The Sustainable Development Goals in Higher Education: A Transformative Agenda?

302 Pages·2021·3.224 MB·English

by  Wendy Steele

Wendy Steele & Lauren Rickards
THE SUSTAINABLE
DEVELOPMENT
GOALS IN HIGHER
EDUCATION
A Transformative Agenda?
The Sustainable Development Goals in Higher
Education
“Offering ‘critical hope’ for a more sustainable future, this clearly written book exam-
ines how higher education can engage in transforming itself and the world by consid-
ering the vision of social and environmental justice represented by the UN Sustainable
Development Goals. Steele and Rickards challenge universities to become enablers of
change by combining deep institutional commitments with bold, ethical cultures of
innovation, and to integrate the SDGs into inclusive research and teaching. Especially
impressive is the way in which the authors draw on social theory and constructive
criticisms of higher education and development, to provide positive and actionable
pathways forward. Reading the manuscript, I wanted to immediately share the
insights of this book with my university leadership, my faculty colleagues and my
students, especially as we try to navigate a post pandemic, antiracist, more equal and
low carbon future for people and the planet.”
—Diana Liverman, Regents Professor and Director of the
School of Geography, Development, and Environment,
University of Arizona, USA
“The world’s universities are important for achieving the UN Sustainable
Development Goals. What should universities be offering to this effort? Equally
important, how should universities themselves change, in response to the SDGs?
Wendy Steele and Lauren Rickards provide a unique, up-to-date guide to these
issues, offering frameworks for thought and resources for action.”
—Raewyn Connell, Emerita Professor, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences,
University of Sydney, and author of The Good University
“This book presents a compelling and refreshing take on the contemporary uni-
versity and its transformative potential. Analysing the engagement between the
Sustainable Development Goals and higher education, Steele and Rickards pro-
vide energy and hope for those of us exhausted by the continual restructuring of
the neoliberal university.”
—Lesley Head, Redmond Barry Distinguished Professor, School
of Geography, The University of Melbourne, Australia
Wendy Steele • Lauren Rickards
The Sustainable
Development Goals
in Higher Education
A Transformative Agenda?
Wendy Steele Lauren Rickards
Centre for Urban Research Centre for Urban Research
RMIT University RMIT University
Melbourne, VIC, Australia Melbourne, VIC, Australia
ISBN 978-3-030-73574-6 ISBN 978-3-030-73575-3 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-73575-3
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Preface
How Did We Get Here?
How did the world get to the point of entering the multi-catastrophic
Anthropocene? How did universities get to the point of being places of
intense paradox? And how did we, as two Australian university-based
academics who research the impacts and antecedents of the climate emer-
gency from a critical social science perspective, get to the point of writing
this book on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the role of
higher education?
All of These Things Are Interrelated
As academics based in a public university system under enormous growth
and development pressures with scaffolding flow-on effects for people,
place and planet, we are highly alert to the fact that the crisis in higher
education mirrors the broader climate of crisis and change. Despite the
rhetoric around sustainability, impact and engagement, there is too little
urgency or action within the mainstream Academy or in society on the
big societal issues such as climate change, biodiversity loss and deep
inequalities.
v
vi Preface
Decoupling the ‘idea of the university’ from the developmentalities
that have led to current global conditions of unsustainability has never
been more needed. And yet it has never felt so hard. The issue is that
they are inextricably linked—joined at the hip—with shared histories,
trajectories and legacies that must be first recognised and understood in
order to be meaningfully addressed. This inconvenient, uncomfortable
truth utterly disrupts the idea that universities are above, beyond or
outside the worlds they critique and serve. It exposes the notion that
universities can choose to engage, or not, as a myth—the question is how,
not if, they affect the sustainable development challenge.
Sustainable Development for Who, How,
