'Global citizenship' has gained traction as a policy objective across school systems in recent decades. It has been defined as education for the development of a sense of cosmopolitan moral virtue, planetary identification and 'global competencies'. In this paper, I argue that historical sociology can help explain why this goal has gained prominence in citizenship education policy since the late twentieth century. Focussing on the Australian case, I propose an analytical model where changes in citizenship education policy for schools are articulated to concurrent transformations of nation-state citizenship within a shifting international conjuncture. This approach reveals that the rise of neoliberal statecraft and the diffusion of human rights discourses since the 1970s are pertinent analytical coordinates to make sense of the growing presence of global citizenship within government policy agendas for schools. The Australian case illustrates the relevance of historical sociology to make sense of contemporary education policy.