College of Humanities and Social Science – Contributions to Sustainability & Social Responsibility

University of Edinburgh

Social Responsibility& Sustainability –
Activity inthe College of Humanities and Social Science (CHSS)

The CHSS Policy and Resources Meeting on 26 January 2009 strongly endorsed the collection of details on academic activity relating to sustainability and social responsibility under the headings of teaching, research and knowledge exchange, and their potential inclusion in the ‘Universities that Count’ survey return.

Colleagues at the College P&R Committee meeting were keen to stress that activity of this sort was by no means restricted to the sciences, and that the contribution of the humanities and social science should also be highlighted. It was noted that social responsibility in particular underpinned much of the work of the College. The following examples are only highlights suggested by the Schools, and while representative, are by no means exhaustive.

Prof April McMahon, Head of College, 16 February 2009

  1. Teaching and Learning

Undergraduate Course in Sustainability, Society and the Environment (SSE)

This is an optional undergraduate course available for almost all students in the university and provides an introduction to environmental and social sustainability issues. The course was devised in 2005-6 by staff from Moray House (Peter Higgins) and Geosciences (Andy McLeod, Simon Allen and Graham Russell, who is now the Course Organiser). It is now in its third year (80 students in first year, 200+ in 2008-9) and taught by staff in Geosciences and CHSS.

In the School of Business, 2008-09 saw the launch of an MSc in Carbon Management, jointly with Geosciences, with an initial intake of 38 students. This programme covers the science, business and economics of climate change. Associated with this programme (though not restricted to it) is the new Chevening Fellows programme - 'Finance for the Low Carbon Economy', which commenced in 2009, with 14 fellows from 11 countries and a value of £200k pa. Electives on business and climate change have also been introduced on general business programmes (UG/MBA), alongside an elective in Carbon Economics ( &

Also in the School of Business, there are various course offerings in the area of Business Ethics, notably a Business Ethics course from the MBA covering Framing Business Ethics: Corporate Responsibility. Evaluating Business Ethics: Normative Ethical Theories. Making Decisions: Descriptive Ethical Theories. Managing Business Ethics: Tools & Techniques for Management. Shareholders and Business Ethics. Employees and Business Ethics. Consumers and Business Ethics. Suppliers, Competitors and Business Ethics. Civil Society and Business Ethics. Government, regulation and Business Ethics.

The School of Arts, Culture and Environment (ACE) argues it is fair to say that both sustainability and social responsibility pervade practically all research and teaching in the School. That said, the following could be highlighted:

MSc Advanced Sustainable Design There are profound changes taking place in the way we design buildings and neighbourhoods. Sustainable development is becoming a universal driver in the built environment, and this programme seeks to equip you with the knowledge and the means to make your own value judgements in this field and navigate a path through a fast evolving and sometimes contradictory body of knowledge.

MSc in Music in the Community
Music in the Community is a relatively young discipline emerging at an influential meeting point of a number of diverse concerns, including performing arts outreach, community development, creative arts therapies, and conflict resolution. The University of Edinburgh has been a pioneer in the implementation of Music in the Community projects both within the UK and abroad, and in developing related methodologies and training programmes.

In the School of Literatures, Languages and Cultures, Dr James Loxley of English Literature teaches a course, ‘Green Thought, Green Shade’, centred on poetry, nature and the environment; and a number of the UG courses in postcolonial literatures and women’s writing address issues of social responsibility directly. The School of Divinity offers a taught masters, MTh Theological Ethics (Ecology), for which Prof. Michael Northcott is programme manager; this degree programme ( engages environmental concerns from the resources of Christian tradition.

The School of Health in Social Science offers pioneering research-informed learning opportunities on leadership development in nursing practice (with MSc in Advancing Learning Practice), alongside research-based teaching on the causes and consequences of health inequalities. The School also focuses on integration of debates and practices about working with difference and diversity across the whole curriculum in teaching provision in Counselling and Psychotherapy. Every student on a Masters programme will submit several essays for which an assessment criterion relates to this theme.

