Justifying Funding for Environmental Awareness-Raising

Government policies and law-making showed to be the most effective in this case, rendering awareness-raising campaigns useless. Or not? Can awareness-raising campaigns be resources well spent and work in tandem with government policies? If we take a sharp turn to political philosophy and consider policies, laws and regulations to be a part of a social contract that is only borne from the consciousness of the collective, then awareness-raising has a pivotal role to play. It would, therefore, make sense that government spending is partially allocated to awareness-raising.

But who is ultimately the best at awareness-raising? Everyone except for the government. Yet, it’s not just the government that gets awareness-raising wrong. Throughout the article, we’ll explore methods that can increase the effectiveness of awareness-raising and justify spending government funds on it. We will look at getting the public interested and moving beyond mere interest to participation. But more importantly, we need to look at how to approach people like myself, fully aware of issues like the environment but not doing anything about it.

KEEPING THE PUBLIC’S INTEREST

Described by Anthony Downs (1991) as the “Ups and Downs with Ecology” it seems that our environmental awareness is short-lived and changeable. Downs identified a five-stage cycle: pre-problem state; alarmed discovery and euphoric enthusiasm stage; realisation of the cost of significant progress stage; gradual decline in the intense public interest; and the post problem state. And, dear reader, I understand that you are thinking “I’m seeing Greta Thunberg in the news forever, I think we are still alarmed.” Perhaps we are, but how do we stay there? In my opinion, we do this by tapping into our anthropocentric tendencies to keep the public’s interest.

Anthropocentrism is the perspective of humans to consider themselves exceptionally placed over other species on earth. The worth of everything is measured by its relation to us. It is evident from the Pew Research Survey that we are greatly concerned that climate change will harm us personally. Typically, our short-term concerns are the health risks of chemicals in products and the agricultural use of genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Our long-term concerns are whether the earth will be a safe place for our children to grow up in.

There might be no shame in that, every species is concerned with its preservation, humankind is just betting on its ability to not suffer the same faith as the Dodo, the Tasmanian Tiger, and the Sabre-toothed cat.

Let’s get to the point! To help environmental issues to remain high on the collective agenda, we need constant reminders of how the deterioration of the environment affects us. But as we will uncover at the tail end of this article, trying to keep people continuously alarmed is a fool’s errand. If your awareness-raising project doesn’t transition from raising awareness about the problems to raising awareness about solutions to environmental problems, you will have lost public interest quicker than you’ve gained it.

PUBLIC PARTICIPATION

The transition from raising awareness about problems to raising awareness about solutions is key in inducing any form of public participation. We need the public to participate because we’ve shifted to a world where the public is the main culprit. That might sound like a bold accusatory statement, but we have gone from decades of production as a source of environmental problems to unbalanced consumption patterns as a great source of pollution. Our electricity consumption (25%) is very high on the list of culprits of greenhouse gas emissions.

Adopting pro-environmental behaviour (let us minimize the use of the word sustainable) will go a long way in protecting the environment. When referring to the seatbelt law, I mentioned that awareness-raising and policy should work in tandem. Awareness-raising leading to public participation increases the likelihood of citizens to respect legal frameworks and be more acceptant towards economic mechanisms.

Discimus ut serviamus, but how? In the earlier mentioned Pew Research Survey, 80% of people polled were willing to make changes to help reduce the impacts of climate change. Your project needs to focus on how to message. You should develop awareness-raising projects on how citizens can make a change and work towards solutions. This can be done by raising awareness about the scale of harm that everyday practices have in conjunction with evoking readiness among citizens to form environmental collectives in their neighbourhoods.

