Climate change and democratic education

This chapter analyzes the advantages and disadvantages of democracies over nondemocracies when it comes to responding adequately to climate change in order to reflect on their implications for democratic education, understood as an ideal of education in which those educated come to a personal, informed awareness of the nature of political reality and a personal and informed understanding and assessment of the value of the two main components of the ideal of democracy: popular sovereignty and the recognition of human beings’ fundamental equality. The chapter offers three conclusions. First, we have reason to invest in democratic education – not just climate education. Second, radical (or agonistic) democratic education can be considered an important corrective and supplement to other approaches. Third, the primary value of democratic education, in the face of climate change, lies in responsibilizing students – fostering serious personal engagement with the issue.