Democratic Education and Social Learning Theory

Abstract

THE ROLE OF MORAL DEVELOPMENT IN THETHEORY OF DEMOCRATIC EDUCATION In a passage that anticipates a large contemporary literature about the aims of public education, Amy Gutmann asserts that common schools help children to develop "the capacities for choice among good lives" so they can participate "in collectively shaping their society." State control and the principle of non-repression prevent adults from limiting children's deliberative scope. Though parents and community may legitimately predispose children toward some conceptions of the good life and away from others, they may not "sanction imposition of non-critical consciousness on children." 1