Democratic Education

As I write in the Spring of 2025, people of diverse political persuasions fear the climate disruption, or at least its consequences.1 They rightly bemoan the polycrisis that we seem to be living through.2 They might agree that the “poor puzzled moon, wore such a frown … The whole darn world seemed upside down.”3

If we are to address any of these problems, we must work together. But here, we see the loss of a crucial middle ground between the intimate family and mostly anonymous social media—the parish pump where people from different backgrounds can gather to interact informally.4 We still have coffee shops, but they’re often populated by people sitting alone, plugged into ear buds, but not interacting with neighbors. It should come as no surprise that we have impoverished public dialogue, irresponsible media, polarized polities, the end of international alliances, the rise of authoritarian political parties and governments, and the loss of trust. We’ve replaced truth with truthiness. Democracy itself is in peril, and with that, the loss of our capacity to address any of these looming problems.

Given all that, does it make sense to talk about education, a realm that is arguably functioning more or less as it did a generation or two ago? And how can we speak of democratic education, which seems to some an esoteric concept far removed from teaching the three Rs? It is a vain endeavor to isolate one factor underlying our troubles. But working our way back, we cannot escape the fact that we need to improve both our individual and our social capacity to work on the problems that beset us. We need to experience how democracy works, to become more capable of working with others, and to combine our learning with our efforts to improve the world. This implies education, and specifically democratic education.

During a time when democracy was as imperiled as it is today, Dewey wrote a sequel to his famous book, Democracy and Education. This was briefer, a pamphlet: “Democracy and Education in the World of Today.” While political crises were paramount, he argued that they could not be separated from education: “The relation between democracy and education is a reciprocal one, a mutual one, and vitally so. Democracy is itself an educational principle, an educational measure and policy.”5 Dewey further saw that democracy cannot endure without education:

We have one thing to learn from the anti-democratic states of Europe … we should take as seriously the preparation of the members of our society for the duties and responsibilities of democracy, as they take seriously the formation of the thoughts and minds and characters of their population for their aims and ideals. This does not mean that we should imitate their universal propaganda … it means that we should take seriously, energetically and vigorously the use of democratic schools and democratic methods in the schools; that we should educate the young and the youth of the country in freedom for participation in a free society.6

This book responds to Dewey’s call for today. It assumes that the project of education is not just an adjunct to the project of democracy, one in which we rehearse for democracy or lament the constraints of society. It is one in which we work for education and democracy as entwined enterprises.

Part I discusses this problem, one that underlies all social life, infusing our understanding of community, economics, justice, and yes, democracy (Chapter 1). It then introduces a model for discussing education in relation to democracy (Chapter 2).

Part II presents the classical view of democratic education. Chapter 3, “Doing Democracy,” opens a discussion of one facet, education by democracy. That emphasizes student agency, whereas Chapter 4 shifts to a facet emphasizing the crucial role of the teacher, education for democracy, especially focusing on the development of the virtues of democracy. If these two chapters are the thesis—that democratic education is necessary and achievable, then Chapter 5 is the antithesis. It explores how sociopolitical structures shape education and democracy, highlighting how structural affordances and constraints often override the agency of both students and teachers. These potentially nullify efforts at education by and for democracy in the schools.7 A critical examination shows the consequences for education of limited democracy in the larger society.

Part III asserts that we need to consider a fourth facet, “education with democracy.” This is where educators and students work to simultaneously transform both education and society to become more democratic. Such an approach is necessary if we seek justice in our educational system or in our political system. It counters the risk that learning activities become so removed from lived experience outside the school that they are perceived as irrelevant or dispensable. Examples can be found in the case studies presented in Chapters 6 through 8 and also in books such as Learning Power,8 Educating for Democracy,9 in the works of Célestin Freinet in France,10 or Paulo Freire in Brazil.11 Chapter 9 offers a novel way to think of the pillars of democracy. Applying the facet analysis, we can see how work on those pillars can be restorative for democracy, but also that that work provides an excellent opportunity for democratic education, especially education with democracy. The key is to see how we can shift from a “citizens later” approach to one for “citizens now.”