Based on the premise that practicing human rights protection equals to democratic rule of law, and there is no one right way to educate for democratic leadership, but understanding that democratising the educational process is important, the Symbiosis School of Political Studies in Greece aims to foster democratic governance and participation in public debate by promoting democratic political culture, civic participation, free media, and by giving a voice to those marginalized or unheard.

The question of citizenship lies at the heart of the legitimacy of rule and political subjectivity. Discussions on citizenship – what it means to be a citizen, who can act as a citizen, what obligations derive from citizenship – are at the forefront of much political discourse. Time again and again we seek to understand how citizenship is claimed, disputed, built — in short, enacted. Citizenship has been an unprecedented project in the making. But it is not simply about status and rights. There is a dynamic element too: citizens, migrants, refugees, illegal aliens and states, all enact claims to citizenship. How do acts shape our ideas of subjects of citizenship, and the very idea of citizenship itself? Acts that articulate claims to citizenship (and produce claimants) create new sites of belonging and identification, differing from traditional, and still important, sites of citizenship, such as voting, social security and military obligation. Acts of citizenship stretch across boundaries and produce new subjects and scales of citizenship. We expand the focus from what people say (opinions, perceptions, attitudes) to what people do – an important supplement, and sometimes a corrective, to a conventional focus on what people or authorities — be it the CoE, the EU, as well as national courts, agencies, and organisations — say about citizenship and identication”

Despina Syrri

Co – Founder of Symbiosis-School of Political Studies in Greece, affiliated to the Council of Europe Network of Schools