ABSTRACT
This chapter examines education for sustainable development (ESD) practice in reference to Japanese educational policies and theories of academic ability by drawing on a literature review of Japanese educational policy. It reviews the evolution of ESD practices in Japanese schools in line with Japanese educational policy in the 2000s. The chapter also examines the ways in which ESD's integration in schools has been influenced by Japanese government course guidelines from 2000 onwards and theories of academic ability from the same period. The dissemination of ESD practice in Japanese schools comes at a juncture when school education in Japan is confronted by globalisation for the first time in its history. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the challenges and prospects for ESD practice in Japan in the post-Decade of ESD (DESD) era, particularly in relation to the problem of how Japan is to survive in the twenty-first-century global economy.
