Risk
When discussing risk factors in the mesosytem students recognised that conflicting transactions can contribute to increasing one’s own group affiliation although did not independently discuss risk factors at this level.
The students did not explicitly talk about ‘us’ versus ‘them’ thinking styles as risk factors that can arise between groups in the mesosystem, although when directed by the facilitators
discussed this in terms of the benefits and resilience debates can build to reduce cognitive biases that can become entrenched and potentially lead to moral reconstrual (Bandura, 1998). The students recognised that debates would stop people ‘bottling up’ their feelings and views, and prevent the from ‘exploding’ because they ‘don’t speak as much [and] have their views heard’.
Building resilience
The literature suggests that the ‘us’ versus ‘them’ thinking styles that can occur between groups in the mesosystem can become an entrenched element of the views of extremist group members. The DCSF toolkit aims to promote debates in schools about current issues to develop multiplist thinking styles to reduce ‘us’ versus ‘them’ patterns and potentially to reduce moral reconstrual of violence against the ‘out-group’ by considering different viewpoints (for example debating for and against the Iraq war). The students were asked to consider this and recognised that this approach could, theoretically, be effective. It was felt that current issue debates would help because some people do not get the chance to share their views and ‘it’s all bottled up inside them and [they are] the people who do something and they just explode’. Although some students felt that their views had already been decided for life, one group recognised that ‘young people are easier to influence’ with regards to their political viewpoint because this is an area where ‘they haven’t got their own views yet’. Debating could help develop these opinions by promoting the skills needed to make informed choices. Having open discussion about current affairs also exposes students to different views to help prevent the fixed viewpoints fuelled by the confirmatory bias that is associated with extremism (Lilienfeld et al, 2009), possibly through a shared social identity (Sindic and
Reicher, 2005). Despite recognising the potential benefits that open discussion on current affairs could have for the preventing violent extremism agenda, students were also concerned about the practical implication of this.
Students in all three schools felt that debating current issues in schools could have potentially harmful consequences because, in the words of one student, teachers ‘can’t control us’. Many of the students felt that debates in schools get ‘out of hand’ and that students ‘scream’ during them because ‘the more you scream the less work you have to do afterwards’ and ‘you always get immature people’ who make contributing difficult. The students felt that teachers often did not have to skills to manage debates in school and that creating a controlled environment for the debate to take place would be very difficult. This was based on their experience debating ‘safe’ issues in school such as uniform policy. In addition to feeling teachers do not have the skills to control debates, the students also commented that they do not feel they have the skills to participate in debates because people ‘just won’t listen to anybody else and then everyone else will just have a go at them and then it will just be an argument’. Some students also do not have the skills or confidence to join in the discussion and if they ‘don’t want to say anything they won’t’.
In addition to feeling staff and students might not have the skills to manage debates in
schools, students in North School also felt that despite ground rules, discussions about current affairs might cause offence to some people. It was felt that ‘there’s the possibility that
someone could say something and then even if it’s one of those things when you say, ‘I won’t get offended’…if somebody says something about you you’re going to have a grudge against them, that’s always going to be there and that might create even more racial tension’. The
students felt that this ‘grudge’ would continue outside the debating session and harm peer relationships and safety in school. This is particularly the case as some ‘immature’ people were felt to be likely to ‘shout out a racist comment’. The students recognised that the people who caused the disruption were likely to be those who needed to explore different viewpoints on current events the most, because they are ‘the people that are going to have problems when they’re older accepting other cultures and races, so everyone needs to be involved’.
Students felt that debate in schools would only be successful if it was something that
interested them and something they had ‘strong opinions’ about. Some of the students felt that ‘current issues’ meant politics and that politics had no relevance to them. South School have a debating club but people do not attend ‘because it’s about politics and stuff’. One student did feel it would be interesting to debate ‘current affairs…because you have a better
understanding of what’s going on because it’s all over the news and everything and you get to express your views about them’. This again suggests that in order to discuss current affairs and violent extremism the curriculum needs to be delivered in a way that ensures contextual relevance to the students, using a variety of sources.
Reporting students’ concerns about this strategy ensures that the research offers a balanced perspective, rather than only reporting data that fit with the status quo and established vocabularies in the toolkit, a criticism Fielding (2004) has levelled at some, so called, ‘empowering’ research.
Using solution-focused approaches, the facilitators explored ways in which the debating strategy proposed by the DCSF (2009) toolkit could be improved so that students could
benefit from the positive aspects they identified from discussing current affairs in schools, whilst lessoning the impact of the negative. Some students felt that one way to achieve this would be through smaller group sizes and consideration of group composition to reduce potential arguments between students who are known to clash. The focus groups were run with 4-10 students in this research and this felt a comfortable number to the facilitators. In the feedback questionnaires a student also commented that ‘it was good having a small group as you got to talk more and have your say’. Even in comparatively small groups (compared to class sizes) of ten, the facilitators found it difficult to reduce the domination of a small number of individuals in the discussion and encourage everyone to contribute (although only two students rated their opportunity to contribute below 5 out of 10). One way the facilitators found effective in encouraging everyone’s contribution was through the use of small group activities within the debate so that people could discuss their ideas before presenting them back to the group. Rating scales to explore consensus were also effective so that even if individuals had not contributed to the group discussion they could indicate how much they agreed with the discussion points. During one focus group a ‘hands-up’ policy was adopted, and whilst it was felt this hampered the group discussion, it did reduce the impact of
individual domination.
Some students felt that improving debates in school would involve having ‘people who agree with you’ because the perception is ‘if you’re the only one who thinks that then you probably won’t say anything and people will just like laugh at you’. This could be facilitated by having the opportunity to discuss the topics in small groups and then presenting shared views as part of a team.
Despite concerns about the practical implications of discussing current affairs in school, no students felt that it would be inappropriate to discuss issues with a religious element critically, as suggested by Resnick (2008).