Future Scenarios and Environmental Education

Abstract

This article explores a number of questions about visions of the future and their implications for environmental education (EE). If the future were known, what kind of actions would be needed to maintain the positive aspects and reverse the negative ones? How could these actions be translated into the aims of EE? Three future scenarios are discussed: the limits to growth (the great tragedy and demise); sustainable development and ecological modernization (hope and innovation); and the Anthropocene park. These scenarios are linked to corresponding EE/ESD approaches and instrumentalism in education is argued as a morally justifiable goal. Finally, education for deep ecology is advocated in order to address the ethical implications of the last scenario.

Keywords:

• anthropocene
• education for sustainable development (ESD)
• environmental education
• future scenarios
• sustainable development

Notes

To present a balanced position Jickling (2005b) adds that despite the need for neutrality, taking an ethical stance IS important, as it teaches students to be actively involved moral citizens. Jickling asks: “But what if environmental thinking needs to transcend the boundaries of conventional thinking and counter more thought-provoking, even radical, ideas? How do we enable our students to push beyond the bounds of our own best thinking, or the conventional wisdom of the day? How do we ensure that they can be exposed to more alternatives?” (p. 93). In interpreting these questions, we can suppose that deep ecology (advocating for the wolves for the sake of wolves) can be considered to be one of those “radical” ideas, and that the “bounds of our own best thinking” imply self-defense against angry parents or intolerant school administrators; and “conventional wisdom of the day” implies an anthropocentric approach to nature. If this interpretation is close to what Jickling meant, then the last question about exposing students to more alternatives remains rather open, as it could mean both the “radical” alternative and any other alternative, which provide no guarantee of non-human rights.

Socially critical scholars contest various injustices they argue are inherent in neoliberal discourse and ideology. EE/ESD scholars call for different cultural-historical epistemologies that include more cosmopolitan (Sund & Öhman 2013) and globally democratic perspectives that expose hegemonic orthodoxies (Jickling & Wals 2008), rather than education that seeks to marginalize other approaches (Jickling & Spork 1998). Thus the environmental “problem” instrumentally reconstituted in education is viewed as requiring reconstruction in pursuit of various social and ecological justices.