ABSTRACT
In most times and places the necessity and appropriateness of civic education has been accepted without question. It has been taken for granted that young human beings must be shaped into citizens and that public institutions have both the right and the responsibility to take the lead. In the United States today, however, civic education has become intensely controversial. Some skeptics believe that our political and social arrangements can function perfectly well without publicly denned (or directed) civic education. Others doubt that any one specification of civic education can be devised for a liberal polity in which individuals, families, and communities embrace fundamentally differing conceptions of choiceworthy lives. Still others argue that any unitary civic education violates the autonomy and conscience of many individuals and groups in a diverse society.
