Neoliberalism and Citizenship Education: Critical Discourse Analysis of Citizenship Education Textbooks in Public Secondary Education in Canada (Ontario) and Poland

Abstract

Citizenship education has been an overarching goal of public schooling historically in every society. In Canada and Poland citizenship education incorporates traditional notions of rights and responsibilities and a commitment to democratic ideals. Yet, the term citizenship is filled with paradoxes: thinking, loyal persons versus critical questioners, private interests versus public interests, national pride and identification versus criticizing and judging the values and limits of national pride (Pratte, 1988). In this chapter, I argue that although the specific socioeconomic and political context in Poland and Ontario have conditioned the understanding of citizenship education as stated in the documents (curriculum for social sciences and civics), the economic priorities of neoliberal globalization have provided a powerful frame of references for educational reform in the field of citizenship education. The chief question underlying my research is to what extent the pressures from knowledge-based economy on the articulation and implementation of new kind of citizenship in visible in the citizenship education textbooks for secondary education in Poland and Canada (Ontario). This study employed an analysis of program documents (curriculum) with CDA (critical discourse analysis) of citizenship education textbooks for secondary schools.