Mundus miserabilis? On progress, regression and the representation of the world in education for sustainable development

This contribution deals with central theoretical and practical problems of education for sustainable development and its justification. The educational and political justifications of most conceptions of sustainable development are in one way or another grounded in negative judgements about regressive states of affairs and developments (such as the effects of anthropogenic climate change). These judgements, however, usually remain implicit and – despite their centrality for the justification of the project of sustainable development – are seldom laid out in the open and discussed in detail. This is why it is usually taken for granted that the normative worldviews underlying these judgments about regression should be both taken at face value and accepted by both students and teachers. In my contribution I will analyze these normative preconditions of the debate about education for sustainable development and the educational as well as political pitfalls and challenges that go along with them (e.g. charges of indoctrination or moralism). I will argue that an educationally and politically justifiable conception of education for sustainable development grounded in the value of personal and political autonomy as educational aims has to be transparent concerning its normative assumptions and preconditions and has to clearly distinguish between genuinely controversial judgments about regression and such claims that we have reason to qualify as non-controversial. In so doing I will show that the normative and justificatory basis of education for sustainable development is much thinner than usually assumed.