TALKING HABITS INTO ACTION:
AN INVESTIGATION INTO GLOBAL ACTION
PLAN’S ACTION AT HOME PROGRAMME
by Kersty Hobson
Thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy
2001
University College London ProQuest Number: U643405
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ProQuest LLC 789 East Eisenhower Parkway P.O. Box 1346 Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 ABSTRACT
The sustainable development paradigm has focused political and academic attention on the concept of sustainable consumption. As current levels of domestic energy use and waste production in post-industrial countries have been increasingly acknowledged as contributors to detrimental global environmental change, debates have emerged about how best to promote the widespread adoption of patterns of sustainable consumption. National strategies, in countries that include the UK, have been developed to affect changes in consumption patterns. This thesis focuses on the environmental information campaign, one strategy that encourages citizens to adopt environmentally friendly consumption patterns or ‘lifestyles’.
To date, these information campaigns have been ineffective at encouraging individuals to adopt environmentally friendly lifestyles. This thesis aims to address why this may be the case. It investigates one behaviour change programme calledAction at Home. It does so by talking to its participants as they take part in the programme. It investigates the discursive processes Action at Home participants engage in when thinking about making changes to their lifestyles. This thesis is theoretically set within grounded social science debates about how publics relate to the concepts and communications of sustainable development. Findings herein suggest that a constructionist and discursive approach to individual’s engagement with sustainable lifestyles information can be helpful in building an embedded model of behaviour change. It situates the adoption of sustainable lifestyles within a ‘life politics’ project of high modernity, positioning the knowledgeable and political social actor and their lifeworld as central theoretical constructs. It concludes that using distanced and disembedded techniques to question deeply embedded and recursive sets of practices has limited viability as a policy tool, bringing the entire sustainable consumption project into question as a feasible political goal. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Writing acknowledgements is a humbling exercise. There are only two expressions of thanks that I can make without feeling a slight rumbling of emotion as they belong to institutions rather than individuals. These go to the ESRC who supported this research through a graduate CASE studentship (Award no. S00429737001) and to University College London’s Graduate School, who provided financial support for me to travel and give my first conference paper in Japan, in June 1998. To whichever committee made the decision to support my work within these institutions, I am very grateful.
On a personal note, my thanks go to all at Global Action Plan UK, especially to Valerie Levrier and Beth Arthy who have been so supportive over the last three years and have stayed cheery despite tyrannical little northern men! Thanks also to the trustees of Global Action Plan who have been behind this work all the way, with special thanks to the late Colin Hutchinson. TheAction at Home participants who agreed to take part in my interviews have been a constant source of amazement to me. They gave up their time to talk openly and freely to a relative stranger, who they invited into their homes and workplaces with respect and mutual curiosity. For opening my eyes to the complexity of issues I first thought to be quite straightforward, I am indeed humbled. I would also like to express an appreciation to those who have listened to, read, and commented on my work, especially the attendants of my up grading workshop in January 1998, including Peter Lunt, Suzzanne Pollock, James Blake, Harriet Bulkeley and Yvonne Rydin. Also thanks to colleagues at the Human Dimensions of Global Environmental Change Conference in Japan who asked helpful questions after I gave my first nerve-wracking paper and who made me feel quite clever for the day.
University College London is the third university I have studied at. The most striking feature of being a graduate in the department of Geography is the striving by all to form relationships based on mutual respect and intellectual inquiry. The epicentre of this unusual search for academic equality has been experienced as a member of the Environment and Society Research Unit. Thanks to all ESRU members over the years, whether staff or other postgraduates, who have created an atmosphere that has been both stimulating and thought provoking. Special thanks also to the two ESRU members who have had the task of supervising my work. Thanks to Gail Davies for casting her sharp brain and discerning eye over my work and helping to knock it into shape. Then to my principle supervisor Professor Jacquie Burgess. For her abundant positivity, humour, good ideas and mind-map scribblings on bits of paper, I am truly grateful. If I end up half the academic and a fraction of the woman that Jacquie is, I will be quite chuffed with myself. A big thanks goes to other postgraduates who have travelled with me on the roller-coaster journey that is the Ph.D. with a special mention to Bronwyn Purvis for loving alcohol and crisps as much as I do and for being a good friend. Other friends whose support and good faith has been priceless include Jane, Nick, Sharon, Roddy, Gill, Lisa, Louise, Jennie, Wood, Pete, Rachel, Beth, Mat, Vikram, and my old housemates at no. 25. A big hug also to my special fnends, my brother and his partner Anne, for putting me up in Warrington and being proud of me. To my late grandparents, Elsie and Andrew Rintuol (B.E.M), thanks to Nan for the chocolate eclairs and the trips to Marks and Spencer’s, and thanks to Grandad for teaching me the joy of being an argumentative sod, an attribute that I hold very dear to this day. I miss you both. I am eternally grateful to my partner Simon Niemeyer, for turning up out of the blue and making me smile again. Thank you for showing me more support, patience, friendship, laughs, love and good dinners than I ever thought I would see. Have I told you how gorgeous you are today? Finally, to my parents Peter and Pamela Hobson. It would seem to me that being truly good parents is a never-ending process of loving, accommodating, learning and forgiving. Above all, it is about believing in your children, no matter how strange or erratic their life choices seem to be. Knowing that, I can honestly say that I have two truly good parents, a fact that often takes a child a few years to learn. For picking me up when I had fallen down flat and was insisting I wanted to stay there, and for sharing the joys of the proudest moments with me, I am totally grateful. For all their hard work and unconditional love, I dedicate this thesis to them. TABLE OF CONTENTS
ABSTRACT...... 2
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS...... 3
TABLE OF CONTENTS...... 5
LIST OF TABLES...... 12
LIST OF FIGURES...... 12
CHAPTER 1. SUSTAINABLE CONSUMPTION AND LIFESTYLES: SETTING THE AGENDA...... 13
1.1 INTRODUCTION...... 13 1.1.1 Chapter structure ...... 14
1.2 CHARTING THE ENVIRONMENTAL PARADIGM...... 15 1.2.1 Bureaucracy versus counter-culture ...... 15 1.2.2 Global environmental change: from science to policy...... 16
1.3 SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT...... 18 1.3.1 Defining sustainable development: trying to catch a wave upon the sand?...... 19 1.3.2 The Earth Summit...... 20
1.4 SUSTAINABLE CONSUMPTION AND LIFESTYLES...... 22 1.4.1 Framing sustainable consumption...... 23 1.4.2 Sustainable lifestyles...... 23 1.4.3 The consumer, the environment and the market...... 25 1.4.4 Mobilising morals...... 27
1.5 MARKETING SUSTAINABLE LIFESTYLES...... 29 1.5.1 Policy context...... 30 1.5.2 A sustainable development information strategy:'Are you doing your...... bit?" 31
1.6 GLOBAL ACTION PLAN ...... 33 1.6.1 Global Action Plan: a brief history...... 33 1.6.2 The tools of change...... 34 1.6.3 The process of change...... 35 1.6.4 The diffusion of change...... 36 1.6.5 Does Global Action Plan work?...... 37
1.7 GLOBAL ACTION PLAN UK ...... 40 1.7.1 Global Action Plan UK: the early evolution...... 40 1.7.2 GAP work programmes: focussing on Action at Home...... 41
1.8 RESEARCH QUESTIONS...... 43
1.9 THESIS STRUCTURE...... 44
CHAPTER 2. ENVIRONMENTAL VALUES AND KNOWLEDGES: A CRITICAL LITERATURE REVIEW...... 46
2.1 INTRODUCTION...... 46
2.2 THE ENVIRONMENT: A POSITIVIST PERSPECTIVE...... 47 2.2.1 Setting up the paradigm...... 49 2.2.2 Setting up modes of inquiry...... 50
2.3 ENVIRONMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY...... 51 2.3.1 Values and motives: what are they?...... 52 2.3.2 What are values related to?...... 53 2.3.3 Summary ...... 55
2.4 INVESTIGATING THE ENVIRONMENT: THE EVOLUTION OF THE SOCIAL SCIENCES...... 56 2.4.1 Sociology and environmental movements...... 57 2.4.2 Criticisms of environmental sociology...... 58 2.4.3 Social constructionism and the environmental paradigm...... 59 2.4.4 Beck and the risk society...... 61 2.4.5 Summary ...... 63
2.6 ENVIRONMENTAL COMMUNICATIONS AND BEHAVIOUR CHANGE: CONSIDERING THE ROLE OF INFORMATION AND KNOWLEDGE...... 64 2.6.1 Encouraging tangible behaviour change...... 65 2.6.2 The affective nature of information...... 66 2.6.3 The role of information...... 66
2.7 PRACTICES, KNOWLEDGE AND MAKING MEANINGS ...... 68 2.7.1 Understanding forms of practice...... 69 2.7.2 Structuration theory ...... 70 2.7.3 Questioning structuration...... 73
2.8 ENVIRONMENTAL KNOWLEDGES: REMOVING THE EXPERT/LAY DIVIDE...... 74
2.9 SOCIAL COGNITION AND MAKING MEANINGS...... 76
2.10 SUMMARISING A THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK...... 78
CHAPTER 3. CHARTING COLLABORATIVE METHODOLOGIES...... 81
3.1 INTRODUCTION...... 81
3.2 THE CASE STUDENTSHIP: SETTING, NEGOTIATING AND POSITIONING THE RESEARCH AGENDA...... 82 3.2.1 Before the CASE; forging links between GAP and ESRU...... 83 3.2.2 Merging research agendas...... 84 3.2.3 Creating a reflexive work agenda...... 85
3.3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY AND TECHNIQUES: EXAMINING QUALITATIVE APPROACHES...... 86 3.3.1 From observation to interaction...... 87 3.3.2 The research interview...... 88 3.3.3 Constructing talk: the affective nature of the research interview...... 89 3.3.4 Single and group interview techniques...... 90
3.4 GETTING INTO THE FIELD: CHARTING EMPIRICAL CONTEXTS AND PROCESSES...... 93
3.5 CASE STUDY ONE: ACTION AT HOME IN BOURNEMOUTH...... 95 3.5.1 Local authorities oxià Action at Home...... 95 3.5.2 Getting into the ‘field’...... 96 3.5.3 The ‘before’ interviews; sticking strictly to the point...... 97 3.5.4 The ‘after’ interviews; expanding the horizons...... 99
3.6 CASE STUDY TWO: ACTION AT HOME IN THE NORTH-WEST...... 101 3.6.1 Establishing relationships...... 101 3.6.2 Creating group dynamics...... 102 3.6.3 Going full circle; from group interviews to single interviews...... 104
3.7 INTERPRETIVE METHODS ...... 105 3.7.1 The active process of interpretation...... 106 3.7.2 Coding transcripts: the accumulation of complexity...... 106 3.7.3 Mapping the codes...... 108 3.7.4 Levels of readings...... 108
3.8 CONCLUSIONS...... I ll
CHAPTER 4. TALKING HABITS INTO ACTION: A DISCURSIVE APPROACH TO BEHAVIOUR CHANGE...... 113
4.1 INTRODUCTION...... 113
4.2 UNDERSTANDING CONSUMPTION AND SOCIAL ACTION: A RELATIONAL FRAMEWORK...... 114 4.2.1 The sociology of consumption...... 114 4.2.2 Habitus...... 117 4.2.3 Giddens: systems of provision and forms of knowing...... 118 4.2.4 Consumption and collective systems of provision...... 119
4.3 MODEL OF DISCURSIVE BEHAVIOUR CHANGE...... 122
4.4 BRINGING PRACTICAL INTO DISCURSIVE...... 125 4.4.1 Changing habits...... 126 4.4.2 Thinking about habits: the processes and framing of change...... 128 4.4.3 Contexts of change...... 136 4.4.4 Embedding new habits...... 140
4.5 SUMMARY...... 144
CHAPTER 5. DISCURSIVE ENGAGEMENT AND SELF- EVALUATION: RETHINKING BARRIERS-TO-ACTION...... 146
5.1 INTRODUCTION...... 146
5.2 NO CHANGE: THE VALUE-ACTION GAP REVISITED...... 147
5.3 ACTION AT HOMEl...... 148 5.3.1 Motives and practices: from money to cultural learning...... 149
5.4 A DESIGN FOR LIFE...... 152 5.4.1 Lifestyle guides...... 153 5.4.2 Self-evaluation and possible selves...... 155
5.5 THINKING AND ARGUING V a m ACTION AT HOME...... 156 5.5.1 Why argue? ...... 157 5.6 THE GLOBAL AND THE LOCAL: MOBILISING DISCOURSES ...... 160 5.6.1 Making use of global discourses ...... 160 5.6.2 Using the local and mobilising the memory...... 162
5.7 CONSTRUCTING THE BOUNDARIES OF CHANGE ...... 168 5.7.1 The scope for change: mapping out practices...... 169 5.7.2 The comfort zone...... 173
5.8 CONCLUSIONS...... 176 5.8.1 To think is to argue...... 176 5.8.2 The ‘green value’ fallacy...... 177 5.8.3 Principles of structuration: mobilising debates...... 177
5.9 SUMMARY...... 178
CHAPTER 6. ‘TRYING TO DO MY BIT’: THE SOCIAL CONTRACT AND FORMS OF RESPONSIBILITY...... 180
6.1 INTRODUCTION ...... 180
6.2 LIFE POLITICS ...... 181 6.2.1 Asking moral questions and extending the environment...... 183
6.3 ADDRESSING SOCIAL ANXIETIES ...... 186 6.3.1 The environment...... 188 6.3.2 Community and interaction...... 190
6.4 RESPONSIBILITY ...... 193 6.4.1 Internal self-ascription...... 195 6.4.2 External ascription...... 201
6.5 TALKING INTO A BETTER FUTURE ...... 206 6.5.1 Social diffusion...... 207 6.5.2 Speech acts ...... 210
6.6 SUMMARY ...... 211
CHAPTER 7. CONCLUSIONS: RECONSIDERING THEORY AND PRACTICE...... 212
7.1 INTRODUCTION ...... 212
7.2 SOCIAL AND HUMAN SCIENCES: CONTRIBUTIONS AND CRITIQUES 213 7.2.1. Theoretical framework; a reminder...... 214 7.2.2 Reconsidering human sciences...... 215 7.2.3 Structuration and knowledges: contributions to social theory...... 217
7.3 RESEARCH METHODS IN ACTION ...... 224 7.3.1 Methodology and methods: constructing discursive spaces...... 224
7.4 CONTRIBUTIONS TO PRACTICE ...... 226 7.4.1 Reflections on collaborative research...... 226 7.4.2 Reflections on environmental communications...... 227
7.5 LIMITATIONS TO METHOD AND THEORY ...... 231
7.6 SUGGESTIONS FOR FUTURE RESEARCH ...... 232 7.6.1 Spaces of environmental practice...... 232 7.6.2 Lay discourses of environmental responsibility...... 234
7.7 CONCLUSIONS ...... 235
BIBLIOGRAPHY...... 237
APPENDIX 1 : SAMPLE PAGES OF AN ECOTEAM WORKBOOK ...... 256
APPENDIX 2: THE ACTION AT HOME ‘WELCOME’ QUESTIONNAIRE...... 258
APPENDIX 3: SAMPLE OF AN ACTION AT HOME PACK: WATER PACK...... 264
APPENDIX 4: ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ON ACTION AT HOME PROJECT PARTICIPANTS AND CONTEXTS...... 270
A CTIONATHOME PARTICIPANTS...... 270
BOURNEMOUTH...... 270
NORTH-WEST...... 272
CONTEXTS OF PROJECTS...... 273
10 BOURNEMOUTH...... 273
NORTH-WEST...... 274
APPENDIX 5: RECONSIDERING MODERNITY AND LIFE POLITICS...... 275
11 LIST OF TABLES
Table 1.1. Global Action Plan International Feedback...... 39 Table 2.1. Typology of behaviour change techniques (De Young 1993)...... 65 Table 3.1. Timetable of fieldwork actions and outputs...... 94 Table 3.2. Bournemouth interviews (October 1997); numbers, recruitment methods and interview locations...... 98 Table 3.3. Bournemouth interviews (April 1998): numbers, recruitment methods and interview locations...... 100 Table 3.4. Action at Home in the North-west: a break-down of interview groups...... 103 Table 3.5. Levels of interpretation and their meanings my two audiences...... 110 Table 7.1. Environmental communications: contrasting prevailing and social scientific approaches to lay responses to information...... 229
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1.1. Moving towards empowerment (from Geller 1995)...... 36 Figure 2.1. A positivist framing of the environmental paradigm...... 48 Figure 2.2. Fishbein and Ajzen’s model of reasoned action (from Fishbein and Ajzen 1975) .. 54 Figure 2.3. From tradition to modernity: the rise of the risk society...... 62 Figure 2.4. The information deficit model...... 68 Figure 2.5. Concepts from Giddens’ structuration theory (Bryant and Jary 1991)...... 72 Figure 4.1. Practices and structuration theory (developed from Spaargaren and van Vilet 2000) 120 Figure 4.2. Discursive model of behaviour change in theAction at Home programme...... 123 Figure 7.1. Summary of theoretical framework ...... 214
12 CHAPTER 1. SUSTAINABLE CONSUMPTION AND LIFESTYLES: SETTING THE AGENDA
Achieving significant changes in consumption patterns is one of the most challenging issues for environment and development, particularly given the extent to which present consumption is deeply rooted in values and lifestyles which have developed in industrial societies, and which are in turn emulated in much of the world. (UNCED 1992: 69)
1.1 INTRODUCTION
Calls for the widespread public adoption of ‘environmentally friendly’ lifestyles have, in the past decade, emerged in international and national policy arenas under the rubric of sustainable development. These calls are founded upon the emergence of a science of global environmental change, whose findings suggest that widespread environmental degradation and resource depletion is now taking place at unprecedented rates, threatening the survival of both current, and future, global populations and ecosystems. These findings also suggest that current patterns of global resource use, distribution and disposal are partially to blame. As a result of the immediacy and origins of these environmental problems, science and the international political community have joined forces to create guiding principles and policy approaches to help slow down and even reverse, these problems. The main principle to emerge has been the concept of sustainable development.
The over-all aim of sustainable development is to make use of environmental resources in such a way that takes into account current demands of the global economies and the need for social development, without compromising the needs of future generations. To move towards this state, the policy focus of managing environmental ‘bads’ has broadened from not only emphasising and managing the environmental impact of productionthe of goods, but also considering theconsumption and disposal of goods and natural resources. This has given rise to the concept of ‘sustainable consumption’. This concept asserts that, to ensure the continuation of resource availability and adjoining quality of life into the future, current consumption patterns, especially those of industrialised countries, have to change.
Under sustainable consumption, all consumers, from businesses to the individual, must change their resource use patterns. This thesis focuses on efforts to change individual consumption patterns. It examines mechanisms employed in policy arenas to encourage individuals to adopt new patterns of consumption and live a ‘sustainable lifestyle’. Such
13 approaches have included price mechanisms, financial incentives or disincentives, regulation and improved consumer information. In addition to these, there is also the ‘public awareness initiative’ which aims to promote the overall awareness of the goals of sustainable development and/or to encourage individuals to change some patterns of domestic behaviour.
During the 1990s the public awareness mechanism was adopted as part of an overall sustainable development strategy by many governments, including the UK’s. Yet, it does not appear that changes in individual’s consumption behaviour are resulting from use of this mechanism. One of the problems in addressing the ineffectiveness of public awareness campaigns is that, despite their popularity as a policy tool, very little is known about the effects they have on publics. This thesis will address this knowledge gap by taking a closer look at how individuals react to one awareness and behaviour change initiative, that of the charity Global Action Plan UK and their sustainable lifestyles programme, calledAction at Home. I will consider the political and epistemological assumptions of behaviour change mechanisms that underlie this approach, and reflect on their resonance. I will then offer an alternative perspective based on discursive approaches to the effects of theAction at Home programme on its participants.
1.1.1 Chapter structure
The remainder of this chapter will discuss the emergence of the concepts of sustainable development and sustainable consumption, positioning Global Action Plan UK and my work within these concepts. I will first chart the evolution of sustainable development, contrasting past discourses of environmental management with this new and highly contested approach. I will show how the science of global environmental change has been instrumental in shaping the discourses of sustainable development, forging a relationship with policy mechanisms that culminated in the 1992 Earth Summit, and the consequent raft of international environmental agreements. From one agreement. Agenda 21, came the project of sustainable consumption. I will show how sustainable consumption is framed by discourses of increased resource-use efficiency, underpinned by the prevailing logic of the neo-liberal economy that casts citizens as decision-making consumers. It is suggested that this model of the individual cannot create a satisfactory account of what constitutes an environmentally friendly individual. Evocations of individual responsibility and environmental citizenship have also been mobilised to appeal to individual morality and feelings of duty, encouraging individuals to act andfo care r the environment. The discourse of sustainable lifestyles is thus a mixture of morals and money. This much has been evident in the UK, through attempts to widely publicise and educate the public about the aims of sustainable development. I will illustrate this by examining the environmental information campaigns that took place in the 1990s, culminating in the Labour
14 government’s "Are you doing you bit?' campaign. This is followed by an introduction to Global Action Plan, the concept and organisation whose work this thesis is based upon. Global Action Plan is positioned in relation to the above discourse, and its history charted. Finally, I will outline the main research questions that this thesis will address and the structure of the following chapters.
1.2 CHARTING THE ENVIRONMENTAL PARADIGM
This section charts the evolution of sustainable development as one framing of the environmental paradigm. I argue here that imploring individuals to take the environment into account in their everyday activities is not a novel approach. The belief that we should all ‘tread lightly on the earth’ has been the central tenet of environmental movements in North America and parts of Europe for many decades. Yet, the evolution of sustainable lifestyles is not simple, linear progression. Environmental concepts have continually been re-framed, fragmented and contested over time. Sustainable development is part of that history, but is also a new discourse, one informed by particular forms of environmental knowledges. To chart this evolution it is first necessary to retrace steps back to dominant approaches to environmental management, dating from the 1960s, before unravelling the causes of the emergence of sustainable development and its outcomes.
1.2.1 Bureaucracy versus counter-culture
For most of the twentieth century, the detrimental environmental impacts of industrialised modes of production were considered relatively minor, being the unfortunate side effects of much needed economic and infrastructural growth and progress (Jacobs 1997a). Two contrasting discourses framed the negative environmental consequences of modernisation. The dominant representation was that environmental problems were an engineering or administrative issue, reflecting a state-centred approach to environmental management. Here, the environment was divided into discrete entities, framed and controlled by science-driven expertise (Bryant and Wilson 1998). In contrast, from the 1960s a marginalised ‘green’ ideology arose. It sought to either critique prevailing capitalist dogmas (Jacobs 1997a) or to reconnect humans with nature, by emphasising mutual and spiritual interconnections through movements such as ‘Ecopsychology (Reser 1995). Whatever its foundations:
The environment became a key manifestation of the counter-culture, and environmental lifestyle a way of resisting an alienating and destructive culture. (Macnaghten and Urry 1998: 47)
It aimed to find an alternate way of living, forwarding ideas of ‘voluntary simplicity’, emphasising that ‘small is beautiful’ (Claxton 1994).
15 The emergence of ‘New Environmentalism’ in 1970s was part of this counter-culture. It took the form of a social movement, forged under political and economic structural changes in industrialised countries (Buttel and Taylor 1994) and marking the emergence of an ‘Alternative Environmental Paradigm’ (Hannigan 1995). These paradigms questioned the relationship between humans and the natural environment in Western societies, and marked the emergence of new forms of ‘environmental values’. Widespread expressions of pro- environmental values were considered to be a reflection of shifting relationships between economy, society, core values and nature (Hannigan 1995). They did not fit neatly into previous social patterns, but instead presented a new way of thinking (Milton 1996).
The actual content, impetus and groupings of these values are still contested. Inglehart (1977, 1990) suggests they mark the emergence of post-materialist values, that once basic material needs have been met, society turns its attention to other social and material issues, such as the environment. In contrast, Cotgrove (1982, Cotgrove and Duff 1980) suggest that environmental concerns emerge as a response to individual or collective needsnot being met within the social world and that expressions of environmental concerns are new forms of political protest. The important point to be taken forward is that these new cultural movements were political and diverse. This counter-culture continued to evolve and fragment even further over the following 20 years, with discourses of green consumerism becoming focal (see Bedford 1999), along with ‘direct action’ and ‘witnessing’ ideas forwarded by pivotal environmental groups such as GreenPeace and Earth First.
Even though the concept of an environmentally friendly lifestyle does appear to advance some of the earlier approaches, it can also be seen to be part of a more substantive re-ffaming of the environmental paradigm; one emerging from science, policy and the creation of new forms of knowledges that began in the 1980s. This was a far-reaching reconsideration of the human relationships with, and use of, the environment, one whose initial impetus can be located in the emergence of a science of global environmental change.
1.2.2 Global environmental change: from science to policy
I will now argue that the forms of knowledge that emerged from the science of global environmental change have become instrumental in recasting the environmental paradigm over the past two decades. This has occurred in three main ways, that has transformed the environment from marginal consideration to a major international issue. First, the naming of an array of new environmental problems created forecasts of potential global catastrophe, necessitating immediate political action. Second, in the need to mobilise forms of action the
16 relationship between science and policy has been reshaped, giving rise to a powerful discourse of global environmental change. Finally, this subsequent discourse has been instrumental in framing international political relations into the twenty-first century. These three points will be examined briefly below.
• Environmental problems: more, worse and faster In the late 1960s and early 1970s, scientific research concluded that anthropogenic emissions into the natural environment were on the increase, potentially posing serious threats to the continuity of ecological life (Hormuth 1999, Smith 1996). Scientific attention was increasingly drawn to issues of environmental degradation. The previous decades of emphasis on pollution as the main cause for concern gave way to a more complex and diverse array of environmental ‘bads’ (Goodin 1992, Witherspoon and Martin 1993). These new environmental problems included ozone depletion, urban pollution, toxic waste, as well as rapid loss of biodiversity and forest cover (Lord 1990). The complexity of global climate issues came to the fore in the 1980s, as the concepts of the ‘greenhouse effect’ and ‘global warming’ received international attention (Witherspoon and Martin 1993). In sum, this array of scientific concepts instilled a new sense of urgency. They depicted an ever-worsening environmental state, caused by increased global industrialisation and its outputs. These problems were larger in scale than any known before and were believed to be worsening at unprecedented rates (De Young 1993, Dowdeswell 1997).
This new perspective was also part of a discourse of ‘environmental limits’, which suggested human actions must be constrained to fit within the earth’s resource capacity (Darier 1999b) and that current environmental problems are pushing this capacity to its limits. This perspective challenges notions of future human prosperity and necessitates a reassessment of all forms of environmental resource use and abuse (De Young 1993). This discourse made it imperative that actionable solutions were created and implemented, thus moving the environmental paradigm from being one of science to one of policy.
• Science and policy The comprehensive scope and anthropogenic nature of the current environmental paradigm meant that the science of global environmental change gave rise to a more diverse array of issues than it could possibly address. Tackling problems of this scale requires international co-operation and regulation. This has drawn science into an ever closer relationship with the world of social policy making. I do not wish to explore the nature of this relationship at any great length here (see Hajer 1995, Jasanoff 1990, Royal Society 1997) only to point out that this relationship is iterative, powerful and has given rise to specific discourses of global
17 environmental change, making it as much a social ideology as it is a scientific concept (Buttel and Taylor 1994). In doing this, it has also added a further dimension and new impetus to the climate and relations of international politics over the past decade.
• The geography and politics of global environmental change Sachs (1999: 27) has commented that “500 years of protected status of the North seems to be drawing to an end”. Indeed, one result of this new environmental paradigm has been affluent countries having to rethink their modus operandi with the environment. Although actual figures are contested, broad trends show the majority of global environmental problems originate in the affluent and politically powerful countries. One statistic suggests that member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development' (OECD) are responsible for material flows five times as high as non-OECD countries. To reach more sustainable levels, OECD countries must reduce per capita material flows by a factor of ten (IISD/UN 1999). This calls into question the very institutions, actions, technologies, economies and values which were, and are, held so dear by affluent countries (Achterberg 1993). It also reshapes relations with non-OECD countries, as affluent countries now have to accept some of the responsibility for detrimental global environmental change. This has given rise to two geographically contrasting discourses. The affluent ‘north’ has to think about modes of production and consumption whilst the developing ‘south’ is concerned with ‘sustainable livelihoods for the poor’ (UNCED 1992: 60), focusing on resource management and poverty eradication.^ These framings are lobal in a geographical sense but also in a sense that it is now unquestionable that solutions have to balance the needs of all countries, not just those of the privileged ‘north’. In an attempt to pull these disparate discourses and needs together, international political forces became mobilised at the end of the 1980s, under the guiding principle of sustainable development.
1.3 SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
This section discusses the emergence and framing of the concept of sustainable development, which has become central in addressing global environmental change since the mid 1980s. It argues that it is not a solution in itself, but rather an expression of an international desire to move towards a more stable and equitable use of global resources. I begin by outlining
' This is an international organisation that aims to affect and play a part in global market development. Membership is limited to countries with market economies and pluralistic democracies (see http://www.oecd.org/about/general/index.htm). Currently the 29 members countries are Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Korea, Luxembourg, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, the United States and the United Kingdom. ^ However, it is increasingly apparent that ‘northern’ consumption trends are increasingly being matched in ‘southern’ countries, especially in South-east Asia (UNCED 1992).
18 briefly the meanings of the concept, to demonstrate its ambiguous nature. Rather than focusing on these inherent ambiguities, I will concentrate on the concrete outcomes that sustainable development has facilitated, such as the array of international environmental agreements and conventions that came out of the Earth Summit. This includes the pivotal document Agenda 21, which has forwarded and framed the sustainable consumption project.
1.3.1 Defining sustainable development: trying to catch a wave upon the sand?
The concept of sustainable development was first introduced as a guiding ideology in the 1980 World Conservation Strategy (Jacobs 1997a) but was later popularised by the 1987 Brundtland Commission report. This document defined sustainable development as:
Development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. (WCED 1987; 8)
This definition attempts to embrace both natural resource use, and social development and equity, not only now, but also for future generations. Its broadness, palatability, and possibly vagueness, meant that it was quickly adopted as an international banner, a goal to strive towards. This has made sustainable development more of a motivating force rather than a clear directional concept (O'Riordan and Voisey 1997).
Sustainable development as a concept has not been without problems since its adoption and has been the subject of many debates, especially concerning its many possible interpretations (McManus 1996). Instead of entering into the academic fray over this matter or settling for one definition, this section briefly outlines some points of contention. The importance of this debate over the possible meanings of sustainable development will be a developing theme in this thesis, as pubic understandings and reactions to the principles of sustainable development, embodied inAction at Home, are discussed. This discussion will demonstrate that while contentious issues surrounding the concept are academic and political, they also have resonance with members of the public. Some of these main points to be developed include:
• That the term sustainable development is a contradiction (Noorman et al. 1998). How it is possible to continue ‘developing’ at current global rates and yet reach a state of environmental sustainability? • Questions as to what, and whose, needs does sustainable development seeks to define arise, both now and in the future (Sachs 1999). • What type of sustainable development is being talked about?
19 Numerous classifications have been constructed, ranging from weak forms, like a ‘business as usual’ interpretation, to strong forms, such a radical critique of western market economies (see Turner 1998). However, a concept that incorporates economic, political and epistemological, dimensions (Murdoch and Clark 1994) in such a brief definition will inevitably be susceptible to debates and competing interpretations. If sustainable development is a goal as opposed to a preordained plan of action, then such debates can be seen as part of movingtowards a state of sustainable development, rather than an undesirable side effect. A more fruitful line of investigation is to focus on the positive outcomes that have arisen from the ideas encapsulated in sustainable development, the most obvious of which is the event and the resulting conventions that came out of the 1992 Earth Summit.
1.3.2 The Earth Summit
In December 1989, the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted a resolution that a Conference on the Environment and Development would be held to advance the sustainable development agenda (Lindner 1997). Between 1990 to 1992 four intensive preparatory meetings were held in which a wide range of international policy actors drafted and negotiated key environmental conventions and agreements. These meetings culminated in the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) or Earth Summit held in Rio de Janeiro. This meeting is often hailed as a defining event for national and international environmental politics. Around 180 government and hundreds of other delegates debated and signed a range of prepared conventions and agreements, which addressed some of the main issues facing the global environment (Lindner 1997). The broadest, most sweeping agreement adopted was the ‘Rio Declaration’ which set out the ethical principles of sustainable development (Sands 1997). Other agreements related to more specific environment and development issues, which included:
• The Framework Convention on Climate Change; which set out international targets for reducing the anthropogenic causes of climate change; • The Biodiversity Convention; which established broad aims to conserve international biodiversity, making use the components of biodiversity in a sustainable manner and enabling an equitable distribution of the benefits of using these resources; • The Desertification Convention; which aimed to create localised action frameworks, to address the degradation of dryland environments; and • Agenda 21; which mapped out a blueprint for sustainable development by outlining the main issues implicated in global environmental change and how they might be tackled (Grubb et al. 1993).
20 For the purposes here, the most important agreements are those directly related to the consumption activities of individuals in OECD countries. These are primarily the Framework Convention on Climate Change (FCCC) and Agenda 21. The FCCC establishes what types of anthropogenic emissions need to be reduced, setting both levels of reduction and time-scales. It employs a framework of broad mechanisms, mostly at national level, to implement these reductions. The individual is not directly targetted by the framework but has subsequently become the focus of national strategies to reduce emissions in response to the FCCC.^
In contrast. Agenda 21 is a generic document guiding the pursuit of sustainable development at a national and international level (Grubb et al. 1993). It sets out the roles for different actors and delineates possible frameworks of action. With an excess of 500 pages, it establishes a package of long-term goals (Hajer and Fischer 1999), making it:
the most comprehensive document negotiated between governments on the interaction between economic, social and environmental trends at every level of human activity. (Lindner 1997: 4)
It has been instrumental in attempts to enact sustainable development ‘on the ground’, through frameworks such as Local Agenda 21 (LA21) which is a programme of action and a concept on which this thesis focuses, and which will be discussed in greater detail in the following section.
• Local agenda 21 Local Agenda 21 and similar exercises in local participatory democracy have a role to play in stirring the agenda of local politics, re-energising local communities and, we hope, in re-establishing a base of legitimacy for local political and community systems. (Rydin and Pennington 2000: 167)
In 1991 the International Council for Local Environmental Initiative (ICLEI) launched its LA21 initiative. It was presented to the Heads of UNCED in one of the four Summit preparatory meeting and later became Chapter 28 of Agenda 21. It proposes that local authorities in participating countries should produce a LA21 strategy with the co-operation of local residents and organisations (Brugman 1997). It aims to take forward the central tenets of Agenda 21 by making use of, and building upon, social capital that exists in local communities, promoting activities that will lead to increased capacity building, human
^ For example, as a result of FCCC obligations the Home Energy Conservation Act (HECA) came into force in the UK in 1996. It challenges local authorities to help reduce carbon dioxide emissions by increasing the energy efficiency of their domestic housing stock by 30% (see http://www.nfdc.gov.uk/heca/pages/heca.html). Methods implied in this Act concern both
21 resource development and the encouragement of environmental citizenship (Pinkney-Baird 1993). The concept of environmental citizenship is central to this framework, as it is to thesis, and will be returned to below.
LA21 sets out the roles of partners in local action, with stakeholders being counted as members of ‘Major Groups’. This approach outlines the role of NGOs in implementing sustainable development, which has helped to position Global Action Plan as a significant player, perhaps because;
NGOs are more like people than are business and Government. There is the need to open hearts and minds. The charisma of many NGOs is more likely to achieve this than business alone. (Advisory Committee on Business and the Environment 1998: 46)
As a result of this charisma, governments are looking increasingly to NGOs to create sufficient support and action to help get policies through (Grubb et al. 1993).
In total, over 2000 local authorities in 51 countries have established the LA21 planning process, changing the practices of local authorities and producing some positive results (Brugman 1997). It has created a framework that requires the participation of a diverse array of actors. The main role of the individual pertains to personal consumption of resources and the adoption of a sustainable lifestyle. The following section explains the sustainable consumption and sustainable lifestyles projects by outlining the ideas and assumptions they contained and considering ways of enacting forms of sustainable living, that implicates both the individual as a consumer and also as an environmental citizen.
1.4 SUSTAINABLE CONSUMPTION AND LIFESTYLES
This section explores the history and epistemology of both the sustainable consumption and sustainable lifestyle discourses. It argues that the sustainable consumption project has been framed to primarily concern the maximisation of resource-use efficiency, whilst also containing moral messages of environmental citizenship. This can be seen by the fact that the rationale of the efficiency approach is embedded in the history and epistemology of market economy systems, which cast individuals and their relations with the state as consumption- based. However, this framing supposes that by adopting patterns of sustainable consumption the individual is sacrificing their consumer sovereignty and quality of life. To overcome this contradiction the reasons for adopting sustainable lifestyles are framed as fundamentally
infrastructure changes and investments in housing stock, as well as attempts to change the behaviour of local residents, often through programmes such asAction at Home.
22 moral. The concepts of individual responsibility and environmental citizenship have been mobilised to explain why individuals should take part in the project of sustainable development. This mixture of economic and moral approaches gives impetus to the distinctive discourse of sustainable lifestyles.
1.4.1 Framing sustainable consumption
Agenda 21 and the United Nations explicitly identified the link between consumption patterns and global environmental problems (UN/CSD 1998). It has also elevated addressing this relationship to a key policy issue. It defines sustainable consumption as follows:
Sustainable consumption is the use of goods and services that respond to basic needs and bring a better quality of life, whilst minimising the use of natural resources, toxic materials and emissions of waste and pollutants over the life cycle, so as not to jeopardise the needs of future generations. (IISD/UN 1999: 1)
As the above definition shows, sustainable consumption is about ‘doing more with less’. It is framed as making efficient use of goods and services consumed, decreasing their environmental impact without decreasing consumer’s quality of life. This creates a specific set of aims outlined in Chapter 4 of Agenda 21, which include:
1. Encouraging greater efficiency in the use of energy and resources; 2. Minimising the generation of waste; 3. Assisting individuals and households to make environmentally sound purchasing decisions; 4. Exercising leadership through government purchasing; and 5. Moving towards environmentally sound pricing (UN 1999, UN/CSD 1998: 2).
These aims offer one conception of how sustainable consumption might be achieved. It works within the logic of sustainable development, enabling the continuation of current economic and political practices in OECD countries, whilst keeping their social and environmental consequences in mind. This is fundamentally a rationalisation of practices, both at the macro level of pricing systems but also at the individual level of domestic behaviours. The centrality of this framing is strengthened if the concept of sustainable lifestyles is now considered.
1.4.2 Sustainable lifestyles
Choosing to tread more lightly on the planet, whether that is through green energy, organic food, fair trade, reusing and recycling, driving less and using trains, buses and bikes, neighbourhood shopping, or whatever. These little things all add up, and.
23 multiplied across hundreds of millions of households, will make a difference. (Charles Secrett'* quoted in Gates 2000: 58)
Current patterns of resource use in households make domestic practices an important element of the sustainable consumption project. In the UK, domestic waste production has been steadily increasing over the past few decades and continues to increase at a faster rate than the adoption of household recycling and reuse practices (Government Statistics Office 1999). Almost half the total carbon dioxide emissions in the UK originate from home and private motoring sources (Advisory Committee on Business and the Environment 1998). Even though household emissions have reduced by a quarter over the past decade due to improvements in energy efficiency goods, the scope for further infrastructural trade-offs are now limited (Government Statistics Office 1999). Thus, the emphasis is increasingly placed on individual behaviour.
Chapter 4 of agenda 21 frames the reduction of consumption in the domestic sphere as being an issue of increasing resource efficiency, making the domestic sphere part of the process of ‘ecological modernisation’ (see Noorman et al. 1998). This project is visible through the predominance of the language of efficiency in the sustainable lifestyles discourse. For example, it is estimated that a third of all resource use in the United States takes place in the domestic arena, with 75% of these resources being used ‘inefficiently’ (Global Action Plan for the Earth N.D.^). It is suggested that environmental problems are:
Exacerbated by wasteful andinefficient patterns of consumption which have characterised the past industrialisation in developed countries, and which is being increasingly replicated worldwide. (UNCED 1992: 32, own italics)
Even though wastefulness has been the prevailing logic of cultures of consumption in OECD countries for centuries, individuals are now recruited as part of a drive for increased resource use efficiency. To achieve this efficiency, individuals are asked to embrace the tenets of sustainable development by taking the environment into account when buying goods and using natural resources (lUCN/UNEP/WWF 1991). This approach breaks consumption down into a number of discrete entities, which operate at all the stages of the life cycles of domestic goods. Individuals are encouraged to consider:
• the absolute amount of goods consumed;
Currently the Executive Director of Friends of the Earth. ^ This stands for ‘no date’.
24 • the origins of the consumables, in terms of their contents and the impact of their production; • the use of consumables, to make the most efficient use out of any goods; and • the manner of goods disposal (DETR1998b, lUCN/UNEPAVWF 1991, Librova 1999).
This list of considerations has been transformed into a set of discrete, workable practices that citizens are encouraged to adopt in their domestic environments, under the mantra of ‘Reduce, Re-use, Recycle and Repair’ (see Department of the Environment 1996). This not only provides a list of actions, but also creates a particular framing of the lifestyle. Although I will not discuss the concept of the lifestyle at any great length here, I will point out this framing offers a highly instrumental perspective, one suggesting that lifestyles are simply “patterns of action that differentiate people” (Chaney 1996: 5). This definition starkly contrasts with cultural and embedded approaches to lifestyles, which have suggested that they are not just sets of actions but are replete with collective and shared meanings, embodied through practices (for example, Giddens 1991). The importance of this distinction will become increasingly apparent as this thesis progresses.
Despite issues of definition, over the past few decades the discourse and practice of household efficiency has become a cultural norm in many European countries, the United States and Australia, although the UK appears to be lagging behind (Cohen 1998). Although it is easy to accept the logic of this framing, it is important to take a closer look at the epistemological and political assumptions that underpin this discourse, as these assumptions map out the role of the individual in the sustainable consumption project. This task is undertaken in the following section.
1.4.3 The consumer, the environment and the market
The advances of affluence—that is to say, of the possession of ever more goods and individuals and collective amenities—have been accompanied by increasingly serious ‘environmental nuisances’ which are a consequence, on the one hand, of industrial development and technical progress, and on the other, of the very structures of consumption. (Baudrillard 1998: 39)
As Baudrillard suggests, the project of consumption has becomethe central trajectory of industrial development and the growth of affluence. It is without doubt themodus operandi of state-centred market economy countries, especially those within the OECD. Consumption is therefore not just a series of acts but the cornerstone of socio-economic history, which all social and political relations are embedded within. The prevailing logic of consumption is part of the rise and institutional acceptance of neo-liberal theory of the state and economy (Booth 1993).
25 Neo-liberal theory casts subjects of the state as sets of autonomous individuals with free-will (Booth 1993). The desires of these individuals to meet their personal needs is a private affair and it is the job of the free market economy to satisfy those needs, treating the environment as a resource that is subject to prevailing principles of supply and demand (Slater 1998, Walsh 1994). Thus, relations between state and citizen are framed by consumption, as:
Personal consumption has become a dominant, even a defining feature of contemporary society, and its promotion probably the single most important objective of modem politics, more or less unquestioned right across the political spectrum. (Jacobs 1997b: 47)
This is not just a theoretical relationship but one that is embedded in the emergence of the citizen-consumer (Keat et al. 1994), a concept which suggests that increasing access to goods and broadening markets is the way to create the basis of citizenship, as enshrined in consumer rights (Lunt and Livingstone 1992). Citizens only need to have full information to make their own, correctly informed, decisions (Walsh 1994), with the emphasis being upon consumer choice. In this atmosphere:
the consumer is encouraged to feel a duty as a citizen to promote the cause of consumerism; the good consumer is a good citizen. (Aldridge 1994: 905)
Within these framings, an actor can be influenced and encouraged to make environmentally sound consumer decisions in response to an increase in environmental information on products (UNCED 1992). This supposes that environmental concern will be expressed in the rational decision making process of meeting personal needs through consumption activities (Hackett 1995).
However, there is a fundamental tension here. It is assumed that individuals are able to pursue their own self-interest via the market, which will respond to the environmental paradigm via its own mechanisms. This paradigm also frames individuals as “blindly pursuing their self-interest” (Samuelson 1990: 207). This creates a form of consumption trap, which is encapsulated in the concept of the social dilemma, as used by social psychologists (see chapter 2). A social dilemma is the tension that allegedly arises between individual and collective interests in the distribution of resource and environmental ‘goods’. There is the conflict between pursuing self-interests, as the citizen consumer does, and contributing to the collective good of society as a whole (Karp 1996, Weenig et al. 1994). Thus, individuals must abstain from their own consumption, considering the environment and others when making decisions thereby reducing their own quality of life and acting in a pro-social or
26 altruistic manner (Kaiser and Shimoda 1999). As the quote below demonstrates, this frames prevailing approaches to creating changes in individual consumption behaviours.
No set of policies, no system of market incentives, no amount of information can substitute for individual responsibility to counteract apathy, our vision will be meaningless unless it helps to motivate individuals acting as citizens, consumers, to make choices on the basis of a broader, longer view of their self-interest. (President’s Council on Sustainable Development, quoted in Global Action Plan for the Earth N.D.: 1)
To enter into this framing, individuals must act as good consumers whilst at the same time seeing beyond their own self-interest. However, the logic of the market cannot contain the contradiction between economic freedom and the need to repress this freedom. I argue that this contradiction is where the concepts of environmental citizenship and civic morality introduced earlier in this chapter enter into the discourse of sustainable lifestyles. I will now expand upon this position by demonstrating how the mobilisation of arguments about individuals taking on forms of moral obligation have mixed with the consumer-citizen discourse to give a framing of sustainable lifestyles that is prevalent in many forms of sustainable lifestyles promotion; that is, a sustainable lifestyle is driven by morals but acted out within the logic of the market.
1.4.4 Mobilising morals
It is argued here that despite the instrumentalist or institutional framing of sustainable lifestyles, their drivers are deemed as fundamentally moral. This mobilisation of morality is important because individuals involvement in sustainable lifestyles will not transpire simply through the passive acceptance of a set of externalised values. Instead, it requires an active and voluntary involvement because:
The required sacrifices and the changes of lifestyle connected with it can never be lasting if they are imposed in an authoritarian way. These sacrifices and changes demand voluntariness, understanding and the preparedness of all people involved. (Achterberg 1993: 82)
This entails the emergence of an active citizen, mobilised by responsibility and duty, rather than the passive citizen, bounded only by rights and privileges (Selman and Parker 1997). Thus, the idea of the environmental citizen re-emerges.
Environmental citizenship is the concept that care for the environment is the responsibility of all citizens, not just governments and other agencies. (Pinkney- Baird 1993: 6)
27 Evoking citizenship requires individuals to cherish local and global values, encouraged by a greater civic awareness and recognition of civil obligations (O'Riordan and Voisey 1997, Myers and Macnaghten 1998). This evocation makes sense in the stakeholder environment of LA21, where all sets of social actors have a role to play. It also makes sense in its encouragement of an outlook that will make environmental issues a forethought not an afterthought (Dowdeswell 1997), as “many promising efforts lose their impact if they are not accepted and integrated into everyday life” (Hormuth 1999: 277).
It also goes some way in acknowledging the social side to consumption. This social side has been emphasised through an on-going intellectual project, which suggests that cultures of consumption are not simply instrumental or individualistic but are socially embedded and highly complex practices (see Miller 1995a, Miller 1995b, Spaargaren and van Vilet 2000). Patterns of consumption are not just created to meet physiological needs but are suffused with personal and shared meanings (Csikszentmihalyi and Rochberg-Halton 1981) that bind together intimate and domestic human relations (Miller 1998) and also enable individuals to create forms of social identity and positioning (Warde 1997). By taking a broad social approach to encouraging environmental awareness, environmental citizenship engages with all aspects of individual’s daily existence, embedding consumption within its social and moral context.
Encouraging feelings of citizenship is also a way to create a social norm of environmental awareness and personal responsibility. It is interesting to note that this framing of the individual and their role in society has been increasingly mobilised as a political ideal, in public debates about moral order and civicness. As other discourses have moved from duty and personal responsibility to choice (Lunt and Livingstone 1992), environmental policy is increasingly focusing on notions of duty and responsibility as a citizen. This concept of the citizen has become increasingly prevalent in the UK, under-going political revitalisation within the current Labour government who plan to teach ‘citizenship’ at all key stages in the National Curriculum, resulting in a recognised qualification (Crick 2000).
The assertion of the political nature of the mobilisation of the ‘responsible environmental citizen’ is supported by the fact that calls for individuals to acknowledge the environmental consequences of their actions appear to be disproportionately strong in relation to the roles and responsibilities given to other stakeholders. At a policy level it seems that the individual is being held responsible for the majority of environmental ‘bads’.
28 Ultimately the burden on the UK’s environment is attributable to the choices and the actions of the consumers. To a great extent producers are, quite naturally, responding to meet the preferences of the customers. (DETR 1998: 4)
Yet the independent charity Waste Watch UK suggest that only 6% of waste comes from households (WasteWatch 1999a) and that only 10% of energy use can be accounted for in retail consumption. Also, the amount of resource savings that can be made from changing household practices is questionable and highly contradictory, seemingly based more on rough guesses and vague recommendations.^
Why then the emphasis on households? One possible explanation could be that this discourse attempts to impose a degree of self-discipline and self-regulation, without having to overtly assault the central tenets of choice and liberty, supposedly enshrined in a liberal democracy. The discourses of consumption and sustainable lifestyles can be seen as a Foucauldian normalizing technique, “a technique whose objective was to control daily human conduct” (Darier 1999a: 25) and to instil the self-discipline believed to be required in tackling environmental problems. Without labouring this point, I aim to point out that, whatever the political reasonings, the discourse of sustainable lifestyles is made up of a number of disparate concepts. This highlights the difference, and creates a tension between, the citizen and the consumer (Sagoff 1988) or the rationalisation of lifestyles and the project of cultural reflexivity (Smith 1996). This tension is demonstrated throughout this thesis. It also runs through some of the mechanisms adopted in the UK to promote the individual adoption of sustainable lifestyles.
1.5 MARKETING SUSTAINABLE LIFESTYLES
This section will show how the discourse of sustainable lifestyles has been used as a mechanism to encourage the public uptake of sustainable lifestyles in the UK, focussing both on the techniques and message used. In examining how the sustainable lifestyles discourse has been mobilised in the UK policy arena to encourage members of the public to adopt more environmentally friendly lifestyles, I will begin by outlining the policy context since the Brundtland report, showing how the UK has been active in making sustainable development part of its policy agenda. A small part of the intention behind this agenda has been to encourage members of the public to take on board the tenets of sustainable development by using mechanisms such as public information campaigns and social marketing techniques. I
^ For example, it is suggested that it is beneficial to ‘plant a couple of additional trees around your home’ which will result in the individual decreasing their CO2 emissions by 201bs a year (for further examples, see United States Environment Protection Agency 1999).
29 will then illustrate the argument by outlining the campaigns that took place in the UK during the 1990s, culminating the Labour government’s 1999Are you doing your campaign.bit?"
1.5.1 Policy context
To facilitate sustainable development, participating countries have responded to the call for the development of “national policies and strategies to encourage changes in consumption patterns” (UNCED 1992: 64). Since the Brundtland report the UK has been a leading international player, setting not only the content of the policy agendas but also their tone. This process began in 1990 when the former Conservative Government produced a national sustainable development strategy entitled ‘Our Common Inheritance’ (Lindner 1997). At the 1992 Earth Summit, the UK Prime Minister John Major promised that a strategy, in line with the principles of Agenda 21, would be prepared (Lindner 1997). This became ‘Sustainable Development: the UK strategy’ (Department of the Environment 1994), which served as a guide for positioning sustainable development within UK policy goals. This work continued with the election of the Labour government in May 1997. Exactly two years after being elected, they produced ‘A better quality of life: The Revised UK Strategy on Sustainable Development’ (DETR 1999b). Its overall aims are set out to encourage:
• social progress that meets the needs of everyone; • effective protection of the environment; • prudent use of natural resources; • maintenance of high and stable levels of economic growth and employment (DETR 1999b:
1).
The UK strategy outlines a broad and inclusive approach to making sustainable development work, emphasising not only economic instruments but also the building of social capacity and community empowerment (see UK Round Table on Sustainable Development 1999). The role of the individual is framed primarily as ‘Action by the Consumer’ which aims to enable consumers to make better consumption choices and also make better use of energy efficiency structures and products in the home (DETR 1999b).
However, price mechanisms are not the only tools employed to encourage individuals to alter their behaviours. Another is the provision of environmental information. This is an important mechanism, as it is believed that:
30 there is still widespread ignorance about the nature of some of these problems and the need for more sustainable solutions. (UK Round Table on Sustainable Development 2000: 10)
In adopting this approach, it is hoped that the widespread dissemination of information about various aspects of sustainable development will put issues onto the public agenda (Staats and Harland 1995, United Nations 1998), mobilising individuals to take positive action. Because of this the use of pubic education and information campaigns has become a widespread policy choice. The next section will focus on the history of these campaigns in the UK, culminating in the most recent one called’'Are you doing your bit?’’
1.5.2 A sustainable development information strategy: ^ Are you doing your bit?^
If the past belongs to material production and control over the means of physical coercion, the future belongs to information. (Dryzek 1990: 111)
As Dryzek predicted, the process of delivering sustainable development has become partially reliant upon the tools of public information and education. It is implicit in this approach that learning about sustainable development is vital if everyone is to become an actively engaged citizen. Indeed the UK Sustainable Development Education Panel (1999: 8) suggest that by 2010, 75% of individuals should have an understanding of “the broad objectives of sustainable development and your personal impact”. There are various means of achieving this level of education. One approach is that of social marketing.
Social marketing aims to promote action around a set of societal problems, marketing ideas rather than products (Geller 1989). The basic social marketing model is proposed as “the design, implementation and control of programs calculated to influence the acceptability of social ideas” (Kotler and Zaltman, quoted in Geller 1989: 27). One example of this social marketing technique is the former Conservative government’s ‘Helping the Earth Begins at Home’ campaign, established in the early 1990s. This took the form of a nation-wide campaign to encourage individuals to save energy in their own homes, both for the environment and for their own financial benefit (Hinchliffe 1996, Eden 1993). A series of leaflets, with the slogan ‘Wasting Energy Costs the Earth’ included tips on how to save money on fuel bills and information about switching to energy-saving goods (see Department of the Environment's Energy Efficiency Office 1994), promoting actions that individuals could take within their household to make a difference (Hinchliffe 1996).
In 1996, the Conservative’s extended their programme of mass advertising and established the ‘Going for Green’ programme. This began as a major campaign in the national press, advertising the ‘Green Code’, a five point call for individuals to ‘reduce waste’, ‘save
31 energy’, travel sensibly’, ‘prevent pollution’, and ‘look after the local environment’ (see Going for Green 1996). Going for Green later became a private limited company and extended its work programme to include an Eco-Schools project, research to develop more tools to increase public awareness, as well as an initiative to improve local environmental participation called the Sustainable Communities Project (see Blake and Carter 1997, Blake 1999).
The change of government in 1997 from Conservative to Labour did not halt social marketing campaigns. In May 1999, the Labour government launched its"Are you doing your bit?'* campaign (DETR 1999a) aimed at encouraging individuals to make small changes to their lifestyles. "Are you doing your bit?* has taken the form of a widespread media campaign, using advertising in national newspapers, on television and in cinemas. The tone has been more light-hearted and tongue-in-cheek than previously approaches, using celebrities and quirky story lines to actively endorse messages.^ There is also information on the World Wide Web containing supporting messages which suggest that we can all make a difference, as “a few changes in what you do at home, at work, when shopping or getting about, is all that you need to do” (DETR 1999a: 2).
As the title "Are you doing your bit?’’ suggests, the individual is encouraged to take their share of helping the environment by making small and cost-effective alterations to their everyday behaviour. This approach assumes that there exists a latent form of responsibility towards the environment that can be appealed to and mobilised into action without requiring a radical shift in lifestyles: the definitive amalgamation of the citizen-consumer and the environmentally responsible citizen. Whether it has been effective as a behaviour change tool remains to be seen. Previous studies of these sorts of campaigns suggest that success will be limited. It has been repeatedly shown that these tools alone do not create significant changes in individual behaviour (Burgess et al. 1998, Blake 1999, van Luttervelt 1998). To address the lack of success of social marketing techniques, there have been debates about the need for more in- depth programmes. These require higher levels of individual engagement than one-off information campaigns (van Luttervelt 1998). They also require increased material and personnel inputs and costs. In turn, it is hoped that they will achieve more palpable results. One such programme is Global Action Plan, which sits within the sustainable lifestyles discourse of efficiency and morality but differs from other programmes in its techniques of
’ Examples include television adverts showing rival radio DJ’s Zoe Ball and Chris Evans sharing a lift to work, as well as the ex-football star and infamous alcoholic George Best placing empty mineral water bottles into a recycling point. The new adverts showing in 2000 all feature the comedian Mark Lamaar.
