From “education for sustainable development” to “education for the end of the world as we know it”

Pedagogy of the implicated: advancing a social ecology of responsibility framework to promote deeper understanding of the climate crisis

“…Numerous scholars have argued that we need to attend to what our negations, resistances and denials etc. in the face of 'difficult knowledge' are telling us (e.g., Garrett 2017) whereas others have presented models for interrupting various different levels and forms of denial (e.g., Stein et al 2020). The ultimate challenge for CCE is, of course, to scaffold learners in apprehending their role in the existential threat of global warming, while at the same time not foreclosing possibilities for action and amelioration.…”

“…As societies experience and anticipate global warming's worsening effects, the mental health impacts of the environmental crisis are increasingly felt, particularly amongst young people for whom 'eco anxiety' has become a defining feature of their generation (Barbiroglio 2019;Pihkala 2020). Indeed, there is increasing recognition that pedagogical encounters with climate change are 'difficult' in the sense that they tend to evoke a range of emotions and defences including discomfort, guilt, anxiety, grief, despair, and various forms of denial (e.g., Garrett 2019;Kelly and Kelly 2020;Stein et al 2020; van Kessel 2020). Because research on the affective dimensions of climate change is very much in its infancy, our understanding of the complex ways in which various climate-related emotions such as grief, anxiety etc.…”

“…As a pedagogical and socially transformative project, difficult knowledge implicates the learner (Britzman 1998); it demands that they consider their 'ethical obligations' towards others who have suffered or who are suffering (Pitt and Britzman 2003, 756) by recognising themselves as implicated in the very conditions of their suffering.In foregrounding the complex ways in which individuals are implicated in the suffering of others, difficult knowledge opens up spaces where individual responsibility for climate-related harms and injustices can be transfigured into concrete actions and forms of solidarity (Rothberg 2019). While certain aspects of the global youth climate movement have been rightly criticised (e.g., Stein et al 2020), the potential for this movement to forge long-distance solidarity should not be underestimated. The movement has been a proactive force in putting pressure on world leaders to commit to leaving carbon reserves in the ground and in highlighting the politicaleconomic factors driving carbon emissions.…”

“…), on the other. Taking up Rothberg's (2019) call for deeper theorisation of the complex relationship between subjective implication and systemic culpability (as quoted in Knittel and Forchieri 2020, 17), I respond to the commonly-voiced argument that an emphasis on individual complicity necessarily detracts from a robust analysis of state-corporate responsibility (e.g., McClanahan and Brisman 20152015).While not discounting differences of scale between individual actions and state-corporate practices, this article maintains that pedagogical frameworks which promote deeper understanding of the complex ways in which individual acts and structural forces interact and mutually reinforce one another are needed more than ever, so that individuals can better apprehend their role in exacerbating and alleviating the climate crisis.The paper is also indebted to de-colonial approaches to global citizenship education which call for the forging of closer links between global citizenship and environmental and sustainability education (e.g., Andreotti 2016;Pashby et al 2020;Stein 2019;Stein et al 2020). De-colonial approaches are valuable not least in terms of illuminating how citizens based in emissions-intensive societies can better apprehend their own complex entanglement in the wider structures that have produced the climate crisis and enhancing their sense of response-abilty (i.e., their ability to respondto the conditions that have created this catastrophe in the first place) (Lobo et al 2021).…”

Sustainability of Youth Careers in Romania—Study on the Correlation of Students’ Personal Interests with the Selected University Field of Study

“…The external sustainability of the educational system can be explained from the perspective of social sustainability, through the long-term impact on the environment and sustainable development [14,15]. The internal sustainability of the education system refers to the impact on the sustainable life of young people, the balance between professional and personal life [16].…”