University of Bath   Press Release    Centre for Research in Education 
and the Environment [CREE]
Wednesday 23rd February 2005


Re-thinking education and learning to address the challenge of 
sustainability	
CREE is very pleased to announce the publication on its website of Dr 
Stephen Sterling’s doctoral thesis, ‘Whole Systems Thinking as a Basis 
for Paradigm Change in Education: Explorations in the Context of 
Sustainability’. Stephen Sterling’s work is well known in the UK and 
internationally, and his previous writing, particularly Sustainable 
Education (Green Books, 2001), has been widely influential.

This publication comes at an auspicious time: in the UK the 
Environmental Audit Committee is conducting an inquiry (following up 
its Learning the Sustainability Lesson report of July 2003) which 
considers how far an education system which fosters education for 
sustainable development is currently being promoted, and HEFCE and the 
Learning and Skills Council are promoting sustainable development 
strategies. Internationally, March sees the start of the UN Decade of 
Education for Sustainable Development (DESD), which aims to promote 
education as a basis for a more sustainable society and to integrate 
sustainable development into education systems at all levels.  The UN 
suggests that ‘Sustainable development requires a holistic approach’ 
and ‘a process to re-orient educational policies, programmes and 
practices’. However, Dr Sterling suggests that most education 
policymakers are unaware of the scale of change needed if education is 
to help achieve a more sustainable society.

Given increasing calls to accelerate ‘the sustainability transition’ 
through education, Sterling’s thesis explores the possibilities and 
difficulties of personal, institutional and organisational change, 
mapped against major and necessary shifts in cultural worldview from 
the mechanistic age and towards a more ecological or relational age. In 
essence, the thesis explores and argues for a learning shift in 
educational goals, vision, policy and practice on the basis of a 
synergy between ecological and systemic thought, which Sterling calls 
‘whole systems thinking’. Sustainability does not simply require an 
‘add-on’ to existing structures and curricula, Sterling argues, but 
implies a transformation of perception and knowing in our social 
culture, and hence also in our educational thinking and practice.

A distinction is made between ‘learning through education’ (relating to 
provision), the usual subject of discourse, and ‘learning within 
education’ (relating to the guiding paradigm, which in turn influences 
subsequent provision). At the level of root metaphor, this change 
involves a shift from the influence of mechanism towards the promise of 
a living systems or ecological metaphor. The emergent ‘postmodern 
ecological paradigm’ - which is explored in the thesis - suggests a 
change of epistemology and weighting, from reductionism towards holism, 
from objectivism towards critical subjectivity, and from relativism to 
relationalism. Without the deep learning that this implies, on the part 
of policymakers, administrators, curriculum developers, lecturers and 
all the actors in education, the response to sustainability is likely 
to be partial and accommodatory rather than full and transformative. An 
innovative theory of co-evolutionary learning and change, which centres 
on the necessary quality and possibility of paradigmatic learning 
within educational thought and policy, is developed in the thesis.

Professor William Scott, Director of CREE says:
‘Stephen’s PhD thesis draws on many years thinking and writing, and on 
much work on the ground with teachers, students, researchers and 
policymakers, both in Europe and farther afield.  The thesis brings 
together ecological thought, systems approaches and complexity, and 
does this in a way that makes it directly relevant to theorizing about 
how we can live together well on this Earth, and about the nature and 
management of learning towards that end.  Stephen’s research is highly 
original and generates an innovative theory of learning and change 
which has the potential for very wide practical applications as Stephen 
and hopefully others continue to explore how education can help us work 
(and learn) towards a more sustainable society.’

The thesis is timely and highly relevant to contemporary challenges in 
the relation between education, learning and the problematic of working 
towards a more sustainable society, and offers an innovative 
theoretical basis for moving forward constructively.
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Endorsement:
‘'We are facing unprecedented alterations to the natural world of an 
unimaginable scale and duration. And yet they are man-made. In the face 
of such change and with the associated uncertainty about the way 
forward Stephen Sterling's comprehensive thesis presents a cogent and 
challenging perspective on sustainable social learning systems, based 
on a combination of systems and ecological thinking strongly linked to 
real world practice. Sterling's alternative approach offers 
educationalists and policy-makers a pathway and frameworks to cope with 
the unfolding complexity of sustainable development.’
Stephen Martin – Visiting Professor in Education for Sustainable 
Development, Centre for Complexity and Change, Open University, UK.

http://www.bath.ac.uk/cree/sterling.htm

ENDS

Note for editors:
Dr Stephen Sterling is a co-director of the Bureau for Environmental 
Education and Training (BEET), and an independent consultant in 
environmental and sustainability education working in the academic and 
NGO fields in the UK and internationally. He was a founder of the 
Education for Sustainability Programme at London South Bank University 
(LSBU), London, where he is a Visiting Fellow of the Centre for 
Cross-Curriculum Studies (CCCI) and an academic tutor. He is also a 
Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Bath, and a member of the 
IUCN Commission on Education and Communication.

He has an extensive publications record, including Good Earth-Keeping: 
Education, Training and Awareness for a Sustainable Future (UNEP UK 
1992), Education for Sustainability (Earthscan 1996) (with John 
Huckle), Education for Sustainable Development in the Schools Sector 
(Sustainable Development Education Panel, 1988), and Sustainable 
Education – Re-visioning Learning and Change, (Green Books/Schumacher 
Society, 2001). His research interest lies in the interface between 
systemic thinking, ecological thinking, transformative learning and 
sustainability. He is the lead researcher/writer for the WWF Scotland 
Linking-Thinking project, introducing systemic thinking in education 
(WWF UK 2005).
............................................................
Professor William Scott
Head:           Curriculum and Pedagogy research group    
http://www.bath.ac.uk/education/cp/
Director:       Centre for Research in Education and the Environment     
http://www.bath.ac.uk/cree/
Editor:         Environmental Education Research    
http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/titles/13504622.asp
                        Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education   
http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/titles/02602938.asp
Address:        Department of Education, University of Bath, Bath, BA27AY, 
UK
Contact:        Phone: +44 (0) 1225 386648                            Fax: +44 (0) 1225 
386113
                http://www.bath.ac.uk/education/profiles/wahscott
                   
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