Activists, globally and in Ireland, are facing inevitable despair, anxiety, fatigue, cynicism, exhaustion and overwhelm that sustainable development-related climate activism can generate in those on the frontline.
After two decades of Education for Sustainable Development: ESD it is now recognised that knowledge alone rarely produces changed behaviour, and that if greater progress is to be made with achieving any of the Sustainable Development Goals, more attention needs to be focused on individuals and how they are transformed from the inside. The Inner Development Goals (IDGs) https://www.innerdevelopmentgoals.org/ have been developed and designed to transform the emotional and spiritual wellbeing of non-governmental organisation (NGO) leaders and activists who require endless resilience, hope and compassion in order to persist in the struggle to achieve a more sustainable planet.
The PhD research project will investigate the function of the Inner Development Goals in supporting Climate Activists in Ireland. It will explore what Inner Development Practices, facilitated through such contemplative practices as meditation, mindfulness, compassion, gratitude, journalling and pilgrimage – can be beneficial resources to Sustainable Development activists in Ireland. It will commence with mapping the current landscape of Inner Development Goals in Ireland. It will then ascertain the capacities that have been cultivated by activists through the proposed interventions, and the capacities that the activists would hope to develop into the future in order to continue making a transformative contribution to future Education for Sustainable Development in Ireland.
Having explored the Inner Development Practices already in use (if any) by research participants, two practice approaches will be introduced: a spiritual intelligence approach and an integral human development approach.
The methodology will be a case study method of enquiry, complemented by a Diary Studies method. The research will be guided by constructive-developmental theory, which outlines how an individual co-constructs the sense and meaning of their experiences, and how these constructions evolve and grow over time.
This research will ultimately contribute to an understanding and appreciation of how inner development and growth of spiritual intelligence can provide the vision and creativity to make the considerable changes required now and into the future.