Rethinking the Talloires Declaration

Abstract

Purpose -The purpose of this article is to critique constructively and complement the Talloires Declaration with a focus on social and cultural elements that shape action. These elements are important to achieving the needed response to the environmental issues that the Talloires Declaration highlights. While the Talloires Declaration has been significant and successful in a number of ways, it does not make clearly visible the social conditioning that -beyond information and knowledge about issues -has such a determining influence on action and environmental literacy. Design/methodology/approach -In this article the action and change the Talloires Declaration seeks to achieve is considered against a backdrop of selected social theory and education for sustainability literature. This literature provides insights on the social change that is part of bringing about environmental improvement. Findings -Patterns of thinking and acting that determine whether action on the environment is taken, an important aspect of environmental literacy, are on the whole determined intersubjectively and reside in perspectives and orientations that are largely tacit. Guidance to university staff to achieve the aims of the Talloires Declaration should keep in focus the need for transformation of social and cultural conditioning and entrenched, unquestioned perspectives and ways of being that strongly influence student and staff action. Staff committed to sustainability will want to consider modes through which such transformation can be fostered. Originality/value -For those concerned with the Talloires Declaration, this article offers considerations important in orienting universities' responses to urgent environmental issues. Few articles have proposed that this foundational document for university commitments to sustainability needs to be rethought with the benefit of passing time and in view of a wider, and largely subsequent, literature.

A Bibliometric Review of Education for Sustainable Development, 1992–2022

“…The articles from Australian authors covered a variety of topics important to the Australian curriculum: teachers' perspectives on sustainability, curriculum and teaching practices, mixed learning strategies for ESD, institutional changes for ESD at the university, ESD policy development and implementation, etc. Sustainability initiatives should occupy a strategic position in higher education institutions, where the mission of universities is to promote sustainable development and to attract researchers from institutions around the world for joint research through teaching, research, and based on publications [87]. The case of Australia also shows that universities do serve as important role models for other institutions in the implementation of sustainability programs in the academic field.…”

A sustentabilidade e o desenvolvimento sustentável na educação em engenharia

“…Ela constitui-se, basicamente, de dez macroações por meio das quais as IES possam participar mais ativamente na busca de novas formas de pensar o desenvolvimento (BARBIERI; SILVA, 2011). Assinar essa Declaração é comprometer-se com a sustentabilidade no ensino superior, sendo que em 2010, 429 universidades em todo o mundo já tinham efetivado esse compromisso (ADLONG, 2013). Por sua vez, a OIUDSMA congrega 14 países e um total de 60 universidades signatárias (LAYRARGUES, 2012).…”

Accounting and accountability challenges

“…Despite the visionary agenda adopted by many tertiary education organisations, progress towards the successful implementation of sustainability strategies has been Accounting and accountability challenges slow and insufficient (Bekessy et al, 2007;Pigozzi, 2010). This raises many questions, such as, why the adoption of sustainability declarations and policies by tertiary education organisations do not necessarily translate into implementation of their basic commitments (Calder and Clugston, 2003;Adlong, 2013). Does this demonstrate that there is little or no public accountability for failing to deliver (Bekessy et al, 2007)?…”