Features
What next for Global Citizenship Education? And what more should international schools be doing? Caroline Ferguson raises the issue
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Education has taken a blow. However, localism and globalism are opposing sides that exist together and can’t be separated (Beiner, 1995). As history has shown, the complicated search for the space between them will continue. It is the space that explains our loyalty beyond the nation, and our concern about pressing challenges that affect the whole planet. There is a crucial paradox between our global reality and national legal power (Held, 2015). It’s impossible to support one without the other. Rather than retreating from the present barrier of nationalist politics, international schools must persist in exploring our global belonging and the tension with national allegiance. Despite politicians telling us otherwise, patriotism, national citizenship and global citizenship are compatible (Nussbaum, 2002). Universal human rights can be applied in local and global contexts for cosmopolitan citizenship (Osler & Starkey, 2010). Indeed, the complex relationship between rights, duty and identity has always been a struggle as citizenship stretches elastically and extends (Heater, 2004). This could be the perfect time to join the conversation and strengthen Global Citizenship Education in our international communities. The discourse on the theory of Global Citizenship Education continues to develop, but what does it mean in Autumn |
Spring
International schools are important institutions for promoting Global Citizenship Education. With multicultural, multilingual student populations, diverse staff and international curricula, there is the potential in such schools for high levels of global awareness and many different perspectives. Yet international schools can also be bubbles of privilege, averse to investigating what it means to have global responsibility. Furthermore, international schools exist in various political settings that are not always accepting of critical discussion about equity, human rights and democracy. International schools value global citizenship. It often stars in mission statements, reflecting the priority given to Global Citizenship Education by international organizations such as UNESCO, and the role international schooling plays in the global economy. Yet how many schools actually consider what global citizenship entails? Indeed it is a difficult term to define. Is it a moral obligation to the planet – to the human community and natural environment? Is it a pledge to social justice? Or is it an intercultural competence that allows us to network in cosmopolitan societies? Global citizenship is a contested concept and inherently political. With recent anti-globalist sentiment associated with nationalist politics, nurturing nativism and rigid national identity over international collaboration, Global Citizenship
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