32 individual engagement and contextual support. In the following section I will chart the history and ideas behind Global Action Plan,
1.6 GLOBAL ACTION PLAN
The resulting combined sense of helplessness and obligation has created a demand for mechanisms, policies and programmes for action which make individuals feel involved in the effort to save the planet. (Milton 1996: 179)
This section discusses the origins of Global Action Plan, showing that it is both a series of organisations and a theoretical basis for individual behaviour change. Since its inception in the late 1980s it has shown some positive results and has formed organisations, through Global Action Plan International, in up to fifteen countries around the world, including the UK. I then proceed to discuss the history of Global Action Plan UK, showing how it diverged from the original ideas and focusing on theirAction at Home programme. I argue that this programme is a unique form of environmental communication in the UK today and offers an interesting opportunity to examine the impacts of environmental communications upon their public participants.
1.6.1 Global Action Plan: a brief history
Global Action Plan was originally founded in the United States in 1989. It emerged from the dissatisfaction of a group of individuals, the most prominent being David Gershon, working in environmental NGOs and science arenas. They felt a framework of support was missing for people who wanted to make environmentally friendly behaviour changes to their lives. They developed a programme that attempted to address this absence, which they called Global Action Plan for the Earth. The aim of the programme was to create a process that would lead to more sustainable and sustained behaviour change (Global Action Plan International N.D.).
Global Action Plan is a series of organisations and a behaviour change tool. It aims to encourage adults* to live more sustainable lifestyles by saving resources and changing their personal outlook on environmental and consumption issues in the process. This is achieved not through information alone, but by “empowering individuals to live increasingly sustainable lifestyles” (Global Action Plan International N.D.: 1). It is based upon the premise that individuals want to change, but negative beliefs and gaps in understanding prevent changes from happening. The next section will detail the tools and processes that Global Action Plan has developed to achieve behavioural changes.
There is also a version for children called "Journey for the Planet’ (see Global Action Plan for the Earth 1998).
33 1.6.2 The tools of change
Global Action Plan’s EcoTeam Program is a community-based campaign enabling large numbers of ordinary people to make a significant contribution to the solution of environmental problems by consciously modifying their way of life. (Global Action Plan International N.D.: 1)
The Global Action Plan approach has several facets that work together to encourage change. These consist of:
• breaking through limiting beliefs about ‘where can I start?’; • taking a step-by-step approach to basic consumption patterns of each household; • making the programme action orientated by team collaboration; • creating a reference system of feedback of team’s progress and savings; and • coaching and training of EcoTeam through the process (van Luttervelt 1998: 3).
Global Action Plan seeks both emotional/personal and behavioural/instrumental changes, with the merging of ‘behaviour-based’ with ‘person-based’ psychology models of change (Geller 1995). It uses very specific methods, encapsulated in the Household EcoTeam Programme, which is a structured set of activities based around the practices within, and concerning, the household (Harland and Staats 1997). There are two main components to this approach: the EcoTeam and the Workbook.
• EcoTeams: Participants of Global Action Plan are organised into EcoTeams. These are groups of five or six proximate households who have regular meetings. They each support the other by working through a detailed and structured workbook with the aid of a trained volunteer. The rationale behind the EcoTeam model is that it provides support, group identity and encouragement to participating households, allowing them to share ideas, problems and achievements with each other. By creating groups that will invariably have their own identity and dynamics, the EcoTeam enables participants to define goals in their own terms, identify what they see as barriers and consciously make decisions about what to change (Global Action Plan International N.D.). It also helps to create a sense of commitment to the programme (Staats and Harland 1995) and to overcome feelings of isolation that appear to be key in preventing effective change. The EcoTeam also acts as a unit of quantification. Each Team’s results are fed back to a central office or local collection point, who then feed back the group’s progress (Staats and Herenius 1995), so that “each household can see the results in a global perspective” (Global Action Plan International N.D.: 2).
34 • Workbook: Global Action Plan translated global resource reduction goals into household actions by setting quantitative targets for households (Church and McHarry 1992). The targets are based on their'Green Decade Goals', which were intended to be achieved in the 1990s. These goals include reducing global waste output by 75%, reducing water use by 30%, and also reducing global pesticide use by 50%, by the year 2000^ (Harland et al. 1993). Each goal was translated into step-by-step actions to be taken in the household and which are laid out in the workbook (see Appendix 1 for sample pages of an EcoTeam workbook). Over a number of months participants choose from a series of topics such as waste, water, transport, energy and shopping habits (Global Action Plan for the Earth N.D.). Participants are guided through a detailed process of quantifying and recording their resource use in relation to these topics, acting upon instructions and behavioural tips as to how they might reduce their use of particular resources. This method enables participants to focus on one set of behaviours at a time, to become aware of their own levels of resource use, to understand how they might reduce this use and to record changes taking place over time.
1.6.3 The process of change
Global Action Plan is not just about specific methods to achieve reductions in resource use. It also enables individuals to change aspects of themselves. Both the EcoTeam and Workbook, it is argued, create an atmosphere and act as a catalyst for change. This change starts from the individual’s behaviour and works outwards to the community, evolving into broader social changes. Global Action Plan argue that the first and most important part of this process is individual empowerment, which aims to overcome the ‘limiting beliefs’ that centre around not knowing what actions to take and also the efficacy of taking actions (Church and McHarry 1992). Figure 1.1 shows the feelings and expectations that Geller suggests are evoked in the process of being empowered by action, information and positive feelings. The ideal state and goal for each individual is statement 4, where all the positive feelings created by taking action and belonging to a group merge, to give rise to a feeling that “We call all make a valuable difference”. By being part of the EcoTeam, having simple actions in the Workbook which stipulate effective action, and by receiving feedback. Global Action Plan addresses the issues of self-esteem, empowerment and ‘belongingness’.
No information is available in relation to successes in achieving these goals.
35 Figure 1.1. Moving towards empowerment (from Geller 1995)
Self-Effectiveness “I can do it”
Personal control Optimism “I am in control” I expect the besf Empowerment “I can make a difference”
Self-Esteem “I am Belongingness valuable” “1 belong to a team”
KEY 1 = “/ can make a valuable difference''' 2— ''We can make a difference" 3 = "I am a valuable team member" 4 = “We can all make a valuable difference’
1.6.4 The diffusion of change
Finally, as individuals develop new lifestyle practices and become more aware of the institutional changes needed to support these choices they are motivated to become more civically engaged. (Global Action Plan International N.D.; 1)
The founders of Global Action Plan believe that through personal empowerment, participants ‘actively care’ about the environment and become agents of change (Global Action Plan International N.D.). By having advocates in local communities, campaign groups are created who spread ‘the word’ outwards, recruiting and offering support to a larger proportion of the local community (Global Action Plan International N.D.). This process of ‘environmental evangelism’ is based on a model of ‘social diffusion’ (see Rogers 1995). This model assumes that there is an ‘individual threshold’ within communities as:
An individual is more likely to adopt an innovation if more of the other individuals in his or her personal network have adopted previously. (Rogers 1995: 322)
36 There is also a ‘critical mass’ reached in a community when 5-10% of individuals are engaged in a particular activity making it self-sustaining'® (Global Action Plan International N.D.). As ‘sustainable communities’ are established it is believed that a greater civil conscience will emerge, that will enable groups to lead regional and national campaigns for change.
Global Action Plan is therefore a ‘bottom-up’ model of social change. Yet, it is one based on pre-determined structures and process. It offers a comprehensive programme, is a structured policy tool for national and local governments, and can also be considered a highly cost- effective means of reducing environmental impacts (Global Action Plan International 1999). It has the potential to address both the aims of the FCCC and Agenda 21. So, taking into account this great potential, what levels of success has it achieved in practice?
1.6.5 Does Global Action Plan work?
Little direct evaluative research has been completed on the effects of Global Action Plan. The exception is work carried out on the EcoTeams programme in the Netherlands. A team of researchers at Leiden University have undertaken a series of investigations, using the tools of environmental psychology. An initial pilot study examined the experiences of EcoTeam members (see Harland, Langezaal et al. 1993), showing that many of participants were already involved in environmental issues and were influenced to take part through personal, informal networks of recruitment. Whilst participating in the programme, individuals found working in EcoTeam groups supportive and most made some behaviour changes as a result of their participation.
This offers some support for the central concepts of the Global Action Plan model and social diffusion process. More detailed studies from the same team followed, examining specific aspects of the programme, such as the effects of differing types of feedback (Weenig et al. 1994) and the effects of information on attitudes and intentions to participate in the EcoTeam programme (Staats and Herenius 1995). A final study offered an overall evaluation of the Dutch EcoTeam programme. Results showed that members of EcoTeams undertook a larger and more frequent range of environmentally friendly behaviours than the average Dutch
This social diffusion model is based upon empirical work concerning the adoption of technologies through time and space, which is called the ‘hardware’. Rogers (1995) is less clear as to whether these same processes would be mirrored with the adoption of ideas and concepts, which he calls ‘software’.
37 population, a trend which continued 6 to 9 months after finishing the programme, and up to 2 years after participation ended’’ (Harland and Staats 1997).
Although the Dutch research is indeed very useful and well executed, it does little to elucidate what takes place during the programmes. The theoretical framework of their research is based on cognitive psychology models of change, such as the Theory of Planned Behaviour (see chapter 2), which create significant statistical outputs, but do not allow exploration of whether such factors as ‘social diffusion’ and ‘personal empowerment’ are processes actually taking place. What is available, however, are useful international figures showing the instrumental aspects of the programme, such as the numbers of participants and the projected magnitude of resource savings made, which are detailed below.
• Numbers reached By 1994 Global Action Plan programmes had been established in 14 countries’^, centrally administered through Global Action Plan International (Staats and Herenius 1995). Table 1.1 shows the most recent figures for the number of international organisations in operation, along with the number of individuals involved.’^
” These results are backed up by US research, which suggests that participants continue to change their behaviours for 6-9 months after the end of the programme (Global Action Plan for the Earth N.D.). These numbers has waxed and waned over the years as new organisations have been set up and older ones have ceased to operate. Global Action Plan International collated these figures between May to October 1998. No more recent figures are not available as Global Action Plan International has gone into receivership and the majority of the organisations listed do not provide information in English.
38 Table 1.1. Global Action Plan International Feedback
c o u n t r y '^ EcoTeams Households Individuals NetherlandSa no data 11,000 no data United Statesb no data 3,000 no data United Kingdonic no data +24,000 no data Switzerland 152 870 3036 Flanders 153 1377 4131 Denmark 103 no data 357 Norway 15 no data 110 Ireland 45 no data 290 Russia’^ 12 60 173 Sweden (old system) 311 2229 5789 Sweden(new system) 219 1384 2885
Although it is not possible to offer direct comparisons between countries, as some organisations record number of individuals whilst another records number of households, it is likely that approximately 52,000 individuals had been involved with Global Action Plan up to mid-1998.'^
However these figures do not give an indication of resource savings that resulted from individuals involvement. Although the accuracy of saving estimates are contested, they are possible given the highly quantified nature of the Workbooks. For example. Global Action Plan US have suggested that each participating household has, on average, reduced the amount of rubbish they send to landfill by 42% and water use by 25% (Global Action Plan for the Earth N.D.). This results in each participant having, on average, reduced their carbon dioxide outputs by 16% (Global Action Plan for the Earth N.D.). The Dutch figures suggest that EcoTeam members have made reductions of the magnitude of 10-25% gas use, 15-30% electricity use, and have reduced the number of kilometres driven per year by 15-20% (Global
Sources of figures: Global Action Plan International Secretariat 1999, personal communication (pers comm.), except a from Paul Harland 1998, pers comm., b from Global Action Plan USA 1999, pers comm, and c from Global Action Plan UK 1999, pers comm.
This is St Petersburg only.
This calculation has been made using the ‘individual’ figures, and in the 3 cases where these were not available, the ‘household’ figures. 1 consider this valid, as often only one member of a household is actively involved in Global Action Plan. However, it is acknowledged that this will underestimate the actual number of individuals taking part, as more than one member per household may be involved. Plus, it provides no indication of the number effected indirectly by Global Action Plan, such as through family and friends contacts.
39 Action Plan Nederland 1998). Based on these figures, it is estimated that Dutch participants have reduced their carbon dioxide emissions by 1500 tonnes per household per year, over a 4 year period (van Luttervelt 1998). These are quite significant savings. Similar statistics are not available from Global Action Plan UK, who have evolved different means of creating change and recording outputs, making them distinctive amongst other Global Action Plans around the world. I will therefore proceed to discuss the evolution and practices of Global Action Plan UK, who aim to capture the central tenets of the original GAP but have moved away from the above EcoTeam model.
1.7 GLOBAL ACTION PLAN UK
This section outlines the evolution and work programmes of GAP UK (GAP from hereon). It begins by showing how GAP came to England and how it developed its unique approach to addressing behaviour change, which positions it within the social marketing techniques discussed above. However, it is argued here that GAP’s emphasis on thecontexts o f change make it a more substantive tool than other sustainable lifestyles campaigns. Then, their three main work programmes are discussed, focusing on theAction at Home programme that this thesis’ research is based upon.
1.7.1 Global Action Plan UK: the early evolution
GAP began through the process of informal diffusion of ideas and concepts, unintentionally adding credence to the concept of social diffusion! In 1991 a British couple who had met with David Gershon in the US returned home with the aim of setting up a Global Action Plan in the UK. Getting together a small group of interested individuals and receiving a small start-up grant from the Department of Environment (GAP UK 1998c), they commissioned the writing of the original UK workbook (see Church and McHarry 1992). GAP was registered and became operational as a charity in 1994. It was launched with two possible methods of delivery available to the members of the public. First, there was the option of the EcoTeam approach, using the new workbook. Working in this format, about 6 teams were launched, half of which saw the programme through.’^ Second, the programme was also been taken down a social marketing route, where participating households were able to receive the information in ‘pack’ format, through the post. This approach proved more popular with members of the public in terms of uptake, and was more in line with the outlook of the newly appointed Director (Trewin Restorick, who is still in this post). Further, as GAP had no core funding, the organisation has always operated as a not-for-profit business, which the EcoTeam path would not have allowed it to do. With these factors in mind, programmes were
No official records of this event exist.
40 developed to build upon these early experiences and create new behaviour change tools, one of which was Action at Home.
1.7.2 GAP work programmes: focussing on Action at Home
GAP has adopted the mission statement that sets their aims as:
to encourage and help individuals to take effective environmental action in their homes, communities and workplaces. (1998c: 7)
With an emphasis on context, they have established three main programmes in line with these three sites of change: Action at Home, Action at Work and Action at AlthoughSchool. the means of delivery are very different, the core aims are not too far away from the original Global Action Plan ideas of facilitating personal change to enable subsequent behaviour change. I will now focus on the aims and contents of theAction at Home programme {AaH from hereon).
“Action at Home helps households to reduce their impact on the environment and save money” (GAP UK 1999: 1). Thus, it sits within the discourse of sustainable lifestyles as discussed above, forwarding both economic prudence and environmental responsibility. However, unlike the social marketing methods of government campaigns,AaH presents a more intensive programme, which enables participants to take the Global Action Plan programme as an individual household.AaH is constructed to emphasise the achievement of small changes, spread out over a six month period, and feeding back these achievements to create further motivation (GAP UK and WWF 1999).
AaH is structured as follows. Local authorities or businesses buy the AaH programme for their communities or employees. Along with GAP, they are responsible for setting up local support infrastructures for participating individuals (see chapter 3 for further information). AaH is then publicised and households choose to sign up, by writing into the central office in London and paying a fee of £12 for the programme. Each participating household then receives a ‘welcome’ questionnaire (see Appendix 2). Upon return to the central office the questionnaire data are scored in terms of ease or difficulty of taking the actions listed. Participants receive a mark out of 100 from this questionnaire, which is their GreenScorel. The aim of the GreenScorel is to provide a baseline of how environmentally friendly a household is. Participants are then sent five packs, one a month, which provide information and step-by-step hints on how to change behaviours in the areas of water, waste, energy, transport and shopping (see Appendix 3). At the end of the six months participants receive a
41 final questionnaire similar to the ‘welcome’ questionnaire for which they receive a comparative GreenScorel, which shows the magnitude and types of changes they have made.
AaH is a unique programme in the UK today. As the quote at the start of this section shows, it is not publicly positioned as an overtly ‘green’ programme, but has the more pragmatic aims of appealing to people who want to ‘do their bit’ for the environment by making some small changes to their lifestyles and/or are keen to save some money off their household bills. This places AaH in line with the social marketing campaigns discussed above, in terms of the messages used. However, it differs from them in three crucial aspects. These are:
• AaH presents a sustained, concentrated action plan rather than a one-off information campaign. By using the GreenScores and the packs, it offers an intensive approach to encouraging individuals to change some behaviour.
• The programme is not simply the information in the packs and GreenScore. GAP stress that they are the tools to achieve change. What is equally important for AaH are the contexts in which the programme is delivered, as they provide support and interaction for the programme’s participants.
• AaH is able to demonstrate measurable reductions in resource use. Figures available from various AaH projects have shown it does make a difference to individual behaviour change. In one London based GAP project, which had a total of 1261 participants, changes in households practices included a 10% increase in individuals turning down their gas when cooking and the same percentage change in individuals putting lids on saucepans when cooking (GAP UK 1998c). With actions that cost a small amount of money, there were marginally smaller increases, such as a 5% rise in individuals putting foil behind radiators, and an 8% rise in households with shelves above their radiators (GAP UK 1998c). A project carried out in the Environment Agency offices in the North-West was very successful, with an increase of 55% in individuals adjusting their toilet cistern to save water, and a 30% increase in individuals who recycled half or more of their used fabrics (GAP UK 1998a).
AaH therefore presents some positive results. It offers an interesting case study in exploring the sustainable lifestyles concept further. In the following section I map out the main research questions that this thesis will address, and I then present the chapter structures for the remainder of this thesis.
42 1.8 RESEARCH QUESTIONS
So far in this chapter the sustainable lifestyles debate has been positioned in relation to broad trends in international politics, in an attempt to understand some of its underlying concepts and assumptions. This has been done by showing how sustainable lifestyles integrates both the concepts from Agenda 21, of an active and responsible citizen, with the prevailing neo- economic framework of the citizen-consumer. I have shown how forms of public communications concerning global environmental change have become part of a policy toolkit for delivering sustainable development. In doing so, it has also been stressed that these public communications do not appear to be having the desired effect of mobilising individuals to take positive environmentally friendly actions. This thesis aims to examine and elucidate some of the reasons why environmental communications are failing to make a significant impact.
This research is premised on the assertion that very little is known about how individuals react to programmes like AaH, and what resonance the messages of the sustainable lifestyles discourse has with members of the public. This thesis aims to carry out an in-depth investigation ofAaH participants reactions to the programme, focusing on the discursive practices they engage in. By outliningAaH's position within the sustainable development discourse I have shown how it is a unique form of environmental communication in the UK today. Its sustained and contextual approach therefore offers a valuable opportunity to look at the processes that take place when individual take part inAaH. The main research questions that this thesis will address are:
1. Why do individuals become involved withAaH^ This research will consider what aspects of AaH appeal to participants, examining the meanings that the programme embodies for them. Prevailing framings suggest that they are either expressing some form of environmental concern and/or wishing to save money. Is there some other reason for taking part?
2. What happens whenAaH participants engage with the programme and have their own consumption practices questioned? This research examines why and how specific types of household behaviours changed as a result of takingAaH. This will be done as an examination of process, rather than just focusing on the endpoint of behaviour changes. Therefore, the arguments and debates that arise as participants work through AaHWiW also be discussed and considered as discursive processes.
43 These questions are asked within a highly reflexive research framework of the collaborative partnership between GAP and myself. Although not a direct research question, this research also considers and show how working closely with GAP on both an applied and academic agenda can provide some interesting insights into the process of carrying out this form of collaborative research.
1.9 THESIS STRUCTURE
In addressing these questions, this thesis will be structured as follows.
Chapter 2 This chapter will map out how academic disciplines have approached this thesis’ two research questions, by considering their framings of investigations into environmental awareness and behaviour change. It begins by examining how the prevailing framework of positivist disciplines, such as environmental psychology, have offered some interesting insights into individuals adoption of sustainable lifestyles practices but are limited in their capacity as processual and contextual tools of investigation. It then focuses on how political and social scientists have engaged with questions of the environmental paradigm within the framework of high modernity, discussing the theoretical constructs of structuration and environmental knowledges. The over-all aim of this chapter is to establish a contextual framework of discursive and physical practices that can be taken forward in the remainder of the thesis.
Chapter 3 This chapter charts the evolution of the collaborative methodologies used in this research. The workings of the CASE award are examined, showing how being a CASE student offered up, and often necessitated, taking a highly reflexive view of this research, a position which shows in the theoretical arguments which emerge in the thesis. Then, the strengths of using qualitative techniques when addressing issues of process and behaviour change are outlined. The details of the empirical research are then mapped out, with both case studies being put into their geographical contexts. Finally, the prcesses of interpreting and integrating the material that arose from the fieldwork process are detailed.
Chapter 4, 5 and 6 These chapters form the empirical analysis of this thesis. Chapter 4 begins by presenting a new framework for understanding howAaH participants changed some behaviours as a result of the programme, and why others remained the same. It marks out the distinction between the changing of habits which takes place rather effortlessly, and the more complex and embedded discursive engagements that occur when participants work through theAaH
44 programme. This argument will question the assumptions that participants are interested in ‘greening’ their lifestyles, instead arguing that they are engaged in a process of self-evaluation and life politics. This project of life politics is part of their feeling that they have to ‘do something’ about current ways of living and interacting. By engaging withAaH, participants feel that they are already making a contribution. Constructing this argument questions, and offer new insights into, some of the main concepts that frame the debate about individuals and the environment, which include the ideas of ‘barriers-to-action’ and environmental responsibility. In total, these chapters offer an alternate theoretical framework for (re) considering some key sustainable lifestyle concepts.
Chapter 7 This final chapter will review the findings of this thesis. It shows how this research has offered a highly grounded critique of prevailing framings of sustainable lifestyles and behaviour change. It considers the robustness of this research’s theoretical framework in light of the preceding empirical analyses, as well as highlighting the contributions this research has made to theories used. It then examines how this research has entered into debates about methods and practice, considering what this thesis’ findings can suggest about the future of environmental communication strategies. It closes the thesis by outlining some of the limitations of this study and future potential research questions.
45 CHAPTER 2. ENVIRONMENTAL VALUES AND KNOWLEDGES: A CRITICAL LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 INTRODUCTION
This chapter examines contrasting epistemological frameworks used in investigations of the environmental paradigm over the past few decades. It will focus on how the paradigm has been framed, how individuals have been positioned within this framing and the implications of these approaches for lifestyle communications. The aim is to construct a theoretical framework founded upon contextual framings of the social agent, and of social processes that create and recreate social practices.
I begin by mapping out a broad history of this field of investigation, contrasting the human sciences with the social sciences. The prevailing positivist framing of the environmental paradigm is outlined, examining the individual’s position within it and also examining the forms of inquiry it makes use of, focusing on the sub-discipline of environmental psychology. This sub-discipline places the concept of values, and their relationship to preferences and actions, as central to its investigations.
I then examine how the social sciences have addressed the environmental paradigm. Early sociological theories followed the positivist lead by adopting realist frameworks and techniques of inquiry. Theories attempted to explain the rise in public expressions of environmental concern by positing macro-level explanations based on new forms of values and types of political mobilisation. However, this positivist perspective soon became subject to an internal epistemological critique, with more reflexive forms of inquiry emerging. This new agenda evoked debates about the relationships between culture and nature, and the constitution of society, institutions of governance, environmental values, and knowledges. One influential theoretical framing of the environmental paradigm. Beck’s ‘risk society’, is then discussed to show how this constructionist perspective has recast the environmental paradigm into a cultural, political and historical framework.
I then consider how both these approaches contribute to understanding forms of environmental communication. This begins by discussing how the predominant perspective of ‘rational individualism’ creates the scenario of a public ‘information deficit’. This scenario
46 suggests that knowledge can be conveyed through forms of public information, which, when read by individuals, will lead them to adopt environmentally friendly behaviour. This instrumental view is not helpful in investigating discursive processes and forms of social engagement. I then return to social theories and argue that to understand the impact of forms of communication, it is first necessary to investigate how the lifestyles and knowledges that are being questioned are formed and acted out.
Giddens’ structuration theory is a highly useful analytical tool for this purpose. It provides a framework that incorporates physical and discursive practices into a recursive patterning of social life. However Giddens lacks an adequate theory of social knowledge. To address this, I discuss theories of ‘local’ knowledges, arguing for a heterogeneous and critical stance in considering the forms of knowledge implied in the environmental paradigm. Finally, I consider how the diverse forms of knowledge that are mobilised by individuals become culturally constructed and shared. I argue for the adoption of a rhetorical stance to human cognition and to the construction of shared meanings and discourses. To conclude, I summarise the chapter by mapping out this thesis’ theoretical framework, which takes a highly embedded approach to lifestyles and the impacts of forms of environmental communication.
2.2 THE ENVIRONMENT: A POSITIVIST PERSPECTIVE
During the late 1960s, the 100-year-old conservation movement in the United States began to take on a new identity. There was a growing realisation that merely conserving wildlife and natural settings was not enough; environmental quality itself was under attack. It became evident that ecosystems and natural resources that serve as humankind’s life support systems were being jeopardised by depletion of natural resources, pollution, and overpopulation. During this period the conservation movement evolved into the environmental movement and psychology, especially applied behaviour analysis, joined in an effort to seek solutions to these problems. (Dwyer et al. 1993: 275)
This section begins with the extended quote above as it neatly summarises the epistemological ‘story’ I wish to tell. The quote sets out a series of events, often repeated as background to policy and academic writings on global environmental change, of how the current environmental paradigm arose. It tells of increased environmental degradation caused by human behaviours, which threatens all forms of existence. It also tells how people have responded, by mobilising in the form of a social movement and looking to new forms of research to help find workable solutions. This ‘story’ is already partially outlined in the previous chapter, which critically charted the emergence of the sustainable development paradigm. In this chapter I do not intend to duplicate this, but to build upon it by focusing on
47 the forms of inquiry and knowledge it implies, particularly in relation to the role of the individual in the environmental paradigm.
This above framing of the environmental paradigm is created by, and recreates, the prevailing positivist outlook held by many policy makers and some academics. It consists of a number of conceptual components, which is depicted in Figure 2.1.
Figure 2.1. A positivist framing of the environmental paradigm
NATURESOCIETY/ECONOMY
ENVIRONMENTAL INDIVIDUALS PARADIGM They make use of The over-use and mis resources to maximise management of global individual welfare THE environmental resources ENVIRONMENT An externalised \ sets of discrete A SOCIAL DILEMMA = resources or natural Individual resource uses must be modified capital ! Research questions : formed by the natural and social sciences / \ What motives underpin How can behaviours be resource use behaviour? altered?
Figure 2.1 picks out key concepts from a positivist framing of the environmental paradigm. These include how the environment is perceived; how the environmental paradigm has arisen; the place that individuals have in this framework; and, most critical for this chapter, the type of solutions that should be sought and followed, especially in terms of the behaviour of individuals. This framing has provided the mainstay of investigations into the causes and solutions of the environmental paradigm over the past few decades and will therefore be discussed in further detail below.
48 2.2.1 Setting up the paradigm
A positivist framing of the environmental paradigm is founded upon a nature-society dichotomy. The splitting of the natural from the social is part of a pervasive neo classical/environmental economics synthesis, which depicts the environment as an externalised set of resources, often called ‘natural capital’ (see Pearce and Turner 1990). This natural capital is part of the human economic system, used as inputs, called ‘resource flows’, which then become waste, called ‘residual flows’ (Common 1988). Thus, natural capital is considered a collective good. Systems of production and consumption aim to use this good via the economic market, which is founded upon the maximisation of resource efficiency and material profit; the central tenets of welfare economics. This framing of the environmental paradigm therefore does not question the status of the environment as a resource base. Rather, it suggests that environmental problems stem from the misuse and/or over-use of natural capital. Thus, environmental problems are an issue of sound resource management.
This approach also sets up a particular framing of the individual. Welfare economics is premised on the idea that the individual has ‘endogenous’ economic values. These values create motives, which guide resource use actions. The basis of these actions are to make use of environmental resources in a manner that maximises their utility and increases own individual gains (Pearce and Turner 1990). Thus, the environmental paradigm is founded upon the existence ofHomo economis (Evans 1991). However, through this framing.Homo economis is positioned in a conflict over natural capital use. This is because environmental resource use entails some form of self-restraint and consideration of long-term collective interests. That is, natural capital needs to be managed sustainably. This inherent conflict in the human use of natural capital is often called a ‘social dilemma’. This dilemma is the basis of Garret Hardin’s well-known scenario of the ‘tragedy of the commons’ (see Hardin and Baden 1977) which is based on the history and use of common agricultural land. It suggests that over time, the quality of common land declines as individuals exploit the land for their own gain, not considering the needs of others also using the land (Biel and Garling 1995). This creates a fundamental social conflict over resource use, which supports the need for collective management.
This social problem is also believed to be internalised by individuals as cognitive dispositions. The evidence for this is found in mathematical models and experimental cognitive work. For example, the tenets of ‘game theory’ give rise to the classic scenario such of the ‘prisoner’s dilemma’ (see Axelrod 1984). This theoretical approach suggests that individuals engaged in
49 a social dilemma act strategically to maximise their own benefits (Axelrod 1984). Thus, Homo economis is verified.
However, it has been long recognised that this experimental approach is strongly divorced from the realities of human interaction and negotiation (Biel and Garling 1995). These assumptions have been highly criticised for their overly rational, systemic and disembedded approach to both individuals and the environment (Daly and Cobb 1989). Yet, this has not prevented them from framing the prevailing epistemology of the environmental paradigm and its attendant solutions. Forms of inquiry to help overcome environmental problems have focused strongly upon the individual’s cognitive beliefs and behavioural outcomes. Therefore, this research will now be discussed to show how it has addressed the role of the individual in the environmental paradigm.
2.2.2 Setting up modes of inquiry
The social dilemma scenario suggests that changing individual resource use patterns is crucial in addressing environmental problems (Biel and Garling 1995). One line of research has examined ways of altering the infrastructures of resource distribution, to overcome the dynamics of this dilemma (see van Vugt and Samuelson 1999). Another line of inquiry suggests that tackling individual resource use necessitates understanding more about the contents of, and underpinning concepts implied in, individual’s perceptions of the environment. That is, how and why do individuals make the behavioural decisions that they do? Investigating these questions has been at the fore of positivist research agendas for decades, especially forms of experimental psychology and environmental economics. These disciplines make use of similar tools and concepts in their research, which include:
• concepts of the individual: individual resource use behaviours are founded upon stable and coherent values and attitudes towards the environment and the self (Tanner 1999, Gray 1985); and • ways of measuring the individual: these values and attitudes are accessible using quantitative, and often experimental, research techniques such as psychometric scales administered through questionnaires, the results of which are then formed into statistically significant composite models.
Along with the similarities in the tools and epistemologies of experimental psychology and environmental economics, these disciplines also have significant differences. Economic inquiry presupposes behavioural outcomes. That is, all individuals will try to act in a certain way when faced with a particular situation, consistent with underlying rationality. However,
50 forms of psychological inquiry are based upon the actual phenomenon of human behaviour. Despite emerging from the same positivist stable, human psychology is able to accommodate, and actually seeks to explain differences in human beliefs and actions. This renders it a more diverse field of knowledge in investigating the phenomena of environmental behaviours.
Over the decades, attempts to decipher the psychological basis of human environmental behaviours have resulted in the discipline of psychology engaging with complex arguments, and broadening its field of inquiry. This broadening has given rise to a specific sub-discipline that seeks to engage with particular questions about the current environmental paradigm: environmental psychology. Environmental psychology is more relevant to this research than other positivist forms of inquiry, due to its direct engagement with the human dimensions of the environmental paradigm from a phenomenological basis. To this end I now discuss the tenets of environmental psychology, before proceeding to discuss some of the contributions it has made to understanding the basis of, and how to go about changing, individual’s resource use patterns.
2.3 ENVIRONMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY
Environmental psychology is a distinct branch of psychological research that involves the examination of the “experimental analysis of ecologically relevant behaviour” (Hackett 1995: 40). It makes use of the central concepts and tools of other positivist forms of inquiry, outlined above, but it also differs in three main ways because it:
• takes an ecological perspective on research agendas; • emphasises scientific strategies for solving community/environment problems; and • adopts an interdisciplinary approach (Stokolos 1978, quoted in Hackett 1995).
Environmental psychology originated in a growth of interest in the psychology of individual’s relationship with the environment, which began in the 1970s (Stem and Dietz 1994). This approach looked at issues of environmental cognition, spatial awareness and spatial behaviours. Over the following decades attention increasingly turned to investigations of environmental cognition, with a primary interest in the forces that guide behaviours towards the environment and that give rise to individual’s environmental concerns (Schultz and Zelezny 1999). These investigations consisted of two strands of operational rationale, existing for both theoretical and policy reasons (Hackett 1995). By utilising the environment as a set of questions, environmental psychology captured a new opportunity to elucidate the inner workings of human psychology. Environmental questions operated as a useful case study for examining long term changes in attitudes and behaviour (Werner et al. 1995). It
51 aimed to investigate “ways of reasoning that remain constant with each person across content issues” (Robbins and Greenwaid 1994: 30). In addition, environmental psychology aids in finding solutions to environmental problems, by encouraging changes in human behaviour (Stem 1992).
Environmental psychology has thus become a forerunner in investigations of possible solutions to global environmental problems. It asks questions about phenomenological differences in human behaviour and cognition in relation to environmental concern and resource use decisions (Krause 1993). The starting point of these investigations is the concept of cognitive values, and their links with behaviour. Therefore in the following section I explore how environmental psychologists have addressed the concept of values and action, and the results of research carried out into these concepts.
2.3.1 Values and motives: what are they?
Values provide a framework of criteria concerning what is to count as a valid argument in regard to a particular issue, what is a reasonable stance to take regarding it. (Peacock 1997: 73)
Values are viewed by environmental psychology as a basic evaluative criterion** (Schwartz and Bilsky 1987). They are stable and consistent across issues within an individual (Macnaghten and Urry 1998). Values frame perspectives on how the world should be, enabling judgements about what is valuable and what is ‘good’ (Sagoff 1988). They are significant, as research suggests value orientations correlate with beliefs about the environmental consequences of human activity (Stem et al. 1993), as well as intentions to perform environmentally friendly behaviours and self-reported environmentally friendly behaviours (Karp 1996). Thus, they are the building blocks of subsequent opinions and actions.
To understand the differences in values and their relation to environmental concem, numerous classifications have been built. Paul Stem and colleagues have lead the way in suggesting how environmental values relate to a more general set of values that can be divided into three groups. These include:
• egoism, that focuses on the effects of environmental problems on the individual; • social-altmism, which focuses on benefits to others; and
** It does not concem measuring and reflecting the worth and utility of nature, as in such processes as environmental valuation, which seek to gauge the inherent quality of an item or object (for example, see Foster 1997).
52 • bio-centrism, which focuses on the intrinsic value of nature (Stem and Dietz 1994).
Specific environmental concerns are evoked by these sets of fundamental values. For example, one person may express concerns about the environment because they believe that nature has an intrinsic value and should be preserved for its own sake: this is bio-centrism. Another person may express concern because they are worried that environmental degradation may effect their own personal health: this is egoism. These core values are also closely related to other sets of values. Research has suggested that individuals who express high levels of responsibility (Gray 1985, Kaiser and Shimoda 1999) or show self-interest and collectivist values (Garling 1998) will also have relatively high levels of environmental concem. This makes concem a function of a moral belief, of what is the right and wrong thing to do (see Thogersen 1996, Robbins and Greenwaid 1994). It is also believed that individual’s values guide their perceptions and judgements. The importance of values becomes more resonant when its relationship with attitudes and behavioural outcomes is considered.
2.3.2 What are values related to?
The normative hypothesis is that individuals who care for the environment have a specific world view or sets of values which can be differentiated and isolated in terms of expressions of specific attitudes (Stem et al. 1993). The term ‘attitude’ has become the mainstay of psychological investigations into environmental concems (Kaiser et al. 1999). Attitudes have been defined as evaluative responses based on beliefs, or feelings, and/or past behaviour, or as part of a pathway of associative networks (Tesser and Shaffer 1990). They have also been defined as a set of leamed dispositions or responses to a given object that occur in a consistent manner (Fishbein and Ajzen 1975). They are either issue specific, such as an attitude towards recycling glass bottles, or are seen as an underlying attitude complex, such as an attitude towards use and disposal of natural resources (Hackett 1995). I do not intend to enter further into a debate about definitions. Instead I consider links between the concept of attitude and action.
Attitudes and values are considered to play a significant role in influencing the level and scope of pro-environmental behaviour (Karp 1996). Environmental psychology has sought to establish methods of locating significant predictors of ecological behaviour, through examining the relationships between attitudes and actions, such as in the ‘theory of reasoned action’. The structure of this theory can be seen clearly in Figure 2.2. This model is a:
53 series of hypothesis linking beliefs to behaviour, with each hypothesis requiring empirical verification. (Ajzen and Fishbein 1980: 81)
Thus, it aims to predict behavioural outcomes by constructing a conceptual model of human cognition and behaviour.
Figure 2.2. Fishbein and Ajzen s model of reasoned action (from Fishbein and Ajzen 1975)
Behavioural beliefs Attitude Evaluations N Intention Behaviour Opinion of relevant others Subjective / norm Motivation to comply /
Many studies have used this theory as a predictive model, with mixed results. Some have shown that there is a significant relationship between intention to recycle and attitude towards recycling (Thogersen 1996). Yet, critiques abound, which stress not only its construction of the human subject, but also the isolated decision-making and attitude-to-action processes evoked (see Argyle 1992, Billig 1987, Shotter 1993). However it should be stated explicitly that its authors did not intend to represent actual cognitive process. Rather they sought to establish a robust computational structure, to gain an understanding and predict intention towards an action:
Of course, regression modelling tells us nothing about cause and effect. It only shows us if there is a statistically significant association between certain characteristics and behaviour patterns. (Taylor 1997: 133)
Why this model matters is not so much its strength as a predictive tool but rather the fact that is has become part of the received wisdom of environment and science policy implementation (Blake 1999). Although it was not the intention, it has inadvertently come to represent a model of human cognitive processes, creating a legacy of highly realist approaches to the
54 relationship between, and the constitution of, individual values and overt behaviour (Kaiser et al. 1999, Rudig 1993).
However, environmental psychology has more recently awakened to hypothesis that ‘other’ or ‘non psychology’ factors are also important in predicting behaviour. Considerable headway has been made in including these as a component of research. For example, Grob (1995) developed a structural model linking environmental concem to factors such as emotions, perceived control, personal values, environmental awareness and environmental behaviour. This creates a multivariate relationship between values, attitudes and behaviour (see Kaiser et al. 1999, Samuelson 1990). Grob (1995: 218) in conclusion to his model building, suggested that including contextual factors improve the power of behavioural explanation.
In future studies, it would be worthwhile to include other categories of influence (i.e. socio-economic, geographical, and cultural location) to gain a more comprehensive pattern of the extent to which environmental behaviours are due to physical, individual, social, societal, historical and cultural influences.
At this point the strengths of social science research becomes apparent, because it is able to address these challenges. This will be discussed in the following section.
2.3.3 Summary
From rather narrow theoretical beginnings, environmental psychology has continued to broaden as a discipline over the past few decades, choosing to acknowledge the complexity of individual’s relationship with their environment. It has provided several useful insights into this area of research, placing the issue of personal values at the centre of the environmental paradigm. In addition to the above, Grob (1995) showed thatthe strongest effect on environmental behaviour were personal values. Contrary to received wisdom, the weakest effect was factual environmental awareness. In examining values, it has been shown that differences in human relations to the environment, and responses to the environmental paradigm, are deep-seated and possibly linked to individual’s world-views and personalities. It has also hints at the social mediation of these values and behaviour by showing how economic and cultural factors may also be instrumental in forming individual’s views. By taking into consideration an array of ‘other’ external variables, it has started to move away from the purely cognitive view of the environmental paradigm, to a more contextual consideration. This links it to forms of early social science investigations, which were also founded upon values and related variables. However, the closeness of the research agendas has decreased over the proceeding decades, as the social sciences have become ever more vocal in their criticisms of the exemplary reductionism of various branches of
55 psychology, which belie the complexity of contemporary social life (Cuba and Lincoln 1998, Hackett 1995).
Social scientists have highlighted the very serious limitations that positivism places upon methods of investigations and the questions that can be addressed.
Sometimes social psychologists give the impression that, if they could only get hold of that ‘belief system’ and trace its inner lineaments, all uncertainties would be resolved. (Billig 1993: 284)
Macnaghten and Urry (1998) have presented an extended critique of the limitations of environmental psychology in investigating the environmental paradigm and it is not my intention to rehearse them at length here. Instead, I briefly chart the evolution of strands of social science research below, showing both the similarities and differences from the human science approaches.
2.4 INVESTIGATING THE ENVIRONMENT: THE EVOLUTION OF THE SOCIAL SCIENCES
The social sciences present a very different form of inquiry to environmental psychology. Social theory seeks to offer up analyses of how society is, its structures, driving forces of power and agency, and human constitution- fundamentally, to capture social life. In examining these relations, it has moved inquiry of the environmental paradigm away from the response-stimulus model of human-environment relations outlined above, seeking instead to embed understandings into broader patterns of social change, by offering up complex and political framings of the environmental paradigm.
Social theory has changed over the past few decades, in terms of how it addresses investigations into the human dimensions of the environmental paradigm. I begin this discussion by showing how, mostly under the discipline of sociology, broad society-level theories of social change were offered up as early diagnosis of the environmental paradigm. As other disciplines became implicated in these investigations, and the epistemological underpinnings of social theories have changed and fragmented, realist theories have given way to a more ‘discursive turn’, causing social scientists to re-examine their own theoretical assumptions and tools of inquiry. In doing so, a re-examination of the nature of the environmental paradigm has also been facilitated. This is seen in the emergence of debates about the nature/society dichotomy and the place of social constructionist theories in this debate. Studies have sought to capture the political and pervasive nature of current environmental issues. One such theory is Beck’s risk society thesis. His diagnosis of
56 modernity places human political relations with the environment as central to the constitution of modem society. He also emphasises concepts that will prove important to this research, such as knowledges, ‘reflexive modernization' and individualisation, that will be discussed further below.
2.4.1 Sociology and environmental movements
Roughly speaking, the role of the social scientist is seen as that of addressing the social causes, impacts and responses to environmental problems which have been initially and accurately described by the natural scientist—a kind of ‘Biology and Science First’ model. (Macnaghten and Urry 1998: 6)
Since the 1970s an increasingly diverse array of theories pertaining to environmental relations have developed in the social sciences (Milton 1996). For the most part, these theories have followed the pattern, described in the quote above, whereby social scientists examine the ‘social’ side to the environmental paradigm model as laid out by the natural sciences. The general thrust of the positivist framing was accepted, supporting the division between nature and society, science and culture. In this section I consider some social theories that have addressed the human responses to the environmental paradigm, asking why and how the environment had become a real and salient issue in many post-industrial countries in the last thirty years or more.
Early social science theories suggested that the basic human response to the increase in environmental problems has been an increase in environmental concem: a similar cause and effect, stimulus and response model that positivist theories employ (Szerszynski et al. 1996). The belief that this response exists is founded upon social trends reported in large-scale public opinion polls, which, during the 1970s and 1980s showed a marked increase in individuals expressing environmental concems (Dunlap 1991, Dunlap and van Liere 1984, Witherspoon and Martin 1993, Young 1992). These approaches differ from economic and psychology models in suggesting a form of social mediation in the environmental paradigm. That is, sets of public values around issues of the environment have a social basis (Milton 1996).
In chapter 1 I briefly discussed Inglehart’s (1977, 1990) theory on the widespread emergence of post-materialist values. Based upon Maslow’s concept of a ‘hierarchy of needs’, this theory suggests that once individual’s basic physiological needs have been met, as was the experience of many people living in post-industrial countries at the end of the last century, other less pressing concems come to the fore; of which the environment is one. Concems about the environment mark out fundamental socio-economic differences inherent in post industrial societies. Other theories suggest that the resonance of environmentalism is more
57 akin to a form of new social movement. Gare (1995) argues that increases in environmental concem are the expression and result of the emergence of a new middle class who are spearheading a social movement. They are using their concem for the environment as a political tool, to reinforce social positions and express anxieties, rather than being a simple response to problems ‘out there’ (Hannigan 1995).
In general, these theories have created a more contextual, political and socially mediated picture of the environmental paradigm, moving it away from positivist framings. However, they have been considered by many as too strongly placed in the realist realm of investigations to offer up any in-depth form of analysis. The following discussion will map out the contents of these objections, showing how they paved the way for a radical reconsideration of the human positioning in the environmental paradigm.
2.4.2 Criticisms of environmental sociology
The socially-mediated realist framing offered by early environmental sociology still prevails in policy approaches to the social science’s contribution to sustainable development and global environmental change (see Szerszynski et al. 1996). However, within the academy, these framings have been subject to a great deal of criticism over the past decade. These criticisms are outlined as follows:
• Social movement: “Some analyses, probably the vast majority, have taken for granted the status of environmentalism as a social movement” (Milton 1996: 79). Yet there is little evidence to suggest that, within the UK at least, it is possible to speak of a unified environmental movement (see Buttel and Taylor 1994, Yearley 1994).
• Green values: it is questionable whether new sets of ‘green values’ have ever emerged. Research has questioned the existence of coherent worldviews and values, ‘green’ or otherwise (Witherspoon and Martin 1993). Positing the existence of post-materialist values presumes a closed system of thinking and evaluation exists around concepts, and that a coherent paradigm exists that pertains solely to the environment (Macnaghten and Urry 1998).
• Environmental concern: environmentalism does not stand as a distinctive set of ideas and practices (Young 1992, Schultz and Zelezny 1999) but is instead a “multi-faceted construction which welds together a clutch of philosophies, ideologies, scientific specialities and policy initiatives” (Hannigan 1995: 56).
58 • Tools of the trade: positivist tools, such as questionnaires, have been the mainstays of some forms of social science research but have been frequently criticised both from inside and outside the discipline (see Krause 1993, Macnaghten and Urry 1998). It is argued they give a false picture of levels of environmental concem for many reasons. These include how the process of asking questions about the environment skews responses towards the ‘environmentally correct’ answer (Witherspoon and Martin 1993, Dunlap 1998, Tesser and Shaffer 1990); the fact that they are unreliable measures of actual behaviour (Stem 1992, Corral-Verdugo 1997); and that the underlying concepts and terms used are open to a wide array of interpretations owing to their ambiguity (Krause 1993, Rutherford 1998).
These criticisms question the very basis of the social sciences analysis of the environmental paradigm. If there are no coherent sets of values or a broad social movement, what is the basis of human framing of the environmental paradigm? Buttel and Taylor (1994) have suggested that in the face of these criticisms environmental sociology must now attend to the social constmction of environmental knowledge, which will give rise to new forms of inquiry. This cultural inquiry and critique has indeed been taking place, sparking a more reflexive approach to sociology (see Macnaghten and Urry 1998). It has also broadened out the range of disciplines involved in the debate, no longer making it the domain of sociology but also including human geography, philosophy and feminism, to name but a few. It has introduced new concepts and epistemological tools. The most fundamental form this new inquiry has taken can be seen in the emergence of debates about the social construction of nature and the environment, which will now be discussed, in further detail.
2.4.3 Social constructionism and the environmental paradigm
Social science disciplines such as sociology have evolved over the centuries to explain the social realm alone, splitting nature and culture quite strongly (Redclift and Woodgate 1994). Indeed this nature and society dualism has been a central dogma in social theory (Descola and Palsson 1996). To understand the social complexity of the environmental paradigm, it is now vital to move towards a richer understanding of how it becomes constructed by, and between, individuals in the social world, by examining forms of knowing and acting and their cultural constitution.
The past 15 years has seen the emergence of a interdisciplinary field of critical theory which aims to decipher the means by which nature, and concepts of the environment, are constructed and reconstructed, through multiple relations, various actors, and varying forms of social power (Castree and Braun 1998). Social constructionist perspectives essentially argue that nature is not intrinsically separate from culture, but is bound up in social practices, that are
59 both socially and culturally constructed (Macnaghten and Urry 1998). Sibeon (1999: 317) has coined the term ‘anti-reductionist’ sociology to exemplify this emergent theoretical movement, no longer seeking to locate a unifying meta-theory but instead looking for a “sensitising theoretical perspective”. It arises out of critiques of reductionist sociology, drawing from several theoretical schools and resulting in differing theoretical approaches such as Actor Network Theory (see Gallon 1986), constructionist sociology (see below) and Foucault’s sociology of power (see Foucault 1980). This is not a harmonious body of theory. There are marked differences, mostly contingent upon the credence given to the pervasive nature of social constructions and social relations of power and discourse (Sibeon 1999).
Over the past decade, there have been a plethora of forms of social constructionist perspectives emerging within social theory, which focus on the plausible ‘reality’ of nature. There are ‘mild’ forms that suggest that social reality is a shared and cultural product, but that material and physical reality is not. There are also more radical forms of constructionism, which suggest that everything within human perception is a social construct. Haraway states that nature cannot pre-exist its construction, removing any idea of inherent environmental value (Castree and Braun 1998). This form avoids making assessments of reality, but looks instead at the emergence and organisation of claims-making activities (Bumingham and Cooper 1999). It has been contested within the social sciences, mostly for its denial of ‘direct perception’ of the world, outside of models and symbols (Milton 1996). Constructionist approaches have been considered too relativist (Shotter 1993), with a major criticism being, if all truth claims are valid, how do we act?
Bumingham and Cooper (1999) argue back that social construction theories have been generalised, misread and misinterpreted, especially by realist critics. Instead of stating that nothing has a meaning outside of social categories, they assert instead that the examination of the processes by which meanings are embodied in these categories is of merit. For example, a monkey does exist even if it not called as such by a human. What is of interest is the process by which a monkey gets its name and how the category of ‘monkey’ becomes established. Therefore research should not focus on whether the environment is a product of the social, but instead consider the conditions which give rise to particular understandings of nature within a social milieu, and the different forms of knowing. This raises questions about social processes and forms of social relations.
This form of constructionist inquiry and framework has been instmmental in forming some of the most influential political theories of the environmental paradigm. It offers a useful analytical tool for ‘middle range’ research, which seeks to marry contextual theoretical
60 approaches with empirical analysis. It is worth rehearsing one such theory—Beck’s theory of the risk society—for two reasons. First, it shows social constructionism ‘in action’, and how taking this epistemological approach questions the very nature of the environmental paradigm. Second, it begins to highlight some of the key concepts that will become central to this thesis and will be discussed in greater detail later in this chapter.
2.4.4 Beck and the risk society
The past decade has seen the emergence of theories of high modernity that have sought to locate the human position in the environmental paradigm in contextual frameworks of social, political and economic relations. These theories are underpinned by constructionist epistemologies, which stress that environmental issues primarily concem human culture and politics (Szerszynski et al. 1996). One such theory is Ulrich Beck’s thesis of the risk society. Based upon the historical and cultural experiences of post-industrial nations such as Germany, Beck (1992, 1994, 1995, 1996) has written extensively on his thesis that the current state of modernity is formed and framed by the all-pervasive existence of profound global environmental risks. These risks have come about due to the technological and political histories of industrialised countries but they are not simply outcomes of historical processes. The social relations implicated in these processes also define them. In his 1992 book. Beck suggested that industrial nations have passed, and are passing through, three consecutive structural and epistemological stages, contingent upon economic and political relations. Many countries in Europe and the United States are now firmly within the third and final stage, which involves living with and in the consequences of scientific and industrial developments wherein technology and innovation have created personal and ecological risks that stretch through time and space, and are now beyond human control.
The implications of these risks do not just concem scientific and regulatory issues, but also frame and create all forms of political relations in post-industrial nations (Jasanoff 1999). This is because risks:
exhibit a tendency to globalization and in this sense brings into being supra-national and non-class-specific global hazards with a new type of social and political dynamism. (Beck 1992: 13)
This dynamism is marked by the erosion of traditional and demarcated forms of knowledge and practice, such as class, politics and science, giving ways to new, permeable and more self-aware forms of being and acting. This process is depicted in Figure 2.3, which aims to capture the main historical movements from modemity to the emergence of the risk society.
61 Figure 2.3. From tradition to modernity: the rise of the risk society
Industrial society Post-industrial society TIME
Manageable risks R I Risks become all ^ ------^ Individualization S Politics pervasive and no longer manageable K S 0 S ^ _____ ^ Critique of Class c PL 0 science I c c Reflexive LJ Science modernization 1 T E 4 4 Sub-politics Y T Y
Central to this argument is the emergence of new forms of knowledge and political relations, brought about by the state of reflexive modernization (Beck 1992). Beck argues that as ubiquitous forms of risk emerge, society becomes more self-aware. This new awareness promotes a critique of scientific knowledge, a form of knowledge and action that once was able to explain and contain all environmental ‘bads’. This critique is democratised and thus the foundations of society, in terms of forms of social cohesion, become open to question (Beck 1994).
Reflexive modernization is doubly important in this research because it is also a form of self- confrontation (Beck 1996). With the loss of old certainties and the reflexive turn of political life, individuals have to make all important life decisions, constructing their own biographies (Giddens 1994). This creates the process of individualisation “in which agents become ever more free from the normative expectations of social institutions” (Szerszynski et al. 1996: 2). This term does not imply the epistemologies of economic and psychological models cited above or the mean the same as the sanctity of the economic consumer (Beck 1998). Instead it means that the individual is left as “the bearer of rights, responsibilities and meanings” (Bulkeley 1998: 263). There is:
62 the emergence of individualised forms and conditions of existence, which compel people to make themselves the center of their own planning and conduct of life. (Beck 1992: 88)
With this, there emerges a form of ‘sub-politics’, where agents outside the traditional political system shape issues and merge into temporary collectives to act out their political agendas (Beck 1994). Another influential theorist, Anthony Giddens, concurs with this diagnosis. He argues that the post-traditional order of high modemity give rise to new mechanisms of self- identity, that shape and are also shaped by relations with institutions and the forms of knowledges that they embody (Giddens 1991).
These theories of Beck and Giddens position the individual in the environmental paradigm, not just as a passive acceptor of knowledge but one who actively questions, constmcts and monitors their own, and others, ways of knowing. This assertion will prove important in later chapters.
2.4.5 Summary
The above section has briefly charted the emergence and evolution of key social science debates concerning the environmental paradigm. It has been argued that early sociological and political theories attempted to offer broad macro-level explanations of the emergence of environmental concerns. In doing so, they accepted the prevailing realist diagnosis of environmental problems, seeking to understand how these problems become translated into social action, mediated by large-scale social structures and institutions.
Through time, these theories were found unsatisfactory for examining and explaining the variety of differences and social complexities that exist around environmental debates. This critique, along with developments and fragmentations of genres in the social sciences, gave rise to a more reflexive form of questioning. For example, ‘ anti-reductionist’ sociology (Sibeon 1999) has questioned the very existence of the nature/society dichotomy that previous theories were founded upon. This created an interest in social constructionist theories. These theories sought to understand how social individuals are implicated in perceptions of the environment, and how these perceptions are continually constructed and reconstructed in social processes. One theory that has developed these ideas, and has offered a highly influential diagnosis of modem society, is that of Beck’s risk society thesis. With the development of the concept of reflexive modernization, this theory has been instrumental in positioning the importance of forms of self-identity and knowledge in on-going debates about the nature of the environmental paradigm.
63 I now wish to take these concepts forward to investigate how forms of knowledge are implicated in communications about the environment, which is the focus of this thesis. Environmental psychology has placed values as central to the debate. Even if the discipline’s static framing of the concept does not have particular resonance, there is still credence in the assertion that individual’s positions within the environmental paradigm have some relationship with what they consider to be important and valued. Social theories have added a mediated, shared and constructionist perspective to the concept of values, placing the individual as an active and knowledgeable agent in contemporary political milieus. This framing is one that is taken forward in the remainder of this thesis, along with the forms of inquiry it implicates.
I now take a closer look at this framing, in relation to the topic of investigation of this thesis; that is, how do these theories of a socially situated and culturally embedded actor marry with current debates about the content, affective influence and cultural positioning of forms of environmental communication? I begin this discussion by outlining the prevailing position that exists in debates on environmental communications, which is once again in the realm of positivist thinking. This shows how forms of information that relate to individual lifestyles focus on the outcomes of behavioural change, thereby constructing a particular ‘information deficit’ scenario. I then proceed in the remainder of the chapter to further explore particular social theories that can establish a more positioned and contextual approach to the concepts and scenarios set up by positivist framings.
2.6 ENVIRONMENTAL COMMUNICATIONS AND BEHAVIOUR CHANGE: CONSIDERING THE ROLE OF INFORMATION AND KNOWLEDGE
The importance of public communications in the sustainable development project has already been mapped out in chapter 1 where they were shown to be part of a policy toolkit for encouraging individuals to adopt environmentally friendly lifestyles. It is also a central technique in experimental attempts to facilitate behaviour changes, such as those conducted by environmental psychology. This framing is based on the assumption that information is able to create behaviour change, as individuals learn new facts and adopt new forms of knowledge. The apparent lack of change in individual lifestyles in countries such as the UK is considered to be caused by an ‘information deficit’. This section maps out the main components of this information deficit scenario, arguing that this framing of lifestyle information does not provide adequate consideration of the cultural and social aspects of communication and behaviours. Therefore, it is necessary to construct a theoretical
64 framework for this thesis using components of social theories that pertain to knowledges and practices.
