Microsoft Word - 26-124-1-SM.doc TO CITE THIS ARTICLE PLEASE INCLUDE ALL OF THE FOLLOWING DETAILS: Sünker, Heinz (2006) Democratic education: educating for democracy. Transnational Curriculum Inquiry 3 (2) http://nitinat.library.ubc.ca/ojs/index.php/tci Democratic education: educating for democracy A keynote address presented to the triennial meeting of the International Association for the Advancement of Curriculum Studies, May 22, 2006, Tampere, Finland. Heinz Sünker University of Wuppertal, Germany Abstract Against the background of the devastating experiences of the short twentieth century (Hobsbawm) and its human consequences the question of real democratic education for a real democratic society is once again on the intellectual and practical agenda. The contribution inquires in a first step about the appropriateness of social analysis and the contemporary adequacy of critical theory for the work of (re-)conceptualizing democratic education. The main focus, therefore, is the relevance of Adorno’s proposals for a democratic education, first appearing in his article “Education after Auschwitz”. There, he says one of the education’s primary objectives should be to ensure that Auschwitz should never be repeated. Auschwitz is a symbol signifying the decline of western civilization. This work Adorno’s helps us to understand other primary relationships among social conditions, political culture, ethics and education, all of which are extremely important in establishing a democratic everyday life, including educational institutions and sites. In a next step the debate between Adorno and Gehlen – his conservative counterpart – is summarized as a major example of the critical and conservative positions in the field of education and society with respect to the questions of concepts of reason, of agency, autonomy, and personal responsibility. In this context, the question of the conditions for the constitution of subjectivity is most pertinent for our further discussions. As Adorno says in this respect, democracy must take hold in such a way that people internalize it and make it their own, i.e., they understand themselves as subjects of dynamic democratic political processes and as active participants in political, i.e., public life. As Castells puts it in the end of his third volume of “The Information Age”: To overcome the gap between technological overdevelopment and social underdevelopment – which is threatening the survival of our planet – we need only responsible governments but an educated responsible society. What is must be changeable if it is not to be all. (Theo. W. Adorno, Negative Dialectics) 1. Under the conditions of neo-liberal regulation strategies, in late capitalism there is an attempt to enforce homogenization processes in the form of globalization that scorn the official deregulation policy as well as the dispersed difference thinking. For what goes by the official name of deregulation policy by all means also in the form of various strategies of social policy on a world scale is really nothing more than an attempt to enforce global social relations that follow unrestrained market logics, or profit orientation, and the turning of potential citizens into customers. This is in the interests of securing power in the context of Heinz Sünker: Democratic education: educating for democracy Transnational Curriculum Inquiry 3 (2) 2006 http://nitinat.library.ubc.ca/ojs/index.php/tci 17 hegemonic disputes (cf. for example Altvater/Mahnkopf, 1996; Todd, 1999; Stiglitz, 2002; Jessop, 2002).1 What C. Boggs (2000) subtitles as “Corporate Power and the Decline of the Public Sphere” behaves complementary to this and conveys the national as well as international standard. Bringing together classical social analytical topics such as capitalism, politics, democracy, political conscience and political involvement, with reference to today’s US American reality but by all means able to be generalized, to a historically concrete relationship, he reaches a devastating conclusion about the state and perspective of democratisation in his study that is titled “End of Politics”. In particular he points out against those who (still) opt for the “taming” or “civilising” of capitalism, the support of democracy in the form of “civil society”, as an result of empirical research: “The reality is that civil society, with the end of the cold war, has come to embrace a turn toward privatisation, toward a neo-liberal emphasis on market capitalism that is fully compatible with the growth of corporate colonisation and economic globalisation” (2000, p. 276). This is an extension of the understanding that earlier lead Bowles/Gintis (1987, p.3; cf. Meiksins Wood 1995) to the conclusion that no capitalist society nowadays is able to be properly seen as democratic because this must go hand in hand with the securing of personal freedom and socially responsible and made responsible dealing with power. When looking at ‘politics’ and its constitutional conditions, in the USA and elsewhere, this basic deficiency has not only not been remedied, rather it even gained strength after the collapse of the state capitalist systems of Central and Eastern Europe. This leads Chossudovsky - in his study “The Globalisation of Poverty. Impacts of IMF and World Bank Reforms” - (2002, p. 310) to the challenging conclusion: “Marked by conflicts of interest and as a consequence of its ambivalent relationship towards private economical and financial interests, the state system in the West is experiencing a crisis. Under these conditions parliamentary democracy has become a mere ritual. There are no alternatives available for the voters. Neo-liberalism has become an integral part of the political program of all the great political parties. Like in a one party state election outcomes today have practically no effect on the actual path of state economic and social politics”.2 The decline of ‘politics’ and ‘democracy’, which seems to be even more advanced in the USA in light of the rule of the ‘thief in the president’s position’ (Kellner, 2001) - and is connected with many crimes (Mandel, 2004) -, has been a deciding qualitative problem of the topics “democratic education”, “achieving democracy” , “education for democracy” and its mediation with the background of social relations for both political structures and political conscience. The obvious enforcing and strengthening of an oligarchic rule in today’s class structured