Educating the European citizen in the global age: engaging with the post-national and identifying a research agenda

In recent decades there have been increased calls for UK schools to develop a more European and global orientation in their pedagogy and curriculum, and to equip children and young people with post-national knowledge, skills, and dispositions. This paper examines some key problems in post-national conceptions of citizenship education, in order to develop a research agenda focusing on the contested nature of notions of post-national citizenship (with particular attention to European and global citizenship), and on the way these notions are understood as having competing claims in education. In examining these issues the paper explains the confused governmental agendas and commitments in relation to European and/or global citizenship education, and concludes by considering alternative theories of citizenship, curriculum, and pedagogy that may provide a deeper understanding of the associated issues and tensions. Although the paper relates directly to the UK, some of the debates have a wider significance.