Context
The Latin American and Caribbean region is made up of 41 extremely diverse countries - middle income nations such as Mexico and Chile, and others that are less developed, such as Haiti; small island states, and vast territories such as Brazil and Argentina. In this context, the main challenges for sustainability and global citizenship can vary from one country to the next, but a number of fundamental common points run across the board.
Despite favourable economic development, 28.2% of the population of Latin America was living in poverty in 2012, with 11.3% in extreme poverty or indigence (ECLAC, 2013). Latin America has the highest levels of income disparity in the world, and these inequalities are mirrored in access and quality in areas such as health, education, and basic services such as electricity and drinking water.
Many countries of the region face great challenges related to increasing levels of violence, which result in high human and social costs. The region is registering more than 100,000 homicides per year. Homicide rates are much higher than for other regions and are considered to be at epidemic levels by the World Health Organization.
The region is rich in cultural and linguistic diversity, with over 650 indigenous peoples speaking more than 600 languages. This diversity is a source of creativity, growth, and human development, but it can also give rise to overwhelming social tensions, exclusion, and discrimination.
Migratory flows are very dynamic in the region, with about 28.5 million Latin American and Caribbean people living outside the region/countries where they were born (4% of the region’s total population), and with an intra-regional immigrant population living in Latin America and the Caribbean estimated at 7.6 million people (ECLAC 2014). This has implications for the protection of the rights of these migrants, as well as their citizenship status and integration into the host countries.
It is essential that education addresses these issues and challenges affecting Latin America and the Caribbean - GCED provides the necessary framework to do so.
This has been recognized by high level decision and policy makers, as can be seen in the 2014 Lima Declaration “Education for All (EFA) in Latin America and the Caribbean: Assessment of progress and post-2015 challenges.” This Declaration is the outcome of the regional meeting on Education for All, which brought together Ministers of Education, UN agencies, civil society organizations and development partners on 30-31 October 2014 in Lima, Peru. They declared to “commit to developing programmes in Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) and GCED so that learners a) acquire the knowledge, values and attitudes to promote human rights, gender equality and a culture of peace and non-violence, b) become the beings they want to be and enjoy secure lives, participate responsibly in society, embrace diversity, live and work together harmoniously and c) contribute to sustainable development, the protection of the environment and life on the planet and be able to confront the challenges of climate change.
Advances and challenges in Latin America and the Caribbean
No common or singular definition exists for GCED in the LAC region. However, it is understood that the concept provides a rich context for debate and investigation to define the conceptual underpinnings of GCED as well as its basic parameters in the specific regional context.
GCED can build on a solid base of experiences in peace and human rights education, civic education, citizenship and democracy education, values and ethics education and philosophy education, amongst others.
Elements related to GCED can already be found in the curricula of several countries in the region, although perhaps with a different label. There is also increased availability of non-formal programmes related to GCED, offered by NGOs and CSOs. This offering complements the formal offering in that it provides more flexible and open learning opportunities.
Despite these advances, many barriers still exist for putting GCED and related concepts into practice; however, there is an important window of opportunity for GCED as policy and decision makers in the region increasingly realize that changes are needed in the current education systems in order to respond to the needs of the present and future generations. This is reflected, for example, in the outcome document of the 3rd Board Meeting of Ministers of Education of the Regional Education Project (PRELAC), held in 2013, which states that “Education should promote active and effective citizenship both locally and globally as well as contribute to strengthening democracy, fostering dialogue and conflict resolution, thus mitigating all forms of extremism and violence.
