The White Paper on Governance by the European Commission describes the paradox that "Europeans want political leaders to find solutions to the major problems confronting our societies, but increasingly distrust institutions and politics or are simply not interested in them". Citizens complain that the political field is not able to solve current problems, but on the other hand they feel increasingly incompetent to understand political processes and to participate, not only in political partys, but also in other organisations as trade unions or NGOs.
In order to solve current and future problems, we need a competent society. Therefore, democracy learning and a democratic learning culture has to become a key element in the process of lifelong learning. Democracy learning means to build-up the competences that are neccessary in order to critically understand political processes and to actively participate. Democracy learning does not refer to specific course contents. Democracy learning takes place in specific spaces and within a specific learning culture. Democracy is not considered a system without power, democracy learning means to understand power relationships and to be able to act competently within them.
In this sense, the Dlearning-project intends to identify learning spaces for democracy and to develop concepts, approaches and projects. There are going to be three key fields of work:
In the first we are going to work on a glossary and elements of a basic concept. The results will continuously be published on this web site.