capitalist societies, the colonisation of the every day life of adults and children through consumerism (classically: Lefebvre, 1972; Marcuse, 1987), the oppression of potential alternatives (Berman, 2000; Steinberg/Kincheloe, 1997), the colonisation of the conscience of those ruled by indoctrination, manipulation and disinformation (Chomsky, 2000, p. 173 onwards; 2001, p. 99 onwards), the myth of the classless society; all this has always belonged to the known inventory in hegemonic struggles.3 Against a reductionist judgement of the situation one could and can maintain, owing to the importance of the differentiation of strategies and institutions, “Even with the necessary criticisms of the unequal power relations surrounding education and the larger society, we need to remember that schooling was never simply an imposition on supposedly culturally/politically inept people. Rather, educational practices were and are the result of struggles and compromises over what should count as legitimate knowledge, pedagogy, goals and criteria for determining effectiveness” (Carlson/Apple, 1998, p.11). The involved problems of forming opinions and judgement as a basis for ‘political ability’ are also referred to by Bourdieu’s views when he confirms that it is valid to recognise the contradiction that Heinz Sünker: Democratic education: educating for democracy Transnational Curriculum Inquiry 3 (2) 2006 http://nitinat.library.ubc.ca/ojs/index.php/tci 18 exists in the fact that everyone “is granted an equal right to personal opinion, but not everyone is given the means by which to carry out this formal, universal right” (Bourdieu, 2001, p. 89; cf. Boudieu, 1984, p. 639, 686 onwards ). First of all the task of “reformulating the concept of democracy” comes into view with its differently formulated attributes, but pointing in the identical direction (Hirsch, 1995, p. 198, cf. p. 187), or the clarification of the question of possibilities for a “rediscovery of politics”, as Boggs (2000, p. 278) calls it, as a base for hopes for processes of “re-politicisation”: “Political renewal depends on recovery of precisely those concerns that a depoliticised society so thoroughly devalues, namely, collective consumption, social planning, citizen involvement, and the imposition of public controls over capital”.4 This shows very clearly the challenges and tasks in dealing with our topic: mediating a concept of democracy with concepts of autonomy and self-determination, and therefore making use of the German concept of ‘Bildung’.5 With this conceptualisation the necessity to account for the fundaments and content of ‘participation’ is linked in the context of theory and practice of democracy in a way that is appropriate for the present. Pateman remarked here: “Davis (1964) has said that the ‘classical theory (i.e. the theory of participatory democracy) had an ambitious purpose, ‘the education of an entire people to the point where their intellectual, emotional and moral capacities have reached their full potential and they are joined, freely and actively in a genuine community’, and that the strategy for reaching this end is through the use of ‘political activity and government for the purpose of public education’. However, he goes on to say that the ‘unfinished business’ of democratic theory is ‘the elaboration of plans of action and specific prescriptions which offer hope of progress towards a genuinely democratic polity’ (pp. 40 and 41). It is exactly this last that can be found in the theories of the writers on participatory democracy; a set of specific prescriptions and plans of action necessary for the attainment of political democracy. This does take place through ‘public education’ but the latter depends on participation in many spheres of society on ‘political activity’ in a very wide sense of the term” (1970, p.21; cf. Széll, 1988). Especially as education and politics are part of the bulwark of bourgeois society, one must remember on the other hand that, spoken by the Marx of Grundrisse, “the great historical side of capital” or “the great civilising influence of capital” (Marx no date: p. 313; cf. Berman, 1988, p. 90 onwards) has, to a great extent, fallen down in these areas, although within systematic borders that, as in the beginnings of the history of education (Heydorn, 1979) clearly let the opposite to partial, utilisable talent and to the overlapping freedom orientated perspective of education emerge. In light of the possibilities of generalising education today, which are particularly based on historical/social developments as well as changes in the labour process (cf. Heydorn, 1980, p. 290), in the interests of securing humanity and the ability to survive (cf. Bloch, 1959: chapter 55) at least essential elements of the debate about ‘education’ and ‘democracy’ are portrayed as renewable.6 2. Here Adorno’s thoughts on a “democratic education theory” (Adorno, 1998b) are given fundamental importance and are to be linked to his formulated starting point in his text “Education after Auschwitz”: “The premier demand upon all education is that Auschwitz not happen again” (Adorno, 1998a, p. 191; see also 1973, p. 361 onwards). Adorno’s concept suggestion and postulate could assume the function of a clamp because through them relationship regulations become possible in the context of social constitution, political culture and education processes, which are fundamental for our topic. Heinz Sünker: Democratic education: educating for democracy Transnational Curriculum Inquiry 3 (2) 2006 http://nitinat.library.ubc.ca/ojs/index.php/tci 19 Against the background of the often devastating experiences of our century - especially with respect to the German experiences - it may seem bold to deal in a text with Democracy, Education, and Ethics in the Post-Auschwitz World, i.e., asking for a democratic pedgagogy and democratic education today. So I would like to declare at the outset that my concern here is simply to recall a number of ideas from the history and present of the discipline of pedagogy, from the tradition of democratic ideas, if possible to rethink them - with a social-theoretical and social policy interest - and to examine their consequences for a democratic education. The focus of my deliberations are – as I said - Adorno's (1903-69) thoughts on democratic pedagogy (Adorno, 1998b) and the starting point of his very famous text Erziehung nach Auschwitz (Education after Auschwitz). This