Why our strategies keep failing us — we’re all systems illiterate
The relationship between education, strategic thinking and climate action.
‘We are at war, we will rebuild what we lost, we will compensate those who were hurt’. While this statement might have you reaching for your history books, it’s not from the past. This is the Greek PM commenting on the current climate crisis; heatwaves and wild fires, ravaging Europe. In a world that’s deeply connected, through its economies, ecologies and social ties — this is serious.
‘The stability and resilience of the Earth system and human well-being are inseparably linked, yet their interdependencies are generally under-recognized; consequently, they are often treated independently.’ Reference
But why?
Inadequate Educational Systems
Within the UK, ‘disciplines’ provide structure to all levels of education. By definition, ‘A discipline is a branch of learning or domain of knowledge that is characterised by distinct objects, concepts, principles, theories, skills, tools and applications’. Reference
While such structures in education can be necessary to provide rigour and depth to knowledge, they can be limiting in responding to real-world issues. Disciplinary approaches can lack in creative engagement and lateral thinking necessary to form links for systems complexities. Educators of such processes can also lack the necessary logic and thinking to teach climate change as a systems issue.
Interdisciplinary learning however, could provide access to new knowledge and skills that may be better applied to cross-sectional issues within specific contexts. ‘Contextual learning is an important and widely used type of interdisciplinary learning where different disciplines or curriculum areas are focused — or converge — on a context, issue or problem’ .Where this can be limiting, Multi-discplinary learning might provide deeper access to several disciplines that normally do not interact in education. It can help strengthen abilities to co-learn, make connections and respond in a way that is conscious of surrounding relationships to other scenarios, processes and complex interactions.
Such interfacing is usually found in research and industry. It requires collaboration amongst all sorts of stakeholders mirroring real world scenarios of industry, governments and communities. Teaching in this way can enable students to be better practiced in skillsets and thinking that cultivates cross-knowledge necessary in responding to our current reality.
However, with the ‘climate time-bomb’ ticking — some may say next generational education is too slow for impact needed now. Focus then sits on those already part of the industry to prioritise climate action and act using sustainable, regenerative and climate focussed approaches. But how?
Given the climate skills shortage, this cannot be possible without upskilling and intentional learning . This ‘doesn’t necessarily mean technical upskilling, but upskilling around enabling change, stakeholder engagement, influencing upwards and effective communication and teamwork’. Not only will it require significant investment but also a desire for people to adapt and continuously self-learn. Investment and governmental awareness campaigns can help identify life-long learning as essential to career growth.
Build Life-long Learning
There are many ways to incorporate learning into our lives. Some useful techniques focus on skills that can influence thinking, talking and doing:
1.Develop Innovation Skills
‘Innovation is Everybody’s Business’ (Tucker, 2010) and simply refers to thinking creatively to problem solve. This could include identifying trends and patterns, forming new links and partners and communicating in a way that brings people together. Once identified, action- planning can be useful to further solutions and translate them into practicable applications.
2.Learn Critical Thinking
‘You don’t need to be a scientist to think like one’. Critical thought usually refers to skills we may naturally already have but are yet to hone. Identifying issues, analysing arguments, discovering the facts, challenging any biases and drawing out conclusions based on significance are aspects of daily societal interactions. Expanding them into complex climate issues can help provide deeper understanding of one’s role and responsibility in decision-making.
3.Encourage research and independent learning
This is about developing a curiosity and humility mindset. Reading and engaging in community networks can be useful ways to spark excitement of personal learning. Support and advice are integral skills of researchers that are often leading new wave thinking to complex solutions — be like them.
Climate Aware Innovation Strategies
Adopting a mindset of continuous self-learning can not only quickly upgrade one’s knowledge, it can also lead to working methods, approaches and processes that are conducive to sustainable climate action which includes necessary adaptation and mitigation. Leaders who are aware of these issues tend to be more pro-active in climate-aware decision-making such as focussing on:
- Resource Efficiency — Global systems-aware material sourcing, selection, re-use and disposal
- Conscious Production — Efficient material use, existing product cycle mapping, in-use emissions, life-cycle entry and exit points, global impact
- Optimised functions — User needs testing, suitable service life, in-built resilience to climate devastation
- Long term analysis — Evidence based future scenario mapping, climate risks analysis
While such strategies can be effective and help move towards regenerative principles, ultimately it will require global acceptance of the existence of climate change and its resultant impact on all life systems and processes. Starting from a unified point is urgent and still unfortunately missing — more must be and can be done together. Building systems based education, investing in upskilling current leaders and developing a desire for life-long learning can greatly impact the world’s readiness for the war that has already started.
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Thanks for reading! If you found this interesting, please also check out my medium page and check out my you-tube channel where I explore new climate intersections using evidence-based strategies and tools that can help us better understand ourselves and our complex environment, to ultimately build a life we love on a planet that we need.
