INTRODUCING CORPORATE POWER TO THE GLOBAL EDUCATION DISCOURSE

This article asserts through a discussion on corporate power that the fundamental causes of sustained poverty and injustice in the world are centred in existing power structures, and until we address them, all attempts to improve the world will remain unsuccessful. The paper draws on a study by Andy Egan (2012) which identified a deficit in critical development education practice in the public sphere in the UK. It points out that in Canada, civil society organisations (CSOs) with a critical voice are systematically silenced and argues that education must, to use a Freirean term, conscientise individuals about the power structures in the world, empowering them with a sense of agency and active participation. It concludes by calling on global educators, in Canada especially, to engage more firmly in the action component of praxis, claiming that in this dark age of speech repression it has become much more necessary to unite and speak out collectively.