The affective atmospheres of democratic education: pedagogical and political implications for challenging right-wing populism

ABSTRACT

This paper draws on the concept of affective atmospheres to theorize how democracy and democratic education take hold and circulate in classrooms and schools. The paper asks under which circumstances affective atmospheres are experienced or even ‘engineered’, encompassing affective and material features that (de)legitimate democracy, democratic education and right-wing populism. The aim is to render the concept of atmosphere tractable through a line of theorizing that recognizes the affective force of democracy and right-wing populism and asks how democratic education may respond by paying careful attention to democracy as affectively produced and transmitted. The paper also examines what it would take to reinvigorate the affective atmospheres of democratic education in schools in light of the rise of right-wing populist affectivity. The analysis makes a contribution to the challenge of asking how right-wing populist affectivity might be resisted in the context of democratic education.

KEYWORDS:

• Affective atmospheres
• democratic education
• democracy
• right-wing populism
• pedagogy

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 For example, free speech is one such value that requires exclusions based on harm, therefore, it is not limitless or absolute under any circumstances. This point is directly relevant to this paper, because right-wing populist parties and movements often use free speech to justify their right to make claims that challenge the humanity of others or discriminate against certain groups. I will return in a moment to the point of how one cultivates an affective attachment to a value like that, while taking into consideration its contested nature as a signifier for democratic participation. I am indebted to one of the anonymous reviewers for suggesting this clarification.

2 For example, a concrete example of content could be the Black Lives Matter movement and how socially just pedagogies may be used to teach how this movement is a manifestation of democratic participation to social transformation. Another example of what could be included under a democratic education program is the teaching of critical media literacy and how social media infringe or promote different voices. I am also indebted to one of the anonymous reviewers for suggesting this idea.