated within the curriculum (hre1), and we may ask whether all teachers are sufficiently aware of the relevant rights legislation (hre2), and if adequate training in human rights for teachers is provided (hre3). opportunities and future directions for human rights education indicative of the wider focus on realising children’s rights in scotland discussed throughout this article, we may look to the recently revised professional standards for teachers in scotland. the general teaching council scotland (gtcs) stands as an independent, selfregulating body for teaching in scotland. all teachers in scotland must be registered with the gtcs, with the gtcs setting standards for professionalism. amongst other things, these standards provide a framework for teacher education in scotland as well as guiding professional development for teachers and acting as a benchmark of professional competency. as such, they are highly significant across the profession, as well as shaping both initial and ongoing teacher education initiatives throughout scotland. the 2021 standard for full registration marks the most explicit commitment to date to human rights and hre. we see the direction that teachers must demonstrate in their practice evidence of: respecting the rights of all learners as outlined in the united nations convention on the rights of the child (uncrc) and their entitlement to be included in decisions regarding their learning experiences and have all aspects of their wellbeing developed and supported. (gtcs, 2021, p. 4) specific reference to the uncrc ‘as outlined’ is highly significant. further, teachers must demonstrate how they ‘contribute to a rights-respecting culture’ where learners ‘meaningfully participate in decisions related to their learning, wellbeing, learning environment and their school’ (gtcs, 2021, p. 9). guidance here is supportive of elements of hre, and there is an important emphasis on participation in decision-making processes. there is no doubt that in this connection, and in the context of the wider commitment in scotland human rights education review 12 to increasing the participation of children and young people, that the further adoption of, for example, the lundy model of participation in educational decision-making would be a valuable step forward (lundy, 2007). further, teachers are required to promote and engender ‘a rights respecting culture and the ethical use of authority associated with one’s professional roles’ (gtcs, 2021, p. 5). again, we see a clear and definitive commitment to professional duties related to aspects of hre and the broad realisation of schoolchildren’s rights. moreover, the issue of the ‘ethical use of authority’ again raises the questions about teaching about and for hre raised above. these are the most explicit references, but several other standards can plausibly be read as being related to or directly relevant to the realisation of children’s rights in education. for example, standard 3.2.2 directs teachers towards their duty to encourage effective learner participation (gtcs, 2021, p. 10). additionally, the system of professional update in scotland ensures all teachers registered in scotland will need to demonstrate their ability to meet these standards every five years in order to maintain a full registration with the gtcs and continue to work within scottish schools. as part of both initial teacher education and in wider continuing professional development in scotland there must, therefore, be adequate input on human rights and hre in order to support teachers in all local authorities to meet these professional standards. how demanding these standards are will, in part, be determined by how demanding we believe hre to be and how wide-ranging obligations in relation to teaching about, through, and for human rights is to be within the scottish curriculum. in order to determine this, greater clarity about how hre is to be conceptualised and realised within scotland is necessary. as noted previously, hre and human rights themselves remain conceptually contested. how best might we realise them in scotland? we need to discuss this question in order to enable the teaching profession in scotland to be adequately supported in meeting these professional duties. it should be possible for there to be a professional dialogue about teachers’ obligations to interpret, enact and create policy around hre. the nature of cfe allows for the space for this kind of professional autonomy and, if properly supported, there is reason to think that the existing good practice in scottish schools around hre could form the bedrock of future national guidance around the delivery of hre. however, there are also questions to ask about what education in and for hre for teachers means. there are clear difficulties in translating a concept devised and principally shaped by lawyers and legal academics into an educational one. these difficulties have been highlighted both in scotland (bemis, 2013) and in other jurisdictions. recent research has considered these problems: the general consequences and challenges of translation of the uncrc into legislation in different jurisdictions (robinson, quennerstedt & i’anson, 2020); developing a theoretical understanding of teachers’ responsibilities in hre (robinson, phillips & quennerstedt, 2020; jerome, 2018); translating human rights principles into classroom practices (robinson, 2017). when we consider hre, s. daniels 13 current covid ‘recovery’ efforts in schools and the extraordinary disruption of children’s right to education during 2020 have significant implications (magendzo and osler, 2020). it is clear that a discussion around these issues is necessary in scotland to make the most of the valuable opportunities presented by the current context and to enable the realisation of children’s rights within scottish education. in order to update the empirical work carried out in the bemis report of 2013, it is time that a further wide-ranging mapping exercise is undertaken of both the extent of teachers’ knowledge of hre as well as their experiences in incorporating it into classroom teaching. in order to complement the legislative changes proposed and changes to professional standards for teachers, it is vital that we identify current practice in schools and gaps and barriers to the realisation of hre, as well as professional development needs for teachers and other educators in scotland. similarly, revisiting the work of struthers (2015a, 2015b) in assessing the development of hre-related inputs in initial teacher education in scotland will be equally valuable. with little evidence about how well hre is implemented in schools or how comprehensively teachers are prepared to deliver hre, it is difficult to judge how well the rights brought into scots law via incorporation have been met, or will be met in the future. this must change as a matter of some priority in order to maximise the potential of incorporation for strengthening children’s rights within scotland, and hre remains a crucial part of this process. the nature of and role for human rights education in scotland then may plausibly be part of a broader discussion over the shape of the curriculum and wider education policies and institutions. this discussion must be viewed in the wake of the june 2021 oecd report on curriculum for excellence, ‘post-pandemic’ planning, and ken muir’s recent report on potential reform in scottish education (muir, 2022). the latter made a series of recommendations, many accepted in full or in part by the scottish government, as ‘principles for reform’, including the significant direction that: all efforts, whether concerned with educational recovery post-pandemic or in terms of the future vision for scottish education, must be directed to the purposes described in article 29 of the uncrc. (muir, 2022, p. 4) a strong commitment to professional autonomy in scottish education has ensured that scottish teachers have long played an important role in interpreting, realising and indeed developing policy as suggested above. with hre arguably a key element in both meeting professional obligations for teachers under the 2021 revised gtcs standards and realising children’s rights more broadly in line with these ‘principles for reform’, there could not be a better time to consider how scottish education may be reformed in order to put children’s rights at the heart of everything and ensuring hre is a key driver in doing so. as part of this human rights education review 14 process, professor muir recommends that invitations to shape this vision should be made to ‘all partners and stakeholders, including all learners, teachers, practitioners, parents, and carers’ (muir, 2022, p. 4). this, in the specific context of hre, strikes me as a fundamental element of addressing the questions identified earlier about the strengthening of awareness and understanding of human rights within scotland. moreover, just such a process, and the importance of children’s and young people’s participation in this process, is identified in connection with the uncrc incorporation bill itself: the scottish government wants a scotland where policy, law and decision-making take account of children’s rights and where all children have a voice and are empowered not just to know and understand their rights, but also to assert and defend those rights and the rights of others. (policy memorandum, 2020, p. 3) there is certainly a highly significant political aspiration associated with the bill. while the commitments to ‘voice’ and empowerment are generally familiar features of discussion around children’s rights in scotland, it is worth commenting on the explicit reference to knowing, understanding, and asserting one’s rights; that is, human rights education of the sort outlined in undhret. it is clear, however, that we must think carefully about what participation is envisaged as and how we determine its meaningfulness to learners (lundy, 2007; mannion et al., 2022). against this backdrop, and the highly significant recommendations of the muir report, we can see important opportunities for the further development of hre within scotland alongside and in addition to the incorporation of the uncrc. finally, the four uk children’s commissioners have made clear in a report to the united nations in december 2020 (children’s commissioners uk, 2020) that children’s rights and human rights education should be a compulsory part of education throughout the uk. however, while this is a welcome and valuable goal questions remain: what form ought hre to take as part of the curriculum? how may we justify the inculcation of values (human rights or otherwise) in children and young people and what conception of human rights and hre will inform policy and practice to ensure this is possible, coherent, and comprehensive? to answer these and other questions, a wide-ranging national discussion is required that engages with the practical and theoretical implications of developing a rights-respecting culture and promoting human rights values in scotland. i will suggest shortly a potential way forward in seeking to answer some of these questions in my recommendations, but detailed conceptual work remains to be done to better articulate the central human rights value of dignity and its implications for education policy and practice. as i have argued, incorporation of the uncrc represents a momentous step forward for children’s rights in scotland. however, it also demands equally serious consideration is given s. daniels 15 to how to further maximise development in the realisation of hre and children’s rights in education both at a conceptual and practical level. this is no easy task, but one that could deliver highly significant reforms to support the realisation of children and young people’s rights in scotland as well as contributing to building a wider culture of knowledge and understanding of human rights within scotland. conclusion and recommendations this article has highlighted how the current political climate in scotland offers significant opportunities for strengthening the realisation of the right to education (and hre) within scotland. against such a backdrop the time could hardly be better for serious consideration of the role of human rights education in these strategic aims. with this in mind i offer three recommendations based on the issues raised here: 1) a clear and explicit expression of commitment from the scottish government to developing hre further within scottish education and consideration of its compulsory status in line with the recommendation of the children’s commissioner. 2) to continue to address the gap in empirical work on hre in scotland to further highlight good practice in hre and identify teacher and pupil experiences and conceptions of human rights, concepts like dignity, and the development of rightsrespecting cultures. this will then serve as part of the wider conversation to determine professional learning needs and potential curricula reform. 3) taking into consideration the wide-ranging and complex questions identified here, the establishment of a working group involving a range of stakeholders in education, including children, seems vital to beginning to shape what future role hre should play in scottish education. there is a wealth of expertise in scotland and an important role for the lived experiences of children in determining the agenda for the development of hre and rights-based schooling within scotland. one can point to the work of the lgbti inclusive education working group between 2017 and 2018 as an example of how this may be undertaken and the scottish government’s willingness to accept and act on the recommendations of such work seen in the roll-out of lgbt-inclusive education in scottish schools in 2021. in conclusion, this is a moment of considerable change for scotland; both in the law through the incorporation of the uncrc, and in education, as the country potentially looks to reform its qualifications body, its inspectorate, and develop a new national education agency amongst other wide-ranging institutional reforms (scottish government, 2022). human rights education must surely play an important role in this conversation. this should be seen as an opportunity to adopt an approach that puts children’s rights and interests at the very centre of our educational institutions, as recommended by the muir report. such an approach is consistent with a commitment to incorporate the uncrc and realise children’s rights more broadly in scotland. consideration of the questions raised in the previous section is, of course, human rights education review 16 relevant to all jurisdictions and especially those who have or will seek to incorporate the uncrc in future. in the scottish context, to fail to make the most of this important opportunity to make rights real in scotland and to enable all children and young people to understand and claim their rights and to participate in the building of a rights-respecting culture throughout the land would be to fail to show the human rights leadership on which this government prides itself. it would, moreover, be to fail in the underlying and animating goal of education policymaking in scotland of ‘getting it right for every child’. the scottish government must, therefore, show leadership in driving forward human rights education and seek to take another important step in the realisation of children’s rights in scotland. acknowledgements i would like to thank the anonymous reviewers and the editorial staff at hrer for their helpful feedback on this article. i would also like to thank dr. penny enslin and dr. nicki hedge for their helpful discussion at earlier stages of this work. references bajaj, m. 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child in scottish education abstract keywords introduction the scottish context human rights education incorporating the united nations convention on the rights of the child united nations convention on the rights of the child (incorporation) (scotland) bill human rights education in scotland human rights education and curriculum for excellence opportunities and future directions for human rights education conclusion and recommendations acknowledgements references unicef’s rights respecting schools award as children’s human rights education issn 2535-5406 http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4761 date received: 12-01-2022 date accepted: 11-05-2022 peer reviewed article © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles unicef’s rights respecting schools award as children’s human rights education ann quennerstedt örebro university, sweden, ann.quennerstedt@oru.se abstract children’s human rights education is a complex area for schools to handle. therefore, it is not uncommon for schools and teachers to seek guidance from actors outside school. this article examines unicef uk’s rights respecting schools award with the aim of shedding light on ways in which the programme can support successful work with children’s human rights education. the programme’s main aims are identified, and research about the programme is examined to determine to what extent the aims seem to be achieved in schools that use it. the analysis shows that the programme holds good potential to support successful work with children’s hre, but that some areas of the programme need to be developed to provide a full hre. a lack of strong research evidence for a programme effect is also noted. keywords rights respecting schools award, rrsa, children’s human rights education, hre, school http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ human rights education review 2 introduction children’s human rights education is a complex area for schools to handle. education is a human right in itself—essential for general development and life chances—but it should also support the development of human rights knowledge and values. the responsibility placed on education to respond to children’s human rights is complex and includes several elements: equal access, knowledge acquisition, value and capacity development, a human rights culture, respect for children as current rights holders, and a rights-respecting school environment. some of these aspects are responsibilities of the state, such as having a national curriculum and teacher education (parker, 2018). others are to be fulfilled by the various professional groups that staff schools, for example organising the school day and selecting educational content and methods (quennerstedt, 2022). everyday school life should constitute a rightspromoting environment. however, a dearth of national direction leaves school professionals uncertain about what to do (bron and thijs, 2011; gerber, 2008; phillips, 2016). teachers also express that they lack the knowledge and training to provide children’s human rights education (leung et al., 2011; tibbitts and kirschsläger, 2010). therefore, it is not uncommon for schools and teachers to seek guidance from actors outside school that are perceived to be experts in human and child rights issues. this article takes an interest in such collaboration between schools and outside actors around children’s human rights education. cooperation around human rights between schools and organisations, such as unicef or amnesty international, has a long history. about a decade into the new millennium such organisations took a further step towards supporting schools’ work with children’s and young people’s human rights by developing educational programmes with a so-called ‘whole schoolapproach’ (covell et al., 2010). this means that the programmes aim to cover and impact all parts of school life, not only teaching and learning in classrooms. the contributions from external organisations have been considered to provide valuable support in a situation when, despite being strongly endorsed by most stakeholders, human rights education for children and young people does not seem to take place in schools to any great extent (lapayese, 2005; lundy et al., 2012). the programmes can be said to operate as substitutes for weak or absent government direction and inadequate teacher education (gerber, 2008; jerome et al., 2015). some commentators indicate that partnering with organisations might be the only way to initiate children’s rights work in schools. gerber (2008) argues that organisation-supported classroom activities can also function as policy drivers, i.e., they may set in motion a bottom-up process for the implementation of children’s rights in education, where the engagement of schools eventually impacts national policy. opening schools to outside actors is not without complications, however. one issue raised by a. quennerstedt 3 some commentators is that organisations’ agendas may not necessarily harmonise with national school policies. the positions of the organisations may, for example, be conceived as overly radical or political if rights education seeks to encourage societal activism (struthers, 2019). this may be seen as problematic by teachers and policymakers (jerome et al., 2015; rinaldi, 2017). it is also unclear whether the programmes draw on both topic expertise (human rights, children’s rights) and educational expertise (the design and undertaking of education). transferring the responsibility for educational content and quality from schools to external, unaccountable organisations can therefore be seen as risky (quennerstedt, 2019; 2022). aim and research questions this article seeks to extend the current knowledge about whether and how collaboration between schools and outside actors can be an effective model for the provision of children’s human rights education. the term ‘effective’ is here understood in the sense of adequate to accomplish a purpose or produce an intended or expected result. the article examines one school programme as an example of such collaboration, namely unicef’s rights respecting schools award. the article will shed light on the ways in which unicef’s programme can be a way to work effectively with children’s and young people’s human rights education. the following questions have guided the study: 1. what are the main aims of unicef’s school programme? 2. to what extent does recent research show that the aims are achieved in schools that use the programme? in the study, both the programme itself and existing research about it have been analysed, with the aim of connecting the programme’s intentions to findings from research. the rights respecting schools award was chosen, first, because it is a widely used school programme for rights education. in the uk where it originated, over 5000 schools are registered, and it has also spread to other countries. second, it is the only school programme for rights education that has been sufficiently researched to provide the volume of material necessary for this study. children’s human rights education the un has emphasised that human rights education (hre) should be provided to children in schools. the first phase of the un’s world programme for human rights education specifically targeted primary and secondary education (un, 2006). the common understanding of hre and what it includes has evolved gradually through un activities and scholarly engagement (coysh, 2017; bajaj, 2011). the now widely accepted definition, laid down in the un human rights education review 4 declaration on human rights education and training (un, 2011), is: human rights education and training encompasses: education about human rights, which includes providing knowledge and understanding of human rights norms and principles, the values that underpin them and the mechanisms for their protection; education through human rights, which includes learning and teaching in a way that respects the rights of both educators and learners; education for human rights, which includes empowering persons to enjoy and exercise their rights and to respect and uphold the rights of others. despite clear communication from the un and strong support for hre in nations around the world, it has only to a limited extent found its way into school discourse and national curricula. parker (2018) discusses the slow uptake of hre in curricula and concrete educational practice and argues that a main problem is the lack of a hre curriculum that elaborates on subject matter and learning goals, and on the details of basic, intermediate, and advanced levels of human rights learning. further, the range of concepts that are used in educational thinking to approach similar issues—citizenship education, global citizenship education, peace education, education for democracy, anti-racist education, and intercultural education (bajaj, 2011; tibbitts, 2017; rinaldi et al., 2020)—presents an additional problem as teachers find it difficult to differentiate between them. that scholars take diverging stands on whether hre is something specific or is largely the same thing as, e.g., citizenship education or peace education (cassidy et al., 2014; zembylas et al., 2015), adds to the confusion. hence, scholarly and professional uncertainty around what hre is presents a difficulty that hinders the uptake in school discourse. previous research on the impact of school programmes for rights education research that studies school programmes for children’s rights education almost exclusively refers to the findings of two groups of scholars, whose research was conducted during the first decade of the millennium. first, covell and howe’s (and colleagues) evaluations of the school programme rights respect and responsibility are often referred to. this research reported good effects, such as increased academic engagement, a more positive school climate, improved relationships, reduced bullying, improved behaviour, and a higher sense of common responsibility for ethically sound conduct (see e.g., covell, 2010; covell et al., 2010). they also found that some schools tended to overemphasise responsibilities. this affected children’s understanding of the nature of a. quennerstedt 5 rights and made them believe that rights are contingent on responsibilities, leading to a certain ‘miseducation’ (howe and covell, 2010). second, sebba and robinson’s evaluation (2010) of unicef’s rights respecting schools award is widely referenced. the main findings showed a range of positive outcomes: extensive knowledge about rights; positive relationships and little bullying; pupils felt empowered and knew how to influence decisions; pupils were engaged in the rights of others and had positive attitudes towards people with disabilities and behavioural or emotional problems; and their engagement in learning had improved. some concerns were also raised by the authors: the sustainability of the effects was uncertain; reward schemes for desired attitudes and the language used raised questions about pupils’ reasons for adapting; ‘helping poor people’attitudes were noted, as was contradictory communication among staff; most decisions were still made by teachers and school leaders. sebba and robinson (2010) acknowledged some methodological limitations of their study. student participants were selected by senior managers, and the schools in the study were all involved in other initiatives, which made it difficult to attribute positive effects to the rights programme specifically. jerome et al. (2015) compiled research on the impact of child rights education published up to 2012. they concluded that there seems to be grounds to claim a positive relation between learning about rights and being more respectful towards others. they also found research support for a correlation between knowledge about rights and high levels of reported wellbeing and experiences of participation. the authors, however, also expressed concerns that the evidence presented for the positive impact of child rights education is rather weak. evaluations have tended to focus on aspects that are easy to ‘measure’—such as implemented processes—rather than on educational impact. they also pointed to methodological weaknesses in several studies that negatively affect the findings’ trustworthiness, such as low response rates from questionnaires, opportunistic sampling of research participants, and relying exclusively on teachers’ reports when assessing levels of implementation. these concerns need to be taken seriously: evidence for claims of impact must be reliable. the rights respecting schools award programme unicef’s rights respecting schools award was initiated in the uk in 2004 to help schools to employ the uncrc (un, 1989) as their values framework. the programme has also been extended to other countries (e.g., norway, denmark, sweden). the uk version of the programme is organised as an accreditation scheme; schools start at bronze level and, after certain work and activities are undertaken and assessment passed, can receive accreditation at silver or gold levels. unicef provides the framework to follow, some material and resources, and organises training and the evaluation procedure for accreditation. the cost of human rights education review 6 registration in the programme and higher accreditations varies from £100 to £1000, depending on school size. the uk programme has undergone modification over time, and apart from the renaming of the levels, some larger conceptual changes have been made in recent years that have brought the programme closer to hre terminology. in the transfer of unicef uk’s version of the programme to other countries, some adaptions can be noted. for example, in the nordic countries the programme is called ‘rights school’ (denmark, norway), and ‘rights-based school’ (sweden). the exclusion of the word ‘respecting’ indicates a different stance on pairing rights and respect; they are not as closely linked as in the uk version. this could be due to earlier critical comments on misinterpretations of respect as responsibility (dunhill, 2019; howe and covell, 2010). furthermore, none of these countries charge schools for the programme. material and analysis to explore the extent to which unicef’s school programme can be a way to work effectively with children’s and young people’s human rights education, the study was designed as follows. rq1 – main aims the first research question, regarding the main aims of unicef’s programme, was addressed by examining all available material about the programme on the unicef uk website. a decision to focus on the uk version was made as the uk webpages provide a large volume of information in comparison with the material available on the websites of unicef in the nordic countries. the nordic countries’ versions build on the uk’s, and their websites also have links to unicef uk material. despite a few differences, such as the previously mentioned toning down of the use of the word ‘respect’ in the nordic countries, the different national versions were judged as sufficiently similar to motivate detailed analysis of only the uk version. in the abundance of information about the programme, several alternative vocabularies are used in parallel, which points to different aspects being core to the programme. as a result, the central web pages/documents the three strands, four key areas of school life, theory of change and the annual impact reports communicate a rather incoherent image of the programme. unicef uk does not explain how the varying conceptualisations of their programme that are presented in the range of documents relate to each other. it is therefore challenging to understand how they make up a whole. the material was analysed by marking frequently used terms and aspects that were given particular emphasis in each document or webpage. these were considered to indicate central objectives for the programme. key terms and aspects were collated and, through a process of going back and forth between the material and the collated aspects and terms, the a. quennerstedt 7 information was grouped, condensed, and abstracted, until overarching aims could be distinguished. the analysis of the programme material was therefore a process of abstracting aims above the separate conceptualisations. the aims that constitute the findings from the analysis are thus the construction of the researcher rather than being distinctly communicated by unicef, but they build closely on the material and the different conceptualisations on unicef’s webpage. rq2 – research support for aim achievement the second research question, concerning research support for the achievement of the programme’s aims, was addressed by analysing recent studies of unicef’s programme. to find as many studies as possible, a systematic search for publications in all languages accessible to the author was made via the electronic database academic search elite and in google scholar. search terms used were rrsa, unicef, rights respecting schools award, in different combinations with school, children’s rights and education. the reference lists of the studies found in the electronic search were then checked to identify further publications. to be included, the work had to: • be published in 2011 or later; • report on original research; • focus on unicef’s school programme or feature it as a significant part of the study. ten publications were found. research from a uk context dominated all but one of the studies had examined unicef uk’s programme. only one non-uk publication was found, and this examined the norwegian iteration of the programme. since the total number of identified publications was low, it was decided to include the norwegian study despite it being the only one from another national context. to respond to jerome et al.’s (2015) caution about weak evidence due to design problems, the ten studies underwent quality assessment. they were screened according to the following criteria, which were weighed together to judge overall quality: • match between the purpose of the study and the chosen research method/s and data produced; • account of the analysis made; • findings and conclusions that are reasonable in relation to chosen method/s and data produced, and to the analysis described; • reflection on the limitations of the study. the quality assessment led to the exclusion of three studies. two were not seen to meet reasonable expectations for representative sampling and sample size, as findings were human rights education review 8 portrayed as representative of students and teachers generally at the studied schools. one provided no account of the method of analysis and did not demonstrate sufficient analytical depth. one of the seven remaining studies was excluded as it reported on the same research as another included text. the objectives and research design of the six studies that were finally included are summarised in table 1. table 1 analysed publications. publication aim of study research design dunhill, a. (2019). the language of the human rights of children: a critical discourse analysis. (doctoral dissertation, university of hull). examines to what extent the language of human rights of children is incorporated into unicef uk’s rrsa and how it is presented on school websites. discourse analysis of how unicef uk in its rrsa incorporates the language of human rights of children, and of how rrsa schools present this language on their website. text analysis. emerson, l., & lloyd, k. (2017). measuring children's experience of their right to participate in school and community: a rights‐ based approach. children & society, 31(2), 120-133. to develop and test a children’s rights based measure of child participation. development of survey in collaboration with children’s advisory group. online survey, 3733 children 10-11 years old in primary schools in northern ireland, 595 of these in rrsa schools (separated in report of findings). halås, c. t. (2020). unicefs rettighetsskoler: en undersøkelse av to pilotskolers erfaringer med å bli unicef rettighetsskoler [unicef’s rights schools: an examination of two pilot schools’ experiences of becoming a unicef rights school]. fourapport nr 58. (r&d-report). bodö: nord universitet. examines how children and adults experience participation and results when becoming a unicef norway rights school. visits to two pilot primary schools during two years. data sources were research led workshops with children, and interviews with students, teachers, and leaders. thematic analysis. webb, r. (2014). doing the rights thing: an ethnography of a examines implications of adopting a dominant ethnographic research during 10 months in a. quennerstedt 9 publication aim of study research design dominant discourse of rights in a primary school in england. (doctoral dissertation, university of sussex). discourse of rights as a framework for guiding policy and practice in a rrsa school. english primary school. discourse analysis of ethnographic data; observations, interviews, texts. winch, a. (2020). our voices matter: how student voice is understood, enacted and experienced explored through case studies of ‘rights respecting schools’ in england. (doctoral dissertation, university of exeter). develops a detailed understanding of how student voice is conceptualised, enabled, enacted and experienced by students, teachers and leaders. case studies of three english secondary rrsa schools. data sources were interviews, observations, focus groups, provision mapping. thematic analysis. woods, f., & bond, c. (2020). how does a level 2 rights respecting school facilitate play for children with special educational needs and disabilities (send)? international journal of playwork practice, 1(1), 1-31. examines how a rrsa school facilitates play for children with special educational needs and disabilities. single case study of english rrsa primary school. data sources were child and teacher interviews and observations. thematic analysis. the studies were read in full. none of them had the explicit aim of evaluating the programme or assessing the achievement of its goals. instead, they focused on a specific issue or aspect. however, descriptions and analyses contained rich information, and therefore offered insights into a wide range of programme-related matters. the findings presented in the different studies were reflected against the aims identified in the analysis of the programme. this entailed several steps: first, findings that were seen as relevant were collected for each aim. the collected findings for each aim were then analysed to identify qualitatively different elements. finally, an assessment was made of the research support for both the achievement of each respective aim and concerns raised relating to the aim. it should be acknowledged that the low number of publications limits the conclusions that can be drawn from the study. as argued earlier, the need to shed new light on the use of school programmes for children’s human rights education still motivates attention to the limited work that has been done. the findings of this study add important elements that enable us to get a more credible picture of whether whole school programmes can provide a good model for children’s hre; however, they cannot provide a definitive answer. human rights education review 10 findings the findings will be presented in two sections, corresponding to the research questions. in the first section, references to unicef documents are given with short names (see legend before references). what are the main aims of unicef school programme? based on the information on its webpages, the following three main aims of unicef uk’s rights respecting schools award were identified: 1. students’ experiences in school should be positive. 2. students’ capacity as rights holders should be built. 3. adults’ rights competence should increase. aim 1: students’ experiences in school should be positive that schools offer students experiences that are positive and promote their wellbeing is a core ambition of unicef’s programme. experiences of feeling valued, safe, and of being heard in school stand out as very significant. that students feel and are safe and protected is emphasised; the theory of change documentation, for example, states as a long-term impact that ‘children feel safe in school’. positive relations between students and teachers, and between students, are also frequently pointed out as decisive for wellbeing in school. to show that the programme affects relations positively, the 2020 evidence report (theory+) describes an ‘increase in those who agreed that pupils were kind and helpful’. the centrality of positive experiences, from being able to express your views and being listened to, is demonstrated in statements such as: ‘teachers and teaching assistants listen positively to pupils’ views and show respect for their opinions’ (toolbox+). further, the school community should be founded on dignity and mutual respect for rights and non-discrimination, which will let students experience being treated as equals (strands+; impact). these positive experiences are to be achieved by embedding rights principles and values into all school matters and contexts. a rights-based perspective is accordingly expected to have a transformational effect on the school environment and human relations in school, and thereby on students’ experiences. an undercurrent to this line of argumentation is found in the material in indications that students’ present experiences are unsatisfactory and should be improved. this is disclosed by statements such as: ‘the award improves the lives of children in the uk by taking a whole school approach to putting children’s rights at the heart of school policy and practice’(impact), or the very name of the theory of change (emphasis added). the aim mainly takes a here-and-now perspective – children are seen to be entitled to experiences that are beneficial for their present wellbeing. but there are also some futuredirected aspects of this aim. positive school experiences are expected to build self-esteem and a. quennerstedt 11 confidence, which will contribute to further growth and development. aim 2: students’ capacity as rights holders should be built that students develop as rights holders and increase their capacities to claim, exercise and protect rights is also a main aim of the programme. such capacities are seen to build on knowledge about the uncrc and an understanding of what rights mean in their own and others’ lives. the centrality of knowledge development is demonstrated in such phrases as ‘the united nations convention on the rights of the child (crc) is made known to children’ (strands) and ‘children have a better knowledge of children’s rights and what these mean in their lives’ (theory). increased knowledge about the convention is assumed to have a range of both immediate and long-term effects. one immediate effect anticipated is that children who know their rights will be ‘empowered to enjoy and exercise their rights and promote the rights of others’ (strands). having knowledge about rights is assumed to make it easier for children to recognise when their own or other children’s rights are being breached in school (theory). there is also an expectation that knowledge about the convention will make children themselves better respect the rights of others in school. this will reduce ‘[n]on-rights respecting behaviours such as bullying and discrimination’ (theory). developing capacities to express an opinion and to take part in decision making are frequently pointed out as central. this is seen in such outcomes as ‘young people can express their opinions, have been involved in decisions about their life in school’ (strand+) and ‘opportunities for children to participate in decisions that affect them’ (theory). more lasting impacts on rights holder capacity are also estimated. rights-respecting attitudes are anticipated to support development towards improved global justice and sustainable living. for example, students are expected to ‘develop a strong sense of social justice and knowledge of local and global issues from a rights perspective and become ambassadors for rights’ (toolbox+), and to ‘become “active”, politically engaged citizens’ (theory). thus, school is seen as key to the development of long-term engagement in social justice issues and children’s capacity to be active citizens who can contribute to change. aim 3: adults’ rights competence should increase the third main aim that is identified in unicef’s programme targets adults in schools, particularly teachers. adults are not expected to already have sufficient knowledge about the uncrc and rights for children. this is evident in several passages that state that the convention should be made known to adults/teachers or that they should develop better knowledge of it (strands, theory). attention is also directed to the actions of adults in school: ‘the award is not just about what children do but also, importantly, what adults do’ (key human rights education review 12 areas). to support schools and teachers to develop knowledge and capacities, unicef arranges training for adults about the programme and about the convention. adults are sometimes called ‘duty bearers’ in the material, which is a strong concept that does not entirely match the more lenient tone concerning teachers’ knowledge. it is spelled out that adults, as duty bearers, are ‘accountable for ensuring that children experience their rights’ (strands). to what extent does recent research show that the aims are achieved in schools that use the programme? in the following i will account for findings in the reviewed research that support the view that programme schools achieve the aims elaborated above, or that question the extent of the contributions. to make the text more readable, references to the six analysed publications are given with surnames only in the running text (with publication year given the first time a publication is referenced). aim 1 – students’ experiences in school should be positive the collated research findings that relate to the first aim show that the programme positively affects school experiences, but also cast some doubt over the same claim. halås (2020), winch (2020) and woods & bond (2020) show that most students who attend programme schools talk favourably about their everyday school lives and social relations in their schools. for example, students in halås’ and winch’s studies describe feeling part of a community characterised by mutual recognition and considerate friendliness, where violence and conflicts are uncommon. most students also report that they can have a say in most matters, are listened to, and can often influence decisions. in emerson & lloyd’s (2017) study, students in programme schools report higher levels of participation than students in nonprogramme schools. the studies also show that some students disagree with the overall satisfaction conveyed by most students. the research also commonly demonstrates that most teachers in the schools visited report that changes for the better have taken place since joining the programme. teachers say that the social relations have improved, mainly between students but also between students and teachers. for example, the teachers in halås’ study report that there are less conflicts, that students’ ability to see others’ perspectives has improved and that the school environment feels safer. the most significant change reported by teachers relates to students’ involvement in discussion and decision making, which is seen to have improved considerably. reports from students and teachers in these studies offer support for the view that most students’ experiences of everyday life in programme schools are positive. it is more difficult a. quennerstedt 13 to conclude, however, to what extent this is attributable to joining the programme, as the only evidence presented is teachers’ accounts in interviews. another aspect that casts some doubt over claims that perceived changes and the current satisfactory situation can be attributed to the programme is that several schools in the studies describe themselves as having been competent and interested in student participation, social relations, and inclusivity before they started the programme. the programme is seen to give a language and a framework for what they think they were already doing. aim 2 – students’ capacity as rights holders should be built the reviewed research clearly shows that the programme schools studied do actively seek to develop students’ capacities as rights holders. there is much work to facilitate students’ opportunities and abilities to have a say in and influence aspects of their school day and environment. halås, winch, webb (2014), and woods & bond all report on practices in the schools that aim to strengthen students’ desire and capacity to take part in discussions and decision making, and they all report that students describe having a say in most matters, being listened to and often being able to affect decisions. the rights council is, in halås’ study, described as giving more power to the students than the students’ council. winch finds that students’ feeling that they have a voice is not diminished when their views do not, in the end, change the decision; the students understand that they cannot always get what they want. teachers report that students have responded to these changes by becoming more engaged in discussions and decision making, and by starting to claim scope for influence. for example, the secondary school students in winch’s study have formed ‘lobbying groups’, which are considered to be very influential. webb argues that the efforts made in relation to giving students more scope to state their views and to influence decisions develop their citizenship capacities and even hold the potential to foster future activism. a second rights-related area through which schools clearly build rights capacity is nondiscriminatory and inclusive relationships. the research reports that students in the programme schools generally show awareness of the equal value of all persons and think that differing views or physical or cultural characteristics should be valued, or at least respected. woods and bond observe that children adapt ongoing play when it is needed for a child with physical disabilities, for example, to take part. students in halås’ study connect rights to bullying and loneliness, and reflect on dilemmas in relations and groups. winch reports students as saying that with voice comes collective responsibility; voices of hate or discriminatory attacks on persons should not go unchallenged. taken together, the research solidly supports the view that the high ambitions in unicef programme schools to develop students’ capacity to state their views, take part in decision human rights education review 14 making and to act in inclusive and non-discriminatory ways can be achieved. nevertheless, this represents a narrow scope in terms of rights education: the development of capacity in other rights-related areas is barely visible in the research. for example, students’ knowledge about rights is an area for capacity building that is highly prioritised in nicef’s description of the programme. knowledge about the uncrc, the rights and their meaning is said to be the foundation on which our capacity as rights holders rests. very little can be found, however, about programme schools’ work to develop such knowledge. halås briefly mentions that rights learning in these schools has improved, but also reports that when asked to state rights, most children interviewed found it hard to remember any. winch notes that rights teaching was seen in the silver and gold schools, but in the bronze school she writes that ‘[e]xplicitly teaching about rights is not yet an integral part of the school’s practice, and student participants do not have an awareness of their rights’ (p. 147). aim 3 – adults’ rights competence should increase teachers in winch’s, halås’ and woods & bond’s studies say consistently that the programme has expanded their knowledge about the convention and rights for children, and that their understanding and commitment have grown. the framework and language that the programme provides is said to guide thinking and action. for example, teachers in halås’ study say that they have gained a new comprehension of what it means to listen to children, and that they have changed the way they collaborate with children. the research also demonstrates that adults in programme schools are aware of how important leadership and policy are to achieve any change, and that structures and practices must be in line with what is communicated in policies. this improvement in adults’ rights competence is only verified by the teachers’ self-reported elevation in knowledge and commitment, which by itself is weak evidence for a programme effect. studies that have examined practice in these schools point out that not all teachers are enthusiastic about the programme, and some are sceptical and do not want to prioritise rights work. webb finds that many school professionals find it a challenge to be the kind of adult the programme asks for. the research does not really discuss that several teachers responsible for implementing the programme take on this role somewhat unwillingly and what the consequences of this might be. dunhill’s (2019) examination of schools’ written material raises questions about whether the knowledge level and commitment to children’s rights in the programme schools have increased as reported by the teachers. first, she shows that the examined programme schools do not employ uncrc language to a great degree, and references to or quotations from it quite often contain direct errors. instead, unicef’s language is repeated, including its focus on ‘rights-respecting’ (rather than rights). according to dunhill and webb, this risks producing a. quennerstedt 15 a rights-respecting discourse, rather than a rights discourse. second, dunhill demonstrates that some elements in schools’ information about their rights work conflict with basic ideas of children’s human rights; for example, statements that some rights are more important than others, and frequent reference to responsibilities. some findings from studies of school practice also counter the impression of the programme’s positive effects on adults’ rights competence. instances where schools’ and teachers’ reasoning does not harmonise with rights principles are demonstrated. winch finds, for example, that rights for children are presented as conditional on competence, and notes that students’ participation (judged according to a four-step scale) in two of the visited schools is restricted to the two lowest steps. webb shows how the ‘empowered’ child subject constructed in unicef’s program becomes a taken-for-granted figure of the child. she reports how, in the school in her study, this image of the child makes school staff less inclined or prepared to notice gendered patterns that negatively affect girls. discussion the overarching concern of this article is to contribute elaborated knowledge about whether collaboration between schools and outside actors can support children’s hre. to bring unicef’s programme and hre closer together, the following discussion will integrate the study’s findings with hre terminology and thinking. the insights from the analysis of unicef’s rights respecting schools award, and of previous research on unicef’s programme, will be mapped onto the three elements of a full-scale hre—education about, through and for human rights—and critically considered. table 2 shows, in the left-hand column, how the three aims and their main content relate to the hre framework. the middle column shows research findings that support that the programme has led to progress towards the aims, and the righthand column shows findings that question the extent of the programme’s positive contribution. human rights education review 16 table 2 programme aims and research findings related to hre framework. programme aims mapped onto the hre framework findings from the analysis that support or question