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12
Global Campaigns Towards Universidades en el Desarrollo de la Economía
Sustainability and Social Solidaria, Bogotá, Colombia
13
Ecopedagogical Literacies World Social Forum- Dynamics of Extension,
Paris, France
Claudia Alvarez1, Madza Ednir2, 14
Magic RM, CECIP, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Claudia Martinez3, André Gbedan4, 15
Universidad del Cauca, Popayán, Colombia
Catalina Quiroz5, Eduardo T. Vitale6,
Erika Licon7, Heloisa Primavera8,
Howard Richards9, Laura Collin Hargundeguy10,
Introduction
Mariano Flores11, Melba Quijano12,
Pierre George13, Silvia Fittipaldi14 and
The need to educate towards new forms of
Willian Jairo Mavisoy Muchavisoy15
1 interaction among humans, the other living
Red Educación y Economía Social Solidaria,
beings, and their natural environment started to
Buenos Aires, Argentina
2 be more strongly felt after the Second World War
CECIP, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
(1939–1945), when the dimension of the negative
3
Be Pe – Bienaventurados los Pobres,
impact of human activity on the Earth system
Catamarca y Santiago del Estero, Argentina
4 became evident. Scientist’s warnings, that the
Université Catholique de Louvain,
natural and energetic resources of the planet
Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium
5 could not continue to be carelessly exploited as
York St John University, York, UK
6 if they were unlimited, became more audible and
Iandê, São Paulo, Brazil
7 globally disseminated. In the decade of the 1970s,
Concordia University, Montréal, QC, Canada
8 a World Commission on Environment and Devel-
RedLASES, Universidad de Buenos Aires,
opment was created by the United Nations (UN).
Buenos Aires, Argentina
9 The Brundtland Report, “Our Common Future,”
Universidad de Santiago de Chile,
launched the concept of “sustainable develop-
Santiago, Chile
10 ment” in 1987, and there gradually emerged
Colégio de Tlaxcala, Tlaxcala, Mexico
11 among civil society’s organizations and move-
Edualter, Barcelona, Spain
ments, a nonexplicit global project of educating
formally, non-formally, and informally for “a
new model of civilization, sustainable from the constructive way with themselves and with the
ecological perspective (integral ecology), which planetary challenges they are facing. They foster
implies transforming social, cultural and ecopedagogical literacy as they can make more
economic structures” (Gadotti 2010, p. 42). people critically read their realities and under-
Originating in the middle of the 1990s in social stand how environmentally harmful acts lead to
organizations in Costa Rica (Instituto Latino oppressions for humans (anthropocentric aspects)
Americano de Pedagogía de la Comunicación- and damage to all else that makes up the Earth
Ilpec) and Brazil (Instituto Paulo Freire-IPF), the (biocentric aspects). They promote understanding
concept of ecopedagogy can be used to describe the politics of these acts and problem-solving on
this movement. how to end socio-environmental oppressions
We understand ecopedagogies as learning (Misiaszek 2018).
experiences based on the Freirean educational In this input, we will present an example of
approach, that promote ecopedagogical literacy – such ecopedagogical planetary initiatives, that
the capacity for critically reading environmental strengthen social mobilization to build economic,
injustices and, becoming aware of their political cultural, and environmental alternatives to
and economic causes, exploring possibilities the systemic imperatives of capitalism, as they
for overcoming oppressions by acting in a reinforce principles and values of cooperation,
collective way. inclusion, and social emancipation: The
Despite the conquests social movements Campaign for a Global Curriculum of Social
achieved during the last decades of the twentieth Solidarity Economy-GCSSE. One of its
century and the beginning of this century, in 2015 distinguishing features is having being conceived
one could see worrying signs that ecopedagogical and launched by social organizations belonging
literacy was far from generalized. In this year, to the Global South – a term coined by Boaventura
while 193 chiefs of government were meeting in Santos (2006) to express a broad field of
a UN Assembly to approve the 17 Sustainable innovation, that goes beyond modern Eurocentric
Development Goals and the Agenda 2030, thinking, challenging colonial, capitalist, and
patterns of production and consumption contin- patriarchal assumptions and giving voice to
ued to be growingly unsustainable, global cultures and knowledges that have been silenced
warming was reaching catastrophic levels, and (http://curriculumglobaleconomiasolidaria.com/).
the basic needs of the greatest part of humanity Another notable characteristic of the Campaign is
were not being met. In 2019, even while the its explicit purpose to strengthen, amplify, and
impacts of climatic changes and the decline of bring together educational policies as well as
biodiversity were more and more alarming, right formal, non-formal, and informal educational
wing political leaders and their supporters contin- processes that can acknowledge and include
ued to refuse to admit that the cause of this process other forms of knowledge, of understanding and
is the destructive influence of the capitalist transforming realities, working towards a new
economic model on the balance of Earth’s ecosys- project of society based on social solidarity econ-
tems. And in addition: the great majority, unable omy principles.
