ABSTRACT
However, it has to be recognized that the government of most schools still approximates to that of the totalitarian state rather than to a democratic model. In many schools the disposition of the principal (and possibly his staff) is quite simply authoritarian. Not only does the question of giving the pupils a measure of self-government never arise, but the problem of political education in any form is rarely considered. Some lip-service may be paid to 'citizenship' and it may even be assumed that acceptable civic values are being learned incidentally, through lessons in history, geography or religious knowledge. But deliberate attempts to practise children in the skills of political life are encountered only rarely.