programme contributions to achieving the aims education about rights build rights capacity knowledge about the convention and about the meaning of rights findings that support many students seem familiar with everyone’s equal value and can name some rights. findings that question findings on teaching/learning about rights or students’ knowledge limited and unclear. education through rights positive school experience positive experiences in the present in relation to: being safe expressing opinions being heard being equally treated findings that support student satisfaction with school community’s safety and friendliness, possibility to express opinions and to be heard. teachers claim programme effect – improvement in relations and participation. findings that question no comparison with nonprogramme schools. schools describe being committed before joining programme. increase adult rights competence increased knowledge actions in accordance with knowledge adults as duty bearers teachers say the programme has expanded their knowledge and changed their way of acting. errors in written material and ideas not in line with rights. disharmonising reasoning and actions by teachers. some teachers unwilling/sceptical. only teachers’ selfreporting. no comparison with nonprogram schools. a. quennerstedt 17 programme aims mapped onto the hre framework findings from the analysis that support or question programme contributions to achieving the aims education for rights build rights capacity empowered in the present to: enjoy and exercise rights protect rights of others identify rights breaches express opinion take part in decision making findings that support schools work actively a) to build students’ capacity to express opinions and take part in decisions, and b) to develop students’ views on difference and equality. teachers claim programme effect – improvement in students’ engagement and claims for influence. findings that question narrow scope of capacity building displayed. no comparison with nonprogramme schools. empowered in the future to be: active politically engaged citizen committed to social justice issues, locally and globally schools work to build capacity for actions that confirm the human dignity and equal value of everyone. as can be seen, unicef’s programme engages in all elements of hre. regarding education about rights, the programme emphasises knowledge development, but existing research does not offer much detail about whether this takes place in schools or not, how it is done, or what knowledge students have. clearly, researchers have not chosen to examine this matter; none of the studies in this analysis examined rights teaching or students’ knowledge. some possible reasons may be: (1) the dominant interest in the field of children’s rights studies in issues of ‘participation’, identified in earlier reviews (reyneart et al., 2009; quennerstedt 2020); (2) the tendency noticed by jerome and colleagues (2015) to study processes rather than impact, which is difficult to measure; and (3) the lack of a hre curriculum, as discussed by parker (2018). it is not possible, therefore, to come to a research-based conclusion about whether unicef’s school programme is a way to work effectively toward education about rights. one concern is the programme’s placing of the uncrc as the main object of knowledge, rather than children’s rights or human rights. this is often expressed in terms of students developing ‘knowledge about the convention’. the strong emphasis on the convention itself might distract from deeper considerations of what rights are and mean, and risk limiting learning. further, human rights, or the wider body of international legislation that surrounds human human rights education review 18 rights, are not suggested in the programme to be part of the knowledge that students should draw on when learning about rights. these aspects constitute clear areas of development for the programme if it is to meet the requirements for hre. education through rights can be said to be the main focus of unicef’s programme. there is a strong emphasis on respectful social relations, students’ wellbeing and being heard, and the centrality of adults’ approach, commitment and actions are underlined. there is a clear alignment between the un’s (2011) description of what education through rights entails and the two programme aims mapped to this hre element. a good deal of research supports that the work done in programme schools to make students’ experiences positive has a real effect. but some findings, and a lack of comparative research, raise questions about the extent to which the effects can be specifically accredited to the programme. in terms of the increase of adults’ rights competence, research that supports the effect of the programme is weak as it only draws on self-reporting, and several research findings question whether adults’ competence has increased as much as claimed by teachers themselves. again, no comparative studies are available to confirm that adults in programme schools have a more developed rights competence than teachers in non-programme schools. taken together, it can be concluded that unicef’s school programme might well be a way to work effectively with the hre element education through rights: the programme provides good support and research findings are promising. there are too many question marks to claim any certainty, however. finally, regarding education for rights, the programme aims to build a rights capacity that covers a reasonably wide area, and so aligns fairly well with how the un describes what education for rights should achieve. further, the programme includes both present and future empowerment. the research findings demonstrate that capacity building is prioritised in programme schools, but that their concrete work seems limited to a few rights areas, and accordingly builds a narrower rights capacity than the one aimed for by unicef. for these restricted capacities, good effects are demonstrated by the research. to include a wider range of rights capacities in schools’ capacity building efforts is an obvious area for development for unicef and schools that work within the programme. the lack of comparative research also hinders the possibility to conclude with certainty that there is a programme effect; whether programme schools’ rights capacity work is better than non-programme schools’ has not been studied. taken together, the programme itself holds a good potential to effectively guide education for rights, but the work in schools does not seem to be broad enough to meet what is expected from a hre perspective. conclusions and looking forward this study can conclude that unicef’s rights respecting schools award can provide good a. quennerstedt 19 support for effective work with children’s human rights education; however, it also concludes that the programme needs development. the weakest part of the programme regards education about rights, where significant improvement to conform to the standards that can be expected from a hre viewpoint seems vital. as parker (2018) notes, a curriculum of hre could aid such development. concerning education through and for rights, the programme harmonises well with hre ambitions, but the actual work in schools seems to be narrower than what the programme aims for, and the changes might not be as extensive as argued. a recommendation to unicef is to consider how the programme can push for a broader approach by schools. in 2015, jerome et al. pointed out positive effects of school programmes that are well supported by the research evidence. this study confirms these effects and elaborates on how they take concrete form in educational practice. the evidence for programme effect remains quite weak. i suggest that future research about school programmes for rights education should consider this when designing research, so that stronger evidence can be obtained. this includes thorough considerations of sample sizes and selection of research participants, to ensure that data is sufficient and representative of the school population, and undertaking comparative research that includes the situations in and reports from both programme schools and non-programme ones. as noted above, there is also a dire need for studies that examine programmes’ impact on students’ knowledge about rights. school programmes devised by outside actors are and will continue to be a valuable support for teachers and schools in their efforts to provide hre for children and young people. in the long term, however, hre needs to become a standard part of teachers’ professional competence. relying on outside actors cannot be a permanent solution for hre in schools. we are not there yet, however, and such school programmes will aid the development in the meantime. table 3 legend and links to referenced unicef material. short name full name link strands (+) working towards the rrsa. the strands of a rights respecting school (webpage) https://www.unicef.org.uk/rightsrespecting-schools/the-rrsa/the-rrsastrands/ https://www.unicef.org.uk/rights-respecting-schools/the-rrsa/the-rrsa-strands/ https://www.unicef.org.uk/rights-respecting-schools/the-rrsa/the-rrsa-strands/ https://www.unicef.org.uk/rights-respecting-schools/the-rrsa/the-rrsa-strands/ human rights education review 20 short name full name link key areas what is a rights respecting school? 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(2010). perspectives of research on human rights education. journal of human rights education, 2(1), 8-29. united nations (un) (1989, november 20). convention on the rights of the child (treaty series, 1577). adopted and opened for signature, ratification and accession by general assembly resolution 44/25. retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx united nations (un) (2006). world programme for human rights education first phase. new york and geneva: united nations. retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/en/resources/educators/human-rights-educationtraining/world-programme-human-rightseducation/phase1#:~:text=the%20first%20phase%20%2820052009%29%20of%20the%20world%20programme,education%20in%20the%20primary %20and%20secondary%20school%20systems. united nations (un) (2011, december 19). united nations declaration on human rights education and training. adopted by the general assembly, resolution 66/137, a/res/66/137, 19 december 2011. retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/en/resources/educators/human-rights-education-training/11united-nations-declaration-human-rights-education-and-training-2011 webb, r. (2014). doing the rights thing: an ethnography of a dominant discourse of rights in a primary school in england. (doctoral dissertation). university of sussex, uk. retrieved from http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/id/eprint/50800/ winch, a. (2020). our voices matter: how student voice is understood, enacted and experienced explored through case studies of ‘rights respecting schools’ in england. (doctoral dissertation). university of exeter, uk. retrieved from https://ore.exeter.ac.uk/repository/handle/10871/122735 woods, f., & bond, c. (2020). how does a level 2 rights respecting school facilitate play for children with special educational needs and disabilities (send)? international journal of playwork practice, 1(1), 1-31. https://doi.org/10.25035/ijpp.01.01.01 zembylas, m., charalambous, p., lesta, s., & charalambous, c. (2015). primary school teachers’ understandings of human rights and human rights education (hre) in cyprus: an exploratory study. human rights review, 16(2), 161-182. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12142-014-0331-5 https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx https://www.ohchr.org/en/resources/educators/human-rights-education-training/world-programme-human-rights-education/phase1#:~:text=the%20first%20phase%20%282005-2009%29%20of%20the%20world%20programme,education%20in%20the%20primary%20and%20secondary%20school%20systems https://www.ohchr.org/en/resources/educators/human-rights-education-training/world-programme-human-rights-education/phase1#:~:text=the%20first%20phase%20%282005-2009%29%20of%20the%20world%20programme,education%20in%20the%20primary%20and%20secondary%20school%20systems 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https://www.ohchr.org/en/resources/educators/human-rights-education-training/11-united-nations-declaration-human-rights-education-and-training-2011 http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/id/eprint/50800/ https://ore.exeter.ac.uk/repository/handle/10871/122735 https://doi.org/10.25035/ijpp.01.01.01 https://doi.org/10.1007/s12142-014-0331-5 unicef’s rights respecting schools award as children’s human rights education abstract keywords introduction aim and research questions children’s human rights education previous research on the impact of school programmes for rights education the rights respecting schools award programme material and analysis rq1 – main aims rq2 – research support for aim achievement findings what are the main aims of unicef school programme? aim 1: students’ experiences in school should be positive aim 2: students’ capacity as rights holders should be built aim 3: adults’ rights competence should increase to what extent does recent research show that the aims are achieved in schools that use the programme? aim 1 – students’ experiences in school should be positive aim 2 – students’ capacity as rights holders should be built aim 3 – adults’ rights competence should increase discussion conclusions and looking forward references challenges and possibilities for transformative human rights education in icelandic upper secondary schools issn 2535-5406 vol 5, no 3 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4981 date received: 30-06-2022 date accepted: 14-11-2022 peer reviewed article © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles challenges and possibilities for transformative human rights education in icelandic upper secondary schools sue e. gollifer university of iceland, iceland, sueg@hi.is abstract transformative human rights education (hre) implies a pedagogic intention to generate human rights cultures, protecting against and preventing human rights violations. this article draws on freirean critical pedagogy to define transformative hre as requiring four pedagogical principles: an explicit pedagogic intention; critical engagement on purposes of education; a critical holistic approach; and cosmopolitan perspectives. a thematic analysis of ten upper secondary school teachers’ narratives on working with human rights in iceland reveals reliance on tacit rather than explicit pedagogical intentions, a lack of critical engagement on purposes of education, and limited opportunities to develop human rights and hre knowledge, inhibiting a critical holistic approach and cosmopolitan perspectives. however, the narratives offer content and contexts that provide possibilities to develop the four pedagogical principles required for transformative hre through processes of critical relational dialogue. this paper raises questions of significance for teacher education in iceland and internationally. keywords narrative inquiry, upper secondary schooling, human rights education, critical pedagogy, teacher education http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:sueg@hi.is s. e. gollifer 5 introduction drawing on a narrative inquiry of ten upper secondary school (uss) teachers’ experiences of working with human rights (gollifer, 2021), i discuss the challenges and possibilities for transformative human rights education (hre) in upper secondary schools (usss) in iceland. despite different interpretations and models of hre (flowers, 2004; tibbitts, 2017), the goal of hre typically involves empowering students to build and promote a universal culture of human rights by learning about, through and for human rights (united nations human rights office of the high commissioner, 2011), suggesting a transformative intention. globalisation has helped to bring about an increased reference to human rights in educational policies since 1990 (ramirez, suárez & meyer, 2007). yet nordic responses to the evaluation of the 2005-ongoing united nations world programme for human rights education (united nations, n.d.) suggest scarce reporting, weak implementation strategies, and the need for hre national action plans (danish institute for human rights, 2017; ministry of justice finland, 2017; united nations, 2017). as signatories to international human rights declarations and conventions, nordic states are responsible for ensuring students’ right to hre. while they do not constitute a political entity, they share commonalities related to culture, social structure, and history, influencing the way hre is understood and implemented (osler, 2016). hre is a new and under-researched field in iceland. as such, this paper provides valuable insights for hre implementation in formal schooling both in iceland and internationally. iceland is the smallest of the nordic countries with a population of 376,248 (statistics iceland, 2022a). its growing migrant population is currently placed at over 15% (statistics iceland, 2022b). the introduction of the 2008 education act for usss (2008) and the 2011 national curriculum guides (ncgs) (ministry of education, science and culture, 2012) for all levels of schooling represented a significant shift from the previous subject-based curriculum. the ncgs promote inter-disciplinary competence-based learning informed by six cross-curricular pillars, including democracy, human rights and equality. legislation supporting hre includes the 1989 convention on the rights of the child (crc) (article 29), incorporated into icelandic law in 2013 (act on the convention of the rights of the child 19/2013). implementation of the 2010 council of europe charter on education for democratic citizenship and human rights education (council of europe, 2010) and the 2011 united nations declaration on human rights education and training (undhret) (united nations human rights office of the high commissioner, 2011) is the responsibility of member states. although not legally binding, undhret’s exclusive hre focus highlights responsibility for legislative and administrative measures, and policies to support hre implementation (gerber, 2011). understanding the challenges and possibilities for transformative hre in schools can support effective implementation. human rights education review – volume 5(3) 6 this paper aims to answer the question: what do upper secondary school teachers’ narratives on working with human rights suggest about the challenges and possibilities for hre as a transformative pedagogy in icelandic upper secondary schools? in the next section, i draw on empirical hre studies to discuss the challenges to transformative hre in schools. i then present four pedagogical principles drawn from freirean critical pedagogy that i suggest are needed to foster the transformational potential of teachers’ work with human rights. these principles are used to analyse uss teachers’ narratives on their experiences of working with human rights. despite the challenges to transformative hre, i conclude by suggesting that teachers’ narratives offer opportunities for teacher education; the content and contexts in the narratives can be used to develop the four pedagogical principles through critical relational dialogue. challenges to transformative hre in schools over 50 years ago unesco recognised the transformative potential of education to promote peace and international understanding, identifying a specific role for human rights to act against all forms of racism, fascism, and apartheid (united nations human rights office of the high commissioner, 1974). unesco’s most recent report, reimagining our future together: a new social contract for education (unesco, 2021), continues to emphasise the power of education to repair injustices and transform the future. as donaldo macedo states in the introduction to pedagogy of the oppressed (freire, 2005), education can never be neutral given its directive nature and, as such, must always be transformative. the notion of education as a transformative process is implied under article two of the undhret, which presents hre as learning about, through and for human rights to contribute to the promotion, protection and effective realisation of all human rights (united nations human rights office of the high commissioner, 2011). learning about refers to human rights knowledge, learning through to pedagogies underpinned by human right principles, while learning for reflects the actionoriented dimension integral to transformation. article 4 makes explicit undhret’s transformative intentions, stating its purpose as the ‘eradication of all forms of discrimination, racism, stereotyping and incitement to hatred and the harmful attitudes and prejudices that underlie them’. studies show that hre in schools, if it occurs at all, is far from transformative. tibbitts (2017, p. 86) suggests that dominant hre models in schools reflect ‘socialization towards prosocial behaviour’. various tendencies combine to dilute the transformational potential of hre in schools: over-emphasis on declarationist approaches (keet, 2017); narrow ethical and moral foci without legal knowledge (lundy & martínez sainz, 2018); interpretations of human rights and hre as synonymous with national values (osler & lybæk, 2014; strømmen lile, 2019; vesterdal, 2016, 2019); and emphasis on personal rather than institutional responsibility for s. e. gollifer 7 human rights (bajaj, 2012). struthers (2017) draws on extensive empirical data on teaching human rights in primary schools in england to suggest that inappropriate attitudes to the empowerment of students and weak government policy make it unlikely that students leave school capable of contributing to broader human rights cultures. she calls for improved teacher education to build teacher confidence and comfort in engaging with transformative approaches. other research calls for teacher education to build teachers’ human rights knowledge (vesterdal, 2016; zembylas, charalambous & charalambous, 2016), including legal literacy (lundy & martínez sainz, 2018). without adequate teacher education, teachers are challenged to engage with human rights controversies and develop students’ political human rights consciousness (jerome, liddle, & young, 2020; struthers, 2017). hre is further challenged by inertial constraints to the introduction of new content such as human rights. assumed acceptance of an education system has a preservative function which results in a general conservatism that protects traditional subjects, fails to provide space to critically engage with potential futures and encourages lack of accountability to ensure enactment of policy (jónasson, 2016, p.14). i will now suggest how freirean critical pedagogy provides a base from which to address these challenges, creating transformative forms of hre. transformative hre freire refers to education as a political act to develop conscientização (critical consciousness) of social reality. this act is informed by praxis (reflection and action); critical dialogue and examination of root causes of oppression to transform an unjust world (freire, 2005). freire understood dialogic pedagogy as the practice of freedom to develop the capacities necessary for human agency. this implies a critical learning process aimed at ‘an expanded notion of politics and agency through a language of scepticism and possibility, and a culture of openness, debate, and engagement’ (giroux, 2010, p. 718). dialogic pedagogy is not a simple pedagogical technique but an epistemological social relationship, requiring a critical and respectful mind. learning and knowing are dependent on dialogue not as an end but as a critical relational process to develop understanding of the object of knowledge (freire, 2005). a reading of freire suggests that four pedagogical principles—an explicit pedagogical intention, critical engagement on purposes of education, a critical holistic approach, and cosmopolitan perspectives—are needed to support the transformative potential of hre in formal schooling. these interrelated principles can challenge inertial constraints by building teachers’ human rights-related knowledge and confidence through relational and critical judgements about purposes of education, as i now explain. addressing human rights should not be dependent on participatory and student-centred approaches, where human rights are implicit. developing a culture of human rights requires human rights education review – volume 5(3) 8 an explicit pedagogical intention. the role of the critical pedagogue is ‘to make sure that the future points the way to a more socially just world’ (giroux, 2010, p. 717) by drawing on ‘discourses of critique and possibility in conjunction with the values of reason, freedom and equality’, with the intention to transform lived realities ‘as part of a broader democratic project’ (giroux, 2010, p. 717). to develop an explicit pedagogical intention, teachers require critical engagement with diverse others about purposes of education. transformative hre moves beyond education aimed at qualifications and socialisation, which biesta (2020) describes as two domains of the purpose of education. it also requires subjectification, the third domain (biesta, 2020). exploring the self in relations with diverse others allows for new interpretations and knowledge that inform the way the world is viewed and engaged with. for teachers, critical consciousness opens space for questions about what, how and, importantly, why students learn; what education is about and for. encouraging freirean critical dialogue to explore purposes of education provides teachers the opportunity to challenge assumed acceptance of dominant purposes of education and adopt critical holistic approaches when working with human rights concerns. a critical holistic approach is the antithesis of what freire refers to as banking education, where ‘the scope of action allowed to the students extends only as far as receiving, filing, and storing the deposits’ (freire, 2005, p. 72). applied to hre, a critical holistic approach implies a cognitive, affective and action-oriented process informed by critical relational dialogues based on mutual trust and respect. processes of learning and knowing require both theoretical content and practice to make visible conflicting and competing histories and ideologies (freire, 2005). such an approach emphasises learning about human rights in ways that challenge acceptance of human rights as a legitimised universal consensus; it encourages accountability for rights, and challenges what freire (2005) calls verbalism (reflection without action) and action for action’s sake (action without reflection). a critical holistic hre approach develops reflection and action that allow the moral and the legal dimensions of human rights to intersect to create critical judgements understood as political acts (adami, 2017). these critical judgements are informed by cosmopolitan perspectives. cosmopolitan perspectives challenge narrow interpretations of human rights and hre that can be discriminatory and exclusive. cosmopolitanism refers to an understanding that ‘one should relate ethically to people from around the world as equal fellow humans’ (gasper, 2006, p. 1229). cosmopolitan perspectives reflect freirean critical consciousness in that both seek indivisible forms of solidarity between people and lived realities, with reality understood as process, as transformation, rather than as a static entity (freire, 2005). osler and starkey (2010) present a cosmopolitan vision of the universal declaration of human rights, underpinned by universality, solidarity, reciprocity, and indivisibility. the universality of human rights should not be understood as diplomatic universals built on assumed consensus s. e. gollifer 9 or to imply sameness. applying a cosmopolitan perspective to the notion of universal human rights allows for ‘the otherness revealed through the multitude of unique life narratives of individuals in diverse contexts’ (adami, 2017, p. 68). the interrelated nature of these four principles—an explicit pedagogical intention, critical engagement on purposes of education, a critical holistic approach, and cosmopolitan perspectives—supports the critical potential of hre. combined, they help to problematise narrow interpretations of hre (adami, 2017; keet, 2012; tibbitts, 2020) and challenge a divisive nationalistic consciousness that affirms subjectivity in hegemonic terms, blocking access to rights for certain members of society (adami, 2017). methods teachers’ narratives provide a valuable resource (osler & zhu, 2011) offering diverse understandings of human rights and the complexities involved in pursuing justice through schooling. the study of teachers’ narratives, that is stories of teachers’ own experiences, has been recognised as crucial to the study of teachers’ thinking, culture, and behaviour (clandinin, 2013). this paper uses teachers’ narratives to answer the question: what do upper secondary school teachers’ narratives on working with human rights suggest about the challenges and possibilities for hre as a transformative pedagogy in icelandic upper secondary schools? usss in iceland present an interesting context to research hre because of a continued emphasis on academic subject specialisation (bjarnardóttir, 2019), despite 2011 policy supporting interdisciplinary and cross-curricular teaching and the introduction of new content, including human rights. in this research project, gatekeepers assisted in the selection of the five female and five male uss teachers who self-identified as working with human rights while teaching mathematics, english, history, science, geography, geology, gender studies, philosophy, and cultural literacy. teaching experience ranged from four to over 25 years, and teachers worked in each of the different types of uss in iceland: schools with exclusively academic study programmes, comprehensive schools offering academic and vocational programmes, and vocational/technical colleges. open-ended interviews were used to collect data on teachers’ reasons for identifying as working with human rights and social justice, their teaching practices and perception of challenges. the teachers were interviewed between one and three times in english and were encouraged to use icelandic when they lacked a word or a phrase. in the rare cases they did, transcripts were checked for accurate translations. this paper does not draw conclusions, make comparisons, or claim population representation in relation to variables such as school type, school culture, subject area, age, gender, ethnicity, or socioeconomic status. the human rights education review – volume 5(3) 10 teachers’ stories are used to identify and inquire into the challenges and possibilities for transformative hre in usss, suggesting a social constructivist understanding of knowledge creation (clandinin, 2013; goodson & gill, 2014). reflexive thematic analysis (braun & clarke, 2019) was used to generate themes associated with the four pedagogical principles introduced in the previous section. the themes i will now present are supported by quotes using pseudonyms. dependence on tacit pedagogical intentions well, first of all, i don’t think i am doing it enough... i mean, i am doing it very unconsciously, until starting this project with you, i hadn’t really thought of myself as using, you know, human rights approaches, i haven’t been very conscious of it but it’s just more, part of who i am and what i think is important (ella, english teacher). ella’s comment above reflects a common sentiment amongst the teachers; their work with human rights is unconscious rather than informed by explicit pedagogical intentions. as bjarni, a geography teacher points out: ‘it was not an agenda to promote social justice, but i think you are always promoting social justice and human rights, but you don’t know you are doing it’. despite self-identifying as working with human rights and social justice, helga, an experienced history teacher with a strong sense of justice, admits she has not thought about teaching and social justice in any depth: ‘i wanted to ask you what you meant by social justice because that is something that i would say, yeah, that’s me, definitely, social justice, but then…what are we talking about?’ tumi, an english and philosophy teacher, suggests that social justice intentions are: ‘more like something that just unconsciously slipped through because it is a concern with all of us, i mean, all the teachers will all think about this a little bit’. tacit knowledge explains people’s ability to implicitly know and do things. however, they are not able to articulate such knowledge very well, and this makes sharing it difficult (polanyi, 1966). dependence on tacit knowledge dilutes the transformational potential of human rights, which requires an explicit pedagogical intention informed by knowledge of human rights and hre to ensure critical holistic approaches and cosmopolitan perspectives. despite their good intentions, teachers’ work can perpetuate unjust school practices. as they individually attempt to engage with social justice concerns, inertial constraints in the form of assumed acceptance of traditional school practices allow dominant purposes of education to persist, pushing new content and ways of teaching to the periphery of the curriculum. developing the tacit into explicit pedagogical intention requires critical engagement on purposes of education to develop teachers’ critical consciousness about what education is about and for. however, institutional constraints impede such critical engagement. s. e. gollifer 11 institutional constraints all ten teachers refer to tensions between introducing new content, such as human rights, and stakeholder expectations of conventional subject teaching and assessment processes. in a school culture characterised by what tumi refers to as ‘self-regulation’, teachers find themselves conforming to existing dominant practices: i come into a [school] culture, and i come in with some ideas… but then you settle into this rhythm, a routine… and there’s nobody from above or from outside coming to tell you or saying you have some grunnþættir [the fundamental pillars]… the conservative teachers, they are the ones who win out in the end. as a science teacher concerned about student dropout rates, simon suggests a need for the school leadership to better engage: ‘i am deeply worried about my school. there is no discussion... i think that the leadership of the school is taking no responsibility’. anna, a gender studies teacher, points out, ‘if you have a job as a teacher, you get students and you go into the classroom and you do what you damn well please’. lack of critical relational dialogue amongst teachers about the implications of having democracy and human rights as a core curriculum pillar can create hostility towards teachers who want to address human rights in schools. selma, an english teacher, was involved at the national level in the development of the 2011 curriculum. while mathematics, english and icelandic were allocated a certain number of credits and teaching hours, schools could decide how to organise the remainder of the curriculum. selma found the situation stressful because of resistance from teachers who sought to defend their own subjects: ‘this is such a political thing, and how do you sort of, what do you put in that recipe? do you throw danish out?’ she describes teachers as defensive and focused on their own subject speciality during school planning meetings. she recalls feeling intimidated by a colleague who asked her, ‘are you implementing gender issues because you are a feminist?’ while referring to her work on gender in her english class. selma talks about feeling guilty when she addresses social justice and human rights because it may be perceived by other stakeholders as not doing what she is paid to do. lack of respectful and relational critical engagement on issues of concern raised by teachers and about their pedagogical choices can lead to feelings of insecurity and lack of confidence. simon recalls an incident when one teacher tried to create a dialogue amongst teachers about the gendered nature of extracurricular clubs. the result was a heated email exchange with no action taken. simon describes his colleague’s attempt to generate staff discussions on gender concerns as a wasted opportunity. he points out that although the same concerns are raised each year by individual teachers, lack of initiative and interest from school leadership creates complacency. the situation he describes reflects what jónasson (2016) refers to as inertial constraints to curriculum reform. tumi describes attempts by two female colleagues to human rights education review – volume 5(3) 12 challenge decisions made by student associations because of content that he describes as ‘borderline, you know, sexist, i don’t know, i´m not saying racist, but, you know, scary, a little iffy’. the lack of support from school management left his colleagues feeling frustrated. when dominant purposes of education emphasise qualification and socialisation and neglect subjectification (biesta, 2020), teachers’ attempts at challenging injustice are unsupported. without legitimising what teachers do, their capacity to collectively organise and engage in critical and relational ways is limited. this means that dominant purposes of education persist and possibilities to generate alternative critical approaches become diluted. diluted criticality and cosmopolitan perspectives the teachers associate hre with participatory, student-centred pedagogy and modelling human rights values in the classroom. they refer to ‘mutual respect,’ ‘care’, ‘fairness’, ‘empathy’ and ‘learning about different others’. ilmur, a cultural literacy teacher, describes encouraging students to recognise and appreciate diversity to challenge what she refers to as a national culture that is ‘not accepting of whomever’: ‘it is important to think about where we come from, how diverse it can be, what we think to be right and wrong towards others’. similarly, helga describes an elective human rights course where students volunteer with the red cross and take part in a 24-hour simulation of being a refugee. helga discusses the course as a means of developing student capacity to learn about the other: ‘that’s probably what i am hoping for, just a kind of better understanding towards those who are different in some way, in school or out of it’. ella and selma use literature to engage students in discussions on characters’ experiences of injustice by creating opportunities for students to place themselves in the position of marginalised characters. ella also uses creative writing and journalling to encourage students to explore themes related to racism, sexism and prejudice in her english class. these examples reflect learning through human rights in that teachers adopt learning and teaching approaches that reflect human rights principles. in an analysis of case studies of social studies teachers in different national contexts, starkey (2021) suggests that teachers’ prefigurative practices and counternarratives can be understood as transformative civic education. the teachers’ narratives provide examples of challenging dominant hegemonic social and school discourses by encouraging democratic processes reflective of their own vision of the ideal society or school. for example, tumi uses democratic deliberation techniques to engage students in a game where they collaboratively create their version of a democratic society while viktor, a mathematics teacher, emphasises pedagogy to build student confidence and wellbeing to challenge a school system that favours academic achievement, leaving students labelled as ‘able’ or ‘not able’: s. e. gollifer 13 when you fail maths, and you’re not sure what you are going to do, and your selfconfidence isn’t high, then you don’t allow yourself to experiment and try different things. some teachers adopt more action-oriented approaches. ingimar, a history teacher, refers to project-based activities to challenge dominant textbook narratives: ‘i did not want to have a class where all we did was to confirm some stereotypes of how life and things are’. anna aims to generate student moral and political consciousness by writing about domestic violence and pornography, while bjarni actively sought to collaborate with a colleague to challenge the perception that human suffering in unfamiliar contexts is ‘not as serious a matter as things that happen in your backyard’: we have been taught about the jews and the holocaust, you know, from since they were born, and so we can probably imagine that, but this reality, i don’t think they understand it. however, it is important to question the extent to which teachers’ practices are prefigurative or represent counternarratives with transformative potential. prefigurative practices challenge dominant hegemonic discourses and practices; they function as a form of counternarrative because they ‘challenge the implicit dominance of the ruling mainstream narratives’ (starkey, 2021, p. 239). mccowan (2010, p.23) understands prefiguration as ‘forms of organisation’ that ‘reflect or model the ideal society they wish to bring into being’. his three functions of prefiguration include realisation of the ideal society in the present, learning as a process for the development of new ideas, and exemplification as a side-effect that allows people to see the possibility of alternatives. although teachers’ practices reflect degrees of these three prefigurations, as for example ingimar’s attempt to challenge dominant textbook narratives and tumi’s use of democratic deliberation techniques, depending on tacit knowledge rather than human rights and hre knowledge, and lack of critical relational dialogue on purposes of education, can dilute the development of critical holistic approaches and teachers’ cosmopolitan perspectives. despite an explicit political intention in the way that she works with students, anna acknowledges that while she draws on the law in her own feminist activism outside of school, she does not do this sufficiently when teaching about gender-related concerns. her use of legislation such as the icelandic constitution or laws related to gender equality have focused on historical perspectives rather than accountability and responsibility: ‘i have not, you know, in my work as a teacher, i have not put any effort or focus on that, but this, this conversation makes me just start thinking about it’. similarly, ilmur explains that while being familiar with the legal dimension of human rights, ‘it is not something that i thought of, you know, as being important’. the legal dimension of hre, including legal knowledge, is an important component human rights education review – volume 5(3) 14 of hre to foster political awareness and action (jerome et al., 2020; lundy & martínez sainz, 2018). it provides an opportunity to inform freirean praxis, reflection and action that generates an action-oriented response to injustice. over-emphasis on socio-moral dimensions of human rights without engaging with the legal and political dimensions suggests a diluted critical holistic approach. helga wants her students to empathise with refugees through the 24-hour simulation activity. however, without opportunities for collective and critical analysis of why and how human rights legislation can work to protect some but fail others, student capacity to develop cosmopolitan perspectives towards injustice is limited. despite these challenges, i now suggest that teachers’ narratives also offer content and contexts that provide possibilities for teacher education to develop the four pedagogical principles required for transformative hre. possibilities for transformative hre narratives can provide content and contexts that provide opportunities for in-depth analysis of struggles for justice and counternarratives (adami, 2017; osler & zhu, 2011; starkey, 2021). in this section, i illustrate how working with the content and contexts drawn from the teachers’ narratives through processes of critical relational dialogue can encourage explicit pedagogical intentions, critical engagement on purposes of education, a critical holistic approach, and cosmopolitan perspectives. the narratives provide important content to develop human rights knowledge and challenge dominant hegemonic perspectives, by exploring human rights from a moral, legal and political perspective. this content can be framed in terms of rights to and in education and human rights concerns more broadly. for example, simon and viktor use student-centred and participatory methods to challenge the didactic approach common in usss, where subject hierarchy and traditional power structures are common. if counternarratives build on convictions that they can be justified by human rights (starkey, 2021), there is a need for human rights knowledge. simon’s and viktor’s narratives can be used to make connections between the right to be in school and feel secure and a school system that legitimises exclusion of certain students. this helps to build recognition that discourse promoting equal rights for all can draw the political dimension of human rights towards reasonable justifications for neglect (adami, 2017). such knowledge builds teachers’ awareness of the role schools can play in violating students’ rights even when their rights to education may be realised. a second example of how content can be used to develop human rights and hre knowledge is drawn from bjarni’s narrative. he describes an annual multicultural event organised by the school association: s. e. gollifer 15 we have had a dance from girls from vietnam, cooking, cooking classes from asia and tapestry from eastern europe… we are promoting other cultures by letting the students do it themselves. his narrative provides an important opportunity for teachers to discuss the role of student associations in maintaining hegemonic views, despite good intentions. events such as multicultural days can create simplistic views of culture and ethnicity that perpetuate rather than challenge prejudice and discrimination (gorski, 2008). providing an opportunity to critically engage with these concerns can raise questions about perceptions of ‘a homogenous ‘us’ restricted to certain kinds of national, ethnic, cultural, religious or socioeconomic belongings’ (adami, 2014, p. 293). this can help to develop cosmopolitan perspectives that challenge the limits of human rights, including how they may be used to promote ‘national narratives of homogeneous, political and cultural accounts of belonging’ (adami, 2017, p.71). there is a tendency for teachers to react towards injustice from an emotional and moral standpoint without addressing the legal and political role of institutions to respond to discriminatory and exclusionary practices (lundy & sainz, 2018). ella’s narrative provides content that can be used to illustrate the importance of discussing rights from a legal and political, as well as moral perspective. she talks about studying in a university in the u.s. with a predominantly african american student population. this experience provides an opportunity for ella to critically discuss issues of privilege and power. similarly, her description of a family trip to mexico can be used to examine socioeconomic wellbeing. she describes the trip as an opportunity to get her children to appreciate what they have and is proud when her son wants to give his shoes to a mexican boy living on the street. this content allows for an analysis of acts of generosity, raising questions about how well-intentioned responses can perpetuate injustice and mask privilege. an analysis of her son’s act of generosity that is informed by a legal and political human rights perspective can raise awareness of systemic influences on social inequalities and lack of institutional accountability to ensure human rights. dialogues on content raised in the narratives—such as socioeconomic inequalities, genderbased violence, student dropout, refugees and asylum seekers and the role of student associations—raise critical awareness of individual, state and school accountability and responsibility to ensure human rights, when informed by domestic legislation such as the act on the crc (no. 19/2013) and the act on equal treatment irrespective of race or ethnic origin (no. 85/2018). working as individuals dependent on tacit pedagogical intentions informed by moral and political convictions can lead to pedagogical choices that allow assumed acceptance of dominant hegemonic perspectives. analysing content in teachers’ narratives informed by human rights theory and knowledge can help teachers to develop explicit pedagogical human rights education review – volume 5(3) 16 intentions and critical holistic approaches, underpinned by cosmopolitan perspectives. providing this opportunity for teachers to collectively discuss content in their own narratives also creates contexts for critical relational dialogue that promotes the significance of subjectification as one of the three domains of the purpose of education. narratives can be used as contexts for relational approaches to teacher education. dialogue informed by teachers’ unique and diverse perspectives generates learning with others, as opposed to about or from others (adami, 2014). when this dialogue aims to kindle teachers’ intellectual curiosity to discover what learning is about and indeed for, it offers possibilities for subjectification as a necessary domain of the purpose of education (biesta, 2020). subjectification emphasises freedom to act as relative to the subjectification of others, placing more attention towards questions of content, teacher/student relationships and, in particular, purposes of learning. in this sense, teachers are developing human rights-related content/knowledge through relational approaches dependent on dialogic pedagogy, where plurality is understood as the necessary condition to become a subject (biesta, 2013). teachers’ narratives provide content and contexts made up of perspectives of teachers from different subject specialisations. learning in relation with each other’s diverse stories in respectful ways can address hostility towards new ways of doing things in environments of competing interests. processes of critical relational dialogue encourage intrinsic responses rather than instrumental intentions to achieve the educators’ purpose, encouraging the development of teacher agency. teachers’ narratives as content and contexts for in-depth analysis of justice concerns provide teacher education the opportunity to develop explicit pedagogical intentions, critical engagement on purposes of education, a critical holistic approach, and cosmopolitan perspectives, the four pedagogical principles needed for transformative hre. conclusion an analysis of ten uss teachers’ narratives identifies challenges to transformative hre in iceland. these challenges are related to reliance on tacit rather than explicit pedagogical intentions, lack of critical engagement on purposes of education, and diluted critical holistic approaches and cosmopolitan perspectives. however, possibilities for teacher education to develop the four pedagogical principles required for transformative hre through processes of critical relational dialogue lie in the content and contexts of teachers’ narratives. when educators engage in the courageous act of education, characterised by being open to the world and diverse others, and are receptive to the possibilities that unfinishedness offers social justice (freire, 2005), transformative hre can become a reality. empirical studies on how relational approaches to teacher education can work in practice in diverse educational s. e. gollifer 17 and country contexts can contribute to understanding the possibilities for transformative hre in formal education. references act on equal treatment irrespective of race or ethnic origin no. 85/2018 [lög um jafna meðferð óháð kynþætti og þjóðernisuppruna nr. 85/2018]. retrieved from https://www.government.is/library/04-legislation/nr-85%202018-english.pdf act on the convention of the rights of the child no. 19/2013 [lög um samning sameinuðu þjóðanna um réttindi barnsins]. retrieved from https://www.ilo.org/dyn/natlex/docs/electronic/95341/112201/f1524267405/isl95 341%20isl.pdf adami, r. 