to read the world as Freire (1974) proposed, is It is possible to say that the Campaign for a
hindered in its capacity to act for change. GCSSE is an initiative which is in tune with what
This situation indicates the importance of some authors call movements of the global civil
the continuity and improvement of global cam- society towards the Great Transition for a plane-
paigns and social movements that educate tary civilization, where the current model of
citizens towards confronting, contesting, and destructive economy that is preying on Nature,
deconstructing the dominant imaginary. These as well as the social interactions stimulated by
initiatives are transforming, when they promote it, marked by individualism, competition, and
mental emancipation – showing that human violence, will be overcome.
beings have possibilities for dealing in a
Global Campaigns Towards Sustainability and Ecopedagogical Literacies 3
Besides making accessible a number of poten- expanded reproduction of capital, but to the
tial tools to develop ecopedagogical literacy, the expanded reproduction of life. Solidarity econ-
Map is in itself an example of an ecopedagogical omy is not a means, it is an end, it is a project of
tool, since it allows for reading the diversity and society.”
the interconnectedness of aspects involved in With the Global Map of Tools, the Campaign
overcoming oppression and building a sustainable for a GCSSE, like many other planetary initia-
social solidarity economy-driven society. In fact, tives, wants to encourage the growing recognition
it brings together and makes easier to locate of the epistemic character of social movements
tools of the most varied types – guides, manuals, linked to environmentalism, feminism, anti-
games, videos – not only on Education for SSE, in racism, anti-capitalism/socialism/communitarian-
a strict sense, but also on Environmental Sustain- ism, which are forging new processes, concepts,
ability, Decolonial Education, Human Rights, methodologies, and experiences. It promotes
Global Citizenship, Radical Democracy, Culture ecopedagogical literacy by raising awareness
of Peace, Diversity, Gender Issues, and Racial of the multiplicity of learnings in terms of meth-
Issues. odologies and concepts arising from SSE organi-
The Map is coherent with a view of Economy zations and the alternative practices derived from
as moral science: human economic activities must it; the identification of the denominations that
be at service of humanity and Nature. Also, it are established as referents for local economic
reflects Brazilian economist Paul Singer’s (2010) dynamics for production, marketing, and also for
conception of SSE as a viscerally democratic exchange of knowledge – for example, the mingas
approach, opposed to any kind of oppression and (collaborative work with neighbors and friends to
discrimination. This resource promotes achieve a goal) or organizational practices hap-
ecopedagogical literacy while contributing to pening in spaces where associativity and inter-
make transparent that SSE integrates interactions associativity in the construction of the collective
with nature with social economic thinking, con- are exerted. It invites the members of the
sidering that ecological care and sustainability Campaign to invest time and expertise to register
must be principles to guide, in all societies, the and collect images and sounds that can be exam-
transformation of practices of organization of the ples of informal educational processes geared
economy, of social and cultural life, and of power. towards transforming economies.
It can make deeper and wider the understand- An essential need, although challenging, for
ing that another logic, based on cooperation and similar efforts to promote ecopedagogical read-
not on competition, is present in the world, orga- ings, is to determine in what measure each tool
nizing human activities related to the satisfaction in the Map systematizes or stimulates interdisci-
of needs all orders (not only strictly economic – plinary intercultural educational experiences
production, distribution, consumption of goods, that can deepen the “understanding of the connec-
savings, loans), to prevent and eliminate unequal tions between environmental and social violence
distribution of power. acts (socio-environmental). A thorough rigorous
The ecopedagogical principles in which the reflection on the determination of the actions is
building of the Map of Tools is based are implicit needed to put an end to the oppressions (i.e., to
in the words of a sociologist, participant of the engage in transformative praxis)” (Misiaszek
Campaign for a GCSSE, when she said in an 2018). Given the nonexistence of an external
activity of the WSF 2018, that the concept of evaluation or “quality control,” the evaluation
SSE can be seen as a great “umbrella” that houses promoted will be internal, where every participant
different conceptions, with something in com- will be invited to rise and answer questions such
mon: “They are experiences oriented by another as: in what measure do the tools promote
logic, not oppressive, where democratic processes actions where “I” is replaced by “us,” competi-
are built from the bases. What unites them is tion is replaced by complementarity and individ-
an ethical component, which refers not to the ual autonomy by interdependence? Do the tools
Global Campaigns Towards Sustainability and Ecopedagogical Literacies 5
this, the Campaign for a GCSSE embraces the presented break with the hierarchy established
potential of educational processes that are often among different kinds of knowledge that is con-
not recognized as such, such those developed sidered by several researchers as epistemic colo-
by social movements through their struggles, nization – one of the expressions of the
generating political literacy. colonization of power (Santos 2011). The decol-
Based on a general agreement on the world- onization of knowledge goes hand in hand with
view that it should serve, the GCSSE must the rejection of domination and accumulation of
be a space where diverse ecologies of know- profit of that has placed knowledge and technique
ledge may converge (Santos 2011), involving at the service of the ambition of a few. Thus,
practice, wisdom, and the experience of people a society is being built, where it will be possible
in everyday contexts. It must be able to integrate to correct the immense planetary imbalance of the
diverse realities into cooperative action. distribution power. These initiatives contradict
neoliberal fatalism. They foster a Pedagogy of
Hope, considering, with Paulo Freire, that utopia
Conclusions is the educator’s realism.