Reformasi and teachers' implementation of civic education in West Sumatra, Indonesia

This study focuses on how civic education is changing in the context of democratization and decentralization in West Sumatra, Indonesia. The dissertation investigates how teachers’ beliefs and practices have changed along with democratization and educational reform, how teachers are connected to political change and the reform of civic education at the national level, and what changes have been and are being made to civic education at the national and local levels. Specifically, the study examines how teachers in senior secondary school classrooms in two schools in West Sumatra obtained information about changes and how they used the information gained in their teaching. It considers what good teachers did in the classroom and how they explained their actions in view of their ideas about civic education and democratic citizenship. Finally it considers whether the civic education provided has contributed to democratization or to producing democratic citizens. An ethnographic case study was done over 16 months (2002–2004) in West Sumatra, consisting of school and classroom observations, document reviews, and interviews at school, city, province and national levels. The overall research question is: How is civic education really changing in the context of democratization in Indonesia? The following questions were investigated to answer the main research question: How have teachers’ beliefs and practices changed along with democratization? What changes have been and are being made to civic education at the national level? How are teachers connected to the reform of civic education at the national level