The focus within the European tradition of democratic education has increasingly been on personal traits or character traits, values, and skills, rather than on broad structural features or systemic issues. This is reflected in a recent publication by the Council of Europe titled Competences for Democratic Culture: Living Together as Equals in Culturally Diverse Democratic Societies. In that publication relevant character traits are grouped under the heading ‘competences for democratic culture’. We scrutinize the notion of ‘democratic competences’ which is developed in the publication and suggest a different one. The Council of Europe presents a model with 20 competences, each of which falls into one of four categories: (1) a value, (2) an attitude, (3) a skill, or (4) knowledge and understanding. We suggest a notion of competences where a competence is conceived of as a complex construct composed of elements from all these categories. We then describe seven democratic competences, grounded in a Deweyan conception of democracy, which we think are both central to a democratic culture while also educationally relevant and manageable.

It is widely accepted that vagueness in law calls for a specific interpretation of the law—interpretation that changes the meaning of the law and makes it more precise. According to this view, vagueness causes gaps in the law, and the role of legal interpretation in the case of vagueness is to fill such gaps. I argue that this view is mistaken and defend the thesis that vagueness in law calls only for an application of the law to the case at hand, leaving the meaning of the law intact.

This paper is about the use of literary work for character education. It focuses on the following question: How can Laxdaela Saga be used as a vehicle of character education for teenagers? The answer is partially based on a review of literature from a neo-Aristotelian framework and Kantian conception of morality and partially on qualitative and quantitative data collected in three schools where Laxdaela Saga was taught for six weeks. The participating teachers found that an emphasis on moral issues was not a digression but supported them in teaching the story and helped the students understand it.

Democratic and Inclusive Education in Iceland: Transgression and the Medical Gaze