Restoration‐based education: a brief overview of a field under construction

Abstract

Education and restoration belong to fields that are profuse in academic production, are integrated into politics and governmental decision‐making, are present in business sectors, and have gained the public interest and the participation of civil society. Therefore, it might seem relatively easy to integrate both spheres of social and environmental interest. However, both sciences and practices belong to traditions of human and natural sciences, cultures whose conceptual and methodological articulation have not been easy throughout history. This article argues that for true integration of education in ecological restoration the following conditions are required: (1) a defined positioning about sustainable development and the purpose of the ecological restoration, (2) recognition of the complexity of the environmental education field, and (3) knowledge of the main postulates of the “restoration‐based education” (RBE). Based on selected RBE cases, we discuss the possibilities of putting into practice theoretical postulates of this transdisciplinary field of work.