Social Work, in the School of Social and Political Science, has been working with practitioners and managers from Social Work agencies in the statutory and voluntary sector in Scotland to develop a suite of new Masters’ programmes which will meet the needs of the professional workforce in the years ahead. In 2008, a new MSc in Advanced Social Work Studies (Adult Protection) was launched. This is the first such MSc in Scotland, and addresses what is recognised as a pressing need in society – that is, to find better ways of protecting and safeguarding vulnerable adults.

A second MSc will come on stream in 2009, again designed to meet professional and academic requirements, this time in Advanced Social Work Studies (Mental Health). Students who undertake courses within this degree will become statutory Mental Health Officers in Scotland. Social Work colleagues have also substantially revised and updated the programme – Advanced Social Work Studies (Criminal Justice Social Work) – and have plans for further programmes in Youth Justice and in Practice Learning.

All these initiatives share one central belief – that by working with colleagues in the field of social work to develop teaching and learning, they can together improve the skills of the workforce and in so doing, make a positive difference in the lives of people who use social services in Scotland.

The forthcoming MSc in African and International Development will offer a grounded and multi-disciplinary grasp of issues of development in an African context for students interested in pursuing a career in development agencies, consultancy, the public sector and non-governmental organisations.

In the School of History, Classics and Archaeology, Dr Martin Chick teaches a range of courses including undergraduate option Energy, environment and security: energy policy in Britain, France and United States since 1945, which examines nationalisation; pricing; environmental concerns; depletion; Suez and OPEC oil crises; nuclear crises, Three Mile Island; the establishment of the European Coal and Steel Community; privatisation and 'dash for gas'; and impact of new and alternative technologies on energy policies.

In Education, a range of UG and PG programmes and courses relate to themes in Sustainability and Social Responsibility. For instance:

Teacher Education:

  • The BEd (Primary Education) includes a first-year residential fieldwork week with an SE element and a further module in SE at the end of the fourth year.
  • In the BEd (Primary Education) there is a course on ‘Technology and Sustainability’ within the Year 4 Option on Science.
  • Postgraduate (PGDE) students of geography have two fieldwork weekends with the emphasis as above, and an assessed part of their course which specifically addresses the role of geography in teaching for a sustainable future.
  • Postgraduate (PGDE) students across all the disciplines in the School can take an elective course in Outdoor Education which has an SSE element (though places are limited and heavily oversubscribed).

Outdoor Education:

  • Postgraduate Certificate/Diploma/MSc Outdoor Education

This degree programme has now been running for over 36 years. Half of the academic courses have an environmental and sustainability education focus. These include a substantial amount of practical and fieldwork. In addition it has an extensive practical skills development programme which includes a 5-week placement which can be at an agency which focuses on teaching SSR. As well as recruiting form the UK it attracts students from many countries around the world.

  • Postgraduate Certificate/Diploma/MSc Outdoor Environmental and Sustainability Education

This degree programme was introduced in 2005 and runs alongside the Outdoor Education programme. All of the academic courses relate to the environment, sustainability and social responsibility and most have a substantial amount of practical and fieldwork. In addition it has an extensive practical skills development programme which includes a 5-week placement which is at an agency which focuses on teaching SSR. As well as recruiting from the UK it has already attracted students from Malaysia, Europe and USA.

PhD students in SSR and related areas:

Recent PhD graduates

  • Takano, T. (2004) Bonding with the Land: Outdoor environmental education programmes and their cultural contexts. Supervisors: Peter Higgins Pat McLaughlin (Moray House).
  • Kandemiri, M. (2007) A Comparative Study of School-Based Environmental Education in Zimbabwe and Scotland. Supervisors: Peter Higgins Pat McLaughlin (Moray House).

