Does European Citizenship Increase Tolerance in Young People?

While Europe is celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of the signing of the Rome Treaty, there is much doubt about the extent of citizens' emotional attachment to Europe. In this article we examine whether young Belgians show a sense of European citizenship, using a range of questions about the European Union (EU) from a survey administered to more than 6000 secondary school students. We show that a genuine identification with Europe — one that is not purely based on a positive evaluation of the EU from a utilitarian point of view — is related to higher levels of tolerance towards ethnic minorities, Muslims and immigrants. In addition, we will provide an overview of the literature on European citizenship and its potential connection to a higher degree of tolerance towards different cultures

When voters with high political knowledge change their votes, it is usually to ideologically similar parties

Electoral volatility has been much discussed of late, with the rise of small parties leading to switches from across the political spectrum. While much research has taken place into the extent of vote switching, rather less has taken place into the ideological ‘distance’ between the parties that are switched between. Ruth Dassonneville and Yves Dejaeghere have done so, and found that voters with a higher level of political knowledge and sophistication switch to parties with a similar ideological profile to the ones they desert

A Comparative Investigation into The Effects of Party-System Variables on Party Switching using Individual-Level Data

Previous comparative electoral studies using aggregate data indicate the importance of party-system variables, such as polarization and the number of parties, with regard to the level of volatility between two elections. Research using individual level data has shown elements, such as political knowledge, political disaffection and party identification, explain why voters remained faithful to their party or not. Until now, no study has investigated these variables simultaneously on individual level data using a large set of elections. This study fills that important gap in the literature using data from 29,591 voters in 33 elections. We find polarization influences party-switching at the individual level, rather than the sheer number of parties, as aggregate-level analyses suggest

Political habits learned in home country are determinants of EU expats’ registration in European elections

The European Union has seen, over recent decades, the creation of political structures spanning the continent. It has coincided with increased citizen mobility, with millions of Europeans opting to live, work and stay in other EU member states. Here, Yves Dejaeghere, Luana Russo, and Louise Nikolic show that political habits that have been acquired in a citizen’s home country are determinants of EU expats’ registration in European elections

We didn\u27t have courage : Internalizing Racism and the Limits of Participatory Action Research

This article follows a group of Latino/a English language learners conducting Participatory Action Research in a segregated school. I examine how students’ perspectives on civic engagement shifted after they joined an after‐school initiative that brought them together with students from a private Jewish day school located directly across the street. Even as students formed new perspectives on civic engagement throughout the year, internalized racism framed how they understood their capacity for civic action

Towards a framework for critical citizenship education

Increasingly countries around the world are promoting forms of "critical" citizenship in the planned curricula of schools. However, the intended meaning behind this term varies markedly and can range from a set of creative and technical skills under the label "critical thinking" to a desire to encourage engagement, action and political emancipation, often labelled "critical pedagogy". This paper distinguishes these manifestations of the "critical" and, based on an analysis of the prevailing models of critical pedagogy and citizenship education, develops a conceptual framework for analysing and comparing the nature of critical citizenship