Importance Of Global Citizenship

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Importance of Global Citizenship A citizen of any country has rights and responsibilities, and as a global citizen it extends to the world at large. I have grown up in different countries around the world, experiencing different cultures perspectives. In my opinion, being a global citizen transcends national borders. It is necessary to be aware of and concerned about issues that may not directly affect us as individuals, but impact the quality of life in the world at large. My experience has shown me that people have different ways of looking at issues and have different ways of defining what constitutes a problem. These things are often culturally defined. An example might be societies that favour strict caste systems versus cultures with more social and economic mobility. It is important to have enough perspective to include multiple points of view. There are other issues however, that they may be culturally accepted but have to be questioned from a larger human rights perspective. Examples of this include female circumcision, (still practiced in at least 26 African countries , as well as other places), human trafficking (which affects 600,000 to 800,00 annually, including children ) and child soldiers. This last topic particularly interests me, as I had the opportunity to see the film ‘Invisible Children’ and talk to the director about his work. It raised my consciousness about this issue and my general awareness in knowing what goes on beyond national borders. Our world is very interconnected. Global communications have allowed us to interact with each other in real time and made us far more aware of what goes on in each other’s backyards. Terrorism has crossed borders, and international security is a concern for all of us, as are environmental issues, including global warming, which impact us all as we share the natural resources of

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