Lesson 28

Global Citizenship

LESSON OBJECTIVES

At the end of this lesson, you should be able to:

1. explain the definition of global citizenship and the categories of global citizenship;

2. discuss the types of rights and duties of global citizenship; and

3. formulate a commitment statement regarding your rights and responsibilities related to citizenship.

Definition of Terms

Citizenship - how residents live in a particular area with previously agreed upon rights and
responsibilities

Rights-any lawful, social, or moral principle of autonomy or entitlement

Duty - an obligation or expectation to perform an action based on the law, social norms, or a moral
standard

Global citizenship - the belief that all people have rights and civic responsibilities based on the reason
that they reside in the world

INTRODUCTION

Socrates, a classical Greek philosopher and one of the founders of Western philosophy, was once
quoted saying, "I am not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world." He identified himself as a
global citizen. What is a global citizen? What are the rights and duties of a global citizen? How do we
become global citizens? The answers to these questions will be discussed in the succeeding paragraphs.
"I am not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world"
What is Global Citizenship?

Before defining global citizenship, let us first discuss the terms global and citizenship separately. What is
citizenship? Are there varied definitions or is there an overarching one? In fact, there are many
definitions of citizenship. It may be defined on the lenses of membership, status, practice, or
performance (Isin & Nyers, 2014. in Isin & Nyers, 2014. eds.).

For instance, described in terms of membership and status, citizenship is defined as how residents live in
a particular area with previously agreed upon rights and responsibilities. These statutes are restricted in
a particular territory and a political boundary. This means that the citizens must have an understanding
of their rights and responsibilities (Abdi, Shultz, & Pillay, 2015. in Abdi, Shultz, & Pillay, 2015, eds).

In addition, using the lenses of practice and performance, citizenship may be defined as an institution
that mediates the rights between constituents of a governing system and the system itself. However,
the relation between the citizens and the governing system is not always unified nor stable (Isin &
Nyers, 2014. in Isin & Nyers, 2014. eds.).

Three Types of Rights

Two very important aspects of citizenship are civic rights and duties. First, let us discuss the definition of
rights and the different types of rights. Rights are defined as any lawful, social, or moral principle of
autonomy or entitlement. It is a collection of what is allowed and what should be provided to a group of
people based on a particular legal system, norms, or ethical standards (Wenar, 2015). The three types of
rights are: (1) civil rights, (2) political rights, and (3) social rights. These will be discussed below:

Civil rights - are entitlements provided by a certain locality to its public

constituents. These include the right to free speech. Every citizen is allowed

to communicate openly. He/She is permitted to voice opinions even if it is

criticizing the government just as long as it has basis and evidence. Civil
rights also include the right to have and to be treated with dignity.

Political rights are administrative entitlements provided by a specific government. These include the
right to run for office. Every citizen has the right to be elected as a representative of his/her community
as long as he/ she meets various criteria.

Social rights are entitlements related to public services and to social protection. These include insurance,
health care, welfare, housing, and pensions (Isin & Nyers, 2014. in Isin & Nyers, 2014. eds.).

Three Types of Duties

What is the definition of duty? Duty comes from the French word "due" which means "to owe" (Gove,
1986). Therefore, duty is defined as an obligation or expectation to perform an action based on the law,
social norms, or a moral standard (Merriam-Webster Dictionary, n. d.). The three types of duties, in
relation to citizenship, are: (1) conscription, (2) taxation, and (3) participation.

Conscription - pertains to the obligation to register as a reserve force in the army. This means that every
able-bodied citizen is asked to take up arms and fight for their country in case of war.

Taxation - relates to the duty to pay a compulsory contribution to a state or the government

Participation - refers to the obligation to take part in the community. Every citizen is encouraged to
participate in the development of their community. They are also encouraged to vote for their leaders
during elections (Isin & Nyers, 2014. in Isin & Nyers, 2014. eds.)

Learning to Live Together

Learning to live together entails understanding different nation's interconnectedness and

Restore Dignity

Paulo Freire (1970) urges people to be educated in citizenship rights in order to question the hidden
oppressive systems that surround them. The task of global citizenship education is not just to teach
about current systems but also the concepts of global social justice and basic rights (Abdi, Shultz, &
Pillay. 2015. in Abdi, Shultz, & Pillay, 2015. eds).

Global citizenship education imparts knowledge about the rights of every individual in the international
community. One of these basic rights is that every human being has the right to live in dignity, Global
citizenship education assists in restoring positive identity, dignity, and self-esteem of individuals (Hahn,
n. d.).

COLLABORATE.

Group yourselves into six to eight members. The goal of this activity is for each group to share beliefs
and opinions about the Rohingya refugee crisis. Read the case study below and answer the questions
after. Discuss your answers with your group.

