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Cultivating students' critical consciousness through global citizenship education: Six pedagogical priorities

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Abstract

This article conceptualizes Global Citizenship Education (GCE) as a liberating and dynamic journey of consciousness-mobilization that supports students' critical thinking about how they can contribute to social justice. The authors’ conceptualization of GCE for critical consciousness is entrenched in the work of Paulo Freire. It is political because it is meant to shape the learner into an emancipated, ethical, and critical global citizen. As such, GCE for critical consciousness is based on six pedagogical priorities: praxis, reflexive dialogue, decolonialism, ecocritical views, caring ethics, and empowering humanity. These six priorities are not meant to be comprehensive; they are aimed at boosting debate on the key levers needed to place GCE on a plausible critical, ethical, and sustainable path. Hence, those priorities explicitly challenge and move beyond Western-European-centric and neoliberal GCE conceptions. The article ends with a call for further academic action to (re)construct the momentum needed to push for their implementation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of English and American Literature, Faculty of Letters, Toyo University, 5 Chome-28-20 Hakusan, Bunkyo City, Tokyo, 112-0001, Japan

    Emiliano Bosio

  2. Stellenbosch University, Faculty of Education, 7602, Matieland, South Africa

    Yusef Waghid

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  1. Emiliano Bosio
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  2. Yusef Waghid
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Correspondence to Emiliano Bosio.

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Bosio, E., Waghid, Y. Cultivating students' critical consciousness through global citizenship education: Six pedagogical priorities. Prospects (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11125-023-09652-x

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