2.6.1 Encouraging tangible behaviour change
The widespread communication of information, from experts to the public, is considered to be central to encouraging pro-environmental behaviour changes (De Young 1993). De Young has constructed a typology of the numerous techniques available for implementing behaviour change, presented in the Table 2.1. The shaded box contains the different forms of information used in prevailing behaviour change programmes.
Table 2.1. Tvpology of behaviour change techniques (De Young 1993)
Behaviour change techniques Source of Information Positive Motivation Coercion change Environment / • Declarative • Material incentives • Material Others knowledge • Social support disincentives (Tangible) • Procedural knowledge • Social Pressure • Feedback • Legal mandates • Modelling • Prompting Internal • Direct experience • Commitment • Sense of duty (Intangible) • Personal insight • Intrinsic satisfactions • Feeling of • Self-monitored • Sense of competence remorse feedback • Sense of confidence
Table 2.1 shows that information is believed to produce tangible behaviour changes. In contrast, the ‘Intangible’ categories of change are rarely addressed directly in research and behaviour change programmes, as De Young suggests they appear to be generated through self-directed processes. Thus, they are rarely factored into experimental design and research. This is not a trivial point. It denotes a substantial gap in environmental psychology’s understandings of the emergence and on-going evaluations of individual values and behaviours. This will be returned to again below and will indeed become a key point in my thesis. At this point however, I wish to consider how information is believed to provide tangible behaviour change. I argue that the prevailing positivist view suggests that information has a positive affective influence over individuals who are exposed to it. This assumption frames the position of the individual and of knowledge in the environmental paradigm, as being subject to a public information deficit.
65 2.6.2 The affective nature of information
We suspect that beliefs about the effects of environmental conditions on the self, because they depend a great deal on second-hand information and are not tightly linked to self-identity, should be changeable on the basis of new information. (Stem etal. 1993:342)
De Young’s (1993) typology of behaviour change techniques suggests that environmental information can take many forms. It can provide facts about scientific concepts such as global warming (declarative knowledge) or provide information that contains practical steps to be taken (procedural knowledge). There is also a role for feedback, such as monitoring household energy use (see Brandon and Lewis 1999). Some forms of information, such as that provided by Global Action Plan, can be an amalgam of two, or more, of these forms of knowledge.
What happens when individuals read this information? The resulting process is believed to be wholly cognitive. Information represents different forms of knowledge, such as facts, principles or theories (Gray 1985). These varying forms of knowledge require different cognitive processes to take place to enable information to be processed (Gray 1985). Once their processes have been activated, individuals read and digest it, transforming it into part of their personal knowledge base. Ehrlich et al (1999: 268) define knowledge as:
accurate information that has been organized and evaluated by a human mind. Under this definition, information does not become knowledge until it is organized in a way that makes it useful.
When this new form of knowledge becomes established within the individual’s knowledge base, it can act as a new source of information that will potentially influence future decisions about behaviour (Ajzen and Fishbein 1980, Karp 1996, Terry 1993). This strong affective value therefore marks out the integral role that information has in the environmental paradigm, which will now be discussed further.
2.6.3 The role of information
Widespread knowledge growth is believed to lead towards the alleviation of environmental problems and the implementation of sustainable development (Macnaghten and Urry 1998). However, over the past few decades, even though there is more known about the environment, the adoption of environmentally friendly ways of living has not increased significantly and the lack of public awareness is constantly bemoaned (Szerszynski et al. 1996). As realist disciplines are founded upon the connection between values and action, it is assumed that lack of action means there is a lack of environmental values, which can be
66 altered by new information. Thus, there is a public ‘information deficit’ (Burgess et al. 1998). The evidence for this gap rests on publics not appearing to have that strong a grasp of scientific facts of global environmental change (Bulkeley 1998, Krause 1993), as well as very low levels of participation in public environmental schemes (Blake 1999). It is not the case that the science of global environmental change is not a coherent enough body of knowledge, but simply that is not being communicated to those who need it (Trudgill 1990).
These numerous assumptions have given rise to a specific framing of the role of information and its relationship to the individual, which is depicted in Figure 2.4. The factors that stand between information and action are called ‘barriers-to-action’ which are an array of physical and personal variables, that are knowledge-based, technological, economic, social and political in nature (Tanner 1999).
67 Figure 2.4. The information deficit model
‘REAL’ ENVIRONMENTAL PROBLEMS UNCOVERED BY SCIENCE
Barriers to action
New Use new knowledge knowledge in SOCIETY = decisions Change An behaviour aggregate Information Learn of Deficit information Change rational attitudes individuals and intentions
Barriers to action
In summary, the above Figure offers a highly cognitive and realist positioning of both the role of information in the environmental paradigm, and the individual’s responses to information. This scenario contrasts with contextual approaches to understanding environmental issues, offered by social theories.
Social approaches suggest that valid contributions to changing how people think and behave require us to address values, beliefs and cultural assumptions, and how these all relate to cultural meanings (Reser 1995). The above framing provides none of this work, instead privileging forms of knowledge and assuming a great deal about how behaviour is constituted. This instrumental view is therefore not an appropriate approach with which to examine the place of environmental communications in individual’s lives. Therefore, I now proceed to build a more socially embedded framework to take forward for the remainder of this thesis. This will allow the examination of meanings embodied in, and the individual’s reactions to, the AaH programme.
2.7 PRACTICES, KNOWLEDGE AND MAKING MEANINGS
This section will address how social theories can help to construct an understanding of the potential positioning and impacts of lifestyle communications on individuals. To achieve this, it is first necessary to examine how the behaviours that communications question are constituted, and their role in forms of social order. I begin by returning to social
68 constructionist debates, arguing that they often leave open considerations of the constitution of day-to-day individual action. To overcome this, some researchers have adopted a useful co-evolutionary perspective, such as Anthony Giddens’ development of ‘structuration theory’ (1984). I map out the key arguments in Giddens’ work, showing how his theory of the inter related levels of human consciousness is useful in marrying together the physical and discursive into patterns of on-going, embedded, and meaningful practices. Giddens’ work is also useful in understanding how these practices are implicated in the production of structural entities, with their unintended consequences forming the conditions and contexts of future action. I then argue that one aspect of Giddens’ theory is lacking; that is, his approach to forms of knowledge. Despite his emphasis on knowledge, he presents an excessively rationalist and isolated view of the individual social actor. This suggests that it is important to investigate the concept of knowledges further, as well as the role of social interactions in the creation of knowledge and meanings.
2.7.1 Understanding forms of practice
Research now needs to address the more fundamental question of what the processes underlying environmentally friendly behaviours are. (Pelletier et al. 1996: 7)
Realist approaches to lifestyle communications take a highly functionalist view of individual behaviour, examining it as discrete entities that serve particular purposes for the individual. The aim of this research is not just to examine the endpoint of any behaviour changes that result from taking part in AaH but more importantly to consider the processes that individuals engage in during the programme, both physical and discursive. Therefore it is important to build a picture of behaviour, and its constitution, that is able to place it in the on going and multiple processes and practices of everyday life thatAaH intersects with. This returns this thesis to discussions of theories of social construction to ask how they can be used to understand the social ordering of everyday lives.
This chapter has already favoured ‘mild’ forms of constructionist approaches, which focus on the processes of creating, using and reinforcing social meanings. However, these forms of constructionist thinking often leave blank, or at least open, the implications of how cultural meanings contribute to the shaping of social ordering. It is vital to clarify this point, to understand the context within which sustainable lifestyles actions and discourses are carried out. The key, therefore, is to find a meaningful theory of social ordering and its implications for the constitution of individual behaviour. Rather than external structural entities being static constructs, it is useful to see them more as the set of social conditions, in which:
69 Actors are influenced, constrained or enabled by a variety of, very often, unstable and shifting conditions among which are included the objectives of other actors and the variable outcomes of actions taken by other previous as well as current actors. (Sibeon 1999: 323)
They are highly spatially and temporally contingent, constantly produced and reproduced. Structures are not timeless entities but are instead sustained social conditions, relations and practices that extend across stretches of time and space.
This approach has moved beyond static debates about whether structures or the powers of individual agency are the key to understanding social ordering, instead suggesting a co- evolutionary perspectives on the basis of material foundations of human interaction with the environment (see Redclift and Woodgate 1994, Woodgate and Redclift 1998). One influential theory is Anthony Giddens’ structuration theory (1984), which I now discuss in greater detail in the following section.
2.7.2 Structuration theory
Giddens’ (1984) structuration theory helped to move sociological theory beyond the polarised concepts of agency and structure, focusing instead on the on-going processes of social life and their role in constituting patterns of ordering at all levels of society, implicating both the individual and institutions in a unified theory of practice and process. What is pivotal about this theory is the link it makes between recursive and routine actions, discursive practices and the perpetuation of structural entities, making it highly relevant for an investigation of lifestyles. I now map out the key parts of this theory that will be used in this research, focusing on how Giddens constructs a picture of the knowledgeable human agent, and how this agent is implicated in the recursive pattemings of social order.
• The individual and structuration Giddens (1984, 1991) suggests that human practices are founded upon three levels of human consciousness, which are:
1. unconscious motives / cognition: a significant feature of human conduct is based in the need for ontological security; 2. practical consciousness: how actors know implicitly to carry on in their daily lives, without giving the reasons for their practices direct verbal expression; and 3. discursive consciousness: being able to give reasons for particular items of conduct, and other discursive practices.
70 To begin with unconscious motives, patterns of routine actions and the establishment of relationships of trust enable individuals to feel secure in their day-to-day activities. These patterns are founded upon the need for, as well as creating a sense of, ontological security. This makes patterns of routinization the bedrock of individual security, creating the distinctive “recursive nature of social life” (Giddens 1984: xxiii). Practical and discursive consciousness are the forms of knowledge that individuals make use of in going about their daily routines. Giddens continually stresses the importance of the knowledgeability of the individual agent to his theory. Routine actions of individuals, whose knowledge exists in practical consciousness, are not carried out as automatons but are instead constantly monitored as, “The knowledge they possess is not incidental to the persistent patterning of social life but is integral to it” (Giddens 1984: 26). This stresses, as indeed Beck does, the centrality of the reflexive capacity of individuals in the practices implicated in contemporary lives.
Structuration theory also provides a highly embedded view of individual lifestyles. They are no longer simply patterns of action that mark out differences between individuals (Chaney 1996) but instead consist of sets of physical and discursive practices. The concept of practices is highly important to this research as:
It is specific social practices, especially of people’s dwelling, which produce, reproduce and transform different natures and different values. (Macnaghten and Urry 1998: 2)
These practices are discursively ordered, embodied and involve models of activity, risk, agency and trust (Macnaghten and Urry 1998), making practices the place were environmental meanings, discourses and acts are created and recreated.
• Principles of structuration The on-going creative process of practices also has other implications for structuration theory. Giddens suggests that the recursive nature of practices creates conditions of future actions, through both their intended and unintended consequences. This process is represented in Figure 2.5. Through recursive practices, consequences of actions feed back into social reproduction across periods of time and create sets of social conditions that are beyond the framing of particular actions. For example, consider car use in the UK today. A car user has intentions when driving their car, which are both the physical purpose of undertaking a journey and perhaps also the social purpose of enabling and expressing personal freedom. One unintended consequence of car use is the harmful emissions produced, which contribute to global environmental change. Also, being a regular car user supports the cultural norm that
71 we are a nation of car users who need to move about routinely in this manner. This in turn sets up governance conditions of more road building projects, which supports these actions further, and so on.
Figure 2.5. Concepts from Giddens’ structuration theory (Bryant and Jarv 1991)
Unacknowledged Unintended conditions of r-^ ^ Rationalization of action ^ consequences action (discursive consciousness) o f action
Reflexive monitoring o f action (involving practical consciousness)
Motivation of action (in part unconscious)
This relationship between intention and outcome enables a reconsideration of the nature of ‘structures’ as actually being part of the recursive nature of social life.
Structure thus refers, in social analysis, to the structuring properties allowing the ‘binding’ of time-space in social systems, the properties which make it possible for discemibly similar social practices to exist across varying spans of time and space and which lend them ‘systemic’ form. (Giddens 1984: 17)
Structures, such as institutions, do not exist outside of the practices that constitute them, but instead give rise to systemised properties that create particular forms of practice. For example, in a study of institutions of environmental management, Hukkinen (1999: 1) uses the principles of structuration theory and concludes that:
Institutional constraints influence how individuals think and act in environmental organizations, and their thinking and acting, in turn reinforce the same institutional constraints.
This creates a mutually reinforcing feedback between actions and consequences. The rules and resources that are used in social reproduction serve as the means of system reproduction, that Giddens calls the ‘duality of structure’ being both the constituents of, and the means of constituting, practices (Bryant and Jary 1991).
This theory therefore provides a useful framework for considering forms of social practices and the individual lifestyle. The significance of structuration theory lies in it being a form of
72 ‘action theory’, focusing on how the processes of interaction by knowledgeable agents produce and reproduce structures (Kilminster 1991). It has proven to be a worthy analytical tool in a number of empirical studies, which seek to explain forms of recursive and institutionalised action with reference to the knowledgeable social agent, such as Boden’s study of ‘talk’ in the workplace (1994). It suggests that environmental and lifestyle communications are not simply about learning new facts to change behaviour but are about the questioning of physical and discursive practices which are highly embedded and implicated in the constitution of on-going social conditions. This is a useful development, but I would caution against uncritically adopting Giddens’ approaches. In the following section I argue that structuration theory offers an impoverished theory of individual knowledges. I then proceed to develop a framework of understanding knowledges that is more active and heterogeneous.
2.7.3 Questioning structuration
There have been numerous criticisms of structuration theory, one of which is central to this thesis.
Structuration theory does not at any level contain a fully relational conception of constraint because of Giddens’ failure to incorporate the reality and concept of human interdependence into this theory. (Kilminster 1991: 97)
Therefore, despite his firm affirmation of the knowing social actor, Giddens still draws an outline of an isolated and ultimately rational agent (Kilminster 1991). If Giddens does believe himself to be part of the ‘linguistic turn’ of the social sciences (Bryant and Jary 1991) then surely the process by which meanings emerge and are used has to take into account notions of interdependence and interaction.
Giddens does indeed offer a very weak picture of human interaction, thinking and meaning, suggesting they are formed by ‘interpretive schemes’. These are:
The modes of typification incorporated within actors’ stocks of knowledge, applied reflexively in the sustaining of communication. The stocks of knowledge which actors draw upon in the production and reproduction of interaction are the same as those whereby they are able to make accounts, offer reasons etc. (Giddens 1984: 29)
‘Stocks of knowledge’ appears to suggest static opinions that are made use of by the actor for their own predetermined communicative ends. This is an unsatisfactory implication. If human knowledgeability is central to this research but there is not a clear picture of how it is
73 created and shared, then insights into meanings and behaviour changes are lost. There are therefore two theoretical areas that require further clarification. These are:
• further understanding the concept of knowledges; and • considering the role of social interactions in the creation of knowledge and meanings.
I now briefly discuss both these points, arguing that many social approaches to environmental knowledge have reinforced the positivist dichotomy of expert/public forms and contents of knowledge, which privileges the abstract over the local. Instead, a theory of knowledges needs to be adopted that considers its heterogeneity and active mobilisation. I then examine how forms of knowledge are implicated in social interaction, arguing for a rhetorical approach to human talk and thought.
2.8 ENVIRONMENTAL KNOWLEDGES: REMOVING THE EXPERT/LAY DIVIDE
Thus, there is held to be a discrepancy between the environmental attitudes of trained scientists working for the state and the environmental attitudes of many grassroots actors who may possess a ‘non-scientific’ yet detailed knowledge of local ecological conditions. (Bryant and Wilson 1998: 324)
Few environmental social scientists would contest that there are discrepancies between the knowledges of ‘expert’ and ‘lay’ actors, as the quote above shows. This is because the discipline has been adept in the past decade at creating debates about the place of knowledge in global environmental change (Benton and Redclift 1994, Dunlap 1998). There has been an awakening of interest in non-expert (or lay) public reactions to the environmental paradigm for sound reasons, such as gaining a better understanding of the impacts of policy ‘on the ground’. Yet, this new focus is not just about taking a fresh cut of opinions, but is concerned with the critical recognition of divergent forms of environmental knowledges. Knowledge, in the risk society, is vital to both the individual and the formation of political relations (Eden 1998) and Beck, along with Giddens, has been instrumental in emphasising the importance of lay knowledges in the constitution of modemity.
However, criticisms of researchers such as Beck, and the epistemological tools they draw upon, have been forthcoming from the critical social sciences (see Bulkeley 1998, Eden 1998). They assert that Beck has not gone far enough in his break from prevailing technological discourses of science and policy, in how he discusses forms of knowledge (Szerszynski et al. 1996). Wynne (1996: 45) has also challenged the lay and expert
74 knowledge divide that is implicit throughout Beck’s work, suggesting that perpetuating this dichotomy:
also reflects—and reinforces—a more basic lack of recognition of the cultural/ hermeneutic character of scientific knowledge itself, as well as of social interaction and cognitive construction generally.
This suggests that scientific knowledge is itself indeterminate and uncertain (Wynne 1996).
Murdoch and Clarke (1994: 118) also argue that the distinction between scientific and lay knowledge no longer holds. With the advent of sustainable development, the focus on forms of ‘local’ knowledge as a source of potential salvation is based upon a definition that suggests it simply contains “categories and meanings and cultural practices that ‘local’ people use to make sense of their world”. Local knowledge is seen as spatially specific, grounded, parochial and somehow more in tune with ‘nature’ than the de-contextualised and universal forms of knowledge that science embodies. Bruno Latour’s (1993) theories on the sociology of knowledges suggests that all forms of knowledge are in fact ‘hybrids’, in that:
All knowledge is made up of many different elements, but always some social, some political, some technical, some scientific, some local and always with the human and the non-human mixed up together. Knowledge is heterogeneously constituted. (Murdoch and Clark 1994: 129)
This assertion places lay knowledges on an equal footing to expert knowledges, and has opened up debates about how and why forms of knowledges exist, and how they are made use of by publics. That is, if the place of knowledge in the pursuit of sustainable development is to be analysed critically, it is the processes by which knowledges are formed and used that are important (Murdoch and Clark 1994). For example, individuals engaging in debates about geographically specific environmental problems can often be accused of representing a form of spatially bounded and myopic awareness, or NIMBY-ism'^ (Bumingham 2000). Yet, if the sites of interaction or contexts of these knowledges are considered, debates about local environments are actually forms of active engagement. That is, local knowledges are not simply narrow opinions that are stridently adhered to, but are in fact situated discourses that actors mobilise for particular ends (Bumingham and O'Brien 1994). This perspective shifts research focuses away from examining local knowledge as a source of public opinions, to instead examining the forms of practices and relations embodied in specific discourses, and
NIMBY stands for ‘not in my backyard’.
75 their contexts of mobilisation, placing the social agent not only as a knowledgeable but also as a political actor.
Positioning the individual as a knowledgeable actor follows onto a further consideration of process. The value of the heterogeneous view of knowledges only holds in this research if the social processes that create and transmit these heterogeneous local knowledges are also comprehended (Irwin and Wynne 1996). This is important, as an investigation of individual’s engagement withAaH needs to not only understand the forms of knowledge being used in practices, but also how these knowledges come into being. Knowledge does not stand alone, but comes into meaning as it moves and is contested through society (Eden 1998). Therefore if local knowledges have validity in unlocking cultural meaning it is important to examine how they come into existence and are (re) created.
In the next section I will bring the chapter (almost) full-circle, to consider the contributions that one particular form of social psychology can make to addressing these questions, by its examination of the creation of meanings. Instead of taking an individualistic positivist view, it begins its inquiry from a wholly social position, in addressing how individuals think and talk, that is, the nature of human interaction. I show how this is a useful addition to my theoretical framework, as it is founded upon process, the recursive nature of sociality and forms of discursive practice.
2.9 SOCIAL COGNITION AND MAKING MEANINGS
To think is to engage in an inner conversation of gestures in which another is being addressed. (Mead, quoted in Sampson 1981: 101)
Individuals are not passive recipients of science and policy, but are instead instrumental in constructing forms of environmental knowledges (Eden 1998). What processes are implied in this assertion? Building upon Macnaghten and Urry’s (1998) attention to the work of Billig, I would suggest that it is important to revisit the place that argumentation and debate have in human thought, to understand the foundations of these processes. Billig, in his 1987 book ‘Arguing and Thinking’, draws attention to the ancient concept of rhetoric, to construct a theoretical framework in which human thought is not reducible to isolated logic but is instead a constantly constructive and discursive act. He states that:
76 We can expect private thinking to be modelled upon public argument. In consequence, it should possess a dialogic, rather than a monologic, character. (Billig 1987: 141)
The acts of thinking and speaking are not simply the processes of giving vent to coherent opinions, but are emergent processes that feed into one another: to speak is to think, and to think is to speak. Thus, individuals are able to hold and use contradictory standpoints, as the construction of arguments is on going and is also highly contextual. Wynne and Lash (1992) also suggest the existence of ‘private reflexivity’ that individuals express in the form of self- reflection and ambivalences.
Billig’s theory adds a further dimension to Giddens’ ideas of discursive consciousness. Rather than Giddens’ static forms of knowledge, Billig is suggesting an iterative process by which discursive consciousness is constituted. It provides a sound foundation for the study of the mobilisation of discourses, by suggesting how individuals know about, make use of, and are active in the evolution of meanings. It also provides a basis for understanding the constructive and emergent nature of communication. That is, if the individual is engaged in an iterative process of thinking and speaking, then the act of communication between two or more individuals is also part of the emergent properties of social life. Shotter (1993) reinforces this by suggesting that it is time for a:
radical reappraisal of the nature of the embodied, common sense, practical-moral, dialogical knowledge possessed by the members of society. In this view, new knowledge neither grows out of a special method, or the special mind of a genius but the voices of ordinary people in conversation. (Shotter 1993: 52)
He talks about speaking as being part of ‘joint action’, which is an iterative process of making meaning, echoing to some extent the central tenets of structuration theory (1993). This suggests that forms of knowledge, and practices, are interdependent and contextual.
But, how is it possible that discursive practices are emergent and yet, by the very necessity of communication, are founded upon shared meanings? Billig’s (1987) concept of ‘commonplaces’ is useful here. He suggests that in everyday arguments, commonplaces are the shared concepts or categories used to build arguments, taking the form of broad and recurring arguments (Myers and Macnaghten 1998). It is not a unified folk wisdom but instead consists of discursive building blocks that both form, and are made active use of, in the construction of arguments. This can also be considered as a ‘discourse’. The meaning of the term discourse is contingent upon the disciplinary context it is used in, but for sociological
77 purposes the general definition is of a set of ideas, a form of argument or “group of utterances which seem to have a coherence and a force to them in common” (Mills 1998: 7).
Thus, Billig’s (1987) and Shotter’s (1993) theories provide a social basis for human knowledges, suggesting interdependent processes in their production. They suggest that communication does not consist of one party expressing ideas that another party either accepts or rejects. Instead, it is a constructive process, replete with argument and counter argument, and consisting of sets of concepts and ways of talking that are held and employed by individuals. This creates a potential framing of howAaH participants might react to, and make use of, the information in the programme.
2.10 SUMMARISING A THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
I now summarise the key arguments, which will be taken forward in the following chapters of this thesis. The aim has been to build a theoretical framework of social practices, embedded in the contemporary environmental paradigm.
This chapter began by critically examining positivist framings of the environmental paradigm. The aim was not an over-all critique of these forms of inquiry but to highlight the contributions that disciplines such as environmental psychology have made to investigations of how environmental behaviours are constituted and how they might be changed. These contributions include placing the issue of individual values as central to the environmental paradigm, in terms of how individual’s behaviours are formed and why they are carried out. More recently, researchers have started to look outside of the realm of individual, cognitive models, and have started to factor ‘other’ variables into their models, showing that the social context is all-important to the constitution of behaviour. This is the point at which the social sciences enter the framework, in being able to elaborate on the constitution and workings of these social contexts and their relationship with individual’s behaviours.
The social sciences, mainly sociology, started its work in the 1970s on the environmental paradigm by offering up society-level causal explanations for the emergence of new forms of behaviours and new types of values in post-industrialised countries. This strand of inquiry soon became subjected to a more critical, reflexive approach that sought to question the very foundations of prevailing framings of the environmental paradigm. It is this form of reflexive social science that is used in this thesis, as the aim is to investigate howAaH impacts on individual’s on-going lives, focusing not just on the endpoint of behaviour changes but also on the process of engagement. To carry out this form of investigation it is necessary to make
78 use of theoretical tools that can help to build an embedded picture of social actors and their lifestyles.
This thesis’ theoretical framework is based on several key concepts. First, Giddens’ structuration theory. This theory moves the picture of the constitution of individual lifestyles past a positivist framing, focusing instead on practices. This focus suggests that the on-going behaviour of individuals consist of inseparable physical and discursive entities that form their consciousness. Practices are socially constituted and embedded in principles of structuration, that perpetuate their existence, both enabling and constraining the individual actor. This theory also stresses the knowledgeability of the social agent, by showing how reflexive awareness is integral to the patterning of everyday life and social orderings.
Second, and to embellish on concepts that Giddens does not adequately address, the concept of knowledges is central to this inquiry. In prevailing frameworks, knowledge is something that the individual has once information is internalised and incorporated into their knowledge base. Therefore knowledge can be disseminated into the public arena resulting in widespread behaviour changes. However, this research adopts a more critical approach to the forms and meanings of the multitude of knowledges implied in the constitution of the environmental paradigm. By arguing for the heterogeneity of knowledge, the aim is to focus on how different forms of knowledges are used, co-exist and are mobilised by social actors in the contexts ofAaH, to understand more about the discursive practices and dynamics that are engaged in through participation in the programme. This moves away from values being considered core, static, coherent and overall guiding principles of actions, to a consideration of expressions of values being a form of on-going negotiation of differing value positions, embodied in discourses.
Finally, social theories of how knowledges are created and circulated allows for a highly constructionist perspective on communication to be adopted. The social psychology theories of Billig and Shotter are adopted to argue for an understanding of communication that is dialogic, iterative and processual. Thus,AaH presents one particular discourse and form of communication to which individual participants will take an active discursive stance, incorporating the meanings and relations embodiedA aH in into an on-going project of making meanings.
This contextual and discursive theoretical framework implies that certain methodologies and techniques will need to be employed in the empirical arm of this research. In the next chapter, I discuss the strengths of using qualitative methodologies in this research, illustrating
79 the particular methods chosen. I also detail the empirical fieldwork that was carried out with yf a/7 participants, and illustrate how this thesis’ data was analysed and interpreted.
80 CHAPTER 3. CHARTING COLLABORATIVE METHODOLOGIES
3.1 INTRODUCTION
In this chapter I take forward the theoretical framework outlined in chapter 2, by discussing the methodological and empirical basis of this research. I aim to examine the reasons for, and methods used in, establishing the strongly grounded and reflexive approach taken throughout this research. I begin by discussing my position as an ESRC CASE research student, examining how the collaborative relationship between GAP and the Environment and Society Research Unit (ESRU) at University College London evolved, by briefly charting the early history of this project. ESRU and GAP began this research with different sets of questions to be addressed and different ideas on how to undertake the research. In the process of negotiating and accommodating these varying aims, agendas were merged, enabling both the pursuit of a strongly grounded theoretical perspective, as well as the delivery of research information to enable GAP to develop their products.
I then discuss the research methodology used. This research draws on qualitative methodologies that have, over the past few decades, become part of the reflexive and linguistic ‘turn’ of social science research. These methodologies enable researchers to explore individuals lives as lived, focusing on the dynamics and contents of discursive sociality, which are all vital factors in this research. I then discuss the qualitative techniques used, of single and group interviews, considering the differences and relative strengths of each and the roles they played in this research. The constructive and affective nature of these approaches is also discussed. In contrast to the traditional ‘object-subject’ view of science, the research interview is not considered a neutral tool of inquiry. It actively constructs forms, spaces and types of talk, as well as new relationships, which affect both the emergent dialogue and the individuals taking part.
This research’s empirical fieldwork consisted of two distinct case studies, both of which are discussed in detail herein. The first case study investigatedAaH an project in Bournemouth, Dorset, which was being jointly run by GAP and Bournemouth Borough Council. In October 1997 and April 1998 I carried out single interviews with household members taking part in
81 this AaH project. The first series of interviews, which took place at the start of the six month programme, examined participant’s expectations and reasons for taking part. The second series of interviews took place six months later and assessed participant’s reactions to the AaH packs as well as any resultant behaviour changes. The second case study contrasted considerably with the first. It consisted of an investigation of a six month pilot project in which individuals participated inAaH through their workplaces. Three private companies in the North-west of England, (owned by United Utilities and British Aerospace) had purchased AaH to encourage their employees to think about their use of resources. Both GAP and these companies sought evaluation of this project. As a result, one research interview group was formed at each site, consisting of 6-8 people each. Each group was interviewed in October 1998, as the project started, and again January 1999. At the end of the project, in April and May 1999, single interviews were carried out with all group members plus other key staff, to get in-depth views on the success and failings of the project.
Following this outline of the fieldwork, I then discuss the analysis of the empirical material obtained. The analytical process is detailed, consisting of transcription of interviews through to the writing-up of findings. I show how the coding of the transcripts was an important process, involving an iterative approach that became increasingly complex as the research progressed. I discuss how these codes were used in mapping out each interview, creating visual analytical aids that took into consideration how discussions emerged and evolved in that interview context. The emergent themes from this analysis existed at several levels, made more relevant by the fact that I was writing for different audiences, which in turn influenced how the material was analysed. GAP treated each case study as discrete projects requiring evaluation. In contrast, the academic challenge lies in consistently integrating the analysis of both studies, to gain theoretical breadth, without eliminating the unique attributes of the two case studies. The contours of this challenge are outlined in the following three empirical chapters of this thesis.
3.2 THE CASE STUDENTSHIP: SETTING, NEGOTIATING AND POSITIONING THE RESEARCH AGENDA
The Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)^® actively encourages the establishment of collaborative projects between the academy and the public/private sectors, through the Collaborative Studentship (CASE) scheme. Under the CASE scheme, the Ph.D. candidate works within/for/on an organisation upon a mutually agreed research topic. Charting the
Founded in 1965, the ESRC are the UK’s largest independent funding agency for research and postgraduate training in social and economic issues (ESRC 2000).
82 establishment and operation of the CASE working relationship is important here for two reasons. First, as these scholarships are relatively novel to the social sciences, assessing this approach will add to the stock of knowledge. Second, and importantly to my work, I wish to illustrate how being a CASE student substantively shaped the nature and timeline of this research, not only in terms of setting case studies but also in the methods and goals of research agendas.
I begin below by briefly charting the early history of this collaborative research, demonstrating how a close working relationship was established between GAP and ESRU. I then examine the different research agendas that GAP and ESRU brought to this project, which required both an applied evaluation and an in-depth, qualitative investigation to be undertaken. Negotiating these two positions created the distinctive framing of this project, which incorporates some positivist elements of ‘before’ and ‘after’ approaches to behaviour change analysis, along with a grounded emphasis on discursive processes. These research negotiations created an iterative and reflexive working relationship between GAP and myself, as well as actively positioning me in a network of research and policy actors who influenced and formed this research’s ‘field’ of inquiry.
3.2.1 Before the CASE: forging links between GAP and ESRU
This research evolved from, and is part of an on-going working relationship, between members of ESRU and GAP. Members of ESRU have long been committed to grounded theoretical research into environmental meanings and knowledges, especially those of lay publics, which have relevance in environmental policy arenas (see Burgess et al. 1988b, Burgess et al. 1998). One key piece of research carried out by ESRU members was a comparative study of English and Dutch lay public environmental values and meanings, from 1993 to 1995 (Harrison et al. 1996). One of the study’s findings was the ineffectiveness of environmental communications as a method of changing people’s behaviours. To disseminate these research findings into the policy arena, one of the authors. Professor Jacquie Burgess, presented them to a private and voluntary sector audience, which included the Managing Director of GAP, Trewin Restorick. Because of the relevance of this work to GAP’s remit. Professor Burgess was later approached and invited to become a trustee of GAP. Professor Burgess accepted, and from there a close working relationship evolved. Subsequently, members of ESRU have become involved in evaluative work for GAP^', giving
For example, in conjunction with ESRU, GAP have undertaken qualitative evaluations of projects, such as an .,4a//project being run through Environment Agency offices in Preston, Carlisle, Warrington and Sale, in the North-West of England.
83 rise to the idea of a CASE project. The aim of both GAP and ESRU was to build a project that worked within the research agenda of ESRU, as well as meeting the evaluative needs of GAP. This merging of research agendas has been a key feature of this CASE research, and will be discussed in greater detail below.
3.2.2 Merging research agendas
The original title of this CASE project was “Encouraging Environmental Action at Home: An Evaluation of GAP’s Action at Home as a strategy for achieving more sustainable lifestyles”. The crucial question at the start of the project was how to conduct an evaluation that worked both as an assessment ofAaH and a study of wider environmental and political meanings. GAP had specific objectives from the start of the project. They already solicited feedback from participants ofAaH through questionnaires administered with the programme. This survey data however, gave a very limited picture of how participants were reacting to, and acting upon, theAaH material. GAP experienced low returns on the finalA aH questionnaires, which varied from 26% to as little as 8% (GAP UK 1998c). This meant that the range of participant’s experiences ofAaH was obscured. As an organisation with a strong commitment to continual improvement of their programmes, GAP wanted to undertake evaluations of their work. Members of GAP had concerns before the start of the CASE award that AaH was not delivering upon its original intentions and therefore a thorough research investigation was needed. By facilitating this research, GAP would also be able to position themselves in policy debates about the most effective methods to take the sustainable development agenda forward. Sponsoring a CASE student was a cost-effective way for the charity to gain a sophisticated evaluation. Their main research aims in this project were:
• the analysis of characteristics and motivations of households who joinAaH, • the analysis of the local volunteers who support the programme; • an identification of the factors which influence the completion of the programme; and • the examination of the extent to which changes in habits are temporary or permanent.
The goal of asking these questions was to create specific recommendations about how the material and structure of the AaH programme could be improved. GAP wanted qualitative research to tell them whether the techniques and messages they were forwarding were being effective. However, there were two contrasting research agendas emerging. In the traditional form of evaluation, that GAP required, focus is placed on what is said aboutAaH and the opinion of participants. In this framing, contextual factors are considered as barriers-to-action, which are the structural determinants of why people do/do not take actions (see chapters 1 and
84 4). All other topics of conversations—such as childhood experiences, to thoughts on a recent television documentary—are considered ‘noise’ that does not fit into a pre-determined evaluative category. For an academically driven agenda, which this research subscribes to, there is no conversational or contextual ‘noise’. Here, the entire spectrum of a person’s life and thoughts help to (partially) illuminate the perspectives of the AaH participants, by considering the vital but seemingly mundane array of embedded factors and experiences that constitute individual’s lifeworld (Finger 1994).
With these disparate agendas, the challenge was to find ways of producing methodological synthesis. There are two important points to be made concerning this challenge. First, although wanting a standard form of evaluation, GAP was not solely committed to a positivist research agenda. They entered into the CASE relationship willing to engage with the possibilities of doing things differently, and willing to enter into a process of reflexive institutional learning. Second, although GAP set the agenda for the structure and timing of the research—which explains why it contains some remnants of positivist approaches, such as the ‘before’ and ‘after’ timings of the interviews—it was Professor Burgess and myself who were responsible for the methods used. The methods adopted were grounded in-depth qualitative methods, with which it was possible to address both the applied and academic questions of this research.
Thus, a feature of the early phase of this research was the merging of differing sets of aims, epistemologies and desired outcomes. This merging was not simply a one-off process, but part of an on-going series of negotiations and feedback. In the following section I discuss how working as a CASE researcher was not only an iterative process with a single institution, but also one where I was actively positioned, and took part in forms of positioning, throughout the research. That is, I was not only involved with GAP but also became part of a network of actors that positioned this research in the policy field. Being aware of this positioning raised questions about the active role I was taking in this positioning, especially during the fieldwork period.
3.2.3 Creating a reflexive work agenda
Becoming a CASE student for GAP involved forging a working relationship with key members of the organisation. Yet, it was not only GAP who had a strong influence on the direction and focus on this research. Due to nature of their work, GAP is embedded and highly active in an environmental policy field, which is formed through networks of actors. Because of my work with GAP, I became part of this network of people who had both direct
85 and indirect input into this research. For example, GAP’s role in policy debates with other charities or political ‘think tanks’ came to constitute my ‘field’ of research inquiry. Also, inputs into GAP and this research came from a wide array of people, such as GAP trustees, individuals involved with local GAP or other environmental projects, who had helped to raise and shape GAP as an organisation and also influenced the questions this research was to address.
The idea that an organisation is part of, and formed by, a network of actors is nothing new (see Clarke and Roome 1999). I raise this point to argue that in being aware of the constitution and influence of this network, questions were raised about how I approached this research. Subsequently, this awareness had a significant impact on creating the reflexive turn of this research, which came into sharp focus during fieldwork. For example, when conducting the interviews, I constantly asked myself, and was asked questions about who I represented: was I an advocate of GAP in the policy and empirical field, or an observer? Was I working for them, or investigating them? In terms of academic debates, this reflexive approach resonates with recent critical work on the ‘field’, which questions the role of self- critical reflexivity within research, and focuses on issues of power, representation and positioning (Coffey et al. 1996, Ellingson 1998, Kincheloe and McLaren 1998, Nast 1994, Marcus 1998).
Although I cannot add to these debates, I argue that my own part in, and reflections upon, my positioning in this field is part of a critical and reflexive form of research engagement. This experience is also facilitated and shaped by using qualitative methodologies. In the following section I discuss the chosen methodology, highlighting its epistemological foundations, as well as the specific methods used in this research.
3.3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY AND TECHNIQUES: EXAMINING QUALITATIVE APPROACHES
Qualitative approaches, which is the epistemological framework this research utilises, are part of the social science’s move away from positivist forms of inquiry, towards more discursive and linguistic modes of inquiry. This methodology does not suppose that qualitative research is a neutral mode of investigation. Instead, its constructs its own forms of talk and has affective influences on the participants, thereby capturing and constructing a particular form of discursive sociality. This section outlines the history of this epistemological movement and discusses specific techniques used in this research. I then examine how the research interview has become central to social science methodologies, showing how both single and
86 group interview techniques were used in this research. I finally highlight the differences between these techniques and the contrasting contributions they have made to this research.
3.3.1 From observation to interaction
The recent interest in interview research is not merely a result of internal developments in social science methodology, but reflects a broader historical and cultural questioning and construction of social reality. (Kvale 1996: 45)
Qualitative research is a means by which grounded social and cultural theories are generated, ‘tested,’ and reconsidered (see Alasuutari 1996). The (re) emergence of qualitative data collection methods can be seen as the empirical arm of debates about forms of knowledge and representation, taking place in the social sciences over the past 20 years, as Kvale points out in the quote above. Social science research has moved from using positivist techniques, to making use of a prevailing array of ‘blurred gemes’ of investigative modes (Denzen and Lincoln 1998). However, it is not just qualitative methodsper se that enable the questioning of knowledge, as these techniques can also be used to develop positivist/objectivist analyses (see Crabtree et al. 1993, Frey and Fontana 1993, Silverman 1993). Instead, it is the theoretical perspective underpinning qualitative forms of inquiry that is all-important.
This research is part of a form of inquiry that makes use of a constructionist and discursive paradigm; a perspective strongly associated with the use of qualitative interview and observation methods (Crabtree et al. 1993). This mode of investigation has become dominant in human geography and other social sciences as it mirrors the epistemological shift from ‘knowledge-as-observation’ to ‘knowledge-as-conversation’ (Kvale 1996, Denzen and Lincoln 1998). This shift consists of the following trends:
• from detached observer to interested and interpretative researcher; • from one-way style of investigation to two-way interactive mode; • to establish a new set of research questions about what does and can occur between people; and • to establish a non-cognitive, non-systematic social constructionist approach (Shotter 1993: 19).
This constructionist and discursive mode of inquiry implies the use of certain techniques that embody the qualitative epistemology of social science research. For example, in-depth qualitative techniques are able to access the breadth and scope of local concerns (Harrison et al. 1996). This mostly:
87 involves investigation of meanings, positions/roles, and actor-actor relations in small- scale settings of face-to-face interaction. (Sibeon 1999: 329)
In the following section, I discuss the methods used in this research to investigate these forms of interactions, examining the technique of the research interview.
3.3.2 The research interview
In qualitative research one explores the realities of everyday lives as they are experienced and explained by the people who live them. Such research as this yields rich and complex linguistic data in which subjective experience and social action are ‘grounded’ in the contexts of both time and place. (Burgess et al. 1988a: 310)
Interviews have increasingly become utilised and partially accepted in an applied research setting, especially in relation to policy arenas, for the purpose of verifying and expanding upon quantitative data (Walker 1985, Miles and Huberman 1994). However, the largest expansion of interest has emerged from the merits of the interview as a discursive tool. This is because it potentially enables:
• local groundedness; • flexibility of technique; • access to cultural meanings; • access to causality, as research can be carried out over a sustained period • contextual richness and depth; • interviewees to define the world on their own terms, reflect their own categories of knowledge and air their own concerns; and • an active role for the researcher, reducing/removing the boundary between the observed and the observer (Drawn from Goss and Leinbach 1996, Marcus 1992, Miles and Huberman 1994, Miller and Glassner 1997).
The strength of the interview technique lies in its re-introduction of emergent and discursive sociality into academic research. The interview is a vital tool in considering the construction of communication, as it is argued that human interaction and knowledge production are interdependent (Kvale 1996). Rather than being cast as rational, systematic and calculative, these techniques casts humans as the knowing and thinking subject (Padilla 1993). Conversation is taken as the context within which knowledge is to be understood (Kvale 1996), because the self is social in thinking and speaking. Such an epistemology and methodology also allows the consideration of the emotional and experiential worlds of human
88 thinking and doing (Ellis and Flaherty 1992). Interviews allow the interviewer to enter into the construction of environmental rhetorics, as they are produced and lived. This raises an important point that will be discussed further below. That is, the interview is itself a site of construction. It is not simply a research tool to capture talk, but is instead instrumental in forming the very discourses and processes that it seeks to investigate. It is important to identify the active role of the interview method in a research agenda such as this one that seeks to capture change.
3.3.3 Constructing talk: the affective nature of the research interview
Silverman (1993) draws a distinction between naturally occurring talk and ‘interview-talk’, in which the interview can be seen as a social event (Catterall and Maclaran 1997). It is a point that is often lost in the voluminous writings on interview techniques, with a few notable exceptions (for example, see Myers 1998). If talk “is the place where culture and ‘the social’ happen” (Wetherall 1998: 391) then constructing an interview site also constructs a form of talk. The question then becomes what it is that this interview talk represents.
I do not wish to enter into debates over whether the interview is a fleeting ‘moment’, or is a manifestation of an underlying social order (see Silverman 1993, Miller and Glassner 1997). For the purposes of this thesis, it is not helpful to make a distinction between the ‘inside’ or ‘outside’ world of the interview context. Instead, Wetherall’s (1998: 393) argument is followed, which suggests that there is no real distinction between ‘talk’ and the ‘the world’ but:
There is rather an unceasing human activity of making meanings, from which social agents and objects, social institutions and social structures emerge configured in ever- changing patterns of relations.
Social worlds, before and after the interview moment, are captured in their creation during the interview process, whether the setting be considered ‘artificial’ or ‘natural’ (Miller and Glassner 1997). The contents and forms of talk are able to offer insights into how the ‘social’ becomes constructed on a day-to-day basis by seeing the arguments and rhetorical tools that the individual brings to these conversations. The methodological principles adopted here are that “saying is doing, and, increasingly, what happens between people is action in the form of talk” (Lunt and Livingtstone 1992: 167). In the process of this talk, individuals are changed. Therefore discursive action therefore forms the basis of this analysis.
89 Much has been written about the positive affective nature of interview techniques (see Claxton 1994, Hayaki and Brownell 1996, Rollnick 1996, Samuelson 1990). By constructing a form of, and space for, talk discursive approaches can have palpable effects on the research participants and researchers alike (Holstein and Gubrium 1997), an effect strongly felt within the course of this research. In acknowledging that this research is a form of ‘action research’ (Jones 1985a), it is important that this observation be brought into discussions of methodology.
Why are interviews considered affective? In the process of talking and thinking, the individual can “obtain insights and understanding of particular social situations during the process of research” (Goss and Leinbach 1996: 116). Individuals are able to examine normal patterns and relationships of everyday life (Claxton 1994) by being given space to explore their ideas and to engage in the process of self-evaluation:
In this respect, dialogue can be revelatory not only about social connections to life’s difficulties but also about alternative social arrangements that could improve the subjects’ lives. (Padilla 1993: 153)
These affective methodologies play a key role in expanding an emancipatory agenda of ‘dialogic’ research. Indeed action research is an essential tool in critical theory and feminist agendas, which seek to create personal and local empowerment through forms of inquiry (Kincheloe and McLaren 1998, Schwandt 1998). It was also part of the on-going consideration of my own positioning, as I forwarded AaH the programme agenda as a consequence of using affective research techniques. Also, accepting that an interactive and fluid process is a site of creation rather than a site of discovery strengthens the epistemological claims that underpin the theoretical foundations of this research. In the following section I examine the interview techniques used, drawing out the distinctions between single interviews and group interviews, as well as explaining why I chose to use both methods in this research.
3.3.4 Single and group interview techniques
Both single and group interview techniques were used in this research. It began with single interviews in the Bournemouth case study, then switched to using both group and single interviews in the North-west study. The reasons for this mixing of techniques are both theoretical and circumstantial. In this section I discuss the main theoretical arguments, whilst my discussion below on the timing and progress of my fieldwork explains how circumstances partially dictated choices.
90 There are many possible considerations that favour using one research technique over another. Crabtree et al (1993) refer to one such consideration as the ‘communication context’ of the research interview. The communication context is the style of communication that the participants may be most familiar with in relation to the subject matter. ConsideringAaH participant’s communication contexts was one of the main considerations determining the use of single interviews at the start of this research. Each Bournemouth interviewee was taking AaH as an individual, receiving the packs in their homes and having little other contact with GAP. The use of single interviews permitted the location of the interview process within this experiential context. It also permitted an in-depth and informal conversational style that would not seem imposing either to the interviewee or to myself, having only recently begun to use this form of technique.
In contrast to Bournemouth, the October 1998 and January 1999 research interviews in the North-west took place in group format. Again, this was also due to the communication context, as participants were takingAaH through the workplace. As such, group interviews were chosen to at least partially mimic the participant’s experiences ofAaH. Another consideration was that interviews took place during work time, so emphasis was also on facilitating a methodology that was not too time-consuming.^^
There are many potential problems in the use of group interviews (see Albrecht et al. 1993). For example, groups in which members have pre-existing relationships and structures may lead to stifled debate, creating coalitions. Yet, this may also increase the fidelity of the research method. The very reason why using this method may be a good idea within institutions is because such structures and dynamics may be part of the processes in the workplace that AaH QniQxs into and thus, is affected by (Holbrook 1996). This is because:
Group discussion itself provides valuable insight into social relations and the ‘stories’ produced in the collaborative performance of a focus group better reflect the social nature of knowledge than a summation of individual narratives extracted in interviews. (Goss and Leinbach 1996: 115)
During this research, the use of group interviews became increasingly pertinent over time, due to the development and increasingly complexity of the research questions emerging from the
This was not an issue for me, but in businesses such as British Aerospace, every hour has to be accounted for on time sheets and given a cost code. Therefore it was difficult to take up too much work time on a project that had no budget past the initial purchase of the programme from GAP.
91 first case study. This encouraged a shift from single interviews to the more dynamic and challenging process of group interviews. From the theoretical perspective, group discussions have a number of advantages. For example, they:
• permit time to explore the issues; • permit access to the discursive dynamics involved in discussions; • highlight the argumentative nature of the discourses surrounding environmental issues perhaps even paralleling the dialogic nature of thinking; and • enable comparisons of the self in a group context, allowing greater evaluation and contemplation (Drawn from Morgan 1993, Harrison et al. 1996).
It is important however to distinguish between types of group interviews. They can either be single, one-off interviews, otherwise called focus groups, or in-depth discussion groups. A focus group consists of 6-8 people who are brought together to discuss a specific topic that is pre-selected by the researcher (Albrecht et al. 1993). The discussion primarily concerns the stimulus material:
In a once only group, people can do little more than express their initial ideas and attitudes, which the researcher must take at face value and interpret accordingly. (Burgess et al. 1988b: 470)
In contrast to focus groups, in-depth groups meet on several occasions, using a pre-arranged time schedule in which conversations are connected to the relationships within the group not just the subject matter being discussed (Burgess et al. 1988a). The aim is to allow for the exploration of issues past initial reactions, enabling relationships of trust to be built in the process.
The groups used in this research were not pure ‘focus groups’. Some interviewees had been involved inAaH for several months before taking part in the interviews. Some were part of the existing Action Teams at the North-west work sites and several participants took part in both group interviews. Owing to the logistical limitations, members did not remain the same at all times. Two of the groups (Norweb and North-West Water) had consistent membership for the two meetings. One (BAe) changed considerably, with only half of the original members turning up for the second group. As such, the groups operated more like a series of focused group discussions, which were able to build upon and move on from previous discussion as part of a larger project. Partly because of this, at the end of the second case study I returned to using single interviews. The specific events of the ‘field’ and the influence
92 they had on my use of research methods are elaborated in the following section, which discusses in detail the timetable of empirical work.
3.4 GETTING INTO THE FIELD: CHARTING EMPIRICAL CONTEXTS AND PROCESSES
In this section I discuss in detail the contexts and timings of the empirical work carried out between October 1997 to May 1999. I begin by briefly summarising, in Table 3.1, the key dates and outputs from the two fieldwork case studies. I then proceed to examine each case study in greater detail. I start each examination by highlighting the distinct features of the case study, as they present contrasting ways of deliveringAaH to households. I then detail the fieldwork timings and contents for each study^^.
For information about interview participants and the contexts ofA@H the case studies, see Appendix 4.
93 Table 3.1. Timetable of fieldwork actions and outputs
BOURNEMOUTH CASE STUDY Date Event/Action Output 1997 Attend public meeting for potentialAaH Notes / Networking 6th October participants 25th October Attend volunteer training day Notes / Networking 27th October - 2nd 21 single interviews withAaH Interview transcripts November participants 1997 30th October & 25th Attend volunteer group meetings Notes / Networking November November Analyse notes and interview transcripts Interim Report to GAP 1998 21 single interviews withAaH Interview transcripts 27th April -3rd May participants May - June Analyse Bournemouth case study Final report to GAP NORTH-WEST CASE STUDY July Attend training days for Action Teams Notes / Networking October Conduct one group interview at each site Interview transcripts 1999 Conduct one group interview at each site Interview transcripts January April and May 21 single interviews Interview transcripts June Analyse North-west case study Final report to GAP
Table 3.1 summarises the timetable of the research fieldwork. It can be seen that attendance at AaH events and training days was also part of this research. They were important as they enabled me to talk with key actors in the projects and observe the programme in progress.^"* Notes from these events did not form a strong part of this research but rather were used as background to further my own understanding of the complexity of the field.
The following section discusses the specifics of the first case study. I begin by setting out the context for the Bournemouth case study, showing how the structure of theAaH programme
There are also on-going actions, such as regular visits to the GAP offices in London, that could be considered as contributing to my empirical work. The substantive outputs from these visits were either meeting with members of GAP staff and/or the collection by me of policy andAaH information relevant to my research.
94 was instrumental in shaping the form and timing of my empirical work. I then detail how and when the empirical work was carried out.
3.5 CASE STUDY ONE: ACTION AT HOME IN BOURNEMOUTH
The first case study, AaH project in Bournemouth, Dorset, was chosen as GAP were in the process of launchingAaH in this region in October 1997, the same time as the CASE research began. Using Bournemouth as a case study permitted my inclusion in the project from the outset, thereby gaining a broad over-view of the operation ofAaH, both as a tool of behaviour change and as a form and context of delivery of sustainable lifestyle messages. As a result I found myself in the field within 3 weeks of starting the research, an experience that would have a major impact on the intellectual development of this thesis.
3.5.1 Local authorities Action at Home
To set the context for this case study, from 1993 to 1999,AaH was delivered to households through local authorities.^^ During this period, over 38 local authorities purchasedAaH (GAP UK 1998c). The aim of this approach was to create local support, interest, and leadership in the programme rather than it being centrally managed from London, which was felt to be too distant and not ‘local’ enough to give the programme affective impetus. This process of delivery involved four sets of actors with varying roles and responsibilities. These were:
• GAP: provideAaH materials, and initial training in establishing a management structure in the local context. Provide update meetings for volunteer groups. Mark the GreenScores; • Local authority: purchase AaH, publicise its availability in the local area and support the local volunteer group as it becomes established; • Local volunteer group: the grass-roots arm of AaH, offering support to local households and providing publicity about the programme in the local area; and • Individual households: purchaseAaH and complete the programme, as well as make use of the volunteer group.
During the course of an AaH project the responsibility for delivering the aims of the project shift from GAP and the local authority at the start, to the volunteer group and the local community once the project has been launched. At the start of this case study, Bournemouth
The Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF) were partners with GAP in deliveringAaH. in WWF were responsible for managing the local arm of the programme, offering support for the volunteer groups. When the partnership was dissolved in 1999, this structure of delivery became redundant. Currently, AaH is sold to individuals households without local support (although the delivery ofAaH may be changing radically very soon: see chapter 7).
95 Borough Council (BBC) were keen to be actively involved inAaH. They were hoping that the project would help to meet some of the objectives of their Corporate Environmental Strategy for 1997/1998, which was part of the Bournemouth Agenda 21 programme^^ as well as helping to meet some of their targets under the Home Energy Conservation Act (see chapter 1). In terms of recruitment,AaH was indeed relatively successful in the Bournemouth area. In total, approximately 630 households took part in the programme, a much higher figure than many other regional projects.
3.5.2 Getting into the ‘field’
Having set the project context, I now discuss the specific details of the empirical work carried out in Bournemouth. My introduction toAaH consisted of attending the programme’s first public meeting. This was held at the Beaufort community centre in Bournemouth on Monday 6th October, starting at 7.30 p.m., as an information event for members of the public who had expressed an interest in the project. My attendance enabled me to develop connections with the key figures in the project and to understand howAaH operated on the ground. It also allowed me to see how members of the public initially perceivedAaH. After this event I began recruiting participants for initial interviews. These first stage interviews needed to take place within a tight time frame. This was because GAP wanted me to talk to participants before they had read any of theAaH packs, to take a snapshot of their initial interests and views to compare the later interviews with. Three methods—GAP household list, BBC and personal contact at the volunteer training day—were used to recruit prospective interviewees. Specific details are:
1. GAP maintained a ‘household list’ for all members of the Bournemouth public who signed up to AaH. This enabled contact to be made with prospective interviewees, and requests were made for interviews over the telephone. In the interests of a sound evaluation, GAP requested that I try to control for age, gender and geographical location within Bournemouth of potential interviewees.^^ Agreements were made on the telephone as to the time and place of the interviews, all to take place in the
^ Their main objectives are the promotion of environmental awareness and understanding, and the encouragement of active citizen participation, to protect the environment and their own well being, and to encourage voluntary organisations that forward this aim (Bournemouth Borough Council 1997: 9). As the household lists did not contain information on ages of individuals it was difficult to control for this factor. However, I made a concerted effort to interview participants from a wide geographical spread of Bournemouth, and I was also aware of the gender distributions of individuals agreeing to be interviewed.
96 interviewee’s homes, and a confirming letter was sent within a few days of each telephone conversation.
2. The majority of individuals contacted through the above method were elderly (60+). To attain a wider age-span of interviewees, a second method of recruitment was employed. AaH was also being offered to BBC employees and so the Local Agenda 21 Officer, Neil Short, recruited younger male and female council officers to take part in this research. All these people were interviewed in the workplace, during working hours.
3. On 25th October, I attended the volunteer group training day. Others present were 8 local people, 2 trainers from GAP who facilitated the day’s events and Neil Short. I took an active part in the day, both to familiarise myself with GAP’s methods and also to meet potential volunteers. I was able to recruit several volunteers, who agreed to be interviewed the following week.
I now discuss the contents of the two series of interviews, showing not only the number of people involved and the questions asked, but also how being in the field facilitated a very fast learning process for myself, that helped shape the outcomes of my research.
3.5.3 The ‘before’ interviews: sticking strictly to the point
Starting on 27th October 1997,1 began my first research interviews. In total, there were twenty- three interviewees from twenty-one interviews^*, as two interviews took place with married couples, both of whom took an active part in the interview process. Table 3.2 presents details of the number of people and modes of recruitment. All interviews were conducted in an informal, semi-stmctured manner and were taped with permission, except for one where permission was refused and notes were made immediately after the event. As well as the interviews, I attended two of the volunteer group meetings (on 30th October and 25th November 1997) to observe the dynamics of the volunteer group, as it became established.^^
28 Two intended interviews were cancelled at short notice due to family illness and absence from work. After the 25th November meeting, I stopped attending the volunteer group meetings. I felt that my presence to be somehow representative of GAP, which was stifling to the group and also a position of responsibility that I did not feel comfortable to continue witii. The life-span of the group was approximately 9 months.
