Kurt Anne Sanchez November 25, 2019

BSBM 1-3 The Contemporary World

THE GLOBAL CITIZENSHIP

We live in a globalized world that gets small and flat because people, places and
economies are increasingly interconnected and interdependent. This condition is mainly
because globalization with its essential drivers-migration, technologies and innovations that
paved the way not only to unlimited possibilities and opportunities but also to challenges and
threats. These challenges that we face are diverse such as economic, instability, social
inequality, conflict, clean water, hunger, poverty, pollution, human rights violation, energy
security and other possible drawbacks of globalization into which these circumstances
concern us all. Hence, we need global solutions. But where do we find them? How can we
help minimize (if not eradicate) such global issues? Through education, we may jumpstart the
process of transforming our global community. Because education according to Ban Ki-
moon, a former Secretary of the United Nations, “gives us profound understanding that we
are tied together as citizens of the global community, and that our challenges are
interconnected.” Whereas, the kind of education may not just be the learning to read, write
and count but the kind of education that is relevant to people’s world and their aspirations
and is transformative- from orienting us the impact of globalization in every aspects of
human relations to reframing our mindset vis-à-vis encouraging us to care for our world and
for those whom we share it. Global citizenship education therefore can help us learn to live in
peace, protect our environment and human rights and nurtures respect for cultural diversity.
Hopefully, this may hone our critical thinking skills needed to find solutions to the
interconnected challenges of the 21st century and to answer the big questions of the day and
the days to come. As Jerome S. Bruner puts it, “Education must be not only a transmission of
culture but also a provider of alternative views of the world and a strengthened of skills to
explore them.”

WHAT IS GLOBAL CITIZENSHIP?

The accelerating international integration bought by globalization has led to ethical

obligations beyond national borders. Of the brewing global issues and engaging steps in
identifying oneself not just as a national citizen but also as a global citizen. If national
citizenship embraces the principle of equality among its nation-state members, global
citizenship is seemingly grounded in the principle of equality of all people regardless of their
national citizenship or birthplace, race, genders, upbringing, circumstances and experience.
Global citizenship then is related to cosmopolitanism. Otte (2016) describes the latter as an
ideology or worldview in which the world is inhabited by individuals with fundamentally
equal rights and obligations towards each other. Cabrera (2008) on the other hand, puts the
former as a conception that should not be viewed as separate from or synonymous with, the
cosmopolitan moral orientation, but as a primary component of it. These two important terns
are interdependent. To be a cosmopolitan, one must recognize his or her global citizenship.
It must be capitalized, however, that global citizenship does not indicate a legal status since
there is no formal authority regulating it (Stromquist, 2009). The status, according to Lagos
(2002), may be best represented as “associatively” or “associational status” that is different
from national citizenship. Global citizenship is a mindset that gives individuals to live, work
and play within transnational norms and status that defy national boundaries and sovereignty.

Defining global citizenship like many other terms has no definite definitions. It varies
depending on which school of thought or perspective one is coming from. For the sake of
comparison, as follows are some of the definitions of global citizenship.

 Is an integral part of a comprehensive conception of cosmopolitan right (Cabrera,

2008)
 Is multi-faceted: taking care of each other, sharing with each other and being mindful
of the natural world (Hanson, 2016)
 Is a way of living that recognized our world in an increasingly complex web of
connections and interdependencies in which our choices and actions may have
repercussions for people and communities locally, nationally or internationally
(IDEAS @ ideas-forum.org.uk).
 Is the ability to see oneself and the world around one, the ability to make comparisons
and contrasts, the ability to “see plurally”, the ability to understand that both “reality”
and language come in multiple versions, and the ability to balance awareness of one’s
own realities with the realities of entities outside the perceived self (McIntosh, 2005)
 Is the demonstration of concern for the rights and welfare of others (Ladson-Billings,
2005)