shows: Auschwitz is the salient sign of the decline of civilization. Adorno's categories and postulate can serve as a focal point because they enable understanding of the relationships between social conditions, political culture, ethics and educational processes which are decisive for our topic. We can see what is most significant about the relationship between political culture, democratic politics and subjectivity in the radio debate, which has since become famous, between Theodor W. Adorno, the outstanding intellectual in post-fascist Germany, and Arnold Gehlen, his counterpart - a conservative 'mandarin', on 3 February 1965: Gehlen Yes, the child, who hides behind the mother's skirt, it has both anxiety and the minimum or optimum of security that the situation produces. Mr. Adorno, you of course again see here the problem of autonomy. Do you really believe that we should expect everyone to bear this burden of a concern with principles, with excessive reflection, with the on-going after-effects of the confusions of life, because we have sought to swim free? That is what I would very much like to know.7 Adorno To that I can very simply say: Yes! I have a conception of objective happiness and objective despair, and I would say that as long as we unburden people [with authoritarian institutions, H.S.] and do not grant them full responsibility and self-determination, so long too will their well-being and their happiness in this world be a sham. And a sham which will one day burst. And when it bursts, it will have terrible consequences. (Grenz, 1974, p. 294f.) The core of this dispute is the meaning of maturity and responsibility.8 Adorno responded to Gehlen's statement with the remark, I mean, the need which drives people to this unburdening is precisely the burden imposed by institutions, that is, the world's agencies which stand outside and over them. It is thus to a certain extent so: first they are chased out, sent out by the mother, into the cold, and are under terrible pressure; and then, afterwards, they flee into the lap of precisely the same mother, namely society, which chased them out. In the context of his view of the conditions of the constitution of subjectivity and its (in)capacity for action, he is here clearly speaking of the relation between autonomy – self-determination - accountability.9 This triad can be illuminated by an exploration of both individual and social history. In defending Adorno's position, intellectuals are the keepers of political culture in a democratic tradition and meaning (cf. Sünker, 1994). This means that, against the (neo-) Aristotelian tradition – which is concerned with ‘elites’ -, not only a few people are able to reflect, to carry the burden of reflection and responsibility, but all are able to do so. It includes, today, the task to (re-)construct the public and, therefore, the political culture in a participatory model. Within this approach, 'the public sentiment which is encouraged is not reconciliation and harmony, but rather political agency and efficacy, namely the sense that we have a say in the economic, political and civic arrangements which define our lives together, and that what one Heinz Sünker: Democratic education: educating for democracy Transnational Curriculum Inquiry 3 (2) 2006 http://nitinat.library.ubc.ca/ojs/index.php/tci 20 does makes a difference' (Benhabib, 1989, p. 389). This is the basic assumption to defend concepts of resistance. Reflections on historical experience, which contains more than any gathering of knowledge, can lead to a socio-historical consciousness accompanied by a capacity for judgement which provides a capacity for action. Thus it can help serve this democratic, participatory goal. Education - precisely in the ways it differs from 'knowledge' - has to derive its present from the past, to make history the content of educational processes (Benjamin, 1969; Flacks, 1988; Wehler, 1988). For a democratic pedagogy this means, inter alia: learning from the history of this country or its regions, and - in my case - the history of German political culture. This requires, firstly, engaging with the question 'What does it mean to deal with the past?' (Adorno, 1998b). And, secondly, posing the question, what form can be taken by an alternative to domination in individual action and social structures in democratic social conditions and an accompanying political culture in Europe – and beyond. In view of the frequently unsuccessful engagement, dominated by political majorities, with recent German history, and the accompanying consequences for the quality of political culture in Germany up to the present day (Mitscherlich and Mitscherlich, 1967; Brunkhorst, 1987; Stern, 1991), for the moment we can only say that this question, as a question for everyone interested in a substantial democratization of all areas of life, must stay on the agenda. The second question which follows from this is related to a problem which is decisive for the future of a European society: that which currently appears as right-extremism and hostility to foreigners, as well as a re-activation of politically motivated violence in this society, and in its adoption by a majority of the dominant political class exposes the latter, relates to traditions in the European and German history and the history of the political culture which many overwhelmingly believed in (Lepsius, 1988).10 In this situation it becomes clear that the question of democracy once again reappears on the agenda. Adorno maintained that the delay in German democracy also resulted in crucial problems in the way the past was dealt with: “But democracy has not become naturalized to the point where people truly experience it as their own and see themselves as subjects of the political process”. This is why, continued Adorno, democracy was evaluated according to the success or failure it brought with it (Adorno, 1998b, p. 93). Speaking about the necessity of “a return to the subject,” Adorno put forward his thesis that education only makes any sense as critical self-reflection. And he concluded: “The single genuine power standing against the principle of Auschwitz is autonomy, if I might use the Kantian expression: the power of reflection, of self-determination, of not-cooperating (Adorno, 1998a, pp. 195). This indicates the relationship between a democratic education and an education for democracy with which we should engage. An initial formulation of