Introduction

This chapter examines the powerful economic and political forces bolstering climate-change denial while squeezing some hope from the way young people have taken to the greening of the planet. It argues that art and design educators should acknowledge the goal of citizenship education in their teaching and support young people in becoming ‘activist citizens’ in their world, communities and schools. The book considers the nature of inheritance and the way it may appear as a comfortable continuity, but also instances from the past that resurface to disrupt common assumptions and norms. It discusses the US liberal arts education of the 1940s which argues greatly informed the same in Europe during the 1960s. The book looks at a collaboration between the Serpentine Galleries, London, and Nottingham University, in which artists and researchers extend the reach of gallery education into community settings.