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Article
Publication date: 20 January 2022

Lisa Powell and Nicholas McGuigan

Responding to COVID-19, this conceptual paper uses rewilding to interrupt anthropocentric and human/nature dualist properties of accounting education. Through rewilding accounting…

Abstract

Purpose

Responding to COVID-19, this conceptual paper uses rewilding to interrupt anthropocentric and human/nature dualist properties of accounting education. Through rewilding accounting education, informed by posthumanist and ecofeminist thought, this paper aims to develop an accounting pedagogy that shapes greater ecocentric narratives. Accounting educators can contribute to addressing crises by evolving new pedagogies that radically transform the education of future accounting professionals.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors take a critical stance in analysing the human-centred accounting education model. They explore how this model can be reimagined through rewilding accounting education, resulting in learning interventions that foster an understanding of intrinsic value, complexity of systems and collective disposition with all species and the natural world.

Findings

Rewilding learning interventions embed an ecocentric approach in accounting curricula design to extend beyond a human focus. Rewilding learning interventions practically explored with application to accounting include learning with and from nature, Indigenous knowledge perspectives, play as a common language and empathy as a dialogical bridge.

Social implications

The authors present an accounting pedagogy that fosters among accounting students and educators a relational orientation and ecological consciousness that encompasses compassion and openness to others, including non-human species and nature. This will ensure that accounting graduates are better prepared for addressing future crises that stem from our disconnect with nature.

Originality/value

This paper adds to limited research investigating accounting and the Anthropocene. Investigations into the Anthropocene’s human-centred discourse in accounting education are vital to respond adequately to crises. This paper extends social and environmental accounting education literature to encompass less anthropocentric discourse and greater relational learning.

Details

Meditari Accountancy Research, vol. 31 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2049-372X

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 29 March 2022

Angela Specht

The nonhuman world is under substantial threat from human activities and economies. Rewilding gardens and community action can build relationships of care with the nonhuman…

Abstract

The nonhuman world is under substantial threat from human activities and economies. Rewilding gardens and community action can build relationships of care with the nonhuman, restore habitat, connect people and land, and empower humans to work with and for the nonhuman. Stories about family relationships to land and through land, and creating a wild garden are used to explore place attachment, creating relationships of care through gardening, and purposeful rewilding of a garden; stories about participation in a community service organization examine how collective action can take rewilding ideas out into the larger community. By consciously creating care for the nonhuman and participating in rewilding, we can actively build ecological paths forward for ourselves and our nonhuman neighbors.

Details

Re-Imagining Spaces and Places
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80071-737-4

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 5 November 2021

Steffen Lehmann

How are our cities confronting the challenges posed by a warming climate, the loss of biodiversity, and the increasing urban heat island effect? ― This chapter discusses the…

Abstract

How are our cities confronting the challenges posed by a warming climate, the loss of biodiversity, and the increasing urban heat island effect? ― This chapter discusses the opportunities and benefits of applying the concepts of renaturalization and rewilding of cities. It introduces nature-based solutions (NBS) in urban planning that are integrated with the aim to enhance urban resilience and to slow down the biodiversity decline, which can be applied in two areas: through the conception of new green neighborhoods and through the regeneration and regreening of existing but neglected parts of the city, such as postindustrial brownfields or economically weak districts.

Contact to nature is essential for human existence, urban well-being, and a good quality of life. Green spaces in cities – big or small – all contribute to health and well-being. However, many cities do not offer residents easy access to green space within the city. Improving better access and extending gardens and parks will deliver a large number of benefits, such as ecosystem services, better water management for enhanced urban flood control, and slowing down the biodiversity loss, with the potential to restore damaged ecosystems. Furthermore, additional green space and NBS help to keep cities cool during heat waves and improve the urban microclimate.

In this context, NBS and regreening can generate significant benefits for citizens, improve urban health and well-being, and offer an opportunity to effectively deploy nature to resolve major societal challenges ― such as social inclusion, food security, and disaster risk reduction. However, it is essential that the design of NBS is fully integrated with other complementary planning interventions and seeks synergies across all sectors.

Details

Nature-Based Solutions for More Sustainable Cities – A Framework Approach for Planning and Evaluation
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80043-637-4

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 19 March 2024

Freya Higgins-Desbiolles

This viewpoint engages with Jem Bendell’s deep adaptation framework which was developed as a response to the threat of collapse. Proponents of deep adaptation argue that societal…

Abstract

Purpose

This viewpoint engages with Jem Bendell’s deep adaptation framework which was developed as a response to the threat of collapse. Proponents of deep adaptation argue that societal collapse is either likely, inevitable or already underway. The deep adaptation framework is employed as a tool to contemplate the necessary adaptation of tourism development and planning in a context of polycrisis leading to collapse.

