Disciplines Shaping the Higher Education for Sustainable Development Competency Scholarship: Results from a Direct Citation Analysis

A substantial number of higher education for sustainable development (HESD) scholars have and continue to focus on determining what competencies are critical for students to master to support the transition toward sustainability [i.e., to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)]. Given the influence of HESD competency scholarship on the preparation of future leaders, it is important to learn more about the disciplines shaping this HESD sub-field. This study reports findings, including from a direct citation analysis, to answer the following questions: 1) What is the disciplinary background of scholars shaping the HESD competency scholarship?, 2) What are the most prominent journals publishing HESD competency scholarship?, and 3) What, if any, patterns are apparent in how articles on HESD competency cite each other? Results suggest that the scholars shaping the HESD competency sub-field do not come from sufficiently diverse disciplines. In addition, articles on HESD competencies are published mainly in sustainability-focused journals (i.e., International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education, Journal of Cleaner Production, Sustainability, Environmental Education Research, and Sustainability Science), with far fewer published in education or other disciplinary journals. Lastly, HESD competency scholars tend to mainly cite each other, particularly across sustainability-focused journals. For a robust set of HESD competencies that will help to ensure that all higher education students will be prepared to contribute to the achievement of the SDGs, it will be necessary for scholars from more disciplines and non-Western geographies to be engaged in competency research and to publish on the topic in a greater variety of (inter)disciplinary journals.