New/current PhD studentships

  • Adolescents’ engagement with greenspace: perceptions, use and associations with physical activity and wellbeing. ESRC / Scottish Government Collaborative PhD Studentship 1+3 Award (2007-2011) – Justine Geyer. Supervisors: Peter Higgins and Candace Currie (Moray House).
  • Climate Change Mitigation through Public Awareness and Education in Scotland. Scottish Alliance for Geoscience, Environment and Society (SAGES) PhD (2008-2012) – Rachel Howell.
    Supervisors: Dave Reay (Geosciences) and Peter Higgins (Moray House).
  • Wild Praxis: Place-based outdoor environmental education
    Self-funded studentship - Sam Harrison. Supervisors: Morwena Griffiths & Robbie Nicol (Moray Ho).
  • An investigation into the use of outdoor activities to learn about environmental issues for elementary level students in Turkey - Nuaray Yildrim. PhD Proposal under consideration. Potential supervisors - Robbie Nicol & Peter Higgins (Moray House)
  • In the past 10 years or so there have also been numerous MSc theses submitted at Moray House with SSR (with an educational emphasis) as the central theme.
  1. Research

In Literatures, Languages and Cultures, much of the research in Scottish and Celtic Studies and the related European Ethnological research centre concerns the nature and sustainability of minority languages and popular culture in Scotland and beyond. For example, Gaidhealtachdan Ùra: Leasachadh na Gàidhlig agus na Gaeilge sa Bhaile Mhòr /Nua-Ghaeltachtaí: Cur Chun Cinn na Gàidhlig agus na Gaeilge sa Chathair, edited by Dr Wilson McLeod and published by the department in 2007, looks at the complex challenges that arise in connection with efforts to develop Gaelic and Irish in urban contexts.

In Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies, staff also participate in research activities addressing questions of social responsibility with regard to Muslim immigrants in Britain, as well as British policy towards the Middle East. Recent workshops include ‘Violence and the Boundaries of the Political in the Arab World’, and ‘Memory and Social Trauma in Literary and Visual Cultures of the Middle East’, as well as a major forthcoming conference ‘Rethinking Jihad: Ideas, Politics and Conflict in the Arab World and beyond’.

Prof. Michael Northcott (School of Divinity) is internationally known as a theologian-ethicist in the area of environment and social responsibility. The School of Health in Social Science hosts a number of current research grants and projects relevant to sustainability and social responsibility, including ‘Supporting reconfiguration of social care roles in integrated care settings in the UK: A comparative study across three health and social care economies’ (PI Guro Huby; DoH-funded), and ‘Quality of Care and Quality of Life For People with Intellectual and Physical Disabilities: Integrated Living, Social Inclusion and Service User Participation’ (PI Mick Power; EU F7 funded).

In the School of Social and Political Science, the Just World Institute was launched in December 2008. From its base in SSPS, it harnesses the University of Edinburgh's outstanding research capacity across the social sciences, including law and ethics, and promotes collaboration with the University's world-class researchers in the natural sciences and medicine. The Institute seeks to understand and influence the principles, policies and institutions of international order in their economic, political, social, security and ethical dimensions.

MERCURY is a three-year consortium led by Edinburgh University which will examine the role of the European Union as an actor in the international system, and particularly the contribution it makes to advancing multilateralism. In collaboration with an international team of researchers, Edinburgh is engaged in the project The European Commission of the 21st Century: Views from the Inside, the largest ever independent attitudinal survey of the EU's European Commission. Its work will generate new knowledge about the Commission, which may inform decisions about how the institution is managed and how it generates policy.

Social Anthropology hosts a range of relevant grants and projects: Tobias Kelly is undertaking the project Tortured Ethics: Anthropology of International Law and Ethics, while Stefan Ecks and Ian Harper, with Roger Jeffery in Sociology and Allyson Pollock in the School of Health in Social Science, have been awarded a grant under the joint ESRC-DfID scheme for a project entitled Tracing Pharmaceuticals in South Asia: Regulation, Distribution and Consumption. Jonathan Spencer, with Jonathan Goodhand (SOAS), Benedikt Korf (Zurich), Shahul Hasbullah and Tudor Silva (both Peradeinya), has been awarded a grant under the ESRC Non-Governmental Action Programme on Conflict, Community and Faith: the Politics of Non Governmental Public Action in Sri Lanka.

