Juggling Global, National, and Institutional Demands: Multi-Stakeholder Dynamics in Global Citizenship Education for Pre-Service Teachers

Global Citizenship Education (GCE) in teacher education is shaped by higher education institutions and the priorities of many organizations and governments. This study examines how global, national, and institutional demands were negotiated in designing a pre-service teacher GCE course in South Korea. The study identifies how actors exercised power, legitimacy, and urgency in shaping curricular choices, pedagogical approaches, and assessment systems, which resulted in strategies such as broad thematic coverage, engagement with field practitioners, project-based learning, and flexible evaluation. It highlights the relational and political nature of curriculum-making, highlighting the key role of balancing competing stakeholder claims. The study contributes non-Western perspectives to a field dominated by Western contexts, offering insights into how GCE can be adapted under centralized governance and institutional constraints.