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transformative human rights education in icelandic upper secondary schools abstract keywords introduction challenges to transformative hre in schools transformative hre methods dependence on tacit pedagogical intentions institutional constraints diluted criticality and cosmopolitan perspectives possibilities for transformative hre conclusion references youth digital activism, social media and human rights education: the fridays for future movement issn 2535-5406 http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4958 date received: 21-06-2022 date accepted: 12-05-2023 peer reviewed article © 2023 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles youth digital activism, social media and human rights education: the fridays for future movement gabriela martinez sainz university college dublin, ireland, gabriela.martinezsainz@ucd.ie amy hanna university of strathclyde, uk, gabriela.martinezsainz@ucd.ie abstract this article examines the social media activity (twitter) of the youth-led ‘fridays for future’ climate movement during the transition from in-person to online strikes early in the covid-19 pandemic. our aim was to identify possibilities and challenges for human rights education in youth digital activism. the research question of the study was to explore whether and how the digital environment serves as an educational space for learning about, for and through human rights. adopting a digital ethnography, we analysed over 9,400 posts in 2020 and 2022, examining the extent to which activists’ understandings of civil, political and socio-economic rights—particularly peaceful assembly, freedom of expression, the right to a healthy environment and adequate standard of living—developed. findings reveal the responsive, inclusive, and experiential nature of peer-to-peer learning in a social movement and our discussion considers how digital activism might support future human rights-based digital learning. keywords digital environment, social movements, digital ethnography, peaceful assembly, experiential learning http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.5120 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:gabriela.martinezsainz@ucd.ie mailto:gabriela.martinezsainz@ucd.ie human rights education review 2 introduction in 2022, the youth-led climate movement fridays for future (fff) organised more than 700 protests worldwide as part of their global climate strike. global protests and massive mobilisations of children and young people have been the trademark of fff, even though the movement only started with greta thunberg skipping school on fridays to protest outside the swedish parliament, demanding urgent action against the climate crisis. four years later, fff has over 14 million people participating in different actions and mobilisations organised by children and young people (fridays for future, 2022). a core goal of the ff movement is to raise awareness about the climate crisis to foster actions that will limit global warming (fridays for future, 2022). this emphasises the educational agenda of the movement. this paper aims to explore the contributions of this social movement in raising awareness of climate-crisisrelated human rights among young people. the informal spaces for human rights education (hre) that emerge in social movements can provide unique educational possibilities, even though the opportunities granted by these spaces are often overlooked. social movements demonstrate how rights cultures emerge and evolve in social contexts (clément, 2011) and the everyday world of social activism can promote the learning of rights (choudry & kappoor, 2010). if our goal is to design and implement hre initiatives that are meaningful, contextually relevant and lead to significant social and political transformations, it is necessary to examine the learning processes that occur within social movements. this paper presents the findings of a digital ethnography that explores the experiences and lessons learnt within the youth-led climate movement fff during its transition from an in-person mobilisation to an online strike, as a result of the covid19 pandemic in 2020. the key research question of the study was to analyse the digital activism of the fff in order to explore whether and how the digital environment serves as an educational space for learning about, for and through human rights, and discuss the opportunities and challenges for hre that result from digital activism. the learning processes captured in this paper are historically relevant, as the covid-19 pandemic drastically hindered the participatory rights of children and young people (mallon & martinez sainz, 2021). we also consider the impact of digital technologies in the repertoire of actions available to social movements (melgaço & monaghan, 2018). since restrictions on social gatherings and interactions reduced the possibilities for children and young people to seek social change through their involvement with grassroots movements, the fff digital strikes provided a unique opportunity to reach a wider audience and exercise unprecedented influence in public debates. g. martinez sainz & a. hanna 3 literature review climate change and grassroots movements climate change is one of the most pressing crises of our time but, unlike other societal issues, the strategic actions required to address it are far from settled or agreed upon. even though most countries have accepted the scientific evidence for the need to reduce carbon emissions, none of them has yet committed to the radical yet necessary laws and policies to keep global warming within the 1.5 ºc limit (walsh, 2021). the disparity between rhetoric and action by governments around the world, particularly those in the global north, is what detonated the fast growth of the fff grassroots movement (bartoli, 2022). grassroots movements are enablers of social, political, and cultural change by ‘purposively and strategically’ acting mostly outside established political and institutional channels (johnston 2014). some grassroots movements, such as the anti-government protests and uprisings of the arab spring in the early 2010s, are mostly political. other movements primarily seek cultural change. fff, since its emergence in 2018, has worked in both dimensions, simultaneously demanding action from governments and policymakers while seeking to shift beliefs about the climate crisis and motivate individual and collective behaviours in response. fff has been successful in raising awareness about the climate crisis, and also in changing international human rights law (daly, 2022). even though fff is one of many environmental movements in recent decades, its global reach and the fact it is led by children and young people who use digital technologies make it an exemplary case of youth activism in the digital era. youth digital activism and peer-based actions many forms of activism in these digital spaces are still connected to in-person forms of political participation, such as protests or voting. however, others are fundamentally digital in nature, with varying degrees of alignment to human rights values and the rule of law (sorrel, 2015). the emergence of digital technologies has introduced fundamental changes in political participation and has expanded practices beyond traditional forms of civic and political life (kahne et al., 2014). easier and faster access to information, a greater facility to create and disseminate content or to communicate with others, as well as the possibility to organise collective actions or campaigns from afar, are just a few of the changes. digital technologies have generated not only new ways of political participation but have also created new spaces that enable greater accessibility and ease of action (mcpherson et al., 2019). the new participatory politics facilitated by these technologies promotes interactive, inclusive, and peer-based actions in which individuals and groups can effectively raise their voices, engage in public deliberation and influence decision-making (allen & light, 2015; kahne et al., 2014; martinez sainz et al., 2020). even though emerging technologies have broadened participation, digital activism also reflects in-person inequalities and discrimination, as shown in digital divides regarding political participation (schradie, 2018). in human rights education review 4 the case of children though, digital technologies have created new possibilities for participation (livingstone et al., 2019), enabling greater political and civic engagement. their capacity to exercise their rights and citizenship have radically changed and the spaces, structures and mechanisms available for their political participation have expanded. in the case of children and young people, digital technologies and the changes in political participation these enable are key to countering the marginalisation and exclusion they often encounter. these changes empower them as active citizens. activism & human rights education there is increasing evidence that social media can serve as an effective learning space for human rights among adults, including academics and practitioners (kim, 2011; kiwan, 2020; zanatta et al., 2019). the digital environment allows interactions that can facilitate organic learning opportunities and the critical dialogues that lead to hre that relates to participants’ experiences and contexts. if this is also the case for children and young people, and digital technologies help them to develop a ‘rights competence’ or ‘rights consciousness’ (birnhack & perry-hazan, 2021)—one that develops not only a knowledge of their rights but the capacity to articulate their activism to work for rights and make the corresponding legal and political claims—then these digital spaces require further examination. as jerome and starkey (2021) argue, one of the central purposes, but also key challenges, for hre is to effectively build children’s capacity to participate in society and empower them to be active citizens through the development of knowledge, skills and attitudes that enable the exercise of their rights. this paper examines the youth-led fff climate movement and its transition from in-person mobilisations to an online strike, as a result of the 2020 covid-19 pandemic. it looks at the cause promoted by the movement—climate action—as well as the interactions and collective performances of its members (johnston, 2014) before, during and after the move towards the digital environment. the paper focuses on the opportunities the climate strikes, both inperson and digital, provide for teaching and learning about political as well as economic, social, and cultural rights. thus, the analysis focuses on specific rights: the right to peaceful assembly (udhr article 21, uncrc article 15; iccpr article 21) and freedom of expression (udhr article 19; uncrc article 13; iccpr article 19); the right to a healthy environment (unhrc 2021); and the right to an adequate standard of living (uncrc article 27). research design ethnography has been widely used as a method to research social movements (della porta & diani, 2006), as it allows us to capture people’s experiences, activities, relationships, and interactions within and beyond the movement itself. however, since digital technologies are so intertwined with everyday life, it is important to design research that takes into account g. martinez sainz & a. hanna 5 this digital component to explore the actions, relationships, values and identities of social movements. the current study adopts a digital ethnography (pink, 2016) and uses digital technologies to collect and analyse archival materials of climate activists who self-recognise as members of the fff movement. the focus is on the shift towards a digital strike, as a result of the covid-19 pandemic, and the social restrictions imposed. the aim is to examine the implications of this transition for these young people’s activism and the peer-to-peer learning of rights in the digital environment. we collected data from twitter under hashtags #fridaysforfuture and #climatestrikeonline on three separate dates: a) 28th february 2020 – the bristol climate strike before cop25; b) 6th march 2020 – the brussels climate strike; and c) 13th march 2020 – the first online climate strike. we also collected retrospective posts two years after the first online strike, including threads and online interactions that discuss the experiences and lessons learnt by young climate activists during the transition. these posts were shared organically and, therefore, show matters that were and are important to them about lessons learned in the digital environment. while there are other social media platforms used by young activists, including snapchat or tiktok, we wanted to focus on a platform that was central to the fff movement (haßler et al., 2021) that would also allow us to: 1) identify fff members; 2) explore their engagement with the movement; 3) explore their interactions among themselves and others outside the fff movement. there are ethical concerns about research that uses twitter data (williams, burnap & sloan, 2017), particularly regarding rigour, scrutiny of ethical panels and anonymity. the current study was subject to a full ethical assessment by the university, according to established protocols regarding the collection, analysis, and dissemination of the data to protect the anonymity and privacy of children and young people. we anonymised posts by removing all usernames, handles, metadata and geospatial location so children and young people or the organisations they work with could not be identified. in cases where content could still be identified, we used paraphrased quotes instead of verbatim ones; and finally, we created generalised groupings of data and provided detailed descriptions of quotes, videos, or photographs after removing identifying information. all decisions regarding the data adhere to the non-maleficence and best interest of the child principles of children’s rights (un, 1989) and follow ethical practices for research involving children (powell, graham & truscott, 2016). the sampling criteria applied to the data used hashtags; only users employing these hashtags were coded and all coding was done by hand. using maxqda, all tweets using #fridaysforfuture and #climatestrikeonline were collected for the chosen dates, one week apart, in the run-up to covid lockdown in the uk. the data were cleaned and those written in english were selected for analysis. this produced a data set of 9,403 tweets which were coded deductively using a framework agreed upon by the researchers. this framework was created human rights education review 6 upon the initial coding of tweets which provided initial categories. coding followed an iterative process which included coding: i) the surface content of a tweet; ii) the type of link posted, if any; iii) the content of the posted link. the resulting coding framework was then used to conduct an analysis of retrospective posts two years later. this included threads and online interactions under the same hashtags that discuss the experiences and lessons learnt by young climate activists during the transition. findings the shift to digital strikes: collective actions and audiences the tweets collected during the first climate strike online demonstrate that it was possible for the key elements of the fff movement to continue with the move towards the digital environment. in particular, the digital space allowed the development of a shared identity as climate strikers and fostered a sense of belonging to the movement, even if striking alone or joining remotely and performing collective actions. many of the participants posted photos of themselves with placards and signs similar to the ones used in in-person protests following greta thunberg’s call to join the digital strike as covid19 restrictions on social gatherings were put into force: so keep your numbers low but your spirits high and let’s take one week at the time. you can join the #digitalstrike for upcoming fridayspost a photo of you striking with a sign and use the hashtag #climatestrikeonline! other members of fff provided more information on how to participate in the digital strike and several emphasised the goals of the collective action, which included raising awareness and keeping momentum. creating a sign in support of climate action and then posting a photo while holding it became a distinguishing feature of the online strikes. this action was a direct adaptation of showing up at in-person strikes with signs and placards in support of the fff movement. the posts as a form of collective action served different purposes and reached a variety of audiences, including other activists and members of fff, governments and policymakers, and finally the wider public. although the actions were the same, the messages targeting other members of the fff movement helped to foster a collective identity and belonging while emphasising the ideas that ‘we are all in this together’ and ‘no one strikes alone’: we’ll have to find new ways to create public awareness & advocate for change that don’t involve too big crowds... even in the face of trials, it's inspiring to see people still fighting. every protest can be adjusted, & i hope that this shows that an online presence matters, not just when everyone's impacted, but when only disabled people need it. no one strikes alone. g. martinez sainz & a. hanna 7 but who is the climate movement? certainly not @gretathunberg alone. our leaders have proven their inability to listen to the science and treat crises as crises. so we must show them the way. it has to be you. it has to be every single one of us. the content posted by participants in the digital strike was also intended to reach a wider audience, with the explicit goal of raising awareness of the climate crisis. this educational purpose, teaching others about the climate crisis, was realised by three clear actions: sharing and circulating information; creating content; and engaging in discussions. the information commonly shared by the activists included scientific reports, graphs and images, videos, and news articles. in contrast, the content created included photos, most of them with protest signs and placards, videos and images that translated scientific evidence, such as the 1.5 ºc limit, into lay terms for example. climate education to the public during a #climatestrike is always key for us! we are all in this together, and together we can get ourselves out of this mess! we let people know why we are out here fighting and how they can be part! this is why i have decided to write [...] our voices are the most powerful tools we have to enact change. when we can no longer raise our voices in the streets, as we have before, we must find new and novel ways of making ourselves heard. [...] i will write about a different aspect of climate breakdown every day, discussing both my own personal experiences and the scientific and political facts that i have learnt and am learning. the primary goal of raising awareness was a distinctive and prominent feature of the digital strike. the actions performed by the fff during the digital strike created a space in which members of the movement and the general public could learn about the crisis, its scientific basis, and its environmental and social implications, as well as the possible solutions and actions. by transferring its activity to the digital environment, fff created two different spaces for the informal learning of rights. first, a space for individuals within and beyond the fff movement to learn about the right to a healthy environment. second, a space for members of fff to learn about and for their rights to peaceful assembly and freedom of expression by taking action and participating in the strikes. right to a healthy environment: education about human rights the un general assembly has ratified a resolution that recognises the human right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment (un, 2022). this makes explicit the immediate and future threats that climate change and environmental degradation pose, and the negative impacts on human rights as a result of the unsustainable management and use of natural resources, loss of biodiversity and unmitigated pollution. even though this resolution was adopted months after fff activists moved toward digital strikes, the information they shared human rights education review 8 and the content they created is aligned with the resolution’s concerns and premises. fff activists focused on educating people about the right to a healthy environment, despite not labelling this as such, and emphasised the negative impacts of pollution and fossil fuels on the environment and the loss of biodiversity. they also discussed the urgency of adopting sustainable lifestyles and policies for the development and use of renewable energy and greener modes of transport. a common phrase used among activists was: ‘be part of the solution, not the pollution’. climate education and awareness-raising about the right to a healthy environment were key goals of actions promoted and collectively performed by the fff movement. activists shared not only scientific reports but also book recommendations and resources, suitable for different ages, to learn more about the climate crisis: if you are inspired by the #fridaysforfuture #climatestrike movement, you can check these books for teens on how to get involved in environmental activism. a pedagogy of hope for your elementary and middle school children? you can read tears at bedtime: are children's books on the environment causing climate anxiety? the information they shared and created reflected their views about the role of education in addressing the climate crisis and the urgent need to ‘educate people’ on how to best take action. ‘education is how we secure the future’, a phrase used during the digital strike, emphasises the role of education as a form of climate action itself and as a means for fff to gain further support. the digital strike recognised the educational value of the digital environment, but members of the fff movement also exploited the educational opportunities of the strikes, emphasising that ‘not all education happens in the classroom’: #fridaysforfuture helps kids to engage with climate science that is not being taught in school and prepare for terrible challenges foisted on them by the adults that have squandered their future. what if we science teachers got connected with [environmental] movements—for example #fridaysforfuture—and helped teach the public about the #climatecrisis? how might we help amplify our students’ voices? before, during, and after the shift to the digital arena, many of the activists made connections between the content and purposes of the climate strikes and existing educational spaces, such as the formal curriculum and the classroom. for example, educators encouraged learning about the right to a healthy environment by linking the content and information produced by the social movement to the curriculum and pedagogical classroom practices: g. martinez sainz & a. hanna 9 read up on climate and social justice issues, then share what you’ve learned online with your friends & family, so they can also benefit from the time you spent learning. heading to the school with a special lesson on wildlife loss and sustainable poetry to remind my first-year students of #fridaysforfuture. a history curriculum that focuses on climate change should explore concepts like “development”, and assumptions about what “progress” looks like. #schools should integrate #climatechange into the #curriculum the informal educational opportunities granted by the digital environment to the fff movement allowed for a comprehensive approach to teaching and learning about the right to a healthy environment. the information shared by the strikers and the online discussions generated by their posts facilitated a wider focus not only on knowledge about climate change but also on its economic, political social, cultural, and ethical dimensions. youth activists often draw connections between climate change and human rights. i feel like we still don't understand the climate crisis in its full effect. at its heart it's a human rights crisis, and a crisis of empathy that we think those lives aren't worth acting for. understanding its causes and solutions starts with science, but it ends with justice. it harms the climate, but also fracking compromises: safe and clean drinking water; human health; food; housing; the environment. these are human rights and to protect them, we need a #globalbanonfracking. you cannot separate climate change from human rights. the climate crisis is inherently a social justice issue. right to peaceful assembly and freedom of expression: education for human rights the right to peaceful assembly protects non-violent gatherings of groups and individuals for specific purposes. people have the right to express themselves collectively and participate in shaping their societies (iccpr, article 21). even though this is an individual right, it can only be exercised collectively due to its inherently associative element (unhrc, 2021). strongly connected to the right to peaceful assembly, children and young people also have a right to freedom of expression, which includes seeking, receiving and imparting information and ideas via any available means or media (udhr art 19; uncrc art 13; iccpr art 19). the digital strike allowed the fff movement to expand the repertoire of individual and collective actions that human rights education review 10 enable them to exercise these rights. despite the restrictions imposed on social gatherings to mitigate the covid19 pandemic, climate activists were committed to adapting the climate strikes and making the most of the digital space. with the use of dedicated hashtags such as #climatestrikeonline, #digitalstrike and #fridaysforfuture, participants could show their unity and common purpose. these hashtags allowed activists to show their commitment to the movement and gain wider support from individuals outside. the digital space allowed them to exercise their right to assemble collectively, despite being isolated. you will see me and many others striking from home on friday with #climatestrikeonline in quarantine at home striking for future. #climatestrikeonline climate striking from home today #digitalstrike staying at home... but still striking! earth is no virus. while we stay home alone to protect the vulnerable from #covid_19 let's unite in the #climatestrikeonline to protect those vulnerable to climate change. the digital strike provided an opportunity for individuals unable able to attend in-person protests to participate in the fff movement. this greater access was particularly important for children who previously might not have had the means and support to skip school to attend strikes, or children and young people with disabilities. even though a significant number of the participants in the digital strike were simply transferring their actions into the digital space, this space allowed many to be involved in the fff movement for the first time. day 1 of my #climatestrikeonline this is week 7 of my 2020 weekly climate strike. you may be by yourself striking today but you are never alone in the battle for climate justice! before i never had the chance to go to a real strike so this is perfect to show my support #climatestrikeonline just want to show my support! i haven’t taken part in any events before but you gotta start somewhere #climatestrike today i am doing my first #digitalstrike to support climate activists all over the world that fight for a stable climate. g. martinez sainz & a. hanna 11 the digital space became one in which individuals with and without prior knowledge and experience of protest and political action could learn about their right to peaceful assembly and freedom of expression through their involvement in the digital strike. thus, the shift to digital by the fff not only allowed for ‘new ways to create public awareness & advocate for change that don’t involve too big crowds...’ (@greta thunberg, 2020); it also uncovered untapped opportunities for the experiential learning of rights. the fff movement and its members developed content and materials to teach the power of non-violent civil disobedience, how to take part in the digital strike, how to get started, how to amplify the message, how to keep safe while striking, and how to create alternatives beyond the in-person strikes (fridays for future, n.d.). local branches also created digital toolkits. these provided not only practical actions, such as posting photos and information, signing petitions, or joining other grassroots organisations, but also explained the rationale underpinning the fff movement, scientific evidence on the climate crisis, and why protests and other forms of activism were important. all the materials were designed to support individuals and make it easier for them to be involved and provided clear understandings of the cause—climate crisis—and the collective actions of the movement—school strikes, mobilisations and protests—even if these were now conducted in the digital space. the experiential learning opportunities provided by the strike allowed many members of the movement—long-serving or new ones—to develop the necessary skills to organise collective actions within and beyond the digital space. the digital strike also helped participants to develop skills to express their views and to seek, receive and disseminate information or ideas on matters that affect them, such as the climate crisis. furthermore, it facilitated the creation of a network larger than the fff movement itself, in which individuals could gain further knowledge, skills and competencies regarding their rights to peaceful assembly and freedom of expression. this network was not limited to children and young people, which meant that intergenerational processes of teaching and learning became part of the digital strike. we stand in loving solidarity with the #climatestrikeonline & #digitalclimatestrike happening today fighting for #climatechange & #environmentaljustice led by bright children & youth all around the world. young fff activists not only had a clear understanding of their right to peaceful assembly but also acknowledged that taking part in protests led to learning. they emphasised the education they gained from protesting, particularly in juxtaposition to their school and classroom learning. participants in the strikes, both in-person and online, regarded the protest as an accessible yet meaningful form of expressing their views and raising their voices. the climate strikes for them were a useful channel of political participation and a way for children and young people to advance social change. human rights education review 12 we learn by protesting. [we learn about] science, politics, economics, society, speaking, the system, [community] organisation, and much more. the fact that children will die or become refugees as a result of the climate crisis feels more important than classes. what these [adults] gatekeeping children’s strikes don't understand is marching in the streets in absolutely the best education. while we are currently restricted in our analogue interaction it is even more important that we continue participating in our democracy and stand up for our values. every little change we make has a ripple effect. together we make the world better because others notice when we act and make their own small changes. intergenerational activism: education through human rights even though fff is a youth-led movement, the data collected demonstrates a significant engagement of adults and their active participation in the climate strikes before the shift. such involvement included parents taking their children to the in-person strikes, teachers using the strikes in their lessons, as well as members of community organisations and activists from other environmental movements amplifying the strikes. an example of such intergenerational support was evident when trade unions joined the school strikes to show their support for fff. sorry my daughter is not at school today, she is in the town centre for the #climatestrike learning about protest. i’ll be taking my daughter to the climate strike on friday, we’re catching the train as i usually would to deliver to bristol. what a day full of learning experiences not to forget for her and me #climatestrike 'the time for change is now'. children and youth are leading the global #climatestrike today and were joined by teachers, trade unionists, community groups and citizens in #bristol to call for climate action. with the shift to the digital space, adults’ engagement continued. members of the fff encouraged adults to actively participate in the digital strike asking them to join but also to demonstrate their support in real life by advocating for climate action in channels of political participation that exclude children such as voting for parties and candidates advancing green policies. adults working from home today, please take a moment to show your support for g. martinez sainz & a. hanna 13 the climate school strikers who’ve moved their protest online! the choice is simple. you either vote to protect the future of younger generations or you vote for mass climate breakdown. you need to make the right choice. #fridaysforfuture as an example shows that our kids are well educated and brave enough to show us to take a leap. we need not only encourage but also support this young generation. we must create opportunities to show their engagement and support their acts. adults not only expressed their support for the movement during the online strikes and its claims. they actively engaged in actions similar to those that children and young people pursued: posting photos with their signs, sharing information, and engaging in online discussions. many continue to support their children’s in-real-life actions: once again, the kids are leading (this time, showing us how to engage in protest and activism in an era of #covidー19). they [policymakers and companies] didn’t listen to the scientists; now they have to listen to the kids. keep it up kids! #climateactionnow #fridaysforfuture children should not be the ones picking up our trash, both metaphoric and literal. this is why adults need to join #fridaysforfuture. however, not all the intergenerational discussions were supportive and many of the interactions between adults and young people were highly confrontational. fff members highlighted a number of negative experiences – some adults mocked the strikes or youth activists’ responses to the climate crisis, and there were coordinated attacks and online harassment. many of these experiences started before the digital strikes but were amplified with the increased online presence and collective digital actions of the movement. dear greta et al. and #fridaysforfuture! please educate yourself not only about the agent #sarscov2 that causes the disease #covid19, but also about the #ipccco2hoax thank you! children need to spend less time moaning and striking about climate change and more time taking numerate subjects, to end up skilled at how to mitigate its ever present impacts. we have enough moaners with greta thunberg [response] — [...] it is funny that the people who say they should focus on education are the ones who need to go back to school. children and young fff members constantly called out the attacks by adults, emphasising the human rights education review 14 discriminatory messages used to discredit their actions and the movement. their responses show how participation in the strikes also helped to empower children and young people and helped them to value the impact and significance of political participation. activism isn't a walk in a park. it's a stumble through a dry and rocky and hostile gorge with thorns and scorpions behind every stone. but the destination is so worth it. we've been boycotting outside school for 6 weeks now. the assumption that we [young people] don't know what we're doing is quite frankly ridiculous. most people involved in #fridaysforfuture are highly intelligent, hardworking, globally-aware individuals who try to ensure that our activism doesn't adversely impact their education. i really question adults’ logic, those who think it is ok to strike for better pensions but think children should not strike for a better future. before the shift to the digital environment, young activists of the fff movement understood the significance of protesting and mobilising as a form of political participation. such significance was indeed framed as a matter of human rights, and when they encountered resistance towards the strikes—both in-person and online—they interpreted it as a violation of their rights. discussion and conclusion grassroots movements provide unique opportunities for hre, for both directly participating activists and bystanders. the study reveals the similarities of the digital strikes with other social movements that function not only as a mechanism for participatory politics but also as an educational space. we see the same informal processes of teaching and learning occurring in the different actions and interactions. the fff climate strikes, both the in-person ones and the digital assemblies, enabled collective action frames (johnston 2014) and collective guidelines for interpreting the climate crisis. they provided motivation for and shaped collective action. posting photos with a sign and using the same hashtag enabled fff members to continue their activism online, support the cause, and reinforce their membership. the findings show that fff participants gained knowledge about climate change, corroborating daly’s (2022) argument that this movement is a catalyst for ‘climate competence’ for children and young people. however, participants rarely frame their claims for climate action as a matter of human rights or explicitly name their right to a clean and healthy environment. even though fff members recognised the relationship between climate change and different human rights at risk as a result of this global crisis—the rights to health, clean water, housing, etc.—the information shared and content created did not look specifically at these rights or mechanisms that can be accessed for their protection. thus, findings indicate that despite the g. martinez sainz & a. hanna 15 connections made between climate change and human rights, ‘climate competence’ does not necessarily translate into ‘rights consciousness’ (birnhack & perry-hazan, 2021). similar to previous research that has already pointed towards the possibilities of activism for hre (hall, 2019) the findings of this study emphasise the need for hre and how it might benefit social movements, helping them to gain the ‘rights consciousness‘ that will allow them to effectively identify the lack of climate action as a violation of their right to a clean and healthy environment, and to assign responsibility on governments and corporations for the violation of these rights. as far as learning about the right to a clean and healthy environment is concerned, findings show that the learning processes identified in the activists’ interactions focused on concrete examples of what a right to a healthy and clean environment encompasses—clean air, clean water, access to natural resources, and the protection of natural resources for future generations. these findings reveal that activism and participation in grassroots movements can work as collateral human rights learning situations (isenström, 2021), in which it is possible to develop values, attitudes and behaviours essential for human rights, despite the scarce reference to the right to a healthy environment or limited knowledge of their legal frameworks. however, in relation to learning about their right to peaceful assembly and freedom of expression, the findings show the potential social media has to develop experiential learning opportunities. in line with the principles of experiential learning theory (elt) (kolb, 2015), these opportunities build upon their engagement with and interactions within the social movement. in accordance with elt, learning happens through the process of knowledge creation through a cycle of concrete experiences, reflection, and experimentation (kolb, 2015). although the potential of experiential learning in hre has been previously identified (hopkins, 2011; lundy & martinez sainz, 2018; tibbitts, 2005), the findings of this paper show that experiences within and mediated by the digital environment can also facilitate learning that centres children’s experiences and their environment. the findings are also consistent with previous research that has shown that learning that results from participating in social movements can be more self-directed, self-controlled, and rewarding than more formal and structured educational opportunities (kim, 2011). the learning the young activists developed, about both the climate crisis and the right to peaceful assembly, is meaningful because it was led by their interests, often contextualised, and connected to their everyday lives. the continuum of possibilities of digitally-enabled activism (earl & kimport, 2011) allows different forms of engagement and participation in social movements. previous studies have shown the advantages of online actions, particularly for validation of activist work and as motivators for sustained action (gong, 2015). the present study supports this work by showing how the different actions during the climate strike of those involved in fff facilitated affirmative interaction and community-building, while human rights education review 16 increasing the awareness of the movement. since the commitment by the un general assembly to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment (un, 2022) was partly the result of constant pressure from activists and environmental social movements, including fff, this study provides further evidence of the impact digital activism in social media can have in legal and social reform, as has been previously proposed by steinberg (2016). however, the present study shows that the learning opportunities facilitated by online activism are not restricted to online interactions or digital spaces and that they reinforce the hybrid nature of the right to peaceful assembly as a result of digital technologies, as previously identified by mcpherson et al. (2019). digital technologies are increasingly mediating and facilitating dynamic forms of gathering that create a continuum between online and offline actions for social change rather than assuming a clearly defined distinction. activists who participated in the digital strikes by posting their offline climate actions—for example, picking up litter from the beach or planting trees—show the hybrid or blended ways in which the fff could protest and express their views. although this hybrid nature can raise questions regarding what counts as meaningful participation, it is evident that participation in assemblies will continue to adapt and expand the available repertoire of social movements. the pedagogical challenge for hre is to adapt to emerging forms of political participation and develop strategies that build the knowledge and capacity needed to respond to them. the actions organised by the fff movement provided experiential learning opportunities for children and young people, demonstrating to them the importance of their status as rightsholders in real-life situations. the strikes, both in-person and online, showed young activists how to exercise their rights online and offline, thus creating meaningful spaces for hre that focus on their present rather than future status as citizens (jerome & starkey, 2021). the right to peaceful assembly is dependent on the realisation of a broader range of civil, political, economic, and cultural rights, as well as the right to hre. this interconnection of rights represents a pedagogical challenge in hre that has been previously identified (martinez sainz, 2018); however, the digital environment makes it possible to transform this challenge into an opportunity by educating about rights through the process of exercising those rights. by doing so, hre recognises the present and evolving capacities of children and young people as citizens and encourages them to learn about rights as part of the process of active engagement and participation in peaceful assemblies. activism not only helps them to raise their voice on matters that affect them but provides them with a mechanism to participate in the production of knowledge (kiwan, 2020). rather than waiting for children and young people to have all the necessary knowledge about rights before they engage in social or political actions, this approach fully recognises them as agents of social change, thanks to their status as present citizens (jerome & starkey, 2021). g. martinez sainz & a. hanna 17 finally, the study highlights the potential of activism, in particular digital activism, for intergenerational dialogue and collective action. the digital space facilitated the interaction between young activists and adults wanting to support the fff movement and their claims for climate action. peer and intergenerational interactions can foster knowledge exchange and capacity-building, creating spaces for hre that not only provide education about rights and for rights but also that help in the development of collective identity and connections with the larger community. such spaces enable members of the grassroots movements to develop a coalitional agency (jerome & starkey, 2022; bajaj, 2019) to collectively fight for the rights of all. the digital environment makes it possible for children and young people to establish global connections and become part of a global movement that leads to large-scale collective actions and worldwide mobilisations. a pedagogical challenge to be considered for the creation of such an intergenerational network for hre is the safeguarding and protection of children and young people from harmful content and interactions online. hre should not only equip young activists with the skills to protect themselves online but make sure that learning spaces— including digital spaces—are safe and that the rights of everyone are respected within them. references allen, d., & light, j. s. 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(2017). towards an ethical framework for publishing twitter data in social research: taking into account users’ views, online context and algorithmic estimation. sociology, 51(6), 1149-1168. https://doi.org/10.1177/0038038517708140 https://www.ohchr.org/en/documents/reports/draft-plan-action-fourth-phase-2020-2024-world-programme-human-rights-education https://www.ohchr.org/en/documents/reports/draft-plan-action-fourth-phase-2020-2024-world-programme-human-rights-education https://p.dw.com/p/42a0d https://doi.org/10.1177/0038038517708140 teachers as human rights defenders: strengthening hre and safeguarding theory to prevent child sexual abuse issn 2535-5406 vol 5, no 2 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer4776 date received: 25-01-2022 date accepted: 26-04-2022 peer reviewed article © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles teachers as human rights defenders: strengthening hre and safeguarding theory to prevent child sexual abuse kjersti draugedalen university of south-eastern norway, norway, kjersti.draugedalen@tonsberg.kommune.no audrey osler university of south-eastern norway, norway, university of leeds, uk, a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk abstract sexual abuse is a public health issue with long-term consequences for children’s lives and education. the convention on the rights of the child is a key reference point in safeguarding, increasingly incorporated into domestic law. this article aims to strengthen safeguarding theory and practice by reviewing human rights education (hre) theory and aligning it with care-based ethics. it proposes a renewed focus on hre in teacher education that examines the teacher’s role and professional responsibilities, strengthens rights-based knowledge, and explores the transformative power of rights. by empowering teachers with skills to recognise and act on harmful sexual behaviour (hsb), they can become powerful human rights defenders, protecting children against child-on-child and adult-on-child abuse. drawing on empirical data on teachers’ understandings of hsb, we apply theory, cautioning against an under-theorised approach that over-relies on rights knowledge or children’s ability to claim their rights in an emotionally charged arena with asymmetrical power relations. keywords harmful sexual behaviour, teacher’s role, hre theory, transformative human rights education, ethics of care, convention on the rights of the child http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer4776 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:kjersti.draugedalen@tonsberg.kommune.no mailto:a.h.osler@leeds.ac.uk k. draugedalen & a. osler 33 introduction child sexual abuse is increasingly recognised by policymakers at global, regional and national levels as a public health issue with long-term consequences for children’s lives and futures, and for their educational opportunities. the world health organization (2017) has declared sexual abuse against children a global public health issue and expressed grave concern for the consequences, both for individual child victims and societies as a whole. prevention of sexual abuse is currently receiving increased attention in public health strategies. the convention on the protection of children against sexual exploitation and sexual abuse (council of europe, 2007), commonly known as the lanzarote convention, provides an international legal framework requiring criminalisation of a range of offences against children. it has been ratified by all 47 council of europe member-states, and is open to other states parties to sign and ratify. the convention’s drafters took, as a starting point, existing un and council of europe standards, including the convention on the rights of the child (crc) (united nations, 1989). the lanzarote convention is a binding treaty that provides, inter alia, for preventative measures, including intervention programmes, education for children, recruitment and training of persons working with children, and raising awareness among the general public (articles 4 to 10). it therefore has direct implications for school curricula, teacher education and teacher roles, across all council of europe member-states. the crc is frequently cited as a reference point in safeguarding policy and is increasingly incorporated into the domestic law of countries around the globe, including four of the five nordic countries: finland, iceland, norway and sweden. according to the provisions of the convention, states parties have a duty to ensure that teachers are provided with appropriate support and training and to ensure that there are legal and policy frameworks to protect the children in their care from sexual abuse: states parties shall take all appropriate legislative, administrative, social and educational measures to protect the child from all forms of physical or mental violence, injury or abuse, neglect or negligent treatment, maltreatment or exploitation, including sexual abuse, while in the care of parent(s), legal guardian(s) or any other person who has the care of the child. (un, 1989: article 19) in other words, teachers have the role of human rights defenders in relation to the children in their care. effectively, they are required, as part of their professional duties, to take appropriate action to prevent child sexual abuse. this role of human rights defender is not one where an individual teacher is expected to act alone; it is one where the state is required to offer appropriate support, including a thorough education of teachers in children’s human rights. we are emphasising teachers’ professional duties as children’s human rights defenders. we recognise that schools can be experienced by students as violent places and that individual human rights education review – volume 5(2) 34 teachers may perpetuate sexual abuse (harber, 2005), but contend that when teachers recognise the role of children’s human rights defender as central to their professional responsibilities, cultures of violence can be disrupted. in this article, we argue that for teachers to confidently take up their roles as children’s human rights defenders, safeguarding children from sexual abuse, a fresh theoretical approach to human rights education is required. we aim to strengthen theory and practice in child safeguarding by reviewing human rights education (hre) theory. this is important for a number of reasons. first, it is imperative to consider how hre theory might be appropriately aligned with a broad care-based ethics that will support teachers in identifying and responding to harmful sexual behaviour (hsb). we note that hsb in a child (defined below) could also be indicative of past or ongoing adult-on-child abuse (ey & mcinnes, 2020). we acknowledge there is no confirmed scientific connection between displaying hsb and having been sexually abused. however, a significant portion of children who display hsb have undergone a range of adverse childhood experiences where sexual abuse is one of several difficulties encountered alongside problems such as physical abuse, emotional abuse, neglect, mental illness, household alcoholism and drug abuse. teachers who respond to hsb may therefore frequently be taking the first steps in protecting a child from a cycle of abuse. secondly, theorising teachers’ work needs to recognise the role of emotions in teaching and learning. this is critical, for across a range of social and cultural contexts, dealing with hsb among children requires teachers and other professionals to overcome cultural taboos. thirdly, and importantly, power relationships need to be acknowledged in the sexual exploitation of children and in the initiatives taken to prevent child sexual abuse. for this reason, we caution against an oversimplistic link between children knowing rights and claiming them. finally, in an hre-based approach to child sexual abuse, hre needs to be transformative. that is to say, both teachers and children need to recognise human rights as much more than society’s normative principles. an hre-based approach to hsb needs to be conceptualised in such a way that that it empowers both teachers and learners to work for societal change. it is our intention, when theorising hre, to apply it to real situations, where this theory can be used or modified, as appropriate. we want it to have practical application. indeed, the theory has been generated, to a large degree, from empirical research. in this paper we illustrate our theoretical construct, drawing on data from an empirical study of teachers’ understandings of child sexual abuse. before we explore the theory and practice of a human rights-based approach to addressing child sexual abuse in more depth, we discuss the term ‘harmful sexual behaviour’ (hsb) in the context of schooling. k. draugedalen & a. osler 35 harmful sexual behaviour harmful sexual behaviour (hsb) is defined as: ‘sexual behaviours of children and young people under the age of 18 years old that are developmentally inappropriate, may be harmful toward self or others, or be abusive towards another child, young person or adult’ (hackett, holmes & branigan, 2016, p. 12). the focus of child protection efforts globally has generally been on adult perpetrators, thereby failing to take into account ‘children and young people who display harmful sexual behaviour’ (ey & mcinnes, 2020). children and young people who display hsb make up a significant proportion of the sexual abuse statistics. researchers estimate that between 30-50 per cent of all sexual abuse against children is committed by other children and young people (association for the treatment of sexual abusers [atsa], 2017; hackett, 2014; shawler et al., 2019). schools are thus a unique arena for both prevention and early intervention against hsb (ey & mcinnes, 2020). primary school teachers are particularly well positioned to act as key safeguarding actors in early prevention and intervention work. we stress that hsb, sometimes referred to as child-on-child abuse, may be indicative of previous trauma and of past or current adult-on-child abuse (creeden, 2013; ey & mcinnes, 2020; leonard & hackett, 2019; mckibbin, humphreys & hamilton, 2016). nevertheless, research suggests that teachers internationally are frequently unable to fulfil their intended safeguarding responsibilities. in england, research with teachers and young learners suggests that peer-to-peer sexual abuse has become normalised, so that teachers overlook it and students feel unable to report it (allnock & atkinson, 2019; firmin, 2019; waters, anstey, clouston & sydor, 2021). in norway, which has seen a rise in sexual violence and abuse, children and young people report that teachers are not doing enough to protect them from harm from peers (barneombudet, 2018; bergrav 2020; hafstad & augusti, 2020). teachers confirm that they find it difficult to intervene to address hsb (draugedalen, 2021; draugedalen, kleive & grov, 2021; vorland, selvik, hjorthol, kanten & blix, 2018). in south africa, where there are concerns about an increase in various types of school-based violence, teachers have also been assessed as ill-equipped to address hsb (makhasane & mthembu, 2019). in adopting the term hsb, we acknowledge there are other contesting terms in the literature, depending both on era of origin and authors’ geographical positioning. hsb is a relatively new field and one where academic and clinical fields overlap (hallett, deerfield & hudson, 2019). as these authors note, labelling children has sometimes been highly stigmatising, with terms such as child molester, juvenile sex offender and perpetrator applied. in line with the principles of the crc, there is a growing consensus to move away from labelling the individual to describing their behaviour (atsa, 2017; hackett, 2014). in the uk and elsewhere in europe, the term harmful sexual behaviour has started to gain momentum (allnock & atkinson, 2019; human rights education review – volume 5(2) 36 vorland et al., 2018). hackett (2011) proposes a continuum of child sexual behaviour: normal, inappropriate, problematic, abusive, and violent. it is the behaviours in the last three categories which are labelled as harmful or potentially harmful. the hsb literature generally makes a distinction between children and young people/adolescents, drawing the line between 12 and 13 years with the onset of puberty. however, our use of the term ‘children’ is in line with the crc’s definition of children as all individuals under the age of 18, except where we distinguish between younger and older students or wish to emphasise a wide age range. we illustrate our theory with empirical data from norway, which is focussed on primary schools (students aged 5-13), but we also draw on literature relating to adolescents, since there is a scarcity of international