Browsing by Subject "Sustainability"

All learners should obtain knowledge about and be able to foster sustainable development, according to Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4.7 (World Commission on Environment and Development, 1987). Consequently, teacher education should involve sustainable development so as to meet SDG 4.7. This study aims to identify the incorporation of sustainable development in Finland’s teacher education programmes in order to support the development needed to attain SDG 4.7. Agenda 2030 and the SDGs were created in 2015 to continue to work towards the goals which the Brundtland report (World Commission on Environment and Development, 1987) established; to guarantee that present and future generations can fulfil their needs without jeopardising planet Earth. Therefore, meeting the SDGs and Agenda 2030 are considered of the utmost importance. As such, the incorporation of sustainable development in teacher education worldwide, is considered significant (Stevenson et al., 2015). However, previous research concerning Finland has indicated that sustainable development in teacher education is advised but seldom practiced (Hofman, 2012). As such it is conceivable that large improvements have not yet been made. This study qualitatively examined the eight universities in Finland, which offer teacher education, using content analysis and document analysis. To determine whether each university’s strategy, teacher education programme and courses during 2019-2020, concerning sustainable development, were aligned with one another, Biggs’ theory of constructive alignment was used. The research material consisted of eight universities’ strategies, ten teacher education programme descriptions and 860 course descriptions. The results revealed the majority of teacher education institutions offer merely a handful of courses, which target sustainable development. The findings varied between universities but typically there were only a limited number of compulsory courses and marginally more electives. However, students could pick electives in other subjects which focused on sustainable development. Therefore, the conclusion is that sustainable development is insufficiently integrated into primary teacher education to be able to enable Finland to adequately respond to Agenda 2030 and SDG 4.7.

This master’s thesis provides context to social change related to Sustainable Development and the factors influencing it from the perspective of Finnish National Art Institutions. The aim of this research is to examine how the principles – or the idea – of Sustainable Development have historically been adopted as part of Finnish society, and to compare how and in what time frame these principles have begun to be reflected in the strategies and operations of the Finnish National Art Institutions over the past 30 years. The research looks at the period from 1992 – determined by the adoption of the United Nations Agenda 21 on Sustainable Development – through to 2020. Institutional theory is used as the main theoretical framework of this study. Stakeholder Typology is used to examine the impact of the stakeholders in the process of adopting the principles and forming the expectations of Sustainable Development. There are four types of data used for this research: newspaper archives (Päivälehti Archives, Helsingin Sanomat), minutes from the plenary sessions of the Finnish Parliament, annual reports of the organisations under the investigation, and background interviews made with the key personnel in the Finnish National Art Institutions. A qualitative research method was selected to support the research and to answer the research questions. The analysis of the collected data is descriptive, highlighting meaningful themes, and following an inductive approach. The idea of Sustainable Development in the Finnish National Art Institutions is visible relatively late compared to the adoption of the principles of Sustainable Development by the Finnish government. Hence, the idea of Sustainable Development is recognised first in the political and public debate, and later in the National Art Institutions. The adoption of Sustainable Development at the operational level started in the Finnish National Art Institutions around 2010, with adoption at the strategic level first occurring around 2020. The pressure to adopt the principles of Sustainable Development in the National Art Institutions has emerged both from internal and external stakeholders. The change has been slow and has taken place primarily from the bottom up. The highest impact for adopting the principles of Sustainable Development comes from the staff and the artists of the organisation, but also from loyal customers, political decision makers, competitors, and sponsors. Based on the academic literature, a change taken place informally is the main driver for a long-term, constant institutional change. Therefore, based on the institutional theory, the long-standing, informal change among the Finnish National Art Institutions identified in this research – and formed through stakeholder expectations – indicates a substantial and permanent change at the operative and strategic level in adopting the idea of Sustainable Development.

