Backcasting for sustainability – An approach to education for sustainable development in management

Abstract

• Backcasting invites thinking from future visions about possible pathways to achieve desirable futures. • This paper proposes a backcasting approach for sustainability education in management. • Our study shows the approach to advance core sustainability competencies, specifically anticipation and collaboration. • Service-learning concretizes course material, and enables place-based learning via the interaction with social innovators. • Backcasting in education is a response to current unsustainability: utopia dynamizes action, and action dynamizes utopia.