El desarrollo sostenible como eje fundamentante de la educación ambiental

In their historical development, societies follow civilizatory and developmental models whose
analysis enables us to understand their differential characteristics, organizational and cultural
methods and lifestyles. In recent decades, a new model has gained ground that has been
interpreted in many ways, but always with sustainable development as the final aim. Key aspects
of this model are social equity and recognizing the limits of nature. Environmental education has
played a vital role in the preparation and dissemination of this model. For over 30 years,
environmental education has worked on development problems, taking as core themes the
concepts of ecodevelopment, new development and sustainable development. This illustrates its
pioneering and innovative nature in the field.
This article analyses the main characteristics of the sustainability model, which serves as a
foundation for educational and environmental processes. All of the above is in the framework of
the United Nation’s call for all educational movements to include this issue, in the declaration of
the decade 2005-2014 as the Decade of Education for Sustainable Development.