research on young children who display hsb (ey & mcinnes, 2020). the idea of children committing offences against other children challenges a society’s traditional responses to punishment, and demands alternative prevention and intervention strategies, as the children involved are often under the age of criminal responsibility. according to child rights principles, children who display hsb are first and foremost children in need of help, not punishment. it is the duty of professionals to offer that help as early as possible. importantly, although children and young people who display hsb are a highly heterogeneous group, there is, as highlighted above, a growing consensus among academics and clinicians worldwide that those who display hsb often have histories of trauma and abuse, with many exposed to a high degree of ‘adverse childhood experiences’ (felitti et al., 1998). human rights exist to address the needs of the vulnerable (osler, 2016) and in the context of education it is the responsibility of adult professionals to safeguard the most vulnerable children in their care. the responsibility of teachers is rooted, as we have seen, in crc article 19, which mandates the state and its employees to protect children from all forms of physical or mental violence (including sexual abuse). furthermore, article 39 requires states to promote the recovery and reintegration of a child exposed to adverse childhood experiences ‘in an environment which fosters the health, self-respect and dignity of the child’ (un, 1989). in its 2016-2021 strategy for the rights of the child, the council of europe has given particular attention to hsb: the strategy has as one of its five priority areas ‘a life free from violence for all children’. peer violence and harmful sexual behaviour by children is one theme which the strategy mid-term evaluation process identifies as a challenge requiring further action. (hackett, 2020, p. 5) however, the council recognises a particular dilemma when it comes to hsb and the lack of effective intervention: ‘children who display harmful sexual behaviour is a taboo topic, with limited available research. therefore, not all member states have developed a specific k. draugedalen & a. osler 37 response to this issue’ (council of europe, 2020, p. 11). this observation is in keeping with research in norwegian upper secondary schools published in human rights education review and elsewhere (goldschmidt-gjerløw, 2019; goldschmidt-gjerløw & trysnes, 2020; goldschmidt-gjerløw, 2021). this research found that teachers did not intervene consistently to address students’ sexual harassment of their peers, with some so uncomfortable about dealing with sexuality they avoided the topic altogether. children and young people’s perspectives on hsb and safeguarding a nationwide survey of children aged 12-16 revealed a number of disturbing trends. these concerned young people’s exposure to harm and a possible lack of safeguarding by adults across a range of arenas, both physical and virtual (hafstad & augusti, 2019). the data from norway revealed that just over 6 per cent [n= 543] reported sexual abuse by an adult, and that 44 per cent of respondents had not yet disclosed this to anyone. a much larger proportion, 22 per cent [n= 2003], had experienced hsb and sexual abuse by a peer, but 30 per cent had not disclosed this experience. the findings showed that girls were at far greater risk of sexually abusive experiences than boys, and that most often the victim knew the abuser. the report confirms that children and young people are too poorly protected from violence and abuse, and that some groups remain especially vulnerable. those labelled ‘the most vulnerable groups’ are those with a higher prevalence of cumulative risk factors (e.g., low socioeconomic status, parents’ substance abuse, psychiatric illness or incarceration) (hafstad & augusti, 2019, p. 20). research among adolescents on intimate partner violence revealed a lack of protection afforded to the young people studied. there was a clear connection between partners ‘sexting’ (sending text messages with sexual content) and the prevalence of violence in a relationship (hellevik & øverlien, 2016). similar results were detected in the international study, eu kids online 2020, which maps internet access, online practices, skills, online risks and opportunities for children aged 9–16 across 19 european countries (smahel et al., 2020). it found that students seldom confide in teachers when they have negative online experiences: number of children who reported that they told no one about their negative experiences ranges between 4% (france) and 30% (estonia). most often, children told about the negative experience a parent or friend or both (rarely did they tell a teacher or professional whose job it is to help children). (smahel et al., 2020, p. 7) it appears that in the new digital spaces that have emerged, young people are generally left to themselves to navigate acceptable behaviour and that governments have often been slow to react. for example, hellevik and øverlien (2016) observed that the norwegian authorities published four action plans to combat domestic violence, but none of these addressed digital human rights education review – volume 5(2) 38 violence. it was only in 2021 that a national action plan on how to prevent and intervene against internet-related sexual abuse of children was launched. another area of concern to young people is easy access to pornography. in a study from the uk, titles from so-called ‘mainstream’ pornography sites were analysed, and it was found that 1 in 8 titles contained descriptions of sexual violence (vera-gray, mcglynn, kureshi & butterby, 2021). in a mixed methods study from norway, informants aged 14-19 years claim that pornography influences young people’s sexuality and sexual behaviour. they identify a connection between the use of pornography and pressure to participate in sexual acts they perceive as degrading, violating and, in some cases, painful. the informants call for better protection from pornography (bergrav, 2020). they also state that they want adults, such as teachers, to address these issues in safe spaces, observing that adults seldom initiate such conversations, and when they do, they tend to address the topic in a judgmental manner, inhibiting children and young people from expressing their views. the study noted that children and young people’s views on pornography, and ‘how sex is supposed to look and feel like’, often remain unchallenged. building on eu kids online 2009 (staksrud & livingstone, 2009), livingstone and stoilova (2021, p. 507) propose the 4 c classification of online risks: content, contact, conduct and contract. simply put, these four categories represent the types of risk children encounter: what they actually view (pornographic content); those with whom they come into contact (adults practising ‘grooming’, sexual abuse or exploitation); the conduct that takes place between the child and those they encounter (sexual harassment, ‘sexting’); and, finally, the contract that formally or informally is made between children and digital providers. yet it would seem that basic digital education can go some way to protecting children online. a review of the impact of digital learning on young people found ‘a positive association between digital skills and online opportunities, information benefits, and orientation to technology’ (livingstone, mascheroni & stoilova, 2021, p. 1). the overall message from studies we have reviewed, examining the issue from the perspectives of children and young people on the one hand, and teachers on the other, is that teachers do not generally enact a safeguarding role. yet of all the professionals working with children, they are the best placed both to prevent hsb and, where it occurs, to protect children. we turn next to examining how hre might be conceptualised to enable teachers to become effective human rights defenders and enact their safeguarding role. theorising a human rights-based approach to safeguarding the human rights project rests on recognition of human dignity (un, 1948: preamble) and human vulnerability. human rights education in schools, drawing on the crc, must necessarily be about realising the inherent dignity of all children and supporting the most vulnerable k. draugedalen & a. osler 39 (osler, 2016; struthers, 2020). the crc also recognises the political rights of children and confirms that these are important to the realisation of other rights in education: the project of enabling human rights and social justice through education is dependent on a deep understanding and application of children’s human rights, particularly their participation rights, by policymakers and by teachers and other professionals working in school settings (osler, 2016, p. 104). these principles give strength to a human rights-based approach to safeguarding in schools and childcare settings and to approaches that ensure that the rights of the most marginalised are protected. protecting the needs of vulnerable children is in itself a justification for hre and for a human rights-based approach to safeguarding: if ever there was a compelling reason for ensuring that young people are well-versed in their human rights entitlements, their protection from abuse or neglect is surely it. hre is thus vital for ‘raising awareness, understanding and acceptance of universal human rights standards and principles, as well as guarantees at the international, regional and national levels for the protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms’ (struthers, 2020, p. 3, quoting 2011 un declaration on human rights education and training, article 4a). yet at the same time ‘schools … may unwittingly reinforce existing inequalities, neglect the perspectives of those they claim to serve, and be tools of violence against children’ (osler, 2016: p.107). it is this tension between human rights ideals and the everyday practices of schools that needs to be addressed when theorising a human rights-based approach to safeguarding. a clear starting point for ensuring effective hre and strategies to address and prevent sexual abuse is the provision of opportunities for teachers to consider these tensions and deepen their own knowledge base. this is critical if they are to act as children’s human rights defenders and contribute to safeguarding young learners in school. human rights education review – volume 5(2) 40 table 1 human rights education and teachers’ work. (developed from osler, 1997, pp. 192-3). conforming reforming transforming various understandings of rights and human rights education (hre) human rights are agreed international standards national values reflect human rights hre is mandated democratic societies protect everyone’s rights individual breeches of rights occur hre may need to be strengthened human rights are a site of struggle ambiguities and tensions exist hre may challenge established political interests teachers’ role duty bearer (on behalf of the state) implement mandated curriculum transmit knowledge and values critique and interpret curriculum policy (read education theory) provide students with opportunities to study how rights are protected / occasionally breeched address ‘rights gaps’ identify and support vulnerable students co-construct hre with students, recognizing their diverse identities, experiences, histories enable students to engage in critical examination of injustice in own lives and wider society equip and enable students to act for social justice engage with/ contribute to education theory recognise shared vulnerabilities table 1 highlights three societal orientations to human rights and hre and considers their k. draugedalen & a. osler 41 implications for teachers’ work. organised as conforming, reforming and transforming, these three orientations are not necessarily mutually exclusive and we might expect an individual teacher to identify with practices or beliefs in more than one of them. so, for example, in the conforming orientation a teacher may understand human rights to be part of an internationally agreed framework of standards. if this only leads teachers to recognise their role as implementing the mandated curriculum, they are not likely to support students in recognising the transforming potential of human rights. yet a teacher whose professional orientation best fits the reforming or transforming column may equally recognise human rights as part of an internationally agreed framework of standards. in this sense, the orientations may be seen as a progression from left to right, across figure 1. a transforming orientation is the orientation we would look for to enable human rights-based safeguarding processes. in theorising a human rights-based approach to safeguarding, we examine in turn the following four elements: the need to align hre with care-based ethics; teachers’ work and the role of emotions in hre teaching and learning; asymmetrical power relations in hre and safeguarding work; and the concept of a transformative hre and its role in safeguarding. in our theorising, we draw on data collected in 2019, from six schools in a municipality in southern norway. a total of 19 school-based professionals participated in focus-group interviews at their respective schools. 15 of these were primary school teachers, and it is their voices we draw on here. the schools were selected to include various environments/student demographics: urban and rural settings; predominantly white and ethnically diverse student populations; and a degree of socio-economic diversity. the participating teachers from these schools were self-selecting. our purpose here is not to provide a detailed narrative or analysis of the wider study, which can be found elsewhere (draugedalen, kleive & grov, 2021). here we simply seek to illustrate ways in which data from these teachers can be read through the theoretical construct we present. we discuss a number of issues: hre and care-based ethics; teachers’ emotions in hre-based safeguarding; asymmetrical power relations in safeguarding; and a transformative human rights education. aligning human rights education and care-based ethics we assert that for teachers to be effective human rights defenders and work with children to implement a human rights-based approach to safeguarding at school, this must be achieved within the framework of an ‘ethics of care’ (noddings, 2013). here children are respected and supported, with teachers accepting the role of care-givers who place their students’ well-being at the heart of their professional activity and attach significant value to the relationship between themselves and their students. this relationship is one of reciprocity, where the carer-teacher is attentive and listens to and observes the needs of the cared-for student, and human rights education review – volume 5(2) 42 the student recognises the care in his or her responses. underpinning teacher-student relationships are the principles of solidarity (what noddings terms mutuality) and reciprocity. these two principles also underpin human rights: rights demand human solidarity … we need to be willing to recognise and defend the rights of strangers, including people with different cultures and belief systems from our own. … [and] there is the key concept of reciprocity. person a’s rights cannot be secured unless person b is prepared to defend them, and vice versa. (osler & starkey, 2010, p. 48) in discussing the concepts of mutuality and reciprocity, noddings is interested in an educational and social outcome, namely, the development of caring individuals. her concern is both the well-being of the individual student and the development of societal values (noddings, 2006). in an educational setting, human rights principles are not abstract ideas to be communicated but living principles that apply in everyday life and everyday interactions. the school is the key arena in which moral education takes place. noddings’ conception of moral education is compatible with our understanding of hre. it has four components—modelling, dialogue, practice and confirmation—each of which can be enacted in the classroom to develop caring and responsible students (noddings, 2013). teachers should model the desired behaviour that they wish students to adopt. modelling requires that teachers critically examine their own role and behaviours and identify the moral behaviours they wish to communicate. the second component emphasises that teachers engage in authentic dialogues with students, so as to truly understand their perspectives. this element dovetails well with the principles underpinning crc articles 12-16 (un, 1989), which address children’s participation rights. these include the right to be heard, freedom of expression, freedom of thought, conscience and religion, and freedom of association. these rights cannot be enacted in isolation, they require a community. teachers need to be active listeners and to create a classroom community in which dialogues can be initiated by themselves and their students. in noddings’ third component, the teacher should provide opportunities to practice moral, caring principles, which she stresses cannot be communicated verbally, but exemplified through practice: a teacher cannot “talk” this ethic. she must live it, and that implies establishing a relation with the student. besides talking to him and showing him how one cares, she engages in cooperative practice with him. (noddings, 2013, p. 167) the last component of noddings’ moral education is that of confirmation. in essence, confirmation requires that teachers know their students well enough to best understand their k. draugedalen & a. osler 43 true intentions in any action, and can confirm the desired intention to the student, even though the action itself may be questionable or harmful. thus, confirmation allows students who have done wrong a chance to correct their wrongdoing, and allows the teacher to be in a position of tutoring the student to adopt alternative, more caring actions. however, this component is only possible when a positive and trusting relationship is already established through a longer process of receptive listening by the teacher: the one doing the confirming has to know the one who is confirmed well enough to make a reasonable, honest judgement of what the other was trying to do. when we confirm someone, we attribute to a questionable act the best possible motive consonant with reality. to do this, we must have sufficient knowledge of the other to make it plausible that this better motive was actually operating. … children and teenagers – often react with relief and gratitude: here is someone who sees my better self! the better self, perceived through receptive listening, is thus encouraged. (noddings, 2006, p. 113-114) by approaching students who have engaged in a questionable act (for example, sexual harassment) with a confirming attitude, a teacher has a far greater chance of making a lasting impact on students, and of enabling them to change their negative behaviour. here, noddings is relying on the concept of the interdependence of all in the school community and the responsibility of the wider community to resolve uncaring behaviour. again, interdependence is a concept underpinning the human rights framework (osler & starkey, 2010, p. 47). noddings’ ethics of care resonates well with the principles of ‘trauma-informed care’, an approach originally developed among professionals working with children and young people who have had adverse childhood experiences, an approach based on clinical developments in trauma psychology and neuroscience (bath & seita, 2018). levenson (2019) is among the growing number of hsb experts who advocate for a more universal trauma-informed approach in educational settings. a key message from trauma-informed care is that of the power of healthy relationships both in healing trauma and creating resilience among those who have experienced adverse childhood experiences (perry, 2009). a number of teachers in our study recognised and articulated the importance of a care-based ethics, or care-based practice, although the term they used was ‘help’ rather than ‘care’. in the quote that follows, a teacher discusses academic and social needs in tandem. she talks about ‘struggling’ children and highlights the importance of knowing individual children well, in the way noddings (2013) suggests: many children who are struggling both socially and academically, they also often have other things going on. their parents often struggle too, so there is a connection that impacts the children. it is important to understand what is wrong in order to human rights education review – volume 5(2) 44 help. (informant b, focus group 6) in the extract that follows, teacher a talks about the importance of a relationship of trust, suggesting interdependence and reciprocity between teacher and child. her colleague, b, responds by using the language of rights: a: i think that when you develop a close relation with these pupils that you see going around and are bothered by something, then most of them will be able to open up. we have also experienced children who all of a sudden just come and start talking. so, it is apparent that to have trust and a good relation is important… b: i try to be ahead, so i tell them about their rights, what other people are allowed or not allowed to do with them, so the children are sure that it is their body and they are in charge. but i have not been able to make them open up about things they have experienced. (informant a and b, focus group 2) teacher b acknowledges that a discourse on rights has been insufficient, in her experience, to enable any child to confide in her. it would seem that by combining these two approaches— teaching child rights within a care-based ethics where relationships of trust are established— teachers create opportunities for children to ‘open up’. not only are care-based ethics and a human rights-based approach complementary but, as this case illustrates, teachers need to cooperate and share practices to find the key to effective safeguarding. it remains unclear whether teacher b’s young students did or did not learn that specific remedies exist if their rights are breached. teachers’ work and the role of emotions in hre teaching and learning we have been involved in the development of a research instrument designed to assess teachers’ perceptions of the principles of the crc (osler & solhaug, 2018; osler & skarra, 2021) and we are also aware of recent studies that have looked at teachers’ role in human rights education (for example, gollifer, 2021; jerome, 2018; robinson, phillips & quennerstedt, 2020). however, we note that the focus of educational research on the crc to date has largely been on children and on student teachers and teacher education. we concur with jerome & starkey (2021, p. 73) that ‘the teacher’s central role in children’s rights education (cre) … has been relatively unexplored in the literature’. zembylas (2017) has devoted attention to the role of emotions in hre, in the context of prevailing rational understandings of human rights. he is primarily concerned with the role of emotions in creating compassion and solidarity among students. our interest here is in the role of emotions in shaping teachers’ approaches to both human rights and child rights education. in particular, we wish to consider what role emotions might play in enabling a carebased ethics, in selecting curriculum content, and in enabling or inhibiting teachers’ readiness to act as human rights defenders and practice a human rights-based safeguarding role. the k. draugedalen & a. osler 45 teacher is responsible for communicating the curriculum; s/he has agency in choice of content and method. s/he thinks, acts and feels. like zembylas (2017) we are interested in the different ways in which emotions may be implicated in the experience of those who perceive, mobilise or claim human rights, and specifically on teachers’ perceptions of their role. in the area of sexual abuse and assault there has been a long-standing societal tendency to blame the victim. so, for example, girls and women may be advised to consider how they dress, so as to discourage sexual harassment, rape or even misogynist killings. children who experience sexual harassment from their peers, or who display hsb, may be equally prone to stereotyping by the adults into whose professional care they are placed. if one purpose of teaching is to encourage students’ critical thinking and taken-for-granted perspectives, this must be a process in which teachers themselves engage. following boler (1999) this implies: a pedagogy of discomfort … [that involves] inviting educators and students to engage in critical inquiry regarding values and cherished beliefs, and to examine constructed self-images in relation to how one has learned to perceive others. (pp. 176-177) a pedagogy of discomfort is necessarily one that takes time. it invariably requires all actors to consider privilege, power and inequality and to acknowledge ways in which emotions can enable or inhibit learning. it applies as much to teachers’ work as it does to student learning. data from another of the focus groups exemplifies how teacher emotions come into play. this teacher appears to have found a more caring human rights-based approach to safeguarding by engaging in a pedagogy of discomfort: a: one can say that one has challenging pupils, but what is it about them that make them challenging? am i not adjusting my lectures well enough to their needs? am i not seeing enough? instead of saying: ‘he just has to pull himself together!’, how do i really adjust to the pupil? researcher: but that requires a certain self-reflection in what you are saying right now? a: yes, that may be the most important mission we have. you know, like when we talk about regulation of emotions with children, then you need to control your own feelings and situation before you can help a child in… in an emergency situation then you need an absolute control over your own emotions. (informant a, focus group 4) the teacher’s professional learning has come about by first acknowledging the emotional impact on herself as teacher, and then adjusting and regulating her feelings so she is able to focus on the child’s needs. addressing asymmetrical power relations in hre and safeguarding work we concur with alison struthers ‘that when children are taught about their rights in practical human rights education review – volume 5(2) 46 rather than aspirational terms, they are better able to apply a human rights lens to their own lived experiences’ (struthers, 2021, p. 48). we have previously emphasised the importance of legal knowledge as ‘part of the struggle for justice’ that, for us, is the very purpose of hre (osler, 2010, p. 121; osler, 2016). legal literacy, and an understanding of the steps that individuals may take if and when their rights are infringed, is powerful knowledge: children must be legally literate and develop the legal knowledge and skills necessary to identify breaches of rights, recognise them as such and, where appropriate, seek legal means to enforce them. (lundy and martinez sainz, 2018, p. 17) we agree with struthers (2021) that ‘reactive safeguarding processes, that rely on adults observing and actioning signs of abuse and neglect’ on an ad hoc basis will almost certainly be insufficient. we recognise that busy primary school teachers, for example, pursuing professional practices that focus, first and foremost, on communicating knowledge and enabling children to acquire a range of literacy, numeracy and social skills may or may not identify behaviours in an individual child that indicate abuse or neglect, or record them in such a way that patterns of concern are identified between professionals. while it is undoubtably true ‘that when children are taught what breaches of human rights actually look like, they are better able to recognise and report violations in their own lives’ (struthers, 2021, p. 46) we would urge caution in assuming that this is likely to be a sufficient strengthening of safeguarding procedures with regard to sexual abuse. prevailing societal attitudes mean that victims of sexual abuse, even when they recognise violations of their rights, frequently delay reporting abuse, sometimes for years, and may be tutored by abusers to believe that any wrongdoing is their own fault (halvorsen, solberg & stige, 2020). we join with struthers (2021) in advocating for stronger links to be made between children’s safeguarding and hre. however, adding basic hre knowledge to teachers’ current limited safeguarding training will probably have minimal impact. provision of safeguarding training for teachers and education for children are listed as part of a broader intervention programme to protect children against sexual abuse and exploitation under the binding lanzarote convention, across all council of europe member-states. it follows that, under the convention, member-states will be required to develop such programmes and that progress in doing so will be monitored. we contend that for human-rights based safeguarding education and training to be effective it not only requires that all parties, including children, understand what breaches of human rights look like and the remedies available to them, but that such programmes explore the asymmetrical power relations that frame current hre and safeguarding work. as we have previously argued: ‘hre must necessarily address human vulnerability and societal injustices and power differentials. … to claim full rights at school, for example, vulnerable students need k. draugedalen & a. osler 47 the support of those in power, including teachers’ (osler & skarra, 2021, p. 194). for effective safeguarding practices to be implemented, teachers need opportunities to consider and discuss these power differentials, and how they might be mitigated, for example through carebased ethics and a pedagogy of discomfort, as discussed above. other asymmetrical power relationships are those existing between students. we know that girls are at greater risk of sexually abusive behaviour than boys (hafstad & augusti, 2019). the tendency to blame the victim leaves girls and lgtb+ students especially vulnerable, along with any student encountering transphobia. these power differentials are ones that teachers need opportunities to consider, discuss and reflect on. asymmetrical power relations also exist between teachers and school leaders and administrators. teachers need the active support of school leaders to implement effective human rights-based safeguarding. without support from school principals, and an assurance that a teacher will be taken seriously by senior school administrators, children are left vulnerable. the crc and the broader human rights framework do not address power relationships in their provisions, yet forms of hre that ignore power relationships are unlikely to support societal change or transformation (osler, 2015). there was consensus across the focus groups in the six schools that support from school leaders made safeguarding duties less daunting or overwhelming (draugedalen, kleive & grov, 2021). without support, teachers reported a sense of isolation and uncertainty. in one case, a teacher described what happened when she observed hsb among students: i have contacted the principal, i have contacted the assistant principal, and of course i have discussed it with my colleagues. and i have contacted the child welfare service. but the problem is that i feel we are not being heard. maybe in the child welfare service, but not in school. it is not taken seriously. (informant a, focus group 5) asymmetrical power relationships between teachers and school principals undermine teachers’ confidence in their observations and judgments, with direct implications for children’s protection. school-based teams that included other professionals, such as a school nurse, helped alleviate unequal power differentials, allowing children’s needs to be more easily addressed. in a separate discussion about hsb and reporting processes, two teachers observed how within their school there was no clear action plan, due in part to poor communication and cooperation between professionals: b: some want to bring the concern directly to the school’s welfare teacher, while others notify the assistant principal, and others again the principal. it varies a lot human rights education review – volume 5(2) 48 depending on how the individual teacher feels. a: we’re vulnerable, right? from the start we (teachers) must dare to see. but then there is the issue of how the information and concern is received. that the relation between us adults will determine further outcome of the process. we choose people we confide in, who are available to us and that we trust. (informant a & b, focus group 1) ‘daring to see’ harmful sexual behaviour relates to a teacher’s confidence in their own judgement and perceived risks in getting it wrong. since teachers may fear acting alone, both emotion and power relations come into play. a transformative hre and its role in safeguarding we assert that ‘transformative hre involves critical examination of the present and the past, so that teachers engage in a process of self-reflection and support learners in reimagining and creating a just future. importantly, it requires teachers to support students in acting for justice’ (osler & skarra, 2021, p. 192). we are concerned here with longer-term societal change and whilst we recognise that education alone cannot be expected to achieve this, it has an important contribution to make. legal knowledge has a part to play, but it coincides and interacts with the knowledge that children bring to the process of learning, namely their own everyday experiences of justice and injustice. ultimately, both teachers and students need to be empowered to recognise themselves as agents of change and to see alternatives to the everyday injustices in their own lives and in the lives of those they observe. alongside human rights knowledge (and especially knowledge of legal standards and their remedies), teachers need to embrace the role of human rights defender of the children they teach, practising an ethics of care, and acknowledging the emotional as well as the rational elements of human rights and the impact of their own emotions on their everyday work. we contend that human rights-based safeguarding practices need to be situated in the wider societal context of teaching and learning that acknowledges power differentials between adults and children, between children, and between teachers and their senior colleagues. a recognition of these power differentials is a first step in working to ameliorate them and to move towards a situation in which children are better protected and positioned. we envisage a context where children recognise sexual abuse as a violation of their rights but where teachers, as human rights defenders, cooperate in building communities. we envisage a future society in which abused children will not be stigmatised but supported to tell their stories and trusted and protected when they report their concerns. a transformative human rights-based approach to safeguarding starts with the teachers’ willingness to recognise that abuse happens. societal change and eventual transformation begins with an acknowledgment of a problem and the need for change. children need to be k. draugedalen & a. osler 49 trusted and believed when they speak out: i believe that as primary school teachers we are significant others, we are so important to these children that it is very likely that it is us they contact if we are willing and able to see and believe them. (informant a, focus group 1) one of the schools from the study was modelling what we would describe as a transformative approach to safeguarding. this school adopted the practice of confirming (noddings, 2006) when addressing hsb, by guiding students to make appropriate choices: c: … just like, when a small child touches itself. … then you can talk to that child about it, and you can do that without making such a big deal about it, right? you can reassure the child that it is completely okay to do that, but not when the class is gathered in assembly. … just like you say that we do not pick our noses when we eat. it is almost like, if you just address it in a normal way, then i feel that they are absolutely fine with it. (informant c, focus group 3) concluding thoughts we propose a theoretical human rights-based approach to safeguarding by emphasising teachers’ role as human rights defenders. this framework aligns hre with care-based ethics; addresses the role of emotions in teachers’ work as it relates to child rights and safeguarding; considers the role of asymmetrical power relations when talking about rights; and proposes a transformative hre. teachers are in a unique position to implement an important safeguarding role in schools and we recognise the importance of early intervention, starting in primary school. they also have professional, legal and moral obligations in the context of the convention on the rights of the child. we recognise that some teachers may start from a conforming orientation to hre, while others will see their role as one of reform, rather than transformation. we wish to confirm these different starting points, and to acknowledge that an individual may move from conforming to reforming and transforming in the course of a day’s work, or indeed a single conversation. the approach may be incremental. elements of all three orientations may operate simultaneously and constructively. our contribution here is to provide a theoretical framework that illuminates some of the barriers to effective safeguarding, recognises complexity, and permits an informed debate on ways forward. references allnock, d. & r. atkinson (2019). ‘snitches get stitches': school-specific barriers to victim disclosure and peer reporting of sexual harm committed by young people in school human rights education review – volume 5(2) 50 contexts. child abuse & neglect, 89, 7–17. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2018.12.025 association for the treatment of sexual abusers (atsa) (2017). practice guidelines for assessment, treatment and intervention with adolescents who have engaged in sexually abusive behavior. association for the treatment of sexual abusers. barneombudet (2018). alle kjenner noen som har opplevd det. barneombudets rapport om seksuelle krenkelser blant ungdom. 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(2017). emotions, critical pedagogy, and human rights education, in: m. bajaj (ed). human rights education: theory, research, praxis, pp. 47-68. philadelphia, pa: university of pennsylvania press. https://doi.org/10.9783/9780812293890-004 https://www.who.int/reproductivehealth/topics/violence/clinical-response-csa/en/ https://doi.org/10.9783/9780812293890-004 teachers as human rights defenders: strengthening hre and safeguarding theory to prevent child sexual abuse abstract keywords introduction harmful sexual behaviour children and young people’s perspectives on hsb and safeguarding theorising a human rights-based approach to safeguarding aligning human rights education and care-based ethics teachers’ work and the role of emotions in hre teaching and learning addressing asymmetrical power relations in hre and safeguarding work a transformative hre and its role in safeguarding concluding thoughts references enabling grass roots activism and human rights-based education for sustainability: case studies of australian youth organisations issn 2535-5406 http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.5016 date received: 30-08-2022 date accepted: 01-06-2023 peer reviewed article © 2023 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles enabling grassroots activism and human rights-based education for sustainability: case studies of australian youth organisations genevieve hall monash university, australia, genevieve.hall1@monash.edu libby tudball monash university, australia, libby.tudball@monash.edu abstract across australia many young people are taking action to address the issue of climate change and educating others through leading grassroots activism on local and global issues of sustainability. this paper discusses findings from an online document analysis that investigated three case studies of how youth-led organisations in australia are leading and developing human rights-based education for sustainability (efs) to empower others to enjoy and exercise their rights in keeping with the guidance of the 2011 un declaration on human rights education and training. this paper discusses how these organisations represent their activism online to empower young people to lead democratic action to achieve climate crisis justice. drawing on a conceptual framework developed by jensen & schnack, the authors argue that the data suggests that the young activists in these case studies demonstrate high levels of ‘social action competence’ through raising awareness and taking action. keywords youth climate action, climate justice, human rights education, education for sustainability, social action competence http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.5016 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:genevieve.hall1@monash.edu mailto:libby.tudball@monash.edu human rights education review 2 introduction across australia young people are taking action to address the issue of climate change through educating others and leading grassroots activism on local and global issues of sustainability (verlie, 2022). inspired by greta thunberg’s peaceful protest outside the swedish parliament in 2018 as a 15-year-old, where she campaigned for a radical reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, a social movement led by young people from all over the world has taken action on this issue (lee, o’neill, blackwood & barnett, 2022). this paper discusses findings from an online document analysis that investigated case studies of three youth-led australian organisations: school strike for climate (ss4c), australian youth climate coalition (aycc), and seed. the paper discusses how they are taking action and developing human rights-based education for sustainability (efs). it explores how they represent their activism online and their approaches to educating and empowering young australians, including first nations youth, who are engaged in leading democratic action to achieve climate crisis justice (henderson & tudball, 2016). the paper explores online documents that demonstrate these organisations’ visions, direct and indirect strategies, and approaches to educating and empowering young people to fight for sustainability and climate crisis justice. the document analysis found evidence of these young activists demonstrating high levels of ‘social action competence’ (jensen & schnack, 1997) and the capacity to be advocates for ‘empowering persons to enjoy and exercise their rights’ (un declaration on human rights education and training, 2011). this was achieved through inclusive and rights-based approaches to taking action for a more sustainable future. the analysis captures how their activism is represented and enacted in varied ways, including their use of social networking sites and their engagement in peer-learning about sustainability. the activities of these organisations are not delivered through formal school education programmes, but led by young people from all over australia. the first organisation, school strike for climate (ss4c), formed in response to greta thunberg’s call for climate action, provides comprehensive documentation of their goals and activities on their website. the second organisation, the australian youth climate coalition (aycc), runs projects and campaigns to help young australians take action to solve the climate crisis (aycc, 2022). it was an aycc initiative that in 2021 formed the third organisation, seed, as a separate branch to empower first nations young people to address climate issues. seed’s vision is that of a just and sustainable future with strong cultures and communities, powered by renewable energy (seed, 2022). they argue that ‘climate change is one of the greatest threats facing humanity, but we also know it is an opportunity to create a more just and sustainable world’ (seed, 2022). g. hall & l. tudball 3 young people ‘believe that the irreversible damage caused by climate change … is the most complex and urgent problem currently facing the world’ (major group for children and youth, 2021, p. 13). this view is a widely shared concern that is motivating young people’s global grassroots activism. their central argument is that governments and world leaders are failing to address major environmental challenges. their concerns are fuelled by the latest report of the intergovernmental panel on climate change (ipcc), which concluded that holding global warming to 1.5 degrees is no longer likely to be achieved (ipcc, 2022). commenting on the urgent need for action on climate change, the secretary general of the united nations, antónio guterres said: we owe a debt to young people, civil society and indigenous communities for sounding the alarm and holding leaders accountable. we need to build on their work to create a grassroots movement that cannot be ignored. if you live in a big city, a rural area, or a small island state; if you invest in the stock market; if you care about justice, and our children’s future; i am appealing directly to you: demand that renewable energy is introduced now – at speed and at scale. (united nations, 2022) states and non-governmental organisations (ngos) have increasingly recognised that climate change has adverse impacts on a wide range of human rights, and ‘existing human rights obligations defined under legally binding treaties must consequently inform climate action’ (centre for international environmental law, 2018, p. 1). this includes the rights of children under the convention on the rights of the child (1989), such as the right to life (article 6), freedom of expression (article 13), health (article 24), an adequate standard of living, including food, water, sanitation, housing (article 27), and education (article 28). the united nations has also recognised the connection between climate change and the rights of children. in 2021, the united nations committee on the rights of the child examined a petition filed by 16 children against argentina, brazil, france and germany, and found that a state party can be held responsible for the negative impact of its carbon emissions on the rights of children within and outside its territory (office of the high commissioner human rights [ohchr], 2021). the most recent programme for international student assessment (pisa) data showed that 83 percent of 15-year-old australian students are familiar with the issue of climate change, compared with 78 percent across the oecd (thomson, 2021). sustainability is featured in australia as a cross-curriculum priority, the curriculum stating that: young people require the knowledge and skills to engage with contemporary issues such as climate change, biodiversity loss, equitable access to resources, and preservation of cultural and language diversity. they are looking for social, economic and political models that provide solutions to these issues. (australian curriculum, human rights education review 4 assessment and reporting authority [acara], 2022) however, the extent of this focus is still highly variable amongst schools, and the need to develop education for sustainability through youth action is an urgent education priority (henderson & tudball, 2016; verlie, 2022). young australian climate activists do not believe enough is being done to address this issue. for example, in a direct, high-level action in 2020, eight australian teenagers took the australian minister for the environment to the federal court in a bid to prevent her from approving the expansion of a coal mine, arguing that she had a duty of care to protect the young from the harmful impact of climate change. although this legal bid was ultimately unsuccessful (slezac & timms, 2022), young australians continue to campaign for climate justice. in the federal election in australia in 2022, climate change was a key issue of concern for young adults, many of whom were voting for the first time. this issue also had a strong influence on the election of greens party candidates and six independent ‘teal’ candidates, who were not aligned with either of the major parties. these candidates successfully campaigned on the platform of ambitious carbon reduction targets and other actions to address climate change (slezac, 2022). unlike the bureaucratic and hierarchical civil society organisations that prevailed in the twentieth century, recent social movements engaged in issues like climate change have been characterised by: … direct action strategies and internet communications, loose coalitions, relatively flat organisational structures, and more informal modes of belonging focused on shared concern about diverse issues and identity politics… [they] adopt action repertoires combining traditional acts such as voting and lobbying with a variety of alternative modes such as internet networking, street protests, consumer boycotts, and direct action. (norris, 2002, p. 3-4) this paper discusses documented evidence of how young australians represent their varied approaches to striving for climate justice through a mix of online and traditional social action campaigning. they do this to ensure inclusive and rights-based approaches to achieving a more sustainable future. conceptual frameworks in this section, the core concepts used to frame the analysis of the three activist groups are discussed. the concept of ‘action competence’ was developed by the danish educational theorists, jensen and schnack (1997), to frame an educational pedagogy for school-aged students engaging in environmental activism. this framework can be applied to young activists g. hall & l. tudball 5 who are motivated to act through their personal commitment to the issue of climate change and who desire to address injustice through social movements that question and change established social structures. jensen and schnack (1997) argue that present and future citizens should be ‘capable of acting on a societal as well as a personal level’ (p. 164). a crucial factor is that ‘concerns about the environment, health and peace must be coupled with a corresponding concern for democracy … or political liberal education’ (p. 165). jensen and schnack (1997) describe four components in their framework. the first focuses on knowledge and insights into ‘what the problems are, how they arose and what possibilities exist for solving them’ (p. 173). this also involves the development of social skills, such as the ability to cooperate and articulate a point of view. the second component is a commitment to resolve the issue under investigation, which requires ‘motivation, commitment and drive’ (p. 173), as well as the building of coherent knowledge. the third involves the capacity to envisage positive futures for society, as ‘having visions about the good life and future worlds is an important part of being action competent’ (p. 174). the final component, action experience, stresses the benefits of taking concrete action, so that young people’s reflections, values, knowledge, and action are valued in their schools and the wider community. young people can position their activism to include direct actions of environmental concern that they themselves engage in, as well as indirect actions whose purpose is to ‘influence others to do something to contribute to solving the environmental problem’ (jensen & schnack, 1997, p. 170). their actions are designed to address the social, economic and cultural implications of climate change, as part of their fight for climate justice. these concepts are used to analyse the grassroots activism of the youth organisations this case study discusses. the paper is also framed by the view that education for sustainability (efs) recognises that upholding fundamental human rights and social justice are also essential for sustainable development (tilbury, 1995; gibson, 2015), and investigates the ways the youth organisations express these ideas. henderson and tudball (2016) argue that to meet challenges such as climate change: … young people need to develop a wide and adaptive set of knowledge, skills and competencies to approach problem solving in critical and innovative ways, to ensure they can contribute to the creation of a more productive, sustainable and just society. (p. 7) according to the united nations economic commission for europe expert group (unece, 2013), efs involves understanding issues such as alternative energy resources, disaster risk reduction, declining biodiversity, poverty reduction and sustainable consumption. it involves not only learning ‘about’ climate change, but crucially also learning to engage in addressing these issues in authentic ways. this paper discusses the way that programmes such as the human rights education review 6 aycc’s switched on schools are an example of learning which occurs in informal learning environments, and which can be a trigger for change (mcgivney, 1999). efs has clear links with human rights education, since they both emphasise the importance of empowering people to participate in real world action to achieve change. in the paper, we also frame the discussion through the declaration on human rights education and training (2011), which emphasises that how human rights education is taught or learned, has equal significance with what is taught. tibbitts (2002) emphasises that the pedagogy of human rights education should be ‘about, through and for’ human rights. in particular, ‘learning for’ human rights includes building respect and responsibility, and empowers and encourages participation in the transformation of community life and society. jennings (2006) argues that while knowledge of the principles outlined in the various human rights instruments is important, it is not necessarily sufficient to bring about the compulsion to take action. similarly, osler and starkey (2010) state that: human rights education implies a deeper understanding of human rights principles, the encouragement of commitment to social justice and solidarity with those whose rights are denied; the development of critical thinking skills, and skills to effect change. (p. 18) by framing their actions as a ‘fight for climate justice’, we discuss how the young people engaged in these organisations are positioning themselves within a rights-based approach. methodology this study was conducted in the interpretive paradigm, through case studies of three youth organisations. it involved an analysis of each organisation’s online documents which are available in the public domain, including materials on these organisations’ websites and social media. these provide information about the context in which they operate, their vision, mission, goals, activities, events, and campaigns. they also contain news articles about this issue. document analysis is a systematic procedure in qualitative analysis for evaluating data to elicit meaning, gain understanding, and develop empirical knowledge (corbin & strauss, 2008). bowen (2009) notes that ‘document analysis is particularly applicable to qualitative case studies… producing rich descriptions of a single phenomenon, event, organisation or program’ (p. 29). atkinson and coffey (1997) refer to documents as ‘social facts’ which are ‘produced, shared, and used in socially organised ways’ (p. 47). as merriam (1988) points out, ‘documents of all types can help the researcher develop understanding and discover insights relevant to the research problem’ (p. 118). g. hall & l. tudball 7 the case study organisations were