Education for Sustainable Development
Lead Researcher: Prof Ken Peattie
Background
Education has been viewed as crucial to developing more sustainable societies, economies and businesses. Little progress will be made without education that helps managers, investors, policy makers, consumers and citizens to understand what sustainability is, how it relates to them and their lives, and what they can do to influence business and other institutions to pursue sustainability more actively. However, more than 20 years on from the Brundtland Report which provided a call for urgent adoption and pursuit of sustainable development as a societal objective, research continues to show that the majority of people have low levels of awareness about sustainability, its meaning and its relevance to them. Even where specific issues have penetrated the public consciousness, such as with global warming, there is little understanding of how it relates to people’s lives, their decisions and their actions.
Aims and Objectives
BRASS’s aims in relation to the Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) debate are to contribute:
a. Research considering the potential for developing more sustainability and social responsibility orientated management education. This includes the influence of the broader educational system in the UK as a platform on which to develop more sustainable management education.
b. The development of educational resources to support the teaching of disciplines relating to business and management in ways that promote sustainability and social responsibility. This includes resources to develop a more sustainable approach to the management of higher education institutions.
c. Direct educational contributions to the teaching at Cardiff and elsewhere to integrate principles of accountability, sustainability and social responsibility into courses.
Methodology
Delivering the project aims took the form of a number of projects:
Building a sustainable knowledge base:
This project was part of the European funded Observatory for a Sustainable Knowledge-Based Region (OSKAR) initiative, and involved a programme for interviews with stakeholders in education and sustainable development in Wales. The project sought to establish the potential for regional change to educational strategies to facilitate the building of a sustainability knowledge base.
Academy of Management Workshops:
BRASS was a co-organiser of the workshop after the 2nd World Summit On Sustainable Development: ‘Lifting Our Game’, organised at the 2002 British Academy of Management Conference in London. This included a paper entitled The Johannesburg Summit: The Implications for BAM and Beyond, presented by Professor Ken Peattie. At the 2002 Academy of Management Conference in Denver, BRASS also organised a Corporate Citizenship “Showcase” symposium, in which Dr Andy Crane was also a speaker.
Corporate Complicity in Human Rights Violation:
Professor Celia Wells developed this specialised new course for the European University Institute.
Sustainability Management for Higher Education
BRASS has sought to contribute to the debate concerning the integration of sustainability management principles into higher education institutions. This has included providing support and encouragement to Cardiff University in relation to these issues. It has also included work by BRASS PhD scholar Rodrigo Lozano on the development of theoretical and practical approaches to sustainability management for higher education institutions (HEIs). A presentation based on this work is available here; and a practical tool to assist HEIs to address these issues is available here.
Teaching orientated resources:
In addition to its many outputs in terms of refereed journal articles and conference papers, many of which will make significant contributions to education as well as to scholarship, BRASS has been active in developing and publishing texts and book chapters which are primarily aimed at supporting teaching and learning related business accountability, sustainability and social responsibility. A number of other BRASS resources have been developed with the aim of supporting those involved with teaching and learning on elements of the BRASS agenda, as well as those involved with scholarship, practice or policy making. These include:
• A sustainable Marketing Knowledge Network
• An annotated Bibliography of the Accountability of Multinational Corporations: A Review of International Human Rights Law
• The UK Foot and Mouth Epidemic of 2001: A Research Resource
BRASS has provided direct input into a number of courses, including:
• The final year undergraduate Strategic Management Course at Cardiff Business School. Sustainability is one of four core themes on contemporary challenges for Strategic Managers which form the basis of this course. The course is taken by an average of 300 future UK managers each year.
• MBA Strategic Management: BRASS staff have provided lectures on Corporate Social Responsibility and Corporate Citizenship for between 300 and 400 future international managers each year.
• MSc Marketing: BRASS staff have provided teaching on marketing ethics and marketing and the law for 30 students taking this specialised Marketing MSc at Cardiff, which began in 2004.
Outputs
• Peattie K. (2004), ‘Building a Region’s Sustainability Knowledge Base: Education for Sustainable Development in Wales’, chapter in Sustainable Regions, Thomas M. and Rhisiart, M. (eds), Aureus Publishing
• Peattie K (2004), Learning to Learn Differently, paper presented to the Sustainable Regions Conference, Cardiff, January
• Peattie K (2005), Climbing the ESD Pyramids: An exploration of the context for Sustainable Business Education: BRASS Working Paper.
• Crane, A. & Matten, D. (2005), Business Ethics: a European Perspective. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Solomon, J. & Solomon, A. (2004), Corporate Governance and Accountability . Chichester: John Wiley.
• Lee, R. with Boswell, J. eds. (2002), Economics, Ethics and the Environment, Cavendish.
• Lee, R. with Wallington, P., eds. (2002), Blackstone’s statutes on Public Law & Human Rights 2002-2003. 12th ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Flynn, A. (2004), “Environmental Policy” in Jones, B. et al. Politics UK. 5th ed. Harlow: Pearson education.
• Wells, C. (2002), “The Reform of Criminal Liability”, in de Lacey, J. “The Reform of UK Company Law”, Cavendish Publishing.
