Session Information
13 SES 04, Posthuman and Agonistic Education
Paper Session
Contribution
In recent years, an agonistic approach to citizenship education has been put forward as a way to educate democratic citizens. With the current political transformations within the European political landscape, such as the strengthening of radical right-wing parties in both national parliaments and in the European Parliament, questions about the shape and content of democratic citizenship education can be seen as being of great importance. The agonistic approach to citizenship education is one way to address such questions.
One of those who have theoretically developed an agonistic approach to education is the educational philosopher Claudia W. Ruitenberg (2009), who takes her starting point in Chantal Mouffe’s (2000, 2005) theory of agonistic pluralism. The main point within this agonistic approach is its emphasis on the political dimension of citizenship education. In Ruitenberg’s line of reasoning she argues that schools needs to acknowledge the political dimension of democracy in order to educate democratic citizens. In acknowledging the political dimension in citizenship education, the general aim of educating democratic citizens can be understood as an aim that is about enabling students to become each other’s political adversaries. Drawing on Mouffe’s agonistic pluralism, Ruitenberg highlights three vital components of citizenship education, these are; (a) political emotions, (b) political disputes, and, (c) political literacy.
The aim of this paper is to theoretically analyze and to further elaborate on how an agonistic approach to citizenship education can be formulated when the political dimension is understood in terms of presence of “the other”. By placing the idea of the political as presence in the foreground, the paper focuses on two of the components in Ruitenberg’s agonistic approach; political emotions and political disputes. There are two main arguments put forward in this paper. The first is that the definition of political emotions within an agonistic approach needs to stem from a definition of the political, or in other words, it needs to stem from an understanding of what it means that something is political in the first place. The second argument is an argument for de-emphasizing the importance of verbalization of opinions within an agonistic approach.
The analysis starts by returning to Mouffe’s (2005) point of departure in Carl Schmitt’s (1932/1996) theory of “the political” and from there follows an alternate reading put forward by the philosopher Michael Marder (2010). The way in which Ruitenberg formulates political emotions, I argue, is based on an understanding that defines political emotions with regards to what object the emotion is directed towards. By placing Marder’s idea of the mere presence of the other in the foreground, the analysis leads to a proposal for widening Ruitenberg’s definition of political emotions. Such a widening stems from an understanding of the antagonistic character of what is “political” in political emotions. Political emotions is therefore understood as emotions that are bound up with collective identities and linked to the frontiers of us/them distinctions (cf. Mihai 2014; Zembylas 2007).
Furthermore, the vantage point taken in Marder’s underlining of the political as presence leads to a proposal for de-emphasizing the role of verbal political disputes within an agonistic approach. Marder’s (2010) elaboration of the concept of enmity can be used to illustrate how the other not necessarily has to be seen as a “debating adversary”, but can be understood in terms of the other who “puts me in question silently, non-argumentatively, and, hence, without giving me a chance to respond by verbally defending myself” (Marder 2010, p 94). A strong emphasis on the verbalization of opinions seems to make it difficult to develop an attentiveness of antagonisms that evolves from the non-verbalized presence of the other.
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
Marder, M. (2010). Groundless Existence: The Political Ontology of Carl Schmitt. New York: Continuum Mihai, M. (2014). Theorizing Agonistic Emotions. parallax, 20:2, pp. 31-48. Mouffe, C. (2000). The Democratic paradox. London: Verso. Mouffe, C. (2005). On the Political. New York: Routledge. Ruitenberg, C.W. (2009). Educating Political Adversaries: Chantal Mouffe and Radical Democratic Citizenship Education, Studies in Philosophy of Education 28:3, pp. 269-281. Ruitenberg, C.W. (2010). Learning to articulate: From Ethical Motivation to Political Demands, in G. Biesta (ed) Philosophy of Education 2010. Urbana, IL: Philosophy of Education Society. pp. 372-380. Schmitt, C. (1932/1996). The Concept of the Political. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Zembylas, M. (2007). Mobilizing Anger for Social Justice: The politicization of emotions in education, Teaching Education, 18:1, pp. 15-28.
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