Balancing the tensions and meeting the conceptual challenges of education for sustainable development and climate change

Abstract

This paper addresses one of the key challenges for work on education, sustainable development and climate change: the overall conceptualisation of central ideas such as Environmental Education (EE), Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) and Climate Change Education (CCE). What do these concepts mean in diverse contexts and amongst diverse actors? The paper draws on evidence from Denmark, Singapore, Canada and the UK to highlight both the similarities and differences found within national discussions around these essentially contested concepts and their relationships to policy and practice. It further argues that such debates about how EE, ESD and CCE are conceptualised remain highly relevant, not just to academic work itself, but also to wider international discussions regarding both the current and potential relationships between conceptual understanding, policy and practice.

Keywords:

• Education for Sustainable Development
• Environmental Education
• climate change
• policy
• conceptualisations
• Denmark
• Singapore
• Canada
• United Kingdom

Notes

1. As many readers will be aware, the UK includes the countries of England, Scotland, Wales and the province of Northern Ireland. The following discussion therefore refers to the UK when describing general trends across all of these, and to each individually by name when describing more specific policy or initiatives.

2. This high level international meeting is described in the following way: ‘The 15th Conference of the Parties (COP15) and the 5th Conference of the Parties serving as the Meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol (COP/MOP5) in Copenhagen marked the culmination of two years of negotiations under the auspices of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Bali Roadmap. The purpose of the negotiations was to ultimately create a comprehensive, legally-binding international treaty to replace the Kyoto Protocol when it expires in 2012’ (Climatico 2010).