Thinking/acting locally/globally: western science and environmental education in a global knowledge economy

摘要

This paper critically appraises a number of approaches to \u27thinking globally\u27 in environmental education, with particular reference to popular assumptions about the universal applicability of Western science. Although the transnational character of many environmental issues demands that we \u27think globally\u27, I argue that the contribution of Western science to understanding and resolving environmental problems might be enhanced by seeing it as one among many local knowledge traditions. The production of a \u27global knowledge economy\u27 in/for environmental education can then be understood as creating transnational \u27spaces\u27 in which local knowledge traditions can be performed together, rather than as creating a \u27common market\u27 in which representations of local knowledge must be translated into (or exchanged for) the terms of a universal discourse.