97 Table 3.2. Bournemouth interviews (October 1997): numbers, recruitment methods and interview locations
No. of interviewees Recruitment method Place of interview 23 in total 9 households Telephone Interviewee’s home 3 volunteer group members AaH training day Interviewee’s home 11 council staff BBC LA21 Officer BBC Offices
Age 18 -35 : 6 35-55: 9 55+: 8 Sex female: 17 male: 6
The topics of discussion in the interviews primarily focussed on a set of questions that GAP wanted answered aboutAaH and individual’s reasons for taking part in the programme. These included:
• motivations for taking part inAaH\ • expectations ofAaH, in terms of their household and the environment; • reactions to the Welcome AaH questionnaire and the GreenScore 1 ; • where they had heard aboutAaH\ and • their involvement, if any, in any other environmental and/or local groups.
Because I had not had the time or the experience at this stage in my postgraduate career to consider what ‘other’ questions or nuances might be of interest to an academic agenda, I did not insert my own academic questions. Instead, I strode into the ‘field’ armed with GAP’s questions, my recording equipment, a map of Bournemouth and very little else. The benefits of being thrown in at the deep-end are mainly realised in retrospect. Bournemouth served as a strong training ground for my skills as an interviewer and research co-ordinator. It was, on the other hand, a daunting experience.
As a result, the initial interviews were relatively short, usually less than 30 minutes, following a quite predictable question and answer routine. This was mostly due to my inexperience at being able to’ hear’ the issues and interests that interviewees wanted to talk about, outside AaH.of In trying to keep them on the subject, I excluded many potentially interesting contributions. Fortunately some people, notably the two couples who were interviewed, were active in forming their own topics of discussion. The differences between them sparked the talk, rather than my own questions. It was not until I reflected upon these first transcripts, necessitated by having to
98 write an interim report for GAP after returning from Bournemouth, that my perspective changed. I then realised that interviews should not be so tightly focused. It should be possible to talk to interviewees about their beliefs and feelings, whilst still keeping to GAP’s need for information about outcomes. By limiting questions to AaH and not exploring the contexts of people’s lives, I was constructing a narrow insight into the complexity of these issues. Fortunately, it was possible through the second group of interviews to facilitate these new insights, and bring the academic agenda back into play.
3.5.4 The ‘after’ interviews: expanding the horizons
In March 1998, the interviewees were contacted and asked to be interviewed again. This interval allowed households to complete the majority of the six months of theA aH programme, with the interviews reflecting upon the experience. Initial contact was made by letter followed up by a personal telephone call. Not all interviewees could be revisited, for a number of reasons.^° In total, twelve people were re-interviewed and nine new interviewees were recruited for the second round of interviews, drawing heavily on the volunteer group. This was an intentional decision. GAP wanted a clearer picture of how the group was fairing, six months on from its establishment. In addition, all volunteer groups members had been taking AaH within their own homes. As well as the interviews, informal information about the running and managing of the project was gathered from Neil Short. The scheduled interviews took place over one week, starting 27th April 1998. Table 3.3 presents a summary of this second round of interviews.
This included one interviewee moving house and several others being away on holidays.
99 Table 3.3. Bournemouth interviews (April 1998): numbers, recruitment methods and interview locations
No. of interviewees Recruitment method Place of interview 21 in total 4 households 1 new / 3 from previous interviews Letter /Telephone Interviewee’s home 9 volunteers 5 new / 4 from previous interviews Letter/Telephone/E-mail Interviewee’s home 8 council officers 3 new/ 5 from previous interview BBC LA21 Officer BBC Offices
Age 18-35: 7 35-55: 8 55+: 6 Sex female: 14 male: 7
The topics of interest to GAP had changed in emphasis, now focusing more on experiences and evaluations. The topics covered in each interview included:
• thoughts on the contents and effectiveness of theAaH packs; • behaviour changes that had taken place since October; • the causes of these changes and the plausibility of continuing new behaviours; and • factors that effected the type and scope of behaviour changes.
All interviews were taped, expect for one.^' The interviewees discussed each subject to varying degrees of depth. All interviews lasted longer than those did in October, up to one hour with members of the volunteer group, for two main reasons. First, the interviewees had more to talk about in relation to AaH, having had six months exposure to it. Second, due to my developing interview skills I was able to open up the conversations and to view them as collaborative projects (Myers 1998), conducting them more as conversations than exercises in extracting facts. Discussions ranged across the topics of crime, community, public transport availability and education—all relevant to the enactmentoï AaH and to these people’s lives. I was able to build quickly upon my field experiences, which were reflected upon as I wrote the Bournemouth case study through as an end of year report and presented it to GAP.
This was due to equipment failing which resulted in only half the interview being taped. The other half was transcribed as notes directly after the interview ended.
100 Consequently, I was better prepared for the second year of fieldwork, which I will now discuss.
3.6 CASE STUDY TWO: ACTION AT HOME IN THE NORTH-WEST
My second case study was planned to offer a contrast to the Bournemouth project. It took place within a new and challenging project for GAP, situated in the North-west of England. Two businesses. United Utilities and British Aerospace (BAe), had boughtAaH for approximately 200 members of staff at the total of 4 worksites. The locations of the worksites were the North-West Water administrative site in Warrington, Cheshire; the Norweb ‘Lancaster Road’ Depot in Preston, Lancashire (both owned by United Utilities) and BAe aerodromes, at Warton and Samlesbury, just outside Preston. The project, both for the companies and GAP, was very much experimental, both in format and possible outcomes. AaH had never before been purchased by businesses with the purpose of encouraging staff to change their resource-use habits, both in the workplace and at home. This project can be positioned in the context of business responses to the sustainable development agenda, where some companies are considering not just economic returns and shareholder value but also meeting commitments towards social and environmental responsibilities, as well as investing in workforces and promoting ‘life long learning’ in the workplace (see Campaign for Learning 1999, Sustainable Development Education Panel 1999, GAP UK and WWF 1999).
All involved parties, GAP and the businesses, wanted evaluation built into the project framework, which became my role between October 1998 to May 1999. This new project was intellectually challenging, providing some significant comparisons to the Bournemouth work. It moved the focus of the research from home to work, from south to north and also from predominantly female to predominantly male participants. In the following section I discuss the details of how this research was carried out.
3.6.1 Establishing relationships
The AaH projects began simultaneously at each of the four industrial sites in July 1998, with each site undertaking the same initiation process. Co-ordinators were appointed, whose job it was to recruit about 10 people to form one Action Team at each site. The purpose of establishing Action Teams was to create groups of employees to promote yfai/and encourage up to 200 colleagues to join.^^ The structure of the Action Teams in the workplace (partially) mimicked the volunteer groups set up in communities such as Bournemouth. Each Action
Final recruitment rates were 133 at Warton, 176 at North-West Water, 158 at Samlesbury and 195 at Norweb.
101 Team underwent a one day training event in July 1998, with two members of GAP staff and myself present, during which the nature of the project was outlined and Action Team tasks allocated. As with Bournemouth, the training days provided me with an opportunity to explain the research project to the Action Team, to familiarise myself with the workings of the project, and to ask the Action Team for co-operation in the evaluation; which was readily granted. After the training days, the Action Teams effectively became the managers of the project, receiving regular update meetings with GAP and having regular inter-site meetings.
In terms of this research, the training days assisted with the recruitment of volunteers to take part in interview groups. One key co-ordinator was nominated for each Team, to centralise the organisation of the project and the research. After the training days, to establish the interview groups and their meeting times, I corresponded regularly with these key administrators at three of the sites.Each took on the responsibility of organising the research interview groups. Because dealing with employees directly and individually was both impractical and also an affront to management, this relinquishing of control was inevitable within such large companies. Also, as interviews were to take place in work time, it was important for them to be co-ordinated by individuals who were aware of the organisational constraints. One of the advantages of this was a firming of the alliances that I had made within the companies, who all worked hard to make sure the research happened. However, it also resulted in a level of unpredictability. These employees had higher work priorities than the AaH project. The pressured environment of the workplace sometimes meant that participants dropped out from the groups at the last minute. Consequently, the research was affected by the whims of the workplace. Due to this I was not always able to execute the research as planned.
3.6.2 Creating group dynamics
The distribution of theAaH packs and publicity by the Action Teams on each site began on 1st October 1998. My first group interviews took place one week after. As I had requested, members of the discussion groups were all participating inAaH and were a mixture of Action Team and non-Action Team members. Table 3.4 shows details of each group. These met twice: a total of 6 group discussions which were followed by single interviews in April and May 1999.
However, one of these sites, Samlesbury, was not able to be included in this research. Despite strenuous efforts on my part, I could not get staff to co-operate fully in organising group interviews and therefore had to omit that site from my research.
102 Table 3.4. Action at Home in the North-west: a break-down of interview groups
NORWEB Size of Male Female Age
Interview type group 18-34 35-54 55+ Group (Oct. 1998) 7 5 2 0 4 3 Group (Jan. 1999) 7 5 2 0 4 3 Single (April/May 1999) 6 4 2 0 4 2
BAE (WARTON) Size of Male Female Age
Interview typegroup 18-34 35-54 55+ Group (Oct. 1998) 6 6 0 2 3 1 Group (Jan. 1999)^^ 6 4 2 3 2 1 Single (April/May 1999) 10 7 3 4 5 1
NORTH-WEST WATER Size of Male Female Age
Interview typegroup 18-34 35-54 55+ Group (Oct. 1998) 5 1 4 5 0 0 Group (Jan. 1999) 5 1 4 5 0 0 Single (April/May 1999) 5 2 3 4 1 0
The group interviews were semi-structured, with key questions for each interview session being drawn out beforehand, in discussion between GAP, myself and the business managers involved. These key questions provided focus for the meetings in which participants were free to raise and discuss issues that they felt were relevant toAaH. My increased interview skills and awareness about how to conduct interviews enabled me to ‘reflect’ back’ rather than actively ‘enter into’ the discussions taking place. Instead of being part of the conversation, I was the facilitator of it.
The first series of meetings were co-facilitated by myself and Dr. Gail Davies, who provided support in this new and challenging context. Each meeting lasted one hour and was taped with participant’s permission. Given the potential implications on work relationships if comments were leaked, confidentiality was stressed in these groups. The topics raised in the first group interviews included:
34 Even though both group interviews at this site had six members, it should be noted that only three people were present at both the Oetober and January groups. Three people who were in the October interview group dropped out in January and had to be replaced with three new members. Therefore, the total number of people involved in these groups was nine.
103 • the ways in which the home and the environment are linked; • whether the environment presents a significant personal and/or social issue; • how to go about changing lifestyles to make them more sustainable; • barriers to making these changes; and • methods thatAaH uses and the expectations of the programme.
The second round of group interviews were carried out in the same manner as the first interviews but this time facilitated by myself alone. I had decided to add another interview event to the previous ‘before’ and ‘after’ model of the Bournemouth work, to talk to participants as they were in the process of takingAaH. To capture this process, the packs that the interviewees had already received were brought to the meetings and used as a stimulus for conversation, with the intention of taking a close look at their reactions to the material. The questions asked included issues of:
• the effects of receiving information in theAaH format; • what they think of the actions included in the packs; • how these actions relate to their current lifestyles; and • the issues surrounding the actions in the packs, such as structural and/or personal barriers.
At the conclusion of the second round of group interviews, participants were informed that there would be a series of single interviews taking place at the end of theAaH project, which they were all asked to participate in.
3.6.3 Going full circle: from group interviews to single interviews
The third and final research session took the form of single interviews, which took place between the end of April and beginning of May 1999. All those who had taken part in the groups who were available were interviewed, in addition to other individuals, such as the managers who had been involved in implementingAaH across their workplace.This approach was chosen to round-up the empirical work, as the single interviews were able to access in-depth individual perspectives and allow a full conversation on issues that individuals may not have been able, or wished, to raise in the group context. It was also partially a methodological experiment to assess the nature of the dynamics that emerged at the end of this process. It was hoped that participants felt comfortable enough with me to explore
The managers had been deliberately excluded from the groups, to allow for employee’s own voices to be heard.
104 the issues in-depth and were prepared to speak openly. I indeed noted that having built relationships with participants before-hand appeared to facilitate frank and in-depth discussions, contrasting markedly with the Bournemouth interviews. Each interview lasted for on average 45 minutes per person and was taped. The interview focused on the overall process the AaH participants had just undergone, considering issues of behaviour change, the effectiveness of the programme within the workplace, and the relationship between home and work. Some questions addressed were:
• how participants saw the over-all process ofAaH, in terms of their original expectations; • whether any of the actions from the early packs are still being carried out; • any changes in behaviour in the workplace; • the effects of the Action Team on the process, and • effects and reactions of their colleagues who are not takingAaH.
This new approach facilitated focused interview discussions and provided an interesting methodological path. It permitted the building of relationships and access to a breadth and depth of material, without being too constraining in time and commitment, which was a major factor for these individuals. All interviews were completed for all three sites by the start of May 1999. Following this, the process of analysis then became the focus of the research. Below I outline the transformation of the interviews from ‘events’ to the final delivery of written analyses.
3.7 INTERPRETIVE METHODS
I now discuss the analysis of the empirical material. I begin by arguing that interpretation of research information is an active process, which requires the researcher to be aware of the epistemological choices being made in his/her processing, structuring and interpretations. In this research, these choices were made following a practice of coding, mapping and analysing the information in a particular way, which I discuss here in detail. This should not give the impression that this analysis was a linear process; rather, it was a cumulative process. As a result of reviewing material at various stages of the CASE project, such as writing interim reports, transcripts were returned to for analysis and re-analysis. Consequently, the complexity of codes increased, as did the number of levels of interpretation possible from the transcripts, which fed back into the research, modifying my ideas.
I do not intend to try and capture the actual steps this analysis took here. Instead, I outline the practices of coding, mapping and writing for several audiences in terms of discrete categories of action. I conclude this chapter by considering the form of empirical analysis I have chosen
105 for the remainder of this thesis, where I argue that the aim is to integrate analysis of the two case studies to achieve theoretical breadth. This is then presented in the subsequent empirical chapters of this thesis.
3.7.1 The active process of interpretation
Qualitative research is endlessly creative and interpretive. The researcher does not just leave the field with mountains of empirical materials and then easily write up his or her findings. Qualitative interpretations are constructed. (Denzen and Lincoln 1998: 30)
After the empirical information has been collected, all taped interviews were transcribed onto transcript pro-formas. This transformed them from an active ‘event’ to a static text, a process in which I was functioning as author, translator and interpreter. The transcription process is itself an integral part of the research (Holstein and Gubrium 1997), an active process and part of developing a constructionist approach (Schwandt 1998). As Kvale (1996: 182) put it: “The transcript is a bastard, it is a hybrid”. The author must choose a method of interpretation that is conducive to the overall research aims and perspectives (Bertrand et al. 1992). For example, interpretive anthropologists such as Geertz suggest that all analysis should be treated like the reading of a text, as the writing of an event fixes it, forming it into a constructed representation (see Schwandt 1998).
Rather than focusing on what the transcripts represent, I am interested in what can be understood from them. Kvale (1996) suggests that there are 5 types of meanings that can be taken from transcripts, which are:
• meaning condensation; • meaning categorisation; • narrative structuring; • meaning interpretation; and • an ad hoc approach.
I suggest that rather than these being distinct forms of analyses, they all form part of a full engagement with transcripts, ones that I tried to capture by developing a series of codes that were both descriptive and interpretive.
3.7.2 Coding transcripts: the accumulation of complexity
The practice of coding is considered to be vital in completing a grounded interview analysis, by creating discrete emergent categories and themes from the data. By fracturing the data and
106 moving it further towards integration (Strauss 1987) this approach allows the researcher to move beyond mere description to higher levels of abstraction. In this research the initial stages of this process began as a guided reading based on the ‘implicit’ theories of the overall project aims (Miles and Huberman 1994) and the GAP agenda. During the first round of Bournemouth transcripts, analysed a few weeks after completing the interviews, I sought answers to the questions that I had asked, and thus created a system of codes pertaining to these answers alone. I scoured the text for information pertaining to AaHthe questionnaires, GreenScorel, incentives, barriers-to-action and the motivations of the participants. Comments were removed from the text and re-ordered under these topics, thereby splicing, editing, reconstituting and de-contextualising them. This was a relatively straight-forward process of finding and condensing meanings, adopting a positivist view in which my role consisted of reporting back interviewee’s opinions.
Upon subsequent reading the meanings of the interview discourse became increasingly important. I had few pre-conceived ideas about this discourse and therefore embarked upon another process of coding and interpretation. This does not constitute “methodological ignorance” (Alasuutari 1996: 373) nor a form of Grounded Theory (Strauss 1987). Rather this process was “an approximation of the creative activity of theory-building” (Silverman 1993: 47) which took the form ‘open coding’, in which the categories emerge from the data, unrestricted by previous categories thereby creating concepts which encompass the main themes within the interview (Strauss 1987). The codes consisted of observations of direct content; states and emotions being referred to and expressed with this content; actual actions; and forms of expressions being used to make points. In this way, the codes were both descriptive and interpretive (Strauss 1987).
This process created codes capable of being used in the analysis of other interview transcripts; I have called these codes ‘transferable categories’. This process of comparison invariably resulted in new (sub) categories being formed and/or the questioning of links between the established ones (Jones 1985b). The question then emerged concerning how I might gauge the processes being talked about, not just in the interviews but also those taking place between the interviews. This was important as this research aims to understand discursive processes and behaviour change. It was necessary to be aware of the temporality of the interviews, especially as some individuals were interviewed on more than one occasion. For this reason, I created ‘temporal categories’ to consider changes taking place between the interviews, rather than analysing them as discrete events.
107 One example of a ‘transferable code’ is that of ‘anxiety’. During many of the interviews there were expressions of concern at the state of the physical and moral atmosphere in the UK today. These expressions exist in all sets of interviews; before and after takingAaH, both in Bournemouth and the North-west. An example of a ‘temporal category’ is ‘learning’. This is not a state but a process that some AaH participants felt that they had, or where, engaged in over time.
3.7.3 Mapping the codes
Once a coding system had been established, the next step was to create a series of ‘discursive’ or ‘mind maps’ (Burgess 1996) of each of the interviews. This process involves modelling beliefs onto a diagrammatic format, in which themes can be mapped out spatially, and relationships between themes can be examined (see Jones 1985b). I found constructing these maps confusing and repetitive. I lost the sense of order in which themes emerged in the interviews, and their relationships in terms of individual’s construction of arguments. However, I am not alone here. Myers (1998) too raises this point, in discussing the way in which the processes of analysis determine conceptions of the interview subject and their knowledges. He suggests that the trend of splicing and mixing up of interview data does have its merits when trying to gauge lay opinions. However, the capacity to “reflect critically on what opinions are, and what people do with them” (Myers 1998: 106) is lost. Because of this, I built a series of linear maps to gauge how the interview progressed, so that the relationships between themes and the connections made could be drawn out as well as the discursive tools used to create conversational integrity or contradiction.^^
3.7.4 Levels of readings
The analysis consisted of multiple layers of tasks. I attempted to draw out specific themes in relation to GAP as well as broad transferable social themes whilst maintaining awareness of the integrity of the interview as a whole, and the effects ofAaH across time. This eclectic mix of aims was necessary because being a CASE student required me to draw out analyses for multiple audiences who each had different expectations of the research. As such, I was required to use the same transcript for several differing levels of interpretation. Kvlae (1996: 214) suggests that there are three broad levels of interpretation of interview text. These are:
I am aware that adding an example of one of these maps would add weight to this argument. However, as they were sketched out on A3 pieces of paper, using coloured pencils and a rather messy style, attempting to include or replicate one is not realistic.
108 • self-understanding ; the researcher condenses what the subjects themselves understand to be the meanings of the statements; • critical common-sense understanding ; the above plus a wider frame of reference, to broader the interpretation of the statement; and • theoretical understanding; using a specific fi*ame of reference to interpret meanings.
Thus, there are a number of levels at which interviews can be examined, from descriptive to theoretical (Strauss 1987). This is not just down to the preference of the researcher, but the fact that the projected audiences for the analysis also effect the form and content of what is written (Nast 1994). Kvale (1996) uses a useful analogy of being either a 'miner' or 'traveller ' of the text. One is either digging for information, knowing that it is ‘down there somewhere’ and only has to be uncovered; or one is moving through the text, allowing reflection upon the way. The GAP ‘audience’ required the ‘mining’ treatment of the text, to help with their programme developments and understandingsAaH of users. There was also the need to draw out broader concerns for an academic audience, acting as a traveller of the text. Table 3.5 gives a brief summary of the levels that I worked at, and the processes implicit in these levels, using the distinctions made by Kvale above as a guiding tool.
109 Table 3.5. Levels of interpretation and their meanings my two audiences
AUDIENCE /READER LEVEL OF ACADEMICGAP ANALYSIS 1. SELF- Lay meanings and knowledges Feedback on programme UNDERSTANDING and project management 2. CRITICAL Placing lay meanings within a Implications for the COMMONSENSE timed and spaced social contextimplementation ofAaH on a UNDERSTANDING wider social level 3. THEORETICAL Understanding the emergence Place of AaH and GAP in UNDERSTANDING of the above from a theoretical and academic constructionist, dialogic ‘market’ perspective
In Table 3.5, academic levels merge into one another, with the analysis of levels 1 and 2 advancing the understanding of level 3. To enter into broader social and theoretical debates, it was necessary to draw out the categories to reflect not just the content of the transcripts, but the implications of their meanings in relation to the issues that GAP engage with. This is vital in research as;
By systematically working and toying with concrete examples of everyday life and culture, one often realizes such aspects of our mundane, self-evident reality as we have this far failed to see it. (Alasuutari 1996: 374)
This approach permits social and theoretical insights but does not mean that theory is being built from a grounded perspective. Theory can be used as a tool to understand and bring analyses into wider academic conversations. Alasuutari (1996) suggests that the relationship between theory to fieldwork can be seen as an ‘hourglass model’, in which a broad theoretical framework sets the context for, and justifies the choice of, a case study; the findings from which then help to (re) develop the original theoretical framework. However, one distinction that needs to be made here is between testing these frameworks of theory, and using them, ‘travelling’ with them, to use Kvale’s phrase. This research does not attempt to test theories talked about in the previous chapters but instead uses them as guides to help draw out and understand key issues. As Eco (1992) suggests, we look to a text’s intentions to limit the number of possible interpretations. In conducting this research, I looked to its intentions to carry out a reading of the transcripts, with theories becoming the ‘shaping containers’ of these readings (Shotter 1993). Thus, theory becomes part of the continual conversations that a
110 researcher has with their transcripts, especially transcripts that are returned to and analysed again on grounds of new insights. This is not a one-dimensional journey, but is in accordance with Agar’s (1990: 84) statement that:
Data collection, analysis and writing are dialectic and ongoing, rather than being separate steps in a linear process.
In the case of GAP, I argue that the levels shown in Table 3.5 stand as discrete areas of interest, with level 1 being the most important to GAP as it concerns their operational demands. The way in whichAaH was functioning as a programme was of paramount importance. This was the intention from the outset of the project. The other levels of interpretation act as the contexts within which GAP can be placed. In drawing this distinction it is not intended to infer a value statement about the merit of the two audiences. It is made simply to outline the differences in levels of analysis for each projected audience and the different ways that the transcripts had to be utilised in order to achieve these outputs. GAP required two discrete reports—one on Bournemouth and one on the work in the North west—that detailed findings and practical implications for the future of their work. Although some theoretical foundations were written into these reports, the writing of on-going research papers was a discrete task. In contrast to the report writing for GAP, the academic framework of this research appeared to be better served if the two case study’s analyses were integrated into one broad theoretical discussion. I will now conclude this chapter by discussing this point further, showing how I have constructed the analysis that forms the following three chapter of this thesis.
3.8 CONCLUSIONS
Undoubtedly, the most difficult skill to leam is “how to make everything come together”—how to integrate one’s separate, if cumulative, analyses. (Strauss 1987: 170)
In the above quote Strauss raises concerns that I will address by way of concluding this chapter. It relates to the integration of interview analyses, from two discrete and contrasting case studies, into a broader theoretical argument, which is worked through in the remainder of this thesis. It is not my intention to enter into a direct comparative analysis of the two sites of investigation. A comparative analysis appears to assume that each case study is able to present a coherent whole, and that each physical site can be seen as a ‘container’ of shared meanings. This assumes that relevant analytical differences would lie between sites, not within them and that I could contrast ‘Bournemouth’ with the ‘North-west’, in some generic sense. This also assumes that the determinants of people’s reactions AaHto can be found in
111 their workplace or geographical location. This research does not seek to locate the determinants of differencesper se but is instead interested in abstracting the main themes and processes emerging in the two forms of investigation, which implicitly contain an awareness of differing contexts due to the embedded forms of methodology used in this research. I am interested here in the way environmental meanings are constructed and come into play when individuals engage with a programme likeAaH. Therefore, the very process of code building and cumulative research, especially in relation to the transferable categories, can address these theoretical questions. That is, by abstracting processes and themes through coding, and looking at their emergent qualities through mapping, the case studies automatically become integrated as theoretical concerns not simply locational ones.
This process of integration can be seen in the following three chapters which present this thesis’ theoretical analysis. These chapters concern the discursive practices thatA aH participants engage in when thinking about their behaviour, and the personal and social issues evoked when taking part in the programme. The analysis begins in chapter 4, which sets out by constructing a broad theoretical model of the discursive processes engaged in AaHby participants. This model forms the basis of analysis in the proceeding two chapters, which provide empirical support to the theoretical model. They argue that a consideration of process, rather than simply behavioural outcomes, can radically alter current understandings of the meanings embodied by, and the discursive impacts that programmes such AaHas have on their intended audiences.
112 CHAPTER 4. TALKING HABITS INTO ACTION: A DISCURSIVE APPROACH TO BEHAVIOUR CHANGE
In a mobile culture where people constantly meet otherness, habits are brought to the surface, becoming manifest and thereby challenged. Once a habit has been described, it has also become something on which one must take up a stance, whether to kick the habit or to stick tenaciously to it. (Frykman and Lofgren 1996: 14)
4.1 INTRODUCTION
This chapter begins the empirical analysis of this research. It presents the discursive framework used over the next three chapters to analyse the processes that take place when participants engage in theAaH programme. I begin by developing an understanding of what drives the acts of consumption featured inAaH, establishing a relational approach to the constitution of domestic practices, and placing these consumption practices within the lifeworld ofAaH participants. Making use of the principles of structuration (Giddens 1984), I present a model of behaviour change that focuses on the acts of discursive engagement that take place during AaH.
The behavioural model developed is drawn from the experiences of interviewee’s taking part in AaH . It marks a distinction between two forms of discursive process, occurring simultaneously as each individual works through the programme. The first discursive process was experienced by just under half the interviewees and resulted in changes to one or more of their domestic behaviours. It is here that, through the detailing and questioning of everyday practices by AaH, individual’s habits are brought into the discursive arena, moving from practical consciousness into discursive consciousness. This shift results in individuals rethinking the logic of some of their habits, realising that they can easily do things differently and resolving to make changes.
The second discursive process was experienced by all the interviewees but resulted in no change to behaviour. The process includes those who had made some changes through the first discursive process but for whom the majority of practices stayed unchanged; as well as the rest of the participants, who made no changes to any of their practices as a result of taking AaH. I argue that this is the central process in understanding how participants react to, and make use of, AaH. It is where the practices questioned by AaH, by being brought into
113 discursive consciousness, become subject to debates and contestation about their meanings, implications and the social relations they embody. They become part of the participant’s emergent narratives of themselves and their positions within the environmental paradigm, which delineates limits to individual change and the embeddingAaH of into their life.
Both forms of knowledge were employed by AaH participants in examining their behaviours and considering the possibilities for change. This chapter will focus on the first discursive process. It examines how and why just under half of the interviewees made changes to only a few of their existing habits. The discursive process that give rise to behavioural changes requires participants to ‘think differently’ about the logic of their current habits, resulting in each realising ‘I can do that’ and making small changes. I demonstrate in this chapter how AaH facilitates this process by encouraging interviewees to make new connections between both new and old forms of knowledge. It is not onlyAaH's material that enables these connections to take place, but also the contexts in which the programme is experienced. Thus, the discursive contexts in which the programme is taken—particularly the workplace and the research interviews—appear to be an integral part of the discursive behaviour change process. Finally, I show how these findings about behavioural changes are ambiguous in terms of resilience of these new habits, and how they faired beyond the six monthsAaH. of
4.2 UNDERSTANDING CONSUMPTION AND SOCIAL ACTION: A RELATIONAL FRAMEWORK
This section considers existing social framings of consumption practices to establish an approach to social action that can then be taken forward in examining the processes occurring as individuals engage withAaH. I focus arguments within current debate on the sociology of consumption, showing how theories of overt and conspicuous consumption that have dominated this field of inquiry are inadequate for understanding the social constitution of the broad range of practices thatAaH encompasses. Rather, it is necessary to adopt a more embedded and relational approach, one using Giddens’ structuration theory (1984). I show how the principles of structuration permit richer interpretation of the habits of the knowledgeable social actor, whilst embedding these habits within the socio-technic systems of provision that form the on-going contexts of individual’s social actions.
4.2.1 The sociology of consumption
Social relations shape the experience of consuming and the social construction of the consumer is a consequence of these processes. (Edgell and Hetherington 1996: 5)
114 The domestic practices addressed byAaH are acts of consumption. In mainstream research (as discussed in chapters 1 and 2) acts of consumption are considered to result from an internal decision making process carried out by individuals who seeks to maximise personal resource gains (Lutz 1997). In contrast, disciplines such as sociology and anthropology have recently examined the dynamics and drivers of the project of consumption either as a critique of rationalist framings of human action (Edgell and Hetherington 1996) or as an opportunity to gain a new perspective on social relations (Slater 1998). These projects attempt to shift research on consumption away from the individual, into the social domain, considering it as ultimately a socially constituted act.
The social nature of consumption is believed to span several levels. On a broad level, consumption is a central process in the socio-economic framework of modernity and has become one of the theoretical and economic cornerstones of modem politics (Jacobs 1997b). Participation in the project of collective consumption signifies individual’s embedded place within systems of resource provision (Spaargaren and van Vilet 2000), establishing and promoting specific forms of economic and social relationships, such as the modem ‘citizen- consumer’ paradigm. Consumption is a social act that often takes place in spaces of public sociality (Clammer 1992). Also, acts and pattems of consumption bind together intimate and domestic human relations in processes that create and are founded upon secure pattems of routinization (see Giddens 1984) that embody emotional relationships (Miller 1998). Social trends of consumption therefore span all levels of sociality: from the global to the individual and from the markets to the emotional. This makes it central to the social world and social life (Warde 1994b).
For the purposes of this research, it is necessary to understand what forms individual consumption pattems, to then be able to examine what happens when they are open to question. Contrasting theoretical perspectives have sought to locate the main social drivers of consumption. Meta-theoretical approaches have constructed unifying frameworks of the reasons for, and stmctures of, mass consumption, such as Marxism (Campbell 1995, Bedford 1999). Other approaches have focused on the drivers of trends in consumption as part of a historical social project. These approaches aim to locate the social processes that establish individual’s consumption ‘needs’, traditionally viewed from a class perspective (Slater 1998). Broad social mechanisms suggest that consumption is driven by:
• the need to create social distinction between classes; • a project to create and narrate individual identities; • the need for mental stimulation and novelty; and
115 • trends of production, where there is an increased specialisation and proliferation of goods in particular niches (Drawn from Shove and Warde 1997, Warde 1997, Lunt and Livingstone 1992).
Some of these approaches are useful for considering the environmental paradigm, especially the theory of consumption as an act of identity production (see chapter 5). I will not attenipt to investigate the relevance of each theory at this stage. Instead I limit discussion to listing problems that emerge when attempting to apply these theories to the constitution of domestic practices of consumption; of which there are two approaches. First, these approaches present either structuralist or post-modernist frameworks of social action. Acts of consumption are either framed as being lead by social forces beyond the individual’s control or they are the ultimate narrative of the self, with the individual being the instigator and controller of all the forms and semiotics of consumption (Bedford 1999). This dichotomy is neither constructive nor informative for this research.
Second, many theories in the sociology of consumption only pertain to the purchase of goods rather than how they are used (Nippert-Eng 1995). Silverstone et al (1992: 15) suggests, “No general model of household practices and relations can ignore how people use objects”. Some studies have focused on a “patchworks of micro-cultures” (Campbell 1995: 98), taking a closer look at consumption and finding pattems of meanings that are culturally constmcted, having both individual and shared social meanings (Wilhite and Lutzenhiser 1997, Csikszentmihalyi and Rochberg-Halton 1981, Livingstone 1992). These meaning of objects and practices are considered by some to be the key to promoting environmental behaviour changes, as understanding meanings opens them up to manipulation (Hormuth 1999). Thus, there has been:
a tendency to generate general theory from the study of more glamorous aspects of a field of behaviour, particularly those more subject to fashion. (Warde 1997: 1)
Sociological theories have been criticised as being too broad to encompass the diverse range of relations and practices inherent in acts of modem consumption (Shove and Warde 1997, Warde 1997). This is because there are many forms of consumption, with multiple explanations, sites and outcomes (Abercrombie 1994). Indeed the practices detailedAaH in vary considerably in their attributes: ranging from forms of inconspicuous consumption, such as the use of domestic water and electricity supplies; to forms of conspicuous consumption, such as shopping and transport use (Shove and Warde 1997). Different features of practices outlined inAaH include:
116 • Context : sites of consumption range from private spaces, such as the home, to public spaces, such as shopping centres; • Frequency : some actions are repeated several times a day, such as switching lights off, whilst others, such as travelling by aeroplanes, may happen only once every few years; • Locus of action : actions range from bodily movements, such as turning taps off, to the use of particular form of technology or ‘gadgets’, and the use of public infrastructures; • Locus of change : altering current practices either involves the curtailment of actions or the adoption of new ones; and • Cost; altering actions can result in the individual saving money or spending money.
AaH seeks to unify all these practices by framing them in terms of their impacts upon the environment, collecting them together under the concept of sustainable lifestyles. Although this unification is conceptually feasible, it is also true that “factors encouraging one type of environmental action will not necessarily be important for another” (Rutherford 1998: 15), and:
It is not uncommon in the ecological domain that one behaviour is affected by either environmental attitude, environmental knowledge, environmental values or ecological behaviour intention, while others are not. (Kaiser et al. 1999: 5)
Thus it is necessary to move away from sociological frameworks that require examinations of each consumption practice individually, looking for attendant drivers and meanings. Such an approach is not feasible within the confines of this thesis, nor a helpful theoretical tool in understanding the placement of consumption practices in everyday life. Instead it is necessary to advance a socially embedded perspective of consumption, one positioned within a theoretical framework that permits consideration of the range of practices featured inAaH.
4.2.2 Habitus
One possible way of advancing past prevailing sociological framings of consumption is to consider the role of practices in the constitution of the social action by examining “a behaviour’s embeddedness in cultural structures” (Tanner 1999: 146). One useful theory is Bourdieu’s concept of ‘habitus’ (Bourdieu 1990). Bourdieu argues that every individual has a fundamental knowledge about forms of social action, called the habitus. This habitus is a system of structured and structuring dispositions that are constituted through practice (Bourdieu 1990) and formed as social facts become internalised by the individual into everyday life, through the processes of experience and socialisation. These social facts are
117 not rigid or handed down between generations. They are adopted pattems, flexible enough for each actor to adapt to new situations and experiences (Strauss 1992).
Habitus is important for considering social practices because it places the taken-for-granted knowledge of culture firmly within concepts of processual systems as lived, which are made up of both individual and collective practices, formed by shared and personal histories. There are, however, several problems with this theory. First, although the concept of habitus is useful, it presents a highly unified theory of practice. Warde (1997) has suggested that its coherence is attributable to stmcturalist notions of class, as the theory of habitus argues that practices are displays of cultural attributes. This neglects any theory of process. Second, issues about process become more apparent as Bourdieu argues that practical habitus does not differ from learned, conscious knowledge in its form, but differs in its existence as internalised categories that are rarely questioned (Strauss and Quirm 1997). Therefore, that which is culturally unknown or unsaid will always remain unknowable and unsayable (Strauss and Quinn 1997, Strauss 1992). Cultural knowledge is locked away within the individual, whose unconscious is formed by past conditions, and embodies the social and personal history of the subject, who is not aware of their own habitus (Bourdieu 1990).
These considerations are problematic for this research because the formation and promotion of sustainable lifestyles is itself a questioning of culturally embedded practices. Social theory has argued in favour of the knowledgeable social actor in all forms of practice (Giddens 1984). Otnes (1988: 120) suggests that domestic acts of consumption consist “to a large extent, of the competent, knowledgeable use and maintenance of such systems”. This is not simply a declaration that individuals are aware of their practices, but concerns constmcting a relational framework of the relationship between consumption practices and their discursive components. I intend to advance these ideas here by considering practices as socially embedded and flexible. The aim is to construct a theory of practice that encompasses forms of knowledge, as well as the vast range of different consumption practices outlined above. In order to do this it is first necessary to revisit the central tenets of structuration theory.
4.2.3 Giddens: systems of provision and forms of knowing
The analysis of the history of consumption can no longer be encapsulated in the question ‘who buys what?’ but must become one of ‘who obtains what services (or goods), under what conditions are those services delivered and to what use are they put? (Warde 1997: 19)
Spaargaren and van Vilet (2000) argue that Giddens’ structuration theory is a useful way of understanding the embedded and social nature of practices. In chapter 2 I have similarly argued that structuration theory is helpful in constructing a relational approach to practices.
118 The strength of structuration theory lies in the way it positions practices within collective systems of provision, whilst considering the place that social knowledge has in the creation and enactment of these practices. In other words, it allows the examination of the individual without losing site of his/her social context, which to date has been a flaw in many studies of sustainable lifestyles behaviour change. Below I revisit the main concepts of structuration theory to be used in constructing a relational approach to consumption practices and forms of behaviour change.
4.2.4 Consumption and collective systems of provision
Pivotal to this research is the contention that in everyday existence the individual is positioned within systems of resource provision that frame consumption practice. These consumption practices are neither determined by these systems of provision, nor are they controlled by the will of the individual consumer. Instead, practices in the domestic sphere, many of which are questioned by AaH, are largely mundane acts of inconspicuous consumption that serve, and are served by, collective socio-material systems of provision (Shove and Warde 1997). These systems of provision, and thus the embedded nature of practices, have to date received little attention by sociologists (Shove and Warde 1997). Giddens’ duality of structuration provides a useful bridge across this conceptual divide. He argues that rather than practices of consumption taking place within reified structures of provision:
rules and resources together constitute the structures that are involved in the reproduction of social practices. (Spaargaren and van Vilet 2000: 53)
On-going domestic practices are the site where these rules and resources meet, create, and are created by individual lifestyles, constructed by the interplay of practical and discursive consciousness. Figure 4.1 explains this relationship by representing the individual actor, the practical and discursive constitutions of their practices, and on-going structures that are bound by collective systems of rules and resources.
119 Figure 4.1. Practices and structuration theory (developed from Spaargaren and van Vilet 2000)
Actor/ Agent ■Human Action Social Practices ...... Structures
Lifeworld
'raetice 1 Practical and Rules discursive and consciousness Resources
Etc.
Practices embedded in an individual’s lifeworld are both parts of their knowledges and choices, as well as being part of the structuring principles of their social context. Structuration theory thus provides the conceptual tools to understand how actors construct their understandings and enactments of practices and also how their socio-technic contexts are instrumental in these constructions. This argument is made clearer by considering the categories of practical consciousness and discursive consciousness.
• Action and knowing Practical consciousness and discursive consciousness are forms of knowledge that are central in understanding acts of consumption. Therefore, their main assumptions will be briefly reiterated in this section. Beginning with practieal consciousness: this form of knowledge constitutes the on-going flow of daily social life, providing the basis of routinization of practices that enables the agent to ‘go on’ (Giddens 1984). Domestic practices are not simply made up of a series of discrete acts that require constant decisions and evaluations. Rather, they consist of a body of knowledge about how to act in modern domestic settings, which makes practices almost automatic to the individual. These practices can be considered ‘habits’, which are defined as:
120 the degree to which behaviour is performed automatically, without a conscious decision and with little cognitive effort. (Staats and Harland 1995: 17)
Habits are important in understanding changes in practices, not only because they are the most effective predictors of future behaviour (Ouellette and Wood 1998, Verplanken et al. 1998) but also because they are the shared foundations of the recursive nature of social life, that constantly recreate the conditions of social action (Astrom 1996, Giddens 1984, Strauss and Quinn 1997).
This form of knowledge differs from discursive consciousness, which is the expression of self-aware reflexivity (Giddens 1984). One of the most important points of structuration theory is that is the division between discursive consciousness and practical consciousness is not static, but can move through time, and through the effects of personal experiences (Giddens 1984). This creates a fluctuating relationship between unconscious motives, practical consciousness and discursive consciousness (Giddens 1984).
Thus, Giddens provides a useful array of theoretical tools to investigate the relationship between discursive and physical practices that can be used in understanding behaviour change. Whilst he offers a strong conceptual approach, he does not provide a clear argument about the processes involved in both the constitution of practices embedded within an individual’s life, and also the movement of the boundaries between practical consciousness and discursive consciousness. Here, I follow Jardine’s (1998: 45) argument in suggesting that to understand the place of practices in social life it is necessary to resist divorcing them from their context, looking instead to the on-going narrative of the space within which the practice is enacted: “This is why practices must be informed by, or enclosed within, a narrative”.
The relational approach taken in this research seeks to understand the discussions of practices within the interviews, as part of the interviewee’s narrative of the self, not just a recounting of forms and locations of actions. This moves towards the consideration of practices as part of an individual’s lived-in world (Macnaghten and Urry 1998) or lifeworld, in which practices are formed and framed by personal life experiences, worldviews and meanings, in an iterative and on-going relationship (Finger 1994). The conceptual tools of structuration theory and Jardine’s narrative framing of practices will now be taken forward and utilised to create a theoretical model of discursive behaviour change to account for interviewee’s experiences of the programme. This approach is detailed below.
121 4.3 MODEL OF DISCURSIVE BEHAVIOUR CHANGE
This section will present a theoretical model which applies the above relational framework to understanding the constitution of practices and the processes of behaviour change that result from taking part in the AaH programme. It seeks to build upon some of the progressive approaches to behaviour change taken in clinical psychology and medical-behavioural literatures, that have made use of the concepts of individual knowledgeability and discursive sociality, in examining how individuals go about making changes to their behaviours. These have shown how addictive habits can be addressed by bringing them into the individual’s awareness: moving them from states of pre-contemplation, to contemplation, and then to action, thus moving habits from the unknown into the discursive (Prochaska et al. 1992). Authors have stressed the importance of social context in influencing and encouraging changes (Prochaska et al. 1992, Wardle 1996). This is a finding that resonates with this research.
However, Rollnick (1996) points out that these models still need to take an approach to change that incorporates the active processes of individual information use, rather than considering individuals as passive recipients of expert advice and intervention. This is the challenge that I hope to address with the model presented below. It casts participantsof AaH as active agents, both in the realisation of the practices that they can change, and in constructing an understanding and positioning of those they cannot. The model is presented in Figure 4.2. The empirical support for this model’s processes and categories will be gathered in the remainder of this chapter and the following two chapters.
122 Figure 4.2. Discursive model of behaviour change in Action at Home programme DISCURSIVE CONTEXT OF AaH PRACTICAL ___ CONSCIOUNESS NEW HABITS
HABITS OLD HABITS BOUNDARY 7 !^ ------
------DISCURSIVE T CAN DO AWARENESS AND THAT’ OF HABITS : ACTION RHETORICAL NEW AT CONSTRUCTION DISCURSIVE HOME: OF TOOLS QUESTIONS PRACTICES : PRACTICES AWARENESS OF THEIR TCANNOT t EMBEDDED /WILL NOT DISCURSIVE /EMBODIED DO THAT’ AWARENESS : ROUTINES SOCIAL CONTRIBUTION RELATIONS TO SOCIAL AND MORAL DISCURSIVE DEBATES CONSCIOUSNESS To briefly explain the key arguments presented in the model, I begin by focusing on the movement of habits from practical into discursive consciousness. At the start of theAaH programme, habits existed within the participant’s practical consciousness. These are the habits that form part of an individual’s daily routines, and are not questioned on a day-to-day basis. By engaging with AaH, habits are brought into discursive consciousness, where participants reconsider them in light of the sustainable lifestyles rubric presented AaH,in and also in relation to the rest of their lives, requiring them to think about what matters to them, and why. Some of these practices are then changed, by less than half of theAaH participants. Habits that cost little in terms of time and effort, and do not cause too much disruption to already established routines, are the ones most likely to change. Reconsidering these habits creates a form of personal revelation, where individuals ask themselves ‘why do I do that?’ If there is no pertinent reason for continuing with the practice, it is concluded that ‘I can do that’, thus facilitating the recommended changes. These new habits then become part of the individual’s reconstitution of their practical consciousness. Yet, they do not automatically sink back into practical consciousness, to become unquestioned habits again. Instead they leave behind a residual awareness—a ‘lens of difference’—through which future practices can be considered; putting ideas to the ‘back of the mind’, as one way they could be acting. These new habits may also become discursive tools, that individuals then mobilise in debates about practices and their implied social relationships, thus creating a new discursive awareness.
However, despite this process, the majority of practices featured inAaH do not change. Less then half of the interviewees made one or more changes, whilst the majority made none. There is therefore a parallel process taking place. Once practices have been brought into the discursive arena by AaH, rather than being subject to change the majority instead become part of participant’s emergent narratives about their lifestyles, as well as the social and ethical debates that these practices imply and embody. Practices least likely to change are the demanding, complex or socially contentious ones, such as transport use and shopping routines. These may already be part of individual’s discursive consciousness, forming the basis of their routines. These routines differ from habits as they are constituted by practices that require some awareness and self-monitoring in their enactment, such as doing the weekly shopping. They also embody sets of social relations that are contentious and are subject to a great deal of debate.
For example, the practice of shopping and the reasons given by participants for their actions are inextricably bound up with debates about consumer and producer relations and
124 responsibilities. For these practices the individual is able to present strong arguments about why they should not, or cannot change. In addition, they also present strong arguments as to why they will not change some of the seemingly ‘easy’ practices featured inAaH. These arguments emerge during the process whereby participants think through their lifestyles and map out their own boundaries to change, becoming more aware of the meanings and positionings of their practices in relation to the coherency of their lifestyles. Because of this process, the majority of practices remain unchanged.
The remainder of this chapter expands upon one component of this behaviour change model: the process of changing habits that was experienced by less than half of theAaH interviewees. I offer empirical support to the theoretical model by showing how habits that exist in practical consciousness become part of discursive consciousness through takingAaH and thus become subject to change. The parallel process, of contesting and rejecting changes to practices, experienced by participants whether they made behaviour changes or not, will be discussed subsequently in chapters 5 and 6.
4.4 BRINGING PRACTICAL INTO DISCURSIVE
Actors are also ordinarily able discursively to describe what they do and their reasons for doing it. However, for the most part these faculties are geared to the flow of day- to-day conduct. The rationalization of conduct becomes the discursive offering of reasons only if individuals are asked by others why they acted the way they did. (Giddens 1984: 281)
In the remainder of this chapter, I expand upon the discursive model of behaviour change by focusing on the movement of habits from practical consciousness. I argue that behaviour changes occur when habits are brought into discursive consciousness by working through the AaH programme. Evidence to support the argument that the habits questioned byAaH are part of practical consciousness is demonstrated by the types of behaviour subject to change and the people who made the changes. The habits altered were all small, no-cost or low-cost behaviours, those easy to change and that were being carried out without conscious effort on the part of the participants. This makes them part of practical consciousness. Those who made changes were individuals who stated they had never really thought about their behaviours before. Individuals who made the fewest changes were those who had already incorporated the environment into their lifestyles to some degree, having gone through this questioning process at some previous point in their lives. Therefore, the process of change is down to the individual’s awareness of their own habits and the types of behaviours being questioned. However, this process was also affected byhow habits were being brought into the discursive arena and questioned AaH.by
125 Changes occur because of the way that AaH questions habits. It treats habits as discrete entities and breaks up the flow of everyday life, making participants think about behaviours as logical, self-contained practices, whose nature they then have to justify to themselves, and also to others present in the research process. As a result of this experience, many participants come to think of habits differently. It is not so much that theAaH participants leam and retain new facts. Rather, previously dormant connections are made between their actions and their environmental impacts. This results in a T can do that’ sensation, to which there is little discursive resistance. I now proceed to expand on this process, offering up evidence from the /I j/ f research interviews.
4.4.1 Changing habits
If we had to decide every morning whether to put on the left or the right sock first, we would waste a great deal of time and energy before we had our breakfast and began the working day. (Frykman and Lofgren 1996: 10)
In this section I show how habits are pivotal to understanding the process of behaviour change that result from taking part in the AaH programme. This emphasis on habits was also recognised by interviewees, who acknowledged their importance in the promotion and adoption of sustainable lifestyles.
Gill^^ - But it’s how you get the message across to other people and how you break habits. A lot of it’s habit forming isn’t it? The way we do things is habit-forming, it’s how you break that habit and educate people. (North-west, October 1997)
Tim - I think it is actually thinking about it. Yeah, ‘cause I personally, if I have a piece of paper and I put it in the waste paper, I feel guilty. I think ‘oh no, don’t do that, take it out’ and remove it. So yeah, it’s probably more habit than anything else. (North west, May 1999)
This emphasis on habits was mirrored by the types of behaviour participants stated they had changed as a result of takingAaH. In the Bournemouth case study, eight of the twenty households interviewed in April had changed at least one habit. These were all no-cost or low-cost actions which included turning the taps off whilst brushing teeth, turning lights and
Extracts from my interviews appear in the text of this thesis in the following format. The name of the interviewee is given at the start of the paragraph; the text is in a hanging paragraph format, with the date and place of the interview appearing in brackets after the main body of text. If I am speaking in the extract, I will be identified simply as ‘Me’.
126 televisions off after use, recycling a wider range of waste, and only putting the washing machine on with a full load. Similar changes were reported in the North-west case study, in which 9 people directly stated that they had made changes as a result of takingAaH. Some examples of the practices changed can be seen in the interview extracts below, which show how /la//have helped to bring an new awareness of their practices to these individuals.
Wendy - Yes, I don’t leave the taps running, I used to do it always when I bmshed my teeth and waste water. Going through everything that was the worst thing I did with water. But I am being more careful. I’m trying not to put the washing machine on everyday, even if it was a small load. I tend to make sure that I’ve got a full load now and that sort of thing. So it is probably quite minor what I am doing, but it is an improvement. So it has helped. And lights, I was terrible with lights, leaving things on and the television on stand-by and all sorts of things. The only thing that I’d like to be better at is really to save newspapers and things but I tend to throw the rubbish straight in the bin and I am trying to make amends, to save cans and bottles and things. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
Sharon - I think it’s made me more conscious and I know I never used to put lids onto saucepans and I do that now. Also it makes it boil quicker. You know, just things I had read it in a leaflet, about sticking lids on pans and just little things. And I don’t leave my TV on, I used to leave my TV on stand-by at night and I just turn if off at the mains. Marie - I do that. Sharon - Which I never never did before. (North-west, April 1999)
All the habits changed take little effort and mostly involve acts of inconspicuous consumption. They involve changing the nature of a practice, rather than the wholesale adoption of a new one. The centrality of ease, and of gaining some palpable benefit in changing practices is a sentiment echoed by interviewees, who stressed how important these small behaviours were in terms of their ability to make changes to their lifestyles.
Paul - I still think you’ll only get some change because some actions in the packs will take a minute or no time at all, and people do those. I think quite a lot of those ones are effective, aren’t they. (North-west, October 1998)
Sean - Well probably the easiest thing to carry forward, because it’s the easiest for them to benefit from, that’s energy efficiency. (North-west, May 1999)
127 Gill - If it’s a simple matter of turning a switch off then yes, I think people will get into the habit of doing that. I think we’ve started turning the photocopier off at night instead of leaving it on and things like that. But if it involved any effort then I don’t think it will change. (North-west, October 1998)
Alex^* - Even though I couldn't sign up to a lot of things in the questionnaire I did get to think about little things that we do that could make a difference. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Wendy - It certainly made me stop, you know. I definitely have got to improve on a lot of things, I wouldn’t say that I would do it all. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
These quotes confirm that it is the small habits that are changing: ones to which there is little resistance to change, suggesting that some practices are more likely to change than others are: a statement this work supports. However, I would also argue that it was not just the nature of the action per se that facilitated changes of habits. It is also the process of reconsideration that AaH takes its participants through. This occurs when the flow of on-going daily practices, that are part of practical consciousness, are brought into discursive consciousness, broken down into discrete entities and then cast in a comparative lightAaH. by This results in an almost revelatory experience for the individual, where they see their own behaviour reflected back to them from a new perspective and they think ‘I can do that!’ The processes and contexts of these transformations are now discussed.
4.4.2 Thinking about habits: the processes and framing of change
The AaH ‘welcome’ questionnaire and monthly packs present the sustainable lifestyles agenda in a series of small, ‘do-able’ actions (see Appendix 2 and 3). They break down patterns of habits into discrete acts, whose own internal logic is then open to reconsideration. For example, the habits of food preparation routines are highlighted in the ‘welcome’ questionnaire where it is asked if participants put lids on pans or turn down the gas to an appropriate level when cooking, thus taking apart the routine of cooking. These simple questions highlights an aspect of a practice that may have often gone unnoticed. The resulting process forces participants to look at their undisclosed habits, by bringing them to discursive consciousness, making the unknown knowable and resulting in a re-evaluation.
38 Alex is female.
128 Examples of this can be seen in the October Bournemouth interviews. Here, many participants talked through in the interviews their responses to theAaH ‘welcome’ questionnaire. Looking at extracts of these interviews shows how interviewees took their lives apart and looked at them bit by bit, rethinking their practices and interrupting the routinized flow of everyday practical consciousness. However, the quotes also show that this process is not simply an act of listing practices one by one, and considering them independently. It shows thatAaH participants think through, and out loud, about their lifestyles whilst working through the programme. In bringing habits into discursive consciousness one by one, there is a cumulative process taking place whereby practices are weighed up against one another. The three quotes below are where interviewees are talking through the ‘welcome’ questionnaire with me. It shows how thinking through enables, or forces, participants to construct narratives of their practices and understand their lifestyles in terms of the rubric of sustainable lifestyles.
Maureen - Leave windows open when the heating is on? I can’t say ‘never’. Like all these things, we don’t have facilities for cardboard, only the newspapers. That blue bag scheme is excellent and we exchange newspapers too with the neighbours, we take different ones, we swap them -that’s a good idea. But this one, glass, I love smashing glass. Don’t have many cans; oh what shall I put there? There is an aluminium bin at the bottom of the steps. In this direction, we’re in Poole, down the road here you’re in Bournemouth. Bournemouth doesn’t have them; Poole does, so I go down there. I don’t know why Bournemouth doesn’t have them. Now textiles and fabric, we don’t have one of those things. Do you mean putting things into a bin? Well you see I take everything to charity shops. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Hazel - I mean this bit, leaving the TV on stand-by, well we never do that, never. Cooking with lids? Sometimes and sometimes not. I do boil more water in the kettle than is required, I must say I do have a thing about filling it up and then turning it on and then making one cup of coffee. Haven’t got gas so that doesn’t apply. I tend to use pans that cover the hob. I haven’t got a tumble-dryer. Leave lights on in empty rooms? No I don’t, my husband’s always going on at me so I don’t do it. I leave windows open, yeah I’ve got a thing about it, I don’t like heating too much to be honest so I’ve always got a window open. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Christine - I already have a garden waste bin. I put my green stuff in. A water butt, for watering my greenhouse. I recycle my newspapers and my glass bottles. At the moment I am trying to train myself to take back the plastic carrier bags to the supermarket each
129 week to re-use them but as yet I haven’t been able to remember to take them (laughing). I suppose I do tend to use them to put the kitchen rubbish in and it goes in the bin. I’ve got 1 or 2 low energy light bulbs; I’m looking into the possibility of having some more. (North-west, October 1998)
As will be discussed in greater depth in the next chapter, these narratives do not automatically lead to changes in habits but are part of the process by which participants come to understand, think about, contest and justify their current lifestyle choices. To focus for the time being on the behaviours that do change, it seems that an interesting process is taking place in relation to how AaH is constructed. The logic of a particular practice is brought into sharp relief, not only from having it move from practical consciousness into discursive consciousness, but also by the comparative process that AaH facilitates. For example, some practices are framed by AaH in terms of their environmental impact and resource use. However, rather than simply offering up absolute figures about how much energy a certain action uses, AaH also compares the resources used or wasted by a particular habit in relation to a recognisable quantified analogy. For example, a statement in the Energy pack suggests that “If we all stopped leaving our TVs on stand-by it would save enough electricity to power a town the size of Basingstoke or Burnley”. Framing practices in this manner seemed to have a considerable impact on how interviewees saw their own actions, as the extracts below show.
Gill - I tell you what did make me think. You know those stickers that we got that’s stuck on your PC. Your printer, what was it? Your thingy left on over night, your PC left on over night, 800 copies of A4 on a laser printer? That’s an awful lot isn’t it? That made me think so I did something. (North-west, October 1998)
Sharon - They’re very good^^ because you look at them and they say ‘if you leave your TV on overnight it’s the equivalent o f and they give you a fact. Marie - I think it wastes 50% of its life or something? Sharon - I can’t remember what the fact was now. And things like that, I think it was good how they compare, they gave us comparison, telling you it was more expensive because it does make people listen. Marie - I think if you hit people with facts regarding money they’ll listen rather than saying so many acres of rainforest get chopped down a day to make them people’s paper. (North-west, January 1999)
Sharon is talking about GAP posters and stickers that were put up in the North-west workplaces involved in the second case study.
