1. Background

The Council of Europe, which is the oldest European organisation, was set up in 1949 in the aftermath of the Second World War. Its primary aim is to protect and promote human rights, democracy and the rule of law in Europe. The Council of Europe is active in many fields, including culture and education. Over 50 years, it has launched a number of co-operation projects in education in order to promote a culture of democracy and human rights throughout Europe.

At the beginning of the 1990s, as a result of the accession process of the new democracies of central and eastern Europe, the Council of Europe underwent a considerable transformation: the Organisation’s membership more than doubled within a period of 10 years. In such times of change, more systematic work on democracy learning was needed. In 1997, a new project, Education for Democratic Citizenship (EDC), was launched by the heads of state and government of the Council of Europe. This project has since grown considerably, acquired a strong human rights dimension and is now called the Education for Democratic Citizenship and Human Rights (EDC/HRE) project.

By launching this project, the governments of European states acknowledged that people must learn how to become democratic citizens, that they are not born with these skills. At the end of the 20th century, European societies were faced with many problems, such as political apathy, migration movements resulting in increased social diversity, environmental threats and increasing violence. EDC/HRE was seen as a contribution to solving such issues. EDC/HRE is about promoting concrete participation in public life throughout one’s life, about responsibility, solidarity, mutual respect and dialogue. It is in the unique pan-European setting of the Council of Europe that the best experts in the field from all over Europe have met over the last 13 years to work on this issue.