The Theories of Ivan Illich and Paulo Freire and Environmental Education: Re-thinking from the Standpoint of Adult and Community Education

Abstract

Adult and Community Education is the practice to support and organize the activities of self-directed education for widening and deepening cultural reasons based on real life. It is composed of enjoying human culture and learning of living/environment, act/cooperation, production/distribution, and self-governing/policy. Environmental Education is to promote living/environment learning as learning to be, and to form Environmental Reason, through realizing the mutual relationship between human individuals and their environment. Environmental Education has to be based on the theory of ‘Conscientization’ proposed by Paulo Freire, and ‘Learning Network’ proposed by Ivan Illich. It is real as Community Development Education that needs Illich's ideas of Conviviality, Subsistence and Commons, and Freire's Ideas for ‘Pedagogy of Hope’ However, if we are to regenerate those theories and ideas in Environmental Education, we must critically analyze them and clarify their meanings and limits. The article will discuss, firstly, Illich's criticism against modern technique and institution, and Freire's understandings of human praxis, secondly, Freire's pedagogy towards environmental education, thirdly, Illich's idea of Learning Network towards Education for Sustainable Community Development Education (ESCD). Lastly, it will propose Community Environmental Education (CEE) to structurize the learnings (1) to conscientize nature, (2) to self-conscientize one's own life, (3) to realize the relationship between nature and human being, and (4) to empower the people by themselves for regenerating the environment.