Intercultural pedagogy is a pedagogical discipline characterized:

- by  the fact that world countries are becoming increasingly multicultural,

-          the recognition that the school grades of the children who are members of ethnic minorities are poorer than those of the children belonging to the ethnic and cultural majority.

Intercultural pedagogy did not develop its own integral pedagogical paradigm, but rather belongs to the group of pedagogies, which respond to social problems and are paradigmatically linked to socio-critical pedagogy. 

 The official standpoint of Europe is (the basic document for the introduction of interculturalism in education was adopted in Dublin in 1983) that interculturalism  brings a new quality into the lives of Europeans. To be a member of a minority should thus not be considered a deficiency, but rather diversity – a different quality. Working with children should not be characterized by paternalism and extraction from ones own culture, but rather by accounting for and acknowledging the differences among people and offering additional help leading to success and not to stigmatization. Interculturalism is linked to demands for abandoning europocentrism and any form of discrimination. The goal of intercultural pedagogy is to learn to live and function in diversity.  The following priority fields of European intercultural pedagogy:

 Mother tongue

All minorities (autochthonous or allochthonous) have a right to preserve their mother tongue, which is why the European intercultural policy has always put forward the demand that classes in the mother tongue of minorities should always be included in the school curriculum. 

Maintaining ones identity

Learning the mother tongue and getting to know ones culture better form a basis in European intercultural pedagogy enabling the minorities to maintain their identity.

The importance of teacher education

Intercultural pedagogy stresses the importance of educating teachers for the needs of intercultural education. Teachers should become familiar with the theory; they should be capable of sociological analysis and prepared to reflect on their potential prejudices and discriminatory practice. They should accept interculturalism as a value.

The importance of intercultural curricula, contents and textbooks

Intercultural pedagogy deals with the formation of intercultural curricula and materials. At the same time it is involved in the analysis of other school subjects and textbooks. It strives towards eliminating eurocentricity and toward loosening the duality at the level between the national and the international, namely between “us” and the “others”.

The development of interculturalism as a pedagogical principle

In order to make the two goals happen (namely an equally successful life for the minority and majority and the capacity to live a peaceful and creative life in a multicultural society) it is not enough to add some subjects and contents to the curriculum, while the school itself remains ethnocentric. As holds for any pedagogical principle, interculturalism too should become steeped in all possible and relevant fields and levels of upbringing and education. 

Expanding the idea of interculturalism across the entire population

The most essential task of intercultural pedagogy is to spread the idea of interculturalism across the entire population. This is in accordance with the values of the democratic world, the functioning of which is based on human rights. This will enable a peaceful existence not only of the minorities but of all humanity in a world where the mixing of different cultures is on the increase due to processes of globalization.

 Minority aid

The spreading of attention toward and ideas of intercultural pedagogy across the entire population, however, does not mean that minorities need no longer be dealt with. On the contrary, they should receive aid in the realization of specific needs, or there will be no success.

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