Environmental Citizenship 

The scope of environmental citizenship

The seminar series was animated by questions such as ‘does environmental citizenship happen in public or private?’  At global or local level?’  Perhaps not surprisingly, the discussions often led to the conclusion that many of the answers to questions about environmental citizenship are better framed as ‘both- and’ rather than ‘either-or’.

This framing illustrates how environmental citizenship transcends the boundaries that the concept of citizenship once helped to guard, such as those between nations and between the public and private spheres.  Environmental citizenship also expands the discussion to include future generations and ecosystems.

It is useful to think of environmental citizenship as including the following:

Public & Private

Citizenship has traditionally been associated with the public arenas of government and civil society.  Public actions, such as lobbying government for stricter environmental regulations and participating in campaigns to protect vulnerable ecosystems, are central to environmental citizenship.  However, because actions and choices in the private spheres of the household and market have environmental consequences, they too are considered appropriate spaces for the enactment of environmental citizenship.  Private actions include, for example, composting and recycling waste, reducing energy consumption and choosing to consume low impact goods and services.

Local & Global

Environmental problems know no boundaries and so demand the cooperation of citizens and institutions across jurisdictional boundaries and at every level – from local councils to the United Nations.  Environmental citizenship therefore includes a sense of membership in a global political community with a common ecological fate.  It includes responsibilities and obligations that extend beyond the nation state (the traditional terrain of citizenship) and reach as far as the impacts of our way of life.  Yet it is important that this sense of membership and these obligations take into account issues of environmental justice.  (See key debates.)

Present & Future

Environmental citizenship includes concern for the well-being of present and future generations.  This is often conceptualised as inter- and intra-generational justice in conversations about sustainability.  Ideally, environmental citizens represent the interests of those who cannot represent themselves in democratic deliberation, such as future generations and non-humans.

Rights & Responsibilities

Environmental citizenship includes rights to a clean and liveable environment and to information about environmentally-relevant policy decisions.  It also includes taking responsibility for environmentally unsustainable actions by reducing individual impact and participating in collective actions aimed at achieving greater sustainability.  Much of the literature on environmental citizenship focuses on the nature of citizen responsibility and the extent to which they are shared equally by all.  (But see key debates.)

Citizens & Institutions

Citizenship attaches to individuals. Popular discourse notwithstanding, it is incorrect to refer to corporations as citizens with rights.  However environmental citizenship challenges the notion that only individual citizens have the responsibility for environmental change.  Governments have a role to play in making it easier for individuals to be environmental citizens.  It is therefore important to consider what are the governance relationships necessary for promoting environmental citizenship and a culture of sustainability.  (See Citizens and Institutions.)

Acting & Thinking

Environmental citizenship can be considered a mode of thinking and acting in which individuals embrace the project of sustainability.  Thought without action is not citizenship and action without thought is merely following orders – neither is sufficient to sustain a democratic culture.  Ideally, environmental citizenship entails the adoption of values and commitments and the performance of actions that are consistent with these.  This can include both cooperative actions like taking part in waste recycling programmes and confrontational actions such as protesting excessive packaging by dumping it en masse outside a supermarket.

Learning & Leading

Learning is an important means of promoting environmental citizenship.  While formal education can provide information and skills, the emphasis is better placed on the broader notion of learning which can include hands-on experience, life-long learning and political engagement.  Both social and institutional learning are necessary.  (See Social and institutional learning.)

Learning about the causes and potential solutions to unsustainability is not by itself enough to prompt action.  And it would be wrong to assume that citizens fail to act simply due to lack of information.  There are many reasons for the gap between values and action and many potential ways to bridge it.  One way that would seem particularly promising in the environmental context is the leadership, not just of governments, but of role-models and exemplary citizens, people who might be called ‘civic entrepreneurs’.  Such leadership is needed to inspire citizens to act in ways that are consistent with their green commitments.  (See four sections under Promoting environmental citizenship.)