Home is Where the Heart is”: Learning and Teaching Political Ideology Through Interior Design

In the United Kingdom political ideology remains a core component of studying Politics and International Relations, yet despite varied innovations in the discipline, innovations in learning and teaching political ideology specifically are relatively sparse. Using a metaphor offered in Michael Freeden’s morphological approach and guided by the principles of active collaborative learning throughout, this article explores the potential of an original and technologically innovative activity designed to aide students’ conceptual understanding of three Western political ideologies - namely, Liberalism, Conservatism, and Socialism. Drawing on a sample of 36 volunteers from a year one, undergraduate political ideologies module, through a focus group discussion and questionnaire there was unanimous agreement as to the intended usefulness of the activity, as too, the creation of a collaborative, engaging, and memorable learning experience.