Understanding barriers to teaching political and controversial issues holistically: The hegemonic barrier model from a Gramscian perspective

Yusuf Erhan Bencamin Onganer

doi:10.29329/pedper.2026.214

Understanding barriers to teaching political and controversial issues holistically: The hegemonic barrier model from a Gramscian perspective

Yusuf Erhan Bencamin Onganer Department of Social Studies Education, Necatibey Education Faculty, Balıkesir University, Balıkesir, Türkiye https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8730-7667

DOI

https://doi.org/10.29329/pedper.2026.214

Abstract

Teaching political and controversial issues promotes students' critical thinking, democratic deliberation, and civic engagement. Nonetheless, educators encounter a range of legal, curricular, institutional, cultural, and professional constraints. This conceptual article introduces the Hegemonic Barrier Model to elucidate the conditions under which these challenges become hegemonic and influence classroom decision-making. Employing a theory-driven synthesis, the study reorganizes patterns identified in the literature through the lens of Gramsci’s concepts of hegemony, coercion and consent, the integral state, common sense, good sense, and the pedagogical role of intellectuals. It delineates three interrelated domains of hegemonic operation: structural-regulatory, institutional-societal, and cultural-ideological. Furthermore, it conceptualizes intellectual-pedagogical mediation as a bidirectional process through which teachers may reproduce, negotiate, resist, or transform these influences. The article proposes six analytical manifestations: legal constraints, curriculum, school and societal pressures, historical narratives, teacher identity and professional subjectivity, and assumptions regarding students’ political agency. Rather than treating these constraints as discrete barrier categories, the analysis examines how power relations, legitimacy boundaries, institutional expectations, and teachers’ professional judgments interact to shape pedagogical choices within specific contexts. Consequently, the model functions as a relational analytical framework rather than a causal or prescriptive instructional model. The study concludes that a difficulty attains a hegemonic character when it is embedded within asymmetrical power relations, engenders the selective legitimation of particular forms of knowledge, narratives, or subjectivities, is sustained through varying combinations of coercive and consensual mechanisms, and is translated via intellectual-pedagogical mediation into a constriction of opportunities for knowledge acquisition, discussion, or participation. The article advocates for enhancing legal clarity, curricular flexibility, institutional protection, professional autonomy, and teacher education. Future research should empirically test the model’s applicability across diverse contexts and incorporate negative and contrasting cases.

Keywords

Political and controversial issues, Hegemony, Hegemonic barrier, Pedagogical mediation, Teacher subjectivity

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How to Cite

Onganer, Y. E. B. (2026). Understanding barriers to teaching political and controversial issues holistically: The hegemonic barrier model from a Gramscian perspective. Pedagogical Perspective, 5(2), 526-550. https://doi.org/10.29329/pedper.2026.214