Janet Carsten has been awarded a three year Leverhulme Major Research Fellowship for Blood Work: Investigating Cultures of Biomedicine in Malaysia and Britain while Laura Jeffery has been awarded a Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship – ‘Chagossian strategies of migration and integration in Crawley, West Sussex’

In Social Policy, the multi-institutional, international project Towards a New Social Settlement in Germany and the UK will feed new empirical findings and theoretical understanding into the general debate about European welfare futures, and ongoing policies aimed at realigning work and welfare more specifically. Its aim is to engage academic and policy communities alike who will gain from an improved understanding of options, and limitations, for policy learning across the UK and Germany.

Likewise, a range of relevant grants and projects are hosted in Sociology, including The Social Studies of Finance project, led from Edinburgh, which applies disciplines such as anthropology, gender studies, geography, history, politics, social studies of science, sociolegal studies, and sociology, to the financial markets. These disciplines are brought to bear on this area on the basis that in order to understand the creation, development and effects of financial markets, we need more than the perspectives of economics or of a "behavioural" finance that is rooted in individual psychology.

The international Youth and European Identity project, its Co-Ordination Team led from Edinburgh, explores the views and experiences of young men and women, aged 18-24, concerning their identity, citizenship and attachment to locality, nation and Europe. It uses surveys and more in-depth discussions to speak both to random samples of young people and young people studying subjects likely to lead to “European careers” beyond their own country.

Finally, the Research Consortium on Educational Outcomes and Poverty is a multi-institutional, international project examining the impact of education on the lives and livelihoods of people in developing countries, particularly those living in poorer areas and from poorer households. Its purpose is to generate new knowledge that will improve education and poverty reduction strategies in developing countries, through an enhanced recognition of education's actual and potential role. Edinburgh participants include colleagues in Sociology, Social Anthropology, and the Centre of African Studies.

Dr Martin Chick of the School of History, Classics and Archaeology has a research interest in energy matters and his book on Electricity and Energy Policy has just been chosen as a Choice (American Library Association) Outstanding Academic Title for 2008. He has worked on natural resources and property rights, and is beginning a new research project on property rights in the sea and the use of its oil and fish resources.

The Moray House School of Education hosts or has hosted the following relevant research projects:

Research Grants:

2000-02 Sporting Estates and Recreational Land Use in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland. Economic and Social Research Council Grant (£43,000, Higgins and Wightman – Moray House).
We were the lead institution in this collaborative project with the University of Aberdeen.

2001-02Isle of Rùm National Nature Reserve: Development of an Environmental Education Plan.
This is the largest National Nature Reserve in the UK. Funded by Scottish Natural Heritage (£10,000, Higgins, Crowther, Nicol and Meldrum – Moray House).

2003An Assessment of the economic and environmental impact of water-related recreation and tourism in the catchment of the River Spey. Report for Spey Catchment Steering Group, Aviemore. (£44,000, GlasgowCaledonianUniversity with Moray House (Higgins)).
This study also considered educational use of the area and environmental impact.
The findings have been used in developing a long-term resource-based plan for the catchment.

2004Building the Scottish Outdoor Access Code and responsible behaviour into formal education and other learning contexts. Scottish Natural Heritage (£18,000, Higgins, Allison and Newman).

2006Teachers’ approaches and attitudes to engaging with the natural heritage (Scottish Natural Heritage) (£25,000, Higgins, Nicol and Ross).

2007Working with Local Authorities to deliver first-hand experience of the natural heritage through the formal education sector (Scottish Natural Heritage) (£20,000, Higgins, Nicol and Ross).

All of the above research projects have been written up as published reports and a number of peer-reviewed publications have resulted.