Ethnicity, religion and social disadvantage in the formation of education policy: the case of French speaking Belgium - German Education Server

Ethnicity, religion and social disadvantage in the formation of education policy: the case of French speaking Belgium

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This report looks at the question of migration-related diversity at school from the vantage point of policy formation. Our concern is on how public policies have faced the issue of ethnicity, minority cultures, minority religions and social disadvantage in the educational field in French speaking Belgium. As previously discussed in WP1, Belgium may be classified as an old immigration country. However, specific policy developments have been introduced on this matter belatedly. The area of multicultural education is, as we will show, no exception to this general observation. This report is divided into three parts. The first section is a theoretical discussion of how ethnicity, religion and social disadvantage have come to dominate the agenda of educators across many advanced democracies. The second section offers an exploration of Belgian policy initiative of the last two decades dwelling on a review of existing literature and relevant documentary sources. The third section presents the main findings of a qualitative research based on face-to-face interviews and which aimed at analysing the main cleavages and policy-ideas at play within the Belgian political and policy debate on multicultural education.