(Education for) Sustainable Development in Geography Education: review and outlook from a perspective of Germany

Nearly 15 years after the Rio Conference and 10 years after the Lucerne Declaration on Geographical Education for Sustainable Development we are interested to what extent the goals of this declaration have been implemented? What role does Geography play in Education for Sustainable Development in higher education? We analyzed the modules of 107 degree programs with Geography as a degree major or as a teacher training subject at 55 German universities, technical colleges and universities of education. We conducted a quantitative text analysis in which we searched the key words “Sustainability”, “Sustainable Development”, “Education for Sustainable Development” and “Nature-Society Studies” in the Module Regulations. Our data indicate great heterogeneity between the degree programs. The key words were predominantly found in majors in “Human Geography”, “Geography” and teacher training programs for “academic high schools”. Aspects of the results considered in the paper include: (a) differences in the orientation of degree programs, (b) varying degree of implementation in the modules, (c) different conceptual understanding of the principles of sustainability, (d) the extent to which concepts of Environmental Education and Education for Sustainable Development are mixed, (e) heterogeneity between mandatory courses and electives.     

REVIEW

Society and Exchange in Nias. By Andrew Beatty. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 1992. Pp. xii + 322. Price $A95.00     

Australian media studies

Miriam Gilson and Jerzy Zubrzycki. The Foreign‐Language Press in Australia, 1848–1964. A.N.U. Press, Canberra, 1967, pp. 233 + xiv, $6.90.

George Blaikie, Remember Smith's Weekly? Rigby Limited, Adelaide, 1966, pp. 258, $4.25.

Research Department, News Ltd., Readers of ‘The Australian’, Sydney, 1967, pp. 44, no price.

Colin A. Hughes and John S. Western, The Prime Minister's Policy Speech: A Case Study in Televised Politics, A.N.U. Press. Canberra, 1966, pp. 227, $4.50. Distributor: Jacaranda Press.

E. Lloyd Sommerlad, The Press in Developing Countries, Sydney University Press, Sydney, 1966, pp. 189 + xiii, $4.25.

W. Sprague Holden, The Impossible Commitment, 29th Arthur Norman Smith Memorial Lecture in Journalism, Melbourne, 1966, pp. 23, no price.

Second Summer School of Professional Journalism, The Australian Press and Foreign News, ed. David R. Robertson, Canberra, 1966, pp. 79, $1 from P.O. Box 194. Canberra City, A.C.T.     

Mobility or migration: a case study from the Neolithic settlement of Nieder-Mörlen (Hessen,Germany)

A combination of stable carbon and nitrogen isotope analysis of collagen and radiogenic strontium isotope analysis of tooth enamel was used to investigate diet and mobility at the early Neolithic settlement of Nieder-Mörlen in Germany. The carbon and nitrogen ratios suggest a mixed terrestrial based diet that is consistent with data previously published for early Neolithic sites in Europe. The strontium isotope data indicate a high degree of human mobility with only one individual having an isotope ratio consistent with locally derived strontium. Unusually, a group of non-local juveniles with isotope ratios typical of upland regions is also present at the settlement but there are no adult burials with such values. Whilst transhumance is considered as an explanation, it would not explain why these non-local juveniles lived foreshortened lives and other possible mechanisms are therefore discussed.     

Competing entanglements in the struggle to save the Amazon: The shifting terrain of transnational civil society

Transnational civil society has often been conceptualized as a third sector, buffered from the power politics of nation-states and global capital. The relative autonomy of this sector has been seen as key in empowering the voices of marginalized peoples and in advocating new counter-hegemonic agendas on the world stage. Recent research, however, has begun to explore power imbalances within the transnational civic sphere, and how different transnational NGOs' modes of articulation with political institutions and market actors inform those power dynamics. We suggest here that the concept of “entanglements,” recently introduced within political geography, can offer a useful spatial imagery in assessing the effects of these varied lines of influence. The article first traces the evolution of the Amazon Alliance, a transnational network of environmental and human rights NGOs and Amazonian indigenous federations. It then examines a countervailing nexus of governmental and corporate entanglements that have been drawing conservation NGOs away from indigenous eco-political engagement in recent years. To understand the waning salience of the eco-indigenous conservation agenda, we argue, requires analysis of the shifting terrain of civil society, and of the articulation of different NGOs with institutions beyond the frontiers of the third sector.