Rights in education: outlines for a decolonial, childist reimagination of the future – commentary to Ansell and colleagues

Abstract

In this piece, we reflect upon a recent article published in Fennia by Ansell and colleagues. We identify and discuss aspects of learning that educational research, policies and institutions can consider, addressing the needs and subjectivities of learners and activating a politics around rights in education. Rights in education foreground the intrinsic value of learning,
inviting us to realign the purpose of education with the overall purpose of life on this planet. It pursues a ‘bottom-up’ strategy for rethinking education as community formation to incorporate complex sources of knowledge and modes of knowing and becoming for children. In order to think about rights in education, we uphold an analytical distinction between schooling and education. The distinction enables us to raise some questions, reflect on them and suggest preliminary ideas for decolonial, childist strategies to envisage education, highlighting how education and the ‘future’ are
intimately woven and exploring what they mean for each other and for childhood. We do so particularly by critiquing ‘western schooling’ as a mode of learning which is a conspirator of capitalism deeply rooted in philosophical racism and contributing to a global epistemological loss. Finally, we outline four strategies of moving forward with a decolonial,
childist lens of reimagining education as community formation and welcome further discussions on rights in education.