This book tackles questions about the metaphysical and ethical foundations of our concern for our planet, and about educational and pedagogical implications. It pursues answers to urgent questions such as: should educational policy and practice be informed by a concern for nature and the environment for our (human) purposes? Or should we teach and learn for the natural environment in and for itself?

Chapters in this volume contribute towards the unmasking and undoing of the various kinds of denialism and pernicious relativism (cultural, moral and epistemological) that have held us in their grip and that continue to thwart attempts to establish a sane and morally sustainable set of relationships between us, human beings, and other animals and the animate and inanimate environment.

Education, the Environment and Sustainability provides educators and interested laypersons with tools for critical reflection and interrogation of their own and others’ assumptions, preconceptions, and practices affecting nature and the environment. This volume was originally published as a special issue of Ethics and Education.

Kai Horsthemke is Visiting Professor at the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa, and at KU Eichstätt-Ingolstadt, Germany, and a fellow at the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics. His monographs include The Moral Status and Rights of Animals (2010), Animals and African Ethics (2015), Animal Rights Education (2018), Indigenous Knowledge: Philosophical and Educational Considerations (2021), and The Meaning of Death (forthcoming).