From patriotism to critical democracy: shifting discourses of citizenship education in social studies

The state of citizenship education in Australia continues to attract media attention as evidenced by two recent newspaper headlines, Students take apathetic view of democracy and Teach young about democracy. These headlines were reporting on the latest findings of the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) on school students understanding of democracy. As a part of a 28‐nation civics survey, the ACER found half of Australian students had no grasp of democracy (ranking them behind countries like Poland, Cyprus and the Slovak Republic); lacked clarity about the Constitution, elections, voting systems or the role of groups like trade unions; were unwilling to engage in politics; and believed politics was relatively unimportant