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"Civic education", ein Begriff aus dem angelsächsischen Raum, heißt wörtlich übersetzt zivilgesellschaftliche Bildung oder auch Bürger/-innenbildung. "Civic Education" hat zum Ziel, bei den Mitgliedern der Gesellschaft zivilgesellschaftliche bzw. demokratische Kompetenzen aufzubauen, die ihr Handeln beeinflussen und sicher stellen, dass die Zivilgesellschaft und das demokratische Gesellschaftsmodell in der Praxis funktionieren. Der Text erläutert die Grundzüge von "civic education" und, warum das Konzept in einem demokratischen Staat notwendig ist.

The questions go back to pre-Platonic times: how do states turn ordinary people, especially new generations of young people, into supportive, contributing citizens? Are the tasks required to do this in modern democracies such as the United States different from those in states which rely on authoritarianism or state-sponsored terror? There are numerous variations on these questions: How does a conquering nation gain the allegiance of the vanquished? If a government is overthrown in a coup, how do the new rulers convince the citizens that they are the rightful and legitimate power holders? All of these devolve into questions of civic education.

Publish or perish, so the formula goes. Beyond that familiar binary, tenure committees occasionally offer the cruel third option to publish and perish. Tales from the front hammer home the message that productive research trumps all else, including teaching. Especially teaching. That message is far too stark. Care for publication should be intensive but not exclusive. In fact, publication and teaching can often complement each other. The first half of that relationship may already be apparent: we know what we research, and we teach what we know. Structuring our courses on our recent or current scholarly work can infuse our teaching with energy and expertise. Less obviously, however, teaching can also drive and direct our research. Other authors in this symposium address the potential for our teaching to generate research questions and involve students in our research projects. In addition, we faculty can teach subjects that we want to know better, furthering our research as we learn alongside our students. Those prospects for producing publications comprise low-hanging fruit, and we should reap it. But I also advocate for a slightly more challenging approach: the pedagogy of experiential learning, which can turn political science into civic education and turn civic education into publishable research. This represents good news for civic education, which political scientists should care about but generally ignore (Battistoni 2013). Our failure to care stems less from an intrinsic lack of interest, as is commonly supposed, than from a lack of understanding, which is easier to remedy. Political scientists do not overlook civic education because our research interests preclude it. Rather, we misunderstand what collegiate civic education actually comprises, how little we would have to do to promote it more effectively, and the incentives that exist for doing so. Adapted from the source document.

AbstractNew York University conducts a successful experiment in the use of radio for civic education

The purpose of Civic Education in Lebanon includes the structure of the government and the way it functions. Isn't it civic desert? One should consider then, the meaning of civics. Civics does not focus on a course or a book, but rather on fundamental social learning. It is the need to lay the foundation for communication and critical thinking when encountering traditions in conflict with what one's own. Yet schools have their role to play, by revealing secular values, for conflict affected areas can easily regress to violence. A menu of civics implement classroom discussion of current critical events. Yet, Lebanese schools are overtaken by the baccalaureate program which hardly gives any time to controversial issues. Teachers are important elements in teaching civics. They have to believe in what they teach, display it verbally, nonverbally and add 'mindful learning'. Yet, one can visualize an array of socio-personal factors when issues are controversial, knowing that humans are resistant to change. To conclude, teaching quality in civics is to be ranked highly on the scholarly agenda and research is needed to better understand the improvement of civic education.

Describes a project that integrated study with civic work in the community and used problem-based learning which focused on welfare and workfare development and affordable housing; San Francisco State University.