It is often suggested that for institutional change efforts towards sustain ability to bear fruit a common vision for sustainability in higher education (SHE) is necessary. Given the contested nature of the concept and the com plexity of academic institutional culture, seeking broad consensus around sustainability presents a significant challenge to those seeking organizational change for sustainability. This article describes a research project that explored professors' conceptualizations of SHE in the case study of Dalhousie University. We identified a number of divergent and conflicting conceptualizations around not only the concept of sustaina bility but also the role of the university in education for it, and promoting sustainability outside of its walls. Given the nature of the tensions in this study in particular and how they relate to important debates in the field of SHE generally, we propose embracing a vision of sustainability rooted in plurality and dialogue.

Declarations for sustainability in higher education are often seen as a set of guiding principles that aid institutions of higher learning to incorporate the concept of sustainability into their various institutional dimensions. As the Decade of Education for Sustainable Development draws to a close and in the shadow of the 20th anniversary of the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, it seems appropriate to re-evaluate how these declarations have changed over the past two decades. In this study, we apply critical discourse analysis to examine how sustainability and the university are socio-politically constructed within these documents. Our analysis uncovers evidence of ideological assumptions and structures that are potentially misaligned with notions of sustainability often discussed in the Sustainability in Higher Education (SHE) literature. It is not the purpose of this study to provide a definitive reading of the documents, but rather to ply a novel critical lens to help elucidate how some taken-for-granted assumptions present in the declarations may work against their stated goals.