Helping the earth begins at home. The social construction of socio-environmental responsibilities

Global Environmental Change

Volumn 6, Issue 1, 1996, Pages 53-62

  Hinchliffe, Steve ^a  

^a KEELE UNIVERSITY   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

IBUPROFEN;

CONSERVATION CAMPAIGN; ENERGY CONSERVATION; POLICY INITIATIVE; PUBLIC AWARENESS;

DRAWING; ENERGY CONSERVATION; GOVERNMENT; INTERVIEW; POLICY; RESPONSIBILITY; UNITED KINGDOM;

UK, ENGLAND, BRISTOL;

EID: 0030111923     PISSN: 09593780     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1016/0959-3780(95)00113-1     Document Type: Article

References (42)

1. 1 D Pearce, A Markandya and E Barbier, A Blueprint for a Green Economy, Earthscan, London, 1989; T O'Riordan and S Raynor, 'Risk Management for Global Environmental Change', Global Environmental Change, Vol 1, No 2, 1991, pp 91-108; B Wynne, 'Uncertainty and Environmental Learning: Reconceiving science and policy in the preventative paradigm', Global Environmental Change, Vol 2, No 2, 1992, pp 111-127
2. 1 D Pearce, A Markandya and E Barbier, A Blueprint for a Green Economy, Earthscan, London, 1989; T O'Riordan and S Raynor, 'Risk Management for Global Environmental Change', Global Environmental Change, Vol 1, No 2, 1991, pp 91-108; B Wynne, 'Uncertainty and Environmental Learning: Reconceiving science and policy in the preventative paradigm', Global Environmental Change, Vol 2, No 2, 1992, pp 111-127
3. 1 D Pearce, A Markandya and E Barbier, A Blueprint for a Green Economy, Earthscan, London, 1989; T O'Riordan and S Raynor, 'Risk Management for Global Environmental Change', Global Environmental Change, Vol 1, No 2, 1991, pp 91-108; B Wynne, 'Uncertainty and Environmental Learning: Reconceiving science and policy in the preventative paradigm', Global Environmental Change, Vol 2, No 2, 1992, pp 111-127
4. 2 W Kempton, 'Lay perspectives on global environmental change', Global Environmental Change, Vol 1, No 3, 1991, pp 183-208
5. 3 A Collier, 'The Inorganic Body and the Ambiguity of Freedom', Radical Philosophy, 57, 1991, pp 3-9; U Beck, Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity, Sage, London, 1992
6. 3 A Collier, 'The Inorganic Body and the Ambiguity of Freedom', Radical Philosophy, 57, 1991, pp 3-9; U Beck, Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity, Sage, London, 1992
7. 4 A Gorz, 'Political Ecology: Expertocracy versus self-limitation', New left Review, Vol 202, 1993, pp 55-67
8. 5 B Wynne, 'Implementation of greenhouse gas reductions in the European Community: Institutional and cultural factors', Global Environmental Change, Vol 3, No 1, 1993, pp 101-128
9. 6 Gorz, op cit, Ref 4
10. 7 This is itself challenged by Gorz, who is drawing on a tradition of Marxian writing associated with the Frankfurt School. Far from requiring no change in values and aspirations, heteroregulation, in the form of taxes, permits and codes, tends to deepen an instrumental, technocentric and essentially individualist view of the world (op cit, Ref 4)
11. 6 Gorz, op cit Ref 4
12. 9 M Redclift, 'Sustainable Development and global climate change', Global Environmental Change, Vol 2, No 1, 1992, pp 32-42
13. 10 L Lutzenhiser, 'A cultural model of household energy conservation,' Energy, Vol 17, No 1, pp 47-60; quote on p 54
14. 11 A Harris, 'Radical economics and natural resources', International Journal of Environmental Studies, Vol 21, pp 45-53
15. 12 The campaign was originally launched as a joint venture between the Department of Energy and the Department of the Environment in Spring 1991. After the disbanding of the Department of Energy in 1992 the campaign was organized solely through the Department of the Environment.
16. 13 A Hedges, Attitudes to Energy Conservation in the Home - Report on a Qualitative Study, HMSO, London, 1991
17. 14 B Wynne, 'Scientific knowledge and the global environment', in M Redclift and T Benton (eds) Social Theory and the Global Environment, Routledge, London, 1994; World Commission on Environment and Development, Our Common Future, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1987
18. 14 B Wynne, 'Scientific knowledge and the global environment', in M Redclift and T Benton (eds) Social Theory and the Global Environment, Routledge, London, 1994; World Commission on Environment and Development, Our Common Future, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1987
19. 15 M Redclift, op cit. Ref 9
20. 16 For a much more detailed review of these and related political-scientific processes, see S Boehmer-Christiansen, 'Global climate protection policy - the limits of scientific advice 1', Global Environmental Change, Vol 4, No 2, 1994, pp 140-159
21. 17 This was the recommendation of the 1988 Toronto Conference on The Changing Atmosphere' and was soon followed up in Europe by the European Environment Ministers' meeting at the Hague in 1989 and the European Commission communiqué to the European Council on the Greenhouse Effect. The Council adopted a resolution in June 1989 on this matter (OJ No C 183, 20.7, 1989)
