Education for Sustainable Development in the Postcolonial World: Towards a Transformative Agenda for Africa

Description

Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) lies at the heart of global, regional and national policy agendas, with the goal of achieving socially and environmentally just development through the provision of inclusive, equitable quality education for all. Realising this potential on the African continent, however, calls for radical transformation of policy and practice. Developing a transformative agenda requires taking account of the ‘learning crisis’ in schools, the inequitable access to a good quality education, the historical role of education and training in supporting unsustainable development, and the enormous challenges involved in complex system change. In the African continent, sustainable development entails eradicating poverty and inequality, supporting economically sustainable livelihoods within planetary boundaries, and averting environmental catastrophe, as well as dealing with health pandemics and security threats. In addressing these challenges, the book: explores the meaning of ESD for Africa in the context of the ‘postcolonial condition’ critically discusses the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as well as regional development agendas draws on a wealth of research evidence and examples from across the continent engages with contemporary debates about the skills, competencies and capabilities required for sustainable development, including decolonising the curriculum and transforming teaching and learning relationships sets out a transformative agenda for policy-makers, practitioners, NGOs, social movements and other stakeholders based on principles of social and environmental justice. Education for Sustainable Development in the Postcolonial World is an essential read for anyone with an interest in education and socially and environmentally just development in Africa. Cover Half Title Series Title Copyright Dedication Contents List of abbreviations Acknowledgements Foreword 1 Setting the scene Introduction The ‘postcolonial condition’ An overview of global and regional policy agendas The SDGs The education SDG Agenda 2063 Continental education strategy for Africa Global and regional agendas and the ‘learning crisis’ Aims and summary of main arguments Conclusion 2 Introducing complex systems Introduction Why complexity theory? General characteristics of complex systems Understanding and researching complex systems Conclusion 3 Towards a framework for conceptualising education for sustainable development Introduction The meaning of ‘sustainable development’ in global and regional policy agendas The meaning of education for sustainable development The meaning of social and environmental justice Defining transformative SD and ESD Reconceptualising a transformative ESD Conclusion 4 Globalisation and the postcolonial condition Introduction The nature of complex globalisation Domains of development Power in global governance Africa and the global economy The postcolonial condition and the environment Changing patterns of global governance Global governance and colonialism Global governance in the era of ‘development’ The influence of global civil society on global governance Regimes of global governance Africa and developmental regionalism Transformative regionalism The postcolonial state in Africa Conclusion 5 Africa and the global governance of education Introduction Conceptualising global and regional education policy The emergence of education for all as global regime of education governance The increasing complexity of global and regional governance of education The aid regime The human rights regime Trade and security regimes The MDG regime The emergence of the SDG regime Emergence of the ESD regime Conclusion 6 The regional and national governance of education Introduction Developmental regionalism and education policy in Africa The emergence of CESA as part of a regional regime of governance-in-the-making CESA and changing patterns of governance at a national level Changing patterns of control over the governance of education Education governance after independence Civil society, the state, and education governance The privatisation of education and training in Africa CESA, privatization, and the future funding of education and training The state and political socialisation Global citizenship education Education, the state, and violence Conclusion 7 From colonial education to the SDGs: changing discourses on skills for development Introduction Skills for economic development: changing priorities Skills formation under colonialism Skills formation and ‘modernisation’ The rise and rise of human capital theory Skills formation, knowledge economies, and twenty-first-century skills Skills formation and lifelong learning Skills formation and regional agendas Framing regional skills agendas: agenda 2063 and ‘inclusive growth’ Skills formation and CESA CESA and basic literacy and numeracy CESA and STEM-related skills Technical and vocational education and training CESA and the cultural basis of skills formation CESA, skills, and the environment Towards a sustainable approach to skills formation Beyond ‘inclusive growth’ Skills, competencies, and capabilities for sustainable development Complex capabilities Conclusion 8 Decolonising the curriculum: education for an African cultural renaissance Introduction Decolonising the curriculum Decolonising the curriculum and the sociology of knowledge Decolonising the secondary school science curriculum The burning language question in African education The instrumental approach The rights-based approach Language-in-education policy, theory, and research Creating an enabling environment to support the development of linguistic capability Conclusion 9 Towards a transformative pedagogy Introduction The progressive approach The formalist approach Towards a transformative pedagogy for Africa Complexity and learning Conclusion 10 Towards a transformative agenda Introduction Towards a counter-hegemonic movement for transformative change Building a broad-based coalition for change Articulate the causes of unsustainable development and of the learning crisis Develop a counter-hegemonic vision for ESD The role of intellectuals in developing a counter-hegemonic vision Realising complex change through developing sustainable education and training systems Placing an ontology of learning at the heart of system reform Developing systemic responses to the learning crisis Facilitating system leadership Investing in educators as agents of transformative change Democratising the governance of education Creating learning systems Moving out of the dependency trap Conclusion References Index