Environmental education has not spread as widely in Japan as expected and therefore has not had any significant impact on environmental problems, even though many educators and researchers have devoted themselves to environmental educational practice. Why is environmental education not popular in Japan, and what does this tell us? The purpose of this paper is to examine the limitations of environmental education, extrapolate the reasons for such limitations, and finally, to suggest a methodology that can make environmental education more significant and useful. First, the insignificance of current environmental education in Japan and its inability to affect serious global environmental problems are examined. Next, the limitations of environmental education in Japan are examined from a historical point of view. Finally, the obstructions to environmental educational practice are revealed and a new approach proposed. The importance of academic skills, interpersonal skills and a philosophy of living are highlighted for this new environmental education approach. Despite discussions on the limitations of environmental education and its inherent characteristics, it is concluded that current school educational practices should be enhanced to ensure that environmental education becomes an education focused on a sustainable future. Therefore, it is first necessary to understand the irresolvable internal contradictions in EE and to dismiss any ideas that environmental issues can be solved through EE. It is also necessary to recognize that it is possible to work towards solving environmental issues by continuing traditional school education in a more careful, better focused manner so as to ensure that the existing EE is incorporated into the overall school education framework

 The UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) ran from 2005 to 2014. This study concerns the concepts of Sustainable Development (SD) and ESD. The term “sustainable development” was coined by the Brundtland Commission in 1987 as the key word in integrating environment and development. SD achieved international consensus at the 1992 Earth Summit, at which Agenda 21 was formulated to promote ESD. The resolution to implement the Decade of ESD was then adopted at the 2002 Johannesburg Summit. In this study, therefore, we follow historical developments in ESD in Japan in the context of environmental and development education.

 Environmental education originated in conservation, pollution, and outdoor education, respectively. After the 1992 Earth Summit, the Japanese government implemented environmental education in public schools, originally in science classes, and limited at first to education on the natural environment. This led to the acceptance of ESD after 2005, including not only its natural but also its economic, social, and cultural aspects.

 Meanwhile, development education in Japan commenced in the 1980s, and focused on development issues in the Global South. However, following the Hamburg Declaration on Adult Learning in 1997, the Development Education Association and Resource Center (DEAR) widened its remit to cover such global issues as the environment, human rights, gender, and multi-culturalism. During the Decade of ESD, the DEAR implemented projects on development of an ESD curriculum, training of facilitators for participatory learning, and promotion of ESD networking in the Asia-Pacific region. We analyze two model curricula proposed by the DEAR in 2000 and 2010, which aimed to connect local and global issues through participatory learning. We further analyze the DEAR ESD curriculum in view of environmental education. Finally, we suggest future developments in ESD related to the Global Action Programme on Education for Sustainable Development (GAP) and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

 Japan stands as a rare country in which ESD has been incorporated as mainstream policy. However, looking back on the United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (UNDESD), ESD has not brought about the transformation in Japan that one expects ESD to aim for, despite this support at the policy level. The cause may be that pouring the “new wine” of ESD into the “old bottle” of the traditional educational system has diluted the dynamism contained in ESD.

 Both “shallow ESD” and “deep ESD” exist. The former stems mainly from widely shared interpretations of ESD that emphasize the overlap and connections with existing school subjects and types of education. The latter is needed to avoid this loss of dynamism and to gain access to the full potential of ESD. Holistic educational approaches that replace conventional ones, as well as system-level transformation, are indispensable to realize this “deep ESD.”

 The aim of this article is to propose the concept of ecophilia as the guiding idea for conceiving an education with ecological concern – ecopedagogy. Drawing on E. O. Wilson’s idea of biophilia and Yi Fu Tuan’s notion of topophilia, I coin the term ‘ecophilia’, which means the human affective and embodied bond with other living beings and the environs, e.g. nature and place. Ecopedagogy is coined to mean an ecological approach to education with the aim of cultivating ecophilia. I argue that embracing ecophilia can expand the current mode of education that neglects environments and nature. Education in terms of ecophilia and ecopedagogy reconnects humans and the environment in an ecologically meaningful way.