this foundational question can be found in classical pedagogic conceptions, as they appeared in the reflective and wide-ranging early bourgeois theoretical debates. At the end of the eighteenth century Kant (1724-1804), in his lecture 'Über Pädagogik' (On Pedagogy), wrote perhaps education constantly improves, and every successive generation takes another step towards the full realization of humanity; for behind education lies the great secret of the realization of human nature (Kant, 1964, p. 700). He also tied this to a positive anthropology which placed social conditions, and thus the social conditionality of humans, in the foreground: “Good education is precisely that which produces everything that is good in the world. The seeds which lie within people must be constantly developed. For the basis of evil cannot be found in the natural constitution of people. The only cause of evil is that nature is not brought under control. People contain only the seeds of good” (Kant, 1964, p. 704f.). lf, as Kant stresses, education constituted the most Heinz Sünker: Democratic education: educating for democracy Transnational Curriculum Inquiry 3 (2) 2006 http://nitinat.library.ubc.ca/ojs/index.php/tci 21 important and difficult question posed to humanity, it thus also led to this requirement: “Children must be raised not towards the current, but the future possibly improved state of the human race, that is, the idea of humanity, and everything appropriate to its destiny. This principle is of great importance. Parents generally raise their children only so that they fit into the existing world, even though it may be ruined. They should, however, better raise them so that a future, better state is brought about” (Kant, 1964, p. 704).11 In the first third of the nineteenth century Schleiermacher (1768-1834) - one of the discipline's founding fathers - also in a lecture titled 'Über Pädagogik' said that education should be based on the intergenerational relationship, from which derives the task that the younger generation should be delivered to the main communities in which they have to become self-sufficiently active (Schleiermacher, 1983, p. 94). Because he was concerned with the category fundamental to the educational relationship, the future - thus the capacity for construction - he binds the perspective of the socially-based action of the rising generation to the dual task of conservation and change. At the same time this premise leads him to a crucial principle concerning the relationship between pedagogy and politics: Both theories, pedagogy and politics, strive towards what is most complete; both are ethical disciplines and require the same treatment. Politics will not reach its goal if pedagogy is not an integral part of it, or if a similarly developed discipline does not stand beside it. The more communal life within the state is practically disrupted - theoretically seen, misunderstood - the less it is possible for a correct approach to exist in relation to the influence of the older generation on the younger (Schleiermacher, 1983, p. 12; cf. Mollenhauer, 1980, p. 103). 3. The positions of Kant and Schleiermacher constitute a critique of the instrumentalization of people - foundational for all approaches to a criticial theory of society - to which Adorno's frosty conclusion, which in a certain sense describes a final stage in social relations, relates in a complementary way.12 This leads us to the task of examining social relations in their consequences for the relations between individuals and society. For the present this means to deal with the contradictory results of the capitalist framework of societalization for people, to dissect their conditions of existence. The relations between society and individual are constituted by a contradiction between a production and a destruction of the social, of sociality, which can be understood as a result of the capitalist framework of societalization, as inherent to it from the outset (Bowles and Gintis, 1987; Berman, 1988). This contradiction can be seen as both a general and a particular social problem, because it is generation-specific, too. What is interesting here in terms of ethics, education and pedagogy is that when one takes up this contradiction between the production and destruction of sociality, one can speak of a caesura or break in the development of the social potential for both control and communication. This finding is relevant within the framework of educational and pedagogic reflections if one poses the question, firstly, of possible determinations of the relationship between education and society13, and secondly of the consequences for possible foundations and practices of democratic education. What is of interest here is, of course, the question of the possibilities of a development of communicative potential within and opposed to social contexts which cannot free themselves of their hegemonic form. The issue then becomes one of the analysis of societalization and individualization, of democratic theory and its 'praxis' in the form of political culture, of the question of the constitutive conditions of subjectivity as a basis for the development of self-sufficient life orientations, and finally of a theory of educational processes, the Heinz Sünker: Democratic education: educating for democracy Transnational Curriculum Inquiry 3 (2) 2006 http://nitinat.library.ubc.ca/ojs/index.php/tci 22 social-theoretical and sociopolitical challenge which still lies in the classical conception of every individual's capacity for education and reason.14 This task becomes relevant precisely when one acknowledges Theunissen's comment, his reflection on social reality, that autonomy is complicated or even hindered, undermined to the same degree that the social deformation of individuals increases (Theunissen, 1989, p. 86). For in connection with classical and still contemporary positions, which precisely in this way indicate their modernity, it is important to pose the problem of a contract based on the principle of communalization (Theunissen, 1989, p. 87) and thus the construction and principles of a relational reason (Geyer-Ryan and Lethen, 1987, p. 68). It seems to me to be crucial to establish a mediation between what Benjamin brought forward on the basis of his conception of the relevance of mutual recognition for processes of identity formation, that there is a coercion-free sphere of human agreement which is completely