SDG4 - Quality Education: Inclusivity, Equity and Lifelong Learning For All will explore the multifaceted and complex nature of the concepts of inclusivity and quality education.

This book explores the role universities have to play in fulfilling the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). At the heart of “sustainable development” is the legacy of unsustainable development with its roots in modernity and colonialism. Critical engagement with the SDGs involves recognising these roots are shared by universities and the reciprocal need for maintenance, repair and regeneration. Universities are not just enablers of change, but also important targets of change. By focusing on the role of education about, for and through the SDGs, the authors seek to advance critical engagement with higher education that is both progressive and meaningful. We are all responsible for bearing witness to our age. This book will appeal to all those who hope that more sustainable future worlds are still possible.

The Role of Education in Enabling the Sustainable Development Agenda explores the relationship between education and other key sectors of development in the context of the new global Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) agenda. While it is widely understood that there is a positive relationship between education and other dimensions of development, and populations around the world show a clear desire for more and better education, education remains an under-financed and under-prioritised sector within development. When education does make it onto the agenda, investment is usually diverted towards increasing access to formal schooling, without focusing on the intrinsic value of education as a tool for development within the international development community more broadly. The authors explore these tensions through a review of literature from a range of disciplines, providing a clearer picture of the relationship between education and other development sectors. The book challenges silo-thinking in the SDGs by exploring how achieving the SDG education targets can be expected to support or hinder progress towards other targets, and vice-versa. Drawing on examples from both low and high income countries, the book demonstrates how ‘good’ education functions as an ‘enabling right’, impacting positively on many other areas. The book’s scope ranges across education and development studies, economics, geography, sociology and environmental studies, and will be of interest to any researchers and students with an interest in education and the SDGs.

Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) lies at the heart of global, regional and national policy agendas, with the goal of achieving socially and environmentally just development through the provision of inclusive, equitable quality education for all. Realising this potential on the African continent, however, calls for radical transformation of policy and practice. Developing a transformative agenda requires taking account of the ‘learning crisis’ in schools, the inequitable access to a good quality education, the historical role of education and training in supporting unsustainable development, and the enormous challenges involved in complex system change. In the African continent, sustainable development entails eradicating poverty and inequality, supporting economically sustainable livelihoods within planetary boundaries, and averting environmental catastrophe, as well as dealing with health pandemics and security threats. In addressing these challenges, the book: explores the meaning of ESD for Africa in the context of the ‘postcolonial condition’ critically discusses the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as well as regional development agendas draws on a wealth of research evidence and examples from across the continent engages with contemporary debates about the skills, competencies and capabilities required for sustainable development, including decolonising the curriculum and transforming teaching and learning relationships sets out a transformative agenda for policy-makers, practitioners, NGOs, social movements and other stakeholders based on principles of social and environmental justice. Education for Sustainable Development in the Postcolonial World is an essential read for anyone with an interest in education and socially and environmentally just development in Africa.

This book analyses the role of the university in working towards the Sustainable Development Goals. In contrast to the previous Millennium Development Goals, higher education is seen to have a crucial role in this new agenda. Yet how can the university fulfil these weighty expectations, and are the dominant trends in higher education supporting or undermining this vision? This book draws on the idea of the ‘developmental university’, a model characterised by its porous boundaries with society and commitment to teaching, research and community engagement in the public interest. The author examines case studies from Latin America, Africa and other regions to analyse how this model can be revived, countering recent trends of marketisation, status competition and unbundling. The book also considers alternatives to the developmental model drawing on indigenous knowledge systems, looking beyond the SDG framework to the creation of a new form of society. This timely volume will be of interest and value to those working in the field of sustainable development, and to students and scholars of comparative education, international development and higher education studies.