Hope and agency for reimagining education towards just and habitable futures

The article explores how education can move beyond technocratic adaptation to the climate crisis and toward planetary Bildung grounded in justice and democratic agency. We develop a theoretical synthesis-Critical Transformative Ecopedagogy (CTE)-that integrates Vygotsky's cultural-historical theory (mediation, perezhivanie), Freire's critical pedagogy (dialogue, generative themes, hope as praxis), Freinet's public and cooperative schoolwork (publicness, usefulness), and decolonial analysis of coloniality and epistemic injustice (Quijano, 2000; Fals-Borda, 1987). CTE reframes educational practices around four braided strands: Critical-Decolonial, Systems, Affective-Ethical, and Place-Dialogic. It proposes three conceptual rhythms that move inquiry from problematization to historicization, mediated analysis, and public address. The paper advances (1) a critique of "net-zero" and competency framings that depoliticize knowledge and emotion; (2) first principles for educational design that legitimate plural epistemologies and political emotions as educable; 2 and (3) assessment criteria aligned with CTE's aims, including evidence of mediation, public usefulness, epistemic justice, and collective praxis. Policy implications include reauthoring standards around decolonial literacies and public work, protecting time for slow, dialogic pedagogy, and building governance arrangements that realize students' subjectification through meaningful decision-making. CTE thus offers an actionable ethical framework for re-worlding education toward plural, just, and habitable futures.