EDUCATION FOR GLOBAL CITIZENSHIP AND INTERNATIONALIZATION: an overview of the state-of-the-art-review focusing on discourses, ideologies, and hegemonic disputes

Abstract

This article presents a state-of-the-art review (SOTA) of Global Citizenship Education (GCE) and the internationalization of education, analyzing how discourses, ideologies, and hegemonic disputes shape educational policies and practices. Drawing on Bakhtin’s and Gramsci’s theoretical perspectives, the study investigates how international organizations (IOs) and education institutions mobilize GCE as both a discourse of justice, diversity, and sustainability and as a strategy aligned with neoliberal and Eurocentric logics. The research methodology adopted in this study was the State of the Art (EA), conducted through the selection and analysis of five journal articles and one book chapter. The analysis reveals two central lines: one emphasizing competitiveness, rankings, and employability, and another centered on values of social justice, equity, and critical global citizenship. Although the latter is often shaped by hegemonic forces, it opens space for counter-hegemonic practices, particularly when grounded in Southern epistemologies, decolonial approaches, and, for example, pedagogical projects inspired by Freirean critical consciousness. The findings indicate that internationalization and GCE, when critically and contextually implemented, can reinforce each other in forming global citizens committed to justice, plurality, and sustainability. The article concludes by defending the need for pedagogical practices that resist homogenization, value marginalized knowledges, and transform educational institutions into spaces of counter-hegemony, that is, spaces of dialogue, resistance, and social transformation.