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Abstract
Across Europe there are growing concerns about Islamophobia and far-right and anti-democratic movements. Until Anders Behring Breivik’s July 2011 attacks in which 77 died, Norway’s vulnerability was not perceived as great as that of other jurisdictions. Breivik declared his abhorrence of multiculturalism but also drew the world’s attention to intolerance and xenophobia in Europe, increasingly directed towards Muslims. In response, Prime Minister Stoltenberg spoke widely of ‘the new Norwegian we’, cautioning against exclusionary discourses and underlining that minorities are an equal part of Norwegian society. This paper examines education policy in the context both of extreme right political activity and national and international debates about nationalism and cosmopolitanism, considering ways in which policy supports an inclusive notion of nationhood, and ways in which it promotes an exclusive model of national identity. Drawing on framing questions from the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement’s Citation1995 civic education study, relating to national identity and social cohesion, it examines how programmes address social cohesion, human rights, cultural diversity, and conceptualise minorities. It assesses the effectiveness of cross-curricular approaches to contribute to justice and equality and challenge racism in a multicultural society, proposing an inclusive model of education for cosmopolitan citizenship, which incorporates diversity.
Notes
1. Here the NPP spoke without responsibility since it was not in government until 2013.
2. Interestingly, on election night Erna Solberg described her win as ‘a historic election victory for the right wing parties’ (BBC News 10 September, our emphasis).
3. ‘Minority languages’ refers to all languages other than Norwegian, Sami, Danish and Swedish. It includes widely-spoken UN official languages, such as Mandarin (estimated 900 million native speakers).and Arabic (estimated 280 million native speakers). Norwegian has an estimated 5 million speakers.
4. The first phase IEA study referred to here and subsequent ICCS studies have each generated vast amounts of data, published in international comparative volumes and country studies. See the University of Maryland website for details: www.wam.umd.edu/~iea
5. Among the political and intellectual elites who adopt such discourses, Feteke (Citation2012) lists, in the UK, Conservative education minister Michael Gove, Baroness Caroline Cox (former education adviser to PM Thatcher), Melanie Phillips (Daily Mail columnist), and in Germany, the philosopher Henryk M. Broder (writer at Der Spiegel/ Die Welt).
6. This permits comparisons between our analysis and that of scholars using the same IEA framework for independent small scale studies published in Oxford Review of Education (İnce, Citation2012; Osler & Starkey, Citation2001).
7. The first phase was intended to reflect the voices of teachers and students as well as producing data amenable to statistical analysis, hence the structured case studies. This qualitative data enabled the development of a test of civic knowledge, political attitudes and civic behaviour used in later phases and provided a context for subsequent quantitative data analysis (Torney-Purta, Citation2003).
8. Education was given limited attention in the large government-initiated research project Power and Democracy (1998–2003) (NOU, Citation2003).
9. It does not review the extensive range of commercially-produced text-books.
10. We have used the Norwegian originals for our preliminary analysis but, where possible, provide references/web links to an English language translation.
11. When we began our study in 2011 school council work was part of the formal national curriculum. This is no longer the case.
12. There is little, if any, acknowledgment that historically the Christian church has not generally buttressed democratic participation, defended minority rights, or supported gender equality.
13. The Committee on the Rights of the Child Concluding Observations (2 June 2000, para: 26–7) expressed the view that Norway’s curriculum on ‘Religions, Knowledge, and Ethical Education’ may be discriminatory; expressing concern regarding the exemption process, recommending a review of implementation and an alternative exemption process. Some parents took their case to the UNHRC (Leirvåg and others v. Norway 2004), claiming that the subject, with its Christian emphasis, was incompatible with freedom of religion under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) Article 18: Right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion and respect for the liberty of parents to ensure the religious and moral education of their children in conformity with their convictions (UNHRC, Citation2004). Other parents took their case to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) (Folgerø and others v. Norway, 15472/02, judgment of 29/06/2007 – Grand Chamber). The UNHRC concluded the religion and ethics curriculum and the limited exemption system breached ICCPR Article 18(4) and was incompatible with other instruments including the Convention on the Rights of the Child. The UNHRC ruled the Christian education curriculum was not delivered in ‘neutral and objective way’. For the full judgement: http://www.unhchr.ch/tbs/doc.nsf/0/6187ce3dc0091758c1256f7000526973?Opendocument. The ECHR found the religions and ethics curriculum violated Article 2, Protocol 1 of the European Convention. The 2008 Purpose Clause of the Education Act aimed ‘to respond to the concern of qualitative equality between Christianity and other religions and philosophies’ with changes in the exemption provisions.
14. The listed national minorities are Kvens (people of Finnish descent), Jews, Forest Finns, Roma and Romani people/Travellers.
15. Immigrants are defined as persons not born in Norway and those born in Norway without a Norwegian-born parent.