6 Education for Sustainability: Individual and Community Action

Introduction

We know that knowledge should lead to action. Hopefully at this point in the course (if not before), you are ready to take some practical steps for yourself, your family and your community, to live in a more sustainable way. This unit should help you to consider some of the options.

Obviously one thing you can do is educate others about the issues and possible actions. Only education will change people's lifestyles and consumption patterns, and create the public support and political will necessary to implement the major changes in society and our economy required to become more sustainable. 

Sustainability is also a topic with great potential to start meaningful conversations with others, linking their immediate preoccupations with spiritual principles and deeper solutions to the problems we all face that get to the causes and do not just respond to the symptoms. It is also a subject on which you can participate in public discourses, either as a well-informed individual, or on behalf of local or national institutions or organizations. This course should give you many ideas and examples on which to build, and more materials are available and frequently updated on the International Environment Forum web site.

The central content of this unit is right here on the Classroom page. The four readings are short. 

Discussion

1. How can we implement sustainable development at the individual level?
2. What are the most unsustainable things about your own life?
3. What do you plan to do after this course to live more sustainably?
4. How can we inspire others to engage in a learning process about sustainability?
5. What opportunities do you see for your community to engage in public discourse or social action about sustainability?

Reexamining Individual Lifestyles

Individuals can do many things to live more sustainably. We can reexamine our values; educate ourselves about the issues; change our ways of thinking to be more integrated, systemic, and long-term; look outward with more solidarity; and live lightly on the earth, being content with little.

Many practical applications of principles of sustainability in daily life can change our ways of thinking. For example, we can economize on our use of water in washing, bathing, laundry, and gardening, and we can make efforts to reduce pollution. We can economize or use more efficiently the energy we consume in heating, cooling, cooking, lighting, and appliances. We can reduce our need for transport and replace motor vehicles with public transportation, bicycles, or walking. Food offers many choices of lifestyle: fast food or organic, meat or vegetarian, local, fair trade, nutritional balance, the possible presence of genetically-modified organisms, and risks of contamination with pesticides/hormones/antibiotics. To reduce plastic pollution, we can stop using single-use bags, cups and other objects, and choose items with less packaging. We can choose clothing made of natural fibers, with possible agricultural impacts, or synthetic fibers that are persistent and non-renewable, and produce microplastic pollution. In our role as consumers, we can consider issues of socially responsible manufacture, changing styles frequently or using things until they wear out, and the desirability of making choices based on brand names and fashions. In choosing housing we can look at location, materials, health impacts, energy efficiency, and social effects. We can consider the sustainable dimensions of recreation, tourism and entertainment, such as their impact on the natural environment, effects of transport, and ecotourism. We cannot ignore the aesthetic aspects of the environment, such as beauty, natural versus human made, and cultural diversity. In all of this, we should try to live according to our ethical and spiritual values.

There are many web sites and books with suggestions for more sustainable and environmentally and socially responsible behavior. Perhaps you can find some and share your favorites with the class on the forum. In the meantime, you may enjoy this one minute video What Sustainable Living Means to Me. 

Video: https://vimeo.com/156039098

This United Nations web site also provides examples of what people can do to implement the Sustainable Development Goals.

Reading 1: The Lazy Person’s Guide to Saving the World (UN) 

The International Environment Forum has looked at bottom-up approaches to implementing the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). One tool it has developed is a rewrite of the SDGs for individuals, things that you can do yourself or with others in your local community. You can consult the list and see if it inspires you to take some more actions for sustainability.

Reading 2: SDGs for individuals

Ecological Footprint

One way to measure our impact on the environment and, therefore, what share of the Earth's resources we are consuming is the Ecological Footprint, which estimates how much productive land and water area a population (individual, city, country, all humanity) requires for the resources it consumes and for the absorption of its wastes, using prevailing technology. In 2017, on the average, each human being was consuming the resources of 2.77 global hectares, when the biologically productive land and sea area available on this planet is only 1.60 global hectares per person (not counting the space required to support other species). 

The world population overshot the planet's capacity for the first time in 1975. Earth Overshoot Day is when we pass the ability of the planet to meet our annual needs without consuming its capital. In 2024 Earth Overshoot Day was August 1rst, and apart from the pandemic it gets earlier every year. Of course, the global average hides huge disparities. North Americans and Europeans consume much more than their share, while impoverished third-world villagers use much less. It is the affluent who are destroying our planet. There are web sites where you can calculate your own ecological footprint and measure what responsibility you have for today's unsustainability. See for example the Global Footprint Network.

Applying Sustainability at the Local Community or Project Level

Progress in our communities depends on and is driven by stirrings at the grass roots of society rather than from an imposition of externally developed plans and programs. Communities should be empowered through processes of action, reflection and consultation to address their own priorities in meeting their needs, while reducing their vulnerability and managing their environment. You may want to increase your local community's and individuals' awareness of the needs and possibilities for sustainable action and of their capacity to respond. 

If you did not get to read about the Global Solidarity Conversations in Unit 4, now would be a good time to explore this resource. Their objective is to bring people from all backgrounds and all political spectrums together. The objectives of these conversations are to raise the consciousness of all participants about the various problems of the community and to develop and nurture a deep sense of solidarity that will enable determined and effective actions necessary for fundamental change. These materials may assist you in discussions with those around you, in your religious community, in your neighborhood, or at town meetings, that can lead to some meaningful social change.

Another tool is a short compilation of Baha'i texts for each Sustainable Development Goal. Different communities will likely devise different approaches and solutions in response to similar needs. It is for each community to determine its goals and priorities in keeping with its capacity and resources. Given the diversity of communities around the world, it is important to encourage innovation and a variety of approaches to the environment and development appropriate to the rhythm of life in the community.

