Democratic school as interdisciplinary platform

A reading path in Antonio Banfi's work

Abstract

This work aims to investigate Antonio Banfi’s (1886-1957) reflection on the relationship between education, society and democracy. The analysis conducted within the complex network aims to identify original pedagogical paths in the context of a historicized work. Banfi’s theoretical elaboration during the period of 1948-1957, coinciding with his election to the italian Senate of the Republic, outlined an articulated and dense political commitment aimed at promoting and defending public education as a democratic platform, predisposed for the education and formation of future citizens for their participation in the life of the country. In this important segment of his work, the issue of democracy assumes a prominent role and, in addition to founding the institution-school, illustrates the profile of a horizontal structure whose operational lines intersect in the sign of interdisciplinarity. The network of relationships, interdependencies and references between disciplines, their dialogue, the cooperative and constructive arrangement of an open and progressive knowledge, refers on the one hand to Banfi’s theoretical project, namely that of critical rationalism as a fundamental and systematic dimension, constantly subject to processes of verification and integration of new acquisitions; on the other hand, it relates to the process of building – first and foremost, a values-based – universalistic school and society.