OVERCOME APOCALYPSE FATIGUE

The modern world has developed into a place where people, particularly in advanced economies, live a day-by-day life without too much doom and gloom. Yes, we are confronted with dire prognoses in the news and on our cigarette boxes. But we can get desensitized by nearly anything you throw at us too often or ill-timed. Most people are aware of the mental discomfort cognitive dissonance, but maybe less so with adaptive preference formation. The latter term explains how humans downgrade the value of desired outcomes as their realization becomes less likely. We’re not only prone to outright ignore truths that question our belief system (cognitive dissonance), but we are also likely to downplay its significance if we find it too much work.

As an experienced environmentalist, you’re fighting against these human traits because you know what is at stake. Destructive storms and forest fires, extinction of species that we hold dear and whole islands and ice shelves on the arctic calving into the sea. But what to do when these frightening scenarios only awake passive emotions, fear and guilt, or lead to avoidance of the topic all together?

Your awareness-raising projects need to reframe the discourse. One way is to speak about opportunities rather than threats. If you were attentive to the European Union’s messaging, you would notice a subtle shift. Instead of overemphasising everything people and companies should not be doing, it took an empowering approach. It is seeking to better the food sources, create smarter energy and transportation systems that move us through smarter cities to our smarter buildings. We connect smarter to automation, to computers, intelligent groups of people working towards progress.

Everyone wants to be part of progress and development. This becomes an even more powerful emotion when used in social networks. Not Zuckenberg’s, but real peer to peer social activity. In a study on social norms and how to utilise them when managing climate change, four thousand households were divided into four groups.

The first group was asked to conserve power/energy because it’s the right thing to do for the planet. The second was asked to think about future generations. With the third one, they employed an economic strategy and made them aware of how much they could save on their utility bill. The fourth group was told how their energy use compares to that of their neighbours. Attempting to coerce the first group with apocalyptic scenarios did very little, while the fourth group came out on top consistently.

CONCLUSION

You could paint a sobering picture that there is no shortage of environmental awareness and thus there is a lack of willingness. But if that’s the conclusion you have come to, I’ve done a bad job in arguing my case. Your environmental awareness project does not have to be in vain, it must understand the multiplicity of relational structures and how to navigate them. What can environmental awareness-raisers do in relation to the public and what can they do in relation to government policy?

Environmental awareness-raisers need to strike a balance between alarming the public, and thus gaining their attention, and evoking action, thus keeping their attention. It is quite apparent that my pet peeve is seatbelt usage, but we can learn from past mistakes in awareness-raising to ensure that your project holds the attention. Highway safety needs efforts were receiving significant stimulus but only led to a 3% increase in seatbelt usage over 3 years. Berating the public rather than shaping a campaign on collective progress led to the need for legislation, high-visibility enforcement, and fines.

Sometimes we can’t get around alarming people, but the objective should be life and your project should be about how to improve our lives. Shape your awareness-raising around feasible goals and do not dismiss, or overlook, those goals that have already been achieved. With underlining the problem comes the need for hope, for a turn-around or improvement, and a reminder of what has been accomplished to date.

Examples of goal orientated, rather than disaster orientated, are small initiatives such as Utrecht4GlobalGoals, where projects are encouraged to spread awareness about what the Global Goals are and what is being done. The stimulus ties into the case for complementary work by awareness-raising projects following government initiatives. Don’t try to reinvent the wheel but seek out government initiatives and design your project as such that it enhances the likelihood of public engagement and awareness of government objectives. With the government being the largest funders in most countries, tying your project objectives to government goals increases the likelihood of funding.

Another example is partnering with local government in a consortium. This is being done by CleanTech Regio, an initiative that brings together several entities in the provinces of Gelderland and Overijssel to focus on pro-environment and economic shared objectives. With the funds acquired they target a variety of organisations, communities and individuals. They provide small grants for businesses to propose zero emission city logistics, or training for jobseekers in IT, health, and other vital sectors. Their strategy is to focus on visibility on the local level with an eye on the future.

There is a plethora of project ideas that people more creative than I have, and can, come up with. It’s on you and your project team to change your message from “we are doomed” to “yes, we can.”

For more articles, check our FUNDED edition.