Human Dignity, Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Justice and Waldorf in North America

Image Credit: Interaction Institute for Social Change | Artist: Angus Maguire.

The question is, how can Waldorf education respond to the current challenges? Should Waldorf schools and associations respond internally but also externally by taking an explicit, public stance? A further question is the nature of the response. Does Waldorf reply by quoting Steiner, in the assumption that this answers all questions, or is it necessary to frame a response that goes further and takes a contemporary stance, one that acknowledges the actual social, cultural and political realities in each country?

In keeping with the emergent consciousness about human and civil rights and Steiner’s discourse on educating toward inner freedom, the Association of Waldorf Schools in North America (AWSNA) reviewed and, after considerable discussion with member schools, expanded its core shared principles to include a more explicit reference to inclusion and diversity. This statement, also known as Principle 8, was approved in 2024, and then revised in 2025 to make the language more representative of the Waldorf community rather than public discourse. Principle 8 states:

Waldorf schools honor and embrace human diversity and dignity

Waldorf schools celebrate the diversity of humankind. Faculty, staff, and board pursue a path of human dignity and equity in organizational, leadership, and pedagogical realms. Schools are engaged in understanding and addressing the current and historical roots of inequity. These endeavors are of spiritual, moral, and educational importance and are rooted in Waldorf education’s founding vision, which included addressing contemporary social struggles within the context of the life of the school.

AWSNA is a voluntary membership organization of more than 160 independent Waldorf schools and institutes across the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Unlike a ministry of education or a governing board, AWSNA does not direct its member schools — it supports them. Decisions that affect all members require genuine consensus, built through eight geographic regions whose delegates carry ideas back and forth between the association and their schools over months, sometimes years. This structure reflects Waldorf education's deep commitment to collaborative decision-making. It also means that when consensus is reached, it carries real weight.

The journey toward what became Principle 8 — AWSNA's formal commitment to human diversity and dignity — began well before its adoption in June 2024 and revision in June 2025. Conversations about accessibility, multiculturalism, and diversity have been a large part of anthroposophical and Waldorf work in North America for over 40 years. An example is illustrated by the Council of Anthroposophical Organizations’ published statement.

In 2019, AWSNA member schools affirmed a commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion rooted in the anthroposophical understanding of the spiritual nature common to all human beings. Then came 2020 and a moment of compound rupture: the global pandemic and the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, sending shockwaves through American society and through Waldorf communities. All were confronted with how much remained unexamined and undone in terms of social and economic justice. The racial justice statement AWSNA published that spring was urgent and necessary, but it was also a beginning, not a conclusion.

As a Class Teacher and delegate in the Great Lakes Region during this period, Williams witnessed both the depth of commitment and the genuine difficulty of the work. A formal task force was convened in 2021-2023, with regional representatives from across North America, to ask a harder question: should diversity, equity and inclusion be embedded not just in policy statements, but in the foundational Principles themselves — the same Principles that guided the definition of an independent Waldorf school through the accreditation process? This was not a simple question. Conversations in regional meetings surfaced real concerns: Would a new Principle be substantive or merely performative? Would specific language around racism or social justice feel nation-specific in ways that excluded Canadian and Mexican schools with different histories and contexts? Was there a risk of divisiveness in communities already navigating significant cultural tensions?

These were honest questions, asked in good faith. The task force moved through multiple rounds of drafting and regional input, revising language carefully, before bringing a proposal to the full membership for further deliberation. In June 2024, Principle 8 was affirmed at the AWSNA Teacher’s Conference held in Denver, Colorado. It is now part of the accreditation framework — not aspirational language, but an assessable criteria that every member school is expected to address in its organizational, leadership, and pedagogical life.

This commitment was made before the current political moment in the United States. Now all stances addressing diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging in the USA are under considerable pressure and that commitment is being tested in ways no one anticipated.

Terminology matters, and translation adds complexity. Human dignity translates straightforwardly across languages, but equity and equality — though both imply fairness — are not the same thing. Equality assumes that treating everyone identically is just; equity recognizes that people begin from different starting points and that fairness sometimes requires differentiated support. To treat a child who has experienced systemic disadvantage exactly the same as one who has not is not justice — it is indifference to circumstance. Equity means ensuring that no one is prevented from reaching their potential because of where they started. This distinction is illustrated clearly in the image above.

Diversity usually refers to the variety of human differences, including gender identity, sexual orientation, ethnicity, religious beliefs, socio-economic background, minorities, physical and intellectual ability, life experience, and so on. Human diversity is normal, though some societies and social settings are less diverse. All the evidence suggests that people who see themselves as in some way diverse or different feel more at ease when there are teachers in the school who are diverse. Where diversity is not visible (e.g. gender orientation) it is helpful if teachers, for example, indicate their support for LGBTQ + rights through simple displays (lanyards, badges etc.). The term inclusion covers the experience that all students and teachers feel they belong to the school, are part of the school’s diverse culture and feel respected and valued as authentic selves. Belonging is not a simple matter to label but is the lived experience of individuals. This also includes experiencing an inclusive curriculum that addresses the range of issues related to diversity, inclusion and difference.

Historical origins of Waldorf position on DEIJ

As Albert Schmelzer has shown in his recent book Rudolf Steiner between the conflicting forces of philosophy of freedom, human rights, nation, and ‹race › (Rudolf Steiner im Spannungsfeld von Freiheitsphilosophie, Menschenrechte, Nation und ‹Rasse›) Steiner’s ideas on these subjects evolved and changed over the course of his adult life. The central signature of this thinking, however, remained constant: the necessity of individual freedom and the need of society to enable and protect through recognition of freedoms of basic human rights. This came to be the most complete expression in his writings and lectures on the principles of social threefolding, in which an individual’s right to freedom of thought, speech, practice of religion is to be balanced by mutual respect and tolerance. Above all, he felt that an education was needed that was primarily based on the nature of the developing human being as understood by anthroposophical anthropology (in German «Menschenkunde») and was shared by teachers rather than government bureaucrats or the direct influence of the economic world.

To some extent, one could say that Steiner anticipated the need to create social conditions, in which mutual respect for human dignity, diversity, equity, inclusion and justice can be experienced by all. This would be a valuable start to a process but, we believe we need to take a more nuanced view of this today. There are those who believe that Steiner’s anthroposophy holds all the answers to all social problems, and that all we need to do is implement the ideas of his threefold social order. They believe, as a result, there would be no discrimination, no historical legacy or marginalisation and no racism and aggressive nationalism. This is naïve and even disrespectful to everyone, but especially those subjected to the detrimental effects of white privilege and colonization. It also highlights a wider issue – namely whether anthroposophy frozen in the form it has in Steiner’s published works is sufficient for an education today.

On 13^th January 1921, Steiner addressed the parents in the Waldorf school. He told them that the ideas of anthroposophy were not and should not be taught- in the Waldorf school (though in 1923 in Ilkley, he did admit that some enthusiastic anthroposophic teachers tended to forget this). Steiner pointed out very clearly that the ‹how› of Waldorf pedagogy- that is, how children and young people are taught- is based on an anthroposophical understanding of the nature of the developing human being. The ‹what›, that is the curriculum as taught, should be based on the teachers’ readings of the ‹social necessities› and these change over time and geographical space. Today, equipping young people to live in a multi-cultural, multi-faith, plural-linguistic and immigration-based society is essential. Furthermore, Waldorf schools need to reflect these qualities in the composition of its staff and families. In other words, supporting schools to become more aware, more diverse, have a fully inclusive curriculum and meeting the developmental tasks of all children and young people is what all Waldorf schools strive for. This is especially true of the independent and public Waldorf schools in North America.