ITALIAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY OF EDUCATION

This essay first discusses the meaning character education can still have in a late modern society, given the current crisis of definite educational purposes, particularly of the moral dimension of education. The author goes on to explain how such a loss of meaning could be traced back to some sort of ‘loss of charisma’ within the educational domain – a hard social fact that has to do both with norms and values and with teachers’ authority and role. Finally, the essay argues for the need of ‘anchorage’ by young people, and articulates the way such a need becomes manifest in the process of identity building, particularly in the public sphere.