Education

The foundation of human development is our inherent capacity to learn. Education is fundamental, starting with mothers who are the first educators of their children, and who are often most directly engaged with sustainability and environmental resources as consumers or producers. Capacity building in the community should include exploring the relationship of humans to the environment, and learning to engage in acts of service related to environmental sustainability. Community processes should be set in motion to agree on collective goals, to reinforce a spirit of solidarity, to involve the community, and particularly the youth, in the education of children, and to build the capacity to manage local problems for the benefit of all. Involving youth in caring for the generation that will follow them can become a self-sustaining process of community advancement.

Watch: Education for Sustainability with Jaimie Cloud 17:50

Jaimie Cloud is the founder of the Cloud Institute for Sustainability Education in New York City, and pioneer in the field of Education for Sustainability. She shares new ideas to create conditions for life-long Education for Sustainability (EfS). Baha'is may remember the “culture of learning” which is being cultivated in Baha'i communities throughout the world.

Science and technology should be accessible to everyone through appropriate education. Most technological development today is driven by market forces that neither reflect nor respond to local needs. To be able to contribute to sustainability, everyone should be empowered within their capacity with the tools and approaches of science: evidence based reasoning, understanding cause and effect, experimentation, thinking in terms of systems in a long-term perspective, and learning adaptive management in a time of dynamic change. The natural and social sciences, crafts, and local and indigenous knowledge are based on similar processes of observation and experimentation, so all can contribute to sustainable community development. Institutional capacity and learning processes should be developed within communities to create and apply knowledge in ways that address their specific needs.

You may be able to help increase other people's understanding of the harmony of science and religion relevant to sustainability. Local educational programs should stimulate consultation on the science and ethics of environmental responsibility, local vulnerability to climate change, sustainable use of energy and resources, and local environmental management. Science and indigenous knowledge systems should be integrated in defining sustainable environmental management adapted to local conditions and cultures and to community needs.

Watch: The Transdisciplinary Approach 3:50 

Michigan Technological University’s transdisciplinary researchers step beyond institutional boundaries to solve complex problems. At a workshop in the Dominican Republic, Kathy Halvorsen (Soc Sci, SFRES) shared her experiences from NSF-funded transdisciplinary research with government employees, academics, and nongovernmental organization leaders from all across North and South America. For more information, go here. This approach is strikingly similar to the concept of Baha'i consultation. 

Reading 3:  EarthEd: Rethinking Education on a Changing Planet by Erik Assadourian.

This file contains the major part of the introductory chapter of the State of the World book with the same title by the Worldwatch Institute. It provides an excellent overview of the topic. Assadourian reflects on the situation and role of education in a culture steeped in unsustainable practices and highlights principles for Earth Education. Read pp. 3 - 8

Watch: Marianne Krasny: Collective Efficacy 6min. 

Spiritual education

Education needs to go beyond science if it is to have an impact. This is where the harmony of science and religion is important. If our true human purpose is to cultivate the spiritual dimension of our nature and to rise above the physical dimension of our nature that we share with animals, and even our intellectual dimension that is the realm of science, then we need to pay attention to spiritual education. This is where motivation to change has its roots. Living sustainably requires changes in our assumptions about what is success in life, in our habits and consumption patterns, and in how we allocate our time and resources. Often this means sacrificing things that we used to consider important, learning to be content with little and freed from all inordinate desire. A spiritual motivation to give up something superficial for things that are more important can drive these changes.

This is a domain that is common to many religions and spiritual traditions, as well as indigenous belief systems and ethical frameworks. It provides a foundation for many people to collaborate in interfaith activities and practical projects for sustainability, such as Interfaith Power and Light and Green Faith in the United States. The Community Sustainability Assessment has a Spiritual Checklist that can help you to see the many ways that spirituality is expressed in a local community.

Reading 4: Global Ecovillage Network, Community Sustainability Assessment Spiritual Checklist (pp. 32-41).

Initiated in Colombia but now implemented around the world, the Preparation for Social Action (PSA) programme integrates the spiritual and material dimensions in education, combining scientific and practical aspects with spiritual teachings: https://fundaec.org/en/preparacion-para-la-accion-social/

Action

Now that you have learned about sustainable development, and its important relation to your physical and spiritual well-being, what are you going to do to put these ideas and values into practice in your own life, your family, and your community? This has been a topic of discussion at some International Environment Forum conferences.  You can find some useful ideas in their reports:

1. Fostering a Bahá’í approach to education for sustainable development
2. Cultivating sustainable lifestyles and
3. Ethical Responses to Climate Change: individual, community and institutions 

Part of the process is to assess your own impacts by informing yourself about or thinking through your consumption patterns and lifestyle choices. Then think about how you can monitor the trends in your consumption, perhaps by the size of the bills you pay or the volume of trash you throw away. You need to consider the dynamics of your own personal situation and what you have the capacity to change.

If you want to develop a project for sustainable social and economic development, you will need to consider what dimensions of sustainability your project can influence. You might also want to express what you have learned in this course through some artistic activity such as a song or an art work that expresses what you feel about sustainability. If you like, you could share it in the Moodle forums with other participants in this course. You could prepare materials for a devotional meeting on a theme related to sustainability, or make a presentation on sustainability to your local community or association. You could also express what you have learned in some way on social networks.

For teachers interested in bringing sustainable development concepts into the schools, junior youth activities and children's classes, there is an excellent paper by Prof. Victoria Thoresen, and some sources of other materials, in the links to educational resources below. If there is a junior youth activity in your community, perhaps they would be interested in a service project related to sustainable development or environmental management.

Resources for Unit 6

This file includes voluntary resources for Interfaith Perspectives and some useful Educational Materials.

Resources for Unit 6