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Promoting Sustainable Consumption in Educational Settings

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Enabling Responsible Living

Abstract

In the debate on sustainable consumption there is broad agreement that a concerted and multi-faceted policy approach is needed to motivate people to consume sustainably. The role of education and educational organisations is commonly confined to that of a provider of formal tuition and as a trainer of skills. This article argues for a broader understanding of educational organisations’ contribution to the promotion of sustainable consumption. It argues that the established settings approach from public health research offers an alternative perspective on educational settings that can help to gain a more comprehensive understanding of consumption-related learning processes in educational organisations. Drawing on the framework of educational organisational culture of consumption, educational settings are described as formal and informal learning occasions that frame students’ consumer learning in distinct organisational contexts. A case example is introduced from the transdisciplinary research and development project BINK that illustrates how this analytical perspective can translate into a more comprehensive approach to school and university development and the promotion of sustainable consumption in educational settings.

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Acknowledgments

The author would like to thank the colleagues from the BINK project as well as two anonymous reviewers and the editors for their helpful comments on earlier drafts of this chapter. The BINK project was funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF). The research presented in this chapter was further supported by the emerging researchers programme at Leuphana University of Lüneburg, Germany.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for Environmental and Sustainability Communication (INFU), Faculty of Sustainability Sciences, Leuphana Universität Lüneburg, Lüneburg, Germany

    Daniel Fischer

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  1. Daniel Fischer
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Correspondence to Daniel Fischer .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. , Economic Education, Sustainable, TU Berlin, Marchstraße 23, Berlin, 10587, Germany

    Ulf Schrader

  2. , Economic Education and, TU Berlin, Marchstraße 23, Berlin, 10587, Germany

    Vera Fricke

  3. School of Business and Humanities, Institute of Technology Carlow, Kilkenny Road, Carlow, Ireland

    Declan Doyle

  4. University College of Hedmark, Postboks 40, Elverum, 2418, Norway

    Victoria W. Thoresen

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Fischer, D. (2013). Promoting Sustainable Consumption in Educational Settings. In: Schrader, U., Fricke, V., Doyle, D., Thoresen, V. (eds) Enabling Responsible Living. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-22048-7_11

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