Introduction -- 1 A resurgence of civil action -- 2 Apatehtic or activist? Young people, citizenship and the public sphere -- 3 The organizing potential of networks and social media: Challenges and opportunities -- 4 The 'failures' of democracy and democratic education in Australia -- 5 A new understanding of civic participation: Citizens in action or citizens in waiting -- 6 Justice Citizens as a model of civics and citizenship education -- 7 Using complexity theory to navigate roadblocks in critical pedagogy -- 8 Justice pedagogy: A framework for active citizen education -- Conclusion.

This book explores alternative models of civics and citizenship education. Specifically, it uses Justice Citizens, a participatory research and film-making project, as a tool to examine young people’s ideas about active citizenship and participation in public spaces. It introduces a framework that seeks to explore the diverse and apparently contradictory nature of young people’s active citizenship. The framework draws on complexity theory combined with critical pedagogy and democratic education to formulate an approach to developing active citizenship among young people. This approach extends theories of both critical pedagogy and education for citizenship, and by doing so seeks to explain the variegated nature of young people’s engagement with civil society. This book contains a valuable repository of ideas and resources for application for teachers to use in schools and classrooms. Academics engaged in initial teacher education, at both primary and secondary levels, will find the framework of use when describing the importance and new approaches to civics and citizenship education within the current school and policy environments. .