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This paper rethinks the fostering task of the teacher in a time when it, paradoxically, has tended to become marginalized and privatized despite its public urgency. Following post-holocaust thinkers such as Hannah Arendt and Zygmunt Bauman, the position explored here is radical in the sense that it takes ‘the crisis of traditions’ and the erosion of a common moral ground or value basis seriously, and it is conservative in the sense that it insists on responding educationally to the call from the past by returning to (a) the moral character of our existence and (b) our own embeddedness in the incompleteness of living traditions. The argument is that there is a difference between educating for common values—which entails a belief in pre-existing commonalities—and making values common in and through education. The latter, we argue, entails an aspiration for continuously creating new commonalities and for cultivating the ability to act and judge as a thinking moral agent in specific, lived and worldly cases. In this sense, the fostering task of the teacher is to create commonality of what is not (yet) common, turning the liberal democratic values of the past into contested objects of study.

Democratic erosion in the United States, and the global decline of support for democratic values and institutions, obliges us to reflect on how we introduce politics to undergraduate students in this challenging era. Recent attacks on democratic rights and academic freedoms on college campuses, as well as the undermining of rule of law and democratic norms in the United States and abroad, compels us to reconsider and reflect on how we introduce politics and civic engagement in the classroom to our students. In this essay, we reflect on how current global and national trends in populism and authoritarianism require us to teach politics courses differently than in the past. We then identify the content, skills, and values we need to emphasize and continue to train students under the stressors of anti-democratic norms and legislation in the United States and around the world. We also identify our responsibilities as educators, as we promote civic and political engagement which may expose students to risks of political repression and even violence. Lastly, we propose ways to help students identify and understand their support for and satisfaction with the current state of democracy and critically evaluate the alternatives.

Tras la segunda guerra mundial, el esfuerzo de los Aliados por liberar a Europa Occidental de los totalitarismos pasaba por tejer un tejido cultural en torno a los valores democráticos, y la promoción de la lectura entre el gran público resultó útil para tal tarea, mediante la reconstrucción de las bibliotecas públicas y el reconocimiento de los cambios en los hábitos y necesidades de los lectores europeos. Sobre esta base, Jella Lepman (1891-1970), escritora y periodista, organizó en Alemania sus exposiciones itinerantes de libros infantiles internacionales, de 1946 a 1949. La fuerza visionaria impulsora de su proyecto residía en la capacidad de concretar el esfuerzo de educar a los jóvenes alemanes en los nuevos valores democráticos y pacifistas: a través de los libros como «mensajeros de la paz», podían establecerse conexiones entre experiencias culturales muy diferentes. La presente investigación pretende reconstruir la historia de las exposiciones de Jella Lepman analizando los datos cuantitativos y cualitativos relativos a las obras expuestas, así como la información disponible sobre el impacto que estos esfuerzos tuvieron en los jóvenes visitantes. La colección de archivos conservada en la Jugendbibliothek de Múnich muestra la extraordinaria modernidad de las elecciones de los materiales de exposición y de los proyectos pedagógicos, con el fin de invitar a los niños a comprometerse con los libros expuestos, en espacios específicamente adaptados a ellos, haciendo de los jóvenes lectores protagonistas del proceso europeo de renovación democrática más allá de los nacionalismos. In the aftermath of the second world conflict, the Allies’ effort to liberate Western Europe from totalitarianisms relied on weaving a cultural fabric around democratic values and the promotion of reading amongst the wider public proved useful for such task, through the reconstruction of public libraries and the recognition of changes in the habits and needs of European readers. It is on these grounds that Jella Lepman (1891-1970), writer and journalist, set up in Germany her traveling exhibitions of international children’s books, from 1946 to 1949. The propelling visionary force of her project lied in the ability to give concreteness to the effort of educating young Germans to the new democratic and pacifist values: through books as “messengers of peace”, connections among very different cultural experiences could be built. The present research aims to reconstruct the history of Jella Lepman’s exhibitions by analysing the quantitative and qualitative data regarding the works displayed as well as the available information on the impact these endeavours had on young visitors. The archival collection stored at Munich’s Jugendbibliothek shows how extraordinarily modern the choices of the exhibiting materials and of the educational projects were, in order to invite children to engage with the books displayed, in spaces specifically tailored for them, making young readers protagonists in Europe’s process of democratic renewal beyond nationalisms. 

Can crime victimization increase support for iron-fist crime-reduction policies? It is difficult to assess the political effects of crime, mainly because of the presence of unmeasured confounders. This study uses panel data from Brazil and strategies for reducing sensitivity to hidden biases to study how crime victims update their policy preferences. It also examines survey data from eighteen Latin American countries to improve the external validity of the findings. The results show that crime victims are more likely to support iron-fist or strong-arm measures to reduce crime, such as allowing state repression. Affected citizens are also found to value democracy less, which might explain their willingness to accept the erosion of basic rights in favor of radical measures to combat delinquency. These findings reveal that exposure to crime can change what people think the state should be allowed to do, which can have important political implications.

