Join this event to hear Yichen Wang discuss Education for Sustainable Development and Ecological Civilisation Education in China.

Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) is increasingly recognised as a contested concept, reflecting varied global assumptions about sustainability, education, and social change.

While UNESCO has fostered an international consensus on ESD objectives, the practical implementation of these objectives reveals significant tensions between instrumental, transformative, and systemic educational aims. In China, Ecological Civilisation Education (ECE) has emerged as a distinctive national response to the global ESD agenda, explicitly framed by state-driven discourses that emphasise moral education and national development.

Drawing on recent literature and empirical insights from the presenter’s PhD research, this webinar critically examines how global ESD discourses are interpreted and implemented within the specific policy context of China’s ECE. Utilising an analytical typology of ESD orientations ranging from knowledge transmission to systems thinking, the session aims to unpack the underlying assumptions, pedagogies, and ideologies shaping ESD practices in China.

The audience will be invited to discuss ECE as a distinct model and its relationship with the global ESD discourse. This event will be particularly useful to researchers and students interested in Education for Sustainable Development.

Yichen Wang is a PhD candidate at the UCL Institute of Education (IOE). His doctoral research explores how educators in Chinese primary schools conceptualise and implement Education for Sustainable Development (ESD). He has presented his work at international conferences and contributed to publications on ESD.