Shared or Individual Responsibility: Eco-labelling and Consumer Choice in Sweden (original) (raw)
Related papers
2008
As the discourses of ecological sustainability point towards the active involvement of individuals in the environmental work as an important prerequisite for targeting the sources of environmental degradation, one of the main foci for contemporary environmental policy is the need for comprehensive individual lifestyle-changes. Within political ecology an Ecological Citizenship, reinterpreting the traditional state/individual relationship by straddling the private-public; national-global; and present-future divides, has been suggested a valuable approach to realising a personal responsibility for the environment. Empirical research analysing the prospects for ecological citizenship to function as a route towards individual environmental responsibility is, however, to date lacking in the literature. Based on masssurveys to 4000 Swedish households, this paper explores if, and to what extent, people in general hold values and attitudes in line with what is expected of the ecological citizen, in order to elucidate the seedbed for cultivating ecological citizens in Sweden. The study concludes that a significant proportion of the respondents demonstrate a value-base consistent with ecological citizenship, emphasising a non-territorial altruism and the primacy of social justice, as well as reporting a predisposition to accept and voluntary engage in individual environmental action. This supports the use of ecological citizenship as a theoretical model for behavioural change, and suggest that decision-makers should apply instruments and design policies which to a larger extent address altruistic motives and allows for people to be (or at least become) ecological citizens also in practice.
Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, 2012
The research problem addressed concerns the interplay between households as consumers, and local governments as policy makers and service providers. Mainly based on interviews with selected households, the paper explores the activities, results and potential long-term gains of a climate dialogue project undertaken in two Swedish towns. The findings are interpreted in terms of Spaargaren and Oosterveer's ideal types of the consumer as ecological citizen, political consumer and moral agent. The main finding is that although the immediate gains in terms of GHG reduction are small, such projects may function as triggers of future change towards more sustainable policies and everyday practices.
Sustainable lifestyles: Framing environmental action in and around the home
Geoforum, 2006
This paper examines the nature of environmental action in and around the home. Given the rise of local sustainable development and the emphasis placed on individual actions for sustainability, the paper examines the role of citizens in adopting sustainable lifestyles, incorporating a range of behavioural responses from energy saving and water conservation, to waste recycling and green consumption. Focussing on the debate in geography concerning the engagement of the public in environmental action, the paper argues that despite the assertions of those who advocate a deliberative approach to engagement (see . Engaging the public: information and deliberation in environmental policy. Environment and Planning A 32, 1141-1148]), an approach based on a social-psychological understanding of behaviour can have signiWcant beneWts. Such an approach is being developed by geographers in a range of settings and in this paper these developments are situated within the context of existing research that has identiWed environmental 'activists' in terms of their values, attitudes and demographic composition. The paper aims to examine environmental behaviour in relation to two key issues: (1) the way in which environmental action is framed in everyday practices (such as consumption behaviour) and (2) how these practices are reXected amongst diVerent segments of the population to form lifestyle groups. The paper provides new insights for examining sustainable lifestyles that further our appreciation of how actions to help the environment are lived in everyday practices and framed by diVerent lifestyle groups. Accordingly, the paper oVers both academics and policy makers new insights into the potential use of focussing on lifestyle groups as a means for changing behaviour.
Applied Geography, 2011
This paper examines the emergence of market-orientated approaches to public participation in environmental issues through an exploration of recent empirical research into 'sustainable lifestyles' as a practical tool for encouraging pro-environmental behaviour. Using the notion of 'sustainable lifestyles', current social marketing policies seek to encourage behaviour change amongst citizens by identifying population segments with similar commitments to environmental practices as the basis for behaviour change initiatives. However, the use of static 'lifestyle groups' implies that that citizens replicate sustainable practices across different consumption contexts and this paper explores this line of argument through the use of data collected as part of a recent UK Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) funded research project on sustainable lifestyles and climate change. Through a series of focus group discussions, participants explored notions of sustainable practices using the home and leisure contexts as framing devices to explore issues of environmental responsibility and climate change. The emphasis placed on practices and context reveal that the comfortable notions of environmental responsibility and sustainable consumption in the home are often in conflict with the discourses of consumption reduction associated with climate change in leisure and tourism contexts. In many cases, these 'paradoxes' are explicitly referred to, reflected-upon and discussed by participants who demonstrate that notions of sustainable practice are mediated by practice and spaces of consumption. Accordingly, the paper argues that in conceptualising market-based approaches to behaviour change around the notion of 'sustainable lifestyles', researchers and policy makers need to address the role of context and recognise the importance of consumption spaces and the conflicts that may arise between these.
The social shaping of household consumption
Ecological Economics, 1999
This paper deals with a recurrent theme in the sustainability debate: the necessity of changing Western consumption patterns and 'lifestyles'. Unlike most accounts, in which the principle mechanisms for ensuring this are 'top-down' approaches of government policies, this paper focuses on the 'bottom-up' approaches of citizens seeking to develop less environmentally damaging technologies and ways of living. The paper examines three Scandinavian examples to illustrate how citizens are voluntarily seeking to internalise some of the externalities of everyday life and provide the collective good of improved environmental quality. The paper discusses the importance of social relations in the shaping of people's preferences for environmental goods. The paper draws out what lessons can be learned from these initiatives and focuses on three factors affecting the future growth and proliferation of citizen-led initiatives: upscaling, the transferability of social experiments and the pervasive societal commitments to unsustainable behaviour.