The Moral Education of Global Citizens

Authors: Jeffrey S Dill

Publish Date: 2012/10/18

Volume: 49, Issue: 6, Pages: 541-546

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Abstract

Global citizenship education is one of the fastest growing educational reform movements today Although still in its incipient stages it has support from all corners—teacher unions governments corporations foundations global institutions etc—and thus it is likely to continue on its growth curve It is best understood as a pedagogical response to the problems challenges and opportunities of globalization migration cultural difference environmental crises and a growing list of global social problems The world seemingly gets smaller and smaller boundaries appear to fade away and we feel more and more connected to corners of the globe that previously felt quite literally half a world away In response to these transformations schools around the world are focusing their curricular and extracurricular attention on expanding the consciousness of their students to prepare them for the opportunities and challenges of a global societyFor centuries schools have been interested in forming the next generation of members for society In the modern era this notion has taken the form of citizen formation for the nationstate The efforts to form global citizens in some ways are simply the next logical step in this long development Our society is now global so proponents argue and naturally our schools must begin preparing members for this society Just as educators in earlier periods of massive societal transition attempted to adjust schooling in order to make education relevant teachers in the twentyfirst century are attempting to make students into “global citizens” equipped with the consciousness and competencies needed to prosper in a more tolerant just and peaceful world1But beyond this global citizenship education like all pedagogical ideals represents a vision of the good At the level of these more fundamental moral purposes a subtle contradiction lies at the heart of global citizenship education it demands moral commitment and empathy beyond the individual and his/her own interests but at the same time it sacralizes the individual autonomous chooser above all other forms The implicit effort attempts to make students into secular liberal consumeroriented cosmopolitan subjects Global citizens should minimize individual interests and demonstrate their commitment to an abstract group but the underlying philosophical anthropology is highly Western and individualistic The universal humanity that represents the deepest longings of proponents of global citizenship education requires significant commitment to others beyond the self But its strategies undermine and erode local attachments and group belonging important sources of identity meaning and commitment beyond the self Whether real or aspired to welcomed or opposed global citizenship education is widely held to be a revolutionary paradigm shift in our schooling practices Upon closer inspection it turns out to be the latest chapter in one particular narrative of Western modernity a long story of liberating individuals from group identities2Using data from teacher interviews and classroom observations in both elite private schools and public schools I first describe the nature of the “global consciousness” teachers see as a primary element of global citizenship and then offer a critical assessment of strategies and practices that are antithetical to the stated goalsAs scholars of nationalism have pointed out schools facilitated the cultivation of a “national consciousness” that transcended local religious and ethnic affiliations and became essential to the imagining of the modern nation in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries Similarly many twentyfirst century schools that emphasize global citizenship seek to cultivate a “global consciousness” that transcends geographic economic political and religious boundaries The global consciousness element of global citizenship as articulated by teachers and schools in this study creates lofty moral expectations it consists of an awareness of other perspectives a single humanity as the primary level of community and a moral conscience to act for the good of the world“The global citizen I want my students to become is someone who is aware of the world around them Not just aware of their neighborhood not just their state not just their nation but the whole world And they think about things in terms of how this can affect what we’re doing in the world not just kind of staying in our little corner”For Beth this awareness is not parochial not limited to immediate surroundings or relationships As a teacher in a small manufacturing town in the rural Midwest with students who often have not traveled far outside of “our little corner” she makes efforts to cultivate an awareness of the “whole world” and the larger consequences of their actions Erin’s students at the American Academy of Asia in Hong Kong are at the other end of the social class spectrum they are children of diplomats and multinational corporate executives But she too wants to help students in her social studies classes see beyond borders “A global citizen is someone who is rooted in a national identity but they have a consciousness that is greater than that They have appreciation for other cultures they have tolerance for other points of view and they see issues on a global scale rather than just from their national boundaries”

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