New APPG on Political Literacy

On January 19th, a new All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) dedicated to political literacy and citizenship education launched in the UK’s Westminster Parliament. APPGs are cross-party groups of members from the House of Commons and the House of Lords, who work with partners in the public, private and third sectors to raise the profile of important issues. The APPG on Political Literacy will do just that by providing evidence on, and arguing for, an education that enables all young people to play an informed, active role in our democracy regardless of their background.

From an academic perspective, a democratically literate society is a goal for all time. Yet equally, this APPG comes at a timely moment insofar as it is responsive, on one hand, to the increasingly fractured and indeed fractious nature of UK politics and, on the other hand, to the current deficit of political literacy seen in UK schools (as taught through ‘civic’, ‘citizenship’, or ‘democratic’ education). 

In England, we have citizenship education on the national curriculum, but ongoing research suggests that this is only taught discretely in a fifth of schools. The 2019 School Workforce Census suggests that just 1 in 7 schools have a single trained citizenship teacher, and that where the subject is taught and/or reported to be taught, it accounts for just 1.5% of learning hours. In Scotland, only roughly 30% of students are likely to receive any political literacy education through Modern Studies, and in Wales and Northern Ireland political literacy is again diluted as features or ‘themes’ within personal and social development curricula. The lack of a clear grounding in politics during primary and secondary education also means that qualifications in Politics at ages 16 and 18 lag well behind other mainstream subjects in terms of entry figures.

There is, then, a lot to be done, but the effort is worth expending.

Academic research suggests, for instance, that where civic education is done well and received consistently, it may increase social capital, support for democracy, political knowledge, expressive political participation, voter turnout, and even political ambition. Crucially, there is also growing evidence that it can mitigate known inequalities in these same variables that we tend to see in adult populations by gender, ethnicity and socio-economic status.

Pursuant to the goal of giving every young person equitable access to opportunities to develop their civic competences, the APPG on Political Literacy supports a mandate to:

(a) provide every child with a minimum entitlement of political literacy in school by, in the first instance, resourcing and monitoring existing requirements to teach citizenship education (including the role of teacher training) at Key Stages 3 and 4 in England and through alternative routes in the other constituent nations of the UK;

(b) explore the potential for new and/or improved qualification trajectories, including the possibility to enhance provision through a new GCSE, EPQ, or BTEC;

(c) strengthen the profile of political literacy in schools by incentivising educational authorities and system leaders to raise the status of citizenship and political education in the curriculum, as well as driving the increased uptake of related qualifications within existing assessment and classification metrics; and

(d) enhance and conduct research to provide more evidence for the link between political literacy and democratic participation.

Having worked in this space in multiple guises over recent years, I am delighted to be a co-founder of this APPG along with its secretariat Shout Out UK. As we move forward, I will chair an academic advisory board comprised of researchers from around the UK. Together, we’ll be supporting our parliamentary colleagues on the APPG to take solutions-focused and evidence-based approaches to advancing its core aims. In this endeavour, I am also delighted to have the support of the Political Studies Association. On the new APPG, PSA chair Professor Roger Scully commented: “As an organisation committed to advancing the understanding of politics, the Political Studies Association of the United Kingdom warmly welcomes the launch of this new All-Party Parliamentary Group on Political Literacy. We very much hope that the APPG is able to raise awareness of the importance of widespread political literacy for a healthy democratic society, and we at the PSA look forward to contributing to that work”.

 If you would like to get involved with the APPG, academically or otherwise, please get in touch with me at james.weinberg@sheffield.ac.uk.