Revisiting the Role of Education in Global Society: Relevance of the Concept of “Value Generalization” in an Educational Context

Interpreting global society through the morphogenetic approach, the article looks at education as one of the dimensions of social change brought about by the plural process of globalization. The role and vision of education will therefore be questioned to finally claim that education has to be revisited in culturally diverse and complex global societies. Necessary steps include moving from a market- to a human-centred approach to education and taking the paradigm of human rights as the universal point of departure. Indeed, framing the concept of “value generalization” (Joas 2013) within an educational context, the paper argues that human rights should be at the core of the learning process and translated into educational practice, in order to enable people whose value systems are diverse and apparently incompatible to establish creative relationships and, ultimately, recognise and accept common standards and principles that make living together in society possible. In particular, considering school class as a social system, the article concludes that “value generalization” could be regarded as a relevant sociological concept to make the school system an inclusive public sphere and further develop constructive discussions on human rights in the school classroom.