Democratic Citizenship Competences Through Foodmaking: Action-Based Group Work in the Context of a Science Kitchen

The paper explores ways in which action-based interventions can be used to study the manifestation of democratic civic competences in the course of joint action. Conceptually, the work draws on the competence model developed within the Horizon Europe Democrat project (Krüger et al. 2024) and its elaborations (Hytti et al. 2024; Kalev et al. 2025), focusing primarily on democratic resilience among the four core competences, while also addressing the remaining competences: solidary- participation, deliberation, critical thinking and judgement. Empirically, the paper is based on an intervention carried out in Tallinn University science kitchen, where participants were required to make decisions collaboratively, share responsibility, and adapt to tensions and changing conditions that emerged during the process. The data set was formed through a combination of participants’ self-reflections and independent observation. The focus was not on the conscious demonstration of competences, but on how they emerged naturally in the course of group work and were interpreted through lived experience. Food preparation functioned as the context of the intervention as an embodied and meaningful activity for participants, enabling the visibility of group relations, decision-making logics, and ways of coping with tension. The paper provides an overview of the conceptual and methodological foundations of the intervention and the main observations concerning the manifestation of civic competences in action-based group work in the context of foodmaking. We also discuss the potential to use such an approach in democratic citizenship education.