The chapter examines perspectives and perceptions of democracy in education in order to develop a robust and critical democratic education among pre- and in-service teachers as well as teacher-education academics in Australia. It begins by outlining the concepts of thick and thin democracy, and revisits the state of civics and citizenship education (CCE) in Australia. Using the framework suggested by Barber’s Strong Democracy, and further developed by Westheimer and Kahne, and Gandin and Apple, this chapter critiques the neo-liberal (thin) democratic discourse of contemporary Australian academic research that suggests that the CCE project only requires some augmentation highlighting issues like sustainability and globalization while ignoring social justice issues. It concludes with a description of what a thick democracy might look like in school education. Using data from an on-line survey the chapter presents the quantitative analyses, and the qualitative responses of the contrasting understandings of democracy, citizenship and the role of education in the promotion and development of an active and thick democracy. It is argued that while pre-service teachers may have a more critical and thicker understanding of democracy that is mirrored in the views of their teacher-education professors, practicing teachers, on the other hand, have largely adopted the mainstream neo-liberal discourse, presenting a tendency to view democracy in a very narrow or thin way that may impact on their classroom practice. The chapter concludes with recommendations related to what a thick democracy might actually look like in school education.