New Foundations, 1921, page 22

 

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SELF-GOVERNMENT. Since the Caldecott Community is an experiment in democracy, the principle of self-government is strongly held. There are three forms of so-called self-government in schools. There is the prefect system, under which the older members of a school help to administer the laws made hy authority ; this is frankly autocracy. Then there is a form of representative or constitutional government which obtains in some schools, hy which the older members, or elected representatives, help to make and administer the laws. Finally there is true self-government or democracy, very rarely to he found, hy which all the members of a community make and administer their own laws. This last is what most modern schools are aiming at. At the Caldecott Community the children are all under the age of fourteen, and although self-government is one of the ideals of the school, it is realised that to force it upon children who are unready for it would he the worst form of tyranny. Dr. Long, in her hook, “ The Psy chology of Phantasy,’’ says that the grown-up is shirking his 30b in shuffling off the responsibility for general organisation upon the children. “ If the disposal of power were to he put indiscriminately in the hands of young children, or in those of an under-developed nation, the result would he chaos and disorder alternating with tyranny. When children are left to govern themselves the natural leaders tyrannise over the rest, and bullying results.” All the machinery of self - government exists in the Caldecott Community, so that as soon as the children are ready for it, it will come into use. The five oldest children, the members of the Senior Study, form a House Committee, with certain duties and privileges. Formal meetings of this committee are held once a week, with one of the Directors in the chair ; and the affairs of the Community are thoroughly discussed, from the effect of spreading jam on bread too long before tea, to the ethics of compulsory chapel. This body is nominally controlled hy the Saturday morning Assembly, when any child can, and occasionally does, impeach any member of the House Committee for officiousness or for breaking rules. The importance and power of the House Committee waxes and wanes periodically. Occasionally it has to he suspended for a time, hut each trial throws fresh light on the subject. Self-government is in fact, at present, more an attitude than a policy. The Directors are never willing to regard any form of autocracy as final, and discussion and suggestion are not only permitted, hut welcomed. While, however, the children are content to leave the organisation of the Community in the hands of the grown-up people, they are not