Complicating the connections between curriculum, sustainable development and socially engaged design

The relationship between design education and sustainable development has come a long way since the Stockholm Conference in 1972. Today, universities worldwide acknowledge the critical role of education in progressing the United Nations’s (UN) 2030 Agenda for sustainable development launched in 2019. This article argues that art and design educators must refocus on addressing and problematizing the UN’s sustainable development goals (SDGs) in post-pandemic curricula. To substantiate this call for action, we provide an overview of key shifts in both Australian design education and design for sustainable development (ESD). We report on the contradictions in our audit of references to SDGs in course descriptions for the University of New South Wales (UNSW) Bachelor of Design (Integrated) and student’s project descriptions in the Design Honours programme. Contextualized within the frameworks of social reconstruction and the pluriverse, we outline plans for further initiatives to turn the rhetoric of SDGs into action and develop design education that contributes to just and equitable societies for all people and the planet.