An African Perspectives on the Current Status of Global Citizenship Education in North Africa

• In Event: Anti-Diversity, Repression and Neo-Mercantilism : Can Global Citizenship Education Survive?

Abstract

In the post-Arab Spring era, Morocco (along with the MENA region, generally) has experienced layers of educational reform that emphasize the role of youth/students in global citizenship education (GCE) in both curriculum changes and national mandates. Scholarship has revealed gaps between the rhetorical/theoretical and the practical/actionable aspects of global citizenship-focused educational reform in the MENA region as well as the ways in which these reforms have been complicated by economic, political, pedagogical and other structural barriers in Morocco (Abdi, 2017; Idrissi et al., 2021). This paper explores the first-hand experiences of college students in Morocco as they navigate both the curricular messages and national mandates of GCE in an English undergraduate program. Moreover, against a backdrop of “America first” and neo-Mercantilist (Akkizidis, 2025) shifts in the U.S. (along with a unique historical relationship between the two countries), this paper pays special attention to the reception of this shift among the Moroccan youth who are the main subjects of these rhetorical calls to action.

Author

• Amanda B. Richey, Kennesaw State University