Teaching Politics in Democracy: A Comparative Analysis of Teaching Profiles and their Correlates

Citizenship education in schools is a significant component of the cultivation of young citizens who are capable of promoting and sustaining democracy. Therefore, the content-related beliefs of teachers of citizenship education and how they teach citizenship and politics in their classrooms matter significantly to the quality of students’ political learning and their understanding of citizenship. Consequently, studying teachers’ beliefs and their teaching strategies is essential to understand how these relate to students’ perceptions and understandings of citizenship and democracy. The present research examines the approaches of teachers of citizenship education in cross-cultural analyses across regions that reflect different cultural and democratic traditions in Asia and Europe. It utilizes large-scale data and employs a teacher-centred statistical approach (latent profile analysis) that accounts for the different regions and their democratic traditions. The distinct ‘teaching profiles’ that result from this analysis are further examined in multilevel analyses to understand the correlates of teachers’ teaching styles and how these ‘teaching profiles’ relate to students’ conceptions of citizenship and their political knowledge. The results of this study are discussed in relation to citizenship education in countries with distinct democratic traditions and in relation to what the findings mean for learning about politics and citizenship in schools.