How can we create more democratic futures

This paper starts from the assumption that the current political culture of European democracies is not altogether consistent with the democratic ethos understood as openness to differences. From this assumption, the question that guides this paper is, how to configure a system/process of education that instead of being defined in terms of universality, identity and certainty is configured according to the values of singularity, otherness and possibility? How to reconcile the values of singularity, otherness and possibility with the creation of a sense of community, both of which should be taken as aims of formal educational processes? In order to respond to these questions we analyse the syllabus of specific subjects taught at primary school level of two European countries (Spain and UK)  and show the correlations between the contents of the syllabus, the values that define them and the dispositions they foster. The last part of this paper makes concrete suggestions of changes to the syllabus considered, and show the probability to develop dispositions consistent with the democratic ethos, in comparison to its initial diagnosis.