This article argues that curriculum work can benefit from signifiers of Bildung to promote democracy in public education. The argument is built on the premise that cultural and intellectual traditions that value Bildung presume a link between the inner cultivation of the individual and the development of better societies (Horlacher 2017). I start by presenting Mouffe’s (2000) democratic paradox and how pluralism is the defining feature of liberal democracies. Based on how curriculum work is a standard of public education (Hopmann (...) 1999), I state that the curriculum must formalise pluralism in education and convey the democratic paradox in educational terms. With reference to Laclau and Mouffe’s discourse theory, I then argue that such a laborious task can be achieved in the curriculum with the aid of signifiers of Bildung. Signifiers of Bildung are discursively empty and cannot acquire a definite meaning. Because of this, they make it possible to speak of the student and the society of liberal democracies while impeding a too narrow comprehension of what they are and ought to be. Therefore, to implement signifiers of Bildung in the curriculum can help establish both a standard of public education and limits to popular sovereignty. However, their use must undergo careful scrutiny, and teachers must remain free to interpret them. (shrink)

Learning to work as a relational caring professional in healthcare and social welfare, is foremost a process of transformative learning, of Building, of professional subjectification. In this article we contribute to the design of such a process of formation by presenting a structured map of five domains of formational goals. It is mainly informed by many years of care-ethical research and training of professionals in healthcare and social work. The five formational domains are:Relational Caring Approach,Perception,Knowledge,Interpretation, andPractical Wisdom. The formation process, (...) described as the recurring detour of a continuing practice, requires ‘exposure’, in-depth learning and learning communities. Relational caring—care consequently resulting from and structured by relational thinking, exploring, and steering—requires ‘inquiry’ as a continuous learning process in practice. The process is ultimately aimed at fostering mature, competent, and practically wise professional caregivers who are able to relationally connect with and attune to care receivers, and adequately navigate existential, moral, and political-institutional tensions in relational caring in complex organizations in Late-Modern society. (shrink)