Adult Education and the Formation of Citizens

"Citizenship education is typically viewed as an unproblematic ‘good’ thing that empowers adults to participate fully in a democratic society. In this fascinating volume, Andreas Fejes and his colleagues outline the normative nature of citizenship education and challenge the idea that those not receiving such education are somehow ‘less than’ full citizens. Drawing on Foucault’s ideas they analyse conceptions of citizenship and practices of education as regimes of truth, and explore the ways that power relations shape citizenship as a process of inclusion and exclusion."

Stephen Brookfield, John Ireland Endowed Chair, University of St. Thomas, Minneapolis-St. Paul, USA.

"Never has there been time when we need more strategic adult education oriented to formal, nonformal and informal sectors, to address the ongoing crises in citizenship and global civil society. In putting adult education at the centre, the authors not only fill a deep gap in citizenship education, they push for more careful consideration of the many challenges citizens face globally. This book is a must read for those of us interested in the discourses of citizenship, adult education, and global civil society."

Leona M. English is Professor of Adult Education at St. Francis Xavier University, Canada.

"This book addresses ongoing, key discussions on citizenship education, contributing an analysis disentangling current questions regarding constructions of citizenship. Hopefully this book can contribute to wise solutions to these kinds of wicked problems of our times. As such, the book should be of interest to a wide range of students and scholars interested in the current conditions for adults’ learning and participatory citizenship."

Annika Pastuhov, Postdoctoral researcher, Linköping University and Åbo Akademi. Book review published in Adult Education Quarterly, DOI: 10.1177/0741713618807849

"This book sketches, on the basis of a fruitful combination of theoretical and empirical research, the directions that formal and non-formal adult education have taken over the last decades in Sweden in connection with changing societal circumstances...I intuitively believe that the insights and critiques presented in this book also apply to many other countries in Europe and beyond. It could be very relevant to replicate this kind of research also in other European countries."

Danny Wildemeersch, Professor Emeritus of Social and Cultural Pedagogy, University of Leuven, Belgium. Book review published in Studies in the Education of Adults, DOI: 10.1080/02660830.2019.1619895