The Role of Education for Democracy in Linking Social Justice to the ‘Built’ Environment: The Case of Post-Earthquake Haiti

The manner in which the built environment is constructed has a tremendous effect on the degree to which health, wealth and social outcomes are distributed within a society. This is particularly evident when a crisis of the natural environment affects the built environment, as was the case after the Haitian earthquake of 2010. Understanding the consequences of the earthquake as socially precipitated rather than a natural occurrence requires a paradigm shift, a project for educational policy, pedagogy and epistemology. In particular, education for democracy in its broadest sense can serve to re-align thinking towards understanding the connection between the built environment and social justice. In this article the authors present their research with teacher-education candidates and the candidates' perspectives and experiences of education for democracy at a Canadian university. In relating these perspectives to the possibilities for contextualizing the aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti, the authors propose educational policy solutions that highlight a thick democracy, social justice, the role of context and history, and a more concrete connection with public health.