ABSTRACT
As this Handbook readily demonstrates, the last 10–15 years have seen the emergence of higher education for sustainable development as a vibrant field of policy, practice and research. Over a similar time span, research synthesis has become far more prominent in debates around enhancing the quality of education research and strengthening its influence on education policy and practice (e.g. Davies 2000; Oakley 2002; Gough et al. 2013; Hattie et al. 2014;Alton-Lee 2014). The purpose of this chapter is to explore whether and how these two trends might be connected, focusing on the role that research synthesis has played in the field of higher education for sustainable development thus far, and the roles it could play in the future.
