(via xkcd: Sustainable)
Wait. What?
Berkes has published on social-ecological resilience in Cambodia? More than once?
Berkes of Berkes et al. 2003? Berks from the linking book? This guy?
Good grief, I really really should have known that already. And have read those articles already.
Most days I’m only pretending to know what I’m talking about.
At least now I have a plan for this week, right?
If sustainable development should be defined differently in PA and Cambodia, who should do the defining? Is that a proper role for me, as a white guy living in New Jersey? How has UNESCO played the role of development expert in defining education for sustainable development?
In the developed world sustainable development is centered around sustaining current levels of consumption and capital (human, social, manmade, natural). In the developing world should the focus be on development? A sustainability curriculum in Cambodia should address pressing material needs, such as malnutrition. A sustainability curriculum would be concerned with increasing material well being, increasing consumption.
Hartwick argued that a nation would remain sustainable if the total capital stock remained steady. In this way a nation could trade natural capital for human capital or manmade capital.
K = K[H] + K[N] + K[M]
However, sustainability education in Cambodia aimed at improving farming practices increases both human capital (skills and knowledge) and natural capital (environmental services). It might also allow money spent on manmade capital like tractors and fertilizer to be spent on more productive uses. The total capital stock of the nation would increase.
Is this so different from the American example? A recycling education program would increase human capital and slow the reduction of natural capital, leading to an increase in total capital stock at time t+n.
So maybe I’m saying the most base logic of sustainability education is universal: increase the total capital stock by increasing human and natural capital. But the curricular objectives are wildly different between a program designed to introduce low/no fertilizer farming and one that focuses on recycling. Again conservation vs. development. Maintaining a level of material wealth vs. increasing wealth.
Questions:
Although there has been some recent scholarship looking at sustainability and social studies, education for sustainable development seems focused on science education.
But UNESCO, among others recommends a more holistic approach to sustainability education. They say:
The overall goal of the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (DESD) is to integrate the principles, values and practices of sustainable development into all aspects of education and learning. This educational effort will encourage changes in behaviour that will create a more sustainable future in terms of environmental integrity, economic viability and a just society for present and future generations.
And their teacher education curriculum appears to follow these guidelines.1
But the former social studies teacher in me is curious. What does it look like on the ground? What attitudes to social studies teachers have towards sustainability education? What about those currently studying to become SS teachers? Are they being trained in how to incorporate ESD into history lessons? In my senior year of high school, I was lucky enough to be taught by a guy that pulled environmental concepts into the social studies classroom.2 I know that was rare 16 years ago, is it now more common?
Today’s idea: Survey and interview SS teachers and college of education students here and in Cambodia about sustainability education. Do their attitudes differ? What about their textbooks?
And does it relate to my previous ramblings about different reasons for sustainability education in the US and Cambodia? Do US SS teachers view ESD differently from teachers in Cambodia?