selected because of the public online availability of their documents, and because they are examples of youth-led organisations which focus on climate justice and education for sustainability and use a combination of direct and indirect action in their strategies and approaches. each youth organisation is discussed as a case study of ‘action competence’ (jensen & schnack, 1997). this is an appropriate method for this qualitative research, since it is exploratory and explanatory research which aims to answer ‘how’ and ‘why’ type questions about contemporary events (yin, 2009). analysis of the qualitative data involves perceiving what is happening in key episodes and then representing these happenings with direct interpretations and narratives, which are used to optimise understanding (stake, 1995). case studies enable the words and actions of each group to be analysed and a complex and layered picture based on an interaction of factors to be built (creswell, 2007). to undertake a critical analysis of the grassroots activism undertaken by these organisations, we explored the vision statements, key goals, and the factors that enabled or challenged each organisations’ actions, and, importantly, how each organisation framed its direct and indirect action with regard to human rights-based intentions. case study findings school strike 4 climate australia (ss4c) in australia, the ss4c network state that they are ‘student led, decentralized, grassroots, nonpartisan, inclusive, non-violent, mission focused, ambitious and creative’ (ss4c, 2022). their website includes information about how to join the organization, upcoming events and resource guides about how to organise actions, as well as key messages and slogans such as ‘what do we want? climate justice! when do we want it? now!’ ss4c campaigns for an end to all new coal and gas projects, investment in renewable energy, and job creation funding for all fossil-fuel workers and their communities. the document analysis showed that this organisation shares similar goals with the aycc and seed organisations and was prepared to use what jensen and schnack (1997) define as direct, democratic action that is critical of the underlying structures of society. these strikes are an important opportunity for the under-18s to enact their participatory citizenship, given the barriers they face when it comes to formal means of civic participation, such as voting and standing for elected positions. verlie and flynn’s (2022) australian research found that what students learn through their participation in climate strikes stands in contrast to the often-limited climate change education and opportunities for active participation provided by schools. this is reflected in the quote from one student striker, who said: to be honest i have learned a lot more stuff at the strike than i learned in the human rights education review 8 classroom… i think we should all be here, learn more stuff about what's happening, climate change, the environment and sustainability. (australian broadcasting corporation [abc] news, 2021) in 2018, then prime minister scott morrison responded to the school strikes for action in australia by saying ‘what we want is more learning in schools and less activism in schools’ (aap, 2018). some students interviewed at the ss4c protest said their schools dissuaded them from attending, while others said their schools were very supportive, even allowing the posting of flyers about the event on school grounds (abc news, 2021). verlie (2022) argues that ‘young people are learning a suite of skills through striking from school leadership, communication, team building, and organisational, democratic and critical analysis skills and are teaching others as they do so’. heggart and flowers (2019) describe a ‘justice pedagogy’ that was developed within a civics and citizenship education programme in a school, where students focused on and responded to real-world problems that impacted on their lives by creating films and campaigning on social media. while programmes such as this are not widely available in all australian schools, groups such as ss4c are using similar approaches in their grassroots community organisations. for example, leading up to the australian federal election in 2022, the ss4c ensured that students had access to varied resources to educate them on a range of sustainability issues (ss4c, 2022). in 2021, thousands of young students across 47 different sites across australia walked out of their classrooms to take part in the global climate strike (abc news, 2021). organisers of the strike demanded that the federal government address climate change issues and turn its back on emissions-intensive energy sources. there were a number of other demands: the resourcing of first nations peoples to work for solutions that guarantee land rights; funding for the creation of secure jobs that fast-track solutions to the climate crisis; and funding for projects that will transition the economy to 100 per cent renewable energy by 2030. one student told the media that they ‘were too young to vote, so were choosing to protest so their voices could be heard’ (abc news, 2021). another young protester was quoted as saying: it is our future that climate change is going to be affecting, young people are often on the front lines of the climate movement and we know that the continuing impacts of climate change will affect us for generations. (rachwani, 2021) in 2022, ss4c australia was part of the twitter campaign #fundourfuturenotgas, to encourage individuals, businesses and other organisations to pledge and ‘stand with school strikers to oppose public funds being wasted on dirty gas’ (ss4c, 2022). the ss4c twitter feed also demonstrates the organisation’s commitment to the rights of first nations peoples. for example, a post from #school strike 4 climate australia showed a video of a young woman who attended the ss4c protest in sydney voicing her concerns about a company’s proposal to g. hall & l. tudball 9 build coal-seam gas wells on the traditional lands of her community, the gamilaroi people from the pilliga region of new south wales. in these ways, ss4c is using social media effectively to spread its message through using the voices of young people who are directly impacted, educating others about the issue, and providing ways of taking action, in what can be described as an example of ‘social action competence’ (jensen & schnack, 1997). australian youth climate coalition (aycc) the mission of the aycc is to build a social movement of young people and grassroots activism that will lead to solutions to address the climate crisis. on their website, the aycc explains: … we are building a movement of young people, standing in solidarity with those on the frontlines of climate change, to lead solutions to the climate crisis... it is only through a huge, diverse and committed social movement, led by those with the most at stake, that we will see just and sustainable solutions to the climate crisis realised. decision makers in governments, businesses and our communities will only make the changes required if there is a strong social movement demanding it. (aycc, 2022) as well as framing itself as part of a social movement, the aycc positions itself as taking direct and indirect action as a rights issue, because: … the climate crisis as an issue of social and environmental injustice. climate change affects everyone, but not equally. it is often the most marginalised in our societies who are hit first and worst by climate impacts and carry the burden of polluting industries. (aycc, 2022) since 2009, the aycc has run the ‘switched on schools program’ across australia, where thousands of students across more than 250 schools have been engaged in taking action on the climate crisis (aycc switched on schools, 2022). through student leadership programmes and youth-facilitated school workshops, the programme empowers the young to build their knowledge, skills, and networks to create change. the website states: our in-school climate justice workshops and presentations that use a peer to peer approach, and are delivered by our passionate youth facilitators. the workshops are designed to spark students’ interest in climate change and solutions, and how they can lead climate action in their school and community. (aycc switched on schools, 2022) this peer-teaching model, which can be conceptualised as efs (tilbury, 1995; gibson, 2015), operates outside the formal classroom curriculum. it includes a number of approaches: awareness raising; problem solving and community action; traditional forms of activism such as letters to politicians, marches, banners, slogans and chants; and social media campaigning including tweets, texts, instagram photos and youtube clips. human rights education review 10 one of the campaigns, ‘a plan for repowering our schools’, aims for public schools to be powered by 100% renewable solar energy and become clean energy hubs for their entire community. the switched on schools website includes resources such as how to build a team, how to run an event, and how to engage decision makers (aycc switched on schools, 2022). this campaign has achieved a number of ‘wins’: students who ‘led a campaign to repower their school after attending one of our summits and ended up being successful in installing over 100kw of solar, led lights and doubling the size of the enviro team in just a few months’; ‘students in south australia who are passionate about renewables in schools organised a meeting with the minister for education, as well as in-school campaigns and community actions on renewables, resulting in a $15 million commitment from the south australian government for solar and energy efficiency for over 100 high schools’; ‘young people and high school students in the latrobe valley, a community transitioning away from coal, have been changing the conversation on climate change and energy, leading solutions by transitioning their schools and community to renewables’ (aycc switched on schools, 2022). the switched on schools website also describes their student climate leadership programme, a six-month peer-to-peer programme for a diverse range of students in years 8-12 from secondary schools across victoria. the programme challenges them to ‘master skills in leadership, change-making, campaigning and communications’. in addition, they ‘strongly encourage applications from students identifying as aboriginal or torres strait islander, students from diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds, students with a disability, students from rural and regional areas, and lgbtqi students’ (aycc switched on schools, 2022). this demonstrates that the aycc is focused on inclusion, social justice, and human rights dimensions in their programmes and actions. the aycc twitter feed (#aycc) demonstrates other direct actions such as meeting with the federal climate and energy minister, as well as creating a ‘fund our future not gas’ light installation at parliament house in the australian national capital canberra. the representation of activism and well organised human-rights based campaigns in these documents demonstrates how the aycc are empowering the young to be well-informed, justice-oriented citizens and climate change activists. while this paper has discussed the ss4c and the aycc organisations as separate entities, the document analysis found many connections and crossovers between them. for example, the switched on schools website includes a page about the ss4c, and information about joining the aycc strike committee (aycc switched on schools, 2022). both organisations also campaign about the same issues, such as #fundourfuturenotgas, and focus on the rights of first nations peoples as part of their climate campaigning. g. hall & l. tudball 11 the aycc twitter feed also highlights a partnership between the aycc and other activist organisations involved in enabling grassroots activism. the aycc, along with ss4c, promoted the environmental music prize through their social networking sites. this prize celebrates artists who inspire action for climate and conservation, and young people are encouraged to vote for the environmental song they perceive as being the most powerful. the prize demonstrates the ‘loose coalitions’ (norris, 2002, p. 3) that exist between the aycc and other environmental organisations in facilitating creative activism, including greenpeace and the world wildlife fund, who were impact partners in this initiative (environmental music prize, 2022). these organisations, and other youth-led organisations, including ss4c and seed, have similar goals and strategies in helping to spread the message across a movement of young people, and are working together as part of a social movement to try and achieve their goals in collective ways (jensen & schnack, 1997). seed seed is ‘australia’s first indigenous youth climate network’ (seed, 2022). the organisation began as a part of the aycc, but in 2021 became an independent organisation. it is led by first nations young people who recognise that they are already experiencing the impacts of climate on their community, culture, and country (seed, 2022). this is of international significance, since: indigenous peoples are among the first to face the direct consequences of climate change, due to their dependence upon, and close relationship, with the environment and its resources. climate change exacerbates the difficulties already faced by indigenous communities including political and economic marginalization, loss of land and resources, human rights violations, discrimination and unemployment. (united nations department of economic and social affairsindigenous peoples, 2022) in the statement on the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (2007) to the parliament of australia, the minister for families, housing, community services and indigenous affairs said: indigenous peoples must have the opportunity to develop and drive solutions if we, as a nation are to achieve real, lasting change. the right of indigenous peoples to improve their economic and social conditions, in the areas of education, employment, housing and health is central to achieving this. (parliament of australia, 2009) the latest data from the ‘closing the gap’ national agreement (productivity commission, 2022) demonstrates that while some of the life issues of first nations peoples in australia are improving (such as the healthy birthweight of babies), others are not (such as rates of adult imprisonment). the seed organisation argues that: human rights education review 12 climate change is an issue of environmental and social justice… low­income people, communities of colour, women, youth and in particular aboriginal and torres strait islander people in australia are on the frontlines of this crisis. it’s our communities that are hit first and worst, not only by the impacts of climate change but the impacts of extractive, polluting and wasteful industries that are devastating our country and fuelling the climate crisis. (seed, 2022) in this way, seed is also positioning its work within an action-oriented, rights-based framework led by first nations young people, one which goes beyond environmental campaigning to focus on issues of equity and social justice, a key part of efs (tilbury, 1995; gibson, 2015). in 2021, seed organised and supported a campaign by remote first nations communities to protest against gas fracking plans on their lands. this campaign included young people travelling to the national capital canberra to directly lobby politicians (seed, 2022). in june 2021, the senate established a parliamentary inquiry into oil and gas exploration and production in the beetaloo basin in the northern territory (parliament of australia, 2021), which seed contributed to through a submission. these documented examples demonstrate how these motivated young people have developed the knowledge, skills, dispositions, and actions to be ‘action competent’ (jensen & schnack, 1997) within a democratic framework. in solidarity with the ‘our islands our home’ campaign, seed has also become a partner organisation to support the voices and leadership of torres strait islander people to protect their island homes from the effects of climate change (our islands our home, 2022). this website explains that: zenadh kes (the torres strait islands and surrounding seas) is home to traditional owners who have lived with a deep connection to land, sea, sky and culture for over 60,000 years. right now, torres strait islanders are on the frontlines of the climate crisis and urgent action is needed to ensure they can remain on their homelands… as part of this, eight torres strait islanders have taken a complaint against the australian government to the united nations for failing to protect zenadh kes from climate damage – demanding australia rapidly reduce our emissions, and immediately resource adaptation needs. (our islands our home, 2022) this campaign was successful, as in september 2022 the un human rights committee found that australia’s failure to adequately protect torres strait islanders against the adverse impacts of climate change was a violation of their rights to enjoy their culture and be free from arbitrary interferences with their private life, family, and home (united nations office of the high commissioner for human rights, 2022). this is a demonstration of the power of sustained advocacy and awareness-raising about this issue by groups such as seed. g. hall & l. tudball 13 seed provides a leadership training programme for first nations youth to build their skills and confidence in leading climate justice campaigns. in 2021, the seed twitter account #seedmob posted a fundraising campaign to enable a representative from seed to travel to glasgow for the cop26 2021 climate summit, in order to call for action for their climate justice campaigns and to elevate the stories and leadership of first nations young people. in 2021, the national director of seed, amelia telford, appeared on q & a, a nationally broadcast current affairs programme focused on the topic of ‘australia’s climate future’. on this programme, she said: when you talk about leadership, you know, if you’re not prepared to step up to the game, if you don’t know what leadership looks like, then, honestly, get out of the way and let first nations people, first people of this country, who’ve been looking after this land sustainably for tens of thousands of years... step back and let us stand up, because we know what to do in a crisis. (abc, 2021) the seed website describes how in october 2022, they took their ‘heal country declaration’ to the steps of parliament house in canberra, and asked elected representatives to ‘invest public money into supporting our communities through public services, sustainable and renewable energy developments, and solutions led by and for aboriginal and torres strait islander people’ (seed, 2022). these publicly documented examples of concrete actions taken to address this issue can be categorised as social action competence (jensen & schnack, 1997). discussion it can be argued that these documented journeys, campaigns, and powerful stories of efs demonstrate how the young people involved in the ss4c, aycc and seed organisations meet the criteria of ‘action competence’ (jensen & schnack, 1997). they demonstrate they have knowledge and insights into the problem (climate change), how it arose (industrialisation and fossil fuel burning), and what possibilities exist for solving it (such as reducing fossil fuels and increasing the use of renewable energy). they also demonstrate a commitment to resolve the issue of climate change, through volunteering their time and energies to these organisations, encouraging renewable energy solutions, and lobbying elected officials and businesses to reduce carbon emissions. these online documents demonstrate that these young people are engaged in taking intentional, well-planned action to achieve a future better world, and are motivated to take action to mitigate climate-change challenges such as fire, flood, drought, and storms so they are not so prevalent and destructive. the members of ss4c, the aycc and seed are similar in that they engage in direct concrete action including strikes, lobbying, education, and awareness-raising programmes, as well as indirect action to encourage their communities, governments, and businesses to take action on climate change. in these ways, they are empowering young people, conversant with the science of climate change, to use their voice to demand action. human rights education review 14 through using the term ‘climate justice’, the ss4c, aycc and seed situate the work they do within a rights framework. for example, a protester at the ss4c protest was quoted as saying: the government is not taking the action it needs to, and it is our future we are fighting for, and we deserve to live in a world where we have… rights. (rachwani, 2021) similarly, the aycc and seed also situate climate change as both a social and environmental injustice and emphasise that it is often the most marginalised in our societies that are most impacted by climate change. in addition, the developing countries which have contributed the least to the crisis in terms of burning fossil fuels may be the most affected by it (bathiany, dakos, scheffer & lenton, 2018). in order to address these social and environmental problems, these young people are questioning and taking action to try and change established systems and structures which have reproduced patterns of injustice over time. the notion of ‘intergenerational justice’ is a potent one regarding the issue of climate change. in an interview with a newspaper before the 2022 federal election in australia, a 19-year-old said: all through school or through uni, we’ve been told: ‘this is your generation’s problem. you’re the ones who are going to fix it’. yeah, we’ll try to, but that doesn’t mean we can’t do stuff now. you don’t need to exacerbate the problems. i think it’s just a bit demoralising, when so many of us are like ‘action needs to be taken’. (chrysanthos, 2022) another 21-year-old said: when you look at the climate change movements – who are leading, who are organising – it’s all young people. the adult generation, older generation are all, like, supplementary. (chrysanthos, 2022) according to thompson (2009), intergenerational justice is about ‘how benefits, burdens, responsibilities and entitlements should be distributed among members of society’ (p. 5), and yet many young people are feeling that they have the responsibility to demand action be taken to find a solution. anthropogenic climate change poses a dilemma about how the intergenerational costs of climate change can be dealt with in a just and fair manner. while young people are being empowered to develop greater agency through involvement in a blend of old and new forms of action competence development (through groups such as ss4c, aycc and seed), questions remain about the ‘fairness’ of the young having to manage a crisis and an environmental disaster not of their making, but one which will disproportionally impact them. g. hall & l. tudball 15 challenges and conclusions despite the enthusiasm with which many young people have engaged with organisations such as ss4c, aycc and seed, underlying much of their participation is a deep fear and anxiety about what their future lives will be like as the climate crisis intensifies. recent research shows many young people in australia are concerned about climate change (sciberras & fernando, 2021). in 2019, a survey by youth mental health organisation reachout found 80 per cent of australian students aged 14 to 23 were somewhat or very anxious about climate change (reachout, 2019), with close to half experiencing these emotions on a weekly basis. a 20-yearold who was interviewed by a newspaper said: i’m deeply, deeply anxious about climate change… we are faced with a future impacted by climate change but feel we have very little say in that future even though we inherit it. (topsfield & aubrey, 2022) educators need to understand that concerns about climate change can be an overwhelming, existential experience for many young people (sciberras & fernando, 2021). jensen and schnack (1997) acknowledge concerns about ‘whether creating anxiety and worry in children is wise or useful’ (p. 164), but their conclusion is that it is empowering ‘for students to learn to be active citizens in a democratic society’ (p. 164). in this way they can develop some agency through their action competence, rather than feeling helpless and powerless. in this paper, we have argued that despite the challenges they face, and the immense difficulty of the task, young climate activists in australia involved in these youth-led organisations are working tirelessly to use their knowledge skills, dispositions, and capacities to take action for climate justice through a rights-based approach. the documented evidence discussed provides examples of what can be achieved when efs is enacted through well-planned, highly collaborative real-world opportunities and informed action beyond the classroom. more than two decades ago, the need for action competence was recognized in the citizenship education policy study project (cogan & derricott, 2000), which concluded that informed and active citizenship must include opportunities for the young to be involved in considering problems from a global perspective, working co-operatively and taking responsibilities in society to achieve this (henderson & tudball, 2016). the ss4c, the aycc and seed provide continuing examples of these kinds of socially responsible actions. young grassroots activists in australia involved in these organisations have demonstrated that, through education and activism, they have developed the capacity to create and lead change to try and mitigate the impact of this urgent issue of climate change and other sustainability concerns that are infringing on their rights. human rights education review 16 note from the authors please note that the authors have been guided in their use of inclusive and respectful language by referring to the advice by reconciliation australia (n.d.). references australian associated press (aap) (2018, november 26). scott morrison tells students striking over climate change to be 'less activist'. the guardian. retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/nov/26/scott-morrison-tellsstudents-striking-over-climate-change-to-be-less-activist australian broadcasting corporation (abc) (2021, october 21). australia's climate future. q & a. retrieved from https://www.abc.net.au/qanda/2021-21-10/13586742 abc news (2021, may 21). school strike 4 climate: thousands of young australians call for urgent action on climate change. abc news. retrieved from https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-05-21/school-strike-for-climate-2021-nationalwrap/100155114 australian curriculum, assessment and reporting authority (acara) (2022). australian curriculum: cross-curriculum priorities – version 9.0 about the sustainability crosscurriculum priority. retrieved from https://v9.australiancurriculum.edu.au/teacherresources/understand-this-cross-curriculum-priority/sustainability atkinson, p. a. & coffey, a. 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(2009). case study research design and methods (4th ed). thousand oaks: sage. https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2022/09/australia-violated-torres-strait-islanders-rights-enjoy-culture-and-family#:~:text=human%20rights%20committee%20has%20found,private%20life%2c%20family%20and%20home https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2022/09/australia-violated-torres-strait-islanders-rights-enjoy-culture-and-family#:~:text=human%20rights%20committee%20has%20found,private%20life%2c%20family%20and%20home https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2022/09/australia-violated-torres-strait-islanders-rights-enjoy-culture-and-family#:~:text=human%20rights%20committee%20has%20found,private%20life%2c%20family%20and%20home https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2022/09/australia-violated-torres-strait-islanders-rights-enjoy-culture-and-family#:~:text=human%20rights%20committee%20has%20found,private%20life%2c%20family%20and%20home https://www.sydney.edu.au/news-opinion/news/2022/03/25/school-strike-for-climate-why-are-students-still-striking-expert.html https://www.sydney.edu.au/news-opinion/news/2022/03/25/school-strike-for-climate-why-are-students-still-striking-expert.html https://www.sydney.edu.au/news-opinion/news/2022/03/25/school-strike-for-climate-why-are-students-still-striking-expert.html https://doi.org/10.1017/aee.2022.5 international organisations and human rights education curriculum reform issn 2535-5406 http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.5098 date received: 23-10-2022 date accepted: 02-02-2023 peer reviewed article © 2023 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles international organisations and human rights education curriculum reform kerim sen eskisehir osmangazi university, turkey, kerimsentr@gmail.com abstract the united nations (un) and council of europe (coe) have engaged in the development of a human rights education (hre) curriculum in turkey. the study programme for an elective high school course, democracy and human rights, was first developed as part of the un decade for hre initiative in 1999. the programme was later renewed as part of coe’s education for democratic citizenship and hre initiative in 2013. this study scrutinises the course’s two programmes with a view to providing insights into the role of international agencies in hre curriculum reforms. the introduction and development of the course—which is possibly the world’s longest-lived example of hre taught as a school subject—was a product of the efforts of the international organisations. after discussing the political-ideological influences of the factions that held power when both programmes were developed, the paper ends with suggestions to improve the effectiveness of international organisations in hre curriculum reform. keywords human rights education, curriculum development, education reform, council of europe, united nations, turkey http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.5098 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ human rights education review 2 introduction the united nations (un) and council of europe (coe) consider education a vital mechanism to internationally promote human rights and democratic citizenship. their role in this area became more prominent after the end of the cold war (osler & starkey, 1996). with a view to strengthening universal values in their member states, these international organisations have launched educational programmes: the un decade for human rights education (hre) initiative (1995-2004); and the coe’s education for democratic citizenship and human rights education (edc/hre) (1997-2010). while the former initiative called for member states to develop action plans and set up national committees for the promotion of hre, the latter strengthened collaboration between the coe’s educational units and member states’ authorities in an attempt to promote edc/hre (barrett, 2020; coe, 2010). having been completed in three phases, the edc/hre initiative developed a conceptual basis, policy instruments, and manuals for policymakers and practitioners that aim to facilitate the implementation of edc/hre policies (keating, 2014). this culminated in the announcement of the charter on edc/hre in 2010. while the coe consistently promoted the core values of human rights, democracy and the rule of law, it came to place a greater emphasis on the promotion of intercultural dialogue (coe, 2008). released in 2008, the coe’s white paper on intercultural dialogue criticised old approaches to cultural diversity, such as assimilationism and multiculturalism. while assimilationism is starkly contrary to human rights principles, a multiculturalism that relies on a ‘schematic conception of society’ runs the risk of ‘endorsing separation of the minority from the majority’, namely fragmentation of a society’s value basis (coe, 2008, p. 18). in fact, essentialised, monolithic and rigid conceptualisations of cultural differences ignore the fact that ‘all people draw on a range of identities’ (osler & starkey, 2010, p. 86). moreover, the conceptualisation of cultural differences in essentialised terms is not consistent with the reality that ‘systems of symbols, concepts, beliefs, traditions, rules and ways of organising and communicating can be borrowed, adapted, shared and transposed’ (osler & starkey, 2010, p. 88). in line with these perspectives, the white paper suggests replacing the old approaches with an ‘intercultural dialogue’ which is ‘an open and respectful exchange of views between individuals, groups with different ethnic, cultural, religious and linguistic backgrounds and heritage on the basis of mutual understanding and respect’ (coe, 2008, p. 10). this new approach requires educators to promote the interaction of diverse identities partly because such cultural exchange fosters the culture of human rights. this new approach is distinctly echoed in the coe’s programmes that have been initiated after 2008. the un and coe still continue their efforts for the institutionalisation of hre, but ongoing global developments, such as the rise of populist nationalism or new despotism, in keane's (2020) words, and the increasingly aggressive policies of authoritarian states accentuate the k. sen 3 importance of their efforts in the field of edc/hre. therefore, we need to look afresh into their past efforts with a view to drawing lessons and generating insights into how they can become more influential in promoting hre in formal education. the case of turkey provides us with useful data in identifying the strengths and weaknesses of un’s and coe’s efforts in the field of hre. firstly, as a member of both organisations, turkey joined both initiatives, and edc/hre found a place in turkey’s national curriculum as an outcome of these organisations’ educational initiatives. the contextual particularities of turkey make it an interesting case for evaluating the impact of the international organisations. this is because, on the one hand, turkey is signatory to several human rights instruments, most notably the convention on the rights of the child (crc), and the european convention on human rights (echr). on the other hand, turkey’s security-centric state tradition is characterised by a routine condemnation of almost all rights struggles as a threat to the unity of the state (babül, 2012). exploring the implications of the tension between a security-centric state’s priorities and its willingness to participate in human rights regimes may yield useful insights for improving the impact of international organisations in hre reforms. in other words, turkey’s contextual particularities make it a unique research object for a scholarly effort that explores the role of international organisations in hre curriculum reform. at the same time, the contextual specificities of turkey limit the generalisability of insights yielded by this study. hre in high schools in turkey the elective high school course democracy and human rights was introduced in 1995 at the start of the un decade for hre initiative, and its first programme was announced in 1999, after a new coalition government was formed in the wake of april 1998 general election (mone, 1999). the course’s second programme, announced in 2013, was developed as part of a project funded by the european union (eu), for which the coe provided edc/hre expertise (coe, 2012). the introduction and development of the first curriculum of an hre high school course was a product of the un decade for hre initiative, and the development of its latest curriculum, and possibly its survival, was a consequence of the efforts undertaken as part of coe’s edc/hre initiative in turkey. the course in question has survived for almost 30 years, despite the massive ideological-political transformation of the country. it is probably now the world’s longest-lived example of a taught hre subject. since this article aims to explore the role of international organisations in hre curriculum reforms, it will not delve into the history of citizenship and hre in turkey; several previous studies have provided rich scholarship on this topic (çayır & gürkaynak, 2008; i̇nce, 2012; sen & starkey, 2019). rather, i will briefly outline the parameters of the political context, and the significant milestones of the un and coe’s involvement in hre reform in turkey. turkey’s participation in the un decade for hre initiative was realised in a period when the human rights education review 4 forces of militant-secular nationalism were focused on tackling the rise of islamic nationalism. while the political turmoil in the country initially interrupted the national efforts to comply with the initiative, the period after the overthrow of the islamic nationalist government in 1997 saw several developments towards the implementation of the un decade for hre initiative (cizre-sakallıoğlu & çınar, 2003). when the country’s politics were being re-designed under the tutelage of the secularist military, the high coordination board of human rights was established in 1998 to oversee human rights reforms undertaken in various policy areas, and a national committee on the un decade for hre (national committee hereafter) was set up in 1998 (national committee, 1999, 2001). to promote hre, the national committee prepared an action plan that envisaged offering hre to almost all public officials in judiciary, security and formal education sectors, including universities. it designated the years from 1998 to 2007 as turkey’s decade for hre and asked the ministry of national education (mone) to develop curricula for hre courses. while the first programme was developed when the rise of islamic nationalism was challenging the hegemony of militant-secular nationalism, the later programme was developed when the forces of islamic nationalism were establishing their hegemony under recep tayyip erdoğan’s justice and development party (hereafter jdp) governments. these programmes provide significant documentary evidence of to the role of dominant ideologies and international agencies in hre curriculum reform. influential ideologies during hre curriculum development before moving into the next part of the article, a few words must be said about the dominant ideologies which prevailed when the curriculum was being developed. the first of these, militant-secular nationalism, was the official state ideology that exalted mustafa kemal atatürk (hereafter atatürk), the founder of modern-secular turkey, and his modernisation efforts (bora, 2003). it was sustained with the backing of the military through the suppression of all rival ethno-religious and ideological movements. the representatives of militant-secular nationalism staunchly advocated republican principles, such as laicism, and vehemently suppressed the rights struggle movements of islamic nationalists and ethnic minorities, such as the kurds, in the 1990s. the military-imposed measures in 1997 banned wearing headscarves in public institutions and shut down islamic middle schools, irreparably damaging those who suffered from these draconian measures. islamic nationalism emerged first as a counter movement to the hard-line militant-secularist state establishment. while its political parties have been banned on several occasions, the eu integration reforms after 2001 paved the way for their coming to power (özkırımlı, 2011). since 2002, erdoğan’s successive jdp governments have gradually established islamic nationalism as the new official ideology. islamic nationalists imagine the turkish people as a religious nation with a particular emphasis on the ottoman past and seek ways to expand the boundaries of public policies grounded in sunni islamic beliefs. while the jdp was committed k. sen 5 to an eu membership agenda in its early years, its policies turned to authoritarianism after it consolidated power over the secular nationalist establishment. the brutal suppression of the gezi park protests in 2013 signifies one of the key events in the jdp’s installation of authoritarian islamic nationalism. even though young people who participated in these protests were exercising their most fundamental human rights, their dissent was perceived by the government as a sort of civil coup and it was violently supressed. afterwards, several significant political events succeeded the gezi park protests, resulting in the establishment of a national security state (sertdemir özdemir & özyürek, 2019). the number of institutions providing sunni islamic education has reached an all-time high, now that erdoğan has asserted almost full control over the country (lord, 2018). these two dominant ideologies are the major forces that mediated, resisted, altered and metamorphosed the influence of the international organisations in the hre course programmes. this article will comparatively analyse the two course programmes with the aim of shedding light on the role of international organizations in hre curriculum reform and the influence of dominant ideologies in curriculum development. it will highlight the political complexities of curriculum development in turkey by focusing on how the development of the course’s programmes was linked to the shifting political landscape in the country and how it was connected to a complicated balancing act between the dominant state ideologies and external political pressures. overall, the article will contribute to the field of curriculum studies by throwing a critical light on the relationship between state ideologies, curricula and formal education (apple, 2014; cardenas, 2005). lessons from turkey’s hre curriculum development experience may increase the effectiveness of international agencies in hre curriculum reform around the world. exploring the meaning of an effective hre curriculum the un and coe endorse a broad definition of hre as an area of education that includes all forms of activities that aim at fostering a universal culture of democracy and human rights (coe, 2010; un, 2011). for example, the united nations declaration on human rights education and training offers a tripartite conceptualisation of hre as education about, through and for human rights (un, 2011). education about human rights corresponds to the acquisition of basic core knowledge, education through human rights refers to the practice of human rights in schools, and education for human rights aims to engage learners in human rights advocacy campaigns and strengthen their commitment to the expansion and institutionalisation of human rights in the wider society. however, this declaration does not prescribe a hre curriculum model, possibly because a top-down technical approach to curriculum development runs the risk of channelling the values of powerful and wealthy groups into formal education (apple, 2014). the un and coe’s endorsement of this broad hre human rights education review 6 conceptualisation may be justified on the grounds that these organisations aim to harness the potential of the whole educational process in disseminating universal values of democratic citizenship and human rights. it can also be argued that confining hre to a curricular subject is problematic since both in-class and outside-class experiences in schools are important for effective hre. a unesco publication is critical of the provision of hre through separate courses that are added on to already-overloaded curricula (un, 2003). and it may be true that the banking style delivery of hre courses without any outside-class reinforcement can be counter-productive. however, in-class activities provide the gist of learning experience in formal education. a welldeveloped hre curriculum delivered through discrete courses, complemented by practical experiences outside class and school, such as opportunities for students to engage in human rights advocacy campaigns, may ensure an effective provision of hre. in fact, when hre is not anchored in a taught subject, it may become elusive for both practitioners and researchers. despite this, the development of hre as a taught course and what an ideal hre curriculum should look like in formal education have attracted little attention. by recognising this problem, parker (2018) has made an attempt to outline the elements of an hre curriculum theory. his theoretical endeavour has explored the possibilities for a consensual hre curriculum model. he has used a metaphor of the sun with its orbiting planets in outlining the key components of an hre curriculum. he suggests that key concepts like universal respect, freedom, human rights, dissent, activism, struggle, peaceful coexistence, and justice should be recurringly taught as the core content. the peripheral content around which these core concepts would be spirally taught may include the historical development of human rights, effective campaigning/protesting strategies, rights activists, major rights documents, human rights organisations/institutions, and key rights struggles. parker’s model urges teachers to use examples of rights struggle movements from contexts familiar to students, as this will raise their awareness of global human rights discourses. what has been conceptualised as transformative hre by bajaj et al. (2016) highlights the role of critical engagement with human rights issues, investigations of social justice problems and actual participation in rights advocacy activities for an effective hre. russell (2018) has investigated the effectiveness of an hre course taught at 10 and 11 grades in three public high schools in new york. the course aimed to engage students with global and local rights issues, enable them to use the conceptual knowledge in making sense of rights issues in their own context, and work in rights advocacy projects. it included the basic core knowledge of human rights and principles, and examples of rights struggle and activists. students were encouraged to draw links between the conceptual knowledge they learned in the classes and human rights issues affecting their lives. russell (2018) found that students were successful in drawing on human rights discourses in making sense of rights violations—such as police brutality and k. sen 7 racial discrimination—in their own environment. alluding to the linking of the global with the local through the concept of vernacularisation, russell (2018) concluded that students’ sense of agency and their engagement with human rights were improved after taking the course. she underlines that hre courses can more effective when students are enabled to use global human rights discourses in critically evaluating rights issues affecting their own lives and engage in rights advocacy campaigns. these studies, along with the coe’s and un’s policy documents (coe, 2010, 2018; un, 2011) and several other significant works (e.g. bajaj et al., 2016; parker, 2018; russell, 2018), provide blueprints of what an effective hre curriculum should look like in formal education. what these endeavours suggest is that an effective hre programme should give due regard to the cognitive (knowing), affective (feeling) and practical (doing) components of hre. it should allow learners to interpret human rights issues based on a universal human rights discourse with the goal of engaging them in real-life rights struggles. it must provide participatory and experiential opportunities in which students can think about the root causes of rights issues and realise what role they can play in eliminating the issues in question. the five requirements of an effective hre programme what can be inferred from these resources is that an effective hre programme must meet at least five requirements: an explicit recognition of human rights as the main frame of reference; a critical consideration of rights issues affecting leaners’ lives; real-life examples of rights struggles and activists; cultural contextualisation of universal human rights values; and opportunities for experience and participation. an hre programme that meets these criteria can be called an issue-centric hre. first of all, such hre must take the universal declaration of human rights (udhr) and crc as the main frame of reference, primarily because these documents reflect the value consensus of the international community (osler & starkey, 2010). the cosmopolitan vision of human rights embedded in these documents offers an effective response to challenges posed by growing inequalities and polarization. it can enable young people of diverse backgrounds to develop a sense of community where they can live together as equal citizens without suppressing their diverse identities. secondly, issue-centric hre must rely on pedagogical utilisation of rights issues affecting learners’ lives because democracy is essentially ‘the way of conducting our common affairs with reference to the values of equality, freedom and solidarity’ (biesta et al., 2014, p. xiii). it must provide students with platforms where they can conduct their ‘common affairs’, discuss and deliberate their common problems, learn the art of democratic conversation, go beyond imposed categories, and think deeply about socio-political problems. the focus on public issues can encourage students to think about and act on issues related to race, class, gender, culture, ethnicity, and religion on the basis of universal human rights values. human rights education review 8 thirdly, an issue-centric hre programme includes real-life examples of rights struggles and activists in order to help students better contextualise the theoretical knowledge of rights and responsibilities and make them keen to contribute to the institutionalisation of human rights. as suggested by westheimer (2019), ‘thoughtful engagement with today’s competing ideas’ is a crucial step for educating democratic citizens (p. 12). the pedagogical use of contemporary public problems can improve students’ skills to refine and improve available policy options, respect different opinions, and listen to those who disagree with them. fourthly, issue-centric hre should enable learners to draw links between universal human rights values and their own local cultural beliefs and practices. drawing on learners’ cultural resources is surely vital for the successful acquisition of any type of school knowledge, but it is more crucial in the case of hre partly because hre aims to create transformations in the cultural resources of students. therefore, the cultural, social, and political specificities of the context must be considered and used in support of the acquisition of human rights values so that students can identify rights issues in their contexts and play a role in eliminating such problems. lastly, issue-centric hre is a practical enterprise, mainly because practice is key to achieving transformative learning about, through and for human rights (un, 2011). meaningful participatory and experiential opportunities can improve students’ commitment to human rights values, their skills for effective campaigning/activism and their abilities to weigh up evidence, understand and respect differences and work with others in creating change in their multi-layered communities. this practical dimension is crucial, partly because mere information transmission can hardly yield transformative improvements. practitioners can synthesise these components differently. one way of organising a course in this way may require taking public issues and inequalities as the main organising principle. a teacher following this route may start a course by presenting a common problem and deepen conceptual learning through participatory opportunities, such as controversial issue discussion, seminars and deliberation (parker, 2003). this may be followed by teaching about strategies for effective campaigning, namely what they can do individually and collectively for the elimination of the public problems in question. inspiring examples of rights struggles and rights activists from familiar contexts can help students construct a stronger understanding. collective analysis and decisions that they make can lead to concrete changes in their individual and collective lives. students’ commitments to human rights values are strengthened since the udhr and the crc are used as the main reference documents in every stage of this educational process. an hre programme that fails to meet these conditions may overemphasise official-nationalist k. sen 9 narratives without any concern to develop young people’s rights advocacy skills, and it may promote a teacher-centric transmission of content knowledge. an ineffective hre programme may require practitioners to teach about women’s rights by celebrating the role of certain men in ‘giving’ women their rights and ignoring women’s struggles in gaining their rights. such a programme may urge practitioners to teach about women’s rights by inviting students to answer questions like why men and women should be equal, how women gained their rights, and how men reacted to women who campaigned for their rights. even though these questions may provide opportunities for participatory acquisition of knowledge, they do not critically consider women’s rights violations familiar to students or encourage them to join in women’s rights advocacy efforts. methods and materials the data for this research were found in the public curriculum documents which are the study programmes of the democracy and human rights course. the first programme of study was released in 1999, and the later one in 2013 (mone, 1999, 2013). a programme of study reflects system-level official expectations regarding what will be studied in the scope of a course. it represents the fundamental documentary source of the intended curriculum of a course. it spells out objectives, themes/units, student performance expectations, measurement and evaluation tools, and instructional techniques to be used in the delivery of a course. the programmes of study analysed in this study outline the essential knowledge, values, skills and understanding that are to be developed in the democracy and human rights course. i started to analyse the study programmes with an initial reading (‘superficial examination’), then deepened my comprehension of the documents by a ‘thorough examination’ (bowen, 2009, p. 32). at the interpretation stage, my attempt ‘to elicit meaning, gain understanding, and develop empirical knowledge’ from the documentary sources is informed by the theoretical frame of the study (bowen, 2009, p. 27). in order to offer a close textual analysis, the thematically equivalent parts of the programmes, such as general goals, recommended instructional tools and student performance expectations, were placed in two adjacent columns. this descriptive comparison enabled me to discern and analyse differences and similarities. at the interpretation stage, i attempted to explain the differences and similarities by taking into consideration the role of international agencies involved and the dominant ideology in power at the time of each programme’s release. findings while the 1999 programme of democracy and human rights course is composed of four units, the 2013 programme is organised around five themes (mone, 1999, 2013). the unit titles of the 1999 programme are the following: human rights, law, state; democracy as a form of government and way of life; human rights and their protection; the atatürk revolution, human rights education review 10 human rights and democracy. the 2013 programme has these themes: democratic system and living democracy; human rights and freedoms; living democracy: active citizenship; a pluralist look at diversity; peace and negotiation. the similarities and differences between