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CEPPA Talk (in person) – Ben Sachs-Cobbe (St Andrews)
September 15, 2022 @ 4:00 pm - 5:30 pm
Location: Edgecliffe G03 and Teams
Title: What’s wrong with teaching our children to be good citizens?
Abstract: Character education is a common part of schooling in the U.S. and U.K., and one popular argument in favour of character education is that it is conducive to producing citizens who have the virtues that make someone a good citizen. But there is an oft-heard objection to the idea that educators should try to inculcate the virtues of citizenship, namely that doing so serves a conservative agenda. In this talk I investigate what separates a conservative from an anti-conservative theory of good citizenship, and conclude that educating children for the virtues of citizenship cannot possibly serve a conservative agenda, or for that matter any controversial political agenda at all.