Katja Meier's founding speech

Speech by Minister Katja Meier on the foundation

of the John Dewey Research Center for the Didactics of Democracy

Press conference on October 6, 2020 with handover of the funding decision. Please note that the speech was held in german and this is a translated version.

Today I have the great pleasure of handing over the funding decision for a new project to the Rector of the Technical University, Prof. Staudinger. This funding will enable the establishment of a new institution at TU Dresden, the John Dewey Research Center for the Didactics of Democracy.

There is no need for me to explain here and now why democratic education in Saxony is becoming increasingly important for all social groups, age groups and professions. And in the context of education for democracy, the questions of how we actually do this, how events find an audience, how exhibitions and publications really appeal, are becoming increasingly important. We ask ourselves: How can the commitment of the many people and institutions in the country to democratic education really lead to a change in attitudes and political culture?

The new research center aims to find answers to such questions. It will support and advise stakeholders in extracurricular education in the preparation, development and evaluation of programs. It will provide the various providers and institutions with understandable and applicable tools, material and knowledge for dealing with anti-democratic attitudes, which will make democracy work in Saxony more targeted and effective.

The research center is a further building block in a series of democracy-promoting measures from the SMJusDEG, with which we are demonstrating that the expansion of our institution's tasks into a Ministry of Justice and Democracy, Europe and Equality is sensible and productive. You will have noticed that we were able to announce the founding of the Else Frenkel-Brunswik Institute at Leipzig University three weeks ago and we will be launching further projects in the coming months.

TU Dresden is an excellent partner for us in this endeavor. Firstly, I was interested to read that you formulated Ms. Staudinger as one of your goals for the development of the university:

"The university today has a responsibility to also become active as a social player. We want to do this to strengthen our liberal democratic legal system, but also with regard to the other major challenges of our time. We will develop interesting, low-threshold offers in the city and in the country to make the latest research findings accessible, tangible and usable."

It is precisely these two points that come together in the new research center: The strengthening of our free democratic legal system and low-threshold offers, especially outside the big cities.

On the other hand, we can build on more than ten years of work by Prof. Anja Besand, who researches the didactics of political education, but has also been and continues to be very effective in committees and advisory functions in the development of school-based political education projects. We can tie in with other research institutions and projects and further cooperation and connections will certainly arise.

Precisely because I consider the research center to be so important, I would like to thank all those who have prepared today's foundation: Prof. Anja Besand for the intensive technical preparation and the University Executive Board of TU Dresden for the quick and trusting preparation and support up to this point.

I wish you every success - this will be important work for Saxony and I am sure that you will implement it creatively and productively, as we know you from your previous work. I look forward to a fruitful and long collaboration.

Prof. Staudinger and Prof. Besand will now provide you with information on the technical plans and tasks and on the namesake, and I look forward to your questions afterwards.