the units/theme titles are important if we want to identify the change in conceptual focus. first of all, it seems the titles of units/themes show that human rights and democracy are the central concepts of the two programmes. the concept of democracy figures in the titles of two units in 1999, while it appears in the titles of two themes in 2013. in 1999, ‘human rights’ is in the title of three units, whereas it is in the title of one theme in 2013. the varying appearance of these concepts in the units/themes titles indicates a change in conceptual emphasis. it seems the 1999 programme is organised more tightly around the concepts of human rights and democracy. besides human rights and democracy, however, the themes of the 2013 programme feature concepts like freedoms, active citizenship, diversity, peace, and negotiation. the concepts in this most recent programme testify to the fact that it was developed with the contribution of the coe. changes in political-ideological perspectives even though the 1999 programme was a product of the un decade for hre initiative, the domestic political atmosphere of turkey seems to have left a prominent mark. this is evidenced by the promotion of official statist perspectives, such as the appearance of the concept of state, law, and the atatürk revolution in the unit titles. this statist tone permeates almost all student performance expectations in the programme. for example, the first unit’s student performance expectations frequently refer to the state: students show with reasons that the purpose of a state as a judicial institution is to regulate social relations based on justice and to rule the public. departing from the aphorism, ‘justice is the foundation of a state’, students associate the state with justice. students show with reasons that the main function of a state is to serve in a way that all in a country are ensured to benefit from human rights (mone, 1999). these performance expectations in the 1999 programme show that the state interpretation of human rights is given precedence. it seems the programme has the intention of presenting the state in a positive light as the main provider of human rights. in contrast, the 2013 programme reduces the emphasis on the state; it promotes a more civilian-liberal discourse rather than highlighting the centrality of state power. in the 2013 programme, the concept of state appears only once in a human rights-related student performance expectation: in the context of the exercise of rights and freedoms, students evaluate that, in terms of putting democracy into practice, states have duties and responsibilities to citizens, k. sen 11 and citizens have duties and responsibilities to state and other people (mone, 2013, p. 19). in this student performance expectation, where the concept of state is employed just once in the whole programme, it might be the case that the concepts of citizen and democracy are given emphasis in order to avoid the risk of promoting a statist perspective. in fact, the other human rights-related student performance expectations in the programme clearly demonstrate that there is a concern to emphasize more liberal democratic discourses: students internalise the characteristics and meaning of human rights and freedoms. students explain the moral foundation of human rights. based on universal human rights principles, students interpret significant developments in our country and the world relying on documents. students follow current issues related to human rights and freedoms. students associate human rights and freedoms to social life. students feel responsible to practice their rights and freedoms (mone, 2013, p. 19). these performance expectations illustrate that the 2013 programme aims to have students acquire a more civilian-liberal notion of human rights. in fact, the concept of human rights is often accompanied by the term ‘freedoms’, which alludes to the fact that the 2013 programme differs from the 1999 one in relying less on statist perspectives. despite the overreliance of the 1999 on official-statist perspectives, it recommends that students be given the chance to interpret rights problems from their daily lives from a human rights perspective. for example, a student performance expectation goes as follows: students evaluate an actual human rights-related development or arrangement in turkey from a human rights perspective and present it as a report (mone, 1999). even though the student performance expectation does not specify any human rights issue, it spells out that students should be given the chance to relate global human rights discourses to socio-political issues in their own contexts. the student performance expectation may be potentially powerful in bringing human rights problems from turkey into the classroom. however, it is left unclear what exactly could be evaluated from a human rights standpoint. given that there were severe human rights issues at the time of the implementation of the 1999 programme, such as the headscarf ban, it remains unclear whether teachers and students would be allowed to touch on that issue from a human rights perspective. from this angle, the ambiguous and generalised expressions in the programme that suggest the human rights education review 12 evaluation of socio-political issues based on human rights are not likely to improve students’ engagement with critical rights issues affecting their own lives, partly because the suppressive political atmosphere of the period made this almost unimaginable. noting the political atmosphere of that period, one would even argue that it would almost be impossible for teachers to bring up that issue and invite students to evaluate it from a human rights perspective. compared to the 2013 programme, the 1999 programme is more focused on the historical development of democracy and human rights: teachers schematically and item by item explain the development of the idea of democracy in antiquity, the middle ages, and the 20th century. by examining relevant documents concerning democratisation movements in turkey in the 19th and 20th centuries, students compare them with developments in other countries and make an evaluation through discussions (mone, 1999). this sort of historical approach is avoided in the 2013 programme; it does not refer to the historical development of democracy, citizenship, and human rights, but is more concerned with students’ acquisition of core knowledge of human rights. it presents human rights and democracy by focussing on their practical implications. changes in how diversity is considered the 2013 programme can be even more forthcoming in encouraging that human rights issues are brought into the classroom. for instance, it makes references to human rights problems that have to do with gender equality, discrimination, respect for diversity and disadvantaged groups: in order to contribute to ensuring gender equality in society, students assume responsibilities relevant to their own position. students stand against prejudice, social exclusion, and discrimination in order to preserve the presence of diversity in peace. students assume responsibilities for disadvantaged groups to ensure that the old and people with a disability effectively join in societal life (mone, 2013, p. 22). even though there is no mention of rights issues that have to do with ethno-religious minorities, the 2013 programme differs from the 1999 programme in encouraging practitioners to bring rights issues from turkey into the classroom. on issues of diversity the 1999 programme is completely silent, but respect for diversity features prominently as a core value in the 2013 programme: k. sen 13 students respect different cultures and values by recognising that cultural differences are natural at local, national, and global levels. recognising the reality that all people are equal, and diversity is an asset, students advocate the preservation of thought, faith, and ethnic diversity within the indivisible integrity of the country (mone, 2013, p. 22). these student performance expectations are progressive in that the national curriculum traditionally considered diversity as a source of concern and fear (çayır, 2014). the memories of the ottoman past, the founding goal of building a homogenous nation, and the contemporary issue of kurdish separatism all hardened the negative official attitude to diversity. however, the 2013 programme takes a step towards the recognition of the human rights value of respect for diversity. the emphasis on this value was arguably facilitated by the involvement of the coe experts in the curriculum development process and by the fact that the armed conflict with the outlawed kurdish worker’s party was about to cease by the time the 2013 programme was prepared. changes in pedagogical approach both programmes recommend a student-centric pedagogy. the 2013 programme recommends instructional techniques such as service learning, project-based learning, controversial issues discussion, problem-based learning, collaborative learning, role-playing and drama, case studies, debate/discussion, and research. the 1999 programme criticises rote-learning and memorisation and recommends instructional techniques such as case studies, role-playing and drama, debate/discussion, problem-based learning, field trips, observation, and interviews. the significant difference is that the 2013 programme includes service learning, controversial issues discussion, and encourages students to practise active citizenship. this marks an important difference, since the 1999 programme asks students to discuss the importance of civil society but does not encourage them to join in ngo activities. it does not urge students to participate in rights advocacy campaigns but conveys abstract conceptual knowledge. however, the 2013 programme wants students to engage with organisations that aim to contribute to the solution of rights issues: as free and autonomous individuals, students practise their rights and freedoms. students encourage people in their environment to use their rights and freedoms. students take part in the processes of democratic decision-making about matters that concern them. for the solution of problems in their environment, students voluntarily and actively engage in the works of organisations relevant to their age and location (mone, 2013, human rights education review 14 p. 20). these student performance expectations suggest that the 2013 programme intends to promote the experiential learning of human rights, whereas the 1999 programme seems more focused on knowledge transmission. the inclusion of active citizenship as a central concept in the 2013 programme distinguishes it from the 1999 programme, which exalts the state as the protector of human rights. also, the 1999 programme presents a list of concepts to be taught in each unit, whereas the 2013 programme includes a set of key values and skills besides concepts. this suggests that the overarching aim of the course’s programme has shifted from knowledge transmission towards a more holistic approach that intends to ensure the cognitive, affective, and behavioural development of students. nevertheless, while both programmes contain the conceptual knowledge of human rights, references to human rights documents, and international and national mechanisms that uphold human rights, they do not specifically mention any rights struggle or name any rights advocate/activist. neither is there any sign that students are encouraged to become critical of the state institutions in evaluating human rights violations. changes relating to atatürk the ideological influence of those in power at the time when programmes were being developed becomes more explicit when we look at how they consider atatürk and the modernisation reforms undertaken under his leadership. while atatürk and the atatürk revolution figure in the title of the last unit of the 1999 programme and some of its performance expectations (mone, 1999), the 2013 programme makes no reference to him at the level of theme titles and student performance expectations (mone, 2013). in the whole of the 2013 programme, atatürk is referenced twice in the explanations of student performance expectations, and in none of the 30 performance expectations is any attribution made to him. one reason for this remarkable change may have to do with the fact that the 2013 programme deliberately distances itself from governmental, official and statist perspectives. nevertheless, the disappearance of atatürk at the level of themes titles and performance expectations in the 2013 programme cannot be simply attributed to this factor. the transition of power from militant-secular to islamic nationalists from 2002 to 2013 is arguably the real reason behind this change, partly because atatürk is a figure of veneration for secular turks as compared to islamic nationalists. this change is emblematic of the political complexities of hre curriculum development in which the impact of international agencies is likely to be overshadowed by the ideological considerations of those in power. discussion and conclusions the overall differences between the programmes suggest that the 2013 programme is better than the 1999 programme in paying attention to the knowing, feeling, and doing dimensions k. sen 15 of hre. it is also more detached from governmental and statist perspectives. saying the 2013 programme is better than the 1999 version does not mean that the coe’s initiative was more successful than the un’s. in 1999, the country’s political conditions were almost completely different, as the military dominated almost all policy spheres. in addition, the un decade for hre initiative was only realised by domestic stakeholders with no participation of international experts or funded projects. on the other hand, coe’s edc/hre initiative was supported with funds and the contributions of international experts. despite some improvements in the second programme, both programmes show significant weaknesses when assessed against what has been outlined in the theoretical model of what an effective hre programme should look like. one major issue is that neither programme includes examples of human rights struggles, human rights activists, a specific list of human rights, and effective strategies of campaigning and protests. given that the programmes include no examples of rights struggle and advocates/activists, students may find it hard to relate universal human rights discourses to their own contexts. this may result in the provision of a highly disempowering hre. the provision of such a sanitised curriculum is not likely to create a substantive transformation in the meaning-making resources of students. this is because the programmes’ disregard of rights struggles, activists and inspirational real-life examples may inhibit the transformative power of hre. hess (2009) underlines that ‘democratic education without controversial issues discussions would be like a forest without trees, or an ocean without fish, or a symphony without sound’ (p. 162). the concept of ‘democratic education’ in this statement can be replaced with hre, as controversial issue discussion is crucial to hre. learning about inspirational examples of human rights struggles and activists may be equally crucial. an emphasis on such examples may foster students’ affective commitment to human rights and give life to an otherwise intangible knowledge of them. opportunities for participation and experience are also vital for students to enhance their commitment. however, these components are absent in both programmes. the development of an issue-centric hre curriculum is not an easy job, as proved by the fact that the more-than-two-decades long international collaboration did not produce an effective curriculum in turkey. even in the present day, it may be almost impossible to find examples of rights struggles and activists in turkey’s hre curriculum. one reason for this may be found in the political conditions of the country. however, if we assume that political support is guaranteed, it is difficult for curriculum designers to agree on examples of human rights activists and struggles to include in the curriculum. the difficulty in finding uncontroversial rights advocacy campaigns and organisations may further exacerbate this problem. human rights education review 16 in turkey, almost all rights struggles are accused of wanting to destabilise the turkish republic, while almost all rights violations committed by the state are justified from a security-centric approach (babül, 2012). even the concept of human rights has a negative connotation in public discourse in turkey. this enables the state authorities to easily criminalise those who advocate human rights. thus far, the repressive state tradition has not allowed rights struggles to succeed and set a precedent. in the usa, there is a tradition of rights struggle; rights groups have not been accused of separatism or implicated in attempts to destabilise the state or collude with an external enemy. however, in turkey it is almost impossible to find uncontroversial examples of human rights struggles, activists or organisations that stakeholders may agree to include in the curriculum. highlighting the weaknesses of turkey’s hre curriculum, one can conclude that participation in the un and coe’s initiatives did not produce an effective hre curriculum, partly because of the political complexities of the country and the strict control of the curriculum development processes by the forces of secular-militant nationalism in the first programme and the forces of islamic nationalism in the second. the problems identified in the programmes accentuate the need to find satisfactory answers to the following questions: how can an hre curriculum be developed and implemented in the formal education of countries where rights struggles/activists are criminalised and supressed by severe punishments? how can an hre curriculum succeed in helping learners vernacularize and practise universal human rights discourses in such contexts? these questions imply that the development and enactment of an issue-centric hre curriculum that meets the five conditions is not easy in contexts where authoritarian leaders barely allow the promotion of democratic human rights values in education. for example, despite the coe’s closer collaboration with the mone since 2011, the only concrete curricular outcome has been the renewal of the elective democracy and human rights course and the introduction of an edc/hre course at fourth grade in primary schools (sen & starkey, 2019). an ongoing edc/hre project entitled strengthening democratic culture in basic education does not include any objectives in relation to strengthening edc/hre in the national curriculum of turkey, such as the introduction of an edc/hre course (coe, 2023). ironically, the turkish national curriculum has been unprecedentedly islamised and moved dramatically away from the objective of promoting universal human rights values during the time these collaborations/projects were underway (sen, 2022). while the case of turkey indicates that authoritarian governments find ways to water down the expected outcome of international organisations in edc/hre reform, in such contexts it may prove too costly for practitioners to offer an issue-centric hre, especially if they are not shielded against possible negative consequences. waiting for the transition of power to actors k. sen 17 who might open a window of opportunity for an issue-centric hre is not ethically defensible. despite these obstacles, however, powerful mechanisms still exist to strengthen hre. history shows that international organizations like the un and coe have succeeded in consolidating cosmopolitan human rights values in education, so they can further strengthen it (russell & suarez, 2017). the consolidation of human rights is a global imperative that requires global responses that can be achieved by effective global coordination. turkey’s hre curriculum development highlights two specific things that international organizations can do to advance their efforts in this area. firstly, international organizations must establish independent monitoring mechanisms that do not only rely on governmental sources in evaluating the quality of hre in their member states. secondly, given that their policy instruments in this area are legally non-binding, they must take their efforts to the next stage by developing legally binding instruments in support of hre. it is now time to think seriously about developing a legally binding international convention that will protect advocates and mandate signatories to teach universal human rights values through separate courses and in other ways. the development of legally binding instruments will certainly require the constitution of enforcing mechanisms to replace the current naming and shaming strategies in order to ensure more thorough compliance in member states. advocates will be encouraged if their efforts are supported by strong international law. if governmental actors are unwilling to comply with such a convention, the international agencies can work with nongovernmental actors, teacher unions, voluntary 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(2019). civil and civic death in the new authoritarianisms: punishment of dissidents through juridical destruction, ethical ruin, and necropolitics in turkey. british journal of middle eastern studies, 46(5), 699–713. https://doi.org/10.1080/13530194.2019.1634390 the council of europe (2008). white paper on intercultural diaogue ‘living together as equals in dignity’. https://www.coe.int/t/dg4/intercultural/source/white%20paper_final_revised_en.pdf united nations (un) (2003). unesco and human rights education. unesco. https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000131836 united nations (un) (2011, december 19). united nations declaration on human rights education and training. adopted by the general assembly, resolution 66/137, a/res/66/137, 19 december 2011. retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/en/resources/educators/human-rights-education-training/11united-nations-declaration-human-rights-education-and-training-2011 westheimer, j. (2019). civic education and the rise of populist nationalism. peabody journal of education, 94(1), 4–16. https://doi.org/10.1080/0161956x.2019.1553581 https://doi.org/10.1080/13530194.2019.1634390 https://www.coe.int/t/dg4/intercultural/source/white%20paper_final_revised_en.pdf https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000131836 https://www.ohchr.org/en/resources/educators/human-rights-education-training/11-united-nations-declaration-human-rights-education-and-training-2011 https://www.ohchr.org/en/resources/educators/human-rights-education-training/11-united-nations-declaration-human-rights-education-and-training-2011 https://doi.org/10.1080/0161956x.2019.1553581 how research into citizenship education at university might enable transformative human rights education issn 2535-5406 http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.5120 date received: 10-11-2022 date accepted: 03-05-2023 peer reviewed article © 2023 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles how research into citizenship education at university might enable transformative human rights education piers von berg university of plymouth, uk, piersvonberg@gmail.com abstract this article presents a new research design for pedagogical research at university. the design demonstrates how personal and cultural citizenship education can be a form of transformative human rights education by nurturing citizens who challenge patterns of exclusion. it draws on shared traditions of citizenship and human rights education that have focused on lived experiences of injustice and uses spaces that mitigate prevailing power structures. these ideas have shaped a new pedagogical action research design that uses theories and practices of transformational learning, authentic reflection, and participatory theatre to stimulate ‘becomings’ in civic identity and agency. ‘becoming’ is a form of dialogical knowledge arising from profound moments of empathy and solidarity. in these moments participants recognise the human dignity of excluded others and share experiences of injustice, which expands their sense of community and agency. the research design is a potential alternative to more market-driven global citizenship education at university. keywords civic identity and agency, higher education, pedagogical research, personal and cultural citizenship education, transformative human rights education http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.5120 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ human rights education review 2 higher education at a crossroads adopting transformative education for human rights is one of the ways in which higher education can respond to rapid social and planetary change (international commission on the futures of education, 2021). the international commission has challenged universities to prioritise pedagogies that promote core values of ‘respect, empathy, equality and solidarity’ (international commission on the futures of education, p. 59). personal and cultural forms of citizenship education (osler and starkey, 2005) that focus on transforming civic identities through empathy, compassion and solidarity can contribute to this agenda. this is one way in which the practices of education for citizenship and human rights are symbiotic; understanding of the one complements realisation of the other (jerome, 2018). whilst there is good evidence that the learning of civic norms and values at university can support respect for the rights of others, there is comparatively little examination of how academics can research and design pedagogical interventions to achieve these outcomes (sloam et al., 2021, p. 23). where universities run global citizenship education programmes, civic values are diluted by an emphasis on skills for employability (hammond & keating, 2017) and this leads to a disconnect with students’ everyday lived experience (sen, 2021). this predominance of neoliberal power structures in higher education was not addressed in the international commission’s report (elfert & morris, 2022). this problem was evident in my own practice. despite being taught human rights law, students wished for time and space away from performative pressures to explore each other’s civic beliefs and practices (von berg, 2019; see similar findings in other social science disciplines – muddiman, 2020). therefore, this study was devised to test how certain pedagogical research methods could stimulate learning of civic identities and agencies that respect rights, whilst being sensitive to university students’ concerns and interests. it draws on two specific shared approaches to citizenship and human rights education: i) looking at the students’ lived experience, especially injustices in their own communities, (biesta & lawy, 2006; lundy & martinez sainz, 2018); ii) distancing research participants from formal pressures in liminal (swerts, 2017) or ‘third’ spaces (blanchard & nix 2019, p. 73). these approaches were incorporated into a novel action research design that used transformative pedagogical practices as research methods to stimulate reflexivity on how students see themselves in relation to others. these practices encompassed authentic and critical reflection on civic identity and agency, transformational learning through critical incidents, and forum and image theatre (explained in detail under ‘pedagogical practices and methods’ in the section on research design below). this is proposed as a new transformative research design for ‘pedagogical research’ (starkey et al., 2014) where a teacher-researcher enables young participants to explore what matters to them in an ethically transparent and participatory way. it is novel because these methods are combined in order to complement each other. p. von berg 3 this type of intervention is particularly needed in higher education sectors such as that of the u.k., which prioritise the student as a consumer and worker (della porta, 2020) rather than viewing him/her as ‘an interdependent, caring and other-centred human being’ (lynch et al., 2007, p. 2). the paper first explains the conceptual framework and relevant literature. it then describes the research design at length, before turning to findings and conclusions. how young people see themselves as citizens and how this can be transformed at university in order to understand transformations in students’ norms, beliefs and practices, a conceptual framework of civic identity and agency is considered first. this is justified in normative terms by a sociological theory of human rights and citizenship. this framework is examined against the empirical research to generate the research questions. citizenship education and human rights education complement one another by nurturing democratic societies, either through cultivating citizens who exercise their rights and responsibilities or through the promotion and protection of human rights (keet and zembylas, 2018). separate strands from citizenship education and human rights have underpinned this study. these are, firstly, the importance of young people having space to explore their own everyday understandings of citizenship (biesta and lawy, 2006) and, secondly, the acknowledgement of the human dignity of the other as a way to expand the moral community of rights-holders (turner, 1993). citizenship is, descriptively, membership of a political community. normatively, citizenship refers to attributes that help sustain a particular version of a political community (kymlicka, 2002). scholars of civic identity have identified personal and collective elements of personal reflection and civic engagement (viola, 2020; youniss et al., 1997). this understanding is twofold: firstly, beliefs, values and norms concerning citizenship as civic identity; secondly, the ability and self-belief to act to further these as a citizen as civic agency. the cultivation of agency is fundamental to citizenship and human rights education (jerome, 2018; mccowan, 2009). agency involves the setting of goals based on values drawn from a personal identity that invests activities with meaning (archer, 2000; bandura, 2001; osler & starkey, 2005). a challenge in using the concept of identity is that individuals are not always capable of understanding and representing themselves, and so interpretation of the data must account for this. the beliefs, values and norms of civic identity are constructed by the individual through the process of reflection and the drawing out of meaning from social experience (haste, 2004). constructivists understand values as the ‘lens through which individuals filter and process information and experience’ that carry ‘explanations for events, narratives, norms, and human rights education review 4 prescriptions’ (haste, 2010, p. 163). norms are understood as social rules supported by either empirical or normative expectations of how others will act (bicchieri, 2006). it is suggested that the values and norms of citizenship are those that explain how one should act as a member of a political community towards others. this is based on turner’s (1993) sociological theory of human rights and citizenship, which argues that moral communities that respect human rights are created through collective empathy and compassion for the plight of others. this is achieved through respect for human dignity, whose core idea is that all human beings have intrinsic value (barrett, 2022). this normative and theoretical position is justified by the social, political, and economic context of modern britain. civic identity and agency in the uk is moving towards greater individualised practices of citizenship (henn & foard, 2014) and a far greater diversity in social mores and identities (sobolewska & ford, 2020). this is accompanied by officially sanctioned hostility towards immigrants and refugees or ‘bordering’ (yuval davis et al., 2018), against a background of persistent relative poverty (cribb et al., 2021, p. 87). such rapid movement towards greater intolerance and inequality is pertinent to my research site, and community tensions caused by this injustice should be addressed by citizenship and human rights education. as far as the evidence base is concerned, it mainly consists of young people, as they form the majority of the undergraduate population (oecd, 2018, p. 426). young people’s civic norms and values are learned in their early years, from family and peers (quintelier, 2015) and through schools and extracurricular activities (keating et al., 2011). studies of young british people’s civic identities show that they reflect a range of beliefs, values, and understandings that are not necessarily consistent or coherent (hylton et al., 2018). this is because civic identity comprises both an understanding of one’s place within the community and prospects for action (viola, 2020), understood here as civic identity and civic agency which are ‘contingent and continually negotiated… [and] reshaped in response to practice and experience’ (smith et al., 2005, p. 440). my own law students synthesised hybrid civic identities. these were comprised of norms of equal treatment of others, influenced by close friendships at university, and employment-oriented values influenced by the institution (von berg, 2019). we know little about how this dynamic process can be affected by an educational programme in one of today’s uk universities. there is an emerging literature on education at university for human rights and citizenship. largely, human rights education provides more radical alternatives (blanchard & nix, 2019) than global citizenship education (fanghanel & cousin, 2012; hammond & keating, 2017; sen, 2021). little research has been done on citizenship education at university (mccowan, 2012). universities’ efforts to teach global citizenship have been criticised for overlooking students’ p. von berg 5 everyday experiences (sen, 2021) and being overly influenced by employability (hammond & keating, 2017). consequently, i chose not to use global citizenship education in order to encourage students to engage with the everyday spaces where they experienced and lived citizenship or their citizenship-as-practice (biesta and lawy, 2006), and i acknowledge other more critical approaches to global citizenship e.g., andreotti (2006). there is a need for studies of how citizenship education can enable students to critically address the culture in which they live, rather than be co-opted by it. radical pedagogy for human rights at university provides a better route for transformative learning by engaging with injustice in students’ own lives and seeking more ethical relationships with the marginalised (blanchard & nix 2019, p. 66-67). citizenship education shares core commitments with human rights education; to develop an informed critical understanding of the world, to treat young people as active learners, and to empower them to make positive change (jerome, 2018). this study draws on personal and cultural citizenship education (osler & starkey, 2005), and acknowledges that cultivating knowledge and competences should form part of any larger intervention. the transformative tradition seeks to shape students’ own personal beliefs and potential for action (banks, 1995; o’sullivan et al., 2002). transformative learning is rooted in profound changes in one’s ‘thoughts, feelings and actions’ (o’sullivan et al., 2002, p. xvii), and this leads to the active participation of students ‘to make their classrooms, schools, and communities more democratic and just’ (banks 1995, p. 20). in essence, the transformation of the learner predicates transformative action. this occurs in a dynamic process where there is ‘greater understanding, appreciation, empathy, and capacity for critique on the part of students’ of injustice in their immediate communities (boland, 2011, p. 105). in sum, a conceptual framework of civic identity and agency, premised on a normative justification of respecting human rights of different others, can help us to understand any transformations in students’ reflexive understandings of their relations with others. this leads to research questions about how student experiences within such an intervention might affect their civic identities and agency, and whether this has any impact on how they construe their relations with others. a research design for transformative pedagogical research in higher education research design and ethics this section explains the research design and methods/practices in considerable detail, as it is the key contribution of the study. the design aimed to provide transformational experiences as both a research exercise and a teaching activity, known as ‘pedagogical research’: pedagogical research creates spaces that facilitate the expression by young people of their views and experiences. [it] aims to provide authentic learning experiences as human rights education review 6 well as to provide data to inform policy and practice. (starkey et al., 2014, p. 428) the teacher-researcher is communicating participants’ experiences whilst simultaneously facilitating those experiences. this research design fits the conceptual framework because it allows participants to tell their own stories about citizenship and rights and explore new iterations of them. transparency is vital in using a ‘rights-based epistemology of pedagogical research’ to allow for reflexivity and provide a basis for an ethical and democratic form of research (starkey et al., 2014, p. 429). transparency means reflecting on and communicating the teacherresearcher’s own civic identity and civic agency as a teacher-researcher. in the information form i stated my belief that citizenship education should be taught at university and the participants’ thoughts and criticism on this was welcomed (and received). participants were informed at the outset that the teacher-researcher derived meaning from helping others, especially those less able to help themselves. this might imply an ability to help others by virtue of a superior position derived from oppressive structures (jefferess, 2008, p. 28). however, the purpose here was for participants to understand how they viewed others and whether they recognised them as rights-holders (see findings below). the wider purpose of the research, to consider whether citizenship education was needed or viable at the university, was explained to participants. students were also informed about the dissemination of their data, which was anonymised, kept confidential and provided on the basis of voluntary, informed consent. participants could refuse to participate and/or withdraw their data at any time (this was explained at the start and repeated later). in learning for democracy, and in working with young people, one must try to base the power relationship on mutual trust, dialogue and allowing participants a voice in the research processes (starkey et al., 2014, p. 427). the research design was informed by the students’ wish to explore their civic identities away from performative pressures. this led to using a space decoupled from their studies, similar to the ‘third space’ that blanchard and nix (2019) find helpful for human rights education at university. also used were spaces at the edges of the community in charities that support the vulnerable, areas which swerts (2017) describes as ‘liminal spaces’, essential for nurturing citizenship when it is marginalised by power structures. these settings provided opportunities to reflect critically on the prevailing cultural norms of employability and individualism in the university, and diversity and exclusion in the wider civic society. consequently, i also emphasised to the students that this was not a class, and their contributions and attendance had no bearing on how i related to them if they happened to be in one of my modules (most were not). the emphasis on critical interaction led to the use of ideas of authentic and critical reflection p. von berg 7 (freire, 1970), transformational learning (mezirow, 1990), and image and forum theatre (boal, 2002). respectively, these approaches were intended to help students to question assumptions behind beliefs, encounter new experiences outside of university, and rehearse and critique behaviour (see below). these were organised as follows: authentic reflection exercises in small groups (stage 1); experiential learning with marginalised groups in the surrounding city (stage 2); and experimenting with social problems in forum theatre (stage 3) – see below. figure 1 combining authentic reflection (1), transformational learning (2), and forum theatre (3). in stage 1, discussion in small groups drew out the students’ civic identities and the familial and peer contexts in which these had been formed; this was supported by image theatre exercises to build trust. in stage 2, the students volunteered in one of three charity organisations that they chose themselves (see below). here they experienced critical incidents which stimulated authentic reflection and questions about their assumptions about others. in stage 3, the students collectively identified issues of concern in their everyday lives and designed a forum theatre play to problematise them and engage with them agentically. the data comprised of my observations written up immediately after each session to record events and reflect on them, anonymous feedback, participants’ responses in focus groups, semistructured interviews, and a reporting-back session on the key findings. therefore, my data consisted of not only how participants saw the questions at the start and at the end, but also how they responded during the process and reflected on the findings in the report-back session several months later. in the interviews, participants were asked about their personal and educational background, how they found their experiences of the workshops, and what, human rights education review 8 if anything, they thought they had learned from the various activities, with a focus on how they saw themselves as citizens and acted as citizens. the focus groups initially reflected on the activities as a whole, then looked at how they saw themselves as citizens and acted as citizens before, during and after the research activities. this research design suggests a new form of pedagogical research because it combines theories drawn from reflective practice, experiential learning, and participatory theatre in liminal and third spaces to examine any effects on civic identity and agency. participants and researcher co-constructed the data in creating new stories around civic identities and experimented with behaviours rather than simply unlocking pre-existing ideas (starkey et al., 2014). pedagogical practices and methods: critical incidents, authentic reflection and forum theatre transformational learning theory is about individual personal change through the construction of new meanings (mezirow, 1990, 2009; taylor, 2009). the theory has been modified to take account of criticisms by those more closely aligned with friere (1970), whose work gives a better account of power structures. mezirow posits the need for a disorienting dilemma or critical incident that leads to a critical re-examination of the normative assumptions underpinning beliefs. later iterations (taylor, 2009) argue that dialogue is used not as an analytical tool, or for debate, but as personal selfdisclosure in trustful communication with others. dialogue helps form bonds by validating personal experience when individuals find ‘they are not alone’ (baumgartner, 2002, p. 55-56). this leads to a greater sense of control and belonging, increasing the potential for building solidarity through empathy. mezirow’s view that objective, informed and rational standards are implicit in human communication underestimates the need to create a safe and trusting space to help students cope with the emotions engaged by dialogue around the edges of understanding and experience (taylor, 2009). this has led to combining transformational learning exercises with playful image theatre activities, in a space free from any educational assessment. secondly, transformational learning also lacks an appreciation of how structural inequalities may affect conditions for learning (collard and law, 1989). freire’s concept of authentic reflection is used, which considers people ‘in their relations with the world’ where they ‘develop their power to perceive critically the way they exist in the world with which and in which they find themselves’ (freire, 1970, p. 81-83). authentic reflection was employed after the students’ experiences in the charities because encountering diverse persons can help to re-examine values and assumptions. p. von berg 9 mezirow and freire have much to say on the roles of teachers and learners (see mccowan, 2009). what i draw from their theoretical models is the importance of criticality (through critical reflection) and conscientisation (through authentic reflection) as a basis for emancipatory action or praxis (the dialectic of reflection and action). students and academics can co-construct this together as ‘teacher-students’ and ‘student-teachers’ (freire, 1970, p. 80), thus developing the ‘teacher-researcher’ concept of pedagogical research (starkey et al., 2014). these ideas of transformational learning and authentic reflection were combined with participatory theatre so that learners could experiment with forms of agency against shared senses of injustice. the forms of participatory theatre used were forum theatre and image theatre. they are part of a larger tradition called the theatre of the oppressed, a form of participatory theatre created by augusto boal. influenced by freire, boal believed that theatre could emancipate through dialogue and learning because the critical consciousness of actors and audience is provoked by interacting with stories close to real life (strawbridge, 2000). image theatre is a collection of group exercises for individuals to use their bodies to express different images of problems in society, as well as to become accustomed to acting (boal, 2002). the images portrayed are of emotions, experiences, lives, and oppression. the process of thinking with one’s body is intended to bypass social norms and inhibitions. forum theatre is a form of theatrical game where a problem from the actors’ lived experience is presented to the audience, who are invited to propose and enact solutions (boal, 1998, 2002). the problem is a form of oppression with an identifiable oppressor and victim (the protagonist). the audience or ‘spect-actors’ are invited to intervene by assuming the role of the protagonist if they think they can address the oppression, whilst the remaining cast stay in character and resist any change. the result is an experimentation with different possible solutions to a social issue that both actors and audience have experienced, or can identify with. image theatre exercises help the cast devise their own script and rehearse. both during and after the play there is a facilitator or ‘joker’ (myself as teacher-student-researcher in this study) who helps the audience, and later the players, discuss what they have learned from the experience and come to terms with any powerful emotions. forum theatre can stimulate reflexivity because theatre allows us ‘to observe ourselves in action’ (boal, 1998, p. 7). it cultivates agency in a transformational sense because participants come to ‘see the social world as one that can be changed [through]… multiple, sometimes small, sometimes decisive, individual or collective acts’ (erel et al., 2017, p. 310). in this process a greater assertiveness can arise from a sense of solidarity among participants that they are ‘not alone’ in their experiences (erel et al., p. 305), a similar development to the one we see in transformational learning studies (baumgartner, 2002). in forum theatre, moments of transformation can be limited to the research space. human rights education review 10 transformations in participants’ identities and agency engendered by forum and image theatre are understood by using kaptani and yuval-davis’ (2008) idea of ‘becomings’, a form of dialogical knowledge (this is applied to the findings in the ‘discussion’ section below). this knowledge is found in the narratives and performances in the collective space, which contain contributions from participants and researcher that affect and are affected by each other. in summary, transformations in identity and agency can occur through challenging students with critical incidents that can be deconstructed afterwards using critical and authentic reflection, which can become reflexive in forum theatre and image theatre exercises. this develops the concept of pedagogical research (starkey et al., 2014) in a university context led by a teacher-student-researcher. as a form of personal citizenship education, it contributes to human rights education because it helps students to confront injustice, practice empathy with others, and discover solidarity. participant profile and recruitment the eleven first-year students came from law, criminology, international relations, politics and sociology. there were eight females and three males; eight of them were white british. all were aged between 18-20, except for one mature student, and mostly non-religious, except for three christians and one muslim. they were heterosexual, with no declared disabilities, and their parents’ occupations were a split of lower and middle-class ones. data analysis below refers to how these backgrounds may have coloured the students’ experiences. data analysis the focus of the analysis was on how the students made sense of their experience in the educational intervention. their prior experiences were taken into account. i was mindful that participants might struggle to make meaning of new experiences. thematic analysis was employed (braun and clarke, 2006; smith et al., 2012). immersion in the data (through transcribing and repeated listening) led to categorising it as a series of codes, sub-themes and themes that had significance for the research question. exploring the data on the students’ experiences the strongest over-arching transformation was how the students began to challenge existing assumptions and tensions in their beliefs, norms and values concerning marginalised individuals in their community. they also began to form social bonds and resources for collective agency with other participants in forum theatre. the students are referred to by their chosen pseudonyms in the data, which comes from focus groups transcripts, interviews and observational notes. p. von berg 11 a felt sense of citizenship and critical reflection on their communities when the students returned from their experiences in the charities i observed that ‘[t]he students had something to say. i could see in their eyes that they were interested in what had happened’. many of them commented on powerful and immediate experiences of meeting refugees, the homeless, and those in financial hardship: i think that was the most shocking part of, or like the most memorable part of the experience i guess because it was … a very personal thing to like go in someone’s house…it was quite bare, and like there wasn’t beds… they had mattresses on the floor and nothing else, and i found that quite upsetting almost. (emma) emma described vivid experiences that affected her emotionally. she has stepped into someone else’s private space. emma was from a small town where she had not encountered a refugee before. she said refugees were ‘something you see on the news… you kind of detach yourself from it. i was like oh there is a person sat right in front of me and …that was kind of really oh my god for me’. in contrast, may, who lived in plymouth, and visited the debt clinic, confessed that she had seen ‘homeless people, or people with drug problems or mental health issues’, but ‘then the person was sat in front of me with the back of their chair to me… so, that was again, not surprising but shocking… kind of like up close and actually talking to them...’ there is an immediacy to these experiences conveyed in strong language, an immediacy that comes from face-to-face conversation and seeing inside a private home. both students had seen individuals up-close who were previously at a distance, on the news or in the street. these individuals had been othered, and so excluded as marginal and less equal (powell & menindian, 2016). the students’ understanding of their experiences gave the individuals they met personality, stories, and humanity. as emma memorably put it: ‘... were human, they were normal people, chatty, friendly, laughed’. the phrase ‘normal people’ suggested a person searching for an appropriate term to describe a human being who was no longer excluded as a different other. these were not simply the reactions of young people with little experience of the world. alex, a mature student who had worked for many years in a high street bank, reflected: … you sometimes forget about the actual people behind the situations… so actually you think more about the people, does that makes sense? it is not just a homeless person anymore. you actually have a background to this person, and this makes this person come alive more. (alex) here alex compared her experience with that of other students in the focus group – an example of how reflection and discussion after the event helped students process their experiences. like emma and may, she moved from being a citizen-as-a-witness, passive and human rights education review 12 distant, whose experience is mediated through norms and prevailing stereotypes, to direct interaction. this disrupts her lens, and stimulates reflection, learning, and empathy. these critical incidents provided a basis for transformation (merizow, 2009) by giving personality, and dignity to people, and a basis for rights for those excluded as ‘refugees’ or ‘the homeless’. they revised empirical and normative expectations and this led to new perspectives (biccheri, 2006; haste, 2010). in each case, the younger participants referred back to parental influences as a reference point that was overturned. charlie had a negative experience in her charity when she saw people verbally abusing each other: [t]o see that people can still treat each other with such animosity [in the homeless shelter], and judge each other even at that low point, i think will stick for me for a very long time. (charlie) this was a strong experience for charlie because it went against what she had ‘always been told [by her parents]’. interestingly, charlie had volunteered in homeless shelters before, and studied citizenship, but nevertheless learned something new in a profound way – a lasting impression of something that went against her prior beliefs. emma was the most striking example of a student who explicitly altered her parental perceptions. she said she had been told by her father that refugees were ‘taking all our jobs’ but she said ‘most of them that i saw were struggling to actually find jobs… that was something that has definitely altered my perspective on it, i guess’. this is clear evidence of movement of an empirical and normative expectation, movement emerging from ‘becomings’ or dialogical knowledge generated in the research space. alex found the experience of the debt clinic challenged her prior beliefs about persons in financial hardship. in her role as a financial advisor at a bank she would simply ‘shoo them out of the door’, as the bank could not help them. now she critically reflected on this, asking ‘who picks it up and where does it go? and should it end there? should they do more?’ she questioned her assumption that she was not able to help individuals. from a very different position, yaya, from