Conference Agenda

Society is currently facing and experiencing a fundamental environmental and social climate-related crisis (IPCC, 2022). Despite this, many groups in society are opposed to or are skeptical about various sustainability reforms and research about the climate crisis and other environmental issues (e.g., Jylhä et al. 2022; Krange, Kaltenborn, & Hultman, 2019; Ojala, 2015). When teaching young people about sustainable development, we cannot assume that everyone is in favour of sustainable development; there is a diversity of views on these issues. Previous research demonstrates the importance of emotions for engagement and sustainability commitment, but also for denial and/or scepticism (Håkansson & Östman, 2019; Ojala, 2015; Öhman & Sund, 2021). Other research suggests that viewing denial as exhibiting both negative and positive mechanisms related to the reduction of risk of becoming emotionally paralysed when facing uncomfortable facts, holds great potential to entering a new understanding of denial (Lysgaard, 2019). This study aims to clarify the underlying logic of how and why some young people express resistance and how habits, values and identity contribute to negative emotions and doubts about sustainable development, climate change and the current environmental crisis.

The analysed data originates from a Swedish internet forum which provide a public space for young people (aged 13 to 25) to discuss political matters. Forums of this kind are particularly valuable to study as young people can here openly discuss their views of sustainability topics (Andersson & Öhman, 2016). There are a number of studies that show the prevalence of youth resistance and that also point to sociological and psychological background factors (e.g., Skogen, 1999; Strandbu & Skogen, 2000; Ojala, 2015). There is however a lack of studies that develop an understanding of the character specifically of resistance to and tensions in sustainability topics among young people. That is, how this resistance is played out in discursive practice and the ideological tensions, arguments and the logic behind obstructive standpoints and manifestations. We propose here an understanding based on Pierre Bourdieu's (1986, 1994/2014) theory of capital, with the addition of symbolic environmental capital (Karol & Gale, 2004). Young people's resistance is relevant to education, we need to better understand resistance in order to deal with resistance and tensions constructively and then recommend didactic methods to cope with the tensions.

Young people are worried about climate change. This anxiety is a rational response to the threats and realities of the current climate crisis, a crisis which young people have inherited and have little power to avert (Pihkala, 2021). If “all education is an introduction in some way to the future” (França, 2019, n.p.), it is surely an institutional failure that so few educational jurisdictions include more than cursory nods to climate change in their primary and secondary curricula (McKenzie, 2021). Despite this lag in policy, however, students are learning about and responding to climate change (Gasparri et al., 2021). In particular, young people’s concern about climate change is clearly visible on the social media platform TikTok (Basch et al., 2022). This youth-focused project is interested in youth experiences and intentions regarding TikTok as a form of critical public pedagogy on climate change. As such, this project asks: What can we learn, as educators, policy makers, and fellow humans, about and from the youth-led, climate-change-focused communication happening on TikTok?

TikTok is a relatively new platform on which users produce and share short video content. Once posted, users—predominantly young people—interact with this content by creating new, often mimetic responses, which interact with TikTok’s algorithm and result in a form of “platform politics,” i.e., “the assemblage of design, policies, and norms,” (Massanari, 2017, p. 336) that continuously influence discourse on the platform. Public pedagogy refers to the teaching and learning that happens in public, outside of formal educational institutions (O’Malley et al., 2020). However, TikTok disrupts the “false binary between public-private places of learning” (Truman, 2021, p. 66) by algorithmically feeding users public-personal-corporate-political curricula (and prompting users to generate their own), available wherever data signals can reach, be it in the classroom or kitchen. TikTok is a place where youth express their feelings of grief, anger, and urgency about climate change and also a place to find hope and solidarity, as well as engage in forms of climate activism (de Moor et al., 2021). McKenzie (2022) observes that while TikTok’s algorithmic controls function as “digital governance over the affective lives of people across the globe” (p. 155) at the same time, such virtual encounters “can also be seen as contributing to forms of collective affect and action that, in some cases, extend beyond the algorithmic ambitions of such platforms.” (p. 155). Because of TikTok’s distinctive platform politics and young user base, researchers (e.g., Hautea et al., 2021) have begun to study TikTok and its content as representative of and instrumental in the (re)production of what Papacharissi (2015) calls “affective publics,” i.e., “networked publics that are mobilized and connected, identified, and potentially disconnected through expressions of sentiment, including in relation to climate change” (p. 311). This presentation will review the existing literature on TikTok and other social media platforms as sites of intended climate communication and education, proposing further questions as to the influence this communication might have as public pedagogy towards liveable climate futures.

Internationally, Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) is given high priority in order to address social, ecological, and economic challenges. The importance of ESD for the future sustainable orientation of our society is underpinned in particular by Agenda 2030 (UN 2015). Alongside these developments, digitality is advancing in many areas of life, such as higher education. Both educational concepts (ESD and digital education) have common goals, as they refer to current and future challenges and cannot be clearly assigned to one discipline. Also, both concepts are about fostering the critical awareness of learners through critical reflective thinking and participatory experience in interdisciplinary contexts (Weselek et al. 2022). In this regard, according to Pegalajar-Palomino et al. (2019), higher education is the key to supporting important developments for both concepts. Future-oriented teacher education should combine both concepts by enabling future teachers to jointly shape sustainable development processes, for example with the help of serious games. These are games that do not serve the purpose of entertainment (van der Molen et al 2017), but pursue an educational goal (Wouters et al. 2013). Thus, escape rooms can be referred to as serious games if they pursue a specific educational goal. In this context, Fotaris and Mastoras describe the specificities of escape rooms from an educational perspective. From their point of view, escape rooms are based on a social constructivist approach, as learners construct their own knowledge when they encounter and deal with various challenges in an escape room in real time. In this process, learners face complex problems, which can only be solved through interaction with others (Fotaris & Mastoras 2019). Referring to serious games and their potential for supporting ESD goals, Spangenberger et al. (2022) report that such games have already been discussed intensively in the international literature. They explain that, from an empirical point of view, various studies have shown that serious games are more effective for learning than traditional learning methods. This is demonstrated by the meta-analysis of Wouters et al. (2013) and other studies evaluating the use of serious games in higher education (e.g., Braghirolli et al. 2016). Since university teacher education aims at teaching key competencies for the later (self-)responsible, reflective, and professional actions of teachers in school, it is of central importance that teachers promote important key competencies for ESD. Thus, important competencies for ESD have already been identified. These competencies, which are important for learners to help shape sustainable development processes, include competencies for collaboration, critical thinking, and integrated problem-solving skills (e.g., Rieckmann 2018). Against this background, it is of central importance that concrete learning objectives are formulated for the field of ESD in university teacher education as a basis for the development and implementation of appropriate didactic methods and tools. It is in this context that the project BNERoom aims to contribute to a stronger implementation of ESD and digital education in teacher training. The overall goal of the project is to develop a digital escape room (BNERoom) on ESD for student teachers, to test it with students, and to evaluate it scientifically. The project initiates an interdisciplinary exchange between students of all teaching professions in educational science and didactics (catholic theology and social education) and scientifically accompanies the negotiation processes among students.