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The article presents the models of the intercultural curriculum in Europe, today; it points out that explicit intercultural curricula are not part of the mainstream European educations systems. The author denounces also the attack to multiculturalism done by some European governments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Can educational mechanisms lower social tension and help achieve social cohesion? If so, how are these mechanisms defined and measured? What is the experience to date with the social utility of education mechanisms? How can one differentiate between an education system that is doing a good job of reinforcing social cohesion and one that is doing a poor job? In this paper; I attempt to respond to these questions by (a) briefly reviewing some concepts of institutional and organizational economics so that the economic implications of education's social cohesion functions can be more clear, (b) reviewing the origins of public schooling so that the reader may place today's educational challenges in historical context, (c) reviewing the anecdotal and field experience to date in the European and Central Asian (ECA) region in meeting the challenges of social cohesion, and (d) drawing some comparisons between the social cohesion performance of education systems in the ECA region and that of the US. In sum, I argue that social cohesion has significant economic benefits; that since its invention in the 17th century, public education has been one of the main contributions to social cohesion in the west; but that countries of the ECA region are having a difficult time replicating the western education experience. In fact, when compared to other pans of the world, the U.S. school system seems to perform rather well with respect to its social cohesion functions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on educational policies in multi-cultural societies. With the influx of migrant workers and immigrants from Southern Europe, North Africa, Caribbean and the Indian subcontinent into the European Economic Community countries, countries have recognized the need to provide equal educational opportunities in a society that is multi-racial, multi-ethnic and multi-cultural. A growing concern for the equality of educational opportunity and for human rights also influenced the development of educational policies.

Contradictory processes are occurring today in Europe. On the one hand flows an ineluctable process of creating a united Europe with open borders and the free flow of people, goods and services, and on the other side multicultural community is disintegrating. Simultaneously, Europe is increasingly becoming a multicultural, multi-religious and multilingual society. Such a society can exist normally only with an intercultural affirmation. Serbia has great experience of life in multicultural communities which is not sufficiently evaluated and, as well as all other European countries, is not only a multi-cultural but a multi-confessional society too. The civil society organizations represent a significant factor of intercultural reaffirmation since they emerged as a response to ethnic and religious intolerance. Starting from the philosophy of the network structure of society and acting in immediate contact with people, while giving the emphasis on their own education, they have become an important factor of changes and humanization of society, supporting the new approach to education too. The trends of globalization and creation of a united Europe pose new challenges to the education both for school learning and lifelong learning. Instead of national myths and xenophobia education and learning must train society for a multicultural, multi-confessional and multi-lingual life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]