Human Rights, Diversity, and National Identity

Book excerpt: Fundamental world changes that simultaneously undermine a nation-state's charisma and promote the rise of a supra-national system have wide-ranging effects upon national states within a modern global society. My dissertation empirically examines the effects of social and cultural globalization on systems of mass schooling, which are central institutions in every country. Globally, primary and secondary education initially emerged as the premier tool for nation-states to create a unified national citizenry loyal to their country and socialized into a common cultural tradition. I examine the extent to which this original nationalizing purpose of schooling is challenged by the increased emphases on universal human rights and diversity in civic education. The analyses consist of two sections. Hierarchical linear models are used to analyze a unique primary data source of 521 social science textbooks from 74 countries during the period 1970-2008. These findings show a worldwide increase in emphasis on human rights and increases in discussions of diversity in well-established liberal democracies. Cross-national, quantitative analyses are complemented by a qualitative case study of social science curricula in British Columbia (BC), which examines nation-building within a context of strong emphasis on diversity and human rights. The BC study utilizes currently approved high school citizenship education textbooks as well as older textbooks dating back to 1871. It also draws on a selection of historical documents, including Ministry of Education reports, curricular frameworks, and high school exit exams. Process-wise, I find the incorporation of human rights and diversity reflects macro-level changes in national and global society. Content-wise, I find four main approaches to reconciling ideas of human rights and diversity with national identity: (1) framing human rights and multiculturalism as part of national identity, (2) using pedagogical approaches that promote multiple perspectives and individual agency, (3) celebrating social and scientific figures and accomplishments as the source of national pride, and (4) drawing on exogenous sources to affirm state legitimacy. This study is one of the first to theorize that civic education worldwide is moving away from a national focus and to provide empirical evidence of this trend. A key implication is that educational systems are being repurposed from their original goal of constructing a unitary national citizenry to a new view emphasizing human diversity and equality in a globally interconnected world. Further, students are increasingly taught that the global civil society and non-state actors are important and legitimate agents of social change.