National and post-national dimensions of citizenship education in the UK

Citizenship education has been an ongoing matter of academic and political debate in the UK since the 1970s. This debate culminated in the setting up of the Advisory Group in citizenship education under the chairmanship of Bernard Crick. The publication of the Crick Report, Education for Citizenship and the Teaching of Democracy in Schools (London, QCA, 1998), has influenced the development of citizenship education across the UK from primary level to post-16. Citizenship education has now been established as a statutory component of the compulsory school national curriculum in England and a set of proposals for Scotland were launched in 2002. In this paper, with particular reference to the Crick Report, I explore the theories and conceptions of citizenship that are evident in this policy area and consider the opportunities it offers for embedding democratic practices within late modern societies.