indonesia, explained how she had come to believe from the media that all refugees were muslims. now she had found out that ‘most of them are christian and a lot of [them] come from like another religion. i am a bit surprised… i have to be like you know more open-minded to, i have to tell my friend’. these two students from very different backgrounds in terms of age, social class, nationality, and religion, questioned their empirical expectations, and in doing so, decided on courses of action. the participants’ experiences suggested that they humanised individuals. this was a term several students, in separate focus groups, used in their anonymous feedback. the students’ p. von berg 13 empirical and normative expectations about marginalised and othered individuals were challenged and, in some cases, possibly altered (e.g., emma). this was a limited interaction that lacked voice from those encountered (except as reported by the students), but it is notable how students from very different backgrounds questioned their norms and values. they had empathy into social exclusion and discrimination and how it felt to not be a citizen – ‘they feel alone’ (jerry). this affected the perspective they used to filter and process information, or their values (haste, 2010). in seeing marginalised individuals as human beings in need of compassionate social interaction they acknowledged a need for different treatment and discussion with others to undo exclusionary barriers. this leads to a recognition that others are rights holders; they are entitled to humane treatment because they have dignity. solidarity and collective senses of agency in forum theatre the participants formed three groups: mental health (alex, charlie, may, yaya and fransisco – who acted as a leader with may); pollution (bella, archie and rosie); and discrimination (emma, jerry and julie). the mental health group was the most cohesive and was able to move from a script to a performance. this was arguably because they retained the links between their personal university experience, what they witnessed in the charities, and the script (according to emma, who struggled in her group but admired the efforts of the mental health one). in the other groups, students did not create a script, either because group members missed a session or because they struggled to find a way to work with their chosen problem. all groups drew a series of structural knock-on factors on flip-chart papers that showed authentic reflections on how their chosen forms of oppression occurred. this meant that these predominantly young groups did not individualise the oppression or focus myopically on student experience (erel et al., 2017). this suggests the benefit of combining experiential learning with forum theatre. the mental health group performed a memorable play. the protagonist, a student called delilah, struggled to fit in at university and eventually developed mental health problems, resulting in her losing her accommodation and begging on the street. in each scene, her parents, peers, and student support staff were too busy to listen attentively to her, talked over her, or ignored her. as an academic, i could relate my own experience of a pressurised work environment to this depiction of isolation in a fast-moving world where peers and proximal others appear too preoccupied or indifferent. one student emphatically agreed: ‘they were just like almost re-enacting just what i, what you see, i guess, sometimes around uni and stuff’. after around four hours of preparation and little training in theatre, each performer knew their role and spoke their lines without a script. encouraging students to express their everyday experience through co-creation, a shared tradition in citizenship and human rights education, helped participants find meaning in activities and understand how rights come to be undermined. human rights education review 14 for the performers, there was a sense of catharsis in airing an issue that was hidden and thought to be experienced solely by that individual. may, who played the parent and guidance counsellor, said: … it was a bit of a relief to get the loneliness aspect kind of heard… rather than internalising it all the time. like sharing it with everyone else. and they all get it as well… and it’s not just you… it brought us closer together, i think. in a separate debriefing, others repeated this impression. bella, who was in the audience, explained what she got out of the play: more awareness… of the subject that we were on about. because it is the same thing. like you always just think ‘oh it’s just me’. (bella) this data could be significant. this form of words ‘oh, it’s just me’ – as if it is not – (bella) and ‘it’s not just you’ (may), has appeared in two other separate studies of transformational learning and forum theatre, with different participants in different contexts (baumgartner, 2002, pp. 55-56; erel et al., 2017, p. 305). the realisation that one is not alone in one’s experience is a powerful resource for building social bonds and solidarity. it was unsurprising that first year students, who had been at university for about six months, were still trying to fit in and adjust. however, several participants from different disciplines – bella, may, archie and fransisco – talked of friendships with other students and involvement in clubs. arguably, this data suggests that forms of alienation, exclusion and consequent distress are strongly felt. as a practice, forum theatre allows individuals to interpret their moment in time, how they fit into their social context, and share their understanding in a way that forms solidarity, a key component of transformative human rights education. the experience of acting in image theatre and forum theatre and going into charities in the community were steps into the unknown for the students and myself, the teacher-studentresearcher. there was a pronounced power imbalance and inequality between the students and the users of the charities. i tried to address this risk by encouraging students to listen to the stories of others and to play the roles of others in forum theatre. it was unsettling and everyone at certain points seemed nervous of performing (even myself as a facilitator), meeting strangers, and not knowing what would happen. alex, who had had positions of responsibility in society (mortgage advisor), talked of not being ‘so afraid’ of how one can ‘invent all these barriers and you might be a bit apprehensive about doing something’. after one session, my observation was: ‘we are all learning together. this is the first time i have run forum theatre [with students] … it was an unknown quantity’. as a teacher-studentresearcher, trying new things in the classroom, one was learning possibilities for agency as a citizenship and human rights educator that improved students’ understanding of human rights p. von berg 15 issues without directly teaching law. it was discomforting that i could not step in as a lecturer with expert knowledge, because the ideas were drawn from participants’ experiences. in summary, the central findings are that the responses indicated ‘becomings’ in civic identity. such ‘becomings’ were manifested in terms of new dialogical knowledge shaping norms and values applied to marginalised members of the community and senses of agency from shared experiences of isolation and exclusion. as a teacher-student-researcher, i shared the students’ discomfort as we tried something new in co-creating new stories and encountering strangers (zembylas, 2015). let us now consider the answers to the research question and develop the conceptual framework. discussion in answer to the research question, the civic identities and agency of the undergraduate participants were shaped by these students humanising those at the edges of their community, building social bonds with diverse others, and critically reflecting on oppression in the university and the community. the most striking form of oppression took the form of the exclusion or misrepresentation of others. these experiences arose among a diverse group of social science students in community-based experiential learning with participatory theatre. this process was supported by moments for authentic and critical reflection. there were limitations in that participants self-selected, and this was a small sample. responses could vary with a larger sample because transformational experiences are partly predicated on students’ perceptions of the activity rather than the nature of the activity itself (ashwin et al., 2016). poignant pieces of data (‘it’s not just me’) emerged, as they have in other transformational learning and forum theatre studies, but here the participants identified a form of oppression in their own lives that had parallels in the community, showing perhaps the value of using critical incidents to inform forum theatre. the form of knowledge produced in this transformative pedagogical research will be analysed using the conceptual lenses of civic identity and agency along with the idea of ‘becomings’ (kaptani & yuval-davis, 2008). the term ‘becomings’ represents a relational and dialogic form of knowledge generated by this research design. the incipient transformations emerged from conversational interactions: ‘public engagement cannot just be about humans talking to one another, rather their iterations are inextricably linked to provoking one another to become this or that’ (waghid, 2021, p. 3). ‘becomings’ are also affective and experiential knowledge. citizenship was identified as a felt experience, particularly when others were humanised through compassion and empathy. this speaks to the aim of transformative human rights education to foster ‘a shared language and an entry point into a moral universe committed to the recognition and thriving of all’ (international commission on futures of education, 2021, human rights education review 16 p. 73). this research design provides lessons and challenges for practitioners. first, student input helped. their wish to explore each other’s civic identities led to the formation of new social bonds that accounted for the high level of engagement (according to their feedback). secondly, the practices and methods worked better in combination: experiential learning in the community offset the tendency for young people in forum theatre to individualise oppression because they had no knowledge of unjust social structures. this helped embed knowledge of power relations and social structures in forum theatre practice, a problem highlighted by researchers with young participants (erel et al., 2017). the activity was challenging, in that time pressures constrained how long it could run and it was an uncomfortable change to students’ and lecturer’s normal modes of interaction. this could deter other academics and students from taking part (smith et al., 2008). also, it was incomplete. it focused mainly on the ‘becomings’ of the students and their potential for transformative action and did not facilitate action against the injustices identified in the university and the community. consequently, there are further questions to address in future cycles of action research: how can this intervention be expanded to support transformative action? might other students and staff engage? if so, how? and what will be the results? conclusions universities have a major, critical role in sustaining and creating the culture of citizenship (crick, 2000, p. 145) and this entails respect for human rights. in the uk, this culture is under strain from an intolerance of differences and an increasing inequality which leads to the exclusion of others (yuval davis et al., p. 2018). these forms of injustice are perpetuated within universities. research into pedagogy on citizenship and human rights at university demonstrates a need to use pedagogies that can respond to students’ concerns about injustice and distance them from institutional pressures (blanchard & nix, 2019; hammond & keating, 2017; sen, 2021). this study contributes to this agenda by providing a detailed research design for pedagogical research into how some of the goals of transformative human rights education most relevant to this political context, such as nurturing citizens with empathy for different others and solidarity with peers against injustice, can be realised using personal and cultural citizenship education. this can be achieved by developing starkey et al.’s (2014) concept of pedagogical research in higher education, 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(2015). ‘pedagogy of discomfort’ and its ethical implications: the tensions of ethical violence in social justice education. ethics and education, 10(2), 163-174. https://doi.org/10.1080/17449642.2015.1039274 https://doi.org/10.1080/17449642.2015.1039274 learning languages of hope and advocacy – human rights perspectives in language education for sustainable development issn 2535-5406 http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.5192 date received: 16-12-2022 date accepted: 07-06-2023 peer reviewed article © 2023 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles learning languages of hope and advocacy – human rights perspectives in language education for sustainable development ricardo römhild university of münster, germany, ricardo.roemhild@uni-muenster.de abstract what if the way we (teach and learn to) speak about human rights crises is part of these crises? this conceptual paper sets out to explore the role of a human rights-informed pedagogy of hope in helping learners cultivate languages of hope and advocacy in the context of language education for sustainable development. recognising that a focus on agency connects critical pedagogies of hope, human rights education, and language education, this contribution argues that the language classroom may become a space of hope by offering stories of hope, change, and transformation to help learners envision a better future and take communicative action towards these futures. cultivating languages of hope and advocacy highlights the learners’ role as active change agents who assume responsibility in the face of their human rights duties and act accordingly. thus, human rights-informed language education may empower learners to contribute to living together in a more sustainable and just world. keywords global citizenship education, language education, languages of hope and advocacy, pedagogy of hope, sustainability http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.5192 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:ricardo.roemhild@uni-muenster.de human rights education review 2 human rights and language education for sustainable development pondering the question whether there is a solution to climate change, philosopher bayo akomolafe dares his audience to ask: ‘what if the way we respond to the crisis is part of the crisis?’ (2019, 05:35). building on this thought from a language education perspective, a follow-up question could be raised: ‘what if the way we (teach and learn to) speak about the crisis is part of the crisis as well?’ in this context, this paper sets out to explore how language education may help learners engage with the climate crisis and other sustainability-related issues in a hopeful, actionoriented way. joining the trajectory of research into hopeful pedagogies (e.g., hooks, 2003; freire, 2004; ojala, 2017), the main argument presented and discussed here is that language education, with its unique focus on literatures, cultures, and communication, can make a valuable contribution to the transformation towards sustainable living together by offering stories of hope, change, and transformation, and by inviting learners to cultivate languages of hope, of change, and of advocacy. as such, this contribution adds to the existing discourse, further contouring the significance and potentials of pedagogies of hope in the context of sustainability, global citizenship, and language education. part of this argument is the idea that hope is not only desirable or necessary in sustainability education, but that hope may also be considered inherent to teaching and learning processes if these are informed by principles of human rights education. this is corroborated by the recurring theme of agency, which connects notions of concrete/critical hope, human rights education with an expanded focus on human rights duties, and language education which encourages learners to develop an ability to participate in global discourses in a hopeful, constructive way. before it is possible to embark on this theoretical journey, it is necessary to provide a conceptual frame of reference with regard to the overall context of the arguments presented here. for this, consider akomolafe’s (2019) words once more, which serve as a vantage point: the crisis akomolafe references is the climate crisis, arguably one of the greatest challenges of our time, to which countless other challenges and issues are connected. in this conceptual contribution, the climate crisis is recognised as a global cultural crisis (e.g., mayer & wilson, 2006, p. 1), a political crisis (e.g., hayward, 2012, p. 9), and, crucially, a human rights crisis (e.g., römhild & gaudelli, 2021). it is linked to issues of social justice, equity, and inclusion – all of which are central to both the sustainability and the human rights discourse. smith and pangsapa (2008, p. 1) remind their readers that social and environmental injustices are inextricably linked and can best be described as socio-environmental injustices. therefore, the discussion led here is situated within the broader discourses on sustainability education, with sustainability being understood as spanning ecological, social, economic, and political dimensions. informed by the un’s (2015) umbrella of sustainable development goals, which serve as points of reference (agirreazkuenaga, 2020, p. 9) for such cross-curricular themes as r. römhild 3 education for sustainable development or sustainability education (lower-case spelling is intended to signify bottom-up transformative pedagogies in the sense of misiaszek, 2018, p. 10), these education efforts come with a clear call to action for all subjects taught in the various educational systems around the world. it is in this context that this article may further be embedded in what is called here a language education for sustainable development. language learning and communication play an integral role in efforts towards sustainable living together because successful communication is key to developing a sense of (global) interconnectedness and shared responsibility for the well-being of all as well as a capability to act and effectuate change. recognising that one of the superordinate objectives of language education is the development of an ability to actively participate in (global) discourses (see, e.g., hallet, 2008; marxl & römhild, 2023), such as the discourse on sustainability, the question posed here is how hopeful approaches to and within language education may contribute to the exploration of alternative, more hopeful and constructive ways of speaking about current and future crises. to develop this line of inquiry, it is possible to refer to existing literature in related fields, such as scholarship on the role of language education in contributing to education for sustainable development efforts (see, e.g., cates, 2022; lütge, merse & rauschert, 2022) or research on hope as a central element in sustainability education and particularly ecopedagogy (see, e.g., ojala, 2017; misiaszek, 2018; bourn, 2021). this is explored in more detail in the following section. hope: wishful thinking, forward dream, concrete action there seems to be a field of tension between a moral imperative to address the climate crisis as a human rights crisis on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the frustrating realities of a well-documented and debated knowledge-practice gap when it comes to sustainable and socio-environmentally just action (see, e.g., bullivant, 2022). in the face of this discrepancy, one might be inclined to ask how exactly (language) education may contribute to meaningful, lasting transformation towards socio-environmental justice – or, somewhat more dramatically, one might ask if there is reason for hope in sustainability education at all. to answer this question (with an emphatic ‘yes, there is reason for hope!’), it is worth turning to the wealth of research on the intersections between hope, (critical) pedagogy, and education for sustainable development which is already available and continuing to grow. this section suggests that hope is not only desirable in sustainability education but, in fact, can be considered inherent to it. in doing so, it also addresses the important terminological distinction between idealistic/passive and concrete/active understandings of hope and thus establishes the preconditions for a discussion of hopeful language education. hopeful pedagogies are most closely associated with paulo freire (2004) and bell hooks (2003) but, as tannock (2021, p. 103) observes, have also been developed by various other ‘radical human rights education review 4 educators and activists over the course of the twentieth century.’ tannock (2021, p. 103) identifies three core elements of a pedagogy of hope: it is ‘a collective not just individual process, a social practice not a psychological orientation, and focuses outward on global social, political and economic structures, as much as it looks inward on habits of heart and mind.’ what is apparent in these core elements is a sense of direction, a certain drive. for instance, snyder (2000) argues that hope includes what people would want to see happen, the ways of getting there, and the need to motivate oneself. in the same vein, hooks (2003, p. 195) describes a pedagogy of hope as revolving around a ‘prophetic imagination’ – there seems to be a clear goal associated with hope. the distinction between a somewhat passive, idealistic, or unguided notion of hope on the one hand and a more targeted, grounded, and active sense of hope as identified above is central to the discourse on ‘education in hope’ – this term is used by bourn (2021, p. 69) to describe freire's (2004) pedagogy of hope – or ‘educated hope’ (giroux 2011). for example, ojala (2017) distinguishes between existential and critical hope; the former being based on trust and almost, as ojala (2017, p. 78) puts it, taking ‘the form of wishful thinking’, the latter being based in reality, critique of the status quo, and the idea that there is a ‘future which is “not-yet”’ (ojala, 2017, p. 79). this notion of critical hope relates to bloch’s (1985, p. 157) understanding of hope as concrete utopia, ‘an unfinished forward dream’ rather than a form of compensatory escapism. with regard to education, bourn notes: a crucial role of education should be to encourage engagement in the complexity of issues, and the need to go beyond emotional responses to recognition of forces that affect processes of social change. hope requires an understanding of ways of dealing with challenging situations and emotional responses, and promoting positive ways forward. this means posing desirable futures. (bourn, 2021, p. 69) arguably, this understanding of hope is essential for transformative action and sustainabilityrelated pedagogies. in an effort to discuss hopeful approaches to language education, it is helpful to turn to freire and his students – in the context of sustainability the most notable one being misiaszek. reporting from several of his studies in the field of ecopedagogy, misiaszek (2016, p. 603) observes that participants frequently recurred to the idea that ‘ecopedagogy must be full of hope’, because ‘without hope fatalism is emphasised and socio-environmental oppressions are normalised.’ misiaszek further corroborates his argument that ecopedagogies need to be transformative and utopian to a certain degree because ‘education must allow students to dream of possible utopias, countering fatalistic educational models in which large societal r. römhild 5 transformation is impossible and “alternative” thinking is delegitimised and portrayed as useless’ (2018, p. 22). misiaszek’s argumentation is based on freire’s position that [the] ability to observe, to compare, and to evaluate, in order to choose, through deciding, how one is to intervene in the life of the city and thus exercise one's citizenship, arises then as a fundamental competency. if my presence in history is not neutral, i must accept its political nature as critically as possible. if, in reality, i am not in the world simply to adapt to it, but rather to transform it, and if it is not possible to change the world without a certain dream of vision for it, i must make use of every possibility there is not only to speak about my utopia, but also to engage in practices consistent with it. (2004, p. 7) in this way, transformative or critical hope counters the fatalism of what freire (e.g., 2000; 2004) calls ‘banking education’, which ‘systematically delegitimizes students’ previous knowledges [as] critical thinking subjects’ (misiaszek & gonzález, in press), thus conceptualizing learners as passive objects rather than active agents of learning and, ultimately, change. it is possible to extrapolate three central insights from the above discussion. first, that hope needs to be grounded in reality to a certain extent. as a case in point, jimenez and moorhead (2021) report that educators and learners stress the importance of optimism and hopeful approaches to sustainability in the classroom as a counter to cynicism and despair, but they also ponder whether it is necessary to ‘reframe optimism’ as recognising that ‘the future will generally be worse for most people, but not as bad as the worst-case scenarios’ or perhaps as ‘having confidence in our collective ability to slow down the pace of our carbon emissions’ or even ‘being confident that we will still find ways to pursue joy and meaningful lives amidst unfolding future hardships’ (jimenez & moorhead, 2021, p. 17). the second aspect notable in all the perspectives discussed above is the idea that hope is inseparably connected to agency. this, in turn, necessitates taking the learners seriously as active agents of their own learning. third, it has also become evident that numerous authors suggest that (critical) hope is desirable and necessary when it comes to educational efforts, particularly in the context of sustainability; this is partly motivated by the connection to (learner) agency. yet, it is possible to argue that hope may not only be regarded as necessary in language education for sustainable development, but that it may, in fact, be inherent to it if such pedagogy is informed by human rights. to develop this argument, the first step is to consider the concept of ‘disappointed hope’ in the light of risk theory, and particularly beck’s notion of a world risk society. from disappointment to hope the philosophical concept of disappointed hope was first coined by horckheimer and adorno human rights education review 6 (1972) and later revisited by bhabha during a keynote speech at ruhrtriennale 2019. talking about the migrant crisis (certainly one of the more prominent human rights issues in the early 21st century), bhabha asks his audience and society as a whole to put themselves in a proleptical position to reflect on where they are today and to identify what they need to do to help themselves now – ojala (2017, p. 78 and 79) would refer to this as ‘pathway thinking’ towards a future which is ‘not-yet’. bhabha argues that dealing with global injustices and human rights issues needs to be motivated by a shared sense of responsibility. climate change and many other sustainability-related issues affect the whole of humanity, albeit not in equal scope. in other words, humanity is bound together by the anticipation of (among others, climate-related) catastrophe. ulrich beck (1986) describes this by using the term ‘risk society’. it is worth emphasising that this does not mean that risks or manifested catastrophes are distributed equally over space and time. in fact, nixon (2011) uses the term ‘slow violence’ to indicate that climate change-related injustices are oftentimes invisible, slow, and gradual, and mostly affect the vulnerable, poor, and disempowered. it is a widely received notion amongst observers that those who have least contributed to the problem have to bear the direst consequences of climate change (e.g., robinson, 2015, 12:19-13:34). it is in these ideas of slow violence and risk society where the moment of current disappointment – even failure and despair – lies. however, bhabha (2018, p. 10) points out that ‘we need to understand what we may call the “rationality of risk”: risk, not simply as the “last act” of desperation, but as a kind of “disappointed hope”, to recall adorno’s phrase’. beck, too, hints at the significance of hope in his concept of risk society. asked in an interview (phoenix, 2013, 25:00-27:10) whether there is, in his opinion, a way out of this crisis, beck explains that risk, as the anticipation of catastrophe, also exists to develop new utopias and hope. in other words, precisely because the risk society is all about anticipation and the avoidance of catastrophe, it is also a hope society. put differently still, from disappointment, a place of fear, despair, failure, crisis, and continuing risk, emerges hope (see also bloch, 1985). this, however, can only be true if society actively works towards the mitigation of risks or, put more positively, towards the realisation of hopeful visions of the future. when it comes to the classroom, it has been argued above that education needs to offer learners opportunities to envision better, more just, more sustainable futures and to help learners cultivate a sense of responsibility and agency, unfolding their own potential as active agents of change. in other words, the classroom needs to become a space of hope. the language classroom as an instance of slow hope to better envisage how the language classroom might become a space of hope, it is helpful to turn to mauch’s concept of ‘slow hope’. engaging with nixon’s notion of slow violence, mauch notes: r. römhild 7 but if we acknowledge that human manipulation of the earth has been destructive force that has caused huge converging threats, particularly over the last couple of centuries, we can also imagine that human endeavors can help us build a less destructive world in the centuries to come. (2019, p. 18) mauch calls for ‘not only an acknowledgement of our present ecological predicament but also a language of positive change [and] visions of a better future’ (2019, p. 18). however, corresponding change and transformation, as indicated by the name of his concept, is going to be slow. following akomolafe’s (2014, p. 2) famous words ‘the times are urgent, […] let us slow down’, slowness – understood in akomolafe’s sense (2019, 16:39-17:00) as a different, a deeper kind of awareness of the world and ourselves – might just be what is needed, as mauch (2019, p. 21) argues: ‘in a world where developments are evolving ever more rapidly, slowness can be frustrating but also inspiring.’ in the context of literary studies and language pedagogy, bartosch confirms that ‘[it] is not the idealization of slowness but the potentials of “slow scholarship” (cf. bergthaller et al., 2014) that let us understand why language and literature matter when it comes [to] cultures of climate’ (2021, p. 7). in short, what is needed is a future-oriented perspective (hope) on living together sustainably in a socio-environmentally just world, in which education serves the development and intensification of sustainable, human rights-sensitive living approaches. yet, this presupposes critical reflection on the now (i.e. the ‘disappointed’) and the kind of world learners are currently living in. it is crucial to recognise current failures and crises – such as socioenvironmental injustices – both in terms of learners identifying them, engaging with them, discussing them in the classroom, but also on a conceptual level in terms of educators reflecting on preconditions and existing frameworks to do so. arguably, the educational tools to move towards teaching and learning processes that are in line with this idea of concrete hope have been known for a while. osler and stokke note that hre [human rights education; rr] can contribute to a politics of hope. educators and activists seek to inspire hope by increasing knowledge and awareness of human rights. educators can also promote hope by equipping their students with the experiences, skills and attitudes to stand up for their rights and the rights of our fellow humanity. they can prepare them to be effective citizens, prepared to show solidarity with those whose rights are denied and to engage in struggles for justice. in this sense, hre is not neutral but concerned with enabling citizens to adhere to a ‘principle [that] recognizes our responsibilities to others across difference, at local national and global scales’ (osler, 2016, p. 29). (osler & stokke, 2020, p. 3) osler and stokke hint at the fact that human rights education and associated principles can help educators and learners move beyond the development of awareness, and that awareness human rights education review 8 needs to be followed by action – in the case of the language classroom this translates as communicative action and discourse participation. as such, human rights education can be directive for hopeful language education for sustainable development which focuses on agency and empowerment as well as the cultivation of a sense of one’s own responsibility. in this context, the notion of human rights duties may prove to be particularly helpful. human rights education: a pedagogy of hope, agency, and shared responsibility to explore the potential of human rights for hopeful language education for sustainable development further, this section first addresses the idea of human rights duties and connects it to the central notion of agency in sustainability education. it then proceeds to discuss human rights-informed language education in the context of a pedagogy of hope, thus forming the precondition for an exploration of a focus on languages of hope and advocacy in the language classroom, which follows in the next section. the intersections between human rights and climate change have been explored within the fields of sustainable development and social justice (e.g., sachs, 2008; levy & patz, 2015; ohchr, 2015) as well as legal studies for a while (e.g., aminzadeh, 2007; posner, 2007; limon, 2009; knox, 2009; bodansky, 2010; caney, 2010) and have recently also attracted attention from a pedagogical perspective (e.g., römhild & gaudelli, 2021). arguing in terms of sustainability and socio-environmental justice, the matter seems rather evident. worldwide, climate change threatens people’s ‘basic capability to support themselves with dignity’ (sachs, 2008, p. 334) as it ‘undercuts the rights to health, to food, to water, and […] it may even affect the right to self-determination’ (ohchr, 2015). levy and patz (2015, p. 311) add the rights to freely determine one’s political status, to freely pursue economic, social, and cultural development, and the right to education itself to the list of potentially infringed human rights. they (levy & patz, 2015) also stress that there is an imbalance when it comes to those who tend to be affected by climate change and the associated human rights restrictions to the disadvantage of low-income countries and poorer people within high-income countries. from a legal perspective, the matter is far from evident. for a start, while climate change certainly affects human rights, it does not necessarily violate them, legally speaking (bodansky, 2010, pp. 520-521). in addition, prosecution can be extremely difficult (bodansky, 2010, p. 253) because it would be impossible for a victim of global warming to show that one particular corporation or factory caused his injury. any theory would need to allocate liability on the basis of market share or some other proxy for degree of responsibility, and although american courts sometimes do this, the difficulties of using such theories for global warming are considerable. (posner, 2007, p. 1934) r. römhild 9 therefore, in line with knox (2009), the discussion might not so much be about human rights as it is about human rights duties that have relevance to climate change and other sustainability-related issues. among these duties are the duty to respect the human rights of others, the duty to protect the human rights of others as well as the duty to fulfil or facilitate satisfaction of the human rights of others (see knox, 2009, p. 179-180). in the context of language education for sustainable development, the cultivation of an awareness of one’s own human rights-related duties may be considered a central learning objective. the focus on one’s own duties directly corresponds with the development of a sense of responsibility and, ultimately, the cultivation of (communicative) agency as a part of education in concrete hope. to work towards this goal, human rights-informed approaches can be embedded in the broader context of teaching and learning in the sense of cosmopolitan, critical global citizenship education (gce) (as called for by, e.g., osler & starkey, 2018; starkey, 2012, 2015). a shared sense of interconnectedness and responsibility for the well-being of all as targeted by this pedagogy is an inherently cultural learning objective as it hinges on the learners’ (and educators’) ability to think of themselves as part of a larger, global community. as such, this pedagogy is dependent on and, at the same time, promotes culturetranscending ways of seeing and positioning oneself in the world and in discourses on human rights and socio-environmental justice. one way of implementing this type of pedagogy in the language classroom is to invite learners to learn and practice languages of hope and advocacy to assume active roles in working towards socio-environmental justice and the protection of human rights for all. human rights and a pedagogy of hope human rights education is an approach to civic or citizenship education which ‘promotes a broadly humanistic regard for all people, whereby individuals think and act in solidarity with all members of the human community’ (hahn, 2020, p. 9; see also starkey, 2015; osler, 2016; barton, 2020). it is this idea of universal inclusivity which sits at the heart of human rights education, and which informs one of the central goals, to ‘expose young people to universal standards and means for protecting and ensuring rights for all’ (hahn, 2020, p. 9). as such, human rights education can also be considered an alternative to more narrow, nationalistic approaches to citizenship education, which focus primarily on responsibilities, rights, and duties within a national society (starkey, 2015, p. 2) rather than global interconnectedness and shared responsibility. the broad humanistic ideology underlying human rights education is reflected in a typology of human rights education categories provided by bajaj (2011). this typology suggests that there are three types of hre initiatives: ‘(1) hre for global citizenship, (2) hre for coexistence (to sustain peace in post-conflict societies), and (3) hre for transformative action (in the human rights education review 10 tradition of paulo freire’s work)’ (overview provided by hahn, 2020, p. 10). these strands are not mutually exclusive, as the example of climate change demonstrates. to address climate change as a human rights issue necessitates that learners: (1) develop a global mindset and an awareness for their own interconnectedness in the sense of global citizenship education; (2) assume responsibility to coexist peacefully and combat socio-environmental injustices; (3) engage in meaningful, sustainable transformative action. within the context of language education for sustainable development, it seems reasonable to turn the spotlight on the idea of hre for global citizenship. firstly, with global citizenship education increasingly taking root in the language education discourse (see, e.g., wintersteiner & zelger, 2021; freitag-hild, 2022; lütge, merse & rauschert, 2022; römhild & gaudelli, 2022) it seems appropriate to highlight that hre and gce can – and arguably, should – walk hand in hand when it comes to teaching and learning about socio-environmental justice and sustainability. it is not by coincidence that sustainable development goal 4.7 (un, 2015) mentions both hre and gce as part of what constitutes quality education in the 21st century. secondly, the goals associated with gce, such as an awareness of one’s own global interconnectedness, can serve as a basis for further engagement and, ultimately, transformative action. thirdly, from the tradition of hre for gce emerged the now widely accepted distinction of teaching and learning about, for, and through human rights, which may serve as a useful conceptual framework for human rights educational practices in (language) classrooms. based on lister’s (1981) definition of teaching about, for, and in human rights, un (2011) distinguishes the aforementioned teaching and learning about, for, and through human rights. hahn (2020, p. 10) explains, ‘[education] about human rights includes developing knowledge of human rights norms and principles, the values that underpin them, and the ways they can be protected.’ in terms of the climate crisis, this entails, among other things, the acknowledgment of climate change as a human rights issue by learning about human rights which are being infringed as a result of climate change as well as knowledge on one’s own role in protecting the rights of others. ‘education through human rights’, hahn (2020, p. 10) continues, ‘includes teaching and learning in ways that respect the rights of teachers and students.’ there is a (classroom) cultural dimension to this notion in the sense that the learning environment allows students to experience human rights consciously. the language classroom offers manifold opportunities for learners to engage in education through and for human rights, the latter aiming ‘to empower learners to exercise their rights and respect and uphold the rights of others’ (hahn, 2020, p. 11). it is this notion which most directly corresponds with the ideas of concrete hope, the language classroom as an instance of this hope, and learners cultivating (communicative) agency, which is central to concrete/critical hope, as was established earlier. one way of learning for human rights in the language r. römhild 11 classroom may be by exploring and practicing language which helps learners advocate for the protection of the rights of others as a way of active communication for a better present and future. a combination of these three dimensions may work towards a human rights culture in the classroom and beyond. only if learners are able to appreciate the value of human rights in their own lives and in their own immediate surroundings will they be able to transfer their dispositions and, ultimately, actions, to increasingly larger scales. in this context, matz & römhild (2021) postulate a number of general principles, which could inform human rights-oriented teaching and learning processes within language education: • learning needs to be relevant to the learners’ lifeworlds for them to appreciate the significance of human rights in their everyday lives as well as identify their own role in upholding human rights for others. socio-environmental injustices pervade all societies on various levels. • this involves a high degree of self-reflection and an awareness of one’s own position and subjectivity in the discourse on human rights and the climate crisis as a human rights issue. • to address socio-environmental issues, learners need to develop problem-solving skills. this could be achieved through meaningful and complex tasks which involve problem-posing and communicative action orientation. • in addition, materials and texts should be multimodal and offer multiple perspectives on a given topic so as to avoid myopic (e.g., exclusively nationalistic) views. this way, the notion of universal inclusivity within the human rights discourse can be made accessible for learners. learning and practicing languages of hope and advocacy the principles listed above serve as a backdrop for the discussion led in this next section, which connects human rights-informed pedagogy of hope and language education on a practical level to examine how the language classroom and language learning itself may serve as a space of hope. this section also features two examples used to illustrate how this might be implemented in classroom practice. elaborating on his concept of slow hope, mauch (2019, p. 19) calls for ‘narratives of hope’, arguing that ‘the arts and humanities have the potential to remind us of past environmental change and positive visions for our environment.’ the language classroom, with its focus on literatures and communication, is predestined to provide these narratives of hope. through literature, learners can access or generate hopeful visions of the future. mauch argues that [what] we need […] are stories and histories of change and transformation: stories of ecological alarm and stories of slow hope. we need stories that alert us to our human rights education review 12 collective vulnerabilities […]; stories that remind us that we are indeed living in what donald worster has called an ‘age of vulnerability,’ and what rob nixon has called a world of ‘slow violence [,]’ [and, one might add, what ulrich beck has called a ‘world risk society’; rr]. we need ecological stories that make us confront the fact that our power (however well-intentioned it might be) is potentially destructive and that the survival of humans on this planet depends on the preservation of soil and water and the habitats and ecological systems that we are an intrinsic part of. but we also need stories that provide us with alternatives to narrowly defined pathways: with ideas that seemed unimaginable before they were voiced and with paths that seemed unwalkable before they were walked. we need stories that empower us to become thinkers, actors, and activists capable of imagining alternatives in a world dominated by technical and economic constraints. we need ideas that will find their way through the mesh of an ever-tighter net of path dependencies. and we need people who will dare to cut apart some of the meshwork. (2019, p. 37) there are a number of particularly well suited text forms, genres, and teaching and learning material available to educators and learners to address socio-environmental injustice issues in the classroom (see, e.g., mochizuki & christodoulouy, 2017; or the examples provided by contributors to surkamp, 2022), which oftentimes include (eco-)dystopian / climate-fiction stories, such as films like the day after tomorrow (emmerichy, 2004) or novels like atwood’s the maddaddam trilogy (2013). arguably, dystopia – here representative of a pedagogy of discomfort (see, e.g., porto & zembylas, 2020), a pedagogy of fear (see, e.g., tannock, 2021, p. 97) or a notion of education as transformation through experiencing crises (see, e.g., deckecornill, 2016) – undoubtably has its place in literature and language education, for instance to alert, to draw attention to the urgency of the situation, and to work against counterproductive forms of hope, such as passive hope. however, there is also a certain danger associated with the use of these texts as they might overwhelm learners emotionally, contributing to a sense of despair and hopelessness prevailing in many communities (bourn, 2021, p. 66), and possibly leading to a reverse catharsis effect: the dramatic, depressing global developments, injustices and human rights violations are being left behind after engaging with literary texts, and learners return to the alleged security of their lifeworlds. regarding communicative learning goals, learners engaging with this kind of text run the risk of practicing languages of risk, despair, and crisis. however, if a central objective of language education is to prepare learners to become active participants in societies and discourses, and thus contribute to sustainable transformation on a communicative level, learners need to be encouraged to cultivate languages of advocacy, change, and hope. r. römhild 13 languages of hope and advocacy hopeful language largely revolves around positive, optimistic, and aspirational attitudes and perspectives. a climate change-related example is the differentiation between one’s ecological handprint from such well-established concepts as one’s ecological footprint – i.e., how many of earth’s resources are used by someone’s actions – or a medium’s / text’s ecological mindprint – i.e., ways in which texts help spread ‘beliefs about the relationship between humans and the living systems that sustain them’ (lópez, 2019, n.p.). one’s ecological handprint turns the spotlight on success stories and all the things an individual / a society already does to promote sustainability and socio-environmental justice (rohwedder, 2022, n.p.). language of hope can be characterised as • positive language, which focuses on achievements rather than failures, e.g., ecological footprint, mindprint and handprint. • revolving around the question of how to achieve positive effects rather than how to avoid negative effects, e.g., how one may contribute to upholding and protecting the rights of others rather than exclusively focusing on how the rights of others are violated. • highly dependent on mindsets, attitudes, and dispositions. on a curricular level, this relates to affective competence areas of language education which form a central component of many sustainability-related competence conceptions across the world (e.g., in un’s (2015) hand, heart, mind framework or germany’s curriculum framework education for sustainable development (kmk 2016)). languages of advocacy are characterized by more hard-edged communicative strategies than languages of hope. for instance, to become an advocate, one needs a topic to advocate for (e.g., other people’s human rights), ways of expressing strong feelings, and an ability to identify target audiences. languages of advocacy also rely on respectful dialogue and active listening skills, and, according to mochizuki and christodoulou (2017, p. 170), may be defined in terms of • argument: logical and clear presentation of evidence and justification; • affect: assertiveness, respect, open-mindedness; • style: linguistic choices that add interest as well as emphasizing and reinforcing key ideas to make an impact on the audience; the use of emotive language, high modality, and personal pronouns to directly involve the reader / listener; rhetorical questions, repetitions, adjectives and adverbs as well as association techniques (this list of style-related aspects is based on eya, 2021). on top of this, languages of advocacy are also highly dependent on mindsets, attitudes, and dispositions, which have a direct influence on the level of persuasiveness and effectiveness of human rights education review 14 the strategies used. it is important to note, though, that both languages of advocacy and languages of hope go hand in hand and that, oftentimes, languages of advocacy are an expression of languages of hope, as is frequently the case in the context of climate change, socio-environmental justice issues, and related human rights challenges. two examples serve to illustrate how this might be turned into practice in the language classroom. in a lesson unit proposed by anika marxl and me (2021), learners are introduced to the reallife situation of an oil spill disaster in the niger delta, which destroyed the lives of local inhabitants, both human and non-human. learners are encouraged to answer a real facebook post, in which the commentator accuses the locals of laziness and corruption, blaming them for their situation. this task prompts learners to engage with the situation and take a communicative stand for the rights of those suffering from the oil spill. they practice strategies of advocacy speech, such as the composition of highly emotive yet convincing argumentation for justice. in this way, they are asked to protect the rights of others on a communicative level. in another lesson unit described by philipp siepmann, janine bruns, and me (fc.), learners engaged with yuval noah harari’s (2018) bestselling book 21 lessons for the 21st century. the book features solution-oriented visions of the 21st century, inviting learners to assume a proleptical position themselves and envisage a more sustainable and just future. the learners were highly motivated by the task to compile their own book entitled ‘21 young people’s ideas for the 21st century’, in which they laid out their visions for the future, learning and practicing a mix of hopeful language and advocacy speech. individual chapters, created by the students, dealt with socio-environmental justice issues that they identified as relevant and included concrete calls for action, on individual, societal, and governmental levels. in both cases, learners are taken seriously as active agents of change. they develop and foster communicative, reflective, and critical competences, which are needed when actively participating in the global discourses on sustainability. by way of focusing on possible solutions and hopeful visions of the future, this type of pedagogy is situated in concrete hope, with learners moving towards a position to effectuate change. conclusions it is one of the central conundrums of global citizenship education and sustainability education that, in order to lead to transformation, it has to balance the severity of the situation, for instance in terms of human rights violations, with the beauty and aesthetics of the world – or hope. returning to the question raised in the beginning, perhaps the way societies and their youth (learn to) speak about the crisis – oftentimes by way of languages of despair, failure, and disappointment – is part of the reason why there seems to be a knowledge-action gap r. römhild 15 and no end in sight when it comes to socio-environmental injustices and climate-related human rights violations. perhaps therein, in focussing on languages of hope and advocacy rather than languages of despair, lies a key to moving towards hope, towards an alternative way of approaching the crises. arguably, the idea of human rights can be considered rather utopian in and of itself, but especially in the context of human rights-informed language education. however, as has been stated above in the context of slow hope, concrete utopia and active hope are exactly what is needed, particularly in education. without hope, there is no aspiration, no ambition, and, ultimately, there are no efforts for change. furthermore, the discussion should not only be focused on human rights but revolve around everyone’s human rights-related duties and responsibilities as well. from a philosophical perspective in particular, the cultivation of an awareness of one’s own position and responsibility is key for the development of a sense of global interconnectedness. philosophically speaking, human rights are universal; they are the only available value system which is recognised globally and independent of nation states. as such, human rights can provide a powerful moral basis – or a ‘moral compass’, in starkey’s (2012, p. 10) words – for the development of an ability to participate in global discourses actively and critically. on the grounds of this moral basis, self-reflection and transformative action may be achieved. thus, language education for sustainable development which is informed by the principles of human rights education can be regarded as an instance of slow hope, and, as such, can be embedded into a broader framework of global citizenship education, in the context of which learners can engage with questions of injustices and human rights-related issues beyond climate change in a hopeful and, crucially, constructive manner. to this end, this paper has argued that the language classroom can and, perhaps, should focus on learning and practicing languages of hope and advocacy. the language classroom is predestined to invite learners to envision hopeful futures, in which the human rights of others are protected by everyone, and work towards these futures on a communicative level. as such, this paper joins the aspirational and ambitious project of re-imagining and re-orientating language education towards sustainability, with human rights perspectives being an integral aspect of learning to live together. declaration of interest statement i have no relevant interest(s) to disclose. references agirreazkuenaga, l. 2020. education for agenda 2030: what direction do we want to take going forward? sustainability, 12(5), 2035. https://doi.org/10.3390/su12052035 https://doi.org/10.3390/su12052035 human rights education review 16 akomolafe, b. 