Moving beyond both a neoliberal as well as a 'heroic' conception of how the International Baccalaureate (IB) might 'make a better world', this paper focuses on the transformative potentiality of IBDP classroom pedagogy from the perspective of an experienced and critically minded educator, whose praxis has evolved across more than three decades of teaching IBDP courses in elite, well-established international schools around the world. In the IBDP teacher's account, particular attention is placed on the relational qualities of the (ideal) classroom culture and on the tensions between learner autonomy, teacher and learner authenticity and the critical imperative to interrogate privilege. We seek to provide a generative case for researchers and educators to reflect and find greater precision on the desired ends, possibilities and limits of critical and progressive pedagogies in school classrooms under contemporary conditions constituting our 'world in trouble'. More specifically for stakeholders of the IBDP, we offer up a promising orientation to IBDP classroom pedagogy in pursuit of the IB mission.