inaccessible to domination: the actual sphere of agreement, speech (Benjamin, 1966, p. 55), and the problem, how power can be criticized from a perspective which appears to profit from and out of it. The question is how reason in itself can establish that murder is worse than non-murder, if it is to one's advantage. In the light of a relational reason, murder becomes suicide, this is already the response of the Odyssey (Geyer-Ryan and Lethen, 1987, p. 69). The systematic significance of these positions for the constitution of subjectivity and its consequences, is whether the issue is still the difference between a construction of knowledge which remains external to the individual, and the development of the individual themselves in constellations of educational processes (Sünker, 1989), so that it can become clear how education, enlightenment and experience are interwoven with each other. The thesis put forward by Adorno, quoted and discussed earlier, that people must experience democracy as their own affair, understand themselves as the actors in political processes, is complementary to the task of taking this up and spelling it out for institutionally-formed educational processes.15 Opposed to one-dimensional, linear interpretations of the working possibilities in the institution of the school, we must insist that the contradiction contained within the dialectic of the institutionalization of education, between education and domination (Heydorn, 1979), indicates that the institution of the school in its diversely-determined structures, dimensions, levels of action encompasses possibilities for the promotion of emancipation and autonomy for all who work in these institutions. This raises the question, firstly of professionalization, the self-understanding of pupils and the consequences contained therein for praxis, that is, the initiation or promotion of educational processes.16 Secondly that of the relationship between the individual being educated and the inner structures of educational processes and their objects (cf. Holzkamp, 1993; Tomasello, 1999; Kincheloe/Steinberg/Hinchey 1999). This requires a pedagogy of recognition which, as Heydorn - taking up the Socratic maieutic - made clear in his emphasis on the significance of the ‘other’ in educational processes (Heydorn, 1979), lies in the promotion of the formation of subjectivity – on the basis of intersubjectivity (cf. Sünker, 1989). This demands at the same time the conceptualisation of the relationship between democratic education and the education of democracy in the context of a social formation that recognises ‘problems of justice’ to be a political problem and approaches solutions analytically and practically. A main line of this positioning, that overlaps the relationship of the individual and society and defines it as political, can be found in the Marxist problem with which both the problem of identity and difference between normality and normativity becomes a central theme as a ‘question of measure’ in order to evaluate historically concrete relations: “Here the old view where people, in whatever narrow minded national, religious or political determination they appear to be as the purpose of production, seems to be very raised above the modern world, where production seems to be the purpose of human beings and wealth appears to be the purpose of production. Heinz Sünker: Democratic education: educating for democracy Transnational Curriculum Inquiry 3 (2) 2006 http://nitinat.library.ubc.ca/ojs/index.php/tci 23 In fact, however, when the narrow minded bourgeois form is stripped away, how is wealth different to the universality, produced by universal exchange, of needs, abilities, pleasures, productive powers etc. of individuals? The complete development of human control over the powers of nature, that of so-called nature as well as one’s own nature? The absolute exhaustion of one’s creative resources with no other requirement than that of past historical development, that makes this totality of development, that is to say, of the development of all human power as such, not measured by a given scale, an end in itself? Where one does not reproduce oneself with certainty, rather produces one’s totality? Does not try to remain an achievement, rather exists in the absolute movement of becoming?” (Marx no date, p. 387, remark H.S). To remove from pedagogical processes - as far as is possible in society and history - the existing formation of subject and object also means making it possible for the rising generation to live and experience democracy in everyday life and in institutions such as family, school, work (Bowles and Gintis, 1987, pp. 204, 208). This holds fast to the possibilities for dealing with individuals and associations of individuals - against the pedagogization of socially produced problems within social relations, that is within social relations of power. This understanding certainly depends on a culture of hope (Benjamin, 1966), an ideal of education, as Kant formulated it; but it also refers to the necessity of building up new social movements to confront the experiences of domination in the various areas of life with experiences and life-forms orientated towards mutual understanding.17 18 In the interests of defending or supporting democracy this perspective gains in importance when one socially theoretically and socially politically assumes a finding for the present social situation and its processing, as Vester et al. (2001, p. 103) depicted in their study “Social milieus in social structural change”: “According to theories by Giddens and Beck it is not the milieus that are in decline today. The class cultures of every day life are to a greater extent extraordinarily stable particularly because of their ability to be altered and differentiated. What collapses to a certain degree are the hegemonies of certain parties (and fractions of intellectuals) over the followers in ideological positions. Therefore we do not have today a crisis of milieus (as a result of the change in values), rather a crisis of political representation (as a result of a growing distance between the elite and the milieu)”. Dangerous for civilising progress it is therefore today a mixture that consists of this crisis of representation, which can partly be said for Continental Europe in the sinking quotas of election participation in the “annoyance” at parties, but not at politics, and problems of the state’s