National minorities: levels of educational analysis

The issue of national minorities is, in the process of European construction, one of the most important aspects that European countries have had to manage. The European legislation and practice promote the idea of living together in the sense of social value consisting in accepting otherness, good understanding of the various ethnic groups within the same local communities and openness to communication and cooperation. The European education should not be directed exclusively to knowing the minority communities, but also to understanding the mechanisms of management and development of partnership relations between the minority and the majority. The complexity of education concerning national minorities is given by the need for multiple approaches on different levels and with various depths of analysis that require interdisciplinary conceptual and methodological references. Thus the diachronic analysis of demographic realities is combined with the analysis regarding legislative, administrative-political, cultural-educational, social-economic, linguistic issues, all filtered by European values, framework and national or European framework. In terms of education for and about minorities there is a need to develop a legal and institutional framework to enable and to promote an intercultural education system. National minorities should not only be able to express themselves freely and without any restrictions from the majority by adequate education, but their specific characteristics and particularities should be included in school curricula of the majority.