ABSTRACT

Citizenship Education (CE) from its inception has been seen as the discipline to ascertain and preserve the nation state’s identity. This preservation of identity has proven to be a particularly complicated task within the African postcolonial contexts. This is due to the fact that the contemporary setting in the majority of these nations has been severely altered by their historical experiences with colonialism. This is due to the colonial legacies left behind in this postcolonial era. Zimbabwe is a former British colony that inherited the British education system and after 38 years of independence, it is still trying to move away from these elements not only in its education system but also in its culture. CE in postcolonial contexts such as Zimbabwe is made more complex due to the nature of the space it operates in. CE in Zimbabwe operates in a hard/sensitive space, which is defined as a heavily regulated space, which makes it hard for CE to thrive.

Therefore, in order for CE to advance Zimbabwe through its education system needs to re-articulate the CE discourse to include the African perspective. This re-articulation of the local space from the British perspective and from “hard” to “soft’ is what is needed for CE in Zimbabwe to meet the 21st-century expectations. Zimbabwe is on the horizon of a new CE landscape and thus it is a critical moment for there to be major strides made to influence the current environment.