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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 December 2024
Humanity must learn to love the idea of leaving future generations a living planet.
Meadows, Meadows & Randers (2005: 283)REGENERATION AND THE PULL OF HOPE
It was 1971, and I had just graduated as a teacher. Browsing in a London bookshop, I discovered a book which, if not exactly “life changing”, certainly influenced its direction. The title of the book – sufficiently intriguing to grab my attention – was Teaching for Survival (Terry 1971). If it was relevant then, it is even more pertinent today. The cover blurb states that the book: “presents a way to change in the classroom the basic assumptions of our educational system – assumptions which ultimately lead to the destruction of our natural environment”. That was a very long time ago – and the need to change educational assumptions, and the Western cultural metaparadigm from which they derive, is now inescapable.
We are living at a watershed point of history, a pivotal period where the aggregate of human beliefs, ideas, policies, activities and behaviours across the world will, in the months and years to come, profoundly affect the chances and quality of life afforded current and future generations of people, the health of the biosphere, and the very habitability of the planet into the second half of the century (Brown 2011; Dixson-Declève et al. 2022; McGuire 2022). The challenge is immense and daunting, and it is global in scope.
We have a narrow but real opportunity to bend current negative trajectories towards a path of human and biospheric flourishing, should we collectively choose. The import of our collective choice cannot be overstated – now, “is the last time in history when we will be able to do this” (Figueres & Rivett-Carnac 2020: 9), or as reflected in Lester Brown's forewarning (2011: 202) “The choice will be made by our generation but it will affect life on Earth for all generations to come”. It is not clear what the future holds, but we do know that it not certain and it can be shaped.
Some years ago I came across the phrase, “the push of fear, the pull of hope” as motivators for change. Deep concern is being evoked by the consequences of our unsustainable way of life and the prospect of worsening conditions.
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