Constructing cosmopolitanism differently: a cosmopolitan nationalist analysis of international and bilingual school mission statements

Cosmopolitanism in international schooling frequently reinforces elite privilege and social stratification rather than serving as a neutral, stable ideal. However, comparative empirical research examining how different international schooling models discursively construct cosmopolitanism alongside national belonging remains limited. This study employs cosmopolitan nationalism as an analytical lens to examine the construction of cosmopolitan identities in the mission statements of international and bilingual schools in China. We conducted qualitative thematic and discourse analysis of 97 IB school websites, utilising AI-assisted coding and iterative human validation. Insights show that international schools foreground a borderless, universalist institutional imaginary that often masks its extractive roots. In contrast, bilingual schools articulate a rooted cosmopolitanism, utilising nationally anchored moral-cultural lexicons to reconcile global mobility with national loyalty. These insights extend the concept of cosmopolitan nationalism and help address epistemic/hermeneutical injustice by showing how bilingual schools should be accepted as being ‘international differently.’