Development education is an under‐theorised aspect of international volunteering, yet it is implicit in the mission statements of many sending organisations when they promise a transformative experience. What does international volunteering offer, and can it make returned volunteers ‘think global’? This paper suggests a tentative definition of development education, outlining key pedagogical concepts that can be applied to analysis of international volunteering projects. Case study research about Platform2, a pilot ‘Global Learning’ scheme funded by the UK government, explores components and challenges of delivery. Discussion highlights the importance of formal structuring of educational opportunities, how international volunteering can both perpetuate and disrupt stereotypes of the global South, the role of proximity in expanding volunteers' capacity to think critically about development, as well as the drawbacks of jumping scale to learn about citizenship.

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This is a repository copy of Building common cause towards sustainable consumption: A cross-generational perspective.

Sustainability and sustainable development are prominent themes in international policymaking, corporate PR, news-media and academic scholarship. Definitions remain contested, however sustainability is associated with a three-pillar focus on economic development, environmental conservation and social justice, most recently espoused in the adoption of the UN Sustainable Development Goals in 2015. In spite of its common usage, there is little research about how sustainability is represented and refracted in public discourse in different national contexts. We examine British national press coverage of sustainability and sustainable development in 2015 in a cross-market sample of national newspapers. Our findings show that key international policy events and environmental and social justice frames are peripheral, while neoliberalism and neoliberal environmentalism vis-à-vis the promotion of technocratic solutions, corporate social responsibility and 'sustainable' consumerism are the predominant frames through which the British news-media reports sustainability. This holds regardless of newspaper quality and ideological orientation.

The United Nations' Development Goals (SDGs) have been criticized but are nonetheless seen by many as an important, if imperfect, international effort to address climate and environmental change, resource depletion and the unsustainability of contemporary life. Many of the Goals need to be implemented at the local level, yet sub-national governments have not been granted any enhanced status at the UN to facilitate this process. As a result, the role and effectiveness of local governments in localizing the SDGs is dependent on multi-level arrangements within respective national contexts. In this paper we present findings on the challenges facing local authorities in England, namely co-dependent ambivalence, partial holism and narrow practices of knowledge governance. We draw on work carried out collaboratively with local authorities and other stakeholders in Greater Manchester and Sheffield, and a UK-wide national workshop. These challenges explain the relatively low uptake and engagement with the SDGs in the context of wider political and economic concerns compared with international comparator cities. Against this background our research found that making the Goals real, relevant, relatable and relational offered a tactical route to localization for English local government.