“With apologies to a cliché that predates the advent of Earth Day by a year, it is easy being green. Too easy. From adorable reusable shopping bags and organic clothing to hemp shower curtains (no nasty petroleum-based vinyl liner!) and "natural is now fun!" beauty products for girls, the proliferation of green products makes doing our bit for the planet a blast, since Americans can combine environmentalism with their favorite sport, shopping.”
In other words, the article argues that we are being sold the story that the environment can be saved with only minimal sacrifice or changes in behavior. And, where we are encouraged to act, it is in relation to relatively inconsequential personal behavior, rather than more meaningful, system-wide change:
“Of the Nature Conservancy's five recommendations for Earth Day, four—figure out your carbon footprint here, time your shower, go for a walk (!), and find a farmers’ market—involve individual behavior. Only a single suggestion, "speak up on climate change" … gets at the only kind of change that has been shown in the 40 years since the first Earth Day to make a difference.”
[Note: For this year’s Earth Day, all five of The Nature Conservancy’s suggested “easy actions” focus on personal action—http://earthday.nature.org/five-things/]
And, when expectations are low, the results are uninspiring:
“90 percent of Americans, Gallup found, say they recycle. And what good has it done? Some, to be sure. But we are producing 38 percent more garbage today than we were in 1970.”
It is all very Monty Python-esque: Come on everybody, let’s form a committee to consider setting-up a commission to make recommendations to compose the serious questions we need to address if we are to contemplate some type of action that should maybe move us in the right direction:
“The problem with the emphasis on changing individual behavior is this: it makes too many of us believe we have done our part. … By believing that green shopping—or even recycling, turning down the thermostat, or carpooling—is enough, we consent to the continuation of the same societal practices that got us into this mess. Compared with the scale of the disaster, changing individual behavior is pathetically inadequate.”
In other words, the more things change, the more they stay the same, while we dig ourselves in deeper.
Take care
David
Instructor Teaching Site: http://www.sagepub.com/strategiccsr/
The library of CSR Newsletters are archived at: http://strategiccsr-sage.blogspot.com/
On the 40th Anniversary of Earth Day, Let’s ... Go Shopping!
Buying green and changing personal behavior won't save the planet.
Newsweek
Apr 21, 2010
