ABSTRACT
This study is aimed at understanding the realities of how the concepts of democracy and citizenship are understood by teachers, and are reflected in teacher education curricula in the Kosovo context. The analysis showed that teacher education curricula reflects general skills that are a pre-requisite for the democratic culture but not sufficient in itself. In light of the past and present political context of Kosovo, the surveyed teachers reflected political citizenship as a key concept as opposed to moral and social citizenship. Kosovo reality shows that the wider teacher professional practice context is of paramount importance in order to understand why democracy and citizenship are reflected in a particular meaning or form. When teachers perceive curricula very narrowly, with subjects divided by clear boundaries, teacher practice will be characterized by a highly content and subject specialised approach. This explains why democracy and citizenship are treated as isolated concepts and not considered to be an overarching programme philosophy in teacher education programmes. There is a need for a combined top-down and bottom-up approach reflecting clear focus and strategy to move from political orientation towards moral conceptions as well as community involvement, in order to achieve the goal for democratic culture in schools with teachers as active contributors.