130 Steve - Well, it’s a good way of putting it, isn’t it. When they say 1 degree, is neither here nor there and you can save quite a considerable amount over 12 months. Some of it stuck. (North-west, January 1999)
If participants are being influenced by comparative facts, it might suggest that they are learning and remembering them, making them part of their environmental knowledge base (see Ehrlich et al. 1999). However, it is clear from these interviews that the actual contents of the questionnaires and packs are not well remembered after their initial impact. Instead, what does stay with participants are thefeelings they experienced when the initial comparison hit them. This leaves them with residual emotions, reminding them about seeing their actions cast in a different and comparable light.
Tom - I hadn’t thought about it, you read and it’s a shock and you look at things differently. Me - Like what, what’s a shock? Tom - I can’t remember just now, there was something that I were reading, when I was reading the last one that we got. Me - Was that the shopping? Tom - I think it was the shopping one yeah and I hadn’t realised, you know and I thought ‘good idea’. I forget what it was now. Gill - That’s the trouble, I can’t remember the questions now. Tom - That’s right yeah. It was only last week or the week before we got ‘em as well. Me - Do they go out of your head that fast? Tom- Well,yeah! (North-west,January 1999)
David - I think everybody’s shocked when you start, when you start realising how much money you can waste or, how much money it costs to do something. That’s when you start realising, you know, that you can start saving stuff. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
Marie - Because I didn’t know that that used a lot of electricity."^ I didn’t think it would use any and it just suddenly dawned on me. (North-west, October 1998)
This point casts further doubt on the concept of an ‘information deficit’ in terms of the rationale of environmental communications (see chapter 2). These individuals are not
Marie is talking about leaving the television on stand-by mode overnight.
131 learning and retaining facts but are instead using the information to reflect upon their own practices, being effected differentially by the implications of this reflection process. The role that the information plays is twofold. First, it provides a source of comparison that makes participants see their practices differently. Second, it highlights to individuals the embedded positioning of their lifestyles, by making connections between their actions and the collective provisioning of goods and services that they are inextricably part of.
With this in mind, I suggest that the key process of behaviour change is relation toAaH lies with the participants making connections between previously unknown or unstated pieces of information. Giddens (1984: 26) sums up this process when he states that:
Human agents always know what they are doing on the level of discursive consciousness under some description. However, what they do may be quite unfamiliar under other descriptions, and they may know little of the ramified consequences of the activities in which they engage.
AaH describes habits and informs participants of the amount of resources habits consume, not only bringing them into practical consciousness but also connecting them with tangible comparisons. This is an important process and these findings resonate with cognitive anthropology research. From research carried out into how individuals talk about and use cultural concepts or ‘schemas’, Strauss and Quinn (1997) have suggested that there are different forms of knowledge that remain unstated in everyday life. These are:
• what is unsaid because it is unknown by a particular individual, but is a piece of accessible ‘social’ knowledge; • what is unsaid because it is known by the individual only as motor habit or image; and • what is unsaid because it would requires new connections to be made by the individual between scattered bits of knowledge.
These categories can help elucidate the process of behaviour change taking place in this research. Although making new connections between pieces of knowledge is limited because existent ideas “act as gatekeepers that bar perception of unexpected events” (Strauss and Quinn 1997: 98), it is also possible that established perceptions do not bar the way to seeing things in a new light, being over-ridden by new information and new connections. Strauss and Quinn (1997: 40) suggest that:
Pointing out connections between previously isolated bits of people’s assumptions can create both greater awareness of those bits and new cognitive links among them.
132 This appears to be what is happening asAaH participants work through the programme. In fact, rather than just making new connections, it can be argued thatAaH uses all of the three forms of unstated knowledge listed above to bring about a greater understanding of practices. This is done by taking that which is unsaid—because it is a habit—bringing it into the discursive arena and comparing it to information that is unknown to the interviewees, such as the facts on resource use. Thus, interviewees were making new knowledge connections, as they examine and construct their lifeworld narratives, considering their practices against one another, and against their meanings and choices: this is part of the whole process of taking AaH. Participants were also reconnecting their lifestyles with pieces of information already in practical consciousness and discursive consciousness, whose resonance takes on a new form (see chapter 5).
As well as these connections between forms of knowledges being positive processes, there were also some problems in making connections. For example, there are inherent difficulties with environmental communications that cast issues in a global framework and then expect them to motivate individuals to take action locally, as individuals do not really ‘think globally’ (Bulkeley 1997). Indeed, there was an active rejection of the global framing of environmental issues byAaH interviewees, which resonates with other research (see Brandon and Lewis 1999, Burgess et al. 1998, Darier and Schule 1999, Hinchliffe 1996, Myers and Macnaghten 1998). It appears that the further removed the scale and content of information is from individual’s direct experiences, the less credible facts appear (Macnaghten and Jacobs 1997). This is to be expected because global risks are not detectable to the senses, being highly mediated and open to conflicting definitions, perceptions and understandings (Hajer 1995, Szerszynski 1999). The quotes below demonstrate howAaH interviewees felt a lack of resonance between their own lifestyles and the global framing of environmental problems. This suggests that the framing of environmental issues is integral to how they are received and to the connections that individuals can make between the forms of knowledges they use.
Marie - To be honest I don’t even think about the hole in the ozone layer. It’s not when I walk outside so you just forget about it. You can’t see it. Well I suppose if I was here and you could see this big black hole in the sky, you’d be petrified, wouldn’t you. And everybody would be doing what they could to make it better but because you can’t see it you don’t think about it. But if you were sat here watching it, you’d be dead scared wouldn’t you? You’d be doing all you could. (North-west, January 1999)
133 Christine - It is miles away and it doesn’t affect us.'*’ Tom - I think so, when boiling the kettle you don’t think of it, do you? Andre- How many people are aware that the ice cap has receded 150 miles in the last 12 years? I mean, that is a frightening scenario for the future. Tom - Yeah but the ice-caps? Thousands and thousands of miles away. Who’ll be bothered? Half of Holland, it’s going to sink Holland. Andre - Well a third of Holland will disappear over night if anything serious happened. And when you think of the land mass that we will lose, it’s quite significant. Again, you are right, it doesn’t affect us directly as individuals and therefore what doesn’t effect us we don’t actually get involved in. (North-west, January 1999)
In contrast to this, at best, vague anxiety about global issues, this empirical evidence suggests that framing evidence locally resonates with participants, having more meaning than global framings. By using the term ‘local’ here, two possible readings are implied. First, it can refer to issues being framed as regionally or spatially proximate to the individual, which is often how concerns about environmental conditions are expressed, owing to a strong identification with a sense of local ‘place’ (Selman and Parker 1997). The ‘local’ was constantly referred to in the interviews as being the most pertinent scale to address problems and present issues. For example, putting information in a spatially proximate context was believed to be the best way to make it ‘speak’, allowing people to relate their personal knowledges of their own environment with abstract environmental problems.
Paul - Can you imagine writing a pack about Warrington, somewhere that’s local, something that people understand? That’s when you’ve got to think about what they can see and what they know. (North-west, October 1998)
Sonia - If you are really going to have to have a GreenScore'*^ surely one should equate it with the local needs. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Ian - Speaking for myself I am more interested in my local environment and if that does ultimately have an impact on the bigger picture for example, then great, all good enough. And it probably does, doesn’t it. We all do our little bit locally. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Christine is talking about the hole in the ozone layer. Sonia is referring to the Greenscorel thatAaH participants receive once they have completed the ‘welcome’ questionnaire.
134 The fact that regional environmental issues were not addressed, and that local information was not included in the packs, alienated some participants from the programme.
Sean - And also it’s fair to say that there wasn’t very much local information in the packs as well. I think that’s probably one of the problems with Global Action being so removed and everything’s come out of a central office and I guess that it’s probably impossible for them to make it more bespoke to a particular area. That’s really one of the reasons why we stepped in and said ‘ well, hold on a minute, rather than send them to people’s homes, give them to us first and we can include some local, some local ideas’. Which hasn’t been that successful really to be honest. Leon - We did send some local information down for the first one, sent down to Action Plan and it wasn’t included. Which was a bit of a disappointment really. (North-west, January 1999)
The term ‘local’ can also refer to a system of reference that has meaning within individual’s lifeworld and with which they can make connections. Framing and comparing practices in comprehensible scales of reference has direct resonance with the lived experiences of these individuals. The framework of this thesis asserts that individuals are knowledgeable actors embedded within socio-technical systems.'*^ Using measures of these systems to make comparisons is therefore highly effective. As Spaargaren and van Vilet (2000: 65) suggest:
Interruptions of daily routines make us (temporarily) alert and very sensitive to consider alternative modes of organising our consumption practices. When going through periods of de- and re-routinisation, we become aware of the level and the nature of what Giddens calls our ‘discursive penetration’ of the collective socio material systems.
By taking AaH, individuals are forced to consider the existence of, and how they make use of, these collective socio-material systems: considering their practices in relation to these increasingly apparent modes of socio-material systems and enabling participants to reflect upon the impact and implications of their habits. Thus, there are different forms of ‘local’ that are important inAaH participants making changes. This point, about using and framing of local knowledge, is also important in considering the contexts of changes implied in the
By ‘socio-technical systems’, I refer to the resource provision contexts of domestic practices. For example, electricity uses. On the one level, to use electricity within our homes is to consume a service. However, this service is part of the infrastrucutral systems and relations of modernity, that embed individuals in sets of social and governance relations, created and recreated by individuals taking part in these systems of provision (see Giddens 1984).
135 processes of AaH. That is, the local is not just a form of knowledge but it is the context in which forms of knowledge are brought to light and considered, throughAaH.
4.4.3 Contexts of change
GAP has always stressed that the delivery contexts ofAaH are as important, if not more important, that the packs and the questionnaires: an assertion that has strong currency in this research. In addition to the above arguments regarding the affective nature of AaHthe information, it is also important to consider the geographies of change, and the contexts that promoted and facilitated the processes discussed above. This suggests that not only are there particular types of knowledges that are used and connected in the process of takingAaH, but that these knowledges and processes are situated. There are three main contexts that feature in this research: the home and community, the workplace, and the interview discussions groups. In this section I briefly examine the affective nature of these contexts, showing that it is the discursive contexts of the workplace and the interview groups that facilitated the greatest engagement with AaH and the biggest response to positive reconsiderations of practices.
• The home and the community Very little was said in the interviews about the context of the home and the effects it had on behaviour changes, despite prompting. The few comments that did arise suggested that the dynamics of the household do not to foster positive interactions with theAaH programme, which appeared to be met with resistance or disinterest by other household members.
Tom - They still do what they want.'*^ Gill - I must admit there were a couple of times, we do think drastically differently so it’s not like an over-all one answer Me - Like what? Gill - John wouldn’t recycle anything out of choice, you know, take a fir tree to get it done at Christmas time. It wouldn’t enter his head to do anything like that. But if you are trying to answer as a family you are taking your opinion really. He’s a treasure hunter; he brings rubbish into the house. Trying to get rid of it and it comes in. Me - What does he think of you doing this kind of thing, Actionof at Hamel Gill - Typically me! (laughter)
^ ‘They’ is other members of the interviewee’s household. Gill is referring to filling in the ‘welcome’ questionnaire and is talking about the differences in domestic practices between herself and her husband, John.
136 Christine - He does know then, that you’re doing it? (laughing) Gill - He’s probably aware of it, yeah. (North-west, January 1999)
Two other female interviewees stated that they were not able to change much because of their husband’s resistance, although no details were given about how this directly affected the interviewee’s attempts at changing their practices. Therefore it appears that the context of the home was not a positive context in fostering processes of change."^ It also seems that the interviewee’s local ‘community’, or relations with neighbours, did not provide a supportive context for change. Approximately four interviewees made references with relations to their local neighbours in the course of interviews. Two said that they sharedAaH information with them, and that they had been supportive in each other’s reconsiderations of practices.
Clare - Well the people upstairs, as I say, we discussed Action at Home because I took the hippo bags up to the flats and they now know to save bits and pieces for the compost. So I mean in a small way, yes, we do share here. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
For the remainder of the interviewees, there was very little said about the context of the community as a positive space for change. Rather, as will be discussed in chapter 6, community spaces were considered by many to have highly detrimental effects on practices.
• The workplace Ian - Even though it’s supposed to be more for the home if you’re talking about it in work, you’re in work most of the day, aren’t you. (North-west, April 1999)
Because the workplace formed the context of the research interviews in the North-west case study the contexts of change were more visible in the research process and more salient to the interviewees than in the Bournemouth case study. In contrast to the appraisal of household dynamics, the workplace appeared to offer a site where individuals were stimulated to think about their behaviours. It encompassed shared spaces that facilitated discussions aboutAaH, as well as providing the opportunity for forms of social learning. For example, posters around the worksites created a ‘buzz’ of interest, encouraging individuals to get involved. These posters appeared to stimulate debates between employees, as the quotes below demonstrate.
^ This research’s findings on this topic can be considered inconclusive as the context of the home was not highly visible during the research process, both physically or discursively (see chapter 7 for a discussion of these issues as a future research question for sustainable lifestyles behaviour change investigations).
137 Sharon - It was good because I know people in this building have took notice of the posters and it sorts of provoked conversation on it, so that’s always good isn’t it. (North west, April 1999)
Marie - I’ve walked into offices and it’s been the topic of conversation, people discussing how many carrier bags they waste and how much it would cost. People do take notice and I mean, it’s where they put them as well, they put them on the toilet doors or the doors when you walk in and you can’t help but notice them and it’s just interesting. Yeah, so it’s done me some good. (North-west, April 1999)
Tim - It’s in your face at the start, isn’t it, you don’t know and it gets you curious. They have these posters up saying ‘mind the GAP’ and people are thinking ‘well what’s that? The posters come up and explain what the GAP is and they say ‘oh right. I’m interested in that, I’ll sign up’ and there’s the interest there. (North-west, April 1999)
The social diffusion of changes in practices was also noted but to a lesser degree. Some interviewees commented that watching other’s behaviour had a positive impact upon their reconsideration of practices, suggesting that somehow, making these practices the norm would facilitate a substantial behaviour change.
John - What other people around you are doing obviously does have a severe impact. And I guess that in some respects that’s going to be a defining thing isn’t it. I mean people’s cultures and what they do in terms of work. Yeah definitely it does depend upon people around you as well. I mean if I was sat with these two guys for like three hours and they were talking about how they had been out segregating and recycling and so on and so forth, I would probably start feeling guilty, so yeah, it obviously does have an influence. (North-west, October 1998)
Marie - Now if he'^^ walks past the filing room or the photocopying room or an office when somebody’s in London, he’ll just turn the light off. Or a whole light that’s not needed on, he’ll just turn them off. You just pick up on it and just turn lights off. I mean a dripping tap; he’ll just turn it off You don’t even notice people doing it and you just subconsciously do it. So I think watching people doing stuff is important. (North west, October 1998)
47 Marie is referring to her line manager.
138 Mavis- It’s what rubs off on people isn’t it. If one person sees another person doing something, maybe they’ll think twice about doing it differently and that person will see them doing it that way and it’s just like a knock-on effect really. (North-west, May 1999)
From these quotes it can be seen that the discursive context of the workplace was a constructive space in which interviewees questioned their practices, were questioned by others and thus were drawn into a process of reconsideration of habits. This point, that the discursive context in whichAaH is experienced is all important to the behaviour change processes, can be seen in the affective nature of the research interviews used in this research.
• The research interviews The reflexive nature of this research enables the dynamics of research interview contexts to be used as support for this argument. The interviews were considered by many interviewees to be a strongly affective tool and space, in which they could rethink their lifestyles. The many beneficial aspects of using qualitative methods of research have already been outlined in chapter 3. Several interviewees offered support to these benefits, by stating that the research process had a positive effect on their practices, or at least their intention to think about their practices a bit more.
Marie - I must admit that since I’ve got here this past hour, I think I’ll go home and I’ll try. You know what I mean; it’s done something for me. I’ll be sat there tonight looking at my bins and I’ll be thinking about the carrier bags. It’s done something but it’s no good just telling us, there’s 55 other people who need to be told. (North-west, January 1999)
Ian - Well it was this group that raised my awareness to it you know. Because before that I didn’t do anything, so it’s obviously had some effect on me. (North-west, April 1999)
Linda - The idea of the group getting together. It’s fair enough, the packs may give you suggestions on how to do things but other people may have other ideas and you can share it within the group, otherwise you’ve only got it to yourself. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
John - I’d much rather get in a conference like this and just sort of talk about it because then ideas get floated around and people listen. Not always agreeing, but they listen and
139 think there might be a problem out there and why the hell are we doing it this way, why aren’t we doing it that way? (North-west, October 1998)
Being part of the research process also seemed to make participants want to see the project through to the end of the six months. ManyAaH participants are ‘lost’ during that time period, therefore creating and maintaining energy and commitment is an important part of the process. Being involved in the interviews, and having contacts beyond Just the packs with people such as the Action Team, was considered to make such a contribution.
Sean - Actually I don’t enjoy reading. I’ve got a habit of skipping through things whereas physical contact and debate, no problem at all and I can go again for another like six weeks. (North-west, January 1999)
David - I have learnt, in the sense of being aware, in focusing. Perhaps if we were to sit down and discuss some aspect of life and we bring together all the things and we focus, you think ‘yeah, I can see something there that I hadn’t thought about. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
Although it was not always discernible if this context of engagement withAaH facilitated a greater degree of behaviour change, it is clear that it provided a greater degree of engagement with the processes that facilitate a reconsideration of personal habits. This allows individuals to make new connections between old and new pieces of knowledge, and to share these connections discursively. In the final section of this chapter, I consolidate the arguments so far by discussing what happens after these processes of behaviour change have taken place. That is, what happens to new habits?
4.4.4 Embedding new habits
Beverley - Well it makes you look at things, I think you do tend to look at things differently. When you’ve read it you put it to the back of your mind to make you try your best. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
In the vast majority of cases it was the small and simple habits that changed as a result of participation inAaH. This occurred as individuals who had not thought about their habits much before had them brought in discursive consciousness by working throughAaH, which compared them to ‘local’ information and with which they made quick and revelatory connections. A key question, however, remains concerning the resilience of these new habits to future changes. Few investigations into environmental behaviour changes are able to
140 report what happens to new behaviours after an initial set trial period elapses (see Porter et al. 1995). In this research, the interviewees were not visited again after the project had ended, so it is not possible to say directly what happened after the research period terminated. However, it is possible to state that interviewees who reported changes in their behaviours were convinced that they would now keep up with this new habits and were, in fact, quite proud of the few changes they had been able to make.
Me - So do you think you will keep up these little things then? Clare - Oh yes, I think I will because I’ve got into a routine of doing them, the habit. But it has stuck now. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
Me - Won’t you be tempted to leave them on all the time? Marie - Leave my light bulbs on? No because that’s just sheer habit now. If I’m not in a room, like my kitchen light is one of those that apparently when you turn them on, it uses a load of electricity to light them, you know, those big long lights. So what I’ll do is I’ll put my light on in the front room and if I don’t really need the kitchen light on I won’t put it on. Like, if I’m getting a drink or something, because you can see in. It uses so much electricity just to light one. (North-west, October 1998)
John - I consciously think now that if I’m sat on the M62 and I can see that I’m not going to be going anywhere. I’ll switch my engine off. Now I never used to, but something’s reminded me that if I’m going to be stuck somewhere for two minutes, I should switch the engine off. (North-west, May 1999)
Kathy - I don’t think I could go back to the way I used to be. I’ve seen people put pieces of paper in the bin and it breaks your heart to see anything. ‘Oh no’ you know ‘some people have just thrown these in the bin’. I’ve only changed in the past couple of months and that’s how it’s getting me now, you know, I don’t like seeing stuff in bins and I’ll just take it out and put it in a recycle bin. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
Steve - You get switched onto it. Tom - If you get switched on like you say, you get into that routine you will carry on doing it at work. Andre - Or you will question. I think that’s the other thing that’s positive is that if people question what goes on. (North-west, October 1998)
141 Paul - I just do it now at home without thinking about it and I think that’s a habit. And like you say, you have habits that you get into in work and you do take them home and bring them back really. Just little things, not really big things or anything. (North west, January 1999)
Interviewees were fully aware of the contents of, and reasons for, their new habits and believed quite strongly that they would remain in place. It would perhaps be expected that over time these habits would once again recede into each individual’s practical consciousness, replacing old habits and enabling the re-establishment of the previous flow of routinization. However, interviewees believed that the process of change was not yet complete and that they would need to continue to change. For example, theAaH packs came to be seen as a source of reference that individuals felt that they could draw upon when considering their practices in the future.
Richard - I think that I am probably slow to react to things and I think it will continue to change. I have kept all these and I’ll put them in a file. I’m an accountant so I do things like that! (laughing). So I will continue to refer to it and my behaviour will change. For example our dishwasher just packed up and probably what we ought to do is to go back to washing my hand but I don’t think that that is really practical but I have written away to the address in the energy pack to get the names of the energy efficient ones. Unfortunately they are all German and cost a fortune and I can’t afford them. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
Elizabeth - I enjoyed each time it came and I think that booklets are really useful, you can look back at them. And you can think ‘oh yes, I was going to do that but I haven’t done it for a few weeks’. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
These above quotes also raise the important issue of the time involved in processes of behaviour change. It is recognised that the changes necessary for the widespread adoption of practices of reduced resource consumption involve a slow process, rather than being a matter of momentary resolution (Librova 1999), with there being a time lag between awareness and action (Pamwell and Bryant 1996).
Clare - Because 6 months, it’s not that long really, is it really to change people’s attitudes. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
142 Ian - I think it’s a start. It’s the same with all these things; it’s like turning a big ship around. You can’t do it in one. You can’t do a U-tum. It’s a slow sort of turning. Any cultural change that you are trying to turn around, you can’t do it over-night, or have an instant success. It’s a slow sort of thing, to go on to see improvements. I think it’s a good start, it’s embedded it in my mind. You’re conscious of it. You recall it when I’m presented with an environmental sort of option. (North-west, May 1999)
The impact of this time lag on changing practices might partially explain why the interviewees did not change the majority of practices mentioned in the packs. However, as the following chapter will argue, the reasons for inertia are more complex that simply being a time lag between awareness and action.
Some of the reasons for this inaction can begin to be detected in the way that interviewees talked about the differences that takingAaH had made to them, not simply in terms of the practices they had changed, but also in the way they were nowthinking about their practices. Interviewees stated that as a result of takingAaH, they had become more ‘focused’ or ‘tuned in’ to the sustainable lifestyles concept and that there was a ‘lens of difference’ in the way they viewed their lifestyles, that may have impacts on behaviours in some intangible way. Whilst the specific nature of the practices changed may sink back into individual’s practical consciousness over time, there is a frame of ‘thinking differently’ that could potentially remain alive for much longer, moving between practical consciousness and discursive consciousness as new issues come up and future connections are made. The following quote summarises this argument concisely. It demonstrates how the interviewees felt that taking AaH had not resulted in him making any significant changes to his habits but it had made him feel and think differently about his practices, giving him a new sense of ‘discursive awareness’.
Sean - I think they’re valid, very valid, even if it just makes you think. I think to say that you haven’t changed is unfair ‘cause you’re now more aware. So, I think it’s unfair to say you haven’t changed because you’ve got more awareness and I suspect because you’ve got an awareness, you may consciously doing things in a different way slightly. Like using less water when you’re brushing your teeth, turning the tap off, things like that, so I think that it probably does make a difference even if it’s only a slight difference just by getting a better understanding of some of the issues. Because you know, it did focus my mind on the whole environment issue, you become very self-aware of where you live. You don’t normally see the impact.
143 unless you’re pottering around your house. You are perhaps not consciously doing it but subconsciously making an effort. I think it’s a healthy scheme to be perfectly honest, even if it’s just to raise awareness. (North-west, April 1999)
In light of this, the challenge of the next two chapters is to investigate in more detail this discursive awareness, examining its contents and how it affects participant’s views of their practices. In doing so, it will be shown that this discursive awareness is the key to explaining why most practices were not changed as a result ofAaH, and why the majority of participants made no changes to their domestic behaviours. This is an important area of investigation, as often the reasons for inaction are just as, if not more, important as the reasons for action (Tarmer 1999).
4.5 SUMMARY
This chapter has argued for a relational framework to be used to understand the discursive processes that take place during the AaH programme. Beginning with the sociology of consumption, a processual and contextual framework has been established. This framework uses Giddens’ principles of structuration to explore the embedded nature of routine practices, and the relationship between practical consciousness and discursive consciousness, in relation to these practices. These principles have been used to construct a theoretical model of behaviour change that demonstrates the centrality of discursive consciousness in the constitution and understanding of practices. As part of this model, this chapter has argued that deeply ingrained habits emerge from individual’s practical consciousness during the process of taking AaH, often resulting in reported changes to habits. This occurs when previously unconsidered habits are seen in a new light, AaH as enables participants to make connections between hidden aspects of behaviours, especially in relation to quantified comparisons of resource uses. New practices come about as interviewees feel the simple logic, or a small revelatory shock of ‘I can do that’. Yet, this process should not be considered as disembedded from the contextAaH that is experienced in. This chapter has also demonstrated how the differing contexts, of home, work and the research interview, have varying effects on this behaviour change process, and that the contexts that stimulate discursive engagement appear to facilitate more change, or at least intention to consider changes and think about practices.
In the next chapter, this model of behaviour change is developed further by the exploration of the processes underlying interviewee’s determination to stick to their old habits and routines, and not make changes to practices. It is argued that the reconsiderations of practices thatAaH takes participants through becomes part of their ‘discursive tools’, enabling them to mobilise
144 and create narratives of their own lifestyles, which form part of the discursive constitution of practices. This makes them more aware of their behaviours without actually making changes to any.
145 CHAPTER 5. DISCURSIVE ENGAGEMENT AND SELF- EVALUATION: RETHINKING BARRIERS-TO-ACTION
A beautiful life worth living is a life of constant self-critique, a work on oneself with regard to the possibilities of thinking differently, of becoming something different from what we have been made, of engaging in the process of construction called ‘self-improvement’. (Darier 1999b: 233)
5.1 INTRODUCTION
This chapter explores why the majority of the domestic practices discussed inAaH are not changed as participants work through the programme. In doing so, it examines the discursive processes that all the research interviewees engaged in duringAaH. This includes the individuals discussed in the previous chapter who changed one or more of their domestic practices, and the remainder of the interviewees who made no changes to any practices. It examines why interviewees concluded that they cannot, or will not, change the majority of practices, in contrast to the ‘I can do that’ reaction outlined in the previous chapter. This focus upon discursive processes necessitates revisiting the model of behaviour change presented in the previous chapter and arguing that participant’s discursive engagement with AaH is the means by which they actively construct their own understandings of the positioning, and implications of, their current lifestyle choices, setting out their own boundaries of what they will and will not change.
This process of considering why individuals did not change will question prevailing behaviour change concepts. Special scrutiny will be given to the existence of a ‘value-action’ gap and barriers-to-action which posit that boundaries to change are set by an array of externalised structural or internal psychological factors. This chapter begins with the assertion that, rather than participation inAaH being driven by a desire to ‘green’ lifestyle practices it is the actual process of taking AaH that either motivates and/or engages the participants. In other words, participants wish to take part in a form of self-evaluation which enables them to map out and achieve a greater understanding of their own lifestyles as part of a larger project of reflexive awareness. By taking part in this self-evaluation, knowledges of all scales are mobilised in the active construction of the meanings and boundaries of lifestyles. I argue that this results in AaH participants creating a newly focused narrative of individual and social identity, positioning themselves in relation to the contentsAaH. of This
146 narrative of identity does not include many changes to practices and habits but instead partially re-embeds practices back into participant’s understandings of their lifestyles.
This argument is followed by the suggestion that rather than being things ‘in the way’, barriers-to-action are in fact the very processes by which individuals come to understand the meanings and implications of their own practices. These findings necessitate a reconsideration of the prevailing concepts used in sustainable lifestyles behaviour change investigations, by countering the prevailing positivist interpretations of barriers-to-action and considering them from an alternate discursive stance.
5.2 NO CHANGE: THE VALUE-ACTION GAP REVISITED
This section briefly revisits one prevailing concept discussed in chapter 2, namely the value- action gap (Blake 1999). This concept suggests that despite individual’s aims of changing to more pro-environmental behaviour, these aims are not always put into action; hence, the value-action gap. On the surface, this research appears to offer support for this concept, as there was a great deal of behavioural inertia by AaH participants even though they had voluntarily signed up to the programme. In both the Bournemouth and North-west case studies, over half the interviewees made no changes to any practices. Those who did only changed one or two practices. The following quote provides an example of this behavioural inertia, showing how it was the more complex ‘routine’ behaviours that did not change.
Gill - My shopping habits haven’t changed at all. I still take my car to the supermarket to load up. I haven’t bought anything different so I don’t know what you can really do to improve on the shopping. If you’ve got 6 carrier bags and you’re on your own, you’re gonna take the car aren’t you, which is fair enough. (North-west, January 1999)
Reasons for this type of behavioural inertia are often summarised as barriers-to-action. These supposed barriers have increasingly become the focus of investigations into sustainable lifestyles where:
There is growing realisation that effective action for sustainable development is hampered less by scientific knowledge than by human barriers of various kinds. (Selman and Parker 1997: 173)
Barriers prevent individuals from adopting environmentally friendly behaviours and have profound impacts upon people’s actions. Research has sought to locate and explain these barriers, which are considered to be an array of psychological and institutional factors.
147 ranging from personal circumstances, to issues of governance and legislation (GAP UK and WWF 1999, Blake 1999, see also GAP UK 1999).
There is evidence to support these positivist scenarios—of the value-action gap and barriers- to-action—in this research, as some individuals were aware of the actions they could, or should, be taking but are not putting them into practice.
Nick - But it’s what you know is beneficial and what you do though, isn’t it? I know what is beneficial to the environment as I spent 4 years in college talking about it. What I actually do, I don’t recycle; very very rarely do I recycle. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
Tom - But when you read about it, it’s better to get milk bottles and send them back and be re-used and re-used, which is going to save on the plastics. Me - So is that something you do now? Tom - No! I still get plastics! But it does want looking at, you know. (North-west, January 1999)
There appears to be in principle support for the sustainable lifestyles agenda that is not matched by the adoption of relevant practices. Instead of trying to breach this divide, I suggest here that a reconsideration of the concepts such as barriers-to-action is necessary. The aim of such reconsideration is not to question the existence of real constraints on individual’s behavioural options. Rather, it is to question the framework in which these positivist scenarios are embedded. In chapter 4, an alternate framework for considering behaviour change was developed. It mapped out the mechanisms by which habits are transformed and also suggested reasons why habits do not change: an area of research that this chapter will now elaborate. The nature of the discursive engagement thatAaH evokes will be examined in detail. From earlier discussions it can be seen that taking partAaH in is active, requiring participants not just to read information, but also to explore their own practices. In view of this, this chapter will argue that barriers-to-action are in themselves part of this process of discursive engagement. They provide mechanisms by which participants map out understandings of the self and their chosen practices, rather than being reportage of the factors that distort the theoretically clear relationship between values and action.
5.3 WHY ACTION AT HOME!
To expand upon the above contention, this section begins at the starting point of the value- action dichotomy by exploring interviewee’s expressions of values and concerns for the environment. Within predominant frameworks, values and concerns are considered to be
148 reflected in motives and reasons given for taking actions (Brandon and Lewis 1999). Motives are considered the driving force of individual actions, aimed to satisfy needs (Biel and Garling 1995) in reference to these desired outcomes (O'Andrade 1992), Simply put, if an individual values the environment they will frame their motives for action or involvement with a programme like AaH in terms of these values, and seek to change their practices in accordance. However, I will demonstrate that this framing of motives provides a superficial assessment of the reasons why individuals participate inAaH. Instead of possessing clear goals and preordained outcomes, manyAaH participants were interested in theprocess of getting involved, the act of engagement. Often, the motives that marked the starting point of involvement inAaH change or were found not to be true reflections of reasons for involvement. This argument will become clearer by considering the motives for involvement offered by participants at the start of the yla/f research process.
5.3.1 Motives and practices: from money to cultural learning
Pat - I don’t think I realised what was involved, when we started. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Previous investigations into individual reasons for the adoption of environmentally friendly behaviours have shown that motives often relate to ‘helping the environment’ and ‘saving money’ (see Brandon and Lewis 1999, Hinchliffe 1996, Rutherford 1998). This echoes those concepts based on pre-determined drivers for environmentally friendly actions, considered to be either self-motivated in relation to increasing personal wealth, or altruistically based, in relation to protecting the environment (see Stem 1992 and chapter 2). At the outset of this research, these general categories appeared in the opening interviews of both case studies, with interviewees saying they were interested in saving money, and only a few interested in saving the environment. However, these distinctive ‘money and ‘environment’ categories were not resilient, dissipating in the face of further investigation and in the process of each interview.
The reason for this dissipation of distinct motives is because in the process of talking through AaH, interviewees shifted from a ‘rational’ and culturally logic way of thinking about their motives for involvement, to a more experiential pattern of thinking about their involvement, following a holistic and associative mode of thinking'** (Schultheiss and Brunstein 1999). In
This is Schultheiss and Bmnstein’s (1999) Cognitive-Experiential self-theory, which suggests that there are two w^ys in which humans deal with new information using a rational system and using an experiential system of thinking (see also King 1995).
149 relating the reasons for takingAaH to their own lives and thinking about what they hoped to get out of the programme, interviewees were engaging in a form of ‘cultural learning’. This is supported by the fact that few participants saw taking AaH purely as a means to improve their current environmental performances in the home. The five people who indicated strong intentions to make some changes had already incorporated a degree of environmental awareness into their everyday behaviour before takingAaH. Other studies have shown that individuals are often already active in environmental practices before participating in environmental information programmes (for example, see Finger 1994).
By contrast, the majority of interviewees, though vaguely aware of the issues that AaH addresses, were not that sure of what they could or should be doing. They were not directly interested in ‘greening’ their lifestylesper se. For them there was a pronounced lack of singular motivation in relation to the environment. In fact, they actively rejected any ‘greening’ project, both personal and social, as the two quotes below demonstrate.
Ian - It has to be left to these lots of anorak types. They’re into it, you know. I’ve seen it in the department, people putting their notices up and getting people involved in the local environment, there’s very few. I mean, there’s a few that will show some interest but in the end, it’s nothing, there’s one or two, they’re practically up for it, they’ve got the water butts and all that, they were into it before really. There’s probably only a couple of percent or something like that that take it on. (North-west, May 1999)
Rachel - But certainly we have no interest in the environmental, hanging out with the greens as you might say, certainly not. Because they have a political agenda, I certainly wouldn’t be swinging from trees or anything of that nature. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
For these participants, any talk of intention to change practices was couched in termsAaH serving as a reminder or incentive to take the small actions that individuals know that they should or could be doing.
Catherine - 1 think really because I’m the sort of person who, constantly at the back of my mind thinks that I should be doing more environmentally fiiendly things but I don’t. I thought perhaps having this behind me would be an incentive to improve the situation. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
150 For these participants AaH acted as a reminder for them to enact practices that they felt they should be doing. I emphasise the imperative here with reason as it signifies an important point. The last quote above demonstrated how the interviewee, like so many others, has some concept of the mode of living and thinking which she felt she should be involved in, but does not envisage happening. It appears to be a classic value-action gap scenario. However, I would argue that the motivation for participating inAaH —for Catherine and the other fifty or more interviewees in this category—is not the possibility of making changes to practices. Rather, it is the process of engagement withAaH that is paramount. To return to the imperative, the existence of Catherine’s ‘should’ suggests that there is a general awareness of sustainable lifestyles: a fact that holds for the vast majority of other interviewees. These participants do not aim to change practices, but are interested in learning more about sustainable lifestyles and what it has to do with them. To illustrate, at a later point in the same interview Catherine reveals the heart of the matter:
Catherine - 1 think I’m generally interested but I am quite lazy about actually doing anything to get involved. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
This theme was repeated throughout all the interviews where participants stated their interest in learning more about being environmentally friendly. They wanted to satisfy their curiosity about ideas which were in the public domain but which they knew very little about.
Andrea - I was reading it for a personal interest as much as anything. I’m not an eco-warrior type or such but I’m vaguely interested in those sort of subjects. I was just trying to pick up on what was being bandied around. I haven’t got any preconceptions really from the start of it. I thought I’d participate and see where it goes. (North-west, May 1999)
Clare- So it is really, I just want to see what ideas people are coming up with. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Some interviewees stated they were not concerned whether they changed any behaviour, as long as taking Æ77 resulted in some increases in awareness. This awareness was both collective and personal in its emphasis. I focus on the ‘personal’ here and will retum to the ‘collective’ motivations in the next chapter.
151 The following quote shows how one interviewee wanted to take part inAaH for her own personal reasons of learning, explicitly stating her desire for more information to help overcome feelings of powerlessness about environmental issues.
Sonia - But it’s always frustrated me, the lack of information in terms of what we can do in our lives everyday. I think it’s important, this emphasis. Because that’s something I find firustrating. Obviously there is not that much information as a lot of places don't want people to know what they do and how they do it, so from an information point of view, I mean, as I said, I don't know what it is going to contain but it will be interesting. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
From these quotes it can be seen that AaH communicates information that can either address participant’s cultural curiosity or feelings of disempowerment. The fact that individuals seek out information is not surprising because:
Learning cultural knowledge is an active, constructive process that continues throughout the life-span. (Harkness et al. 1997: 176)
It is important to note the way in which participants subsequently use theAaH information. Using the ‘information deficit’ model would suggest they are incorporating information into their knowledge base so as to make better informed consumer and behavioural decisions (see Ehrlich et al. 1999). However, I will demonstrate that /la//participants are using the material as a form of self-evaluation to construct and understand an on-going narrative of themselves. For some this was an intentional project; for others, it resulted from engaging withAaH. Thus, interest in learning more about being environmentally friendly is not simply driven by a desire to leam about an abstract cultural concept. Rather, information is actively used to enable individuals to contrast their lives in relationAaH, to thus engaging in a process of self- evaluation.
5.4 A DESIGN FOR LIFE
This section argues that AaH serves as a ‘lifestyle guide’ but does not provide rigid instructions on what to do and how to live. Rather, it is used to examine aspects of lifestyles, allowing individuals to think about how they could be living and helping them construct possible ways of being for the future. It is an emergent process of self-evaluation in which individuals actively make use ofAaH to think, argue and understand themselves and their life choices better.
152 5.4.1 Lifestyle guides
AaH can be seen as a lifestyle guide (Giddens 1991). As such, it is not unique (see Warde 1997) though it does differ from other sources of lifestyle guidance (see Aldridge 1994). This is seen in the fact thatAaH is not used by participants as a tool to sign up to a conspicuous or overt project of styles of consumption, such as the ‘greening’ of the lifestyle. Rather, it informs them about one possible mode of living, in relation to other possibilities, focussing on the inconspicuous and private questioning of current practices.
Importantly, as it has already been argued, the majority of /laTf participants do not want to be seen as ‘green’. This point challenges some of the normative sociological arguments about why individuals engage with a sustainable lifestyles project. For example, theories from the sociology of consumption suggest that involvement withAaH could be seen as part of an individual’s creation of a sense of distinction and difference (Baudrillard 1998). Bourdieu’s work on class and taste suggests that environmental concern and post-materialist values might be adopted by people of higher socio-economic status so as to distinguish themselves from others (see Librova 1999), thus creating a type of consumerism that revolves around new cultural hierarchies (Longhurst and Savage 1996, van Liere and Dunlap 1980). Yet,AaH interviewee’s aims were not so overt or conspicuous as these theories demand. Instead, participants were interested inAaH as part of engaging in a process of self-evaluation. This can be seen for example, in that interviewees were interested in finding out about their GreenScore and how their lifestyles faired under GAP assessment.
Sandra - I’ll be interested in what comes back, the analysis of it. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Dave - So people clearly like to feel you know, that they’re doing better you know and so there’s a very strong motivation in filling in the beginning and the end questionnaire to put in, ‘yes. I’ve done what you wanted. I’ve done better’. (North-west, April 1999)
The following quote demonstrates the rather playful manner in which the interviewees considered their GreenScore. They did not see it as a serious judgement on their behaviours but more a social game in which they were willingly categorised, telling them something about their lives.
153 Richard - You know, when you do some of these quizzes in a magazine, and you are in a block. If you score 45-26 that means you’re this and that. Whether it would be better doing it like that'*^ and giving it a phrase, ‘you are obviously environmentally conscious but you could improve’. I think that people do it for a laugh anyway, but they still feel that they have been categorised. You wouldn’t do it unless you wanted to be categorised. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
It could thus be argued that taking part inAaH is part of a broader project of self-evaluation. Individuals are strongly motivated by actions or processes that provide a clearer understanding of the self (Quinn 1997). There appears to be a growing trend for people to seek forms of self-evaluation, with the latest being a ‘life coach’: “it’s like going up in a balloon, to see where you are, who you are and how you fit in” (Anon 2000). By providing a form of comparison and allowing individuals to view their own lifestyles through a ‘lens of difference’ as outlined in the previous chapter,AaH offers one perspective, one frame of meaning and reference with which they can examine their experiences and life practices (Finger 1994). Participating inAaH offers an opportunity for critical self-evaluation using external, ‘objective’ information (Wayment and Taylor 1995) allowing the examination of personal positions in light of a present ‘other’, in the form AaH.of
This was indeed an important outcome for participants. TakingAaH allowed them to reaffirm their current choices and also to highlight other possible forms of practice, assessing where they fitted into the environmentally friendly rubric.
Elizabeth - It was helpful for me to see where I stood. There was a few things that made me think, ‘do I do it and if not, why don’t I?’ I was really glad to see there were a few things that I thought were important. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
Peter - So yes, you know, as I say in all I think it confirmed a lot of the things that I was thinking, it made me think about a few things that I wasn't doing much about. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Steve- I’d probably look into it more seriously but up to now I’m not environmentally friendly. (North-west, January 1998)
He is talking about ways that the ‘welcome’ questionnaire might be improved.
154 Andre - And having completed that questionnaire, as I said, I’m dark brown rather than green. It’s just that I’ve realised how insular my life is in relation to what I do and how I do it and having sort of got myself on this track, I don’t particularly go left or right, so not really particularly environmentally fiiendly. (North-west, October 1998)
Thus, it can be argued that participating inAaH permitted individuals to be part of a broader project of rethinking their lives. It is not just about where they stand in relation to the ‘environment’, but also about who they are as individuals. This argument will be explored further in the following section.
5.4.2 Self-evaluation and possible selves
Self-evaluation is viewed as an integral part of the project of cultural reflexivity. It is:
rooted in the social process, particularly the process of taking the role of the other and seeing oneself from the other’s perspective. (Wilke and Meertens 1994: 6)
It leads to a process of awareness of the self; not just as a desire to know oneself better, but as an integral part of the project of modernity. This project necessitates that individuals take an active role in the on-going construction of a coherent narrative of the self (Giddens 1991). It has been argued elsewhere that identity creation is an integral part of being an ethical consumer (see Bedford 1999). Consumptionper se is widely considered to be an act of creating, maintaining and communicating an identity in a late modem era of choice and anxiety (Warde 1994a). Some theorists have framed this as a project in which individuals can mould and reshape their own identities through consumption into any feasible story, creating endless possibilities of momentary reinvention (Clammer 1992, Featherstone 1991). However, these perspectives have been heavily criticised for disembedding the individual from their social context (Edgell and Hetherington 1996).
The majority of consumers are not actually in a position freely to adopt a new lifestyle or identity by the expedient of changing their consumption patterns. (Featherstone 1991: 113)
To address this point, I would suggest that takingAaH enables individuals to explore aspects of their selves or their possible selves. Lord et al’s (1999) ‘working self concept’ is useful to expand this point further. They argue that individuals do not possess a full picture of their identity at any point in time. Instead, they have a picture of a ‘working self which represents a small proportion of potentially accessible aspects of the self. This working self consists of a “continually shifting combination of core self-schemas and peripheral aspects of the self made
155 salient” (Lord et al. 1999: 176). In this way, participating inAaH is not signing up to a new identity in a wholesale fashion but is a way of exploring current and possible selves. This requires playing with possible ways of living whilst remaining grounded in the on-going contexts of current lives. As Munro’s pertinent analogy suggests:
A production view of self is one of persons sometimes expanding their empires, sometimes retreating in disarray to a core, or minimal self. One can think of an air bag, expanding with the drawing in of air and then contracting on its expulsion. The metaphor of self is one of inflation and deflation: first out, then in. (Munro 1996: 253)
Participating inAaH can thus be seen an exploration of the self against other feasible selves, a movement back and forth between the self, possible selves and the information embodied in the packs. This argument can be taken forward by showing that the information in the packs is not accepted uncritically by the interviewees. The use ofAaH information is a process of constructing a view of the self. This is an integral argument in this thesis, for it shows that AaH is used actively as a constructive tool in the on-going search for identity.AaH serves as a conduit through which participants can rethink how they want to live, by actively arguing with, and against, the information in the packs, to construct a clearer sense of self.
In summary, this process of critical and active self-evaluation isthe process by which participants come to understand themselves better. This is central to the model of discursive behaviour change detailed in chapter 4, where this process is referred to as the ‘discursive and rhetorical construction of practices; awareness of their embedded/embodied relations’. This chapter will now proceed to explain how these discursive processes can be viewed as rhetorical and how they contribute to an awareness of the social and material relations within which interviewees are embedded. This is achieved by investigating more closely howAaH is used by participants in the process self-evaluation and the monitoring of identity. The aim is to demonstrate that the nature of engagement with theAaH packs and contexts are a highly argumentative process, and that this contestation is pivotal in the participant’s construction of an understanding of the self and their social practices.
5.5 THINKING AND ARGUING WITH ACTION AT HOME
Facts fuel the argument. (Myerson and Rydin 1996: 21)
The following section will illustrate the processes through which AaH participants reflected upon debates evoked by the programme. In general, the process is one of contestation. Yet, it is not a case of simple rejection or acceptance of the packs and questionnaires. Rather, it is a fundamental questioning of the relationships embodiedAaH. in Arguments are part of the
156 process by which the AaH material, and the social implications of the practices therein, are mapped out and understood, as this thesis’ model of discursive behaviour change has suggested. The unfolding of these arguments is part of an embedding AaH of into individual’s lives, as discursive consciousness is always deliberative. This is demonstrated by the fact that individuals both argue against, but also make use of,AaH. That is, they actively position themselves in, and through, particular discourses and debates.
5.5.1 Why argue?
Before illustrating the above argument, it is important first to examine some of the reasons why AaH might give rise to such levels of debate. There are reasons implicit in the processes of individual’s understanding and embedding information; that is, individuals think rhetorically. Also, there are reasons that mark the specific contested nature of current environmental debates. These distinctions are drawn here for the sake of clarity but also because they will prove important distinctions in the conclusions of this chapter.
• Thinking rhetorically The rhetorical framework of social psychology that this thesis is based upon has already been discussed in preceding chapters. To summarise, this approach provides an understanding of human psychology that is fundamentally social. It is based on the premise that individuals do not think before speaking, but that both these acts are part of an unfolding process of understanding and debating (Billig 1987). Thus, understanding information is a process of debate, of positioning of both inner and outer voices. Consumption of information is constantly ‘active’ (Mills 1998, Myers and Macnaghten 1998), as individuals approach information from a fundamentally argumentative perspective.
• Global Action Plan and the Environet Documents do not stand alone. They do not construct systems or domains of documentary reality as individual, separate activities. Documents refer to other realities and domains. (Atkinson and Coffey 1997: 55)
AaH does not stand alone as a text. Rather, it is positioned within a broader discourse pertaining to the environmental paradigm. Engaging with the packs requires that interviewees actively enter into environmental discourses. These discourses not only describe issues, but also contain specific concepts and embodiments of relations between politics, science and the public (see Hajer 1995, Myerson and Rydin 1996). It locates the reader in what Myerson and Rydin (1996: 7) have called the ‘Environet’. They describe the ‘Environet’ as a:
157 metaphor for the aggregate collection of texts, words and voices making linkage upon linkage between the environment words.
Myerson and Rydin also argue that environmental communications are not static representations of a particular viewpoint. Rather, they enter into broader social and linguistic conversations about facts and knowledge. Following this proposition, it can be argued that AaH is situated within a network of environmental discourses.
• The Contested Environment Carol - And also so many environmental things aren’t as black and white as they make out. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
As the above quote suggests, the contents of the Environet are a contested body of information, which has been found in many studies (see Burgess et al. 1998, Bumingham and O'Brien 1994, Clayton 1993, Darier and Schule 1999, Halfacre and Matheny 1999, Harrison et al. 1996, Hinchliffe 1996, Myerson and Rydin 1996, Szerszynski 1999). This research strongly echoes these findings. Throughout all the interviews, the concepts of the ‘environment’ and the ‘environmental’ are constantly questioned, analysed and reinterpreted by interviewees. There appear to be two main reasons for this.
First, the concept of the environment represents what can be called an ‘epistemological externality’. It was argued earlier thatAaH interviewee’s ambiguous reactions to the ‘environmental’ is based on their feeling that it is ‘out there’, being merely another social fact which they could or should know more about, but one which remains distanced from their everyday experiences. The environment is not something that many participants felt passionate or deeply engaged with. Instead, a form of curiosity bound their interests and cultural learning that did not require the complete acceptance of implied concepts to be engaged with. Thus, ideas of ‘helping the environment’ have little directional force (see Darier 1999b, Lanthier and Olivier 1999) and the ‘environment’ has little resonance with their everyday lives. As one interviewee succinctly put it:
Andre - I’ve got so many problems in life, in terms of my daily living and hassle and aggravation that I have, you know. Whether I am going to be employed next week or if there is going to be another company re-organisation. You know, the sorts of changes within society, particularly the last 5 years, has meant that people’s focus is totally, I mean this environment business is irrelevant. I’ve got far more important problems to worry about than these things. (North-west, October 1998)
158 Second, due to the sets of relations that is embodies; the environment is contested as a concept. This is because individuals:
interpret messages as ambiguous, evaluate messages in terms of their source and trace out competing notions of responsibility. (Myers and Macnaghten 1998: 335)
The environment is questioned and subject to a critical evaluation (Irwin and Wyrme 1996), not just because of its sources and definitions, but also because of the wider social relations it embodies.
Struggles over definitions can also be seen as a struggle over sites of power and authority in modernity. For example, in one North-west interview group there was an extended dialogue about the pros and cons of having milk delivered to the home, as opposed to buying it in the supermarkets. As well as being about convenience and price, the purchase of milk also came to embody different ways of living and sets of social relations.
Brian- But I don’t think even something as simple as milk, you are being pushed into a different lifestyle almost. I mean, the reason we still get bottled milk is less to do with Global Action and more to do with the man that’s delivered it for years. I don’t think I would have the heart to turn around and tell him you’re just not getting milk off him any more. Because we don’t live in a town, we live in countryside and he delivers milk to everyone in the houses that lives near us and we’ve always got milk form him and as far as I’m concerned as long as he’s delivering it, we always will. You still find out what’s going on in the houses further down if nobody’s told you because you can have a chat to him in the morning. You do away with all that; you lose that if you go the supermarket for your milk. I know it sounds very simplistic but you do. (North-west, January 1999)
This theme will be explored further in the following chapter where the social nature of interviewee’s ‘environmental’ concerns will be discussed. The point is raised here because the following section will consider how theAaH information is used by its participants to map out understandings of their own lifestyles, and these contestations and debates form an integral part of this mapping process.
Therefore, the following section will examine howA aH participants make use of the discourses of the ‘Environet. Making use of these discourses does not imply they are
159 uncritically accepted. Rather, it displays an active mobilisation of the arguments embodied in AaH, which are both used to make points with and are also contested. The main source of information with which these discourses are contested is that of the individual’s own experiential information. It forms the foundation of their constructive mapping out of environmental understandings and practices. Therefore, these processes are not a simple case of using local information to contest the global. The process of self-evaluation is a much more active and strategic undertaking.
5.6 THE GLOBAL AND THE LOCAL: MOBILISING DISCOURSES
Individuals have a vast range of resources to deploy in thinking, conversation and social persuasion; temporary, emergent constructs motivated both internally by its own dominant cultural logic and externally by a particular social relationship or situation. (Lutz 1997: 186)
This section will explore the manner in which interviewees made use of multiple discourses to map out their understandings of their own lifestyle and identities. Global discourses of the environment are contested, but also mobilised in the construction of these narratives. The main source of information used to position these arguments is the individual’s experiential system of thinking, which is used to embedAaH into the individual’s lives. Thus, there is a constant interplay between discourses. Participants useAaH as a form of self-evaluation against a sense of the ‘other’. Yet, this ‘other’ is not simply the voice of expert discourses of global environmental change. Rather, it is a shifting ‘other’ whose form changes as participants contrast and construct their own local knowledges in the midst of on-going conversations. This creates a complex dialogue in the process of self-evaluation, the contents of which are discussed below.
5.6.1 Making use of global discourses
In the previous chapter it was suggested that taking part inAaH results in participants experiencing a new discursive awareness. This is both an awareness of habits, as well as an awareness of the discourses and concepts that practice is part of. Thus, the concepts of global environmental change—or the Environet (Myerson and Rydin 1996)—become part of the participant’s discursive unfolding of the self. The quote below exemplifies this point, showing how one interviewee used ideas of ozone layer depletion to recount her experiences of protecting the skin from the sun, contrasting the UK and New Zealand.
Gill - I think when it first came to light a good few years ago I’d gone out to New Zealand and I wasn‘t really aware, at this stage. I think I was using sun factor 2, which isn’t really high. I went out there and I couldn’t buy anything under 15 and 35, it was the
160 norm and I was like, I can’t believe. I never thought it was worth putting the stuff on and I couldn’t understand that, but they had terrible problems with skin cancer then. I think until it actually creeps over all of us we won’t think about it but it is starting to effect us all now, you can tell. (North-west, October 1998)
The Environet is used by interviewees to explain, to mediate and possibly also to legitimise individual personal experience. It is also instrumental in framing their anxieties; especially those pertaining to the ‘hidden’ problems that the global environmental change discourse embodies. The two quotes below demonstrate how these discourses create, or at least embody, forms of modem anxieties and how they are related back to personal experiences and concerns, giving these experiences and concerns a new angle or fresh impetus.
Sharon - I think it’s scary when you see on the news, about the carbon dioxide levels and the sun bum factor and whatever it is, along with the weather. You think ‘god’; they never used to do that did they? I mean it’s good that they do it but it’s really disturbing that as well. And you go out and you’re like ‘Oh, I don’t want to breathe’. (North-west, October 1998)
Kerry - It’s the media, you hear about the ozone layer. It’s just the fear for the future generations. I’ve got 2 young children and I don’t want them to have sunblock and no fresh air. We’re mining it for the younger generation. (North-west, October 1998)
Global environmental discourses are a part the discursive evaluations and contestations that AaH evokes. However, as shown above, issues such as ozone depletion have an ambiguous position within these discursive processes. They help to shape perceptions and meanings of particular experiences, and are mobilised by participants to make particular points. Dryzek (1997) argues that discourses can be used and adopted without taking on associated practices or entering whole-heartedly into its belief system because they allow stories to be told about the past and the future. The ‘global’ becomes one lens through which events can be seen and debated, a voice used to re/present experiences. This resonates with Bumingham and O'Brien’s (1994) argument that all accounts of concems use systems of reference to make points in relation to a particular set of interests. From this perspective global environmental concepts can be seen as another mobilised system of reference.
To give an example of the media, stories that had been heard or read on the moming of the research interviews were used by interviewees to strengthen their line of argument and to
161 justify their feelings towards taking environmental actions. Two quotes below were recorded at the time when The United State’s president, Bill Clinton, was publicly reneging on previous environmental commitments, seemingly bowing to pressure from American car and oil industries.
Rachel - We really lost our chance. That dreadful slump and the car industry was in difficulties. The government gave them massive amounts of money to help them out. They shouldn't have done that; they should have given the money to someone who was going to help the buses. They really should, they missed their chance but politicians are swayed by the money and industry, you know. Look at that silly Clinton, you know he can’t say boo to a goose, his environmental things are total rubbish because he’s been taken by the short hairs by the car industry there and the oil. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Fred - It’s dispiriting when you hear on the television that America is back-sliding. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
It can be seen firom the preceding paragraphs that discourses firom a wide range of sources are adopted as tools of persuasion to argue through the positions individuals are taking in the course of the interviews, whilst at the same time being instrumental in shaping these positionings. This resonates with Latour’s (1993) theories of knowledges, discussed in chapter 2, as multiple systems of reference are mobilised to create hybridised knowledges.
5.6.2 Using the local and mobilising the memory
Another system of reference that was prevalent in interviews was the individual’s own experiences. These are not only mobilised alongside global references but also used to argue against them. It is through this process by which knowledges and practices inAaH are deciphered and embedded, in relation to the individual’s lifeworld. These forms of knowledge are often referred to as ‘local’. Use of the term ‘local’ refers to more than the mapping of a spatial grid, but refers also to situated shared values and culture (Marcus 1992: see also chapter 4). Even though topics discussed in the form of experiential knowledge may be physically proximate to the individual, such as interviewees using examples of environmental issues in their local area, the concept of the local refers to individual’s lifeworld. These lifeworld are where individuals derive meaning and:
162 such meaning- which is always socio-cultural and collective in nature- determines how individuals approach a given issue or problem. (Finger 1994: 144)
For example, one interviewee eloquently reinforced this point by showing how she has assessed her environmental priorities in light of her own needs, experiences, internal negotiations and locally constructed concems.
