This book is the outcome of a global study undertaken on behalf of the World Education Fellowship (WEF) in collaboration with UNESCO. It provides education policy makers with evidence to support programs that address the major challenges faced by education systems in the next decade. It contains case studies, and it expands on the work done by UNESCO’s International Commission on Education for the 21st Century (the Delors Report).
Education has long been viewed as a vehicle for building community. However, the critical role of education and schools for constructing community resistance is undermined by recent trends toward the centralization of educational policy-making (e.g. racial profiling new laws in the US—Arizona and Texas; No Child Left Behind and global racism), the normalization of “globalization” as a vehicle for the advancement of economic neo-liberalism and social hegemony, and the commodification of schooling in the service of corporate capitalism. Alternative visions of schooling are urgently needed to transform these dangerous trends so as to reconstruct public education as an emancipatory social project. Teaching for Global Community: Overcoming the Divide and Conquer Strategies of the Oppressor examines these issues among related others as a way to honor and re-examine Freirean principles and aim to take critical pedagogy in new directions for a new generation. The goal is to build upon past accomplishments of Paulo Freire’s work and critical pedagogy while moving beyond its historical limitations. This includes efforts that revisit and re-evaluate established topics in the field or take on new areas of contestation. Issues related to education, labor, and emancipation, broadly defined and from diverse geographical context, are addressed. The theoretical perspectives used to look at these emerge from critical pedagogy, critical race theory, critiques of globalization and neoliberalism, marxist and neo-marxist perspectives, social constructivism, comparative/international education, postmodernism indigenous perspectives, feminist theory, queer theory, poststructuralism, critical environmental studies, postcolonial studies, liberation theology, with a deep commitment to social justice.
Global news is generally bad news. On the surface, the story is about war, poverty, ethnic and sectarian strife. Democracy movements advanced by the U.S. government seem to be stalled or even reversed. Yet just below the surface, more hopeful trends are brewing. A new global awareness of the people at "the bottom of the pyramid" is summoning forth an unprecedented response to human need and suffering. It involves a shift from vertical to horizontal power that official aid agencies are only beginning to comprehend. Whereas twenty-five years ago, government aid accounted for 70 percent of all American outflows, today 85 percent of all outflows of resources come from private individuals, businesses, religious congregations, universities, and immigrant communities. If aid policy in the twentieth century relied on top-down bureaucracy dominated by policy specialists and elites, the twenty-first century is shaping up as an era in which citizens, social entrepreneurs, and volunteers link up to solve problems. U.S. military and economic power are basic components of America's presence in the world; but in an environment of rampant anti-Americanism, it is compassion that is America's most consequential export. Civil society, once the distinctive characteristic of American democracy, is now advancing across the globe, carrying with it new forms of philanthropy, citizenship, and volunteerism. Tens of thousands of voluntary associations are prying open closed societies from within, solving problems in new ways, and forming the seedbed for a long-term cultivation of democratic norms. Building Nations from the Bottom Up: The Global Rise of Democratic Society presents a sweeping overview of the forces now shaping the global debate, including citizen-led development projects, poverty-reduction strategies that substitute opportunity for charity, and electronically linked movements to combat corruption and autocratic rule.
As the world moves towards the twenty-first century, it enters a period of unprecedented crisis: the human race can no longer take the future for granted. Yet over the last decade, millions of people worldwide have turned to local action to tackle some of the planet's seemingly intractable problems. In thousands of towns, cities and villages, community groups and non-governmental organisations are teaming up with local authorities to form links with their counterparts in the developing world - but until now, these initiatives have been virtually ignored by the mainstream media. Even participating communities are sometimes barely aware of the movement's existence. Towards a Global Village aims to lift these local initiatives from obscurity into the mainstream by offering the first comprehensive account of the emergence of community development projects on a global scale. Basing his account on data from programmes in twenty-one countries around the world, Shuman evaluates their influence and offers sound, practical recommendations for increasing their impact and effectiveness. Towards a Global Village offers hope, ideas and inspiration to all those who continue to believe that there is some point in working for real change at a local level.
Economic growth and the creation of wealth have cut global poverty rates, yet vulnerability, inequality, exclusion and violence have escalated within and across societies throughout the world. Unsustainable patterns of economic production and consumption promote global warming, environmental degradation and an upsurge in natural disasters. Moreover, while we have strengthened international human rights frameworks over the past several decades, implementing and protecting these norms remains a challenge.These changes signal the emergence of a new global context for learning that has vital implications for education. Rethinking the purpose of education and the organization of learning has never been more urgent. This book is inspired by a humanistic vision of education and development, based on respect for life and human dignity, equal rights, social justice, cultural diversity, international solidarity and shared responsibility for a sustainable future. It proposes that we consider education and knowledge as global common goods, in order to reconcile the purpose and organization of education as a collective societal endeavour in a complex world.
In Intercultural Communication, the authors draw on their deep intercultural experience to show us how to build successful communication bridges across diverse cultures. The book explores various theoretical positions on global communication ethics and norms by providing an overview of the contemporary socio-cultural situation and seeking ways in which common ground may be found between these different positions. The authors raise points of critical reflection on intercultural events and issues in various areas of communication including health, work, environment and education. The book also covers a range of issues, from the interactions of various cultures to the expansion of social organizations and the growing global infrastructure.
At a time when global civilization stands at the crossroads comes a book that helps to understand the emerging challenges, from global warming and other environmental issues, global poverty, free trade, foreign debt burdens, and the expanding global economy, to the worsening conditions in many nations. // The book takes a look at the causes of the crises that have developed over centuries, and describes how, even as the miracles of technology have unfolded, the model of progress itself has proven to be disruptive and damaging. The book shares a vision of how we can help re-vitalize and re-direct global society. From environmental rejuvenation to democratic forms of progress, from the reform of the United Nations to greater international democracy, and from solutions to social problems to a new ethics needed for life and the planet, the book lays out interesting possibilities. For those who want things to change, beneficial directions are provided. For others it questions many pre-conceived notions, and provides refreshingly different perspectives.
Globalization presents major challenges to scholars of history. Different variants of global history and world history compete with, and transform, more traditional approaches of national, regional, and local scope, accompanied by new forms of international and transcultural cooperation. However, as this book shows, these transnational trends in the historical discipline are not without precedent. Based on painstaking research, this volume reconstructs the history of the International Congresses of Historians from the first one in The Hague, 1898, to the nineteenth in Oslo, 2000. It also tells the story of the International Committee of the Historical Sciences, the world organization of historians, which was founded, with much American support, in 1926 and today includes 54 national committees and 28 affiliated international organizations from all parts of the world. Karl Dietrich Erdmann, former president of this organization, covered the story up to 1985. Wolfgang J. Mommsen continued it into the twenty-first century. This book traces and analyzes the changes of historians' problems, topics, and methods, as reflected at their International Congresses and in the work of their international organization. It describes the cleavages, debates, and forging of ties among historians from different parts of the world and ideological camps. It demonstrates how historians fought against academic nationalism-or succumbed to its seduction. It shows how the Cold War polarized the world of historians whereas the International Congresses offered a platform for bridging the gap. Since 1990, they have helped to redefine the relationship between historians from the West and from other parts of the world. The internationalization of the study of history is reaching a new quality. Karl Dietrich Erdmann+'s book was first published in German in 1987. It has been translated, updated, and edited for an international audience of the twenty-first century.
"How does globalization impact upon our personal lives? What are its boundaries? This book examines how local and global studies interact. Filled with case studies and empirical research that show the ways in which real local lives function under global conditions, this book helps students push the boundaries of their understanding of globalization"--Provided by publisher.
