The global citizens movement is a constellation of organized and overlapping citizens' groups seeking to foster global solidarity in policy and consciousness. The term is often used synonymously with the

anti-globalization movement The anti-globalization movement or counter-globalization movement, is a social movement critical of economic globalization. The movement is also commonly referred to as the global justice movement, alter-globalization movement, anti-globalis ...

or the

global justice movement The global justice movement is a network of globalized social movements demanding global justice by opposing what is often known as the “ corporate globalization” and promoting equal distribution of economic resources. Movement of movements ...

Background

The concept of

global citizenship Global citizenship is the idea that one's identity transcends geography or political borders and that responsibilities or rights are derived from membership in a broader class: "humanity". This does not mean that such a person denounces or waives ...

first emerged in the 4th Century BCE among the Greek Cynics, who coined the term “

cosmopolitan Cosmopolitan may refer to: Food and drink * Cosmopolitan (cocktail), also known as a "Cosmo" History * Rootless cosmopolitan, a Soviet derogatory epithet during Joseph Stalin's anti-Semitic campaign of 1949–1953 Hotels and resorts * Cosmopoli ...

” – meaning ''citizen of the world''. The

Stoics Stoicism is a school of Hellenistic philosophy founded by Zeno of Citium in Athens in the early 3rd century BCE. It is a philosophy of personal virtue ethics informed by its system of logic and its views on the natural world, asserting that th ...

later elaborated on the concept, and contemporary philosophers and political theorists have further developed it in the concept of

cosmopolitanism Cosmopolitanism is the idea that all human beings are members of a single community. Its adherents are known as cosmopolitan or cosmopolite. Cosmopolitanism is both prescriptive and aspirational, believing humans can and should be " world citizens ...

, which proposes that all individuals belong to a single moral community. The twenty-first century has seen increasing calls for global citizenship in light of how transportation and technology—are binding disparate parts of the world more closely together than ever before. Authors as

Paul Raskin Paul Raskin is the founding President of the Tellus Institute, which has conducted over 3,500 research and policy projects throughout the world on environmental issues, resource planning, scenario analysis, and sustainable development. His research ...

, Paul H. Ray,

David Korten David C. Korten (born 1937) is an American author, former professor of the Harvard Business School, political activist, prominent critic of corporate globalization, and "by training and inclination a student of psychology and behavioral systems". ...

, and

Gus Speth James Gustave (Gus) Speth (born March 4, 1942) is an American environmental lawyer and advocate who co-founded the Natural Resources Defense Council. Early life and education He was born in Orangeburg, South Carolina in 1942. He graduated su ...

have argued for the existence of a latent pool of tens of millions of people ready to identify with a global consciousness, such as that captured in the

Earth Charter The Earth Charter is an international declaration of fundamental values and principles considered useful by its supporters for building a just, sustainable, and peaceful global society in the 21st century. Created by a global consultation process, ...

. Organizations such as

Oxfam International Oxfam is a British-founded confederation of 21 independent charitable organizations focusing on the alleviation of global poverty, founded in 1942 and led by Oxfam International. History Founded at 17 Broad Street, Oxford, as the Oxford Co ...

believe that a global citizens movement rooted in social and economic justice is emerging and is necessary for ending global poverty. The

Global Scenario Group The Global Scenario Group (GSG) was an international, interdisciplinary body convened in 1995 by the Tellus Institute and the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI) to develop scenarios for world development in the twenty-first century. Further deve ...

likewise identified such a movement as the key change agent in a

Great Transition Great Transition is used by the Great Transition Initiative and its predecessor, the Global Scenario Group (GSG), to describe a vision of a just and sustainable global future. The term was originally coined by Kenneth E. Boulding in ''The Meaning ...

to a socially and ecologically sustainable future. A more recently formed group vying for a sustainable global future through international unification via an international federation are the Young World Federalists. A global citizens movement would differ from the existing fragmented civil society organizations and social movements in that such campaigns and movements tend to be issue-specific rather than united in a shared struggle for a socially just and ecologically sustainable global society and the establishment of an institutional structure to support it.

Critiques

Skeptics of the notion of a global citizens movement question whether or not a high enough level of global solidarity can emerge in light of nationalism, racism, and the dominance of the Westphalian state system. However, other scholars point out that the historical emergence of nationalism must have felt just as improbable in a time of warring city-states, and yet in retrospect appears inevitable. In their book

Multitude Multitude is a term for a group of people who cannot be classed under any other distinct category, except for their shared fact of existence. Though its use dates back to antiquity, the term first entered into the lexicon of political philosophy w ...

Michael Hardt Michael Hardt (born 1960) is an American political philosopher and literary theorist. Hardt is best known for his book ''Empire'', which was co-written with Antonio Negri. Hardt and Negri suggest that several forces which they see as domin ...

and

Antonio Negri Antonio "Toni" Negri (born 1 August 1933) is an Italian Spinozistic- Marxist sociologist and political philosopher, best known for his co-authorship of ''Empire'' and secondarily for his work on Spinoza. Born in Padua, he became a political ...

offer a more radical critique that posits

Michel Foucault Paul-Michel Foucault (, ; ; 15 October 192625 June 1984) was a French philosopher, historian of ideas, writer, political activist, and literary critic. Foucault's theories primarily address the relationship between power and knowledge, and how ...

's notion of a “plurality of resistance” as the only legitimate path forward.Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri, ''Multitude: War and Democracy in the Age of Empire'' (London: Penguin Books, 2004); Michel Foucault, ''The History of Sexuality'' (New York: Vintage Books, 1980). Instead of leadership and organizational structures, Hardt and Negri put faith in the emergence of spontaneous coherence due to self-organized networks among various autonomous resistance movements. However, it remains unclear how a network of autonomous movements would differ in practice from a global citizens movement.

Notes

External links

Great Transition Initiative
��the GTI Paper Series and framework offers further context for discussion of a Global Citizens Movement
Encyclopedia of the Earth
��has an entry on the Global Citizens Movement under the category of Sustainable Development {{DEFAULTSORT:Global Citizens Movement Community building Activism Alter-globalization Global civilization Social movements Cosmopolitanism Global culture

Background

Critiques

See also

Notes

Further reading

External links