사회과에서 민주주의 개념과 관련된 국가 정체성 교육 내용에 대한 비판적 고찰

Abstract

This study aims to critically analyze concepts related to national identity in social studies, whose purpose is to nurture democratic citizens under the circumstance where controversy over national identity related to the notion of democracy has been raised recently. The content of this study performed in order to achieve its purpose is as follows. First, the followings are to sum up the concept of national identity in the form of propositions based on the theory of constitutional interpretation about the notions related to Korea's national identity. Firstly, the key to Korea's identity is democracy and the expression of democratic republic is an agreeable smallest common factor. Secondly, modern democracy encompasses liberal and social democracy and the democratic principles of Korea's constitution are based on the combination of both. Thirdly, it is valid to find Korea's identity from the basic principles of constitution embracing the principles of constitutionalism and welfare state as well as the principle of democracy. Second, the discussion and suggestive points are presented as follows by summing up the results of analyzing the content of social studies related to national identity by each school level. First of all, social studies of elementary school introduce national forms according to national identity and basic rights in the constitution in textbooks but the introduction of concepts is rough. In the case of liberal democracy, democracy and liberal democracy are in mixed use in similar contexts. Next, social studies of middle school do not deal with exact meanings of the concepts related to national identity such as democratic republic or liberal democracy but such notions emerge in the subject of history, which lead to students' confusion about terminology, and the content is organized in such a way of causing a worry that the identity of Korea may be recognized rashly as liberal democracy. In addition, to look into social studies of high school, by introducing liberal democracy as a basic principle of the constitution it results in students' rash recognition of the national system as liberal democracy and overlapping of the basic principles of the constitution also needs to be reconsidered. Meanwhile, in the case of social studies, the basic free and democratic order is used as a similar term to liberal democracy and this may trigger students' confusion and misunderstanding over the concept of national identity. In particular, the textbooks on Korean history have some problem in that it described Korea's history of political development as the history of liberal democracy development not the history of democracy development, which is very controversial. Third, the suggestive points about improvement in education on national identity based on the above research results are as follows. Firstly, in terms of educational policies, educational policies related to national identity corresponding with the ideology of constitution need to be created and implemented. Secondly, in terms of curriculum, organization of curriculum and improvement of their composition system are needed so that education on Korea's national identity may be systematically conducted within the viewpoints and framework of democratic civic education. Thirdly, in terms of textbooks, improvement on textbook composition system and content are necessary so that education on national identity may be conducted with internal stability from the perspectives of democratic civic education.