Maureen - I was just looking at these things for example.They are all important and I automatically put dirty beaches but that is not a problem here. So I decided to tick those things that are still a problem in this area. Because when it comes down to it, we still turn things into our own particular needs, whereas if I was in Bognor Regis, dirty beaches and bathing water would be number one now because they have just not got their Blue Flag yet again. I remember years ago when we lived at Seaford we had terrible problems with oil pollution, it was dreadful, it was always getting on your feet. So I think they are all relevant but we are basically selfish and pick the ones that effect us. I mean I have ticked number 3, loss of wildlife habitats but I have been on safari in Africa and I have seen that all of that. If it were lost to mankind that would be very sad. But if you have never been there, you may never think about it. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
In this research, the definition of what actually constitutes an environmental problem is contested, as local environmental conditions are used as a source of comparison. The following extracts are taken from interviews where individuals were arguing that national water issues, of availability and quality, were not pertinent to their local area.
Peter - All our reservoirs are full and all the boreholes are filled up to 100%, so don’t worry. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
Sharon - There’s the river Mersey, last week it was on the news about it. They have started to clean it up a bit now, so it’s not so much of a problem around here. There’s meant to be an octopus in the river Mersey now. Kerry - Someone put it in! Liz - It’s got 3 heads now! (laughter)
Maureen is showing me a Bournemouth Borough Council questionnaire that was sent to all local households, asking them to prioritise what they feel to be the most pressing of local environmental issues.
163 Sharon- It’s getting better, they’ve got some salmon coming back into it. (North-west, January 1999)
Referring back to chapter 4 and its discussion on the contexts of behaviour change, the ‘local’ also refers to the spaces in which AaH is engaged with. Some of the issues brought up during interviews—considered by interviewees to be about the environment and/or AaH the programme—were dependent upon the programme’s context. ‘Local’ knowledge is therefore situated, mediated and mobilised by, and in, varying contexts. This effect was most strongly felt in the workplace, where work relations mediated issues pertaining to the environmental paradigm. Environmental problems thus became problems of work practices and relations. For example, the quote below demonstrates how changing the practices of work colleagues—that the AaH project was meant to promote—was placed within the context of work relations and ‘others’ habits, that become problematised byAaH.
Gill - Now I can’t stand the waste of paper at work, people go through forests so I initiated the fact that we would reuse paper in the photocopier machine. Now that’s gone by the way-side as people will not use recycled paper, so we end up with boxes and boxes of recycled paper, perfectly good enough. Somebody’s taken a print of a bit of information and then that’s it, gone. So it’s sitting in a box now at the side of the photocopier. But it’s got to the stage now where it’s creating a rift because I was putting in recycled paper and put prints all over the place about how to do it, what tray to use for this, what tray to use for that and people were actually physically taking these out and putting in new paper because they couldn’t be bothered to realise that if you put the paper that way instead of that way you get one tray or the other. I just thought it isn’t worth falling out about it. Although the management were quite happy for the initiative to go ahead they’ve not said to people, ‘look we don’t want you using that, do it this way’. And I’m only a minion so I can’t say to people ‘no, you’re not using that, get it done like this’ because it wouldn’t wash. So I’ve just took all the signs down and thought ‘well I’ll take a back seat’. (North-west, April 1999)
In fact, the structures and practices of the workplace mediated interviewee’s perspectives on the success/failure of AaH in their workplaces. It was as though the workplace was acting as a lens through which these interviewees were seeing the issues and problems of implementing the sustainable development agenda: the workplace was both the experiential space of the individual’s engagement withAaH, as well as operating as a metaphor for the success or failing of the programme. Examples can be seen in the quotes below. These relate both to
164 specific issues of facilitating AaH in work spaces, as well as hypothetical concems and scenarios about how such a project could and should work. They demonstrate how the feasibility of making AaH effective is translated into issues of management stmctures, inputs and attitudes.
Andre - I think there is a need for the company to reinforce those sorts of things. I don’t think you can simply leave it to a programme like Global Action if you like, in the sense that we say ‘let’s look at what we do in certain areas of our life’, right? (North-West, May 1999)
Sharon - But I think Global Action Plan, I mean it’s good that they’re coming at it from the bottom up in the stmcture of the company but I think they ought to have a group going at the same time, of managers. So you’ve got a group going down and a group going up. They should meet somewhere in the middle. Because I think it’s all very well but we haven’t got any managers on our Global Action Plan group and it would be nice if they had a group in with us or separate, you know, to get feedback, to get input from all levels in the company not just the bottom. I don’t mean that in a derogatory way but it’s be nicer to get sort of more senior people involved because they are the ones that are going to be able to change things. We can influence them to a certain degree but they’ve got the power, you know, more than us and I think it would have been nicer to have had them involved. (North-West, January 1999)
The important point here is that this ‘local’ knowledge is not a determinant or static network of individual’s perceptions of environmental issues. It is rather an active and situated source of reflections, positionings and debates that emerge in the process of takingAaH. Individuals make use of many forms, from the media to their own experiences and memories. Indeed, individuals often used their memories when arguing through a narrative of their own practices. As Marcus (1992: 316) suggests:
Collective and individual memory in its multiple traces and expressions is indeed the crucible for the local self-recognition of an identity.
There are two ways in which individual can use references to the past to help form understandings of current environmental meanings and concems. First, as D’Andrade (1992) argues, to understand what drives a person we need to know not only the history of the individual but also the cultural and personal goals that they have been exposed to during their
165 lives. The quotes below demonstrate how these individuals use the narratives of their lives to position their interests inAaH and the issues it embodies for them.
David - I’ve always been conscious of it.^’ I was an architect so you design things into your buildings, and then I lived in Afiica for 15 years and I was teaching there, so I suppose it becomes part of you, you become very unconscious of it. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Peter - Well I do it anyway, the recycling, and I suppose with being young during the war you automatically saved things. You couldn’t throw anything away because you couldn’t get a replacement, so you hung onto it. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Richard I have always been interested in it.^^ I’ve had the green consumer guide for years and years. Because I used to live in London and I got really quite frightened about mid 1980’s, just after I left college and got a job and the economy at that time was over heating. There was a lot of building going on and I thought that it can’t be sustained and of course it couldn’t, it wasn’t sustained. That is when I first got interested. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
The second way that personal stories are used can be seen in the way they emerge in the interview context. Giddens (1991: 75) suggests that recounting past experiences is part of an active construction of current concems and arguments, sifting the past “in light of what is anticipated for an (organised) future”. However, in this research the process of making use of the past is more active than ‘sifting’. Instead, like any interpretation of history, memory is open to deconstruction and reconstruction, making use of the widest possible variety of sources (Davies 1990). By becoming the author of the self, to paraphrase Shotter (1993), lives can be seen as temporally developed by the past, as well as developing as an event. Individuals are not just recounting their lives but look to their stories to understand themselves.
For some AaH interviewees, past experiences take on a new salience when positioned in a particular context. For example, the following quote is part of the response to a question asked in one interview group about how participants made the connections between what they
David is talking about water conservation. Richard is talking about issues of green consumerism.
166 do in their households and environmental problems. It demonstrates how stories of past personal experiences were mobilised to explain and create individuals own positions.
Rob - I think you’re aware that all the energy that you’re consuming effects the environment. I mean, you get on the hillside and look down. In a built up area, you just see a thick haze and you see the chimneys belching smoke and the atmosphere. It’s very rare that you get a clear day. You stand on the hilltops and look over the sea and it’s fairly clear and the coastline is fairly clear and you come inland and you see this grey fiig over and you think ‘I’m going back home into that’ ! Sean - I agree with that. I like fell-walking as well and I remember I think 2 years ago up Bryn Cloud you could actually smell the car exhaust, it had actually been collecting and that sort of brings it home because you are more aware of your environment when you are in a beautiful place, aren’t you? John - I guess the first time I really thought about it was when I was doing my degree because part of it was Astronomy. There’s light pollution in this country, serious for astronomers; there’s really no great places for Astronomy in this country just because of the urban sprawl. That includes areas like Cumbria and Scotland. So you start thinking then about how urbanised the UK is and again the implications of that, the traffic and fumes because again the atmosphere flickers because of the crap in it, the other pollution. (North-west, October 1998)
As the above quotes show, individuals position themselves and use memory as an interpretive source of argumentation—memory that is both local in being experiential and also local in being evoked through the particular context ofAaH and the research interview. This renders the mobilisation of knowledges an active process. In arguing this point is not to suggest a relativist approach to all forms of knowledge. Rather, these experiential arguments are used as part of the process of discursive consideration ofAaH. Wayment and Taylor’s (1995) study of forms and reasons for self-evaluation examined some of the information sources used by individuals in self-evaluation processes. These included sources such as ‘objective information’ or ‘personal standards’. Wayment and Taylor concluded that the most common source of evaluation information used by individuals was that of ‘personal standards’. Thus, the experiential world is the primary form of knowledge used to consider and evaluate other forms of knowledge.
This supports the argument made in the previous chapter that participating inAaH is part of individual’s strivings to make sense of the concepts it embodies in relation to their own lives, rather than just as an abstract concept that concems environmental behaviours. This is
167 supported further in the quotes below, where the achievements of participants were viewed not from their disembedded summary of the GreenScore, but rather from the individual’s own feelings about what they have changed. As suggested at the start of this chapter, they demonstrate howAaH engages with participant’s experiential system through the process of taking part in the programme.
Elizabeth - What I felt at first was that I was in competition with everybody else but then I realised that I wasn’t, I was in competition with myself. So from that I don’t think I want to know what everyone is doing, when I realised that it was just to improve what I could do, I didn’t feel that other people were important. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
Brian - I did fill the things in but at end of the day it’s my satisfaction in what I was doing. It doesn’t matter how good you say it is, I am not going to do that. Therefore if I fill in the GreenScore I know I am not going to improve here. But so what? It is how I feel at the end of it and what I feel that I have achieved, not you telling me what I have achieved. Because at the end of the day I am not going to go to my next door neighbour and say ‘you do realise that my score has now gone up by 22 points?’ I don’t think that should be the reason why you do it. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
On the basis of this evidence I would argue that the primary process of discursive engagement with AaH is that of an active mapping out of the boundaries of individual’s lifestyles and preferences, which become more apparent to participants in light AaH.of All debate discussed above is part of a discursive process by which individuals draw out the narratives of their own identity and position their own practices. This is the discursive process through which participants reach decisions about what they will, and will not, change in relation to their practices. This is an important line of argument in re-contextualising understandings of barriers-to-action and processes of behaviour change, and one that will be examined further below.
5.7 CONSTRUCTING THE BOUNDARIES OF CHANGE
This section returns to the concept of barriers-to-action. It considers the effects that the discursive processes detailed above have on individual’s dialogue about, and understandings of, practices. It will demonstrate how the arguments and sources of knowledge detailed above are used by AaH participants to mark out the boundaries of their lifestyle. By creating a feasible, though by no means coherent, narrative of the practices they can and will alter as a
168 result of taking AaH. Thus, what are usually considered as barriers are in fact the discursive boundaries drawn up by participants as they work throughAaH.
There are many sound financial and physical reasons why individuals do not consider changes to their practices as feasible options, which creates varying scopes for individuals to change. These limitations to change are also bounded by narratives of meanings, depicting lifestyles as a ‘weaving together’ of a network of complementary practices rather than just a stock of separate actions. By drawing out the boundaries of their own lifestyles individuals are both creating a better understanding of themselves and stamping their own autonomy onto calls for changes to practices. By focussing on this contextualised approach to participant’s discussions of practices, a more embedded understanding of the construction of their barriers- to-action is hoped to be developed.
5.7.1 The scope for change: mapping out practices
It is argued here that the scope for changes in practices are bounded by both the socio material circumstances of the individual as well as the meanings of the practices that form their lifestyles. It has already been established that the interviewees actively rejected the majority of the changes to practices outlined in the GAP packs. This is not in itself surprising, as many of the recommended changes take time and/or money (see Krause 1993) or are outside the individual’s current set of circumstances. Thus, the interviews suggest an inverse relationship between the difficulty of taking actions and the willingness of individuals to consider them. For example, many younger interviewees highlighted the fact that renting property excludes them from making any substantial changes to their home.
Jane - Well I live in a rented flat, a first floor flat, no garden and although I totally agree with the objectives and ideas of what you can do at home, it is very difficult for me to implement them and totally impractical in cases. I found it firustrating. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
There is only so much room or ‘environmental space’ in individual’s lives, bounded by physical circumstances. Indeed the base-line ofpotential for change has too often been overlooked when investigating environmental behaviour decisions (Brandon and Lewis 1999). This lack of scope for change resonated even more strongly with discussions about transport use and choices.
Kathy - Both of us have got long journeys to work and unfortunately, because of where we live, public transport is not an option for us. Although Gillingham is on the mainline
169 station, for me to get to Bournemouth would take three and a half hours because I have done it, I’ve tried it. I’ve actually done it just to prove to myself. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
Marie - There’s no train station within walking distance^^ and there’s no, well there is a bus service that goes along and it only to goes certain places, you know. If you live in Liverpool you can’t get here really. (North-west, October 1998)
Indeed, some interviewees found thatAaH highlighted how limited their potential for change was.
Sue- As I say, that one really, I have had to think quite seriously. Although that is probably the one that is the most difficult for us to change^"*, it’s the one that’s made me think most about it and the effect that that could be having. (Bournemouth, April 1999)
David - I think that perhaps you tend to read these things and look at them and think ‘how do I fit into this? Am I doing what’s acceptable?’ and you find there aren’t many places that you can change. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
As well as the infrastructural, financial, spatial and temporal limits, there are also other limits. It appears that resistance to change is based upon the fact that the participants are actively setting boundaries as they take part in this process which requires them to reconsider their practices. As discussed in chapter 4, individuals become more aware of their habits and the contents of their routines as they are brought into discursive consciousness. This process is actively taking place as AaH is worked through—‘unfolding’ in front of the participant’s eyes. For example, the interviewee cited below was talking through the transport section of the ‘welcome’ questionnaire when he realised how rigid his shopping routine was.
David - Our system is that we take a moming out, we drive down into town, do whatever things we have to do in the town, like the bank and money and a coffee. My wife wants to get to the shops, and then we drive over the to supermarket and then back
Marie is talking about her workplace in Warrington and the lack of public transport available to travel to work. Sue is talking about her household energy efficiency.
170 home. We never vary from that routine. Isn’t it strange? Never! (Bournemouth, October 1997)
In being made to reconsider their lifestyles, participants not only become more aware of their practices and routines but also actively evaluate them, against and with each other, thereby bringing the inter-woven nature of practices into discursive consciousness.
The example below shows how an interviewee talks through his practices, mapping out the different parts of the sustainable lifestyles set of practices, weighing them up against each other. He explains his actions in terms of circumstances, preferences and the behaviours of others. His narrative moves out from himself, to the social norms of environmentally friendly practices, and then back into himself, coming to the conclusion that he is not ‘environmentally friendly’.
Steve - I don’t do much recycling but I have in the past, took some tins down to the tin bank and bottles and things like that. But it’s sort of drifted off, more through the actual muck. Like, you go and you recycle all the tins but you need warm water to wash them out so you are using energy to do that. You’ve got to draw the line somewhere so I didn’t bother. I’ve got one low energy light bulb that is the free one. Getting some double glazing next week so that that will help. Changed my boiler to a combi boiler because basically mine is knackered and I want to get it up to some decent standard so I suppose I help the environment that way. But as far as newspapers and stuff like that, I suppose if the bin wagons would drop the things off in the right, like they do in other countries I’d probably look into it more seriously but up to now I’m not environmentally friendly. (North-west, October 1998)
As well as a generally ‘unfolding’ narrative of lifestyles, particular practices are focused on, highlighting their meanings and position in individual’s lives. In locating and explaining these meanings individuals are offering up reasons both to the interviewer and themselves, as to why they were not able or willing to make more changes. It is important to consider the content and implications of the meanings of practices when examining the discursive debates surrounding behaviour change. This is because they are the framings of practices that inform and guide individual’s arguments about making changes. It can be argued that meanings implicit and embodied in practices are both personal and social, individual and shared (see Baudrillard 1998, Csikszentmihalyi and Rochberg-Halton 1981, Silverstone et al. 1992) and are negotiated during the course of engaging withAaH. Social practices do not simply concern satisfying a range of functional needs but are framed within a wide array of cultural meanings (Strauss and Quinn 1997). As a result, emphasising the meanings of practices was
171 a main source of interviewee’s resilience to change. Despite questioning these practices by taking part in AaH, many interviewees were determined not to change. The two quotes below illustrate how preferred ways of living and acting were not open to considerations of change.
Clare - That’s just the way we live. I would rather live with the air-flow than I would with condensation.^^ (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Richard - I wouldn’t bother adjusting the toilet to save water, as I don’t believe this stuff, it’s over the top that we use too much water to flush the loos. It is more important to protect your hygiene than save water in that respect. Again, using bath water on the garden? I’m not quite sure how you do that unless again, you go into your down pipe, which I don’t think is a very sensible option. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Each individual’s preferred way of living were brought into sharp relief when questioned by AaH. In addition to personal meanings of practices, shared meanings were also evoked during the process of discursive engagement withAaH. It has been suggested that shared meanings are important in understanding the nature of practices, as these meanings become:
incorporated into a sense of ‘self, thereby entering into the definition of an individual’s existential concems and life-long ambitions. (Quinn 1997: 91)
However, I would argue that it is implausible to suggest that all cultural meanings evoked during A aH are salient to all participants at all times. Instead, they are part of the mobilisations of knowledges, of unfolding and understanding the meanings of practices, that help to constmct the interviewee’s own limits to action.
One of the main shared constructs to emerge from the interviews is that of ‘convenience’. Interviewees stated that in carrying out routine actions, their lives were bound by considerations of time and ease. Practices had to be considered convenient to be incorporated into their daily lives. Convenience is a pervasive modem concept. It embodies the goal of making routine actions more manageable, allowing for the reordering and control of time and introducing flexibility, whilst reducing labour input (Warde et al. 1999). However, as Jardine (1998: 38) suggests, it is a tmism to make the statement that any culture or society has shared meanings: “The cmcial question really has to do with the content of those shared meanings and their implications for public order”. In response to that statement, it is evident that
This quote refers to a question on the ‘welcome’ questionnaire about whether individuals left their windows open when they had their heating on.
172 convenience has a potent effect on ‘public order’. It is part of meeting the demands, and being a part of, the current socio-technical systems of provision. At the same time, it is an expression of the need for individuals to have choices in their practices. As the following quotes demonstrate, convenience is a strong theme with interviewees, for whom the concept became a short-hand to explain the logic of their actions, also helping to mark out the boundaries of what they will and will not change.
Sean - It’s got to be easy and take very little of you time because time is becoming more and more precious isn’t it. (North-west, October 1998)
Paul - Basically, you don’t want the hassle of going into other shops. You want to get in, get what you want and go on your way. It’s just convenience. (North-west, January 1999)
Many of the changes to practices included in theAaH programme do not fit neatly into the convenience construct, thus causing them to be rejected as an implausible option for change. In the concluding part of this section, it will be argued in constructing these narratives, the interviewees create a sense of the boundaries of their lifestyles, a newly aware ‘comfort zone’, from which they are unwilling to move.
5.7.2 The comfort zone
David - While I feel that while I wouldn’t want to spend money because I don’t have it to spare, I would rather spend it on other things, so I work to the lowest level I can within my comfort zone. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
Through the discursive processes detailed aboveAaH interviewees form a narrative of their own personal ‘comfort zone’. This active construction of the boundaries of the lifestyle is founded upon the need to maintain a sense of ontological security or a “protective cocoon” (Giddens 1991: 40). Individuals work to maintain this cocoon and this can be seen in the active rejection of changes to their lifestyles.
Sonia- Well, basically you are policing yourself in a way and that’s not always a very pleasant thing to do. If you’ve got to adjust your lifestyle, that’s a further unnecessary adjustment, it’s not like it’s actually improving anything. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
173 Andre - And you sort, of slot yourself into a certain point and you’re not going to go beyond that point. (North-west, October 1998)
Peter - We can’t deny ourselves these things entirely, we have to live today and not in some other fantasy. I admit if I had a Jaguar things might be different but we don’t see how we can do it any other way than we do. And we keep the use of the car to the minimum but that minimum can’t be less. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
This process is vital in understanding lay reactions to environmental communications and calls for changes to behaviours. By taking AaH, these individuals are coming to a better understanding of themselves and are embedding the list of generalised practices in the packs into their own lives. Although this is a constructive process, it is not necessarily a positive one. This adds to the tone of rejection that emerges in the interviews. For example, there was a great deal of apparent frustration reported by the interviewees in attempting to engage with the packs and questionnaires. This is because the format did not allow individuals the space to reflect back to GAP their circumstances, choices and experiences that marked out the narratives of their lifestyle. Interviewees wanted to be able to engage in a discursive process, which would allow them to explain and justify themselves, to detail why and how they had a particular ‘comfort zone’, which AaH does not allow them to do.
Brian I must admit there were a few areas where I was a bit critical of it^^ and I’ve actually written hand-written notes on the forms as I was ticking the boxes. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
Sharon - I remember thinking at the time, if you tick ‘no’ in one box, it wasn’t necessarily your fault that you had to tick that ‘no’. Marie - Yeah, like ‘do you drive to work?’ Sharon - Yeah, things like that. Marie - You didn’t get a chance to explain why the answer was ‘no’. Sharon - Yeah, sometimes it was, things were out your control and it made you look worse that what you really were. Me - That’s the questionnaires? Sharon - Yeah, yeah like Marie says, if they had a box like a comments or something, I don’t think they did, did they? Marie - They did at the bottom.
56 Brian is talking about the ‘welcome’ questionnaire.
174 Sharon - It would have been better if instead of just ‘yes and ‘no’, they could have devised something else. I know it’s difficult to fit into a questionnaire but I’m not sure if they’ll get tme answers out of this because it’s probably saying everyone’s not interested when they are but it’s just certain things are out of your control. (North west, January 1999)
Sabitree - That sort of thing I feel you have to have a certain degree of your own autonomy over these things, you can’t follow the letter. But when you’re asked a straight-forward question and then you are judged that you’ve got it wrong, you don’t have any chance to explain how you do the things. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
There appears to be an intrinsic need for individual’s own voices to be heard in the construction of their narratives of practices. This need for autonomy adds further support to this chapter’s arguments about the place of experiential knowledge in the discursive processes of AaH. That is, at the end of this process, amidst all the conflicting arguments and possible conclusions, the individual has only their own understanding to draw on with which to mark out the final line between change and no change. There is a need to draw a final line under whether they are—and what actually constitutes—‘doing their bit’. The following quotes demonstrate how participants have drawn out their limits to change, with which they seem content.
David - I think that what comes out in the end is not ‘yes, you did very well or not’ but that you are living the best you can. Even without feeling proud of yourself, I feel that I will work to my economic level and beyond that, doing recycling or bottle and papers which I could just put in the bin, is my contribution. Beyond that? (Bournemouth, April 1998)
Marie - You’ve converted me, you know what I mean, and that’s it now. I’ve changed. What more can you do for me? Unless you brainwash me into putting my tins in certain bags. (North-west, April 1999)
This is an interesting process. It suggests that the vfaJf material calls practices into question and pulls individuals into a process of discursive engagement, whilst at the same time embedding some of these practices back into participant’s lives through the way thatAaH is structured and the messages therein. I call this a ‘discursive trap’. It is a trap that sustainable lifestyle communications will consistently fall into because they use disembedded media to ask highly contextualised and embedded questions (see chapter 7). To conclude this chapter,
175 how the processes detailed above might be useful in re-ffaming the concept of barriers-to- action will be considered, with the aim of creating a better understanding of the meanings and processes by which these barriers become constituted.
5.8 CONCLUSIONS
A single, simple target is usually a good way to ensure failure. The response is often an explanation of why that idea will not work. (Rollnick 1996: 25)
In this concluding section, it is argued that current framings of the value-action gap and barriers- to-action can be reconsidered from a discursive standpoint. Whereas these barriers are usually framed as personal or social stmctures which stand in the way of the enactment of individual values, this chapter has argued that they can be viewed as the very means by which those individuals who are engaged in a process of self-evaluation come to mark out their understandings of themselves and the discursive debates that surround sustainable lifestyles. Re- framing barriers in terms of theprocesses by which they emerge can lead towards a greater understanding of the purposes and outcomes of barriers. This argument consists of three components, to be expanded upon in the following sections.
5.8.1 To think is to argue
We often do not know what we think, what our values are; and we may be engaging in debate precisely in order to discover what we think. (Holland and Rawles 1993: 15)
The first component of this reconsideration of barriers is the nature of human engagement with seemingly factual material which creates an over-all atmosphere of contestation. As one interviewee aptly stated:
Peter - So I don’t think I would take that immediately at face value but we need to listen to these things. So you cannot say such and such a thing is true because if you examine it, there are all kinds of issues, which are rarely thought about. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
Billig’s (1987) approach to understanding human discourse shifts these types of contestations from being barriers to the way that humans deal with social controversy and make sense of information. Debates about barriers are indeed an integral part of individual’s markings of their own boundaries, and evaluations of personal and social identity. The elaboration of arguments about what individuals feel they can and cannot, will and will not change is part of AaH participant’s on-going creation of lifeworld. As a result, these discursive contestations
176 are not factors that could be removed by ‘better’ information campaigns. Rather, they are the emergent properties within wider social projects of constructing and understanding a meaningful lifeworld.
5.8.2 The ‘green value’ fallacy
The notion of ‘barriers’ to a particular developmental pathway presupposes the desirability of that pathway. (Vigar 2000: 24)
This chapter has argued that the majority of individuals takingAaH are not interested in ‘greening’ their lifestyles. They are involved more so out of social curiosity and a desire to view their own lifestyles from a perspective of the ‘other’—that AaH comes to represent. There is no coherent ‘value’ starting point for interviewees and also no clear intention, for most participants, to alter their practices (c.f. Stem and Dietz 1994, Garling 1998, Karp 1996). As Shotter (1993: 69) suggests, rather than acting ‘out o f an inner plan or schema:
We can think of ourselves as acting ‘into’ our own present situation, in terms of the opportunities and barriers, the enablements and constraints it offers.
Thus interviewees ‘think into’ their own lifestyle usingAaH to become involved in a process that they hope will lead to a clearer understanding of their own position. Starting with no clear expectations appears to be actually part of this process, as to understand the nature of the practices detailed inAaH, interviewees had to reflect and embed these practices back into their lifestyles. Gaining this clearer perspective of the self does not necessarily entail making changes to practices although, as the previous chapter showed, some do occur.
5.8.3 Principles of structuration: mobilising debates
Finally, and building upon the last point, it is important not to let this research fall prey to the criticisms I have outlined of prevailing approaches, by disembedding this chapter’s reworking of barriers from the contexts of their emergence. Rather, it is important to broaden discussions on rhetorical arguments and reconsider barriers from the principles of stmcturation. It should be remembered that there are boundaries to changes set by the social and technological environments that individuals are firmly embedded within. That is:
When people are striving for more sustainable lifestyles and patterns of domestic consumption, the possibilities (not) offered by collective socio-material systems are of strategic importance. (Spaargaren and van Vilet 2000: 65)
These socio-material systems are both enabling and constraining. This characteristic means that they will set limits to action through forms of structural properties and mediated
177 relationships. It is also possible to apply these principles of structuration to the discursive contestation that this chapter has detailed. That is, rather than seeing the mobilisation of arguments as processes that have resonance within the interview andAaH context only, I suggest that the very processes of reconsidering lifestyles and practices creates an awareness—often an uncomfortable one—by the participants of their own position within these principles of structuration, thereby realising their own position within systems of enablement and constraint.
To briefly recap the principles of structuration, the structural properties of any context are both the medium and outcome of social activities and practices (Giddens 1984). Individuals are not trapped within a social structure. Instead, all forms of social action are ‘joint action’. That is, individuals respond to others and their actions, creating exchanges that are often very different from our intended actions and produce unintended outcomes (Giddens 1984, Shotter 1993). By existing within a system of joint action, individuals are authors of structures of enablememt and constraint.
People construct between themselves organized settings of enabling/constraints ‘into’ which to direct their future actions and sometimes those settings can become more constraining than enabling. (Shotter 1993: 79)
In the process of participating inAaH, the contradictions and unintended consequences of joint action unfold as individuals think and argue through the embedded nature of their practices. Hence, the evocation of discursive barriers-to-action can be seen as the individual’s realisations of the embedded and seemingly intractable nature of the environmental paradigm in relation to the principles of structuration and their position within it. As a result,AaH interviewees find themselves in the midst of debates about the rules and resources of systems of provision to which they have to create a semblance of coherence in the construction of their own life narrative. In the need to maintain a valid narrative of the self, more practices remain stable than are subject to change.
5.9 SUMMARY
This chapter has argued for a reconsideration of the positivist scenarios of barriers-to-action and the value-action gap from a discursive perspective that considers the emergent processes by which arguments barriers emerge. It has been argued that the ‘value’ starting point of the normative framing of behaviour changes—which is criticised—neglects the fact that many individuals choose to participate inAaH as a form of discursive engagement rather than a means to facilitate behavioural outcomes. In this way AaH is a tool with which participants can undertake a project of self-evaluation to leam more about sustainable lifestyles and to see
178 where they stand in relation to its main premises and recommended practices. By engaging in this discursive process participants become involved in complex debates about the meanings of the environmental paradigm and consequently draw out the ‘boundaries’ of their own lifestyles, discovering a deeper understanding of their meanings. Creating these narratives of their lives forms both a greater awareness of its environmental implications and provides a justification for further entrenchment of practices.
This entrenchment of lifestyle practices in the face of these discursive processes is partially necessary. As they work through AaH participants become more aware of the wider social implications of their practices. They find themselves positioned within spaces of ‘joint action’ and it becomes apparent that the debates surroundingAaH are not just about practices per se, but are also about the nature and distributions of the rules and resources that exist within modem western society.
Exploring this last point further is the main aim of the next chapter. It will examine in greater depth the contents of the social debates that emerge from the interviewee’s discursive engagement withAaH. It will contrast this chapter which has dealt with the ‘inward’ looking components of the interviewees engagements, by looking ‘outwards’. It will build upon the findings of this chapter by suggesting that the process of self-evaluation thatAaH participants engage in is not just about the ‘individual self. It is also about the social concerns and ideas/ideals of the ‘good life’ of interviewees.
179 CHAPTER 6. TRYING TO DO MY BIT’: THE SOCIAL CONTRACT AND FORMS OF RESPONSIBILITY
Not for the first time, democratic societies are reported to be in a poor state of health. Worries like this have surfaced at various times over the last five decades or so. In previous times, the issues have been whether free nations could properly govern themselves, whether they could resist anti-democratic movements, and whether they could sustain economic development. This time, however, concerns are subtler and perhaps more troubling. They are less about our democratic institutions and more about ourselves as citizens. (Johnston and Jowell, 1999: 179)
6.1 INTRODUCTION
This chapter builds upon the findings of chapter 5 by considering further the meanings and directions of the self-evaluation processes that individuals engage in when taking partAaH. in It continues to elaborate upon the role of discursive sociality and interactions, as outlined in the model of behaviour change in chapter 4. In addition, some of the main areas of contestation and concem that interviewees discussed will be explored further, demonstrating how these concerns add another dimension to the participant’s involvementAaH. in By engaging with AaH participants are talking themselves through a process of self-evaluation and social evaluation. In the process, they feel they are making some contribution to alleviating their social concerns. This is because by engaging discursively with debates, they feel they are at least ‘doing something’ by actively talking solutions into existence.
This chapter opens with the assertion that the process of self-evaluation detailed in the previous chapter is part of a broader moral project. As well as permitting individuals to take a closer look at the self, the process also addresses concerns thatAaH participants have about distributions and abuses of equity, justice and power. In asking questions about themselves and their ways of living interviewees are actively moving into social debates about rights and responsibilities in modem society. Interviewees are not just concerned with their own lifestyles, but also how these lifestyles are part of, and make a contribution to, issues of ‘quality of life’, encapsulated in debates about lack of community, interaction and mutual respect. Ultimately these debates concem those sites and allocations of who is responsible for creating positive social change.
After outlining the central themes of interviewee’s concems, this chapter draws upon normative debates over allocations of responsibility in the environmental paradigm, and
180 argues that these debates have often confounded or simplified the concept of responsibility. Responsibility appears to exist in two main forms: personal and collective. By discussing who is, and should be, responsible for making positive social changes interviewees are taking part in a deliberative process. This process has characterised the interviewee’s engagement with AaH throughout this research. It is also part of the interviewee’s desire to move society towards a new form of ‘social contract’, whereby all actors take on some form of responsibility for ‘making things better’. Interviewees believed that they had already made a contribution to creating this social contract. By actively engaging withAaH they felt they were helping to get the message ‘out there’ by ‘performing’ this new social contract into existence and binding others to it through their ‘speech acts’.
6.2 LIFE POLITICS
The previous chapter demonstrated that participating inAaH is a process of self-evaluation. In the process of examining their lifestyles and mapping out the meanings of practices, interviewees became more aware of their lifeworld and the wider implications of the concepts and relationships embodied in their practices. This self-evaluation was not aimed at the individual alone; it is also a form of social evaluation. This finding contradicts claims that issues falling under the heading of ‘lifestyle’ have nothing to do with broader political processes (see Dryzek 1997). Rather, this process of comparison and positioning is argued to be part of the cultural reflexivity and creation of identity that is a hallmark of modemity (for a critical appraisal of modemity and life politics, see Appendix 5).
Giddens (1991) has termed this project ‘life politics’, arguing that it one of the conditions of late modemity. This concept is part of the family of social theories of high modemity discussed in chapter 2, including Beck’s (1992) risk society thesis. Giddens argues, in a similar fashion to Beck, that past centuries of individual and collective political struggle was part of a project of ‘emancipatory politics’. This project had the central aims of achieving degrees of social equity and justice, moving away from structures of oppression to elevate each individual’s ‘life chances’. This project is believed to have been achieved mostly in the twentieth century. Following the emancipatory stmggle, the project of life politics emerges, dealing more with ‘life choices’ than ‘chances’. Here, the individual now has some degree of freedom of choice due to the elevation of the ethics and practices of the emancipatory project. Consequently, individuals are empowered to ask questions regarding how they want to live. This project is embedded within socio-material trends of globalisation, wherein:
181 The narrative of self-identity has to be shaped, altered and reflexively sustained in relation to rapidly changing circumstances of social life, on a local and global scale. (Giddens 1991: 215)
Within the constant flux of modemity, individuals are required and empowered to examine the politics of their own lifestyle, both as a project of self-determination and of morality.
With this life politics argument, Giddens presents a convincing picture of a post-traditional political landscape. Yet, his theoretical emphasis on the creation of identity and life choices has been criticised for, amongst other things, neglecting past sites of power such as tradition, hierarchy and history that still persist today (see Darier 1999a). In contrasting emancipatory and life politic projects, Giddens establishes a binary opposition that appears overly polarised. This definition of life politics relies on its tension with a ‘tradition’, purportedly now diminished, whose implications and practices are only vaguely addressed in Giddens’ work. Emancipatory struggles do not appear to have a strong influence on lifestyle politics. Yet, this research suggests that the existence of widespread patterns of liberation and choice was questioned by interviewees, and that the politics of emancipation may still be a primary concem. To illustrate, as one interviewee commented:
Sean - You’re talking as if you’ve got the choice. If you’ve got a reasonable job and a reasonable salary, yeah you can make the choice can’t you, but otherwise, you can’t. (North-west, October 1998)
Although this chapter does not intend to enter into a debate about the existence of freedom and choice in modemity, it is however suggested that it is possible to move beyond this emancipatory/life politics binary by focusing on the areas of debate and concem whichAaH participants raised in interviews. Giddens (1991) suggests that life politics raise questions for the individual that are essentially moral. However, this morality is not just about the self, of morally justifiable ways of living; it is also an on-going project of the politics of emancipation. The themes of justice and equality are not yet diminished but are alive and well in public debate. The difference between past and present emancipatory projects lies in how these moral questions are asked. They are being addressed in new spaces, using new discursive tools that are distinctive to modemity (Cohen 1998, Eder 1996). As such,AaH can be positioned as one of these new discursive tools, which individuals use to engage with moral debates.
This argument, for the extension and relocation of the emancipatory project, does not require a complete de-bunking of the past, as critics of Giddens have suggested he does. Rather, it
182 encourages an acknowledgement of the changing nature of the spaces of individual’s engagement with, and public monitoring of, the politics of emancipation. Beck (1998: 28) captures the spirit of this change when he suggests that:
This “me-first” generation has been much criticised; but I believe its individualism is moral and political in a new sense.
What may seem self-focused, such as individuals taking part inAaH as a process of self- evaluation, is really the means of addressing moral and political concems of modemity. This argument will be expanded upon in the following section, which will demonstrate the ways in which AaH is used by participants in an active sense, to ask questions about forms of relations and morality within modemity.
6.2.1 Asking moral questions and extending the environment
Sonia- I get upset about the state the world. How could we do this to each other? (Boumemouth, October 1997)
The quote above demonstrates that AaH participants are not just concerned with asking questions about their own lifestyles. In asking questions of ‘how will I live’ they also address questions of ‘how are we all living now and is it theright way?’ For the interviewees, participating inAaH appears to be viewed as an opportunity to reconsider modem practices and political relations. Importantly, this is anactive process. Participants do not simply passively absorb more information to enable them to make some form of detached lifestyle judgement, as the last two chapters have shown. Rather, they are actively looking to become part of some form of change by entering into social debates, usingAaH to become part of these debates.
Within the interviews, conversations about the distributional equity of environmental ‘goods’ and ‘bads’ are fundamentally social questions about faimess. The following extract focuses on the faimess of water pricing systems in the UK. The interviewee clearly felt that the current system was untenable and unfair, and she had clear ideas about a replacement system that would be financially and socially equitable.
Rachel - Now I would like to suggest to somebody that we have differential rates. Everybody is entitled to so much water. There is no point in saying it’s like any other utility because it isn’t. If you can’t afford electricity you can use gas, if you can’t afford gas, you can use paraffin stoves but when there is no water, you are going to be dead
183 within a week. So I think that it’s quite unreasonable to charge people who are using hose pipes the same rate as drinking water. So if they reckon that one uses 150 litres a week, a day or whatever, the figure is 150 per person. Now I think if one has 100 litres on a low rate, a budget rate then everybody could afford to pay. And thereafter you then have a higher rate. It should be easy enough for the water people to work that out. But you have the first one hundred litres or something. Disabled people need more water, not all disabled people, just the ones that are definitely in need of more water—incontinence and things like that. Then they should be given a large quota of water. But I don’t see why one should pay the same amount for necessary drinking water as someone down the road who is washing their car. So I do think that it is an unfair system of pricing water. (Boumemouth, April 1998)
In this research, what are essentially debates about resource uses are also questions about social norms and forms of authority. Interviewees are creatively exploring how mediated relationships within systems of provision should or could be carried out as part of the active positioning of the individual within prevailing stmctural properties, as discussed at the end of the last chapter.
To give another example, debates about the distribution of environmental ‘goods’ were echoed in interview dialogue about forms of environmental knowledges. The debates evoked issues of the ‘environmental uncertainty’ of science and expert advice, as a coherent body of knowledge (Irwin and Wynne 1996, Murdoch and Clark 1994). They were also concerned with issues of trust and sites of power. Sagoff (1988) suggests that the questioning and withholding of absolute tmst is part of living in a centralised political system, such as in the UK. As a citizen, it is necessary to surrender some responsibilities and forms of knowledge to distanced authorities and then take part in an active monitoring of them. As one interviewee aptly stated:
Sean - To make a difference to anybody’s life, I think you’ve probably got to gain their trust. You’ve got to believe in what you’re telling them and they’ve got to see. (North west, May 1999)
Using AaH to ask questions about ‘whose knowledge?’ and ‘who to trust?’ can be seen as part of this active democratic monitoring. The following quote demonstrates how interviewees were reluctant to give their tmst to various purveyors of environmental information. They questioned these purveyor’s vested interests and their legitimacy in compiling information in a fair and neutral manner.
184 Rob - But you don’t know whether to actually believe some of this statistic stuff some of the time. I mean x hectares of forest are being destroyed every day but how many are being replanted in other parts of the world? You never get a tme balance I don’t feel. It’s very much the news impact rather that these people are looking for. Tim - It exaggerates. Ian - I always thought that was a common factor with the news, they always like disaster and they don’t like the good stuff Rob - I would like to see statistics that are fully balanced and that we can believe but I don’t think we’re getting that. Even from environmental organisations I’ve no confidence that you get a balanced story. Tim - Yeah, I agree with that. It’s not just statistics, we want some more information as well, because you can do anything you want with statistics, lets be frank about it. I think we try and educate the public to a point and then stop, and I think we should be either taking it that little step beyond or stopping that little bit short and I think where we are at the moment is just an unhappy medium. Me - So who would you tmst with that sort of information? Sean - I certainly wouldn’t tmst a pressure group because they are going to be biased to be honest with you. I wouldn’t necessarily tmst a government because again they’ve got to be biased as well. Tmst no one I think! (laughter). I would tmst an independent researcher for example, if it was an established credible university doing a study. How topical is that today! (laughter). Then I would tmst that more than a government or a pressure group, provided of course you haven’t been funded by a pressure group (laughter). I would want to see your accounts! (North-west, October 1998)
Taking a//provides participants with a means to consider issues beyond their own practices. Indeed, it appears that the very process and the act of involvement withAaH represents a means for participants to address their social anxieties and to take part in the active search for tenable solutions. As the previous quotes demonstrated, it provides interviewees with a discursive space in which they can explore their own ideas about how things should be and possible ways in which current practices and relations could be improved. This is not just a simple mapping or blaming process but is, as the following quote succinctly demonstrates, a chance to take a step back and consider on-going social conditions.
Andre- I think Kersty, it’s a fundamental re-valuing of where we are at! (North-west, October 1998)
185 Throughout the interviews it was clear that participants were not simply evaluating themselves and how they could act better. They were also looking for collective solutions to problems that they hoped could then be put into action.
Paul - What I’m hoping out of all this, is that at the end of the day, what comes out of the home environment in terms ofhow do we do things better. (North-west, October 1998)
How does being involved inAaH help its participants to work towards a collective improvement in the states and politics of emancipation? To address this question—to understand what it is that they wish to change—it is first necessary to take a more in-depth look at the contents of participant’s expressed concems about modem social life. These concems are focused on issues of community and spaces of constructive interaction. They are mediated by the contexts through whichAaH is experienced, which give rise to situated social and moral anxieties. In the Boumemouth case study a great deal of talk concemed the degradation of communities. In the North-west case study there was a similar set of anxieties about mutual care and interaction but these were mediated and seen through relations in the workplace. By developing a deeper understanding of these social and moral anxieties, it will become clearer as to the way in which interviewees believe participating inAaH is a step to actively address their concems. This is possible becauseAaH allows individuals to actively map out social problems and to understand how they are, or can be, part of the solutions, allowing them to talk a better future into existence.
6.3 ADDRESSING SOCIAL ANXIETIES
Explicit statements of concem and commitment need also to be sensed as expressive manifestations of deeper anxieties about embedded trajectories of contemporary society. (Grove-White and Szerszynski 1992: 292)
This section discusses the social concems expressed byAaH interviewees. The purpose of this discussion is not simply to gauge opinion, but to understand what it is that participants are seeking to address by takingAaH. The majority of anxieties focus around the feelings of loss—of community and morality—and fear for the future.
186 There is a noticeable difference between younger and older interviewees^^ in the expression of their concems. Older interviewees talked a great deal about the past, drawing out examples of the social and moral degradation that has taken place during their lifetime and which they believe is tied up with environmental degradation. The following quote is a prime example of this, where connections are drawn between the loss of community and lack of interaction, modem lifestyles and the emergence of issues that make up the environmental paradigm.
Andre- At one time there were villages and towns and in the main, villages were a fairly close knit community where there was inter-reaction and inter-co-operation in terms of how you managed things and how you do things. Now that has all been blown away on the basis that everybody lives a fairly insular life. Because of the way my life is, I know very few people who actually live where I live. (North-west, October 1998)
In contrast, younger interviewees were more likely to talk about an ‘environmental ethos’ that they saw as needing to be considered in everyday life. They appear to have engaged to varying degrees with the project of domestic ecological modemisation (see Noorman et al. 1998), where practices such as recycling are considered the cultural norm even if these individuals were not actually doing them. They were also more likely than the older interviewees to focus on current environmental concems as set in public media fomms. As one interviewee commented:
Liz - I think when you see on the news about the latest issue or whatever and you think I should really do something. (North-west, October 1998)
Whilst the anxieties of older interviewees were set by contrasting the past with the present, younger interviewees were projecting their anxieties onto the future.
Jane - Well, we’re only on this earth for a short length of time and I just think of children growing up. What are they going to have? What sort of life will they have if everything is mined? That’s how I am feeling, that the world is going towards the end of this destruction and maybe I can slow it down slightly. (Boumemouth, October 1997)
Although I do not know the exact ages of the interviewees, I am drawing out the distinction of younger interviewees being up to their late 30s and older interviewees being 40+, although in reality the majority of older interviewees were in the 50+ age-bracket.
187 Despite the differences in emphasis between the generations^*, the sum of these concems yielded a current of opinion. This suggests that interviewees strongly feel that the ethos of modem living betrays social equity and ‘proper’ ways of living, both in terms of the use of resources and the treatments of others. This connection between environmental and social anxieties is a cmcial one to the arguments in this chapter and will be explored in further depth below.
6.3.1 The environment
It has been argued that the concems of modem urban dwellers are increasingly founded upon fear of ‘local’ environmental degradation (Hollway and Jefferson 1997):
due to the deterioration of the environment—contaminated water, polluted air and congested living conditions. (Laituri and Kirby 1994: 124)
Expressions of environmental concem is inextricably linked with expressions of social concems and fears (see Bulkeley 1997, Burgess et al. 1988b, Bumingham and O'Brien 1994, Clayton 1993, Darier and Schule 1999, Eden 1998, Grove-White 1991, Grove-White and Szerszynski 1992, Jacobs 1997a). These concems shift the boundaries of what can be deemed as ‘environmental’ concern, to extend the ‘environment’ concept beyond other political paradigms (Jacobs 1997a). This occurs because the ‘environment’ relates to the over-all quality of life, placing the environmental paradigm firmly within the situated lifeworld of the individual social actor.
This argument about the relationship between the environmental and the social is supported by the research interviews. Very few interviewees expressed concerns that were ‘environmental’ in the ecological sense. For example, in the following quote the interviewee bemoans the loss of local heathland. This is quite rare amongst the interviewees as she does exhibit a sense of ‘nature’ in her concems. However, the quote also shows how her story of the use and abuse of local hedgerows is not ‘ecological’ but rather signifies social struggles over ways of living.
Sonia - That’s a big problem around here. The Council keeps on building council estates where, at the risk of sounding really class-ist, not only are they giving over more and / more heathland every year; it is one of the few main pieces of heathland left in the
I cannot pursue this line of argument about age differences any further as it was not the focus of my research but I do feel it clearly merits more specific research on the issue.
188 country. They keep giving more and more chunks to housing. But on top of that the kids on the housing estates are constantly setting it alight. And people are just totally oblivious to these kinds of issues, the importance of local hedgerows and your communities. I just think that people don’t think about it, they just want the their hedges to screen them from them. Those are the issues that are shocking. (Boumemouth, April 1998)
Across the two case studies the ‘natural’ environment was noticeably absent. Examples raised of environmental ‘bads’ were more concemed with managing the natural world and bringing it under control in an urban environment. The following quote demonstrates how disorder in the natural world, in the form of rats in Birmingham, is linked with disorder and lack of adequate management in the socio-material world.
Rachel - Up in Birmingham, they were so overcome with rats, and it’s partly because all of the mbbish, all these take-aways and things that people just dumped their boxes. If you walk through Boumemouth at night and in the moming you can see all these chicken take-away boxes and things, it’s gross. And then the water people didn’t have it in their contracts that they had to do de-ratting and sewage people didn’t either and so the govemment has let that fall through. No one is responsible for keeping the sewers clean so it you went down the road and lifted a hood, I bet you would have them pouring out. (Boumemouth, April 1998)
Connections are also made between the quality of the local environment and trends in over-all quality of life. Interviewees used a mixture of ‘local knowledge’ and science and health discourses. Younger interviewees, especially in the North-west, mobilised these to explain their anxieties.
Kerry - My sister has quite bad asthma and I think that’s more from all the fumes of the cars. Like she never used to have it half as bad as she does now and I’m sure it’s related to that. So I think if you could reduce the emissions, people’s health is going to improve. (North-west, October 1998)
There were a number of concems about how local living conditions were reducing personal and shared quality of life which were linked with the social and moral conduct of others. One of the main symbols of this degradation was the level of littering. The following two quotes are from older Boumemouth residents who have perceived a demise of local environmental
189 conditions through their lives. In the second quote, the interviewee is explaining how she felt upon returning to the UK after years of teaching in Africa.
Peter - There’s litter all over the place, nobody gives a damn! (Boumemouth, October 1997)
Clare - And the mbbish, it was filthy, and people didn’t care you know. They’d walk along throwing sweet papers down and that’s adults, never mind the children, you know, it was just disgusting. (Boumemouth, October 1998)
From a theoretical perspective, it can be suggested that this finding supports Castree and Braun’s (1998: 34) plea that “we need to get out of the habit of excluding urban historical geographies from our environmental histories”. The urban environment is indeed a fundamental ‘environmental’ concem forAaH participants. It embodies historically and spatially situated contexts, representing the ‘local’ experiences of theAaH interviewees. Here again, the theme of ‘local’ knowledge that runs throughout this thesis emerges, this time as the forum of expression for social concems. What do participants believe is causing this degradation? Within the interviews it is clearly linked with inadequate forms of everyday social interaction, which are seen as causing individuals to become ignorant of how to be ‘proper’ citizens; citizens who know how to treat each other, and as a result, also know how to treat the local environment.
6.3.2 Community and interaction
Fred - I think the problem is also the lack of respect. People do not care enough about themselves to even begin to care about the person next door. They go in and close the door and say that what I do in my house is up to me! (Boumemouth, October 1997)
Studies of lay public’s environmental concems have highlighted individual desire to live in stable communities, free from high levels of anxiety (Macnaghten and Jacobs 1997). Communities are important. They are not just about spatial proximity but are also:
about space, the culture, organization, function and institutional arrangements and co operation of people. (Mensah-Abrampa 1998: 138)
AaH interviewees of all ages repeatedly stressed that they felt there no longer exists a sense of community. This loss, or absence, of community concems both the loss of ‘place’ as well as
190 the erosion of personal and moral identity (see also Burgess et al. 1998, Macnaghten and Jacobs 1997).
In these interviews, feelings about the loss of community emerge from decreased levels of constructive social interaction, which interviewees felt to be caused by loss of spaces of interaction. Spatial arrangements have indeed changed considerably over the last century, causing changes in sites and possibilities of social interaction and learning. In modem urban life people are socially distanced from each other even if they are spatially proximate. Thus, there has been a transformation of public space (Eder 1996). Beck (1998: 29) echoes this trend when he suggests that:
The spaces in which people think and act in a morally responsible manner are becoming, on the one hand, smaller. On the other hand, they are becoming global and thus difficult to manage.
The following quote exemplifies this tension. In it, the interviewee evokes a past where there existed a sense of community. The contrast that Beck identifies, between the personal/’local’ and the global is replicated in this interview extract. The interviewee focuses on the insularity of modem living that is (ironically) caused by the globalising mediums of televisions and computers. Whilst Beck (1992) and Giddens (1991) might focus on the positive side of the lifestyle project that this trend sits within, it was clear that many interviewees did not feel that such a project was having many socially beneficial effects.
Ray - You don’t know what a community is, you don’t even know who lives next door, you never see them, you never bother with them. Because of television, because of computers and computer games and all the rest of it, people are living there within their walls and they’re not inter-relating enough. I think that it is a current problem and then there’s no way that they can actually get together. This is where I think churches fall down because I was listening to the radio and the minister said in the old days we didn’t have pews in church, it was an open space and it was used for all sort of communal activity, used to hold the fair or the market in there. They held dances in there but it wasn’t as it is now. There’s no place for you to meet anyone socially, you know, of your age. You think ‘well I’d like to meet a boy’. You go to a disco and go to a pub, well they’re not the environments to teach social responsibility but there isn’t anywhere else and everything else costs you money. (Boumemouth, October 1997)
191 This quote raises an important point about the location of modem forms of responsibility; an issue that will be returned to later. Here is it important to note that the apparent lack of positivity towards the lifestyle project was reported not only by the older interviewees, but also by younger ones. The following quote from an interviewee in his mid 30s concems the negative effects that the increasing emphasis on the private home as an isolated unit of sociality and consumption is having on local social relations.
Steve - It’s the way you live you own life. I’ve been in this house since February and I think I’ve talked to my next door neighbour twice, just over the fence to say hello and basically that’s it. My other next door neighbour, have known the family a while and we just sort of nod to each other as we drive up the drive and that’s it. My other house, with it being a terrace, I knew both my next door neighbours and the ones next to that. We had one communal back street where we all washed cars and things like that, we used to talk a lot. But now, with it being a detached house in the middle of an estate, it’s sort of my patch and we don’t seem to converse. Not just me trying to converse with them but them converse with me. I mean I don’t even know who my next door but one neighbour is. If somebody asked me the name, I wouldn’t have a clue. So it seems to be your own little patch. (North-west, October 1998)
This lack of interaction not only makes individuals feel isolated. There is also a collective impact on a sense of ‘civicness’ within communities (Selman and Parker 1997). Concems about loss of communities are not particular to AaH interviewees. Similar concems, about levels of civic involvement and ‘social capital’ have also been recorded across the UK by a national survey of public opinions on the state of communities (see Johnston and Jowell 1999).
In summary, it appears what is lacking and whatAaH interviewees wish to debate and foster, is a sense of social and personal responsibility. Participants feel it necessary to address social concems, to create a ‘civil’ society and to mobilise some level of involvement in finding solutions to them. The ‘environment’ in this context seems a suitable vehicle to further this end. Indeed, when talking about how to address concems, debates about individual and collective responsibility were paramount.
Responsibility is therefore an important concept in this research. There are several reasons for this. Chapter 1 outlined its centrality in prevailing framings of the sustainable lifestyles paradigm. Also, debates about personal and social responsibilities emerged in the process of the research interviews and proved, forA aH participants, to be an important part of
192 understanding how they can, and do, take an active role in creating social change. The following section investigates further the framings and discourse of responsibility as they are used by the interviewees to examine where the concept is positioned in their discursive engagement withAaH.
6.4 RESPONSIBILITY
Ian- Because the govemment are trying to give everyone a conscience, aren’t they. There’s something about responsibilities going about. (North-west, May 1999)
This section will argue that each interviewee’s discussion of personal and social responsibility in making changes to behaviour and society are in fact argumentative touchstones in their on going project of life politics. Exploring the role of debates about responsibilities in the interviews will provide further understanding of the purpose of participant’s involvement with AaH. It also confirms the finding that dilemmas of responsibility are rife in modem society, as writers such as Beck (1992) have suggested. This is possible as in a risk society where sites of responsibility are diffuse or obscured:
one can do something and continue doing it without having to take personal responsibility for it. (Beck 1992: 33)
Some researchers believe that evoking feelings of responsibility in publics has the potential to be a powerful behaviour change tool. As DeYoung (1993: 491) contemplates:
Consider the coercively motivating effects of a sense of duty or feeling of guilt—powerful if intangible behaviour change techniques.
This is an important point. Feelings and debates about responsibilities have the potential to bridge a seemingly unbreachable divide that exists within systems of liberal democracies conceming the environmental paradigm. The ethos of living in a liberal democracy does not promote the creation of systems of coercion, of forcing citizens to act in a certain way. The sanctity of this freedom from coercion was strongly echoed in this research, as the four following quotes demonstrate.
Leon - I don’t think you can make it compulsory for the individual, it’s just down to the individual to do at the end of the day. If they don’t want to do it, they won’t do it. (North-west, May 1999)
193 Christine - You can look at it both ways, if people are made aware, a lot of people aren’t aware of low energy light bulbs and what the repercussions are of using them. I think if people are made aware of the choices that they have and what will happen if they make this choice rather than that choice, then it’s still down to the individual to choose. (North-west, May 1999)
John - I’m not in favour of instructions like that to be honest because all it does is get people backs up and whatever it is, even if it’s a really good sensible instruction, I know people out there. As a union rep I know what they’re like, they don’t like being told to do anything, you know. But if you can persuade them to be something, which one’s a better way of doing it? So I think the lads on line, it’s about persuasion and it’s passing the message on, so its up to people involved in environmental issues to keep pushing the message about how to create the impact. (North-west, May 1999)
Andrea - I mean we have the information, or I have the information through the packs and stuff and try and implement it to everybody else really, that’s what we should be doing (laughing). Should, ah, a dirty word - ‘you will do it’! (North-west, May 1999)
In contrast to interviewee’s emphasis on choice and freedom, the current ‘environmental limits’ discourse requires individuals to surrender some vestiges of liberty for the sake of environmental survival, in the form of acts of consumption (Macnaghten and Urry 1998, Miller 1995a). How can this contradiction between freedom and necessary sacrifice be managed? The most effective way appears to be encouraging individual and public feelings of responsibility for taking positive action to help the environment. For example, the following quote demonstrates the power of feelings of responsibility. This interviewee has clearly internalised a sense of personal responsibility for monitoring his water use, a feeling that appears to be resilient to external influences and does not necessitate him feeling forced into acting.
