The sustainability movement in higher education has made considerable headway in the areas of research, campus operations, and community outreach, but has been less successful in bringing about curricular reform. To promote greater thinking about sustainability in the undergraduate curriculum, this essay explores three main questions: What are the…

Can education for sustainable development (ESD) policies help to create a more sustainable society? In the article I argue that contemporary secondary school curriculum policies relating to ESD are rhetorical devices that will achieve little towards resolving global problems. I suggest that the conceptualization of SD is itself fundamentally…

The author argues that education, as we see it today, is more a part of sustainable development's (SD) problem than a part of its solution because it reinforces the principles and values of an unsustainable lifestyle and economy. He argues for an economy that is not centred on free market and profit, and which circulates wealth with a logic of…

The gap between policy rhetoric and school practices in environmental education has not only persisted but probably increased over the past twenty years, given the contested advent of education for sustainable development (ESD) as the dominant international policy discourse in this area, and an increased focus in schools on didactic teaching in…

This article addresses how to reconcile the creative and innovative emphases of future knowledge societies with the needs and demands for longer term sustainable development of enduring and worthwhile practices--within education and beyond it. Drawing on a theoretical framework of organisational memory and sustainability, the article argues that…

Six years ago Tony Benn left the House of Commons "to devote more time to politics." These days he sees himself as an "untrained classroom assistant to the nation," encouraging people to take charge of their own political destinies. Benn tells the author that education is a fundamental part of that process. Education, whether…

This article illustrates the importance of nature experience for environmental knowledge, values and action. Recent empirical German research on the importance of nature experience will be analysed with regard to research foci, innovative research contributions and selected research results. Research deficits and challenges will be identified.…

Over the last thirty years, the idea of sustainable development has come to be seen in policy circles across the globe as a necessary and urgent response to a range of social and environmental issues that threaten both the integrity of the biosphere, and human wellbeing. Increasingly, education, and particularly higher education, is seen to have a…

Addresses the issues involved in re-engineering the discourse of environmental education--and education more broadly--towards an overriding concern with sustainable development. These approaches assume certain epistemological positions with regard to the language and referent to meaning. Sketches out a possible typology of such positions and…

Education is central to two recent international efforts to address an impending ecological global crisis. "The Earth Charter" and the UN document "Decade for Education for Sustainable Development 2005-2014" challenge all people to consider the socio-ecological, ethical, local and global dimensions of human life. These…

In environmentalist discourse, there is often an assumption that certain non-industrial peoples, usually called "traditional" or "indigenous" live in more "harmonious" relations with nature. The general argument is that instead of treating these communities as "backward" or "uncivilized," the…

Despite the recognition by early champions of the environmental movement in the United States that humans and the diverse ecosystems in which they live are indivisible, many environmental education policies and programs have tended to uphold the categorical distinction between "nature" and "culture" (e.g., Sessions; Soule and Press). In the late…

Suggests that globalization is neither inevitable nor viable in the long term. A "green" focus in education can achieve the twin goals of sustainable communities and economic development. (SK)

This essay addresses current attitudes toward the environment and use of the earth's resources and suggests that restoring harmony with the natural world lies in respecting the natural law observed by ancient and indigenous people. Discusses the role of environmental education programs such as the Earth Restoration Corps. (LZ)

Education for sustainability has attempted to extend the range of concerns teachers and students are meant to address from the environmental into the social and economic. But this has brought with it aspects of an anti-industrial sentiment and an essentially defensive, issues-focused agenda aimed at the individual. It has weakened the role of…