The influence of liberal studies on students’ participation in socio-political activities: the case of the Umbrella Movement in Hong Kong

Abstract

This paper reports an investigation into how secondary student participants in Hong Kong’s Umbrella Movement related this particular political experience to their learning of Liberal Studies. Questionnaire-based surveys and interviews were conducted to probe their interpretations of Liberal Studies’ impact on their political involvement and their perceptions of national versus local identity. The results indicate that students perceived the subject to have offered them background knowledge necessary for comprehending the movement rather than functioning as the cause of their participation against the backdrop of wider socio-economic conflicts in the community at large. Moreover, the current Liberal Studies curriculum seems to have reinforced students’ sense of a dichotomy between their local and national identities. Further examination of that dichotomy sheds light on both the review of Liberal Studies and another recently proposed, but swiftly shelved, curriculum: Moral and National Education. The study’s broad implications for citizenship education worldwide are also discussed.

Keywords:

• Liberal studies
• local and national identity
• moral and national education
• Umbrella Movement

Notes

1. The six modules are Hong Kong Today, Modern China, Public Health, Personal Development and Interpersonal Relationships, Globalisation, and Energy Technology and the Environment.

2. Scholarism is a student activist group formed by secondary school students. It began life as a pressure group against the introduction of Moral and National Education (MNE) and participated in several anti-MNE protests in 2012.

3. The EDB began the first round of consultation on the Liberal Studies curriculum review in April 2014, and the review was expected to be completed in July 2015.