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Recent moves towards greater pupil participation in school decision-making have in part been based on instrumental rationales, such as increases in test scores and improvements in behaviour. This article assesses a different approach — that of the ‘prefigurative’ — through which the school embodies the democratic society it aims to create.Two examples of prefigurative initiatives in Brazil are assessed: the Landless Movement, a social movement for agrarian reform that runs a large network of schools in its rural communities, and the Plural School, a framework of social inclusion in the municipal education system of Belo Horizonte. Qualitative case studies of the two showed significant enhancement of the democratic culture of the schools and changes in the teacher—student relationship. However, a number of problematic issues were also raised, including the difficulties in extending participation to the whole student body, and the tensions with teachers when students began to exert greater influence in school. Finally, the implications of these prefigurative cases for an understanding of education for democratic citizenship are drawn out.
Tristan McCowan (Mon,) studied this question.