Exploring Links Between Education and Sustainable Development Goals Through the Lens of UN Flagship Reports

Abstract Based on an exhaustive content analysis of 37 global reports, this paper examines how well links between education and other Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are represented in flagship publications of the United Nations system. Taken together, the reports identify links between education and all the SDGs, with the notable exception of SDG 14 on oceans. However, some goal areas have received much more attention than others. While some causal links are identified and highlighted as important, relevant constraints are sometimes not extensively discussed, and few concrete policy options to act on these links are provided. Going forward, it would be important to assess whether the messages contained in UN flagship reports adequately reflect the state of scientific knowledge and the lessons learnt from development programs that focus on education in relation to specific SDGs. The systematic analysis provided here can offer a basis for an integrated analysis of policy priorities for education as a whole. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment