Sustainable Outreach: Communication, Education and Digital Technologies

This chapter addresses the outreach and communication of sustainability from the perspectives of digital technology, formal and informal education. It discusses the successes and challenges of these processes in increasing awareness and driving behaviour, starting from the notion that communication can be about, of, and/or for sustainability. Recognising the simultaneous existence of a sustainability imperative and a digital imperative, the chapter reflects on the extent to which the internet facilitates, and to which extent it hinders behaviour change for sustainability. Concerning formal education, the chapter examines the challenges related to the reduced flexibility of curricula and, on the other hand, emerging tools and methods that address sustainability education. Museums are used as examples of informal education for sustainability that can help overcome some of the limits faced by formal education. Aspects related to language and cultural barriers, digital illiteracy, social and gender inequalities are some among the various obstacles to sustainability communication for all. These various elements are confronted with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), and some contradictions emerge.