Democratising Inclusion
摘要
The push for inclusive education, as with any drive towards sustainable development goal, is a collaborative and participatory process. Without the buy-in and input from broad and diverse stakeholder groups, any progress will be stilted and transient. To this end, the transformative, systemic change urgently needed in the education sector is the shared responsibility of educators, policymakers, parents, activists, students, and other interest groups. However, while inclusive education is a shared goal, a shared understanding—or even a shared definition—is hard to come by. A lack of consensus around what education means, and how it should best be delivered, remains largely missing. How should inclusion be defined? Who ultimately decides what constitutes full inclusion? And how can we best navigate situations where a students’ own agency and notions of belonging conflict with the broader goals of the All means all movement? To form a shared understanding of inclusive education, and to increase the participatory nature of education development, a more deliberative approach to policymaking can be helpful. In doing so, the voices of all interest groups can be amplified, and a shared consensus is more likely to be decided upon. ‘Deliberative democracy,’ as it is sometimes known, is grounded in the very inclusive principles of participation, reflection, and mutual respect. In this chapter, Brahm Norwich explores how deliberative democracy can serve as a tool for policymakers in the field of inclusive education. Drawing from a recent citizens’ panel project conducted in the UK, Norwich considers how structured deliberation and decision making that includes diverse stakeholders can offer more nuanced insights into the complex issues of inclusion.