This study examines how democratic values have been promoted through natural sciences education over the last 50 years, providing a comprehensive analysis based on a systematic review of relevant literature. The central problem addressed is understanding the role of natural science education in fostering democratic values such as equity, participation, critical thinking, and ethical responsibility. This research aims to identify and analyze strategies, methodologies, and transformative experiences that contribute to the promotion of democratic values. This study employs the PRISMA methodology to ensure a rigorous and structured systematic review. Data were collected from multiple databases using detailed Boolean equations. Tools such as ScientoPy and VOSviewer were used for data preprocessing, clustering, and network visualization, followed by qualitative analysis to categorize the findings. Educational programs in natural sciences have increasingly integrated democratic values, fostering a culture of inclusivity and participation; the incorporation of ICT has enhanced equity and participation, while civic education has been fundamental in developing critical and informed citizens; citizen science initiatives have empowered students to engage in democratic deliberation and address epistemic injustice; cooperative learning methods in science classes have effectively promoted gender equity and inclusion; and emphasis on sustainability and environmental justice in science education has promoted democratic values and empowered students to take action on global challenges. In conclusion, natural science education is an effective vehicle for promoting democratic values, but it is an understudied field. By integrating practices that emphasize inclusivity, critical thinking, and ethical responsibility, science education not only enhances students' scientific understanding but also prepares them to be active, informed, and responsible citizens.

New evidence suggests that the world recently changed for the U.S. Supreme Court owing to its decision to abrogate the abortion rights first announced in Roe v. Wade. In contrast to the conventional wisdom that Court support is little undermined by unpopular rulings, the Dobbs decision generated a substantial knock on the Court’s legitimacy. Two crucial frailties limit these findings, however. First, no one has determined whether the lost legitimacy has persisted, since earlier research relied on a one-shot survey conducted shortly after the decision. Second, no analysis has addressed the “values-based regeneration” hypothesis—that support reemerges not long after a legitimacy hit is inflicted. Based on a nationally representative 2023 survey, my analysis finds that the lost legitimacy has lingered, but institutional support may be being rebuilt owing to its close connection with democratic values. Overall, I conclude that understanding persistence is more complicated than many may have assumed.

A new generation of children are learning the importance of democratic values at a level which makes sense to them. Appropriate ‘democratic values’ for South Africa are set out in the Constitution, and the national curriculum aims to equip all learners with the knowledge and skills necessary for meaningful participation in society. In many schools, these values – responsibility, respect and the freedom of self-expression – are merely posted on the walls of classrooms, but are not integrated into the subject content. This article proposes that teachers need to determine children’s perceptions of the values in question, and these should be the starting point for teaching democratic values. Young children need to understand and experience values in the classroom, suitable to the development of their moral reasoning. To concretise concepts of values, we used the ‘pledge tree’ activity in an intervention, in which 9-year-old children wrote their values on paper ‘leaves’ which they then posted on a huge polystyrene tree. The paper reports on this experience as a research investigation, capturing children’s ideas.

Due to the current war in Ukraine, the E.U. must decisively rethink its values and educational models: it is necessary to develop them on the economic and socio-political levels, putting the principle of democratic citizenship at the center. Keywords. Merit - War - European Union - Democratic Values - Education

This article analyzes how guns emerged as both urgent topics of dialogue and common features of everyday life for 228 students and their teachers in six communities across the United States who participated in the Digital Democratic Dialogue (3D) Project, a year long social design-based experiment aimed at foregrounding youth voice and fostering connection across lines of geographic and ideological difference. We trace the myriad ways that guns literally and discursively shaped the multiple ecological contexts of the 3D Project in order to detail youth sociopolitical learning and extend traditional models of civic education. We propose a paradigm of speculative civic literacies that privileges a collaborative push toward democratic interrogation and innovation over integration into existing civic and political structures.

Type of the article: Research Article AbstractThe organization’s trade union greatly increases worker productivity by fostering a healthy work environment, resolving employee complaints, and encouraging employee involvement. To ascertain how union practices (collective bargaining, democratic principles, and job security) affect worker performance in Nepal’s cement manufacturing sector, this study investigates their impact on employee productivity. A causal and descriptive research strategy was employed. Survey participants were the employees working in the selected cement manufacturing companies of Nepal. The primary cross-sectional data were collected from October 2024 to February 2025. The paper used purposive sampling techniques; a total of 476 structured questionnaires were distributed, and 247 were retrieved. This paper also employed descriptive statistics and correlation and regression analyses. Similarly, Cronbach’s alpha was used to determine the internal consistency. The study’s findings indicated a substantial positive and significant impact of collective bargaining on employee performance (β = 0.691, t = 18.08). A robust, positive, and statistically significant impact of democratic principles on employee performance was identified (β = 0.60, t = 16.76). The results indicated a robust positive and statistically significant impact of job security on employee performance (β = 0.85, t = 18.54).