At our Spring Conference earlier this month, Charlotte Dwyer, Director of Scotdec, led a workshop on Global Citizenship alongside Faith Bateman, Education Lead: Professional Learning at WOSDEC. Here, Charlotte provides some context, makes the case for Global Citizenship education and highlights the key themes raised during the workshop.
This year’s SIDA spring conference came at a time of global turmoil and change. Here in the UK, Westminster announced drastic cuts to the aid budget, a reduction from 0.5% to 0.3% while rampant cuts to US AID from the Trump administration have left aid programmes around the world in disarray. While the international development community were vociferous in voicing their views about this it was largely ignored by most of the public. Data from the Development Engagement Lab shows that in the UK that while 52% of people are concerned about the level of poverty in ‘poor’ countries only 38% think we should provide aid, and only 18% think development aid is effective. How can we reengage with the public and ensure that Scotland becomes a good Global Citizen?
Our workshop sought to open discussion by providing some stimulating activities to provoke thought and discussion around the following questions:
- How can we build global solidarity?
- What is the role of international development INGOs in this?
- What does it mean to be a ‘good Global Citizen’?
Global Citizenship has its roots in Development Education, with its emphasis on increasing understanding of global issues, an awareness of the interconnectedness of global problems and promotes active participation to create a more just and sustainable world. With the IDEAS network of Global Citizenship educators integrating with SIDA, it is a timely reminder of the close links of Global Citizenship and international development and that now is the time to rethink how Global Citizenship can support the aims of the wider international development community.
Global Citizenship is key to engaging the public in global issues, increasing awareness and, importantly, supporting action for change. There are three key areas to achieving this and our workshop was shaped around these.
1. Local to global connections
The Development Engagement Lab highlighted that the public’s primary concern is around economic crisis and immigration with a lack of correlation to issues within the wider world. How can we link local issues to global issues? Making use of the active participation methods of GCE, we invited participants to explore what it means to be a global citizen. After groups reflected on what local issues were of concern to those living in Scotland, we then asked them to think of global issues which were of concern to them in their work. The next step was to find connections between the local and global issues and discuss ways to highlight the local dimension of a global issue. Sometimes those links are masked, but in our globalised world nearly everything we consume or do is influenced by geopolitics, trade and a history of colonialism and empire. Finding a way to reconnect people to this is vital. The fairtrade movement is an excellent example of this.
2. Activating values
While we can draw out the local to global connections, we also need people to consider where their responsibility lives within these connections and why they should care. As a group we reflected on the values which are required to be a ‘good’ global citizen which ranged from solidarity, empathy and compassion to actively participating within a local and global community. How might we activate these values in Scotland in relation to international development issues?
3. Addressing root causes
One of the provocations I brought to the workshop was around the way large international development organisations have traditionally engaged with their audiences in the UK. Historically, this has been through a charity fundraising lens and has relied on activating guilt and sympathy to fund raise for their cause. Does this have the reverse effect in terms of activating solidarity and awareness of the issues? Is it possible to fundraise and be a good global citizen? Radi-Aid certainly offers up one answer with humour and provides a great tool for opening discussion about this.
One criticism of running public fundraising campaigns is that they don’t address the root causes of the issues and can present simplistic responses to complex global issues. Global Citizenship approaches encourage understanding of issues and how we can address the root causes. By using an ‘issues tree’ participants were asked to consider an issue and think about the root causes of the issue, the effects (branches) and then actions that could be taken to mitigate or address the root causes. We encouraged everyone to focus on what the Scottish public could do and reflect on how this approach might build solidarity around the issues which are important to the international development community.
A way forward
My own perspective is that Global Citizenship is an underutilised tool in International Development. In Ireland, there is a commitment to a percentage of ODA being put towards global citizenship. They are advocating for this to increase and be part of all ODA projects. Ireland is currently working towards 0.7% of GNI being put towards ODA and is in sight of reaching this. In a country where global citizenship is recognised as an integral part of International Development, support from the public for international development is higher and therefore arguably public support for ODA is also higher.
Obviously, the context is very different, and Ireland has a far bigger budget for ODA, however, their commitment to GCE is something for Scotland to aspire to. The mace of the Scottish Parliament carries four values: wisdom, justice, compassion and integrity. These values stand us in good stead for a Scotland that wants to be recognised as a good global citizen and now is the time to act and remember in the words of the cultural anthropologist Margaret Mead:
“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”
Author: Charlotte Dwyer, Director, Scotdec.