The International Baccalaureate Middle Years Programme (IB MYP) is a curriculum framework for students aged 11 – 16 that ‘aims to develop active young learners who are internationally-minded’. It is popular in international
schools around the world and is currently used in 1,356 schools in 108 countries, more than half of which describe themselves as international schools. The
‘global’ is ever present in MYP policy and curriculum documents, and discourses around global citizenship feature strongly, yet only one IB publication directly
addresses global citizenship education.
This study explores global citizenship education in MYP policy and curriculum documents. It provides critical reflection on concepts of global citizenship evident in the programme’s main framework policy document for the MYP, an IB position paper on global citizenship, and two case study unit plans. Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) is used to examine language structures around global citizenship, investigating configurations of global citizenship constituted within Western, neoliberal-oriented concepts associated with globalisation.
Four key findings emerged from the analysis: first, that ‘international education’ may be understood as a platitude for private education; second, the programme
has evolved into a curriculum framework that can be used in any kind of school setting globally in which the school can afford to pay the IB’s fees. Third, the
programme blends the language of progressive education with the language of neoliberal globalisation in its promotion of global citizenship education. Finally,
the study concludes that the IB, by subtly fusing the language of Western oriented neoliberalism with that of global citizenship, orientates its focus towards growth in numbers of schools using the programme, attracting ever greater numbers of customers and expanding its influence.