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(2021). global citizenship education im deutschunterricht. special issue: ide – informationen zur deutschdidaktik, 45(4). https://doi.org/10.1080/0305764x.2011.651205 https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-83000-7 https://www.unep.org/resources/report/transforming-our-world-2030-agenda-sustainable-development https://www.unep.org/resources/report/transforming-our-world-2030-agenda-sustainable-development https://www.ohchr.org/en/newsevents/pages/climatechangehumanrightsissue.aspx educating children about sexual orientation and gender identity post-marriage equality in australia issn 2535-5406 vol 5, no 2 (2022) http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4789 date received: 08-02-2022 date accepted: 24-05-2022 peer reviewed article © 2022 the author(s). this is an openaccess publication licensed under terms given in: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (cc-by 4.0). https://www.humanrer.org research articles educating children about sexual orientation and gender identity postmarriage equality in australia paula gerber monash university, australia, paula.gerber@monash.edu phoebe irving lindner monash university, australia, phoebe.lindner@gmail.com abstract australia achieved marriage equality in 2017, following a controversial and divisive postal survey which invited all australians to ‘vote’ on whether same-sex couples should be allowed to marry. the ‘no’ campaign focused on the alleged negative impact of marriage equality on children’s education. scare-mongering television clips claimed that boys would start wearing dresses to school and radical sex and gender education would become mandatory. four years later, it is timely to consider the legacy of the ‘no’ campaign on education. an analysis of developments since marriage equality was achieved, reveals that lgbtq+ students have become more vulnerable to discrimination and there is less human rights education (hre) about diverse sexual orientations and gender identities. the article concludes with six recommendations for measures to combat these negative developments. keywords human rights education, hre, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, lgbt, lgbtq+, marriage equality, sexual orientation, gender identity, sogi, safe schools, religious discrimination bills, australia http://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.4789 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://www.humanrer.org/ mailto:paula.gerber@monash.edu mailto:phoebe.lindner@gmail.com p. gerber & p. i. lindner 5 introduction in december 2017, australia became the 26th country to open the institution of marriage to same-sex couples. such reforms were achieved following a divisive postal survey, in which australians were invited to ‘vote’ on whether same-sex couples should be allowed to marry. unlike in ireland, where a referendum was necessary to amend the constitution to allow same-sex couples to marry, no such constitutional or legislative requirement existed in australia. despite this, the australian government decided to undertake a non-compulsory postal survey, to evaluate citizens’ views on whether the institution of marriage should be available to all persons, regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity (sogi). the outcome of the postal survey confirmed that the majority of australians supported marriage equality (winsor, 2016). shortly after the survey results were announced, the federal parliament amended the marriage act 1961 (cth), by removing the words that defined marriage as being ‘between a man and a woman’. since then, thousands of same-sex couples have married. the australian bureau of statistics reported that in 2018 – the first full year in which same-sex couples could lawfully marry – 6,538 same-sex couples were married, accounting for 5.5% of all australian marriages that year (australian bureau of statistics, 2019). the introduction of marriage equality in australia signalled a new era; one in which lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (lgbtq+) people expected they would experience reduced discrimination and enjoy increased respect for their human rights. unfortunately, this expectation has not been realised, and schools have become the new ‘battleground’ in which those who campaigned against marriage equality are continuing their fight against equal rights for lgbtq+ people. the attainment of marriage equality was accompanied by an upsurge in vocal opposition to schools teaching students about diverse sexual orientations and gender identities and the use of anti-bullying programmes designed to make schools safer for lgbtq+ students and students with lgbtq+ parents. organisations such as the australian christian lobby not only advocated against marriage equality, but also for the abolition of the safe schools program (brohier, 2018), an initiative designed to create safer and more inclusive school environments for lgbtq+ students, staff and families (the safe schools coalition australia, n.d.). this campaign was successful, with federal government funding for the safe schools program ceasing and most state and territory governments withdrawing their support for it. while australia’s national curriculum does include some opportunities for human rights education (hre), it is largely silent on matters relating to sogi and the rights of lgbtq+ persons (gerber & pettitt, 2021). the safe schools program ameliorated, to some degree, the human rights education review volume 5(2) 6 absence of comprehensive hre about sogi in the national curriculum. however, since the safe schools program was defunded, there is less opportunity for students to learn about sogi and the rights of lgbtq+ people. this article begins with an analysis of how hre is addressed in international human rights law, followed by a similar analysis of how international human rights law recognises the right of lgbtq+ people to live their lives free from discrimination based on their sogi. within international human rights law, hre and the rights of lgbtq+ people are rarely considered together, notwithstanding that there are clearly important links between the two. the discussion in sections 2 and 3 of this article analyses the international human rights law pertaining to both hre and the rights of lgbtq+ people and, in so doing, demonstrates how governments have an obligation to ensure that students learn about the rights of lgbtq+ people. section 4 moves from an examination of australia’s obligations under international law to an analysis of what is happening domestically. it considers the extent to which sogi-based hre was provided in australian schools before marriage equality, and what has changed since then. in particular, it considers two key developments, namely, the federal government’s defunding of the safe schools program and its attempts to enact the religious discrimination bills 2021. section 5 considers a way forward, discussing reforms that would help australia to implement sogi-based hre within schools, in accordance with its international law obligations. according to unesco, a comprehensive approach to addressing sogi-based discrimination and bullying that would help ensure schools are an inclusive environment for lgbtq+ students—requires governments to adopt six specific actions, namely to, (i) develop national policies or action plans; (ii) have inclusive curricula and learning materials; (iii) provide training for educational staff; (iv) ensure there is support for students and families; (v) enter into partnerships with civil society organisations; and (vi) monitor discrimination and evaluate the implementation of these measures (unesco, 2016). section 5 discusses each of these six elements, including how they can be implemented in australia. p. gerber & p. i. lindner 7 international human rights law relating to hre the principle of human rights education was first espoused in the universal declaration of human rights (udhr) in 1948. the drafters of the udhr wanted to ensure that states not only provided education, but that the education provided would promote respect for human rights. as the unesco delegate, pierre lebar, observed: [in] germany, under the hitler regime, education had been admirably organized but had, nevertheless, produced disastrous results. it was absolutely necessary to make clear that education to which everyone was entitled should strengthen respect of the rights set forth in the declaration and combat the spirit of intolerance (un economic and social council, 1948, 12). the result was article 26(2) of the udhr which provides that, education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. it shall promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religious groups, and shall further the activities of the united nations for the maintenance of peace (united nations [un], 1948). this broad definition, outlining the need for education to be directed to respect for human rights and freedoms, was subsequently incorporated into the international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights (icescr), article 13(1) of which provides that, the states parties to the present covenant recognize the right of everyone to education. they agree that education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and the sense of its dignity, and shall strengthen the respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. they further agree that education shall enable all persons to participate effectively in a free society, promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations and all racial, ethnic or religious groups, and further the activities of the united nations for the maintenance of peace (un, 1966a). [emphasis added] directing that education ‘enable all persons to participate effectively in a free society’ is particularly relevant when discussing the need for hre that addresses sogi-based human rights violations, as it requires that hre contribute to lgbtq+ people being able to live their lives free from discrimination based on their sogi (un human rights council, 2015). making the experiences of lgbtq+ people visible within the school curriculum has demonstrably positive impacts on lgbtq+ students, and their peers, and is essential if students of all sogis are to participate effectively in their schooling, and in society (ezer et al., 2019). the convention on the rights of the child (crc) also addresses hre. article 29 of that treaty human rights education review volume 5(2) 8 sets out governments’ obligations regarding the content of education that children are to receive. of particular relevance to the human rights of lgbtq+ children is the mandate that education be directed to, (a) the development of the child's personality, talents and mental and physical abilities to their fullest potential; (b) the development of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, and for the principles enshrined in the charter of the united nations; … (d) the preparation of the child for responsible life in a free society, in the spirit of understanding, peace, tolerance, equality of sexes, and friendship among all peoples, ethnic, national and religious groups and persons of indigenous origin (un, 1989, art 29(1)). hre that is inclusive of respect and understanding of diverse sogis is necessary to fulfil the aims of developing ‘the child's personality, talents and mental and physical abilities to their fullest potential’ and developing ‘respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, and for the principles enshrined in the charter of the united nations’ (un, 1989, art 29(1)(a) and (b)). furthermore, hre that promotes respect for the rights of lgbtq+ people is also arguably essential for ‘[t]he preparation of the child for responsible life in a free society, in the spirit of understanding, peace, tolerance, equality of sexes, and friendship among all peoples, ethnic, national and religious groups and persons of indigenous origin’. this is because homophobia, biphobia and transphobia are able to thrive in environments where there is not ‘understanding, peace, tolerance, equality of sexes, and friendship among all peoples’ (fulcher, 2021). in 2011, the un general assembly adopted the united nations declaration on human rights education and training, article 4 of which further clarifies and articulates states’ obligations to provide hre, declaring that hre should be directed to, (a) raising awareness, understanding and acceptance of human rights; (b) developing a universal culture of human rights; (c) pursuing the effective realization of all human rights and promoting tolerance, nondiscrimination and equality; (d) ensuring equal opportunities for all through access to hre, without any discrimination; and (e) contributing to the prevention of human rights violations by combating ‘discrimination, racism, stereotyping and incitement to hatred, and the harmful attitudes and p. gerber & p. i. lindner 9 prejudices that underlie them’ (un, 2011). all of these directives are relevant to creating a society where the rights of lgbtq+ people are respected, protected and fulfilled (gerber, 2013). in addition to articulating the norms pertaining to hre, the un has also actively promoted hre through the activities and advocacy of its various organs. the un declared the period from 1995 to 2004 to be the ‘decade for human rights education’. this decade reflected an ambitious determination on the part of the un to further hre, by providing a framework for ‘global mobilization of strategies for human rights education’ (un high commissioner for human rights, 2000, [178]). as this decade was coming to an end, the un human rights council (hrc) proclaimed the ‘world programme for hre’, commencing in 2005. the world programme seeks to ‘promote a common understanding of basic principles and methodologies of human rights education, to provide a concrete framework for action and to strengthen partnerships and cooperation from the international level down to the grass roots’ (world programme for human rights education, n.d.). there have been three phases of the world programme, spanning four years each. the hrc’s ‘plan of action for the fourth phase (2020-2024) of the world programme for human rights education’ states that one of the programme’s ‘specific objectives’ is, to expand human rights education for, with and by youth in formal and nonformal education and, indirectly, informal learning, prioritizing young people in situations of exclusion or vulnerability. (un human rights council, 2019, para. 22(b)) in a footnote, the hrc specifies that the ‘young people’ to whom it is referring includes ‘lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex youth’ (un human rights council, 2019, fn 16). furthermore, the plan explicitly provides that educational and training activities shall, foster respect for and appreciation of diversity, and opposition to discrimination on the basis of […] sexual orientation and gender identity, and other bases. (un human rights council, 2019, para. 10(b)); [emphasis added] the plan also sets out some ‘core competencies’ that should be covered within hre, including, respect for and appreciation of diversity, including through the use of inclusive language and attitudes, and opposition to discrimination on the basis of […] sexual orientation and gender identity and other bases. (un human rights council, 2019, para. 27(c)(ii)); [emphasis added] human rights education review volume 5(2) 10 these specific references to sogi and lgbt+ young people is a significant improvement on plans for the earlier phases of the world programme. the plans for phases two and three of the world programme contained only one reference to ‘sexual orientation’ (but notably not ‘gender identity’) under the heading of ‘principles for hre activities’ (no reference to ‘sexual orientation’ was made in phase one of the world programme for hre). the more specific and detailed inclusion of sogi in the plan for phase four indicates that the un’s hre efforts are recognising the importance of expressly including education about the rights of vulnerable minorities. international human rights law relating to lgbtq+ people while the un’s references to sogi issues within the hre context is relatively new, hre has been a focus of the un’s work regarding the rights of lgbtq+ people for a long time. for example, in 2011 the hrc adopted a resolution directing the office of the high commissioner for human rights (ohchr) to undertake a study into violence and related human rights violations based on sogi. the resultant report outlined ways in which lgbtq+ students were discriminated against within education systems (un human rights council, 2011, paras. 5861), and briefly canvassed the ways that some states had attempted to address such discrimination. under ‘examples of initiatives to counter homophobia and transphobia in educational institutions’, the report specifically recognised that, ‘in australia, the publicly funded safe schools coalition (www.safeschoolscoalitionvictoria.org.au) offers teacher training and learning materials’ (un human rights council, 2011, para. 77). the free & equal programme is a un initiative aimed at promoting respect for the rights of lgbtq+ people (un, n.d.). launched in july 2013, by the un high commissioner, un free & equal is a global campaign for equal rights and the fair treatment of lgbtq+ people everywhere. it is implemented in partnership with several other un agencies, including the united nations children’s fund (unicef) and the united nations educational, scientific and cultural organization (unesco), both of which play important roles in school-based hre. un free and equal recognises the vital role that hre plays in improving respect for the rights of lgbtq+. this is illustrated in the 2016 report to the hrc, entitled living free and equal, which recommended that states should be, establishing comprehensive national and school policies to prevent and address such [homophobic and transphobic] violence; ensuring that curricula and learning materials are inclusive; providing training and support to teachers and other staff; ensuring safe and inclusive school environments; providing access to objective, accurate information on sexual orientation, gender identity… (un, 2016, p. 28) p. gerber & p. i. lindner 11 in addition, the report noted that, it is important to tackle harmful stereotypes and attitudes through: the explicit inclusion of affirming messages about diversity and lgbt and intersex people in the national curriculum; the provision of adequate training to teachers and education sector staff; and monitoring levels of discrimination, including against lgbt and intersex students. (un, 2016, p. 69) thus, the un’s initiatives to improve respect for the rights of lgbtq+ people recognise the important role that hre plays in achieving equality and non-discrimination for sexual and gender minorities. in 2014, the hrc requested the un high commissioner to report on good practices and ways to overcome violence and discrimination against lgbtq+ people. the resultant report stated that, united nations agencies are increasingly integrating issues of sexual orientation and gender identity into their programmatic work, including in the areas of development, education, labour rights, child rights, gender equality, refugee protection, hiv and public health. (un human rights council, 2015, para. 7) once again, australia was identified as a country that was actively seeking to reduce discrimination within education, through the ‘expansion of anti-bullying programmes and other anti-discrimination measures in schools’ (un human rights council, 2015, para. 74). while not explicitly referenced in the 2015 report, the safe schools program was still running at the time, and it is likely that this was the programme referred to. the role that hre can play in improving respect for rights of lgbtq+ people has received increased attention since the 2016 appointment of the un independent expert for the protection against violence and discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity (independent expert) (narrain, 2020). the independent expert has made important observations regarding hre relating to sogi. for example, the first independent expert stated, we call on states to adopt and implement effective measures prohibiting violence, anti-discrimination laws covering gender identity and expression — real or perceived — as well as sexual orientation as prohibited grounds for discrimination, to develop inclusive curriculums and learning materials, training for and support to teachers and other school staff, education and support programmes for parents, safe and non-discriminatory access to bathrooms, and awareness-raising programmes nurturing respect and understanding for gender diversity. (muntarbhorn, 2017, para. 21) human rights education review volume 5(2) 12 the 2nd independent expert stated in 2018 that states needed to: (a) design and conduct public education campaigns, including on antibullying and sexual education; (b) formulate education policies addressing harmful social and cultural bias, misconceptions and prejudice. (madrigal-borloz, 2018, para. 97) the un’s efforts to promote hre are beginning to include the rights of lgbtq+ people, and the un’s efforts to increase respect for the rights of lgbtq+ people recognise the vital role that hre plays in achieving this goal. however, these efforts still tend to operate in parallel and would benefit from increased collaboration and cooperation between the different arms of the un that are separately working on hre and the rights of lgbtq+ people. hre in australia unlike most other liberal democracies, australia does not have a human rights bill. it has, however, ratified the crc and the icescr, which, as outlined above, both require state parties to provide hre. however, australia has not yet given domestic effect to these norms through the enactment of legislative mandates pertaining to hre. this has contributed to australia not fully complying with its international commitments relating to hre (gerber & pettitt, 2021). the un committee on the rights of the child (crc committee) (2001, para. 17) has recommended that state parties should formally incorporate hre into education policies and legislation at all levels. without such measures, the committee noted, it will be unlikely that hre will be incorporated into educational systems (2001, para. 17). australia’s failure to embed hre in legislation and education policies has contributed to the finding that: ‘[h]uman rights are not well understood by the australian community’ (national human rights consultation committee, 2009, p. 149). australia, as a federation – consisting of six states and two territories – also suffers from a lack of legislatively mandated hre at the state and territory levels. the victorian charter of human rights and responsibilities act 2006 (vic) is one of only three state or territory-based human rights acts (the two other jurisdictions with human rights acts being the act and queensland). section 41(d) of the victorian charter provides that the victorian equal opportunity and human rights commission (veohrc) has responsibility for education about human rights. however, this responsibility is misplaced, because the responsibility for curriculum and schools falls on the department of education, not the veohrc (gerber & pettitt, 2021). while there is a lack of legislative mandate, there are some policies that to some extent ameliorate this omission. for example, the 2008 melbourne declaration on education goals p. gerber & p. i. lindner 13 for young australians provides that education should be free from discrimination based on ‘gender’ and ‘sexual orientation’. however, this does not flow through to the declaration’s action plan, with the result that ‘the declaration’s reference to orientation is widely undiscovered’ (jones & hillier, 2012). further, this policy is about education not being provided in a discriminatory manner, rather than the provision of hre that is inclusive of diverse sogis. sogi-based hre pre marriage equality while hre is not legislatively mandated, human rights do appear, to a limited extent, in the australian national curriculum (australian curriculum, n.d.). for example, human rights are referred to within the general capabilities area of ‘ethical understanding’, and sexuality forms part of the learning area of ‘health and physical education’. this section outlines how the rights of lgbtq+ people were addressed within australian schools prior to marriage equality, by analysing both the national curriculum and the safe schools program. sogi-related hre in the national curriculum australia has a national school curriculum for foundation (a nationally consistent term for the year of schooling prior to year 1) to year 12. unfortunately, hre is only included to a limited degree in the national curriculum, and it largely remains up to the discretion of individual schools and teachers as to how to include it in the classroom (gerber & pettitt, 2021). hre has been incorporated into a variety of subject areas, including english, history and geography (gerber & pettitt, 2021). unfortunately, no hre specifically relating to the rights of lgbtq+ people is included in the curriculum. an example of how the curriculum addresses diverse sexual orientations and gender identities is in the health and physical education curriculum for years 7 and 8, where there is a reference to ‘investigating how changing feelings and attractions are part of developing sexual identities’ (health and physical education, n.d.). although the reference to identities in the plural suggests more than one sexual identity, no further elaboration on diverse sexual orientation and gender identities is provided. this is in stark contrast to the many references within the curriculum to diverse cultural identities. a 2010 national study on the sexual health and wellbeing of same-sex attracted and gender questioning young people found that heteronormativity dominates the curricula of australian schools (hillier et al., 2010). heteronormativity is the presentation of heterosexuality as the ‘norm’ of human sexuality. it reinforces and perpetuates homophobic oppression, reflecting wider societal attitudes to sexuality and gender diversity (rhodes, 2015). the follow-up 2021 national study found that, a large proportion of young people in this survey said that their education included human rights education review volume 5(2) 14 no mention of lgbtqa+ people in supportive or affirming ways, and this can foster a sense of invisibility or exclusion. (hill et al., 2021) rhodes (2015) argues that the lack of visibility of lgbtq+ identities in the national curriculum ‘oppresses and silences those who don’t conform to heterosexist ideals’. he further states that, within this context there is little room for the myriad expressions of sexuality beyond the biological and physical. the emotional, spiritual and lived experiences of lgbtqi people and the contributions they have made to society are nowhere to be found in the curriculum. (rhodes, 2015) there are several missed opportunities for sogi-related hre in the national curriculum. for example, history is a subject in which family histories and structures are studied in the foundation year and in years 1 and 6. while the changing nature of families in terms of their size and structure is discussed, and different types of families such as nuclear, single parent and blended families are noted, there is no reference to same-sex families. this reflects the notable absence of sogi-related hre in the australian national curriculum prior to marriage equality. a recent critical discourse analysis of the health and physical education component of the australian curriculum found that the latest version is an improvement on earlier iterations; however, it suffers from a lack of clarity. this lack of direction may cause teachers to experience confusion as to what to teach their students about diverse sogis within sexuality education (ezer et al., 2019). the safe schools program: filling the gap the safe schools program was initially developed in victoria in 2010, in response to an identified need by school communities, parents and teachers ‘for greater support for lgbti students, who are at higher risks of bullying and suicide, and to ensure that schools create safe and inclusive environments’ (victoria department of education and training, 2021). the programme’s function was ‘to ensure schools are safe places for all students, including lgbti students, and are free of discrimination’ (victoria department of education and training, 2021), and it played a role in filling the gap left by the absence of sogi-related hre in the national curriculum. building on the victorian programme, a national network of organisations – the safe schools coalition australia (ssca) – was developed to work with schools across australia, to create safer and more inclusive environments for lgbtq+ children, staff and families. this included raising awareness about the rights of lgbtq+ people (the safe schools coalition australia, n.d.). ssca received funding from the federal department of education and training between p. gerber & p. i. lindner 15 2014 and 2017. the nation-wide safe schools program assisted hundreds of schools across the country to promote respect, safety and inclusion, benefitting the whole school community. there were three components to the safe schools program: i. tailored professional learning: ssca offered professional development for teachers and school staff. training sessions could be adapted to the needs of the school and ranged from introductory sessions to in-depth training around complex issues (the safe schools coalition australia, n.d.). ii. guidance and consultation: ssca staff provided support to school leaders and teachers, including tailored advice on inclusive practices, assisting school staff to explore the school climate and make improvements to school policies to be more inclusive (the safe schools coalition australia, n.d.). iii. resources for school staff: ssca provided a range of resources for school staff to respond to homophobic/transphobic behaviour, and actively supported and included gender diversity, intersex and sexual diversity in school communities. ssca also produced ageappropriate teaching and learning resources aligned to the australian curriculum for use by schoolteachers, called ‘all of us’ (student wellbeing hub, n.d.). the guide linked to the health and physical education curriculum for years 7 and 8 on the topic of gender and sexual diversity. safe schools was an optional resource for schools and teachers: it did not form part of the school curriculum and was not mandatory. school principals and teachers exercised their professional judgement about accessing support and resources appropriate for their school (the safe schools coalition australia, n.d.). thus, while safe schools helped fill a significant gap in the national curriculum, it was only effective to the extent that individual schools were willing to adopt it. sogi-based hre post marriage equality somewhat counter-intuitively, the achievement of marriage equality was followed by a reduction in education regarding sogi-related issues and support for lgbtq+ students and families. this section examines how hre relating to sogi became politicised during the marriage equality postal survey and emerged as the new battlefield between conservative politicians and the religious right on one side, and the lgbtq+ community and their allies on the other. this section focuses on two strategies that saw sogi-based hre challenged and diminished, namely, (i) the campaign against the safe schools program that culminated in it being defunded; and (ii) the religious freedom bills, which, if passed, will potentially increase and legitimise human rights education review volume 5(2) 16 discrimination against lgbtq+ students and teachers within religious schools. together, these two measures have had a chilling effect on the extent to which lgbtq+ students feel included and respected in australian schools. a 2021 national study reported that approximately 60% of participants said that they had felt unsafe or uncomfortable in the previous 12 months at secondary school due to their sexuality or gender identity (hill et al., 2021, p. 52). the death of the safe schools program as already noted, there was no legal requirement for a postal survey to gauge public opinion on whether lgbtq+ people should have equal rights to marry. parliament had the power to achieve this reform by amending the marriage act 1961 (cth) to remove the definition of marriage as being exclusively between a man and a woman. although the postal survey was ultimately successful 7,817,247 people (61.6%) responded ‘yes’ and 4,873,987 people (38.4%) responded ‘no’ (australian bureau of statistics, 2017) – the process left a damaging legacy that is being seen in schools across the country. the ‘no’ campaign has been described as a ‘moral panic’ for the way in which it created a sense of anxiety around how allowing same-sex couples to marry would lead to changes in the curriculum that would threaten childhood innocence and disrupt societal values and morals. the particular focus of this moral panic was the safe school program (penovic, 2021). the narrative of fear around corrupting children was embraced and amplified by some elements of the media. for example, by february 2017, the australian newspaper had published nearly 200 adverse stories concerning the safe schools program (penovic, 2021, p. 324). the target audience for this campaign was parents. they were subjected to fear-mongering that focused on changes that would be made to their children’s education if same-sex couples were allowed to marry (see factrackers, 2017). the qr code below links to an example of the videos that the ‘no’ campaign ran about how marriage equality would purportedly lead to radical changes to the curriculum. the stated purpose of these videos is to ‘disabuse … viewers of the notion that there is no relationship between same-sex marriage and changes in the education system’ and to assert that children will be indoctrinated and exposed to ‘discussions of group sex, discussions of anal sex’. p. gerber & p. i. lindner 17 figure 1 a qr code below linking to one of the videos of the ‘no’ campaign on marriage equality. the views of opponents of marriage equality are largely informed by their religious beliefs. however, in a secular country like australia, arguments based on religious grounds are unlikely to be successful. therefore, opponents of marriage equality chose to frame their campaign as being about ‘family values and children’s rights’ (jones, 2015). a video produced by the coalition for marriage did not even mention marriage. rather, it begins by stating that ‘school programs have no place teaching my son about radical gender ideas’ and continues with another woman saying ‘how am i supposed to protect my kids in the future from this stuff.’ the final message is ‘say no to these radical sex and gender programs’ (same-sex marriage no campaign launches, 2017). thus, the postal survey gave those opposing equal rights for lgbtq+ people licence to disseminate fear about how education would change if marriage equality were achieved and gave legitimacy to these arguments on the basis that they were simply part of the national debate about community values (grattan, 2016). linking marriage equality to education made the safe schools program an easy target. parent groups began challenging the validity of the safe schools program, and even resorted to taking their children out of schools that voluntarily signed up to it in order to ‘protect’ their children from learning about sogi issues (see for example, kids rights, n.d.; you’re teaching our children what?, n.d.). politicians also spoke out against the safe schools program. for example, one nation party queensland leader steve dickson claimed that female students in grade 4 were ‘being taught by teachers how to masturbate, how to strap on dildos, how to do this sort of stuff’ (hamiltonsmith, 2017). however, a fact-checking report by the conversation, revealed that: ‘there is no discussion of the details of specific sex acts, sex aids or sexual health in safe schools resources’ (louden & rowe, 2017). in fact, the safe schools program was an optional resource human rights education review volume 5(2) 18 for schools and teachers, which helped school staff ‘create safer and more inclusive environments for lgbti students and families’ (louden & rowe, 2017). following vocal opposition to safe schools, the australian government announced an independent review of the resources provided to schools by the programme (louden, 2016). professor william louden (2016, pp. 2, 9) conducted the review into the ‘appropriateness and efficacy’ of the programme, and found that, • the resource ‘all of us’ is consistent with the aims of the program, is suitable, robust, age-appropriate, educationally sound and aligned with the australian curriculum. • the content of the four guidelines documents is consistent with the aims of the program, reducing homophobic and transphobic behaviour and intersex prejudice, and increasing support for same sex attracted, intersex and gender diverse students. • the language and content is suitable for the teachers, parents and senior students likely to read policy documents. notwithstanding these findings, the outspoken critics of safe schools were successful in persuading the federal government to cut all funding for the safe schools program (thompson, 2018). it is clear that campaign to stop marriage reform, which consumed the media and public for several years, created a climate of fear that ultimately led to the safe schools program becoming the proverbial ‘sacrificial lamb’ (rasmussen & leahy, 2018). the religious freedom bills much of the anti-marriage equality campaign focused on family values and children’s rights. however, as soon as the outcome of the postal survey was announced, opponents of marriage equality changed tack and started campaigning for legislation to protect their right to espouse their religiously informed views. on the face of it, this is a reasonable demand. australia has federal laws prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sex, race, age and disability, but not religion. an act prohibiting discrimination on the basis of religion would be a welcome addition to the non-discrimination legislative framework. however, opponents of marriage equality advocated for much more than a mere prohibition on discrimination based on religion; they sought to elevate religious expression above other human rights, allowing people to use their religion to discriminate against others, including lgbtq+ people. indeed, the draft legislation was described as giving australians ‘the right to be a bigot’ (ireland, 2020). p. gerber & p. i. lindner 19 before analysing the religious discrimination bills 2021, it is important to recognise the protection that religious schools already enjoy under existing anti-discrimination laws. the sex discrimination act 1984 (cth) prohibits discrimination on a number of grounds, including sogi. however, the act contains exemptions which allow certain entities to lawfully discriminate against a person, based on their sogi, in certain circumstances. section 38 provides that educational institutions established for religious purposes can lawfully discriminate against teachers and students on the basis of their sogi if it is done in ‘good faith in order to avoid injury to the religious susceptibilities of adherents of that religion or creed’. the effect of these exemptions is that religious schools are allowed to lawfully expel a student on the grounds of their sogi. after public criticism of this provision, prime minister scott morrison, in october 2018, promised that the discrimination law would be amended to make it clear that religious schools could not expel a student on the basis of their sexuality (karp, 2018). more than three years have passed since this promise was made, and no legislation protecting lgbtq+ students from being expelled from religious schools has been presented to parliament, let alone passed. in contrast, victoria has recently joined tasmania in removing religious exemptions from its anti-discrimination laws (the equal opportunity (religious exceptions) amendment bill 2021 (vic) was enacted in december 2021. tasmania has not had religious exemptions since 1997, anti-discrimination act 1998 (tas)). religious people and organisations are entitled to a ‘shield’ that protects them from being discriminated against because of their religion. the draft religious discrimination bills operated more as a ‘sword’ which people of faith could use to discriminate against others. it has been observed that, ‘if passed, [the bills] will entrench in law the idea that lgbtiq+ people are still not quite like everyone else – for this is the effect of state-sanctioned discrimination’ (poulos, 2021). in may 2022 an election saw the election of a new federal government. the labor government, led by anthony albanese has committed to better protected the rights of lgbtq+ people and the religious discrimination bills will not be pursued further. however, to some extent the damage has already been done. lgbtq+ students have become political fodder and can seemingly be subjected to persecution and discrimination with impunity. the suicide of 13-year-old schoolboy tyrone unsworth in brisbane, in november 2016, following homophobic bullying, provides ample evidence that australia needs to do much better in supporting and protecting lgbtq+ youth, and educating young people about the right of lgbtq+ people to live their lives in dignity and equality (lewis, 2017). human rights education review volume 5(2) 20 the way forward australian schools have become less inclusive and less safe for lgbtq+ people after the attainment of marriage equality. there is an urgent need for more, rather than less, sogibased hre. to achieve this, australia should follow unesco’s recommendations regarding a comprehensive education approach to combatting homophobic, biphobic and transphobic bullying. this requires the development of, (i) national policies or action plans; (ii) inclusive curricula and learning materials; (iii) training for educational staff; (iv) support for students and families; (v) partnerships with civil society organisations; and (vi) monitoring of discrimination and evaluating the executed measures (unesco, 2016). each of these elements is discussed below. national policies and action plans over 25 years ago the un ohchr published guidelines for national plans of action for human rights education (‘guidelines’) (1997). australia has yet to adopt a national plan of action for hre. this reveals the low priority that successive federal governments place on human rights generally, and hre in particular. the guidelines recommend that the first step towards developing a national plan of action for hre is to establish a national committee for hre. the australian council for human rights education (achre), was established in 1999 by a group of committed and dedicated volunteers to actively pursue human rights education in australia (australian council for human rights education, n.d.). the achre has organised several international hre conferences and run projects such as the ‘citizen for humanity project’. however, developing a national plan of action for hre in australia does not appear to be on its agenda. the absence of a national plan of action for hre in australia is a significant impediment to comprehensive hre that includes sogi issues. without such a national plan, australia cannot identify short, medium and long term priorities in hre, and the strategies and programmes needed for these priorities to be realised. inclusive curricula learning materials and curricula convey influential messages about ‘normality’, legitimacy and power (unesco, 2016). this makes the invisibility of diverse sogi perspectives within the australian national curriculum particularly problematic. the lack of representation of lgbtq+ people in schools has negative consequences for all students (iglyo, n.d.). for example, p. gerber & p. i. lindner 21 invisibility reinforces stereotypical views of sexuality and gender, and thus contributes to the incidences of homophobic, biphobic and transphobic bullying (unesco, 2012). conversely, the inclusion of lgbtq+ identities and realities within the school curricula has demonstrably positive impacts on the well-being of students (kosciw et al., 2013; taylor & peter, 2011). an inclusive curriculum that addresses the experiences of lgbtq+ people reduces prejudice and sogi-based bullying (kosciw et al., 2013; taylor & peter, 2011). inclusive and affirming curricula have the power to break down prejudices and improve respect for and the safety of lgbtq+ students, by conveying positive representations of lgbtq+ people, and explicitly affirming their equality in dignity and rights (snapp, et al., 2015). the lack of mandated sogi education within the national curriculum is one key barrier to addressing sogi issues within schools. in an australian study, a participant said that teachers get very nervous and find it difficult to deal with contentious issues, and that ‘unless they are embedded in the curriculum they will not be taught’ (burridge, 2013, p. 46). there is an urgent need for sogi-related hre to be embedded in the national curriculum. this requires removing heteronormative language and attitudes (unesco, 2012) and providing positive and nonstereotypical role models of people who identify as lgbtq+ in all subjects across the curriculum (o’higgins-norman et al., 2010). it is also important that the contributions of lgbtq+ people be incorporated across all areas of the curriculum with open reference to their sexual orientation and gender identity, thereby promoting positive role models (iglyo, 2018). there is no shortage of lgbtq+ role models in australia. students would benefit from learning about the contributions made across diverse disciplines by respected lgbtq+ public figures in australia. to name but a few, these include the first gay high court judge, michael kirby; the first lesbian high court judge, virginia bell; lgbtq+ politicians bob brown and penny wong; musicians peter allen and troye sivan; artists william dobell and jeffrey smart; sportspersons samantha stosur and josh cavallo; and trans model andreja pejić. in terms of how sogi-related hre should be provided, best practice suggests that it should be ‘embedded throughout the full curriculum or, at least, be mandatory for all students’ (iglyo, 2018). warwick and douglas (2001, p. 21) found that with an inclusive curriculum, teachers are more likely to address lgbtq+ issues and reach more students with consistent positive measures of inclusion and respect. the integration of lgbtq+ issues throughout the curriculum also demonstrates stronger institutional support for the rights of lgbtq+ people, which can help to foster support amongst teachers, students and parents (burdge et al., 2013). teacher training while teachers play a vital role in creating a safe atmosphere for all students, regardless of their sogi status, many of them lack the confidence and knowledge to discuss lgbtq+ issues human rights education review volume 5(2) 22 or support students who are lgbtq+ (iglyo, n.d.). teachers often ‘have misgivings about the perceived controversial nature of hre’ (struthers, 2016). this is multiplied many times over when the hre relates to lgbtq+ issues because teachers can be reticent about discussing diverse sexual orientations and gender identities, for fear of how this will be received by the school administration and parents (mitchell et al., 2014). teachers may feel ill-equipped to educate students about sexual and gender diversity (kitchen and bellini, 2012). for teachers to be able to provide hre regarding sogi issues, they must have the knowledge and skills to do so. therefore, ‘a national or regional training programme for teachers and other school staff on lgbtqi awareness and inclusion is essential’ (iglyo, n.d.). this could be incorporated into initial teaching training as well as ongoing professional development. support for students providing access to support programmes and resources for lgbtq+ students in relation to sogi issues is integral to fostering an inclusive and respectful school environment (snapp, 2015). in order to achieve this, links to relevant lgbtq+ youth services and groups should be established for signposting and referrals, and specific support for everyone affected by homophobic, biphobic, and transphobic violence should be provided (iglyo, n.d.). it is important the lgbtq+ students have access to support staff who understand their issues and are trained to respond accordingly (o’higgins-norman et al., 2010). these may be school counsellors or nurses, level coordinators or designated teachers. partnerships with civil society organisations partnerships between schools and civil society (specifically, ngos with an lgbtq+ youth focus), can be instrumental to fostering an lgbtq+-inclusive and respectful school environment. lgbtq+ ngos can assist with advice on bullying policies, ensuring curricula and teaching materials are lgbtq+-inclusive, and providing training and support to teachers in dealing with issues of sexual and gender diversity. monitoring of discrimination and evaluating executed measures in order to create lgbtq+-inclusive schools across australia, it is essential to know the nature, prevalence and impact of sogi-based violence within schools. thus, it is important to monitor homophobic, biphobic, and transphobic bullying (iglyo, n.d.). this can be achieved by recording incidences of bullying that are based on students’ (perceived or actual) sogi, so as to build up a record of the issue within each school (iglyo, n.d.). initiatives aimed at fostering an lgbtq+-inclusive school environment should also be monitored and evaluated so as to develop an evidence base and adapt measures according to this evidence (unesco, 2016). evaluation should be undertaken with the input of lgbtq+ p. gerber & p. i. lindner 23 young people and findings and recommendations from the evaluations be implemented (attawell, 2012). conclusion it was reasonable to anticipate that the attainment of marriage equality in australia would lead to increased education about diverse sogis and the rights of lgbtq+ people and ultimately culminate in a less heterocentric curriculum and school system. however, the opposite is true. achieving marriage equality sparked renewed efforts by the ‘no’ campaign to limit the rights of lgbtq+ people, using arguments of protecting children and religious freedom. this culminated in the defunding of the un-endorsed safe schools program. as a result, an essential protective and empowering platform, through which the rights of lgbtq+ people could be discussed, was removed, and lgbtq+ children became more vulnerable to bullying and other forms of discrimination. law reform on its own is not enough to protect the human rights of lgbtq+ people. legislative change must be accompanied by a multifaceted, holistic approach to eliminating discrimination that includes increased positive representation of sexual and gender diversity in education, films, the media and from religious leaders (gerber, 2018). marriage equality was an important step forward, but equally important is embedding education about the rights of lgbtq+ people in our national curriculum and ensuring that our young people learn about respecting diversity, in all its forms. the recent change of government does give some cause for cautious optimism. the new prime minister, anthony albanese said in his victory speech that he wants australia to be a country where ‘no matter where you live, who you worship, who you love or what your last name is, that places no restrictions on your journey in life’ (gerber, 2022). time will tell whether this change in government leads to a change in what is taught in schools and how safe lgbtq+ students feel. references attawell, k. 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(n.d.). http://youreteachingourchildrenwhat.org/safeschools-coalition/ https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/undoc/gen/g16/154/15/pdf/g1615415.pdf?openelement https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/undoc/gen/g16/154/15/pdf/g1615415.pdf?openelement https://ap.ohchr.org/documents/dpage_e.aspx?si=a/hrc/42/23 https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/vienna.aspx https://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/compilation/pages/guidelinesfornationalplansofactionforhumanrightseducation(1997).aspx https://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/compilation/pages/guidelinesfornationalplansofactionforhumanrightseducation(1997).aspx https://www.unfe.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/unfe-2020-annual-report.pdf https://www.unfe.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/unfe-2020-annual-report.pdf https://www.education.vic.gov.au/about/programs/pages/safeschools.aspx?redirect=2 https://www.education.vic.gov.au/about/programs/pages/safeschools.aspx?redirect=2 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-04-08/openly-gay-teacher-karen-pack-sacked-morling-college-email/100055422 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-04-08/openly-gay-teacher-karen-pack-sacked-morling-college-email/100055422 https://www.sbs.com.au/topics/pride/agenda/article/2016/08/12/definitive-timeline-lgbt-rights-australia https://www.sbs.com.au/topics/pride/agenda/article/2016/08/12/definitive-timeline-lgbt-rights-australia https://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/education/training/pages/programme.aspx http://youreteachingourchildrenwhat.org/safe-schools-coalition/ http://youreteachingourchildrenwhat.org/safe-schools-coalition/ educating children about sexual orientation and gender identity post-marriage equality in australia abstract keywords introduction international human rights law relating to hre international human rights law relating to lgbtq+ people hre in australia sogi-based hre pre marriage equality sogi-related hre in the national curriculum the safe schools program: filling the gap sogi-based hre post marriage equality the death of the safe schools program the religious freedom bills the way forward national policies and action plans inclusive curricula teacher training support for students partnerships with civil society organisations monitoring of discrimination and evaluating executed measures conclusion references