Embracing the Paradox in Educational Change for Sustainable Development: A Case of Accounting

Abstract

Higher education institutions have been encouraged to prepare their graduates to be socially and environmentally responsible professionals. However, previous studies have found a slow uptake of education for sustainable development (ESD) in university curricula, particularly in non-environmental disciplines. This paper investigates the process of developing educational change for sustainability in an Australian university and the impact of such development on an area that has long been resistant to the sustainability initiative—accounting. The paper analyzes an approach that embraces a top-down research-led change and a bottom-up educational change for sustainability, linking university strategy, research concentration and institutional culture development with ESD in the case of accounting. This study examines issues of interest to higher education institutions engaged in accelerating the diffusion of ESD in non-environmental disciplines.