Citizenship Education FAQ

Without citizenship education, the rule of law and democracy is under threat. After a period of suspension of our most basic freedoms and rights (freedom of movement, rights of association, protection of our privacy), understanding of fundamental rights, as well as responsibilities in more normal times, cannot be assumed. Across the world, the balance has shifted toward authoritarian regimes. Dissatisfaction with democracy has also been fuelled by fake news and conspiracy theories.

Children now have access to information on an unprecedented scale through the internet. But content can be harmful, false or threatening. New commercial pressures are being placed on children and exposure to scrutiny by both friends and strangers on social media can be a serious source of stress, even leading to depression and self-harm.

There are also more positive signs. Protests have grown across the world in favour of more democracy. The crisis is encouraging new thinking about methods of participatory democracy and ways to make voting easier to support representative democracy.

Without more priority given to citizenship education to equip the next generation with the knowledge to fight for such reforms, erosion of democracy and the rule of law, together with the rise of new populist and extremist forces, will be the result. This is already happening within the EU particularly in Poland and Hungary.

Preparing and launching an ECI is a huge enterprise, so we need all the help we can get. You could become part of a network of volunteers we can call upon to help us with framing our demands and messages, setting up communication tools through a special website and social media. Ask your school or university what they think and how they can help. Write to your local politician or member of the European Parliament. We also need partner organisations at least in the minimum number of 7 Member States we decide to target.

Here it’s volunteers on the ground who can really help because in each country the coalition could look different since citizenship education is a reflection of our different histories and cultures. In some countries, ECIs appear to work better than in others.

The debate has to be adapted to what is happening in the country and the future of education. A long period of preparation should result in setting up both a European campaign and a network of national chapters to collect signatures. The more people own the ECI and are prepared to take the lead in their own city or country the more likely it is that we will all find the right answer to your second question and trigger a response from the public to prepare a better way for living together and belonging in Europe!

It came from a meeting of minds between those believing in the potential of EU Citizenship as the first transnational citizenship of the modern era and educators in the schools, colleges or civil society. The ECIT Foundation has promoted the idea of a Statute for a European Citizenship of rights, participation and belonging, which is gaining support. According to an ECIT draft for such a statute, there should be European rights to be informed and educated. There are too few active European citizens with the language skills and other advantages to make use of their rights to freedom of movement. The Networking European Citizenship (NECE) network and other civil society initiatives have become increasingly conscious that the Council of Europe and the EU have promulgated charters and resolutions, but which are then unevenly and insufficiently implemented. These ideas were discussed at an online campus and conferences held in 2020 by both NECE in cooperation with ECIT and a great number of partners across Europe. A ‘NECE declaration’ has been signed off by renowned European scholars and citizens. However, no declaration is enough on its own and must be highlighted and followed by action. The ECI is one way to achieve this.

The pros and cons have to be carefully assessed. An ECI faces many obstacles. Only 7% of all attempted ECIs reached the target of one million signatures. Public awareness about ECIs is low. Much depends therefore on setting up strong national coalitions and fundraising. Some experts have calculated the real cost at about 1 euro per signature.

Another challenge is that education remains an area of responsibility for national or regional governments, so the role of the EU is to encourage cooperation rather than propose top-down European action. It is difficult therefore to formulate demands which are both within the competence of the Commission and which interest the public and motivate them to sign, as previous organisers of ECIs in the educational field have found. We have gone through a lengthy process of exploring the Treaty articles and legislation which can be used as a basis for the ECI and changed our approach several times.

To become part of the 7% is still no guarantee of success. If 1 million signatures are reached, the organisers engage with the Commission, which then responds and there is a hearing and debate in the European Parliament. The Commission is not, however, obliged to act on an ECI which is an instrument of participatory rather than direct democracy.

There are positive points, however. A new regulation came into force on 1 January 2020 making it easier to sign an ECI since the amount of personal data to do so has been reduced for some countries. The Commission provides technical support and the free use of a server for the online collection of signatures and has set up a forum to help organisers. We have consulted the forum on the legal basis of our proposal, networking and fundraising. Together with other organisers, we are also putting pressure on the Commission to be more proactive and launch information campaigns, so more people know about ECIs. Our demands are getting support from the European Parliament which has voted for a special budget to raise public awareness of ECIs.

Even if the target is not reached, an ECI can have other forms of success. For example, Voters Without Borders can claim that its first demand — reform of the rights for mobile EU citizens to vote and stand in their country of residence in municipal and European elections — is being met since the EU has begun the process of revision of the legislation. The taskforce has participated in hearings organised by the European Parliament and the ECI has been reported on in the press and been presented frequently at different events. There is a strong case for eliminating disenfranchisement in national elections brought about through freedom of movement and continuing the struggle for universal suffrage. Similarly, there is a strong case for more action to ensure that every child in the EU has access to good quality European citizenship education.

We are demanding a child guarantee which would be equivalent to a right to European citizenship education under Article 25 TFEU and an additional right to those created when Union citizenship was created by the Maastricht Treaty. This right should of course be extended to all children including those whose parents are not EU citizens. The more recent Treaty revision with the Lisbon Treaty placed emphasis on the rights of the child so by putting together these two Treaty reforms we consider that there is a sufficiently sound basis for this initiative. Indeed, European Citizenship, the first transnational citizenship of the modern age, is citizenship in the making and for the long term so children should be central to its focus. Every child should receive an education in European citizenship and values of democracy, human rights and the rule of law.

Such a statute is needed to create a common understanding of what European Citizenship is and therefore how it could be taught. We are basing that demand on a report by the European Parliament in January 2019 on the implementation of the legal provisions for EU Citizenship (A8-00041/2019) calling for “concrete initiatives towards the consolidation of citizen specific rights and freedoms under an EU Statute of Citizenship, similar to the European Pillar of Social Rights”. The European Parliament repeated this demand in March 2022 when it gave an opinion on the Commission’s Citizenship Report. The Conference on the Future of Europe through citizens’ panels and a series of dialogues and other events across EU 27 also approved the idea of such a statute in its conclusions in May 2022. Efforts to draw up such a statute would help create more consensus about what to teach and provide a basis for proposing a model approach which teachers and pupils can adapt to their own needs.

According to a study carried out by Eurydice, approaches to citizenship education differ, with some countries preferring to teach this as a stand-alone subject, others in relation to others. The EU should reflect both approaches by providing a model for EU citizenship education. The EU can also introduce a clause on European citizenship education in legislation which governs European rights to freedom of movement, migration and to participate in the EU. A requirement to make citizenship education an objective of all relevant policies and programmes would make the EU approach more systematic and allow for the scaling up of its many projects, such as Next Generation EU, the Digital Education Action Plan, Horizon Europe and Erasmus plus which are often too small and invisible to make an impact and become replicated.

We are convinced that although the commitment to citizenship education is included in several policies and programmes, there is still a need for a focal point. Citizenship education represents challenges beyond the capacity of educational systems and civil society organisations to find all the answers in isolation from each other. There should be a place where teachers, trainers and facilitators can find the latest research on citizenship education, the techniques and examples of best practices from across different educational systems and cultures. The objective should be that all stakeholders can find examples of teacher training, didactic materials, curriculum guidelines, textbooks, projects and methods of evaluating European citizenship education.

We have an open mind about what form such a focal point should take and recommend starting with a pilot project or preparatory action funded by a special line in the EU budget. After a period of experimentation and consultation, a decision should be taken on whether to set up within the European Education Area, a Centre of Excellence or eventually a more formal structure such as a European Agency. There is also a proposal to create a Centre for Democratic Competencies.