David - So the general impression I get are that things are not too bad but that doesn’t change my attitude to water consumption. I think once you adopt a certain policy in your own life, for the individual. I’m not saying that my wife is more extravagant but I don’t agree with her, that’s just something which is just a matter of focus but as long as I personally don’t go around telling people what to do. So my contribution is tiny and individual. (Boumemouth, October 1997)
194 Understanding responsibility is pivotal to this thesis and the sustainable lifestyles debate. Indeed, it is unfortunate that such an important concept has received little analytical attention within the social science literature about lay perceptions of global environmental change. Some authors who have addressed the relationship between the environmental paradigm and responsibility have presented it as a highly diffuse concept with two possible meanings. It is either suggested that responsibility is a personally possessed attribute that is hidden away from discursive reasoning by being felt as a moral obligation (Eden 1993), or a means of referring to a lack of positive action from other social actors who should be making a contribution to positive social change (Darier and Schule 1999). This research suggests that the concept of responsibility covers both of these states. These have often been confounded in analysis (Kaiser et al. 1996) through simplifying discussions about what, and where, responsibility is located, both socially and individually. The distinction can be drawn between these two different forms using Kasier et al’s (1996) definitions of:
• internal self-ascription of responsibility: acceptance of a moral obligation to act; and • external ascription: a sense of duty and moral obligations of others.
Both these forms of responsibility were concurrently present in all theAaH interviews. To examine their incidence and meaning further, the following section will consider interviewees’ debates about sites of internal ascription of responsibility, reconsidering the prevailing framings of personal environmental responsibility. This will be followed by a discussion on the debates to emerge in interviews about external ascriptions of responsibility.
6.4.1 Internal self-ascription
As people feel somewhat guilty for what they do or fail to do for the environment, they seem to feel morally rather than conventionally responsible for the environment. (Kaiser and Shimoda 1999: 250)
Many AaH interviewees expressed some degree of moral responsibility for making a contribution to improving environmental conditions. This often manifested itself as feelings of compulsion to act and references to actions that interviewees felt they ‘should’ be taking, with some feelings of guilt being experienced when these acts were not fulfilled.
Wendy - I did feel really guilty actually to be honest, when I read all of this, I felt guilty of virtually everything. (Boumemouth, October 1997)
195 This would suggest that motivations for involvement withAaH is essentially that of a moral obligation. This echoes Eden’s (1993) findings in her pioneering study of individual environmental responsibility, which will now be discussed in some detail.
After holding a series of focus groups in Leeds at the beginning of the 1990s, Eden found that her interviewees often felt they ‘should’ or ‘must’ adopt some form of environmentally fnendly practice. Therefore, environmental responsibility was founded on moral compulsion. As Eden’s interviewees were not able to say what gave rise to these feelings of compulsion, it was concluded that the sources of these moral obligations were poorly articulated and therefore not fully understood by these interviewees. To understand how this could be the case, Eden makes use of Giddens’ concept of practical consciousness, to suggest a location for these moral obligations. This concept enables obligations to be fully present and inform action without the individual being able to give them discursive vent. However, counter to Eden, this research suggests that proclamations of responsibility are in fact a vital part of discursive consciousness because they are part of individual’s understandings and debates about environmental conditions and actions. Debates about who and where responsibility lies is also part of interviewee’s contexts of engagement withAaH.
In her study, Eden (1993) suggests that feelings of responsibility were poorly articulated, but seemed to be contingent upon individual feelings of efficacy. Efficacy is an individual’s belief about what they can do; the connection between their actions and the effects of these actions in their ability to bring about change (Tanner 1999). Efficacy is important in promoting environmentally friendly behaviours because individuals want to feel that their efforts are worthwhile, having the positive impact they desire (Harrison et al. 1996). However, it is also argued that most people’s sense of being able to make a difference in relation to environmental problems tends to be weak (Macnaghten and Jacobs 1997).
Eden’s (1993) focus on the link between responsibility and efficacy gave rise to a concept of ‘actionable responsibility’. This suggests that individuals feel responsible only for things they can change, the things that are ‘actionable’ for the particular individual. To this point these findings are supported in this research. The concept of ‘actionable responsibility’ goes some way to capturing the processes detailed in the previous chapter of how individuals map out the boundaries of practices they can and will change as a result of takingAaH. This is illustrated in the following quote, where the interviewee, through thinking about her practices and answering theAaH questionnaires, has become aware of where the domains of efficacy within her own lifestyle are located, and how much ability she has to make effective changes.
196 Sue - I know it wasn’t as high as I thought it might not that I knew what I was expecting but I didn’t do that well. I did conclude it was because of the transport that has pulled us down. I think I scored quite high in the shopping and scored quite high on the things that I had more control over. The things that I didn’t have much control over like my heating system or my travelling, we fell right down on. And that was really what I concluded at the end of the day. I got more on shopping. On lifestyle I got higher than the average but not on things that I feel that I didn’t have control over. We’ve got solid fuel; we haven’t got gas, which is probably considered the most green at the moment. It was quite interesting but that’s just how I thought to work it out. At the end of the day the things I didn’t have control over, we scored low on. The things that couldn’t control on we scored quite high. That was the division. (Boumemouth, April 1998)
The areas in which individuals felt that they had little control over—where there was little efficacy—were viewed by many interviewees as being near impossible to address: they were too ‘big’ for one individual to take on board.
Sharon - You don’t want to tackle bigger issues because you feel like you are a bit out of your depth. (North-west, January 1999)
However, this research challenges the distinction between having control and having no control as the defining factor in feelings of personal responsibility. The argument that individuals with high levels of efficacy take more action has been challenged by other studies that suggest feelings of efficacy do not always have a positive relationship with individual’s willingness to engage in environmentally friendly behaviour (Tanner 1999). Research carried out in Manchester (UK) and Frankfurt (Germany) also concluded that individuals felt they had to do the ‘right thing’ in terms of environmental action even if the positive effects of these actions were minimal (Darier and Schule 1999).
To add to this argument, it is clear fromAaH interviews that a low sense of efficacy did not diminish a sense of personal responsibility. This suggests that participating AaH in is not a mark of individual’s feelings of ‘actionable responsibility’ but rather is the need do to something: to engage in a process. Interviewees willingly and actively engaged withAaH, even if they felt that their actions had low levels of efficacy. This is illustrated in the
Sue is referring to her GreenScorel.
197 following quotes. They come from four individuals who had taken an active part inAaH, reading the packs and changing some domestic behaviour as a result.
Gill - So you’re not really achieving anything at the end of the day except for little bits, that’s not enough. (North-west, May 1999)
Elizabeth - I like the whole idea of it but the questions say ‘do you feel you’ve not changed things because you feel it’s not going to make a difference?’ Well I don’t feel that but I just feel that it is like a drop in the ocean. When I went to Tesco’s last week, I was there in the very end aisle and I was there with my 3 or 4 carrier bags that I had taken and I had to walk past the other 20 checkouts. I could see them all using the new bags. There was nobody else! (Boumemouth, April 1998)
David - I can only say that I am contributing in some respects. Whether one can see that contribution in the end, I don’t know. (Boumemouth, April 1998)
Kerry - I don’t think it will make a noticeable difference really. At least you feel like you are doing something good about it. I like to do a little bit, you know what I mean, at least it’s not on my conscience, that I’m just throwing things away and they could be recycled or whatever. (North-west, May 1999)
Therefore, it appears that a moral sense of proper conduct—of at least trying to do something no matter how ineffective—was a more powerful driver than feelings of efficacy. Thus, the concept of ‘actionable responsibility’ has only weak resonance in this research. Many interviewees did identify the area they wanted to focus upon as their own home and their own actions. However, rather than this site of action pertaining to levels of efficacyper se, this research suggests that the focus on the home and the self pertains to the tension of freedom versus coercion, as outlined above. Many interviewees do not feel optimistic about the outcomes of the actions they may take for the environment. At the same time, they also believed that it would be hypocritical of them to try and tell others what to do.
Alex - I also believe that I should have my own house in order before I try to tell other people what they should do. (Boumemouth, October 1997)
David - If somebody walks along the road and I drop the litter, it’s not my job to go up and tap them on the shoulder and tell them not to litter the street. It is my job not to litter. They have to live their life the way they feel because you just can’t be in judgement
198 of other people’s way of life. I mean, I would find other things quite unacceptable, like Formula One racing if it came down to it. I am not interested; the idea is a bit idiotic. But many other things are idiotic. (Boumemouth, April 1998)
Pat- One has to concentrate on one’s own area. (Boumemouth, October 1997)
Rather than being associated with feelings of efficacy, which relate specifically to outcomes of action, this research suggests that responsibility is related to individual’s sense of agency. Agency can be understood as the possibility of ‘doing otherwise’, of making some difference to the world (Giddens, quoted in Bryant and Jary 1991), the desire to change a situation (Macnaghten and Jacobs 1997). By feeling that they are at least ‘doing something’, even if it does not make a palpable difference,AaH interviewees felt at peace with their own lifestyles and choices. This accords with the processes identified in the previous chapter where interviewees constructed narratives that allowed them to justify and understand their own choices of practices, thus enabling them to understand what ‘doing their little bit’ entails. The two following quotes demonstrate how, as a result of this process, interviewees were happy feeling that they were at least doing something by taking the positive action of engaging with AaH.
Clare - I would like to think that it was the wider conception but I can see that there’s just a few of us shouting in the dark, isn’t there really. If I do my bit then I’m happy with that. (Boumemouth, October 1997)
Marie - I mean, you may not solve the whole problem, people may still waste stuff at home but at least at least you’re doing something. (North-west, April 1999)
These feelings also resonate with a clear distinction that emerges in this research of the difference between having a sense ownershipof of changes and being givenresponsibility for making changes. Current discourses of environmental responsibility assume that personal feelings of moral obligations are part of a pervasive and mutually accepted form of conventional responsibility. That is, individuals can and do understand that they are partially responsible for the environment: they simply need to be reminded that they have to keep their share of the bargain. This misunderstanding of the nature of responsibility has led to a climate in which “the ‘responsibility’ falls to us all but only once we follow the government’s lead” (Irwin 1995: 136). As a result, individuals actively reject the agenda being set by, often more powerful, others. In contrast, positive outcomes appear to arise when individuals have been able to define their own goals. This is demonstrated in the following quotes. They are
199 from Action Team members in the North-west who had voluntarily taken part in particular environmental work projects and felt a sense of achievement at the little that they had done.
Leon - We work in conjunction with Boots and they did a tree replanting last year and they planted 10,500 trees. And we’ve got about what 8 sacks full of Christmas card this year off this site alone. And my team got into this. I mean, one guy, he got so many he had to make about 5 trips, 2 sacks from one guy. It’s quite amazing really. Me - So what do you think motivated those people on that particular issue? Leon - Well I think it was the replanting of the trees. I went around and saw them all and explained to them about this replanting of trees and stuff like that. They all seemed to latch onto that, what a good idea it was. You know, that they’re putting something back into the environment through Christmas cards. I mean, 4 of them out of my 8 or 9 really latched onto it but the others didn’t because of work commitments. And our offices, the cleaner and I in our offices, she went round and cajoled people (laughing) because she goes in very office and it’s quite amazing how many we got just out of our office. (North-west, January 1999)
Andre - But if you can see that it’s going to be doing some good, like we said, replanting trees rather than it going to the company, I think people are more willing to give something back to the environment rather than to the company. The amount of paper that this company wastes, shiny good quality paper and books. The amount of trees that they must go through is unbelievable and there’s no need for half of it really. (North- West, January 1999)
The process of taking AaH provided interviewees with an increased feeling of agency—a feeling that they can change something and make a contribution to addressing their social anxieties but which is not contingent upon the specific contributions of individual actions. This feeling of agency is created through interviewees engaging in the debates surrounding AaH. That is, the process of discursive engagement enables participants to feel that they are making some difference, with the concept of responsibility being a clear discursive articulation of arguing this agency into being. This argument runs counter to Eden’s (1993), which suggests that the foundations of moral impulses to take action are locked away in practical consciousness.
Using practical consciousness as theoretical construct to understand notions of responsibility appears to be based upon a misunderstanding of its foundations as a concept. Giddens (1984) stresses that the basis of practical consciousness lies in the routinization of recursive practices
200 and the repetitiveness of material activities carried out on a day-to-day basis. However, this research has shown that debates about responsibility are active processes of individuals entering into moral discourses and debates and mapping out their own place in them. Indeed, moral engagement withAaH is part of the reflexivity of human knowledgeability, which is central to Giddens’ arguments. Thus evocations of responsibility are really part of individual’s discursive consciousness. It is an essential part of the reflexive monitoring of human sociality, as:
To be a human being is to be a purposive agent, who both has reasons for his or her activities and is able, if asked, to elaborate discursively upon the reasons. (Giddens 1984: 3)
Entering into discussions of responsibility is one element of engaging in on-going moral questions, arguments and conversations—with others and within ourselves.
In light of this point, the manner whereby Eden (1993) uses the concept of discursive consciousness also needs to be reconsidered. Discursive consciousness should not be interpreted as providing access to coherent and instantly articulated reasoning in verbal form as Eden clearly expects her subject to be able to do. Instead, discursive consciousness is dynamic and diffuse: it is part of an internal conversation about possible selves, which is talked into existence (see chapter 5). Feelings of responsibility are not personal dispositions, but rather appear to be part of the individual’s understandings of the emergent feelings of the need to ‘do something’—feelings that are prompted by taking part AaHin and are part of the moral conversations of everyday life that position the individual in an on-going project of emancipatory-life politics.
ExaminingAaH interviewee’s discussions on external ascriptions of responsibility strengthens this point. The following section will demonstrate how talking about the responsibilities of ‘others’ is part of an acknowledgement and situated mapping of the place that individuals feel they and other social actors have in these moral and social conversations.
6.4.2 External ascription
If ascriptions of personal responsibility are part of an engagement with a social project of life politics, then it is necessary to understand its relationship with debates about the responsibilities of others, that are called ‘external ascription’ (Kasier et al. 1996). This external ascription is important as articulations of responsibility are often proclaimed relationally, in reference to other social actors (Myers and Macnaghten 1998). Staats et al (1996: 189) suggest that this discourse emerges as, in terms of addressing environmental problems, “the contributions
201 made by other parties are surrounded by much uncertainty”. In this research and other similar studies, dialogue arises concerning who is, could, and should be taking responsibility for facilitating social change (see Burgess et al. 1998, Harrison et al. 1996, Hinchliffe 1996, Macnaghten and Jacobs 1997). These conversations are about ‘conventional responsibility’, as they relate to social expectations of self and others (Kaiser and Shimoda 1999).
The concept of conventional responsibility suggests that these discussions are about allocating and assessing normative roles, rights and responsibilities within a structured framework and debating which social actors are not meeting the expectations of their ascribed roles. These debates are often proclaimed in a negative fashion and can appear to be exercises in allocating blame rather than constructive exercises in understanding, as the following quote demonstrates.
Peter - I don't have a car. I go up like a flipping packhorse sometimes with all this stuff to the nearest recycling bin and dump it in and people with cars, they go to supermarkets. Most of the supermarkets now have got recycling points and they couldn’t be bloody bothered. Now how do you get through to them? I don't know. And we’re back to the 'can't be bothered'. How do you get over that? I can't answer it. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Yet a closer reading of the interview transcripts suggests that external ascriptions serve more than one function and that the meanings of these ascriptions are contingent upon the level of reference. For example, in the interviews there were specific descriptions of how and where obligations have not been met in particular instances. The following quote concerns AaHthe project in one of the North-west workplaces. It shows how the project was only marginally successful, owing to some individuals—such as ‘management’—not taking on board responsibility for making the project work. The shop-floor members of the Action Team were thus left to meet the challenge of making AaH work alone.^
Christine - I feel that management could have gone about it differently. They could have done a seminar, it could have been done in a team briefing, whereby they could have been told ‘if everybody switched off their computer it would result in this—this would help global warming’ or whatever the knock-on effect was. They could have been
^ To put this quote in context, all three workplaces takingAaH did not have an internal budget to allow the Action Teams to cover the costs of events or the work time that they were expected to spend on the project. As a result. Action Team members had to do things for the project in their spare time, with little visible input from management.
202 encouraged—‘if you pass, can you just switch it off. Nothing. No great big deal. I think they could have looked at it that way and they could have led by example. (North-west, May 1999)
In contrast to the examples of specific situations discussed by interviewees, references to groups of other social actors were made when interviewees wanted to illustrate a point concerning debates of equity and fairness, of sharing out resources and contributions to making a difference. As Lemer (1981: 7) states, if a debate:
leads to a definition of the situation highlighting absolute or relative deprivationvis- à-vis some valued good, then justice concerns almost inevitably become salient.
As the implications of social practices are discussed, debate about the distribution and allocation of environmental ‘goods’ and ‘bads’ are illustrated through the creation of ideals of sites of responsibility.
The following quotes illustrate how notions of conventional responsibilities were evoked in numerous contexts and at differing levels of debate, being part of the drawing out of pictures of how society should work. The first of these relates to general institutional responsibilities that have been created as a result of Agenda 21. The second and third concern the specific practices of who are, and should be, responsible for enabling recycling.
Andre - We do have a responsibility to each other, we have an individual responsibility. But if the government are going to go down the road of actually going along with the Rio conference decisions then you’ve got to actually put an inhrastructure in place. (North-west, October 1998)
Rob - Although it’s a duty upon all of us, the council—it’s their responsibility to provide a simple procedure and facility to do these things. (North-west, October 1998)
John - I think individuals are making efforts to get rid of the rubbish from tips and things like that, taking the bottles to recycling points. But I don’t think really we’re getting encouragement from the local councils, as much as we could do because it is finance based. (North-west, October 1998)
A further addition to this argument emerges from the number of hypothetical situations that interviewees created when talking about conventional responsibilities. Beyond allocating
203 specific duties, a more general frame of reference is used in discussions about how theories of equity and fairness actually operate on the ground. As the implications of social practices are discussed, debates about the distribution and allocation of environmental ‘goods’ and ‘bads’ are illustrated by creating pictures of sites of responsibility. The interviewees below use the hypothetical example of bosses telling employees to catch the bus to work and then themselves driving in big cars, as an illustration of the pervasiveness of unequal distributions of responsibilities.
Andrea - That’s certainly the feeling I got from a lot of people out there, saying ‘oh, you’re telling us to catch the bus to work and look at so and so with his range Rover’. It’s not fair, you know. I can’t say to somebody ‘ you shall come on a bike’ (laughing). It’s not fair! (North-west, May 1999)
The following quote is an extract from an extended discussion in one of the interview groups about the relative responsibilities that exist between producers and consumers of food. Note how the extract starts with ‘might’ and then proceeds into a detailed mapping of the different social actors responsible in relation to who has control and choice, and also how the location of different responsibilities shifts in the course of the dialogue.
Ian - You might go somewhere to buy a package of beefburgers or whatever is the thing, and that packaging could contain either a piece of paper or a bag or several bags, and when you have unpacked these damn things you end up with a lot of rubbish. Where do you go from there? Rob - Things are over-packaged. Going back to pizzas or beefburgers, 10 inch pizzas that will come in a box about 12 inch square to make it look bigger. So it’s the marketing that always try to make the products look bigger and better than what they actually are. If they were honest, they might never sell anything. Sean- I mean, you can get around things like that though can’t you. Like Tescos and Sainsburys, they all sell them fresh now, don’t they? So you can avoid the packaging, with the beefburgers you can go to the butchers or something like that. Ian - Yeah, but if you go to Safeways or wherever they are covered in cling film. Sean - Yeah sure it’s just that you get rid of the cardboard box, so you are reducing it. Ian - But if you’re buying sort of pre-packed because the shop hasn’t got that facility, you are stuck with that as a problem. (North-west, October 1998)
This delegating and debating about sites of responsibility is part of a mapping of the current and an ideal social world, and is part of individual’s search for tenable solutions for change.
204 The following quote encapsulates this process. It shows that the project of allocating responsibility is not one of simply distributing blame. Instead it is considered a serious component in meeting the challenges of changing lifestyles and social relations.
Sean - I think the important thing about awareness is that once peoples’ level of awareness has risen they’ve got to facilitate that. That means we’ve got the make the realisation of that awareness easy, so when somebody becomes very aware of recycling for example bottles and paper, it has got to be easy for that person to recycle bottle and paper. If it’s a simple thing of turning off a light switch then obviously we’ve got to make that facility available. It’s things like that. So once you’ve raised the level of awareness, you’ve then got to facilitate it and put in the infrastructure, which is obviously a long-term thing. You’ve got to put something in place for them to be able to choose that otherwise it’s just no good. Otherwise you can get frustration—T’ve got a reasonable level of awareness, I want to do something about it but I can’t because there’s no facilities in place, so I can’t switch it off. So I think it’s what you do, it’s like if you show a dog a bone you’ve got to give it. (North west, January 1999)
The importance of the concept of responsibility can be seen in the direction of these debates. I would suggest that calling forward of notions equity is an expression of, and attempt to create, a missing form of ‘social contract’: a contract in which mutual efforts are clearly visible. In the process of participant’s debates about social responsibilities, individuals are actively calling for different sorts of relationship to come into existence, between sets of social actors. The following quote demonstrates how central this notion of everybody making an equal contribution is to forwarding ideas of social change.
Paul - I think if councils and governments—I’m not saying everybody because you always get people who just aren’t bothered—but I think a lot of people would help them in return. If they saw that something was being done, it would stir your conscience and even if you were doing it for whatever reason, it doesn’t matter. The fact that you’re doing it, you’re doing it, aren’t you? But you’ve got to see people helping you. (North-west, October 1998)
Even though interviewees felt that currently social responsibilities were not being met, they also felt that if everybody made an effort there would be some progress. Indeed, it did seem that beyond coercion and financial incentives, this was the only way that change was going to
205 happen. This was, despite the current negative diagnosis, ultimately a proclamation of hope for the future.
Beverly - I mean if everyone does what they can, then it certainly does make a difference. It has been proved in the past. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Individuals are clearly willing to factor themselves into a renewed social contract while they are negotiating their position within a network of responsibility. This point will be advanced in the following section of this chapter. It suggests that by marking out these sets of responsibilities participants are attempting to enact or talk this social contract into existence. Debates of responsibilities and the other issues discussed in this chapter are not just interviewee’s words and concerns being given public airings. Instead, these individuals are performing social acts with which they hope to make a difference to the very problems that they are discussing. By entering into an engagement withAaH, they are actively talking a better future into existence.
6.5 TALKING INTO A BETTER FUTURE
Sonia - One of the reasons that I want to become a teacher is that I want to try and educate people about what is happening and to have a sense of responsibility about what is happening. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
The final section of this chapter will argue that taking part inAaH not only permits participants to explore, map out and address their social concerns. It also provides a means by which they feel that they can, and indeed are, enacting solutions to these concerns. The very process of taking AaH—of thinking and arguing and changing some habits—is a form of social action that will make a contribution to halting the environmental and social degradation that thinking with, and through,AaH evokes. As previously discussed, interviewees felt that even though little tangible might result from AaH in terms of behavioural outcomes, the very act of ‘doing something’ was beneficial in itself.
To expand this point further, taking part inAaH provides participants with a sense of agency. They do not appear to have a template of changes and ideal end states, but rather a better future is talked into existence through highlighting problem areas, such as loss of communities and loss of social interaction. In having the discursive space to debate these issues, individuals were able to move towards the goal of a better future. For example, the following quote is from an interviewee who had changed very little in terms of practices as a result of takingAaH. However, she felt that her awareness and her willingness to engage with the issues were going
206 to make some form of contribution to making positive change that she did not expect to get much personal benefit from.
Alex - Well, it’s very personal isn't it. I mean I won’t see anything out of this. I just know that I am contributing to the work. Basically I just know in my own mind that I’m thinking about what I am doing, what I am throwing away and what water I am using, what energy I am consuming and I am trying to make cuts to reduce my consumption. Although there aren’t going to be any immediate gain. I’m not going to see anything from this in my lifetime but I know that I am feeding into the whole sustainability thing, the goals, the long term goals of sustainability. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Participating inAaH is a process by which individuals address social anxieties by entering into moral conversations with and through the programme. Shotter (1993) states that this process of enactment is part of everyday politics. Human activities and actors are on-going objects, not completed forms of knowledge, and speech has both meaning and directionality with which individuals can and do mobilise debates to move towards different states. This ‘enactment’ can lead to one of two directions AaHfor interviewees. First, there is the hope that taking part in AaH will begin some process of social diffusion of changes in outlooks and behaviours. Second, through the ‘speech act’, absent others are drawn and positioned in individual’s desired social contract.
6.5.1 Social diffusion
Elizabeth - And I thought, well, it’s only a start, but people have got to think about it. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
The outcome of participating inAaH can be seen as interviewees being part of “an initiating process” (Pamwell and Bryant 1996: 330) to induce change. As the above quote suggests, some participants believed that by engaging in sustainable lifestyles debates they will make some contribution to raising general public awareness about these issues. They hoped that this awareness will move outwards from these individuals to society, encouraging other people to start thinking and engaging in the same ways thatAaH interviewees have. How this process of wider engagement will follow is not exactly clear from the interviews but there is a feeling that forwarding these messages can only have a positive effect on others.
Sonia - To be honest, obviously the individual is very small but the cumulative effect I think, it would make a difference. Not just in terms of actual energy savings and that sort of
207 thing but also the messages that it sends out, and one hopes that if sufficient people become conscious, then it becomes a big enough thing. It is then obvious to producers, obvious to governments that this is where people’s priorities lie. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Peter- Even if it on a global level it doesn't make that much of a difference, it’s a consciousness change towards the broader picture beyond the home as well. And so I think that when something like this comes along, it sums it all up. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
AaH interviewees believed that getting the messages ‘out there’ was important part of making change. Perhaps this is why, in this research and in other studies (see Darier and Schule 1999), lay publics often call for more information to be made available to themselves and others in relation to environmental problems.AaH interviewees suggested that public education is important to bring about movements towards more environmentally friendly societies.
Richard - We need to push for more concrete sensible evidence to be given to people. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
Sabitree - Why?^* Because I think really that people really have to be taught. Let’s face it, we don’t know and we have to learn it, people need to be told what’s going on. (Bournemouth, April 1998)
Sharon - It’s not being communicated enough, I don’t think. I think that’s one of the major problems. If people knew out there that they could get recycling bins, that there were different programmes going on. Because not everybody reads the Weekly News.^^ Communication is a big key issue I think. People just don’t know. (North-west, January 1999)
These calls for more information do not necessarily endorse the ‘information deficit’ model, discussed in previous chapters. Rather, it is part of the interviewees desire to ‘make things better’. Calls for more environmental information to be given to the public can be understood
This is in response to my question about why Sabitree decided to become involved withAaH and the volunteer group in Bournemouth. This is a local paper in the Warrington area.
208 as a way of interviewees drawing others into reconsiderations of their practices and getting them to make contributions to moral debates. ThereforeAaH participant’s calls for more information can be viewed as a prompt for activity by other individuals and institutions, by the very process of including them as actors in debates. If environmental solutions can only emerge through collective action (Jacobs 1997a), then the constant incitement of the ‘other’ to take part is possibly a call for ‘joint action’, not just a complaint of a lack of it.
As well as disseminating information, participating AaH in was seen by a couple of interviewees as being a process of the social diffusion of positive sentiments, culminating in a tangible social change. The following quote uses the analogy of throwing a stone into a pool and watching the effects of the ripples.
Sue - You hope that’s it’s like the stone thrown in the pool, that the ripple effect will help. So that people say 'oh yes, I have got my pack and I’ve got this and this is happening'. So that other people will think 'oh, this sounds good!’ and you have a knock-on effect. Even perhaps if some people didn’t take the initial response, you hope that will generate out an interest, which must be good. I think at the end of the day it is the only way that it effectively works is getting individuals being responsible for themselves. (Bournemouth, October 1997)
This above quote shows how this interviewee believed that change was a matter of gradual social learning, watching others and positive reinforcement. This was also supported by the experiences or beliefs of other interviewees.
Marie - You wouldn’t necessarily see it, it can also be quite slow. It’s like if you’ve got a child growing up isn’t it? You see it every day and then an aunty comes along and says ‘oh, you’ve grown!’ Yes, I would say there is a change there, because I think people are more aware. If you say ‘oh, there was a computer left on last night’ they say ‘oh all right. I’ll make sure it doesn’t happen again’. And if you say something like that, that the computer was left on, they’ll automatically say ‘okay’ rather than ‘well, what does that matter?’ (North-west, April 1999)
Whatever the results from such an event, many AaH interviewees believed that just by taking part they had made some contribution to getting this process of change started.
Leon - I suppose it planted the seed. (North-west, May 1999)
209 As well as the spreading of ideas to others, these expressions of ‘others’ was also part of drawing them into a new social contract, through the performative ‘speech act’ of discursive engagement with AaH.
6.5.2 Speech acts
This chapter has suggested that taking part inAaH is a way of enacting and creating a much desired new form of social contract. Not only were interviewees signing themselves up to this social contract. They were also drawing and committing absent others to it by performing their desire for a better society through a ‘speech act’. Szerszynski’s (1999) paper on the performative dimensions of risk and trust offers an engaging insight into this phenomenon, which is instrumental to this research. Szerszynski’s work focuses on the voicings of lay uncertainties concerning the issues of risk and trust. These debates are often interpreted as lay publics stating normative preferences as to what, and who, they believe are the agents of blame and trust. However, Szerszynski argues that evocations of the concepts and relationships implied in issues of trust can also be seen as performances in themselves, enactments that attempt to ‘bind’ absent others into a relationship of trust through the ‘speech act’.
Szerszynski (1999: 245) argues that language, as well as describing the world around us, serves also as an active attempt to change the world through ‘speech acts’:
Through language and gesture we are performing certain acts which can, in the right circumstances, bring about social effects hermeneutically, through changing the definition of a situation, and of its constituent social relations.
The findings of this research have great resonance with this argument, both in relation to the act of individuals takingAaH and the debates to emerge in the process of the interviews. Engaging withAaH can be seen as a performative act; a means of bringing about change. The argumentative process is an act in itself through which individuals make sense of and discursively modify their own lifeworld. In the process of mapping out and debating the relative rights and responsibilities detailed in this chapter interviewees are not only making sense of their world, but are also actively changing it through speech. In drawing others into this discursive picture they are attempting to bind them in the roles that have been constructed for them: bringing about a new form of social contract. This argument reinforces the underlying theme of this chapter. It helps to explain the interviewees constant emphasis on engaging with moral and social debates and the need to feel that they are doing something—a need that engaging withAaH allows them to (partially) satisfy.
210 6.6 SUMMARY
This chapter has argued that taking part inAaH is not simply an inward looking project of self-evaluation. It is also an outward engagement with the project of life politics. The issues evoked through interviewee’s discursive engagements withAaH are essentially social issues. They concern the collective qualities of life and questions of morally right ways to live that are situated in, and mediated by, interviewee’s experiential contexts. In engaging in these debates participants are taking an active part in two processes. First, they are mapping out the relative rights, roles and responsibilities of all the social actors implicated in the environmental paradigm. This process draws the conclusion that a new form of collective social contract is needed if positive social changes are going to be made. Second, in taking part in this process interviewees feel they are making a contribution to alleviating these social problems. Participating inAaH allows them to feel that they are already doing something positive by simply engaging with the programme and being made to think. They believe that this process is part of them ‘doing their bit’, which will make a positive contribution. This is because it helps to get the messages of AaH ‘out there’ through various processes of social diffusion and awareness raising. Also, engaging with the debates of life politics enables interviewees to perform ‘speech acts’ whereby language is used to actively change the given situation, drawing out possible/other futures and talking them into existence. By including other social actors in this process, interviewees are binding them into this new form of social contract, thereby creating a better future through speech.
This chapter concludes the empirical investigation of how and whyAaH participants became involved and engaged with the programme. The last three chapters have developed an argument that departs quite considerably from prevailing frameworks used to investigate attempts to promote environmentally friendly behaviours in the household. In short, it has argued that the process of taking AaH is considerably more important to participants than any potential behavioural outcomes or financial incentives. In the final chapter of this thesis, these findings are reviewed. The contributions and the limitations of this study will also be discussed, both in terms of theory and practice.
211 CHAPTER 7. CONCLUSIONS: RECONSIDERING THEORY AND PRACTICE
Those who wish to promote what they see as healthier lifestyles, and more sustainable patterns of consumption, must acknowledge that giving information, advice and encouragement have to be seen as just one component of a much wider strategy. To write your book, and then stand back in puzzled confusion whilst the masses of enthusiastic readers continue much as before, is only possible given an ignorance of the depth of the psychological challenge which a change of lifestyle poses. To become either angry, despondent or exhausted are the reactions of one who has grievously underestimated the magnitude and subtlety of the problem. (Claxton 1994: 78)
7.1 INTRODUCTION
This chapter will review the robustness of the theoretical framework used in this thesis in view of the empirical evidence accumulated in chapters 4, 5 and 6. I begin by revisiting the theoretical framework, as discussed in chapter 2, recounting its main components and examining how this framework has stood up to empirical analysis. I then review the role that human sciences have played in this analysis. Many social science disciplines have increasingly neglected or ‘black-boxed’ the contributions that human sciences can make to empirically grounded research. Despite the focus on critiques of positivist epistemologies, some research findings from human science sub-disciplines have proved useful in this thesis. This is due to their ability to compliment the broad, processual theories of the social sciences by offering focused, coherent, and often empirically driven concepts, that can be used to fill some cognitive/emotional gaps in social science knowledges.
Following on from this, the social theories used in the theoretical framework are then reviewed. I begin by revisiting the theories of high modernity used in this research, especially the work of Beck (1992, 1996) and Giddens (1984, 1991). It is argued that the framing and positioning of individuals within these theories has proved highly relevant to this research. However, there is an important qualifier to their use. Both Giddens’ and Beck’s theories are excessively focused on the mediated nature of perceptions of risk. They cannot accommodate the experiential knowledges that individuals employ when talking and thinking about their lifestyles; a form of knowledge that has been central to this thesis’ arguments. To follow, it is then argued that Giddens’ (1984) structuration theory has provided a robust set of principles, which can be used to interpret the discursive practices ofAaH participants. This research has made a contribution to structuration theory by adding empirical weight to Giddens’
212 theoretical arguments. However, Giddens presents an impoverished view of discursive processes. For AaH interviewees, making and using knowledges appears to be an active and political process. This finding offers support to the dialogic and rhetorical theories of social psychology, such as the work of Billig (1987, 1993) and Shotter (1993).
I then discuss the contributions that this thesis has made to debates about method and practice. Qualitative methods have proved themselves to be adaptable research techniques in building both in-depth discursive analyses and applied evaluations from empirical material. Interview methods have highlighted the affective discursive spaces that qualitative techniques construct, showing how important the contexts of^faT/are in the ‘success’ of the programme.
I then consider the contributions that this research has made to GAP’s work programmes and to practices of environmental information dissemination. This thesis has presented a highly grounded critique of prevailing approaches to the affect and relevance of environmental information for lay publics. In delivering such an empirically grounded critique, this research has enabled GAP to reconsider their working practices. However, as I will illustrate, problems arise when attempting to translate research findings—such as those in this thesis—into practice.
To conclude, some limitations of this thesis’ research will then discussed. I highlight some potential theoretical limitations of the empirical and analytical methods used. This leads into a consideration of future research questions, which are summarised under two main points. First, this thesis highlights the need for further research into the dynamics of the spaces—of home and the workplace—which AaH is delivered in. Second, this thesis has argued that responsibility is a key discursive concept in individual’s reactions to the environmental paradigm. Further research is needed to examine the complexity, dynamism and contextuality of this concept in the formation and enactment of lifestyle practices.
7.2 SOCIAL AND HUMAN SCIENCES: CONTRIBUTIONS AND CRITIQUES
This section examines the ability of this thesis’ theoretical framework to stand up to empirical analysis. A brief reminder of this framework is mapped out, followed by a discussion of how human sciences have been used and critiqued throughout this research. Cognitive/emotional concepts from disciplines such an personality psychology have made a significant contribution to this thesis and this research suggests that social scientists need to reconsider the contributions that human sciences can make to empirically informed research. The contributions and critiques that this research has made to social theories used are then
213 discussed, especially in relation to theories of high modernity, structuration theory, and the production and use of heterogeneous knowledges.
7.2.1. Theoretical framework: a reminder
A summary of the theoretical framework as laid out in chapter 2, is given in Figure 7.1.
Figure 7.1. Summary of theoretical framework
SOCIETY Theories of high modernity Beck’s ‘risk society’
^ The Environment Socially constructed sets of relations, discourses and practices
How do individual’s knowledges and practices become constituted and re-created ? => Giddens’ structuration theory J \ Forms of Principles of co-evolution consciousness & structuration
\ Knowledges = hybrids: / Importance of discursive practices
Rhetorical & dialogic Mobilised through (Re) created through construction discourse ‘joint action’
As Figure 7.1 shows, this thesis’ framework is founded upon social constructionist approaches to relations between nature and culture, with the boundaries of the ‘environment’ being permeable and fully embedded in sets of social relations and practices. Through this
214 framing questions are raised about how social action and discourses can be understood. Giddens’ (1984) framework of structuration theory is employed to address these questions. It makes knowledges and discursive practices central to any investigation of individual’s reactions to sustainable lifestyle discourses. This framework has been the basis of the empirical analysis in this thesis. However, the empirical analyses of chapters 4, 5 and 6 have also made use of concepts from various sub-disciplines of the human sciences. Therefore, it is important to first consider the contributions that human science research has made, or could possibly make, to social theories in relation to the environmental paradigm and behaviour change.
7.2.2 Reconsidering human sciences
Since the emergence of a ‘cultural’ or ‘discursive’ turn in the social sciences (Blake 1999), human sciences have been broadly critiqued and excluded from social science research due to their positivist approaches to questions of human thought and action. This critique, and subsequent exclusion, has extended to social science investigations of the environmental paradigm. Disciplines such as environmental sociology (Benton and Redclift 1994, Bumingham and O’Brien 1994, Macnaghten and Urry 1998, Hannigan 1995, Redclift and Woodgate 1994), cultural geography (Blake 1999, Bulkeley 1997, Burgess et al 1998, Eden 1998, Harrison et al 1996, Hinchliffe 1996), and environmental anthropology (Descola and Palsson 1996, Milton 1996) have presented and favoured strong theoretical and empirical arguments as to why lay public’s place in, and reactions to, the environmental paradigm need to be considered from contextual, discursive and cultural approaches.
Chapter 2 of this thesis discussed in detail the rationale behind this movement, outlining the social basis of critiques of human science epistemologies and methods of positivist forms of inquiry in relation to lay public’s understandings of environmental change. The case studies of this thesis add weight to these critiques. Chapters 4, 5 and 6 suggest that positivist framings of the environment do not accord with individual’s experiences of, and relations with, the environment. Rather, the environment is understood and positioned by the individual in relation to their lifeworld. Chapters 1 and 2 of this thesis discussed how disciplines such as environmental economics, and sub-disciplines of social psychology, view the current environmental paradigm as a ‘social dilemma’. This social dilemma is a conflict within the individual and within society. It is between the short term gainsH of omo economis, maximising personal profit through optimal resource use, and the longer term needs of maintaining resources for the collective good by restricting the individual’s maximisation goals (see Biel and Garling 1995, Common 1988, Hardin and Baden 1977, Pearce and Turner 1990).
215 This thesis suggests that the term ‘social dilemma’ does indeed summarise the individual’s experiences of the environmental paradigm. However, rather than this dilemma being founded upon the conflicts of the profit maximising individual, it concerns the nature and state of economic and moral social relations in high modernity. Individuals are engaged in on-going conversations about how they, and others, should live. When individuals talk about resource use in the AaH interviews, their discussions are focused on issues of fairness and equity, not about the self versus the collective. To this end, this thesis offers a strongly grounded critique of positivist framings of the environmental paradigm and the political concept of the sustainable lifestyle.
Yet, I strongly caution against assuming that human sciences are not able to make a valid intellectual contribution to investigations of lay public’s relations to the concepts of global environmental change. To understand the experiences of participants as they think about their lifestyles, this thesis has engaged with theories of cognitive and/or emotional processes. Indeed, without establishing an understanding of how people think and feel, sustainable lifestyles and behaviour change issues cannot be tackled. Social science literature appears to have ‘black-boxed’ cognitive processes, making little attempt at incorporating or considering them within the bounds of social theory.
The strengths of the social sciences lie in their engagement with broad, processual theories. But, in creating embedded positionings of the individual, specific psychological processes are often left blank. For example, the concepts of practical and discursive consciousness have proved useful in this research. Yet, social scientists rarely engage with questions about how these knowledges function and change as they are used. Human sciences can help to fill these theoretical gaps by focusing upon specific cognitive and/or psychological mechanisms in a coherent and intensive manner. As this thesis has engaged theory firom an empirically grounded perspective, it has been necessary to reassess the contributions that the human sciences can make in understanding individual’s reactions to the messages and methods of the sustainable lifestyles agenda. Consequently, key concepts have been adopted from the human sciences. Some examples of theories that have made a significant contribution to this research include:
• The working-self concept (Lord et al 1999): this provided a psychological basis for understanding why individuals do not have one coherent, static sense of self, but rather core and peripheral identities that are dynamic. This may help to explain whyAaH
216 participants wish to take part in a form of self-evaluation: they want to learn more about themselves and explore the relationships between these different forms of self-identity.
• Processes of behaviour change (Prochaska et al. 1992, Wardle 1996, Rollnick 1996): theories about how individuals make changes to deeply ingrained behavioural patterns from behavioural/clinical psychology literatures have helped to formulate the discursive model of behaviour change presented in chapter 4. These psychological theories engage with the experiences of individuals as they confront lifestyle issues, making them experiential and empirically grounded.
One of the main strengths and contributions human science theories have made to this thesis is their empirical basis. This is because they are founded upon behavioural observations of individual differences. Theory is built up from phenomena—therefore sharing (some) epistemological ground with social science empiricism. They also share a focus on process. The human science theories used in this thesis present cognitive conceptualisations of possible forms of process, but do not make explicit assumptions about whether these processes are external/social or internal/individual. For example, the working-self concept (Lord et al 1999) suggests that the individual moves between different states of the self- identity. What is left open is how this movement is facilitated and how these different states of self are formed. Therefore, some human science theories contrast sufficiently with social science approaches to be able to offer fresh insights into individual’s psychological processes. At the same time, both disciplines share characteristics of theoretically informed yet grounded observation.
There are limits to the contributions that human science theories can make to social constructionist modes of investigation. This is due to the norms of many human sciences sub disciplines of abstract model building and using distanced quantitative research techniques. Yet, I argue that an unquestioning assertion of the unbreachable differences between these two modes of inquiry results in social science researchers missing potential contributions that multi-disciplinary research can make in the investigation of complex problems, such as changing lifestyles for the sake of the environment.
7.2.3 Structuration and knowledges: contributions to social theory
I now examine how this thesis has used and contributed to the social theories of its theoretical framework. This section begins by focusing on theories of high modernity, especially the work of Beck (1992, 1996) and Giddens (1984, 1991) and their positioning of the individual within the socially constructed and mediated environmental paradigm. I then discuss
217 Giddens’ structuration theory, showing how Giddens’ concepts of consciousness have strong resonance throughout this research, which has been able to contribute empirical weight to his theories. Finally, theories of knowledges are discussed. This thesis asserts that theories of lay knowledges, as well as emphasising the heterogeneity of all forms of knowledge, should frame individuals as active and political co-creators of environmental discourses.
• Theories of high modernity This thesis’ theoretical framework is embedded within theories of the constitution of society in high modernity, particularly the work of Beck (1992, 1996) and Giddens (1984, 1991). Their sociologically-driven theories of high modernity have had great resonance throughout this thesis, especially in positioning individuals in the environmental paradigm. To recap briefly, both Beck and Giddens argue that individuals in contemporary societies are engaged in processes of reflexive modernization. The state of reflexive modernization arises due to the omnipresence of environmental risks and consequential changes in forms of governance. These social changes result in ‘society’ becoming more self-aware, critiquing once infallible institutions of science and politics. As old structures of class and religion are eroded they have been replaced with reflexive forms of thinking and living. This makes individuals responsible for their own political and personal trajectories amidst ever-changing global contexts. Thus, they are involved in a project of political individualisation or life politics (Giddens 1991).
This thesis offers strong empirical support for the existence of forms and processes of political individualisation, which Beck (1998) argues, isthe new social commitment. The empirical chapters of this thesis have shown that individual’s engagement withAaH can be seen as part of a project of self-evaluation. Beck (1992) is prophetic in arguing that the social crises of risk will be transformed in high modernity into individual crises. In other words, people cope with the potential enormity of the dangers of living in a risk society by turning social problems into ones of individual achievement. This diagnosis helps to explain the form of engagement thatAaH represents. It is a way for participants to take part in a form of self- evaluatory life politics by enabling them to assess where they ‘stand’ in relation to the environmental paradigm. It enables them to feel that they are taking some form of positive action to help improve current social and environmental problems. It can also assist in understanding why most of theAaH interviewees suggested that ‘doing their bit’ was all that they could do to make a difference. The potential catastrophes of the risk society are perceived as so all-encompassing that individuals can only engage with, and have a sense of agency in, issues that are situated in their lifeworld spaces.
218 Beck and Giddens emphasise how this individualisation also results in individuals being liberated from traditional structures and expectations. Whilst accepting this argument to some degree, it is possible to question the extent of this liberation. Beck and Giddens’ positive diagnosis of modernity belies the limitations and constraints AaHthat interviewees expressed throughout this research.
This thesis has argued that the project of emancipation—of struggles for fundamental human rights and issues of equity—is still the primary concern of individuals. Indeed, interviewees expressed great anxiety throughout this research about the scope and site of threats to modem liberty. For example, one of the effects of reflexive modernization is an increase in overall awareness about how social relations are structured and how they operate in modernity. This awareness can also be extended to individuals being able to locate the forces of ‘normalization’ in society. Normalization is a Foucauldian concept that suggests that the power of discourses influence or press individuals into internalising sets of norms and forms of conduct (Darier 1999b). This requires:
instilling self-enforcing, self-imposed mechanisms of social control on the entire social body and on each individual. (Darier 1999b: 221)
The debates of the AaH interviewees suggested that a potential normalizing discourse is the ‘ citizen-consumer’ concept. In this research there has been an active and morally-based rejection of the ‘citizen-consumer’ discourse—a discourse that has become prevalent in the UK over the past two decades—because it appears to represent unfairness and inequity in all forms of social relations. AaH interviewees expressed that they felt increasingly obliged to act out the role of ‘citizen-consumer’ but that this role was forced, limiting and exclusionary. Therefore, there appear to be new sites of oppression in modernity that individuals feel acutely subjected to. This points to a fundamental contradiction at the heart of the risk society. Beck and Giddens both assume that broad social-level changes of individualisation and liberation will be reflected in the experiences, actions and discourses of individuals. The exact opposite seems to be tme when this theoretical point is tested through empirical research. As Jardine (1998: 165) suggests:
Many of the social institutions of liberal society are indeed perceived as coercive by those subject to them, hence the paradoxical tendency of liberal societies is toward a continual growth of centralized state power in the name of individual freedom.
This growth of power has taken on new forms, as the ‘citizen-consumer’ discourse suggests. Individuals are well aware of where these sites of, and struggles for, power lie. This can be
219 read as a rather bleak assessment of the potential of individuals to become politically engaged in the risk society. Beck (1992) has suggested that through individualisation and the forming of sub-political coalitions, a new page in the history of democracy will be opened. The power of consumer discourses and the on-going project of emancipation suggest that this opening of a new page in democracy, in the views and experiencesAaH of participants is still a very distant prospect (see Hinchliffe 1997). How is it possible to form sites of sub-political coalitions in a ‘risk society’ when the nature of individual’s political engagement has become self-focused and the spaces of engagement have moved from the community to the household? There is an intractable contradiction in the positioning of the individual in theories of high modernity suggesting that theorists such as Beck and Giddens need to pay more attention to the empirical implications and applicability of their conceptual categories.
• Structuration theory Giddens’ structuration theory (1984) has proved useful in this research to the extent that it enables sustainable lifestyle debates to move away from prevailing positivist framings towards an examination of knowledges and practices implicated in the ordering of everyday life.
Structuration theory has proved useful in this thesis on two counts. First, structuration principles have helped to outline the relationship between individual actions, the consequences of actions, and the setting of conditions or contexts for future actions. Although this research has not addressed the principles of structuration directly, they have been implicit through the contributions they make to understand implications of individual’s behaviours in the perpetuation of environmental problems. The concept of ‘unintended consequences’ helps to understand how domestic habits unintentionally reinforce environmental ‘bads’, as the intentions of individual’s habits are not directly related to the environmental consequences of carrying out these habits. Indeed,AaH interviewees became aware of their seemingly intractable position within these structuration principles as they worked through the programme.
Second, structuration theory conceptualises forms of human consciousness and their roles in individual’s behaviours. The most important are practical consciousness and discursive consciousness, which form the basis of the model of discursive behaviour change presented in chapter 4 of this thesis. Practical consciousness, as a form of knowledge, has strong resonance in this research. Giddens (1984) suggests it is an unspoken awareness that enables individuals to ‘go on’ in daily life without having to actively think through a particular course of action. This research has suggested that practical consciousness neatly defines the habits
220 that AaH participants questioned during the programme. The habits questioned were small, repetitive actions that interviewees said they rarely gave much consideration to; they just did them. As a result of this questioning process, AaH made individuals think about their behaviours, moving them from practical consciousness to discursive consciousness. Giddens states that the division between these two forms of consciousness is permeable, and the empirical findings from this research support this hypothesis.
One problem with structuration theory in relation to this research is Giddens’ limited discussions on the nature and dynamics of discursive consciousness. In this thesis’ model of behaviour change, simply bringing habits from practical consciousness to discursive consciousness does not in itself alter individual’s practices. In addition, it discursive is the processes that are important; those that take place once habits become part of discursive consciousness. Chapter 2 of this thesis argued that Giddens offers an impoverished approach to the dynamics of discursive consciousness. This argument is further strengthened by the empirical analysis in this thesis, which suggests that discursive processes and practices are central in understanding individual’s reactions to, and interactions with, sustainable lifestyle communication material.
For example, one communicative (or textual strategy) that had a significant impact on interviewee’s habits was that of the analogies used in some GAP packs and posters that illustrate the quantity of resources used or wasted by behaviours, such as leaving a computer on over-night. In being presented with meaningful comparative measures, interviewees were able to actively make connections between their normal patterns of practices and the environmental impacts of these practices. These new connections caused interviewees to review the logic of their actions and consider the possibility of acting differently. As more habits were brought into discursive consciousness, they were compared to the GAP analogies as well as other practices. In additions they were also compared to interviewees own ideas of their ‘comfort zone’; to individual’s circumstantial limitations to making behaviour changes; to debates about knowledges and social relations that practices embody; and finally, to the cost and convenience of making behaviour changes. Thus, there was an incremental discursive process taking place that enabled interviewees to build narratives of lifestyles choices and preferences. Giddens framing of discursive consciousness as a static ‘stock of knowledge’ is questioned by these findings. They suggest that discursive consciousness is built upon complex, iterative and on-going processes. This argument is expanded in the next section, which explores the implications of this research’s findings for theories of the contents and formations of lay knowledges.
221 • Making and using knowledges Chapter 2 of this thesis argued that a heterogeneous approach to knowledges is a productive way to investigate lay reactions to sustainable lifestyles information. This approach follows Latour (1993) who considers all forms of knowledges as ‘hybrids’; that is, all knowledge is heterogeneously constituted (Murdoch and Clark 1994). Analyses ofAaH interviewee’s dialogue supports this ‘hybrid’ approach to knowledges. Prevailing approaches to ‘expert’ and ‘lay’ knowledges predict thatA aH interviewees would present forms of ‘local’ knowledge which could be contrasted with the ‘expert’ global discourses representedAaH. in However, this research has shown how interviewees, whilst talking and arguing about and with AaH, presented situated discourses from multiple sources. These sources include personal stories and memories; media information; scientific findings; legislation and regulation; and political theories of the state. Thus, interviewee’s arguments were founded on a wide array of epistemologies, mobilised for varying ends.
The existence of multiple discourses in these research interviews can be seen as part of Beck’s (1996) thesis that in a risk society there will be increased social awareness and critiques. As Beck (1996: 34) argues:
The theory of risk society is a political theory o f knowledge of modernity becoming self-critical. (Author’s own italics)
In Beck’s view, individual knowledges and perceptions of the state are socially constructed and mediated by relationships with institutions. This assertion seems feasible if, as Beck does, the knowledge being investigated is ‘scientific’. Beck suggests that individual’s perceptions of risks are founded upon ‘second-hand’ information, which implies processes of institutional mediation. Yet, what then happens to experiential knowledge in this framing? This thesis has argued that individuals critically evaluate all forms of knowledge and information from embedded lifeworld, not just from the ‘second hand’ sources of information that Beck suggests. Individuals use information such asAaH to better understand themselves. It is an active process which emerges from, and continually reconstructs, the individual’s own experiential system of knowing. Therefore, the socially positioned individual mediates knowledges evoked in lifestyle debates.
This embedded approach does not suggest that experiential knowledge is simply a new way of conceptualising ‘local’ knowledge. Rather, it suggests that there is a process taking place, which this research has touched upon, wherein individuals are active in constructing knowledges—knowledges that are situated in, and relate to, the lifeworld of the individual.
222 being formed in relation to spaces of dwelling and interaction. Examples of this are seen in the North-west case study of this research. It has been suggested that work relations and structures strongly mediated AaH participant’s reactions to the programme. Hence, the messages and implications ofAaH were seen through the individual’s own experiences of their workplace.
The North-west case study also demonstrated how experiential knowledges are mobilised as strategic appraisals of information. AaH interviewees map out understandings of their lifeworld. In doing so, they are not just referring to themselves, but use their diverse knowledges to make a point; to think out loud; to take a contradictory position to another speaker; to back another speaker up; and to ask questions. The AaH information becomes part of this discursive process, being argued with, for and against, and sometimes being accepted. This suggests that interviewee’s heterogeneous knowledges and their multiple sites of mobilisation typify the dialogic nature of discursive engagement. It is an engagement that is anchored in and positioned by the experiential lifeworld of the individual whilst also being a highly politicised practice of debating, contrasting, contradicting and re-evaluating.
The task of drawing out concepts that neatly summarise the shifting complexity of the dialogic nature of social life and thinking is not an easy one. This thesis has provided support for theories of both Billig (1987) and Shotter (1993). It has argued that the process of engaging withAaH is one characterised by contestation and debate, as Billig’s rhetorical approach suggests. These argumentative stances are also part of the ‘joint action’ of making meanings and producing understandings that Shotter (1993) talks about. ^a//interviewees appear as individuals who are political ‘to the core’, mobilising arguments to suit the self and the on-going context of the conversation. They are emergent ‘works in progress’, using speech to think with, whilst multiple dialogues and discourses take place internally, from which arguments are mobilised in, and stimulated by, particular contexts.
To conclude, it can be suggested that this research offers strong empirical support to key features of Beck and Giddens’ diagnoses of high modernity. Beck’s (1992) account of the risk society and the process of reflexive modernization and individualisation, along with Giddens’ concept of life politics (1991) resonate with this thesis’ findings. However, this research also suggests that theories of knowledges need to take into account both their ‘hybridised’ formations and their contexts of mobilisation.
223 7.3 RESEARCH METHODS IN ACTION
This section will examine how this thesis has used and contributed to debates about research methods. I begin by reconsidering the methods used in this thesis. The qualitative approaches adopted throughout have provided both in-depth discursive analyses for the purpose of this thesis and applied evaluations for purpose of GAP’s work programme appraisals. Qualitative methods, especially interview techniques, have proved to be highly affective research tools, making this thesis very much a piece of ‘action’ research (Jones 1985a).
7.3.1 Methodology and methods: constructing discursive spaces
The epistemological basis of this thesis’ qualitative research methodology was discussed in chapter 3. It was argued that the adoption of qualitative approaches is congruent with the aims of this research, which were to access the meanings and discourses that participants engage in when working through the programme. Qualitative methodologies are inextricably linked to the social scientific ‘cultural turn’ of the past two decades or more, that this thesis’ epistemological approach is strongly positioned within (Kvale 1996, Denzen and Lincoln 1998). Therefore, it is important to consider how effective these research methods have been in addressing initial research aims. I now consider some salient points to arise from the methods used, focussing on lessons leamt from the two types of interview methods used, and the importance of the affective nature of constructing interview spaces upon research findings.