22. 18 F Buttel, A Hawkins and G Power, 'From limits to growth to global change: constraints and contradictions in the evolution of environmental science and ideology', Global Environmental Change, Vol 1, No 1, 1990, pp 57-66
23. 19 Plans are still afoot for privatization and these efforts to provide greater, long-term, legitimacy for nuclear power generation have been part of the attempt to attract prospective share holders
24. 20 J Burgess, 'The Production and Consumption of Environmental Meanings in the Mass Media: A Research Agenda for the 1990s', Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, Vol 15, 1990, pp 139-161
25. 21 A Ross, Strange Weather: culture, science and technology in the age of limits Verso, London, 1991
26. 22 It is fair to point out that terms like neighbourhood and community would, at the time, have had very little purchase in many sections of British society. Clearly, the political culture in the UK had rendered these terms largely redundant. It is also interesting to note that terms like community have recently been placed back onto some political agendas
27. 2 production', Social Problems, Vol 40, No 1, pp 50-73
28. 24 L Brown, State of the World, W W Norton, New York, 1989
29. 25 Department of Energy News Release, 17 April, 1991
30. 26 G D McCracken, The Long Interview, Qualitative Research Methods 13, Sage, California, 1988
31. 27 For similar arguments see Kempton, op cit, Ref 2; Hedges, op cit, Ref 13
32. 27 For similar arguments see Kempton, op cit, Ref 2; Hedges, op cit, Ref 13
33. 28 For more detail on the methodological and theoretical background to this work see J C Mitchell, 'Case and Situation Analysis', Sociological Review, Vol 31, 1983, pp 187-211; T Dant, Knowledge, Ideology and Discourse, Routledge, London, 1991; J Thomas, Doing Critical Ethnography, Sage, London, 1993; S Hinchliffe, Applied cultural geographies of energy use and the limits to heteroregulation: an Anglo-Danish case study, unpublished PhD thesis, Department of Geography, University of Bristol, 1995
34. 28 For more detail on the methodological and theoretical background to this work see J C Mitchell, 'Case and Situation Analysis', Sociological Review, Vol 31, 1983, pp 187-211; T Dant, Knowledge, Ideology and Discourse, Routledge, London, 1991; J Thomas, Doing Critical Ethnography, Sage, London, 1993; S Hinchliffe, Applied cultural geographies of energy use and the limits to heteroregulation: an Anglo-Danish case study, unpublished PhD thesis, Department of Geography, University of Bristol, 1995
35. 28 For more detail on the methodological and theoretical background to this work see J C Mitchell, 'Case and Situation Analysis', Sociological Review, Vol 31, 1983, pp 187-211; T Dant, Knowledge, Ideology and Discourse, Routledge, London, 1991; J Thomas, Doing Critical Ethnography, Sage, London, 1993; S Hinchliffe, Applied cultural geographies of energy use and the limits to heteroregulation: an Anglo-Danish case study, unpublished PhD thesis, Department of Geography, University of Bristol, 1995
36. 28 For more detail on the methodological and theoretical background to this work see J C Mitchell, 'Case and Situation Analysis', Sociological Review, Vol 31, 1983, pp 187-211; T Dant, Knowledge, Ideology and Discourse, Routledge, London, 1991; J Thomas, Doing Critical Ethnography, Sage, London, 1993; S Hinchliffe, Applied cultural geographies of energy use and the limits to heteroregulation: an Anglo-Danish case study, unpublished PhD thesis, Department of Geography, University of Bristol, 1995
37. 29 See J Law, Organizing Modernity Blackwell, Oxford, 1994 for a clear review of the construction of themes in ethnographic research.
38. 30 I make the distinction 'global' because responsibility for local issues (like car exhaust fumes or local waste incineration plants) was talked about rather differently, see S Hinchliffe, 'Locating risk: energy use, the 'ideal' home and the non-ideal world', paper submitted to Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers
39. 31 From this point on there will be a number of word-for-word quotations from interview tapes. These contain the non-standard grammar and word choice that we all use in our everyday speech. The following notation is used: Speakers are introduced by their names (pseudonyms) followed by a colon (I am Steve). Ellipsis points (. . .) indicate material that I have deleted. Square brackets denote non-spoken contextual information and full stops indicate pauses (each stop roughly representing a one second pause). These notes and conventions follow Kempton, op cit, Ref 2
40. 32 Interestingly, discussants were often surprised to learn that domestic energy use accounted for roughly a third of total primary energy consumption in the UK. Hedges reported a similar level of surprise and underestimating of domestic and personal energy use. Hedges op cit, Ref 13
41. 33 A Giddens, Modernity and Self-Identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age, Polity Press, Cambridge, 1991
42. 34 Thanks to Jacquelin Burgess for suggesting the importance of timing to me.