When and to What Effect?
Now more than ever it is clear that we cannot neglect our global context
and local connections. The SDG agenda is not perfect, but it holds
radical potential relative to what many universities currently do and
offers a platform and prospects for transformative action and change.
Universities are at the heart of sustainability from the inside out. The
SDGs are a shared witness statement to the state of the planet, one that
requires humility and responsibility, but also brings with it hope that a
more sustainable future is still possible.
Melbourne, VIC, Australia Wendy Steele
Lauren Rickards
Acknowledgements
We would like to acknowledge that we live and work on the unceded
lands of the Wurrundjeri people of the Eastern Kulin Nations and as
uninvited guests we pay our sincere respects to Ancestors and Elders past,
present and emerging.
This book began with a small project that received the RMIT University
Enabling Capability Platform (ECP) ‘Big Ideas’ seed funding in 2018.
We would like to acknowledge and thank Swee Mak and the ECP
Directors for their support and engagement with the project. In particu-
lar, our thanks to Bruce Willis, Emma Shortis, Robbie Guevera, Simon
Feeney, Renzo-Mori Junior, Jago Dodson, Prashanti Mayfield, Billie
Giles-Corti, Ralph Horne, Joana Correria, Kim Gordon, Andrew Butt,
Libby Porter and Olga Kokshagina for their constructive suggestions and
encouragement. A number of key people have been supportive of the
project and made time for meetings and discussion around the innovative
role of the SDGs at RMIT University, including Calum Drummond,
Mark McMillan, Belinda Tynan, Peter West, Katherine Johnson, Peter
Kelly, Usha Iyer-Raniga, Clare Russell, Riaan Lourens, David Downes,
Sherman Young, Linda Stevenson, Brian Coffee, Kylie Porter, Karyn
Bosomworth, Melanie Davern, John Handmer and Darryn McEvoy. The
project has been greatly enriched by the many contributions of the
vii
viii Acknowledgements
research associates and assistants: Oli Moraes, Mette Hotker, Anthony
Richardson, Jaydon Holmes, Sarah Robertson and Tom Overton-Skinner.
Externally we would like to thank Scott Rawlings (Office of the
Commissioner for Environmental Sustainability), John Thwaites
(Monash University), Councillor Cathy Oke (City of Melbourne), and
Lars Coenen and Michele Acuto (University of Melbourne) for their
early engagement and encouragement. Our thanks also to the University
of Johannesburg, Association of Commonwealth Universities and British
Council for their support and promotion of the SDGs and higher educa-
tion theme, in particular Consola Evans, Alex Wright and Georgina
Nicolini. At Palgrave Macmillan we sincerely thank Rachael Ballard and
Joanna O’Neill for their support and encouragement.
Finally, we would both like to thank our families who understand all
too well the pressures of juggling multiple roles during a pandemic
lockdown. Wendy would like to thank Russell and Jesse for sharing the
journey with such love, as well as Libby, Crystal, Karyn, Brian and Kristen
for laughter and light in these uncertain times. Lauren would like to
thank Gemma and Selby for their immense patience and inspiration,
as well as Zoe, Leanne, Kim, Karyn, Susie and Andrew for their fierce
support and encouragement.
Contents
1 A Transformative Agenda 1
2 Sustainable Development in the Anthropocene 35
3 The Role of the University in Society 67
4 Ethical Innovation 107
5 Re-thinking Research Engagement 145
6 Learning and Teaching Matters 169
7 What Does Success Look Like? 205
8 Sustainable Futures 247
Bibliography 269
Index 285
ix
About the Authors
Wendy  Steele is Associate Professor in
Sustainability and Urban Planning in the
Centre for Urban Research (CUR) at RMIT
University, Melbourne, Australia. Her
research focuses on cities in climate change
and human-nature relationships in the urban
age, as a key dimension of scholarship and
education in, for, and about environmentally
sustainable development. She is the author
of six books on the role and impact of quiet activism, critical urban gover-
nance, climate justice and sustainability as a transformative agenda.
Lauren Rickards is Professor in the Centre for
Urban Research (CUR) and Director of Urban
Futures Enabling Capability Platform at RMIT
University, Melbourne, Australia. Based in
human geography, her research focuses on
social responses to the climate change crisis,
including the role of climate change in sustain-
able development, and implications for the
research and education sectors.
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