ABSTRACT
Since democracy and social justice are so central to our conception of why we should educate in a democracy, it is important that we step back and consider what they mean and what they can mean. The British philosopher W. B. Gallie suggested the idea of “contested concepts.” For Gallie, such concepts are inherently subject to multiple interpretations depending on readers values, concerns, experiences, goals, and beliefs. Among these concepts are democracy and social justice and, we would add, freedom, and education. “Democracy” is a contested concept that is ever changing and evolving. Those committed to educating for a socially just democracy must realize it “must be continually debated and transformed to shape and respond to changing social and environmental conditions”. The most common definition of democracy is that it is a system of government where the citizens of a state exercise power to rule the state, either directly (pure democracy) or through electing representatives (representative democracy).