Design/methodology/approach

This is a conceptual viewpoint article that is built on deductive analysis of recent events, reports and scientific findings. It employs the deep adaptation framework to analyse possible alternative tourism futures in the face of the threat of collapse.

Findings

Bendell’s framework included four aspects of response to the recognition of the threat of collapse: resilience, relinquishment, restoration and reconciliation. In this work, the deep adaptation framework is employed to analyse what a deep adaptation approach to tourism might offer for efforts in securing optimal social and ecological outcomes. Findings highlight damaging activities that we should relinquish, more resilient approaches that communities could encourage and restorative practices such as rewilding and pluriversal economies as protective measures. This work recommends a precautionary approach to transform tourism education, research and practice in order to secure better tourism futures.

Originality/value

This work is novel in engaging with the threat of future collapse and in using the deep adaptation framework to consider alternative tourism futures.

Details

Journal of Tourism Futures, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2055-5911

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 14 May 2018

Bastian Thomsen, Olav Muurlink and Talitha Best

This paper aims to explore the potential agency of university-based social entrepreneurship ecosystems (U-BSEEs) from a political ecology perspective. It addresses how higher…

Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to explore the potential agency of university-based social entrepreneurship ecosystems (U-BSEEs) from a political ecology perspective. It addresses how higher education institutions can leverage their embedded role within a community to foster social entrepreneurship, by leveraging adult learning theories of andragogy and heutagogy in (social) entrepreneurship education.

Design/methodology/approach

This empirical study interviewed ten senior-level academics in the USA, the UK, Ireland and Australia with practical experience in the (social) entrepreneurship and social innovation space. Qualitative methods of structured interviews, coding and analysis were used as an appropriate procedure to examine the political ecology of U-BSEEs and the interconnectedness of its actors.

Findings

Key findings included criticisms of higher educations’ role in society; financial resources and university impact on stakeholders; the potential of student-based initiatives and programs leveraging andragogy and ideally heutagogy adult learning theories; and changes universities could implement to become key actors of U-BSEEs. Student engagement and cross-disciplinary work is apparently the modus operandi to successful university based ecosystem development.

Research limitations/implications

Research limitations included sample size and lack of junior and mid-level academic perspectives; surveys could be conducted in future research on the topic to generate quantitative data to strengthen findings. Implications of the research suggest that universities possess the necessary resources and personnel to serve as keystone actors of an ecosystem, but currently do not leverage the expertise available to them.

Practical implications

All respondents concurred that focusing on students as change agents, and building social entrepreneurship education programs could foster a trophic cascade of increased collaboration, economic growth, political capital and social good in the local and regional ecosystem.

Originality/value

This study is original in its attempt to build on the entrepreneurship ecosystem literature by considering the agency of U-BSEEs from a political ecology lens.

Details

Journal of Enterprising Communities: People and Places in the Global Economy, vol. 12 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1750-6204

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 5 November 2021

Sarah Clement

Biodiversity loss now ranks as one of the most significant global drivers of environmental change. In an increasingly urbanized world, there is enormous potential to address this…

Abstract

Biodiversity loss now ranks as one of the most significant global drivers of environmental change. In an increasingly urbanized world, there is enormous potential to address this problem through conservation, restoration, and creation of new urban ecosystems. This chapter explores how nature-based solutions (NBS) can contribute to addressing the urgent problem of biodiversity loss in a way that goes beyond just greening gray environments. It then explores the alignment (and misalignment) between the ways in which NBS is framed as a nature conservation tool globally and the ways in which biodiversity is considered in urban approaches to NBS. Finally, the chapter explores the ways in which NBS might become an essential part of the solution to biodiversity and ecosystem decline. It discusses how NBS can be effectively leveraged to address the biodiversity crisis in urban areas, through conservation, restoration, and efforts to create thriving places for both people and nature. Although the concept of NBS in urban areas is fairly divorced from its nature conservation origins, reconnecting with those ecological roots is important for creating biodiverse, resilient cities. In so doing, NBS could offer a unified concept for environmental management in urban areas that integrates the ecological benefits of nature conservation with an innovative focus on confronting major societal challenges. Though this is a demanding task, it could provide a fit-for-purpose approach for conserving biodiversity and supporting functional ecosystems in the Anthropocene.

