The politics of environmental preservation and utilization :

Abstract

Survey data collected in the Spring of 1984 from a simple random sample (N = 344) of metropolitan adult residents were used to test hypothesized relationships between four predictor characteristics--age, social class, residential background, political ideology--and class/status dimensions of environmental concern, and between these two dimensions and preference for three solution strategies--voluntary, individual change and government regulation of consumption and of production. These relationships, in addition to the possibility of interaction effects between all the independent variables and two measures of the free-rider problem on preference for solution strategies, were analyzed using analysis of variance and regression statistical techniques.

Results showed that among the individuals surveyed: (1) neither the free-rider problem nor the four correlates effected significantly either perceptions of environmental concern or preference for solution strategies; (2) perceiving the environment in terms of life-style concerns elicits a high level of concern and support for all three strategies; and (3) perceiving environmental issues in terms of economic interests elicits conditional support for only one of the solution strategies, government regulation of consumption. The implications of these findings for mobilization of support for the environmental movement concluded the dissertation.

This dissertation addressed the discrepancy between concern for environmental problems and support for environmental reform. Two explanations were proposed. First, because environmental problems threaten both life-style and economic interests, they may be perceived in terms of both status and class politics. This multidimensionality of environmental issues presents a stumbling block to the mobilization of support by generating disagreement over specific issues and solution strategies. Second, the free-rider problem, which plagues social movements of all kinds, modifies the link between attitude and behavior.