ability to take action that can reach the “powerlessness of politics in industrial societies” (Jänicke, 1986). In this situation we face the ‘depoliticisation’ of politics by dominating powers. But in the interest of the survival of our planet we should be interested in what Castell calls ”a responsible, educated society” (1998, p. 353; cf. Flacks, 1988, p. 68 onwards), i.e. a society based on the reflexivity and competencies of educated citizens (citoyens) who are interested in public discourse on public issues and democracy.19 Therefore principles of universalization and reciprocity are on the agenda. As Heller (1984) concluded the perspective is 'To create a society in which alienation is a thing of the past: a society in which every man has access to the social "gifts of fortune" which can enable him to lead a meaningful life . . . True "history" is pregnant with conflict and continually transcending its own given state. It is history - consciously chosen by men and moulded to their design - that can enable all men to make their everyday lives "being-for-them" and that will make the earth a true home for all men' (1984, p. 269). This shows again the necessity to discuss the problem of regulating the social in a reasonable way – especially in a time when the “extraordinary gap between our technological overdevelopment and our social underdevelopment” (Castells, 1998, p. 359) is threatening Heinz Sünker: Democratic education: educating for democracy Transnational Curriculum Inquiry 3 (2) 2006 http://nitinat.library.ubc.ca/ojs/index.php/tci 24 comparable to the situations in the first half of the twentieth century. Therefore we have to bring the topic “democratic education – education for democracy” to bring to the fore. Thereby once again in a new form the task of reformulating the relation of education and democracy comes to light, whose practical formation depends on the interests and competences of educated citizens whose ‘educated’ and ‘stubborn’ (therefore different yet able to be generalised) “capacity for expression and to distinguish” (Negt/Kluge, 1993, p. 289) forms the basis for the mediation of the power of judgement and reasoning that is historically socially necessary in general as well as in particular interest. This perspective is strongly connected with the political project of the “abolition of all education restriction” (Heydorn, 1994/95, IV, p. 138). Here one must adhere to the fact that a) “Education is no independent revolutionary movement, not even indirectly, it can only be so in connection with the entire historical movement” (IV, p. 62), but it b) is essentially about realising that education “makes its own unchanged contribution which is irreplaceable. This contribution must not be withdrawn from the institution; it cannot be made in the same way in any other place” (IV, p. 141). A real democratization of our societies has to be seen as a problem of our planet’s ability to survive. We have to perceive it as a task for various policies tied to the power of judgement and competence of action of all citizens.20 The demand for education for everyone remains in this context on the agenda as a central challenge for the real existing social inequalities and overcoming it in a democratic way. Another, a human, world is possible. Notes 1 Duchrow’s view (1997, p. 102 ) refers to the fact that it concerns here by all means a conscious struggle for power, above all from the side of the often violent possessors of power: “Correspondingly in secret documents it is also demanded that in this conflict about the ownership of and sharing out of powers that try to alter the status quo, one must fight ‘on all levels of power’, namely military, political, economical and socio-psychological. The interesting thing is, however, that in 1987 secret services and Supreme Commanders of the North and Latin American Armed Forces present at the conference in which the documents were presented seemed to be quite stable and superior in military, political and economic matters. Most of their attention is aimed towards what they call the ‘socio-psychological’ or cultural level of power, people’s ‘hearts and thoughts’. Practically this means for them that the main struggle against the ‘international communist movement’ henceforth must be introduced to churches, schools, universities and, above all, to the media. Correspondingly the main opponents become: the basis church, release theology and human rights’ groups as well as solidarity networks like Amnesty International and development organizations like ‘Brot für die Welt’, who work with the poor. The head of the Philippine security authorities once expressed his broad view of the enemy at a torture trial of Edicio de la Torre, a release theologian with the sentence: ‘We are suspicious those who do good deeds and do not get rich’. Social movements are defamed through disinformation campaigns; their activists are disabled or even murdered by death commands like the Jesuits in El Salvador or, at the moment, in the hottest war of low intensity in South Africa. Of course this strategy includes the old methods of equipment and of military and death squadron training that pose as representatives of the USA, as well as economical destabilization programs. Nicaragua and El Salvador as well as other Central American countries are the best known examples of recent history”. This view makes clear how different power strategies can be used, whereby the first “area” of the shaping of power refers to the fact that Foucault has obviously been received even in these circles. 2 Here one may refer to German discussions that have been placed under the heading of “the transformation of democracy” (Agnoli/Brückner, 1968), “parliamentary ritual and political alternatives” (Roth, 1980) or “the failure of the state” (Jänicke, 1986). 