In the seventies, the translators of Vergessene Zusammenhänge (Ciske Balhan and myself) studied education at the University of Leiden. We specialized in social-educational theory (‘social pedagogic’) and we studied Klaus Mollenhauer. He was a well-known educationalist who conceptualized the field of social education in West Germany, with a focus on youth care and youth welfare services. But we also knew Mollenhauer in another way; he was one of the key representatives of German Critical Pedagogic. I read his Erziehung und Emancipation (first published in 1968). The book is a plea for democratic education; a dialogue between parents and their children, teachers and their students, youngsters and their educators.