The wood products industry has a significant impact on the natural environment and surrounding society by utilizing natural resources in its operations. After receiving criticism from stakeholders, forest companies have increasingly paid attention to economic and social features together with environmental performance. When covering sustainability communication in forest products industry, previous studies have mainly been focusing on sustainability reporting. After spread of digitalization the importance of sustainability-related online communication has increased, especially among forest companies and associations. This study addresses the sustainability-related online communication in the wood products industry, since it has not been studied extensively yet. The purpose of the study is to examine on corporate and sectoral levels how companies and associations communicate with their stakeholders online and what are the current topics of sustainability-related online communication in the forest products industry in Finland. Empirical data was collected by carrying out the qualitative content analysis inductively and deductively based on forest companies’ and associations’ websites. Both methods were utilized to ensure discover of topical sustainability issues from data. According to the findings, sustainability communication of forest companies and associations still bases on environmental factors. However, the share of social factors such as stakeholder engagement is growing. Although, majority of forest companies and associations have applied various social media channels to communicate with their stakeholders, the evaluation of the communication effectiveness of these channels is difficult and requires further research. In the end, to achieve mutual benefit companies need to engage and involve their stakeholders in decision-making process on company’s sustainability issues through social media or other online platforms.

Agricultural and forest land use is critically affecting and effected by sustainability challenges both globally and in Finland. One way to aid the situation is through increasing the amount and comprehensiveness of rural land valuations. This can be done for instance by expanding the assessments of underrepresented ecosystem services with the help of participatory valuation methods. Albeit utilising existing methods for this purpose would already provide significant help, participatory valuations could be developed even further by applying virtual reality (VR) value elicitation. Although the utilisation of VR as a versatile study tool has been suggested by several authors, the studies and applications are thus far scarce, though slowly increasing. Hence, this thesis sets out to provide new insights into the implementation of VR and its unique benefits over other methods in the specific case of rural land valuations. The method employed in this paper is integrative literature review, as it gives opportunities to combine literature about other valuation methods and VR’s proven effects and reflect these on rural land valuation studies’ findings and stated future needs of this sector. Central findings demonstrate VR’s potential as a value elicitation tool in rural land valuations by virtue of its ability to offer immersive experiences and render almost any kind of environment accessible. Immersion can help in learning and subsequent value formation, consequently changing intent to behave as well as alter actual behaviour. Therefore, the use of VR can affect both stated and observable values and can affect value study results significantly. On the other hand, accessibility allows participation for all kinds of people regardless of limitations relating to knowledge level, or mental or physical capabilities. Hence, VR can grant access to significantly more people to nature areas otherwise rural, unfamiliar, hard to explore, hard or impossible to get to, or that exist in the past and in the future. In sum, by providing opportunities for increased amount and ease of participation, as well as holistic well-informed valuations, VR offers possibilities to support and drive the sustainability transition and transformation of Finnish rural land use sector. Although findings are promising, more research and practical application of VR are needed. Based on the potential of virtual reality in combination of the needs in rural land use sector, this thesis introduces some example scenarios where VR value elicitation could be used and be useful. The premises of all scenarios are rooted in existing studies, as this can help in gaining information on the applicability, as well as comparability of VR to other established value eliciting methods. This aims to enhance the robustness of VR as a study tool, as robustness can be seen as one of the weak points of VR value elicitation currently.

Knowledge co-production has become increasingly popular and even ‘buzzed’ notion in sustainability sciences. It is being applied in various contexts and for myriad of purposes under different, even partially contradicting rationales, yet it is often expected to contribute better to the sustainable transformation of society than normal science. One of the uniting elements in different understandings and applications of ‘knowledge co-production’ is the involvement of the extra-scientific actors in the research process. This implies changes in the conventional roles and relationship between science and society, that raise new questions about the autonomy and accountability of science. This master’s thesis studies knowledge co-production in higher education context and, more specifically, in the case of the HELSUS Co-Creation lab 2019-2020, and critically explores the notion of co-production in sustainability sciences. The dynamics, relationship, and roles between the scientific and extra-scientific actors within the Co-Creation lab are the specific interest in this qualitative case study that is primarily based on 12 semi-structured interviews of the lab participants analyzed by qualitative content analysis. The study shows how the dynamics between the master’s level students and the partners from the private and public sectors had features that resembled to some extent commissioned research type of roles, task coordination and interdependencies, however, it also contained significant characteristics that distinguished it from pure commission type of dynamics, as the autonomy of the student was greater, the control of the partner over the knowledge production process was lesser and the accountability of the students to the partners was more indirect and softer. The similarities between the application of knowledge co-production in the HELSUS Co-Creation lab and the co-production by the logic of accountability are highlighted and critical questions concerning instrumental forms of co-production, logic of accountability, usefulness of knowledge and scientific autonomy are discussed. More critically reflective approaches towards co-production are called for.