Stage-managed participation?! social and democratic competences in everyday school life

The creation of opportunities to participate in school organization is linked with the hope of enabling students to partake in social and democratic learning. However, an empirical approach to projects focusing on citizenship education and on the mediation of social competences reveals that the effects hoped for are not always achieved, rather, there exist certain impeding factors. On the basis of debates on classroom rules, the author discusses the thesis that major blockades for democratic and social learning are caused by the contradiction between equality and hierarchy, on the one hand, and by that between autonomy and heteronomy, on the other. Students frequently react by drawing on customary classroom practices, while teachers often alternate between positively enabling and restrictive normative school regulations. An increase in personal responsibility and autonomy among students would thus not only open up opportunities of participation, it should also be considered an incitement towards self-regulation.