 Teleological progress is the underlying motif of modern culture, and informs education, innovation, and economic development. Progress includes a gradual increase in consumerism. Since the 1940s, the Keynesian Settlement and its embedded belief in progress is legislated in exponential 2-3% economic growth. Unfortunately, climate change is a direct result of the increasing amounts of CO2e byproduct that gets expelled in the production of plastic consumer items, and this production increases exponentially year on year. We are now hearing serious concerns from scientists about the sixth great extinction, the Anthropocene epoch, and the end of modernity in ecological collapse. In this article I argue that climate change is an outcome of our dedication to progress and consumerism and I try and unravel the mechanics of exponential economic growth in contrast to an alternative model of economics and debt, first developed in Mesopotamia about 5000 years ago. The contrast may not be operationalisable in modern times, but it does offer a significant counter-argument to the concept of progress and shows that Steady State economics has been successfully implemented by a continuous civilization for thousands of years. The depth of the philosophical shift is illuminated in the understanding of Mesopotamian theology, astronomy, astrology, and understanding of cyclic, rather than linear, time. This type of critical account highlights the need for education to fundamentally challenge some key norms in modernity, from ‘progress’ to the sense of entitlement that consumerism and economic growth provide. Education is a key site for cultural transition, and as the constraints of climate change are making ever more clear, the moment to mobilise the educational sector is here.

 Franklin Bobbitt is the founder of modern curriculum theory. There is a generally supported saying that Bobbitt’s theory went through two stages, the first focused on social efficiency with a mechanical and behavioral approach, and the second a more progressive approach, caring for the living experience of pupils. A close reading of his so-called turning point paper proves that this is a misunderstanding and that these two parts actually composed an organic unity in his theory from the very beginning. This misunderstanding happened mainly in the 1970s, with a tendency to criticize the Tyler Rationale as scientism. It influenced the canonical narrative in curriculum textbooks later and became a stereotype in our understanding of Bobbitt. It obscures the complexity of the history of educational thought.

 The aim of this paper is to analyse the actions of various actors involved in ‘global human resource development’ and to clarify whether discussions on global human resources are based on local perspectives.

 The results of the analysis are as follows: 1) after the year 2000 began, industry started discussions on global human resources in the context of training employees to work overseas, 2) the discussion moved to universities by the late 2000s, 3) MEXT led the universities through competitive funding, 4) large universities put emphasis on study abroad programmes and English language education, and 5) smaller universities also reorganised their faculties and departments focusing on global as the key. These discussions are local and closed ones in terms of time and space.

In the field of education, evidence means an objective ground for setting or judging an educational policy, plan or method, as an effective means to attain a given political end or educational objective. Evidence-based education has been regarded as a decisive device to pursue the accountability and improve the quality of education by connecting educational researches to educational practices and policies.

Evidence-based education in the UK and the USA, however, has been criticized for distorting the essence of education and the nature of educational practices through its use of evidence-based medicine as a model, and for dismissing the hermeneutical or holistic traditions in educational methodology and the autonomy of the professionals engaged in research or practice. But these criticisms do not seem to be accepted by those who believe in the possibilities of education and believe that its possibilities can be realized by operating evidence-based education rationally. It may be quite difficult to overcome evidence-based education under these circumstances.

In this article I consider the above explanation accounting for espousal of evidence-based education to be not so much a variety of truth as the story, which is provided, with some political interests, for those who intend to acquire the competencies or skills to survive in an era of uncertainty. I pay attention to the consequences brought about recursively by the execution of evidence-based education in the historical-social context which has called for evidence-based education itself. In other words, I take notice of the unintended political or ideological functions that the story as an organized system of meaning performs as the result of repeated and reflexive retelling in that context.

It is important to notice that the notion of evidence-based education has emerged in association with changing views on education. As the education that I call Education II(modern education) is separated from education I (traditional and fundamental education as an ongoing process of call-and-response with the world) in accordance with the rising of commodity exchange and merchandization, the former turns to education to satisfy learners’ needs or desires, which is a prerequisite for evidence-based education. Furtheremore, the execution of evidence-based education, under the present conditions of commodification, merchandization and the transformation of scientific research, has gradually reversed the relation between education and evidence. When education is seen as what can be evaluated with evidence, a new type of education emerges, which I call Education III. Education III, which reduces teaching and learning to visible operations, is very adaptable to interdisciplinary research, hybrid business and the globalized society. But when evidence for accountability turns from the grounds for judging the level of achievement into the proofs of having attained the objectives, the purpose of education tends to become the constructing or disguising of evidence necessary therefore, impoverishing education and leaving it vacuous.

In conclusion, evidence-based education has changed the nature of education, making the acts of teaching and learning superficial and moving toward depriving education of its substance. Moreover, some branches of educational studies may be absorbed into interdisciplinary ones, and in turn the theories of education may be abandoned.