Teaching Democracy
| Teaching Democracy: Unity and Diversity in Public Life | |
| Author(s) | Walter C. Parker |
|---|---|
| Publisher | Teachers College Press |
| Publication date | 2003 |
| Pages | 191 |
| ISBN | 0-8077-4272-4
|
Walter C. Parker is a Professor of Education and an Adjunct Professor of Political Science at the University of Washington. In his book Teaching Democracy: Unity and Diversity in Public Life, he works to define civic education and explain its importance among other theories of multicultural education that have been seen throughout American history.
He introduces his main argument by writing that “there can be no democracy without its builders, caretakers, and change agents: democratic citizens. These citizens are constructs, too. Who ‘builds’ and cares for them? Parents, peers, educators, corporations, media, social forces, and structures—all these are responsible, but among them educators are the primary stewards of democracy” (p. xvii). Throughout this book, Parker asserts that educators are responsible for “building” citizens who are able to balance the interests of the individual and the American population as a whole. He describes this democratic citizenship as the balance of the unum and the pluribus.
Parker asserts that the main purpose of multicultural education is to help all students, also known as citizens, to obtain the skills, knowledge, and attitudes to interact with other citizens of different backgrounds, which will contribute to the United States being more democratic and just (p. 1). He also emphasizes, “multicultural education is for everyone” (p. 1). Parker contends that acting as a citizen without multicultural education and the enlightenment that comes with it is worse than political apathy. He uses Hitler’s thugs and members of the Ku Klux Klan as examples of citizens acting without being enlightened about multiculturalism and how their actions can have adverse effects on society.
Idios is an ancient Greek root that means private, separate, or selfish. Parker says that all citizens are naturally idiots, not in the way that we use the word now, but the original meaning: self-centered. He argues that American citizens should, instead, be concerned with the public interests. He writes, “An idiot is one whose self-centeredness undermines his or her citizen identity, causing it to wither or, worse, never to take root in the first place” (p.3). Instead of allowing our students to be idiots, we just instill in them multicultural knowledge so that they can be the driving forces that move the United States toward a country of tolerance.
One major problem with having a country full of idiots is that it promulgates idiocy. Parker writes, “There is a democratic education problem in the United States. The young are not learning properly to care for the body politic and the body politic is not adequately caring for the young” (p.14). He goes on to discuss the Civil Rights movement and how it was affected by this notion. Parker says that the Civil Rights movement was a movement to give citizens access to what was promised to everyone during the creation of the United States of America. As Parker puts it, “the purpose of the Civil Rights Movement was not to alter the American dream, nor to revise it, but to realize it” (p. 21). This aligns with John Dewey’s assertion that the purpose of American democracy is to give American citizens a way to live together. This necessitates multicultural education.
The tension between the idea of the American population being historically tolerant and aware of multicultural issues is effectively illustrated by a story told by one of Parker’s colleagues, a well-known African-American scholar named James A. Banks. Banks says, “We learned about liberty and justice in school, and said—repeating the Pledge of Allegiance in our segregated school each morning—that our nation had ‘liberty and justice for all’” (p.24). This shows the gap that Parker has identified as being a part of American culture throughout history. During segregation, students were being taught to repeat the phrase “with liberty and justice for all” while pledging their own allegiance to the United States of America, a country that was actually denying them the liberty that was given to their white peers. Parker recognizes this as an example of unity being celebrated, while simultaneously being denied (p. 26). This has been, and remains, a problem in American culture.
Parker also recognizes a major problem with democracy as a whole. He points out that “History gives democracy no advantages. All democracies are weak and short-lived, and no actually existing democracy is an ideal democracy” (p. 52). Does this mean that it is impossible to build an ideal democracy? Parker does not think so. Instead, he suggests that if educators can build enlightened citizens, the democracy of the United States can become ideal. He says that teaching all citizens to be just “requires a conception of justice that is capable of discerning injustice not merely at the surface of social life but in the underlying modes of relating” (p. 73). He cites Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail” that asks, “How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?” and then says, “The answer lies in the fact that there are two types of laws: just and unjust” (p. 54). This clearly shows that the education and enlightenment of citizens is critical to the development of a democracy.
One of the obstacles that prevents the formation of an ideal democracy is fear. Parker writes, “As far as emotions go, fear goes far and deep. It is an intelligent emotion, of course, warning us of danger. But it is crippling, too, and one of the primary causes of prejudice” (p. 76). This is important to keep in mind when making and voting for policies in the United States. Parker discusses times throughout American history in which we have seen fear cause horrible acts, but acts that were legalized by the American government, such as the Japanese internment camps and the Salem witch trials.
Parker also points out that interaction with people of other cultures and ideologies is not enough to promulgate tolerance. In fact, there have been studies that show that interaction of people from different races has actually increased racial antagonism and stereotyping between the groups of people (p. 79). What is really needed to bring about tolerance between different groups of people is deliberation, rather than simple contact.
“Deliberation” is derived from the Latin word “libra” which means to weigh or scale (p. 80). People of different groups need to deliberate policies and use their differing perspectives to enhance each other’s thoughts and ensure that they agree to enforce the policies that are most likely to produce an ideal democracy. As Parker says, “social knowledge is advantaged by group difference is that the presence of multiple perspectives increases the likelihood that dominant norms and beliefs are subjected to observation and critique” (p. 99). Deliberation is also enhanced by including multiple perspectives because these perspectives contribute not only to group enlightenment, but also to individual enlightenment (p. 100). Parker writes, “They bring to individual life a sense of the possible” (p. 100). This, again, reinforces the importance of productive interaction (deliberation) between groups of people, rather than simply allowing the dominant group to create policies that maintain the status quo.
Parker also explains that deliberation is not only important for working with problems. Deliberation is also an effective way to acquire and organize knowledge. He writes, “In a society that is trying to achieve democracy, all adults are called upon to be its stewards” (p. 148). Deliberation and seminar can be used to achieve this end in a classroom, as well as in the real world among adults. Parker further argues, “All citizens in a society struggling to be just and democratic are in principle obliged to participate, not just a tiny few” (p. 124). This is an important tenet of Parker’s book because it emphasizes why his assertions are relevant. Teaching deliberation and discussions between people of various backgrounds is equally important in a classroom setting and in society in general. Toward the end of Teaching Democracy, Parker quotes Vivyan C. Adair’s article titled “Poverty and the (Broken) Promise of Higher Education” that was published in the Harvard Educational Review. She wrote, “Education is important to all citizens; it is absolutely essential to those who must go on to face continued obstacles of racism, classism, and sexism, to those who have been distanced and disenfranchised from the U.S. mainstream culture, and to those who have suffered lifetimes of oppression and marginalization” (p. 150). This quotation summarizes the premise of Parker’s book.
Learning about democracy and how to deliberate with different groups of people is the most effective way to work toward building an ideal democracy in the United States. As Parker cites John Dewey saying, education, specifically teaching citizens about democracy, is imperative to building the future society, which is the world in which our students will be living (p. 161). Thus, Parker illustrates the importance of teaching democracy to today’s youth and working toward an ideal democracy. Hopefully, his ideas about the promotion of democratic ideals and cohesive deliberation will help shape the way that the American education system informs its students and its citizens.
