The Civic Interdependence Curriculum

In all countries where it is taught, civic education remains a parochial and nationalist enterprise aimed at cultivating the arts of liberty, within rather than among, national societies. As a result, otherwise virtuous civic curricula end up undermining an awareness of interdependence and the need for global cooperation and democracy. Arising from CivWorld’s Interdependence activities, a small group under the leadership of former City College President Yolanda Moses and Benjamin Barber has developed a “civic interdependence curriculum” meant to be a template for real civic education courses at the high school and college levels.

A version of the curriculum has been adapted to meet New York City public school benchmarks, and has been used at Williamsburg Prep in Brooklyn, N.Y.; other schools including Humanities Prep, The High School of Environmental Studies, and Eleanor Roosevelt High School are potential partners in teaching the new curriculum. In addition, a reader has been published under the title The Interdependence Handbook (edited by Benjamin R. Barber and Sondra Myers).