• Research methods : addressing a negotiated agenda Chapter 3 detailed how the empirical work for this research was part of a negotiated agenda between GAP and ESRU. GAP wanted a traditional ‘before’ and ‘after’ evaluation ofAaH its participants, along with suggestions about how working practices and programme structures might be improved. In contrast, ESRU wanted a grounded and in-depth investigation into lay understandings of, and meanings implicated in, engagements with sustainable lifestyles communications. It was hoped that qualitative methods of (limited) participant observation and interviews in the form of two discrete case studies would breach this epistemological divide and be able to fulfil both research agendas. It is possible to conclude, with the support of material this thesis has engaged with and the successful production of interim reports for GAP over the past three years, that qualitative methods have indeed been able to satisfy both research agendas. This was possible because interview methods permit the investigation of a wide array of questions, which can accommodate both an applied and discursive research
224 agenda. More importantly, the breadth of information they can access allows empirical analysis to take place at different ‘levels’ (see Kvale 1996).
• Spaces of interaction : the geography of knowledges Carrying out empirical research in the form of two contrasting case studies allowed for the use of varying interview methods. Inkeeping with the ‘communication context’ (Crabtree et al. 1993) that A aH was being experienced in, single interviews were used for the Bournemouth households, whilst group and single interviews for the North-west work-based project. This approach enables an assessment of the relative strengths and weaknesses of single and group interviews. Single interviews permitted informal and in-depth discussions to take place between interviewer and interviewee. It also enabled interviewees, especially those who were interviewed in their own homes, to reflect on the situated knowledges of their households in talking and thinking throughAaH. In contrast to this, the work-based group interviews offered a more complex, affective and situated research process to take place.
Chapter 4 of this thesis argued that the home and work contexts of theAaH programmes analysed in this thesis were central to interviewee’s engagement with the programme. It argued that the discursive space of the workplace, and the discursive processes thatAaH in the workplace encourages, were instrumental in engaging individuals with the programme, stressing the social nature of behaviour and/or discursive changes. Chapter 4 also argued that the group interview was a highly affective discursive space. Participants of these groups stated that they found these interviews more useful than theAaH packs. They encouraged them to think about their lives and allowed them to listen to others opinions and thoughts. The process of taking part in a form of shared ‘discursive action’ left many interviewees feeling that they had made some positive changes and contributions, without having to alter any habits, enabling them to overcome the so-called ‘discursive traps’ that distanced behaviour change programmes can create. These group interviews also highlight how work relations and the workplace mediated interviewee’s perceptions of, and reactions to,AaH the programme, and how the environmental paradigm became translated into issues of work relations and practices.
This thesis has not fully explored the role of the geography of these situated knowledges, in terms of the AaH programme. Rather, the contextual and affective nature of discourse has been implicit throughout. Despite this, some constructive suggestions can be made. Often interviews and discussion groups are used as sources of lay opinions—a means at getting at individual’s concerns and ideas. If, instead, conversations are viewed as active, contextual, emergent processes then I would strongly support the arguments forwarded by researchers
225 such as Bumingham and O'Brien (1994, see also Bumingham 2000). They suggest that research should focus upon how, and which, discourses are used, mobilised and developed by lay individuals in discussions concerning the environmental paradigm. This approach enables both the examination of the processes that individuals engage in whilst actively forming understandings, as well as the discursive connections between differing discourses. This research can only hint at the possible direction of this research but it suggests that it is indeed a fruitful avenue of investigation.
7.4 CONTRIBUTIONS TO PRACTICE
This section discusses the contribution this thesis has made to debate concerning the practice of environmental information dissemination. It begins by arguing that the reflexive nature of the collaborative research relationship between GAP and ESRU adds weight to calls for critical research agendas to be taken into institutions in relation to the environmental paradigm (Welford 1998). Findings from this thesis also support existing social science critiques of prevailing approaches to environmental communications. The challenge now for practitioners such as GAP is how to translate such critical and socially embedded findings into practice.
7.4.1 Reflections on collaborative research
I now consider whether carrying out this research in the form of a CASE studentship has anything to offer to existing theoretical and methodological arguments about the practices of empirical research. As detailed in chapter 3, being a CASE student facilitated a highly reflexive position to be taken at all stages of this research. This reflexivity was influenced by two main factors, which were:
1. GAP was anxious to incorporate research findings into their programmes as soon as possible. Therefore a substantial proportion of this research had to be analysed and written through in both the first and second years of this research. This meant I was constantly looking back at old work, rethinking, rewriting and developing the research analysis. This was a highly iterative approach to research analysis.
2. Working closely with GAP made me part of their Teaming-action network’ (Clarke and Roome 1999). This network was made up of a wide array of policy, academic and lay actors who had inputs into this work by actively questioning its aims, methods and findings throughout the three years of the research.
226 This reflexivity operated through time as well as through the research relationships that were established. It was also part of being a CASE student. By having detailed access to GAP, working with them and having regular contact, being able to attend meetings and having their support throughout, resulted in a critical research agenda being facilitated and a two-way learning process taking place. The empirical implications of using a CASE position to carry out this research also have implications in setting the academy’s research agenda. In recent debates about the relationship between institutions and environmental research, there have been calls for the introduction of a more critical social research agenda (Welford 1998, Stubbs 2000). Welford (1998: 2) has suggested that too much current research is informed by the modernist epistemological assumptions that underpin the discourses of eco-modemism and eco-efficiency, thus supporting a ‘business as usual’ approach where:
So-called independent research is limited by the discourses which are already shared within a particular scientific community.
Consequently, there is a need for researchers to use critical social theory to examine and question institutions from more human-based and embedded theoretical positions. This thesis suggests that one potential approach is the facilitation of close working relationships and the gathering of detailed empirical material, that may be advanced through establishing on-going and mutually beneficial working relationships, such as the CASE research position.
7.4.2 Reflections on environmental communications
There now exists a substantial body of literature which argues that public forms of environmental communication are highly ineffective tools in encouraging individual behaviour change and the widespread public uptake of environmental messages (see Blake 1999, Burgess et al. 1998, Finger 1994, Harrison et al. 1996, Irwin and Wynne 1996, Macnaghten and Jacobs 1997, Macnaghten and Urry 1998, Myerson and Rydin 1996, Rutherford 1998, van Luttervelt 1998). This thesis has aimed to contribute to this body of research by closely examining how lay publics react to forms of environmental communication. In doing so, it has illustrated the complexity and socially embedded nature of individual’s responses. It has suggested that in tackling issues of sustainable lifestyles behaviour change, it is not informationper se, but the discursive processes that ensue that are important. This finding has strong implications for behaviour change programmes. Recalling De Young’s (1993) typology of behaviour change techniques in chapter 2 (see Table 2.1), the information types commonly used by policy-makers and researchers are those labelled ‘Tangible’. The ‘Intangible’ forms were those that cannot be accurately measured or controlled for. These included self-monitored feedback, personal insight and direct
227 experience. These are the very processes which this thesis has argued make up the discursive practices through which individuals engage with environmental communications.
Table 7.1 aims to show, in a purposefully polarised manner, the starkness of the contrast between prevailing positivist approaches and the body of social sciences literatures that have examined and questioned these approaches from discursive perspectives.
228 Table 7.1. Environmental communications: contrasting prevailing and social scientific approaches to lav responses to information
Prevailing policy and human science Summary of social science research approaches to environmental findings about lay responses to communications environmental communications Individuals enrol in forms of environmentalIndividuals become involved AaH in as they communication as they are concerned about are curious about the concepts it embodies the environment and/or want to save money Individuals want to take part in a project of Individuals want to take part in a form of ‘lifestyle greening’ self-evaluation as part of the ‘life politics’ project When readingAaH packs and questionnaires, AaH participants engage with the programme individuals rationally weigh up the arguments from a highly rhetorical-argumentative therein stance, using the material to argue with and against Behaviours change when new facts are learnt Behaviours change when habits are brought and then used to inform behaviour into discursive consciousness and seen in a new, comparative light The ‘environment’ is a scientific concept thatThe concept of the environment is highly the public need to know more about contested, not only as a body of knowledge but also because it embodies and implies a set of social relations By disseminating environmental informationIn the process of mapping out their own about the science of sustainable development, lifestyles and social contexts, individuals individuals will eventually be able to ‘think mobilise highly contextual, complex, multi globally, act locally’ sourced debates, whose sources and assumptions are also questioned Getting individuals to take action can beDiscourses of responsibility are evoked in achieved by reminding them that they have to order to argue for, and into existence, a new take environmental responsibility for their form of ‘social contract’, believed to be behaviours necessary in making social changes to achieve an environmental ‘life politics’
229 The strength of this critique is evident from the above table but key questions remains about the implications of these findings for the practices of disseminating environmental information, and more specifically, for GAP. It is possible to suggest that GAP began its institutional life in the left-hand column of Table 7.1. Throughout its life-span, it has been engaged in on-going evaluations and reconsiderations of its programmes, that has made it more aware of the importance of the taking the right-hand column of Table 7.1 into account. This research has been part of GAP’s engagement with the implications of their practices. The challenge then is to put these findings into practice.
This research has shown that GAP does indeed have positive effects on many of the individuals who take part in theAaH. A significant minority of theAaH interviewees did make changes to some practices and amongst those who did not make any changes there was an increase in environmental awareness that may yet translate into action. However, by examining lay responses to environmental communications, this research has illuminated the near impossibility of overcoming ‘discursive traps’ through the use of information dissemination techniques. These findings have contributed to GAP examining its programme structures and indeed itsraison d ’être from a different perspective than conventional evaluations. To this end, GAP has taken some constructive steps in rethinking their programmes.
To give specific examples of GAP’s responses to this research, the structure and delivery of AaH has changed significantly since this research began in 1997. The Bournemouth case study examined not only individual’s reactions to AaH the material, but also how the programme operated on the ground. Interim reports about the Bournemouth project suggested to GAP that the delivery and structure of .4a i / was caught somewhere between a ‘grass-roots’ model of encouraging behaviour change and a social marketing model (see chapter 3). This Bournemouth research also suggested that the AaH material needed to be modified to overcome some of the criticisms that participants were airing. As a result, AaH has undergone substantial modification. The packs were rewritten in 1998 and the volunteer group structure disbanded.AaH is now either sold as a supported programme, for example through workplaces, or can be bought by individuals all around the country without supported contexts.
In the final year of this research, GAP has plans to move the delivery ofAaH away from packs and onto the World Wide Web, for individuals to access free of charge. GAP’s main information dissemination tool will become a regular lifestyle magazine. This approach appears to be pushing AaH further into the left-hand column of Table 7.1, although it should
230 also be noted that GAP have decided to concentrate their efforts on other programmes, such as in schools, where more support can be offered in the delivery context AaHof —which this research has stressed is all important to individual’s reactions to the programme.
This change of approach inAaH raises questions about the seemingly near impossible project of enacting the right-hand column of Table 7.1 in terms of institutional practice. If discursive processes and spaces are indeed all important, how can they possibly be enacted ‘on the ground’? More importantly for GAP, how can one environmental charity with limited resources and policy support—and that has to operate as a business to cover running costs—possibly hope to begin to address the issues that research such as this throws up in relation to environmental communications? Although it is not the intention of this thesis to enter into policy discussions, this highlights an important research question that remains unadvised, concerning the translation of in-depth and discursive research findings into workable policy practice. This point leads onto an important part of drawing out research conclusions. That is, consideration of the limitations of this research.
7.5 LIMITATIONS TO METHOD AND THEORY
This section briefly considers some of the limitations of this research, both in terms of methods and theory used. These include:
• The constraints of discursive practices The aim of this research was to examine the discursive practices that are mobilised when environmental communications are engaged. As a result of this approach, and also due to other constraints (see below) this research is not able to offer any empirical observations of the discursive processes that were taking place outside of the research interview space—in either the interviewee’s home and/or their workplaces. The ability to offer observational support to the interview findings would have perhaps enabled stronger and empirically grounded arguments to be made as regards the relationship between discourse and practice which, in this thesis, is theoretical. This relationship is important to sustainable lifestyles research and to date has not been addressed to any significant degree (although see Corral- Verdugo 1997).
• The constraints of collaborative methodologies For the most part engaging in collaborative research with GAP was constructive but it did also create some limitations. Taking on some of the trappings of traditional evaluation approaches resulted in limitations being put on research methods. For example, by adopting a ‘before’ and ‘after’ structure to research interviews more in-depth methodologies, such as
231 those forwarded by members of ESRU (see Burgess et al. 1988a, 1988b), could not be used. GAP was happy to have the interview groups built into the evaluation of the North-west project, but only in the ‘before’, ‘during’ and ‘after’ structure. Therefore it was impossible to construct in-depth interview groups, such as those in which the same personnel meet once a week over a number of weeks to explore one topic. In addition, the North-west case study operated in highly structured workplaces, which meant that there was a loss of control over the research process. This resulted in interview groups sometimes not consisting of the same people from one meeting to the next.
Also and as already highlighted above, the theoretical bent of this thesis limited the number of concrete recommendations that could be made to GAP, in terms of steps to improve their work programmes. By taking a constructionist and discursive approach, the findings of this research are not easily translatable into ‘do-able’ actions that can be implemented in the policy arena.
• Considering discursive contexts Chapter 3 of this thesis discussed the process of empirical analysis that was used to examine the Bournemouth and North-west case studies. The aim was to attempt to integrate the discursive practices that arise in both case studies to create a theoretically grounded contribution to theories of social processes and behaviour change. This process of empirical analysis gave rise in the research findings tosome discussions on the situated and contextual nature of discourses. However, for the most part, the importance of the situated knowledges in each case study remains implicit rather than being fully elaborated on. Therefore, this thesis cannot fully address the Bournemouth and North-west contexts either in terms of geography and/or in terms of spaces of interaction, which were central to the formation of discursive practices. With these limitations in mind, I now proceed to discuss some potential research directions that have arisen from this research.
7.6 SUGGESTIONS FOR FUTURE RESEARCH
There are several key conceptual areas that this thesis has touched upon and in doing so, has highlighted missing areas of knowledge that this research has not been fully able to address. Further research would facilitate some of the debates raised in this thesis to be progressed. I will now highlight two of these key areas that require further work.
7.6.1 Spaces of environmental practice
This thesis has argued that in addressing their lifestyles and also in facilitating moral life politics project, AaH interviewees express a strong need to take part in formative discursive
232 processes. The importance of these discursive processes has been discussed in this thesis but it has not been able to address the dynamics of the contexts within which these processes take place, outside of the research interview. The contexts that this research has touched upon have been limited to the home and the workplace.^^
To begin with the home, current research employs a number of different theoretical frameworks to understand the household as a discrete entity, ranging from firm economic analyses (see Evans 1991, Katz 1997, Wilk 1989, Wilson 1991), to personal and collective cultural emphases (see Booth 1993, Dupuis and Thoms 1998, Quinn 1997, Silverstone et al. 1992). Yet, few studies have managed to shed light on household dynamics in relation to the forming and acting out of patterns of domestic practices (although see Samuelson 1990). Researching this area is palpably difficult due to the intimate nature of the subject matter, but this theoretical and empirical blind spot is not trivial. It is highly problematic that the current political emphasis on changing lifestyles is founded upon an under-developed knowledge of the inter-personal and gender dynamics instrumental in forming lifestyles.
This research’s findings—and those of social geographers who have raised questions of the dynamics of discursive spaces (see Harrison et al. 1996)—suggest that the ‘politics’ of the household is an important determinant in reactions to, and adoptions of, the sustainable lifestyles agenda. This research alludes to there being significant gender issues within these dynamics. However, as I have chosen not to engage with issues of gender in this thesis, the evidence is too scant to draw any firm conclusions.
Even when prompted, few interviewees discussed the political dynamics of their homes. Research into this area would permit a greater understanding of the role that discursive practices and dynamics have in the constitution of lifestyles and the implications of trying to change them. Conducting research within the private domain of the household is problematic. The plausibility, and indeed desirability, of carrying out a form of participant observation is questionable. It is interesting to note that such methods, which are considered feasible in anthropology and development studies, may very well be considered as unacceptable in western countries such as the UK. Perhaps there is scope for using epistemological approaches such as the ‘sociology of subjectivity’ (see Ellis and Flaherty 1992) by getting
^ Although the ‘community’ is implied throughout this research, it is difficult to provide any focused research questions about this space. There are two reasons for this. First, the research did not directly address individual’s engagement with, and the dynamics of, their community—instead it emerged solely as an area of concern and anxiety (see chapter 6). Second, locating where a ‘community’ might be found, in terms of a physical space of interaction, is a contentious issue within the academy and not within the bounds of this research (see Jardine 1998, Rydin and Pennington 2000).
233 household members to keep diaries of events and decision processes. Another possible approach would be to interview household members specifically about their domestic relations. Whatever methods are adopted, it is vital that the academy improves its understanding of the micro-politics of the household from a constructionist perspective. This would make a significant contribution to the lifestyles debates.
Another space covered is that of the workplace. This was a more easily accessible space for investigation. Carrying out a form of participant observation in the North-west workplaces has indeed provided evidence of how dynamics of these workplaces facilitated engagement with AaH. An interesting question thatAaH in the workplace raises, but which this research has not been able to address, is how the contextual knowledges that arise through the dynamics of on-going discursive engagements in work spaces are related to the environmental knowledges of the home. The employers who took part in the North-west project were trying to influence their employee’s environmental behaviours, both at work and home. This research suggests that the relationship and dynamism between these two spaces is not a straight-forward division between work and home (c.f. Nippert-Eng 1995). Rather, the knowledges of space and home have an on-going dynamism thatAaH both taps into and facilitates.
7.6.2 Lay discourses of environmental responsibility
The concept of responsibility is pivotal in the political framing of the sustainable lifestyles discourses. In the AaH interviewee’s processes of mapping out theirs, and others, contributions to making positive social changes, it also played a key role. Calls for individuals to take on their share of responsibility for environmental conditions assume that this discourse has resonance with lay publics. However, social research has suggested that responsibility is a much more complex and relational concept (see Eden 1993). This research has engaged with this debate about what responsibility might mean to lay publics and in what contexts it is evoked. In doing so, it has been suggested that responsibility consists of at least two sets of discursive practices: one of personal self-ascription and another of external, conventional ascription.
These forms of responsibility are both mobilised and contested byAaH interviewees. They appear to play some part in driving individuals to take positive action—such as getting involved inAaH —whilst at the same time being constantly debated by theAaH interviewees. One example concerns who is responsible for changing the nature of consumer practices. Chapter 1 of this thesis examined how the sustainable lifestyles discourse is a mixture of responsible environmental citizens and the ‘citizen-consumer’.AaH interviewees were well
234 aware of the constructed and politically timed nature of their emergent roles as ‘citizen- consumers’ and how this discourse is founded upon economic and political vested interests. Many interviewees reacted strongly against the ‘citizen-consumer’ framing, calling for producers and retailers to take on board some responsibility for taking the environment into account. However, despite such high levels of contestation and rejection of the ‘citizen-consumer’ concept, many interviewees expressed a compulsion to at least try to be conscientious or ‘good’ consumers (see Bedford 1999).
As the concept of responsibility was not initially the focus of this research, but emerged from it, it has not been able to address the complexity, and seeming contradiction of this concept in too much detail. Consequently, several important research questions remain outstanding. These include considering the relationships between internal and external ascriptions of responsibility; how lay discourses of responsibility become created and recreated; and its relationship to the seeming ‘moral obligations’, that appear to make someAaH interviewees feel that they have to at least try to ‘do something’. Further research is required to understand the part that concepts of responsibility play in discursive practices.
7.7 CONCLUSIONS
Over the past several decades international political and research attention has increasingly focused on the seemingly rapid rate of global environmental degradation caused by human patterns of production and consumption. Responses to these trends have addressed the need to alter patterns of production and consumption, especially in OECD countries that have a significantly higher per capita output of harmful emissions than non-OECD countries. Amongst the mechanisms that have emerged in response to these trends is the widespread dissemination of environmental information. This approach prevails in policy and realist academic disciplines. Its use is founded on the belief that environmental information will fully inform the public about key issues and concepts, thereby appealing to a latent sense of environmental responsibility. As a consequence, this information is expected to encourage the uptake of environmentally friendly lifestyles, thereby addressing the ‘information deficit’ that characterises environmental knowledge in the public domain.
In contrast to the above approach, this thesis concludes that the public uptake of environmental information is not about a public ‘information deficit’ and/or the desire of individuals to adopt environmentally friendly lifestyles. Rather, it is about addressing issues of social equity and justice. Individuals such as theAaH participants seek out environmental information not simply aiming to change their lifestylesper se but wishing to participate in a highly moral project of life politics. This project questions not just how they are living as
235 individuals, but also how society operates in terms of the distribution of resources and sites of responsibility. By being able to take part in a constructive discursive process, such asAaH, individuals are able to feel that they are making some form of contribution. They believe they are helping to make society more considerate, more willing to engage in debates about morality, and fairer. Therefore, if sustainable lifestyles are to be achieved and the sustainable consumption political project advanced, there must be explicit recognition of these discursive processes, with attempts made to transmit/translate these processes into policy debates and practices.
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255 APPENDIX 1: SAMPLE PAGES OF AN ECOTEAM WORKBOOK
(from Church and McHarry 1992: Reproduced with permission of Global Action Plan UK).^
HOUSEHOLD WASTE SAVINGS CHART PLEASE Complete Each household group in your EcoTeam should have one of these charts. Household name ...... Workbook number ...... If you have any trouble This is the first of the feedback charts which will help you assess your filling in this sheet, please contact your community savings. Filling these in each month is the key to finding out just how coordinator or the GAP much difference you are making. ' National Office This chart will help you work out your waste savings in kg of materials.
W aste category 1 W eig h t kg % by w eig h t Paper G lass T ins/cans
Plastics j
Textiles/clothing j
Organic waste j
Other materials 1 1 Total weight of waste produced in the first week (A ) ...... kg
Waste category Weight kg % by w eigh t
Paper j G lass 1 T in s/can s \ Plastics ! Textiles/clothing |
Organic waste j Other materials ! Total weight of waste produced in the fourth week (B ) ...... kg
To work out your total waste saving just subtract the ‘After’ figure (B) from the ‘Before’ figure (A).
Total waste savings made by our household in the first month (C) kg
You can work out your percentage savings figure: ► Multiply figure C by 100 ► Divide this figure by figure A (waste use ‘Before’) The resultant figure is your percentage saving.
Example:lf you saved 8 kg of waste and your original waste production figure
was 32 kg, then the percentage figure is 8 x 100 4- 32 = 25% saving.
NB; You will get a better picture if you assess your savings over the whole year, so you could follow this procedure at the end of each month. You can also help people get more of a feel for these figures if you divide the total figures by the number of people in the household to get a figure of kg of waste per person.
64 The poor quality of this reproduction is due to it being made from a rather faded photocopy of the original book, which has now gone missing from the GAP offices and therefore cannot be recopied.
256 ENERGY USE SAVINGS CHART: Reading your CO^ m eter PLEASE Complete Each household group in your EcoTeam should have one of these charts.
Household name ...... Workbook num ber ...... If }/Pu have atty froiiblc filling in lliis sheet, please This chart will help you work out your energy savings and convert them into kg con tael your cominunHy of COj. This form will need to be filled in over the next year, so please keep it coonlinalor or the CAP National Office in a safe place. The ‘Before’ figures are taken from your past electricity bills. In the "After" section, the first quarter should be the one that starts and finishes while you are carrying out the EcoTeam programme. The ‘Before’ first quarter should be exactly a year before the ‘After’ first quarter. Check with the GAP National Office if you need advice on this.
i 1 l _ Electricity | G a s 1 Coal*/Oil i
C o st U se 1 C o st U se C o st U se i (Kwh) (Therm s) (ton n es/ i i litres) Quarter: j
• First 1 - Second } 1 - Third j - Fourth 1
TOTAL USE j Kwh 1 . Therm s Litres* 1 Total C O j j 1 Production j Kwh X 1 Therms x 5.3 | Litres x 2.6
(A) 1 — ...... -...... kg ...... kg ! = ...... ^ .k g
Total production of CO^ over the last year (A) = ...... k g o f C O j * N ote: If you are using coal to heat your homes contact the GAP office for information.
ENERGY USE: AFTER______
This form will need to be filled in over the course of a year. The figures that you will use during the EcoTeam programme relate to the first quarter after you make your changes.
257 APPENDIX 2: T m ACTION AT HOME ‘WELCOME’ QUESTIONNAIRE
© h o m e W elcome to Action at Home!
How green is your household? Are you spending more money than you need to? Just complete and return this simple survey and we will send you your GreenScore.You will be able to see how green your actions are and how you compare with others.
To return your completed survey to us, you can re-use the envelope it came in. Simply fold your survey in half and put it in the envelope so that the FREEPOST address on the back of the survey shows through the envelope window.
Don’t worry if you don’t know the reasons behind the questions. All will be explained when you receive your action packs in the coming months.
Your individual answers will be treated in the strictest confidence and will not be passed to any other organisation.
What is your...
AaJon at Home membership number (see cop of the enclosed letter)
N am e
A ddress
P o stc o d e
M i
258 In this section we are trying to find out what different people need to turn their concerns into action. For this reason we would be grateful if you could answer the following questions (please tick one box only in each question). Anything you tell us is entirely confidential; it won’t be passed to anybody else and won’t alter your GreenScore.
About you and your home
A re you D m ale Q female
Are you □ a fijll-time employee (more than 30 hours each week) C3 self-employed/freelance D a part-time employee (less than 30 hours each week) D unem ployed D a hom em aker o r carer D a fiill-time student □ retired Other (please specify)
3.1 Which of the following age groups do you belong to? □ under 18 □ 18-34 □ 35-S4 □ 55-74 O 75 or over
4.J Which ethnic group do you belong to? □ W hite O Black Caribbean D Black African Q Black o th er O Indian D Pakistani Q Bangladeshi D Other Asian □ C hinese O Mixed race D O th er
Is your home... D a flat or maisonette O a detached hou se n a semi-detached/terraced house Other (please specify)
Is your hom e... O owned by you or a member of your household O rented Other (please specify)
About your household
Your household consists of all the people living in your home. How many people, including yourself, live in your household? □ l D l O 3 0 4 0 5 0 6 How many of these are under 16? O I O 2 O 3 O 4 O 5 o r m ore
Parts 2-5; W hat’s your GreenScore?
We will use your answers to sections 2-5 to calculate your GreenScore. Please don't miss any out and tick only ONE box for each question unless it specifies otherwise.
The GreenScore has been developed to ajjply to households’ so you may also need to consider the habits and behaviour of other people who live with you when completing the survey.
W e recognise that there are many other things that people can do that are not included here and also that it is not possible for everyone to take all of the actions. But we hope you will find it useful to have some indication of your success at taking Action at Home. If you would like to make any additional comments, please fed free to do so in the space provided after question 22.
259 Energy
Does your home have.. Yes Som e No Don’t know or n/a reflective foil behind the radiators which are on outside walls □ □ □ □ draught excluders fitted to the doors or windows □ □ □ □ lagging on the pipes □ □ □ □ lagging on the hot-water tank □ □ □ □ low-energy lightbulb(s) in use □ □ □ □
Does your home have... (these may be more relevant to homeowners) Yes Some No Don’t know or n/a cavity wall insulation □ □ □ □ a gas condensing boiler □ □ □ □ double or secondary glazing □ □ □ □ loft insulation □ □ □ □
Do members of your household... Always/almost Often Occasionally Never/ n/a always almost never turn the TV off at the set instead of leaving it on stand-by □ □ □ □ □ put lids on saucepans when cooking □ □ □ □ □ keep the thermostat temperature as low a*?'- as is comfortable (e.g. between 18° and 21° C) □ □ □ □ □ defrost the fridge/freezer at least once a year □ □ □ □ □ read the electricity and/or gas meters □ □ □ □ □ turn lights off when leaving a room □ - □ □ ■■ □ □ f keep windows closed when the heating is on □ □ □ □ □ dry clothes naturally (instead of using a tumble dryer) O □ □ □ □
W ater Does your home have a garden? D Yes O No 'If’No’, go to question 1 If Yes* a) is there a water butt installed in your garden? Q Yes □ N o b) does your household compost organic waste? Q Yes D No
If you have a garden, do members of your household... Always/almost O ften Occasionally N ever/ n/a always almost never water plants in the early evening □ □ □ □ □ water plants close to the roots □ □ □ □ □ use a hose or sprinkler to water the garden □ □ □ □ □
Do members of your household... Always/almost Often Occasionally Never/ n/a always almost never turn off the tap whilst brushing teeth □ □ □ □ □ reduce water use by taking shallow/shared baths or quicker showers □ □ □ □ □ fix leaking taps □ □ □ □ □ make sure the dishwasher/washing machine is full before turning it on □ □ □ □ □ dispose of cooking or motor oil down the toilet or drain O □ □ □ □ dispose of solid waste down the toilet or drain, such as cotton buds, sanitary products etc. □ □ □ □ □
260 Does your home have... Yes Some No Don’t know/na a water-efficient toilet cistern or a water-saving device in the cistern □ □ □ □ water-saving devices on the taps □ □ □ □
Waste Do you have access to some form of recycling facility (e.g. bottle bank etc.)? O Yes D N o D Don’t know or not applicable
If’N o’ or Not applicable.’ please go straight to question 17.
If Yes’, is it a. .. D collection from your house O public recycling point, such as in supermarket car-parks
If facilities are available, do members of your household recycle the following... All/almost all Som e None/almost none glass □ □ □ metal cans □ □ □ plastic bags □ □ □ plastic containers □ □ □ textiles and fabrics □ □ □ domestic white goods, such as a fridge □ □ □
Do members of your household re-use the following... (e.g. plastic containers for storage etc.) All/almost all Som e None/almost none newspapers and/or paper □ □ □ glass □ □ □ plastic containers □ □ □ plastic bags □ □ □ envelopes, for example with re-use stickers □ □ □ textiles and fabrics □ □ □
18. Do members of your household... Always/almost Often Occasionally Never/almost n/a always never buy goods that have less packaging than others □ □ □ □ □ buy and use refillable packs and containers, such as those available for some washing powders □ □ □ □ □ use mains power instead of batteries wherever possible □ □ □ □ □ make out a list before shopping □ □ □ □ □ buy recycled products where possible □ □ □ □ □ take re-useable bags when shopping □ □ □ □ □
Transport Do members of your household... Always/almost Often Occasionally Never/almost n/a always never organise travel arrangements to avoid unnecessary journeys, for example by combining trips or car sharing □ □ □ □ □ walk or cycle (instead of using other forms of transport) for short journeys (up to 2 miles) □ □ □ □ □
261 (a) Do members of your household own or have regular use of a car? O Yes If Yes', how many cars does your household have? D No — ► If No . go straight to question 21
(b) Do you or a member of your household rely on it for health/mobility reasons? O Yes n N o
(c) Is the use of a car essential for work purposes for you or a member of your household? D Yes D N o
(d) Do car drivers in your household... Always/almost Often Occasionally Never/almost n/a always never keep the car tyres properly inflated □ □ □ □ □ keep the engine properly tuned □ □ □ □ □ where possible, share journeys with others D □ □ □ □ avoid keeping unnecessary loads in the boot of the car (or on the roof) □ □ □ □ □ turn off the engine when stuck in a traffic jam for more than a few minutes O □ □ □ □
How many short journeys (less than 2 miles) does the average member of your household make in a typical week by.. N o n e 1-5 6-10 11-19 20-29 30+ car □ □ □ □ □ □ public transport □ □ □ □ □ □ m otorcycle □ □ □ □ □ □ bicycle □ □ □ □ □ □ o n fo o t — □ □ □ □ □ □
How many longer journeys (more than 2 miles) does the average member of your household make in a typical week by.. N o n e 1-5 6-10 1 1-19 20-29 30+ car □ □ □ □ □ □ public transport □ □ □ □ □ □ motorcycle □ □ □ □ □ □ bicycle □ □ □ □ □ □
Com m ents If you have any further comments you would like to make about your own circumstances or our survey, please include them here.
''I
262 Your household and Action at Home Please would you help us by answering the following further questions about yourself? This will enable us to more effectively encourage other people to help the environment by participating in Action at Home.The answers are solely for our information.They will not be passed to any other organisation, will be treated in the strictest confidence and will not alter your GreenScore.
Please tick as many boxes as applicable How did you hear about Action at Home? D in the press O it was recommended by a friend Q I saw a leaflet CD through work D at an event D through being a WWF member D from my children or their school O ther
24. What are your main reasons for taking Acoon at Home? D concem about the environment D to benefit my children D to save money off bills etc. C3 to find o u t my G reenScore n to make use of the special offers CD I wanted to support charity n not sure O ther
25. In which area are you most hoping to make a difference? (tick one box only) CD waste reduction CD shopping habits CD energy use CD transport use CD w ater use CD no preference CD don't know O ther
Global Action Plan Thank you for FREEPOST LON5465 completing this London important survey. W C2B 6BR To return it to us, you can re-use the envelope it came in. Simply fold your survey in half and put it in % the envelope so that the FREEPOST address opposite shows through the envelope window. Alternatively you can of course use your own envelope, using this
Glot»! Action PUnn a leqiMeiecJ chanty on 1026148 FREEPOST address. WVVf-UK s a tngnieied chanty no 20170?
263 APPENDIX 3: SAMPLE OF AN ACTION AT HOME PACK: WATER PACK
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' %
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264 action 4 hom e
Ev«ryora» w*## water. Lote of It. In a country which 3 steps to water wisdtwn has besn known for Its rain, wa've tended to taka water for granted. It’s always thara whan you turn on the tap, an endless supply. Or is it? What m can i l r w p s In fact, as our demand for water goes up and up, Here you’ll find so m ew ^^ thlr^ tftere Is less to ^ round. And as we throw more you can do in your kitchen and rubbish down the drain, we're polluting the water bathroom to save water. Most of them our wildlife relies on. don’t cost anything, and will make little o\K) LA difference to your lifestyle. There are And yet It's so easy to use a bit less, and to take also some suggestions about what more care of the water supply. Most of the Weas In to look out for when buying household this guide are common sense and won’t «rat you appliances which use water. anything. If you have a water meter, they will even 'The frog save you money. Put together, they can make quite Uaing water hi year garden a difference. does not Many of the plants in our gardens 'We can all do our bit need a reliable water supply If they drink up to heio save water. This are to blossom and thrive. This section pack contains loads of includes lots of ideas on caring for the pond your garden in a way which makes practical ideas wMch the most of every precious drop. in which win help you. Simple Watddng what goes it lives.' actions reaHy can have down the M e an impact. Saving water isn’t just about saving on the amount we use. It’s also about Indian Proverb Happy water saving!' saving the quality of the water in our rivers and underground supplies. Here you’ll find tips for small changes you Bill Oddie can make to help ensure our wildlife Broadcaster and conservationist has a plentiful and clean water supply. action © h o m e \
Where does it go? Here are som e answers to the most Q. Surely the odd water shortage commonly asked questions about One person typically uses the saving water. doesn't hurt? equivalent of 18 buckets of water Unfortunately it does, particularly when K) a day - that's ISO litres. The average combined with drier weather. As we G\ Q. Shouldn't the water companies o\ household uses its water like this: demand more water, the water companies be doing more to save water? are having to extract more from existing Yes, they should. As a result of growing Flushing the toilet 30% underground reservoirs which are not pressure from the public and government, Baths and showers 30% being refilled by rainfall and from rivers many water companies are beginning to Washing machines 15% which are already running low. This has two take this responsibility more seriously. For Dishwashers and washing up 6% main effects, fvlany species of wildlife, such example, companies are having to spend Outside (garden, car washing etc) 4% as otters and butterflies, suffer as too TIP TIME much m ore money on fixing leaks in their How to use Hippo the Water Saver Other indoor uses much water is drained away, affecting their supply pipes. But it is also up to everyone natural habitat. And low river levels Inside this pack you will find your free Hippo. (cooking, drinking, cleaning etc) 10% to do their bit - on average each of us uses increase the concentration of pollutants in When you put him in the water cistern of Other 5% the equivalent of 6,500 buckets (55,000 your loo, he will help you save buckets of the water. This also means that there is litres) every year! water by taking up some of the space that less oxygen for the plant and animal life. would otherwise have to be filled by new Q. My garden is my pride and joy. water each time you flush. Simply follow the Q. Does having a water meter help? instructions on the back of the Hippo to fit Will I have to skimp on watering it? Water meters can save money, as you only him in your cistern. He should settle in with It IS possible to keep your garden pay for the water you actually use. They no problem s a t all. looking gorgeous and use less tap water. also help you to keep labs on your water For example, watering your plants at use and on whether you have any leaks. If But if you find he is spoiling the performance sunset, rather than in the heat of the day, your house is large with just a few people, of your flush, try trimming the bag down and putting him back in. If you already have a means that the water will have a chance or if you don't have a garden, you may find Hippo, please pass him on to a friend. If you to get to the roots rather than simply a water meter works for you Some water have any questions about your Hippo or evaporating. Step two of this guide companies will install them for free, or give would like to buy any more, contact Hippo provides lots of ideas for keeping your you a trial period so that you can find out the W ater Saver on (01989) 766667. garden green. whether it will save you money. action © h o m e
Many of these actions only take a bit of thought. Once you've How to fix a leaking tap m ade an effort for a lew weeks, you’ll find you have a whole new set of habits you don't even have to think about. A tap usually drips because its washer needs replacing. To fix it. follow these instructions or call Stop dripping in a plumber. For a list of registered plumbers in your area, contact The Institute of Plumbers on A dripping tap can waste 13 litres a day - around a bathful 01708 472791. every week. So make sure you always turn taps off completely. 1. Cut off the water supply Then fix dripping taps. It isn't difficult (see opposite page) and and turn the tap on full. Look for an «œrgy label if you do it yourself will cost you pennies rather than pounds. 2. Unscrew cover, taking care when buyii^ a new washing-machine to avoid damaging your tap's or dishwasher. They slww whether the Stop running chrome finish by using a appkance is w ater and energy efficient. Instead of leaving the tap running, try to use a glass of water spanner instead of a wrench(S>. for cleaning your teeth, or a bowl of water lor washing fruit and When undoing the hexagonal vegetables or rinsing soapy clothes or dishes. If you run the nut, hold the tap to prevent it tap to make water really cold before you drink it, why not fill a rotating and damaging your On your marks... jug and keep it in the fridge instead? basin, bath or sink. Hold it • Put a Hippo the Water Saver in your toilet with your hand or with wood cistern (enclosed with this pack) Fill it up as illustrated ®, again taking • Turn off taps completely Washing-machines and dishwashers use lots and lots of water. care not to damage the • Fix leaking taps However, they can also save a great deal of time, especially If chromium plating. • Don't leave the tap running when cleaning you're cooking and washing for a family. The trick is to make 3. If a small nut is holding the your teeth sure that you only put them on when they are full, so that you washer in place, unscrew it • Use a bowl of water for rinsing fruit and with a spanner. vegetables make the most of the wafer and electricity they use, or use 4. Prise off the old washer • Rinse soapy dishes in a bowl of clean water the half-load button when that isn't possible. and replace ®. • Replace one bath a week with a shower 5. Reassemble your tap as • Only use washing-machines and Shower power described above in reverse dishwashers when full Replace one tiath with a shower once a week and you'll be order and test to ensure that it • Don't use a sink disposal unit saving up to 25 litres of water. Water warning! Power showers is functioning properly. Your tap • Install a water meter, if appropriate can use even more water than a bath. should now be drip free! action © h o m e
If you have a garden you can find that If you have to use a hose SPECIAL OFFER! your household uses 50% more water A normal hose uses 500 litres of water Here comes the rain when it’s hot outside. But there are many in one hour, and a lot of that is sloshed Enclosed in this pack is a special offer for things you can do to keep your garden where it isn’t needed as you move around buying a water butt for your garden. This w blooming and gorgeous, whilst at the Os the garden. A seep hose, usually available is a large container which catches some oo same time saving water. from your water company, uses only 100 of the rainwater running off your roof via litres. You can also fit a trigger-gun type a pipe coming off your gutter. It is fitted Give your plants what they head to your hose - they cost alaout £5 - with a tap. Alternatively, you can convert really want so that you can turn the water off when a plastic drum or barrel, but make sure Plants mainly drink through their roots, you're not using it. it has a lid to make it safe for children and generally prefer a good soaking to and animals. a quick sip. To make sure your plants get what they want, try chopping the bottom TIP TIME Set your mower on a higfter level to leave off a plastic water bottle and Inserting the grass longer and your lawn will stay it into the soil so that the narrow end is greener and drink less directed straight to the roots. Pour water • Water plants early evening when it's cooler • Water plants close to tfre roots into the upturned bottle and down it goes Try planting flowers and plants which don't • Use plastic bottles in the soil to channel to where it's needed. need much water. These include lavender, water to the roots lilacs tulips sunflowers wall flowers jasmine, • Use your washing-up water to water your Keep that w ater In the soil buddleia, holly, broom and crocuses garden Watering plants in the evening gives the • Avoid sprinklers (they can use 1,000 litres water a chance to soak down to the roots of w ater in an hour) instead of evaporating in the heat. • Use a trigger-spray gun fitting on your hose • Ask your garden centre about plants which Putting bark, stones or a mulch of grass don’t need lots of water. See Tip Time (opposite) cuttings around the base of a plant can • Use buckets of water, instead of a hose, help to keep the water in the soil, and will to wash your car also keep down the weeds! / t a m . more alioiit saving water, you should find those conracts userai:
Water UK the trade body The Wildlife Trusts for Environment % ency Henry Doubleday , for the water companies. campaignfamoaian information information Îî RioRio Hoii House, WatamirlA Waterside D Drive, Research Association^^ Call for det»ls of your on water and wildlife. Aztec West, Alirondsbury for adwce and organic local company. The Green, Witham Park. Bristol BS12 4Ü0 gardming products. 1 Queen Annes’s Gate, Waterside South, Lincoln Tel: 0800 80 70 60 Ryton Organic Gardens Lond(mSW1H98T INS 71R to report cases of Rytcm onDimmore Tel: 0171*344 1844 Tel: 01522 544400 polluted rivers. Covenhy CVS 316 Tel: 01203 303517 DID YOttlET VERY RUt? Mte hope you found this booklot mlid-survey to teH us about your has hehied you save water hi lots experience. It wHI help us to review of d n ferait ways. But somettoiss, dciAw af Mame to «wure that it is we hmow that there can he thhigs as effective as possible in iwlphQ wMch get In tlw way of goml you put good intentions hito practice. intentions. It would he very helpful If you could use the endoswl Tluudi vni.
Aaion at Home is run by two independent and respected charities, Global Action Plan and WVVf-UK. Global Action Plan, originator of the Action at Home programme, was established in the UK in 1995. It has helped thousands of people throughout the country to take practical environmental action. WWf-UK, the world's largest independent conservation organisation, supportsat Home as.4cf?on part of its commitment to protect the rsch diversityof life on earth by helping people live m harmony with nature.
Global Action Plan, World Wide Fund for Nature UK, 8 Fuiv/ood Place, Panda House. VVeyside Park, London WCIV 6HG Godaiming. Surrey GU7 1XR Tel 0171 405 5633 Tel: 01485-426444 Fax. 0171 851 6244 Fax-01483-426409 E-mail: [email protected] E-mail: wwf#wwfnet. or g WMF Global Action Plan is a WWF-UK is a registered registered chanty no. 1026148 chanty no. 201707
All items in this pack are printed on recycledpaper
Wnren, dssiçneQ and produred by 8fifr.*-ti PublKarions London K M 3AY let 0171 -4IS 3333 ■ - Global Aciicri Plan.WWt UK 1998 9/98
269 APPENDIX 4; ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ON ACTION AT HOME PROJECT PARTICIPANTS AND CONTEXTS
This section provides information about the people who participated in this research. It also provides further contextual details on both the Bournemouth and North-west case studies, to add depth to the information provided in Chapter 3.
ACTION AT HOME PARTICIPANTS
This section consists of thumbnail sketches of AaH participant’s socio-economic backgrounds and geographical contexts. It aims to supplement Tables 3.2, 3.3 and 3.4, and to provide a deeper understanding of who AaHthe participants were, and why they were taking part in the AaH project. This information was originally omitted from the thesis due to my reticence at categorising and generalising about research participants. Some of my earliest analysis of the Bournemouth interviews tended to follow the positivists models of analysis I was reading about in environmental psychology literature at the time, which attempted to understand more about the types of people involved in pro-environmental behaviors. I tried to place interviewees into discrete categories of preferences and practices, such as whether they seemed ‘green’ or ‘non-green’. The intention was then to use this information in both my academic work and also for GAP’s marketing purposes, to try and understand what sort of people were taking AaH. In doing this, it became increasingly clear to me that such categorisation and typification obscured the complexities and contradictions of the views and actions that my interviewees expressed. As a result, I felt quite strongly that such an exercise was to be avoided in my final analysis and tried earnestly not to categorise individuals when writing this thesis. Although my intentions were well grounded (or at least well intended), this stance sent my work to the other extreme of providing very little information about the participants, making their identities and their comments seem rather groundless. This section attempts to compensate for the omission, by providing brief outlines of the individuals involved in the research interviews.
BOURNEMOUTH
Amongst the Bournemouth interviewees there were three different groups: households participants, AaH volunteers and Bournemouth Borough Council (BBC) staff. A reasonably
270 clear distinction can be made between these three groups in terms of their age, incomes and reasons for taking part inAaH. Household participants: Mrs. Purkis, David, Peter, Mr. & Mrs. Isles, Elizabeth, Clare, Mr. & Mrs. Bodger and Rachel All the 10 household members interviewed were retirees, aged 65 or over and living with their spouses (except 2 who were single). Bournemouth is a popular retirement spot on the Dorset coast, having a relatively high pensioner population and many purpose built retirement flats/units (see http://www.bournemouth.gov.uk/index.asp for further information). All these interviewees had decided to get involved AaHwith after seeing an advert that BBC had placed in the free local newspaper. They were primarily interested in the project to save money on household costs. Although Bournemouth can be considered a rather affluent seaside town, these pensioners in fact had to manage their finances carefully, surviving mostly on state pensions and some personal savings. Only one couple I interviewed amongst this group considered themselves financially well off. The other interviewees stated that they were interested in ‘saving’, being frugal with resources to help them be frugal with their money. None of these interviewees had any stated environmental, pressure group or political allegiances. In fact, they were keen to distance themselves from being considered ‘green’. One interesting common thread is that four of them had lived for extended periods in Africa, as either teachers or missionaries, and had seen and lived with poverty at first hand. This made them concerned with saving not only their own resources, but also global resources, making their interests inAaH both financial and moral. Volunteers: Sonia, Sue, Carol, Maureen, Sabitree, Jo, Linda and Pete Volunteer group members presented a highly varied range of ages and backgrounds, and all had the aim of making a contribution to improving current environmental conditions. Sonia, Jo, and Pete and Linda (married couple) were in their early to mid thirties and in skilled employment. Sabitree, Sue and Carol were in their forties and were a student, shiatsu massager and teacher respectively. Finally, Maureen was past retirement age. All the younger volunteers, as well as Sue and Carol stated that they were or had been members of environmental/green groups. Carol and Sue were members of Greenpeace and/or Friends of the Earth, whilst Sonia, Jo, and Pete and Linda had been involved in groups that focused on local action, such as a composting collection scheme and a group maintaining local ecology through weed clearing. Although Maureen had not had any prior environmental commitments, she was also interested in making a difference at a local level, as she was involved in a community women’s circle and neighbourhood watch. They all felt in different
271 ways that AaH was an opportunity to do something constructive in their local community whilst also helping ‘the bigger picture’. These interviewees did appear somewhat more affluent that the householders interviewed although I would suggest that this was because all but one had working, and often had dual, incomes, not because of any clear class differentiation between the householders and the volunteers. Council staff; Wendy, Alex, Hazel, Roma, Ian, Bev, Kathy, Richard, Nick, Catherine, Pat, David, Jane and Brian The council staff interviewed decided to take part AaHin after an internal memo was sent around the workplace in August 1997 detailing the benefits of the scheme. Participants came from a wide section of BBC departments, from finance and administration to community services and health and safety. In my interviews, there was a discernible gender split in terms of interests in AaH, position within BBC and age. The female interviewees whose ages ranged from early twenties to late thirties were mostly at officer or administration assistant level in departments that dealt with community issues. They all expressed some environmental concerns. Although none were members of environmental groups, many stated that they did recycle regularly and were interested in saving money as well as making a contribution to wasting less resources at a global level. All apart from one were from dual income households. In contrast, the men interviewed were more senior in positions in BBC, working in accounting and finance. They stated that they were not particularly interested in saving the environment but in saving money from their household expenditures. None had affiliations with environmental or green groups, or were active in their communities and two were openly cynical about the worthiness and consistency of the environmental agenda.
NORTH-WEST
The three interview sites for the second case study in the North-west are discussed separately below, to give a brief sketch of the participants of the group and single interviews. North-west water: Sharon, Marie, Paul, Kerry and Clare All were junior members of staff, working in either the testing laboratories as water quality analysts or in administration, and had volunteered to take partAaH. in All the women were between 20 to 30 years old, and Paul was in his mid-thirties. Only Sharon expressed a keen interest in recycling and environmental issues. The others stated they were concerned about some of the environmental issues that they were hearing about through the media and took AaH as they wanted to see if there was anything they could do differently, as environmental
272 conditions were getting worse and people needed to start to think about how their behaviour was making a contribution. None were members of any environmental or political groups. British Aerospace Warton: Rod, Sean, Tim, John Leon, Ian, Andrea and Mavis This group was dominated by middle management males who were all obviously comfortable financially but by no means from affluent backgrounds. Their ages ranged from early 20s (Tim) to late fifties (Rod), with all except Tim having worked for BAe for many years, and in two cases (Rod and Ian), for their whole careers. Half of them had been directly involved with implementing workplace changes resulting from ISO 14001 accreditation (see below) and had volunteered to take part inAaH. The remainder had been gently coerced by their superiors. Only one (John, the trade union representative for Warton) made direct reference to having environmental concerns and being part of a pressure group. The two females who joined the second group were Andrea, a young graduate working her way up and Mavis, an administrator in her mid-fifties. Only Andrea expressed environmental and social concerns but again, she was not active in local or national groups. Norweb: Gill, Christine, Andre, Steve, Stephen, Tom and Brian Gill and Christine worked in administration whilst 5 men’s positions in Norweb ranged from a line manager to a depot electrician. All interviewees were in their late thirties to late fifties and although were earning a living wage, were not in a high-income bracket (with several facing redundancies at that point in time). Gill was the only member who had any direct green group affiliations, being a member of Friends of the Earth and supporting direct action. Christine said that she was taking part inAaH to see how she could make a difference to the environment whilst none of the men expressed direct environmental concerns, being more focussed on saving resources and money both at home and in the workplace.
CONTEXTS OF PROJECTS
This section will briefly provide more information on the contexts of the case studies, discussing the local factors that would have influenced the success/failures ofAaH.
BOURNEMOUTH
As mentioned above, Bournemouth is a relatively affluent seaside town. As stated in 3.5.1, BBC became involved inAaH to help facilitate their Corporate Environmental Strategy. This strategy had come about as when this research began in 1997 Bournemouth had recently become a unitary authority and they were making great efforts to forge a local identity for the
273 town, promoting quality of life issues^^ (although within the bounds of the rather prevailing conservative atmosphere of a retirement haven). Sustainable consumption has been one of the approaches to be promoted. For example, recycling facilities became available at the majority of supermarket car parks, with virtually all my interviewees being able to tell me where their nearest recycling points were. Some parts of Bournemouth had a weekly household paper collection and BBC intended the collection to eventually cover the entire town. BBC had therefore become involved inAaH as one strand of a larger policy to make recycling practices part of the towns culture that was focused on making life better in Bournemouth.
NORTH-WEST
The North-west case study contrasted with Bournemouth, as the areas around Preston and Warrington are less affluent, with an industrial working-class basis. This was reflected in the three worksites that were struggling for various reasons to facilitate the project properly, although each of the sites had their own sets of contextual factors in relation to theAaH project. Warton had recently received ISO 14001 accreditation. To achieve this, their site resource systems had already been examined and recycling facilities had been put in place, along with site-wide publicity about reducing wastefulness of resource use both on the factory floor and in the offices. AaH was thus intended as a complimentary strand to IS014001, to engage with individual’s behaviour. In contrast. United Utilities (who owned both North-west water and Norweb) had not gone through ISO 14001 and at the time of this research were under-going major company restructuring and redundancies. Some recycling bins had been provided and encouragement of recycling practices had been taking place on an ad hoc level for some time in the offices but had met with resistance from many staff members who resented current work relations. There had been no such initiatives in the depots. Therefore AaH was intended to start raising staff awareness and help deliver changes to practices as a complete package, independent of United Utilities.
These efforts are still continuing. They include the BBC conducting a local attitude survey in 1998 and a citizen’s panel in 1999, in an attempt to deliver the best services possible to local users (see http://www.boumemouth.gov.uk/index.asp).
274 APPENDIX 5: RECONSIDERING MODERNITY AND LIFE POLITICS
In this section I will comment further upon the concept of modernity as employed in this thesis, taking a critical stance to its relevance and universality as a framing of modem western society and social relations. I will also reconsider the concept of life politics from a similar critical stance. The concept of modernity (or high modernity) has become adopted by many areas of the social sciences and humanities whole-heartedly^^. Theorists such as Beck (1992, 1994, 1995, 1996) and Giddens (1991) employ the concept as a shorthand diagnosis for the broad sets of social relations and processes that they argue typify contemporary western societies. The idea of modernity is used to explain the historical phases that industrialised countries have passed through in the past few centuries. For example. Beck (1992) suggests that countries such as the UK and Germany have become ‘risk societies’ due to the all-encompassing environmental hazards of widespread industrialisation. The concept of modernity also implies sets of social relations that have emerged from these historical events and are believed to typify modem westem living. Beck and Giddens both suggest that rigid social structures of class and politics have been eroded and in their place are open and fluid social relations, where individualisation and critique are central political processes and all citizens are liberated from the constraining expectations of the past (see section 2.4.4 and Figure 2.3). This presents a picture of modem social life as being one of optimism, inclusion and endless possibilities that are all contained within the condition of modemity. However, the often-uncritical nature in which the framing of modemity is adopted needs to be reconsidered. Does the concept of modemity have resonance with the individual’s experiences of modem living and is this optimism well founded? There are always going to be inherent problems with any theory that attempts to generalise broad social processes and capture ‘how society is’. As Delanty (1998: 1) comments: “The concept 'society' in social theory has generally presupposed notions of cultural cohesion and social integration associated with national societies and the framework of modemity” Modemity does celebrate diversity and difference in individuals, and indeed it is one of its defining features, but it is the processes of reflexivity, critique and individualisation which are assumed to bind modem social life into a state of cultural cohesion and integration. Yet, it can easily be contested that the social processes that frame modemity are far from inclusive.
^ For example a search, using the BIDS bibliographic social sciences database, for articles and books with ‘modemity’ in their title published between 1995-2001 came up with 1422 entries.
275 Access to knowledge and information about the state of the ‘risk society’ is an essential component of individual engagement with modemity. Yet, Beck and Giddens pay scant attention to how the constmction and centrality of information excludes many people from entering into the social critiques that are held so central to modemity. Bourke and Meppem (2000) argue that the discourses of sustainability and globalisation have become ‘privileged narratives’. They contest that too often knowledge, in relation to these debates, is considered as a free-floating entity or public good that encompass and define all individuals concems and needs. Instead, no knowledge can be separated from the forms and sites of power and social relations that it embodies, as can be seen in the authority that the various ‘science’ discourses maintain, despite recent knocks to its credibility (such as the BSE ‘crisis’ in Europe). The privileged nature of these narratives can mean that they circulate in elite forums of debate and maintain a certain authority by their jargonised complexity. Qualitative research has shown that in the UK during the 1990s very few non-expert individuals were engaged with sustainability debates because of the apparent exclusivity and complexity that the term embodies (see Macnaghten and Jacobs 1997, Harrison et al 1996). Thus, positions of authority are maintained by access to the very discourses that are meant to be the tools of social critiques in modemity, suggesting that only those who are able to access and engage with key debates are able to be part of this critique. Thus, the assumption that modemity is fuelled by universal processes of engagements with new forms of knowledge ignores the exclusionary nature of these discourses. Modemity also ignores the material nature of exclusion in modem society. Giddens gives only one short paragraph in his 1991 book on modemity to the possibility that social exclusion is still a key feature of everyday life. Instead, he focuses on the project of ‘life politics’ which suggests that individuals are now empowered to ask how they want to live, now that they are free from the emancipatory stmggles of past centuries and able to make choices about who they want to be (see section 6.2). However, the evidence of life in the UK at the start of the twenty-first century paints a very different picture of how far choice determines individual’s life decisions and pattems. Research conducted for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation suggests that in the UK about a quarter of the population are living now in material and social poverty, with the gap between the rich and poor still widening (Gordon 2000). Even though theorists such as Inglehart (1977, 1990) were pronouncing decades ago that westem society can be typified as a post materialist society, it is tme to say that for many people the project of survival and making ends meet still prevails over the project of reflexivity. As Mohan (2000: 293) observes:
276 “Critics argue that geography’s current preoccupation with identity and consumption has produced some interesting studies of consumption pattems, but neglected the basis of these pattems in a profoundly unequal restmcturing of society.” Thus, the modemists dream of the end of class and emancipation through information and ability to choose seems a rather twisted take on the lives of one in four people in the UK today. If “consumption...enables people to create altemative worlds from those proposed normatively by the hegemonic center” (Blim 2000: 34) then those who are not able to consume either material goods or new knowledge are logically not able to move themselves away from this controlling centre of authority and by definition are not part of the processes of individualisation and critique - in short, life politics- which are central definitions of modemity. This argument suggests that a further reconsideration of the applicability of the assumptions of modemity needs to be made in light of the scale of social exclusion in countries such as the UK.
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