Deliberative pedagogy for youth democratic agency: Innovative citizenship education in a polycrisis

Democratic citizenship education faces unprecedented challenges in preparing young people for active participation in an era of complex global crises. Current approaches to citizenship education often struggle to meaningfully engage young people in democratic processes, particularly around complex issues like climate change that directly affect their futures. This aligns with broader European concerns about youth democratic disengagement and the need for new educational approaches that foster what the EU’s Horizon DEMOCRAT project (2024) terms "solidary participation" and deliberative competencies. There remains a critical gap between policy aspirations and classroom practice. This research explores how place-based deliberative pedagogy can strengthen democratic citizenship education and youth agency through practical innovation. This study presents and evaluates an innovative deliberative pedagogy model through a case study examining how young people (11-14 years) engage with controversial local decisions that have broader democratic implications. Longo (2023, p.18) defines deliberative pedagogy as "simultaneously a way of engaging in civil discourse about complex and divisive issues, as well as a reflective method of education in which students develop democratic skills by working to address wicked problems." Through this lens, the research explores how students' deliberation of a proposed local coalmine, using narrative analysis, helps develop key democratic competencies: critical thinking, democratic resilience, and capacity for reasoned debate across different viewpoints, temporal and spatial scales. The methodology combines place-based learning with deliberative democratic principles to create what UNESCO (2021, p.2) identifies as a "radical reframing" of education's role in addressing complex environmental, economic and social challenges. The mixed-methods approach evaluates both the quality of deliberative engagement and development of democratic agency through a Deliberative Quality Index, participant surveys, and teacher interviews. Building on work by Samuelsson (2016) and Jerome et al. (2020) on classroom deliberation, this research offers additional insights into how local, place-based innovation can contribute to broader European strategies for democratic citizenship education. Findings suggest that place-based deliberative pedagogy can support development of autonomous democratic agents by connecting learning and analysis of local issues to broader global democratic challenges within the school curriculum, strengthening citizens' capacity for democratic agency. This work has implications for how we might strengthen democratic citizenship education across European contexts, particularly in addressing wicked problems. It responds to calls for educational innovation by providing an adaptable model that bridges theoretical frameworks with practical implementation, offering insights for policymakers, educators, and researchers working to enhance citizenship education and democratic engagement in an increasingly complex world. References: DEMOCRAT (2024) Strengthening democracy through education for democracy: Policy recommendations from the DEMOCRAT Project, Education for Democracy. Jerome, L., et al. (2020) The deliberative classroom and the development of secondary students’ conceptual understanding of democracy. Middlesex University. Longo, N. (2023) Putting deliberative pedagogy in place. In: The Pedagogy of place-based initiatives and anchor institutions. Metropolitan Universities. Samuelsson, M. (2016) Education for deliberative democracy: A typology of classroom discussions. Democracy and Education, 24 (1). UNESCO (2021) Futures of education. March 2021. International Commission on the Futures of Education.