From democratic school to civic and political participation / De la escuela democrática a la participación política y ciudadana

Abstract

The aim of this article is to study the possible influence that exercising a representative role at school may have on secondary school students’ willingness to participate politically in society. In order to do this, an analysis was carried out of the answers given by 300 students between 13 and 18 years old, from a school with marked democratic practices, when asked about their experience of democracy at school and their intention to participate politically. The results show that students’ willingness to participate in society by means of conventional actions, such as voting, does not depend directly on whether they have exercised a representative role at school. However, non-conventional actions, such as attending demonstrations or supporting boycotts, does have a meaningful relation with the exercise of representative roles in the school. As a conclusion, we highlight that participating in the representation of the school influences the democratic formation of students and their willingness to participate politically in society, although this influence is more closely related to non-conventional actions, such as strikes, boycotts and demonstrations.