The Rohingya refugee crisis refers to the massive migration of nearly 700,000 people from Myanmar.
The Rohingya fled using small and fragile boats, thus they were dubbed as "boat people" by the media.
They are members of Muslim ethnic minorities with their own language and culture in the said country.
They escaped from Myanmar because they experienced extreme violence from militants and Buddhist
mobs. Almost 6,700 Rohingya, among whom are 730 children below five years old, were killed.
The government of Myanmar denies citizenship to Rohingya. In fact, they were excluded from the 2014
census and were refused to be recognized as people.

The government views them as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh (BBC News, 2018).

Most of them fled to Bangladesh, Malaysia, Indonesia, and Thailand. Many of them were stuck in the
sea for days.

Issues in Global Citizenship

Despite the progress in the conceptualizations and in the education of global citizenship, there are still
issues and challenges arising. These issues and challenges may be classified into three: (1) conflict
between global citizenship and national citizenship, (2) conflict between global citizenship and individual
differences, and (3) development of the imagination for global citizenship. These will be discussed
below:

Conflict between global citizenship and national citizenship - Even though people are encouraged to
become global citizens, in reality, they live in their own culture with their own context (Ignatieff, 1994.
as cited in Pike, 2008. p. 225). This is very obvious in countries with a significant amount of immigration
(Yemini, 2017).

The performative aspect of citizenship, not only looks at the rights and duties being performed, but also
at the rights and duties not being performed or not allowed to be performed. For example, what about
states that do not allow press freedom (Isin & Nyers, 2014. in Isin & Nyers, 2014. eds.)? How will the
global right to freedom of speech be implemented if the state does not allow it?

Conflict between global citizenship and individual differences - For instance, in the membership and
performance aspect of citizenship, how would one classify non-citizens who perform the duty of citizens,
like immigrants that pay taxes? Should they be given the same rights as the citizens (Isin & Nyers, 2014.
in Isin & Nyers, 2014. eds.)? In Italy, for example, immigrants who perform very personal services or care
work for Italian families and know deep-seated secrets are still not treated as part of the family because
they are foreigners. In fact, they are called "intimate foreigners." Examples of these are caregivers,
nurses, and domestic helpers (Hepworth, 2014. in Isin & Nyers, 2014, eds.).

In another example related to this, "abject citizens" is a phrase used to describe citizens who experience
being rejected from citizenship even though they were born in the same territory. This term usually
refers to nomadic cultures like the Roma or Sinti who are from a different ethnic group with their own
culture (Hepworth, 2014. in Isin & Nyers, 2014. eds.).

Individuals may also have multiple citizenship identities (Harrington, 2014. in Isin & Nyers, 2014, eds.)
For instance, a person may have dual citizenship because he/she resides in two countries. Finally,
another source of conflict is the assumption that English is the universal language (Yemini, 2017) even
though it is not the language used by the most number of population.

Development of the imagination for global citizenship Another challenge is the slow progress in
developing a global imagination (Richardson, 2008). Citizenship is not permanent, can be transformed,
and contestable (Harrington, 2014. in Isin & Nyers, 2014. eds.)

The word global in global citizenship has the tendency to focus only on the experiences of the majority.
It highlights only the existing sociocultural, political, and economic systems. It neglects the experiences
of the minority and the marginalized (Abdi, Shultz, & Pillay, 2015. in Abdi, Shultz, & Pillay, 2015. eds).

Who is the active citizen? The word active has come to refer extremes. On one hand, it is the "good"
citizen who follows social norms. On the other hand, it is the "bad" citizen who questions and disobeys
social norms. Is the concept of active citizenship used to "pacify" people? Is it used to make people
comply to what is expected from them? (Neveu, 2014, in Isin & Nyers, 2014. eds.).

SUMMARY

Citizenship is defined as how residents live in a particular area with previously agreed upon rights and
responsibilities (Abdi, Shultz, & Pillay, 2015. in Abdi, Shultz, & Pillay, 2015. eds). Internationalization, or
becoming global, is defined as including worldwide components to education (Yemini, 2017). Global
citizenship is defined as the belief that all people have rights and civic- responsibilities based on the
reason that they reside in the world (Israel, 2012).

The three types of rights are: civil rights, political rights, and social rights. On the other hand, the three
types of duties, in relation to citizenship, are: conscription, taxation, and participation (Isin & Nyers,
2014. in Isin & Nyers, 2014. eds.).

Global citizenship may be classified into: open global citizenship, moral global citizenship, and
sociopolitical global citizenship (Veugelers, 2011). Finally, the issues and challenges in global citizenship
are: conflict between global citizenship and national citizenship (Yemini, 2017), conflict between global
citizenship and individual differences (Isin & Nyers, 2014. in Isin & Nyers, 2014. eds.), and development
of the imagination for global citizenship (Richardson, 2008).