Since 2010,character education has gaining significant territory in public policies.But there has been academic debate regarding whether character education is over-ly individualized,lacking the spirit of publicness.Supporters of character education argue that character education incorporates education of individuals'civic virtues.Furthermore,character education is committed to solving social conflicts through facilitating society mo-bility.However,the critic literature disagrees these arguments.First,it indicates that'char-acter'is predominantly viewed as a set of soft skills to be developed in order to boot individ-ual labor market outcomes and wider economic growth.Such perspective could be viewed as a way of manipulating individuals'subjectivity.It also serves to protect the status quo of so-cial structure,hiding social conflicts.Second,critics point out that the emphasis on cultivat-ing individuals'civic virtues manifested in daily social interaction.It serves reproducing adapters of given social structure,rather than critical and reflexive agents of positive trans-formation.With a nod of the critics'argument,we believe that publicness of character edu-cation should not be inferred from quantifiable private benefits.Rather,whether individu-als'subjectivities can be defended and safeguarded by the education process is the core of pursuing public good.
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