Curtin University Homepage
  • Library
  • Help
    • Admin

    espace - Curtin’s institutional repository

    JavaScript is disabled for your browser. Some features of this site may not work without it.
    View Item 
    • espace Home
    • espace
    • Curtin Theses
    • View Item
    • espace Home
    • espace
    • Curtin Theses
    • View Item

    The power of us : counteracting decreasing sustainability

    192119_Raphaely2013.pdf (6.415Mb)
    Access Status
    Open access
    Authors
    Raphaely, Talia Diane
    Date
    2012
    Supervisor
    Prof. Dora Marinova
    Type
    Thesis
    Award
    PhD
    
    Metadata
    Show full item record
    School
    Curtin University Sustainability and Policy Institute
    URI
    http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/443
    Collection
    • Curtin Theses
    Abstract

    This PhD thesis comprises nine published papers covering three case study areas namely flexitarianism, the new human agenda and sustainability humanistic education. Whilst the case studies are concerned with three deliberately diverse areas, specifically food choices, development and tertiary education, they are united by the common conceptual themes of individual empowerment and action as a way of countering increasing unsustainability. The thesis takes a strong stance against the vast geopolitical megasystem of vested interests flourishing within the dominant geopolitical economic discourse and emphasises the role of personal power.To date, most attempts at countering mounting local and global unsustainability have failed, because those tasked and trusted to develop and implement solutions have a conflicting, short-term vested interest in maintaining the sources of the global human and environmental crisis. These globalised economic and political profit and power forces are subverting essential transformative change.The central premise on which the thesis is built is that there is an urgent need for a solution that offers an accessible and immediate opportunity for regaining, repairing and renewing human and biophysical wellbeing. Its main argument is that the possibility of countering increasing unsustainability perpetuated by global power alliances lies in the collective actions and outcomes of uncoordinated individual choices and endeavours mobilised through awareness, empowerment and education. Through such personal liberation from the duplicity of the megasystem and the ability to take back their power, humanity, comprising a collective of individuals and personal actions the world over, holds the key to a more sustainable future.In this previously academically unexplored area flexitarianism, the new human agenda and sustainability humanistic education are examples of how the sum of individual, uncoordinated actions, holds restorative and transformative opportunities for the achievement of a more sustainable world.

    Related items

    Showing items related by title, author, creator and subject.

    • Parks, people and planning: local perceptions of park management on the Ningaloo Coast, North West Cape, Western Australia
      Ingram, Colin Barry (2008)
      Attaining the ‘appropriate’ balance between human use of national parks and their protection is a topic of considerable public, scientific and business interest and is thus an important focus for research. An increasingly ...
    • Insider resistance : understanding refugee protest against immigration detention in Australia, 1999 – 2005
      Fiske, Lucy (2012)
      Protests by detainees in Australia’s immigration detention centres made regular headline news between 1999 and 2005. Journalists interviewed government ministers, senior departmental officials, refugee advocates, mental ...
    • Participatory geographic information systems to anchor the creation and construction of knowledge to support rural community development. A case study of Tshane village, Botswana
      Mulalu, Mulalu (2010)
      This research investigated the role of participatory geographic information systems (PGIS) in instituting the culture of using knowledge in order to implement a rural community development strategy that targets improving ...
    Advanced search

    Browse

    Communities & CollectionsIssue DateAuthorTitleSubjectDocument TypeThis CollectionIssue DateAuthorTitleSubjectDocument Type

    My Account

    Admin

    Statistics

    Most Popular ItemsStatistics by CountryMost Popular Authors

    Follow Curtin

    • 
    • 
    • 
    • 
    • 

    CRICOS Provider Code: 00301JABN: 99 143 842 569TEQSA: PRV12158

    Copyright | Disclaimer | Privacy statement | Accessibility

    Curtin would like to pay respect to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander members of our community by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which the Perth campus is located, the Whadjuk people of the Nyungar Nation; and on our Kalgoorlie campus, the Wongutha people of the North-Eastern Goldfields.