3 The emphasis on the importance of competence for regulating social relationships by means of subjects makes it even more clear how important it is to break down the basis for opposite action, which Siemsen (1948, p. 5) labeled “the blind subjection to a state leadership, a party or a fuehrer”. Heinz Sünker: Democratic education: educating for democracy Transnational Curriculum Inquiry 3 (2) 2006 http://nitinat.library.ubc.ca/ojs/index.php/tci 25 The analysis of media politics, media culture and the control of behavior by the media also belong to this context (cf. Kellner, 1995) 4 In this context confer with Meiksins Wood (1995, p. 290f.): “I have suggested throughout this book that the capitalist market is a political as well as an economic space, a terrain not simply of freedom and choice but of domination and coercion. I now want to suggest that democracy needs to be reconceived not simply as a political category but as an economic one. What I mean is not simply ‘economic democracy’ as a greater equality of distribution. I have in mind democracy as an economic regulator, the driving mechanism of the economy. Here Marx’s free association of direct producers (which does not, even in Marx’s terms, include only manual workers or people directly involved in material production) is a good place to start. It stands to reason that the likeliest place to begin the search for a new economic mechanism is at the very base of the economy, in the organization of labour itself. But the issue is not simply the internal organisation of enterprises; and even the reappropriation of the means of production by the producers, while a necessary condition, would not be sufficient, as long as possession remains market dependent and subject to the old imperatives. The freedom of the free association implies not only democratic organisation but emancipation from ‘economic’ coercions of this kind”. 5 The German language allows to distinct between “Erziehung” (education 1) and “Bildung” (education 2). While education 1 is aiming at affirmation, accomodation, conformity, education 2 is aiming at maturity and responsibility, reflexivity, social judgement, aesthetics, human development without forgetting society – or better: processes of societalization (cf. for a conceptual analysis Sünker, 1997). 6 Here the deciding factor is to keep an eye on how fundamentalism and perspective are determined by processes of change; cf. Bloch’s thoughts on this: “Change is possible in the false meaning to a great extent; the Huns also caused change, there is also change through Caesar mania, through anarchy, even through the mental illness of blather, which Hegel calls a ‘perfect picture of chaos’. But dignified change, even that of the Kingdom of Freedom only occurs through dignified understanding; with more and more precisely controlled necessity” (1959, p. 326). 7 With these ‘nice’ words Mr. Gehlen is trying to hide his collaboration with National Socialists. 8 See with respect to Adorno’s approach and concept of “Mündigkeit”, translated as “maturity and responsibility” French/Thomas (1999). 9 See for a mediation of concepts of autonomy, modernity and democracy Arnason (1990). 10 An initial thread to this discussion is today the theme ‘Youth and Violence’, which reveals this in its various facets and brings forwards very diverse findings in relation to the question of the conditions (Otto and Merten, 1993, Heitmeyer, Möller and Sünker, 1992). A second thread relates to the theme 'The 68ers and Youth Violence Today' and value education, in which the thesis itself is not very interesting, but rather the question of the role which can be played in hegemonic struggles by such a nonsensical proposition such as the responsibility of the 68ers for today's youth violence. Otherwise it seems to me to be worth referring to a conception of the problem of education similar to that of S. Bernfeld (1892-1953) over seventy years ago: „The educative role of the family is now everywhere in question, and the old pedagogical remedies on which our grandparents still relied have ceased to be effective, or at least have lost most of their authority. With regard to moral and social questions, a general insecurity prevails, robbing parents of the courage to enforce their will and lay down the law. Beset by a host of feelings, which include guilt and hostility to family and children, parents are caught in a situation of psychic stress and reach out for whatever help tested educational doctrines may give them. Even if these should not quite bring the desired results, they would at least permit the parents to justify themselves: they could say that they had done what was possible. This situation indeed creates a considerable interest in education, but not necessarily a high appreciation of it. On the contrary, there are indications that predict an early fatigue and disappointment in the parts of the parents. For the plain fact is that educational theory does not meet the expectations people set on it” (Bernfeld 1973, p. 3f.). 11 Interesting too is Kant's observation that not only parents but authorities, too, are to be considered as obstacles to the road to an improvement of the human condition: “ Monarchs regard their subjects only as instruments for their goals. Parents care for the house, monarchs for the state. Both do not have as their aim the welfare and the completeness for which humanity is destined and for which it is capable (Kant, 1964, p. 704). Marcuse (1987, p. 34) compared Kant’s position with the reality of capitalism and reached the following conclusion: “The monopoly capitalistic manipulation of the population, the inflationary economy, the ‘defense’ policy of ‘kill and overkill’, the training for genocide, war crimes that become normal, the brutal treatment of the great number of prisoners have lead to a frightening increase in violence in every day life. …The whole complex of aggression and its victims indicates a proto-fascist potential par excellence”. Heinz Sünker: Democratic education: educating for democracy Transnational Curriculum Inquiry 3 (2) 2006 http://nitinat.library.ubc.ca/ojs/index.php/tci 26 12 This diagnosis of the frost also throws a characteristic light on the question of the preconditions of National Socialism, as the German form of Fascism, in people themselves: “A barbaric experiment in state control of industrial society, it [the Hitler period, H.S.] violently anticipated the crisis management policies of today. The often cited ‘integration,’ the organizational tightening of the weave in the societal net that encompassed everything, also afforded protection from the universal fear of falling through the mesh and disappearing. For countless people it seemed that the coldness of social alienation had been done away with thanks to the warmth of togetherness, no matter how manipulated and contrived; the völkisch community of the unfree and unequal was a lie and at the same time also the fulfillment of an old, indeed long familiar, evil bourgeois dream. The system that offered such gratification certainly concealed within itself the potential for its own downfall“ (Adorno, 1998b, p. 95; cf. Adorno, 1998a, p. 201; Sünker/Otto, 1997). 