NCDO and Global Citizenship: from public support to active participation
After the NCDO (the National Committee for International Cooperation and Sustainable Development) ceased operations in 2017, the NICC Foundation received a portion of its archive, with the goal of making it accessible to the public. Drawing upon the NCDO's mission and expertise on global citizenship, this timeline was created. The NCO, the predecessor of the NCDO, and later the NCDO had the mission to educate about and raise awareness of International Cooperation in the Netherlands. However, in 2011, the organisation shifted its focus towards promoting global citizenship in an increasingly interconnected world. The new focus was global responsibility, and the NCDO took on the task to research and share knowledge about global citizenship. The following paragraphs are based on the NCDO’s (2012) report (A15855 in the NICC collection), which was meant as the basis for the organisation’s work.
The following is a quote from the same report, discussing the role of the NC(D)O in the winning public support for development cooperation:
“For decades, winning public support for development cooperation was the mainstay of Dutch development policy. In recent years, however, the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs has shifted its focus from garnering public support to strengthening the global dimension of citizenship. This has, resulted in the Netherlands fulfilling a pioneering role compared to its neighbouring countries.”
The change in the NCDO’s mission reflected a change in development thinking. New areas of focus were mutual dependency, shared responsibility, centring individual citizens, and sustainable development. This becomes apparent in the following quote from the same report.
“The realisation of the need to also effect change ‘over here’ is the result of newfound insights into how the development of poor countries is slowed down by the privileged position occupied by rich countries (in global trade markets, for example), or of the understanding that the wealth of the rich is enabled by disadvantaging others.”
What is Global Citizenship?
There is not one single definition of global citizenship. Rather, the concept has varied in meanings across different times and places. It goes beyond the legal definition of citizenship often touched upon related to nation-states. In this timeline, we trace global citizenship back to ancient philosophers such as Socrates, Aristotle, and Diogenes.
The NCDO (2012) distinguished between a formal definition of citizenship, related to the legal relationship between a citizen and a nation-state, and the ‘moral’ definition of citizenship, which emphasises active participation and is considered normative. The report discussed four different approaches towards global citizenship.
- Liberal Citizenship Theory. This theory focuses on the formal conception of citizenship, allowing individuals to choose whether to participate in society, with limited state interference.
- Communautarist Citizenship Theory. In contrast to the Liberal Theory, this theory views humans as members of a sociocultural community rather than isolated individuals. It emphasises the moral dimension of citizenship through community participation.
- Republican Citizenship Theory. This theory also emphasises community, but it focuses on the political community rather than the sociocultural community. People are expected to be interested in public affairs and engage in the act of policymaking and/or with policymakers.
- Neo-republican Citizenship theory. Building upon the previous theory, this perspective recognises the diversity of societies today, where membership to community is influenced by global and local ties.
The NCDO’s definition of the global dimension of citizenship is as follows:
“The global dimension of citizenship is manifested in behaviour that does justice to the principles of mutual dependency in the world, the equality of human beings and the shared responsibility for solving global issues.”
Global Citizenship, therefore, encompasses behaviour by citizens that reflects these principles (shared responsibility, equality, and mutual dependency) in individual conduct.
Thematic Areas of Global Citizenship
The NCDO (2012) focused on two main thematic areas within their work on global citizenship: the sustainability of society, and the sustainability of nature. Regarding the sustainability of society, the NCDO focused on the equality of citizens, their ability to provide for their own needs, the understanding that respect and equality extend beyond the individual, as well as the eradication of unjust inequalities. This thematic area aligns with the UN’s Declaration of Human Rights (1948) (read more here), encompassing civil, political, economic, social, and cultural human rights.
Regarding the sustainability of nature, the NCDO emphasised sustainable development that meets the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs (this is the definition from the Brundtland Report, read more elsewhere in the timeline here). This includes achieving a balance between humans and nature, maintaining natural capital, ensuring the liveability of the planet for future generations, and promoting intra- and inter-generational equality. The concept of growth and its relation to sustainability were also highlighted in this context.
In 2007, the NCDO published a ‘canon on global citizenship’ to start a discussion around the topic and provide a guide for teachers, educators, and others. The publication provided eight ‘windows on the world’, not as closed topics of global citizenship, but as heuristic guidelines to promote discussion around the topic. The ‘windows on the world’ are:
- Diversity
- Identity and Image
- Human Rights
- Sustainability
- Globalisation
- Distribution
- Peace and Conflict
- Global involvement
These windows were later incorporated as thematic areas in the NCDO’s (2012) report, in which the organisation presented its definition of the concept ‘global citizenship’.
Understanding Global Citizenship
Other conceptualisations and reviews of the literature around global citizenship have been developed, for example by Stromquist (2009), Oxley and Morris (2013) (E00475 in the NICC collection), and Schattle (2005) (E00147 in the NICC collection). Read a short discussion of these taxonomies and/or check out the clip of the NICC interview with Prof. Joana Duarte in which she elaborates on different conceptualisations in the media area above.
Stromquist (2009) outlines four thematic frames of global citizenship: the world culture discourse, the new-era realism ideology, the corporate citizenship discourse, and lastly the planetary vessel discourse. These frames offer different perspectives on global citizenship and can be explored further in the table (located in the media section) or in more depth here.
Oxley and Morris (2013) developed a typology of global citizenship based on the existing literature. They distinguished between two main forms of global citizenship: cosmopolitan and advocacy based. Within cosmopolitan citizenship, they identify four conceptualisations: the political, moral, economic, and cultural. For advocacy-based citizenship, they include social, critical, environmental, and spiritual. More details on these conceptualisations can be found in the accompanying media or in the NICC collection.
Schattle (2005) distinguishes between two main discourses: a civic republican one and a libertarian one. The former focuses on global citizenship through principles of awareness, participation, cross-cultural empathy and responsibility, whereas the libertarian discourse stresses concepts like international competitiveness and mobility. While NCDO's approach aligns more with the civic republican discourse, it is worth noting that the libertarian discourse has also had a presence in the Netherlands. For example, the history of volunteering abroad in the Netherlands, which started with the predecessors of what would become the SNV, illustrates elements of libertarian discourse. More information on this can be found here.
In sum, it is evident that there is no singular definition of global citizenship. The concept is complex and has been interpreted and explained differently over time and across various contexts. The common thread lies in incorporating ‘the global’ into ‘the local’, extending ideas of citizenship beyond the legal framework tied to one's nation-state. The diverse interpretations of global citizenship are exactly what makes this timeline valuable. The following bullets will delve into various movements, figures, and events related to concern with ‘the global’ in the Netherlands. Through this overview, the Stichting NICC aims to provide the background knowledge and understanding of the development of global citizenship thinking in the Netherlands over the past decades, fostering a more evidence-based and global-oriented perspective on the future.
Sources and further reading:
- NCDO’s (2012) report (A15855 in the NICC collection)
- Stromquist (2009)
- Oxley and Morris (2013) (E00475 in the NICC collection)
- Schattle (2005) (E00147 in the NICC collection).