Details

Nature-Based Solutions for More Sustainable Cities – A Framework Approach for Planning and Evaluation
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80043-637-4

Keywords

Content available
Book part
Publication date: 5 November 2021

Abstract

Details

Nature-Based Solutions for More Sustainable Cities – A Framework Approach for Planning and Evaluation
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80043-637-4

Article
Publication date: 3 January 2023

Garry D. Carnegie, Delfina Gomes and Karen McBride

The purpose of this study is to augment an understanding of the importance and relevance of a proposed new definition of accounting to reset, inform and develop accounting…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this study is to augment an understanding of the importance and relevance of a proposed new definition of accounting to reset, inform and develop accounting education, professional practice and research, from tomorrow, for the purpose of shaping a better world. In the process of setting an agenda, we outline, discuss, and analyse the eight articles which follow depicting complementary and insightful scenarios during COVID-19.

Design/methodology/approach

This study applies an original informing framework for discussion and analysis purposes, described as Framework of the Multidimensional Nature of Accounting. The proposed, multidimensional definition is “Accounting is a technical, social and moral practice concerned with the sustainable utilisation of resources and proper accountability to stakeholders to enable the flourishing of organisations, people and nature” (Carnegie et al., 2021a, p. 69, 2021b).

Findings

Accounting is conceived, understood and examined in the research portrayed as a combined technical, social and moral practice concerned with shaping a better world to enable the flourishing of organisations, people and nature. To the contrary, accounting is not recognised as a mere neutral, benign, technical practice.

Research limitations/implications

While this paper examines the other articles, there is no substitute for carefully reading, and reflecting on, all the articles published. Importantly, each contribution provides unique and comprehensive insights on accounting during the initial global pandemic period.

Originality/value

Accounting is studied in different organisational and social contexts against the backdrop of a global pandemic, among other “wicked problems” worldwide.

Details

Meditari Accountancy Research, vol. 31 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2049-372X

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 14 August 2018

Linde Egberts

The purpose of this paper is to assess the consequences of a nature-culture divide in spatial policy on cultural heritage in the Dutch Wadden Sea area, which is protected by…

2304

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to assess the consequences of a nature-culture divide in spatial policy on cultural heritage in the Dutch Wadden Sea area, which is protected by UNESCO for its ecological assets.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper investigates this by discussing the international and national policy frameworks and regional examples of the consequences of the divide.

Findings

The effects of the nature-culture divide appear to be negative for the landscape. Approaching the Wadden Sea Region as an agricultural-maritime landscape could help overcome the fixation on nature vs culture and the hardness of the sea dikes as spatial boundaries between the two domains. A reconsideration of the trilateral Wadden Sea region as a mixed World Heritage Site could lead to a more integrated perspective.

Originality/value

These findings inform policy development and the management of landscape and heritage in the region. This case forms an example for other European coastal regions that struggle with conflicting natural and cultural-historical interests.

Details

Journal of Cultural Heritage Management and Sustainable Development, vol. 9 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2044-1266

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 6 September 2018

Allison Earl, Robert VanWynsberghe, Pierre Walter and Timothy Straka

This paper aims to present an interpretive case study in education for sustainability (EfS) that applies VanWynsberghe and Herman’s (2015, 2016) adaptive education as pedagogy…

Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to present an interpretive case study in education for sustainability (EfS) that applies VanWynsberghe and Herman’s (2015, 2016) adaptive education as pedagogy. Dewey’s theory of behaviour change is applied to educative experiences based on habit disruption and real-world learning, leading to creativity in the formation of new habits. The programme presented inverts dominant conceptions of knowledge to design innovative sustainability pedagogy. Instead knowledge resides alongside experience, cases, intuition, advice, experimentation and dialogue in the individual and collective effort to address daily sustainability challenges.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper reports on the outcomes of an interpretive case study (Merriam, 1998) of a higher education programme in sustainability pedagogy. It presents a series of reflections by instructors and participants in discussing the programme’s relationship with the core themes of habit, disruption, creative action and dialogue framed within the five features of adaptive education: stakeholders, real-world learning, off campus, transdisciplinarity and non-traditional rewards.

Findings

Through this examination, the authors found that adaptive education offered a pedagogy that simultaneously addressed the need for increased sustainability knowledge, whilst inverting its dominance. As a long-term project, the extent of the programme’s impact will be evident beyond the programme’s completion.

Research limitations/implications

This interpretive case study is analysed through high-level conceptual and theoretical aspects of the pedagogy rather than the particularities of the case. By putting the centrality of knowledge into question, the authors are advocating for a more experimental role for higher education in its teaching and learning. These questions are broadly applicable.

Social implications

There are research, learning and social benefits to this programme. Adaptive education builds capacity for future leaders and educators of sustainability.

Originality/value

The paper concludes with a discussion for further theorizing and research on adaptive education and EfS in higher education. This research will contribute to broader discussions of the evolving role of education in sustainability.

Details

International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education, vol. 19 no. 6
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1467-6370

Keywords

1 – 10 of 57