13 Socio-historical and socio-political analyses of the relationship between education and society can be found in an extremely interesting Anglo-Saxon discussion, which revolves – following very often the work of B. Bernstein - around the concept ‘new sociology of education’ and ‘critical pedagogy’ (Giroux and McLaren, 1989; Wexler, 1990; McLaren, 1993; Farnen/Sünker, 1997; Whitty, 2002; Ball, 2003; Apple 2003; Kincheloe 2004). On the German-language discussion see Heydorn, 1979; Lenhart, 1987 and von Friedeburg, 1989, Sünker/Krüger, 1999. Both approaches meet in emphasising the relevance of ‘consciousness raising’. 14 With clear words Heydorn makes it obvious that neither violence nor liberation have automatisms: “It concerns the production of what is efficient, obedient, exchangeable and moronic, technical rationality is separated from human rationality according to system. Relying upon previous history this is considered possible, revolution of technology and the deformation of humans. In schizophrenia not only the mental asylum and collective suicide lie in wait, but also the possible uprising of people to produce themselves” (Heydorn, 1979, p. 289). 15 lt is understandable that this emancipatory perspective is far more difficult to represent in the framework of school socialization process (cf. Wexler, 1999) than in the context of educational work which is not based in the school context as youth work (cf. Peter, Sünker and Willigmann, 1982). In view of debates on global society and interculturalism, such an approach to the task of schooling seems even more relevant (Steinberg, 2001; Richter, 2006). 16 Here it should be considered that – following the famous phrase from Marx’ ‘Theses on Feuerbach” (1969, p. 5f.) – “conditions have to be changed by men and the educator himself has to be educated”. 17 Here the systematic place of a justification of “communicative freedom” is also named (Theunissen, 1978, p. 45 onwards ), a conception which, unlike that of Habermas, does not limit itself only to the area of interaction. 18 As opposed to the worship of technology, streams of money and their power, the logics of the market, social movements are presently opting for alternatives, as Castells (1998, p. 351) writes: “What is characteristic of social movements and cultural projects built around identities in the Information Age is that they do not originate within the institutions of civil society. They introduce, from the outset, an alternative social logic, distinct from the principles of performance around which dominant institutions of society are built”. This opting for alternative social logics qualifiedly distinguishes the present situation from the beginnings of capitalism, as Braudel (1994, p. 164) describes: ‘In short there are many poor people, many are miserable – a large proletariat for which the science of history is gradually providing a place according to the requirements of difficult research. A proletariat that burdens the entire activity of the century and whose weight is becoming more and more pressing in the course of the years. On this ground a persistent so-called Brigantentum is flourishing – a real social revolution which is taking an endless, unproductive course. For at the end the general misery settles the conflict: it mercilessly throws the poor and destitute back to the starting point. In Spain it is down to two factors: the survival of the old wealth and a stronger decline in population that both produce a strange social class, a proletariat that is similar to the plebs of Ancient Rome. Poor people who have always lived in poverty, no hopers from the cities as they have become famous through picaresque novels, muggers, real and fake beggars, all the gente del hampa and the hampones, the vagabonds – all these people have stopped work, admittedly only after the other side, that of work and employment, did not want to have anything to do with them”. 19 This is one reason why Heydorn (1980, p. 301) ends his “Survival through education” with the sentence: “Consciousness is all”. 20 This includes the question of aesthetics: „Indelible from the resistance to the fungible world of barter is the resistance of the eye that does not want the colors of the world to fade. Semblance is a promise of nonsemblance” (Adorno, 1973, p. 405). 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New Brunswick/London: Transaction, 193-204, 486-488 Sünker, H. 1997: Heydorn’s Bildungs Theory and Content as Social Analysis, in; Farnen/Sünker, 113-128 Sünker, H./Otto, H.-U. 1997: Volk Community: Identity Formation and Social Practise, in: Sünker/Otto (eds.): Education and Fascism: Political Identity and Social Education in Nazi Germany. London/Washington: Falmer, 15-35 Sünker, H./Krüger, H.-H. (Hg.) 1999: Kritische Erziehungswissenschaft am Neubeginn ?! Frankfurt/M. Suhrkamp Széll, G. 1988: Participation, Worker’s Control and Self-Management. Current Sociology 36 (No. 3) Heinz Sünker: Democratic education: educating for democracy Transnational Curriculum Inquiry 3 (2) 2006 http://nitinat.library.ubc.ca/ojs/index.php/tci 30 Theunissen, M. 1978: Sein und Schein: Die kritische Funktion der Hegelschen Logik. Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp Theunissen, M. 1989: Möglichkeiten des Philosophierens heute, in: Sozialwissenschaftliche Literatur Rundschau 12, 77-89 Todd, E. 1999: Die neoliberale Illusion: Über die Stagnation der entwickelten Gesellschaften. Zürich: Rotpunktverlag Tomasello, M. 1999: The Cultural Origin of Human Cognition. Cambridge/London: Harvard University Press Vester, M. et al. 2001: Soziale Milieus im gesellschaftlichen Strukturwandel. Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp Wehler, H.-U. 1988: Aus der Geschichte lernen? München: Beck Wexler, Ph. 1990: Social Analysis of Education: After the New Sociology. New York/London: Routledge Wexler, Ph. 1999: Die Toyota-Schule: Ökonomisierung von Bildung und postmodernes Selbst, in: Sünker/Krüger, 35-57 Whitty, G. 2002: Making Sense of Education Policy. London: Paul Chapman Author Heinz Sünker is Professor in the Department of Social Sciences, University of Wuppertal, Germany. His most recent book is Politics, Bildung and Social Justice: Perspectives for a Democratic Society (Sense Publishers, Rotterdam, 2006). Correspondence to: suenker@uni- wuppertal.de