Consumer Citizenship Education for Sustainable Development in Higher Education in Latvia

Higher education and science determine the intellectual potential of a society, train new specialists, and consolidate and change citizenship values. Consumer citizenship education for sustainable development is an important function of higher education with a significant moral, social, political, economic, ecological and legal capacity. Consumer citizenship education plays an important role in ensuring the stability and sustainable development of any society. These approaches make it possible to develop the multi-scale thinking of future specialists and enhance their ability to analyse critically the main dilemmas created by the processes of social, legal, environmental, and economic development. The article is devoted to the experience of the Latvian system of higher education in consumer citizenship education within the context of sustainable development. It focuses more specifically on cooperation as a form of voluntary interaction between the partners involved in ensuring sustainable development. The aim of the research is to analyse the experience of consumer citizenship education in Latvian higher education within the context of sustainable development emphasizing the role of various forms of studies. Mostly theoretical research methods have been used in the present study. The starting point of for this research is a theoretical framework. There are both legal underpinnings and practical implementation aspects in this task. The features outlined above are emphasized in the normative acts referring to the Latvian higher education, the documents of the institutions of higher education, and particularly in the study programmes. The results of the research show that consumer citizenship education can be acquired as an interdisciplinary system. The goals and objectives of consumer citizenship education involve training young specialists possessing broad professional knowledge, developed critical thinking, the ability to organize and manage work in a modem way, understanding of the ethical, civic and patriotic values, as well as the ability and skills to engage in various social activities. Consumer citizenship education needs transdisciplinary knowledge if it is to solve the problems of humanity, the problems aggravated by unsustainable, unethical, even immoral consumption. The link between consumer citizenship education and sustainable development is ensured by shared common values, which reveal the sense and importance of both consumer citizenship and ethical sustainability.

Global Citizenship Education:A Biased Field

Global citizenship as an idea has become an increasingly important issue on the educational agenda since the late 1970's. The importance allotted to this issue is clear in the attention given to it by for example UNESCO where global citizenship education(GCED) is an area of strategic focus. Increasingly schools all over the world are attempting to or expected to educate the global citizen, but how exactly do you educate the global citizen? What does this global citizenship consist of? While surely the type of training and education needed to train a global citizen will vary greatly depending on culture, pedagogical approach and various other factors, it is also a question worth asking, whether ‘global citizenship'is one and the same all over the world, or whether we should come to terms with the idea that the way global citizenship is practiced in different environments may vary greatly. Another question that begs an answer is whether it is at all possible to be citizens of the world in the same way that we are citizens of a country. While some may dismiss global citizenship as a mere linguistic fancy, there is also evidence,which this paper will attempt to discuss in a preliminary way, that it is possible to develop a feeling of global citizenship in a society. However, it is very important to keep in mind that global citizenship education as treated in the literature so far has been quite Eurocentric(this includes North America). A survey of research on GCED found that two thirds of the research published after 2000 was written by researchers based in the US and if you add other English-speaking countries such as Canada, England, Australia and New Zealand, the proportion is even higher.English in the field of education research often serves as the international lingua franca. Since there is also a tendency among English speaking academics to not be able to read many other languages, the material that would be published about GCED in Chinese, Japanese or Arabic, for example, would have much less global impact than the material published or translated into English, so material in English is likely to have a relatively larger impact than material in most other languages.

Citizenship Education under Discourses of Nationalism,Globalization,and Cosmopolitanism:Illustrations from China and the United States

The authors,one from China and one from the United States,present a theoretical framework for understanding the discursive fields of citizenship education as composed,in large part,of the discourses of nationalism,globalization,and cosmopolitanism.The framework is illustrated by examples from citizenship education in China and the United States.Citizenship education in these examples is largely influenced by the discourse of nationalism.The discursive fields are fractured,context-specific,and dynamic.In conclusion,the authors call for awareness of how these discourses operate,and propose that the discourses of globalization and cosmopolitanism merge and strengthen within citizenship education.The effect could be a new citizenship education that is responsive to the current needs of local and global democratic communities.

Globalization,National Identity,and Citizenship Education:China’s Search for Modernization and a Modern Chinese Citizenry

Since the early 20th century,numerous scholars have proposed theories and models describing,interpreting,and suggesting the development paths countries have taken or should take.None of these,however,can fully explain China’s efforts,mainly through education and citizenship education,to modernize itself and foster a modern citizenry since the late 19th century.This article traces and examines these efforts through a reflective and critical analysis of such public texts as official policy documents,curriculum standards,and related commentaries,and reveals three major findings.First,China’s leaders have advanced different views of and approaches to development and citizenship in response to changing domestic and global contexts.Second,the Chinese state determines China’s development course,defines its national identity and citizenry,and selects its nation-building curricula.Third,the Chinese state’s growing desire for national rejuvenation in an increasingly competitive,globalized world in the 21st century mandates an important education mission that its citizenship education be politically and ideologically open and accommodative,and help students develop global,national and local identities and function as active,responsible citizens of a multileveled,multicultural world.This article furthers academic understanding of how China’s education responds to economic,political,and social demands and shapes students’multiple identities in a global age.

On the development of citizenship education outlook in China

A sourceidentifying and comparative study of the development of the outlook on citizenship education in China and the Western countries indicates that there emerges a tendency of similar orientations in terms of relations between citizens and the state and society,between citizens’rights and obligations and between citizenship education and moral education.At the same time,there also exists the possibility of mutual integration of the viewpoints and the ideas of Chinese traditional moral education in such aspects as subject basis,educational mechanism and values orientation.

Learning to Live with Religious Plurality in Personhood Formation

Every person has a more or less articulated worldview that I define in its most brief form as ＂a view on life＂. That might be a religious view and could be with or without a God-concept, but the religious domain forms a sub-domain of the embracing domain of worldview. We can make a distinction between organized and personal worldviews. I will argue that pedagogically speaking schools should be aware of the value and relevance of worldview education especially focusing on the development of the students＇ personal worldview as an integral part of their personhood formation （＂Bildung＂）. Worldview and/or religion are part of the public and the social domain, although not undisputed, and that is why I make a plea for worldview education as part of citizenship education. Already in the school as an embryonic society （John Dewey） students should learn to live together with differences and this should also include the ability to recognize differences between worldview/religious. The results of empirical research projects in the Netherlands and also from a European Commission granted project ＂Religion in Education＂ have shown that students really want to learn from and are interested in the worldview of their fellow students. They are also in favor of schools where they can meet a diversity of worldviews among teachers and students. Dialogue and encounter are important to them. So, worldview education as part of citizenship education can foster students to learn to live peacefully together.

Citizenship with Chinese Characteristics?An Investigation into Chinese University Students’Civic Perceptions and Civic Participation

Citizenship is a complex and multidimensional concept.There has been a tendency to compare traditions of citizenship in the West with those in the East,captured by a stereotype that depicts the West as individualistic and the East as collectivist.The purpose of this study is to investigate what kind of citizenship is exhibited by Chinese university students,including both their civic perception and their civic participation.Using a recently developed distinction between thin and thick citizenship,the findings from both quantitative and qualitative data analysed in this study reveal that Chinese university students tend towards thin citizenship,as they demonstrate positive civic attitudes yet lack strong evidence of participatory citizenship.The paper also discusses the impact of Confucian and other Chinese traditional value systems on typical views of citizenship held by Chinese students,and offers the suggestion that the citizenship education curriculum should incorporate experiential learning.