18 PROCEEDINGS OF THE NEW ZEALAND ECOLOGICAL SOCIETY, VOL. 18, 1971

COM M UNIT Y'A T TIT UDES TOWARDS ENVIRONMENTAL

RJ: s'b U RC E S

TIMOTHY O'RIORDAN*

. Dep:utment of Geography, University of Canterbury

One of Fraser Darling's (Darling 1951) manyamusing anccdotes is that' of the cows and thesupergrass. The story goes that some scientists gottogether to produce a strain of grass that was morenutritious than existing grasses. After several yearsof research the big day eventually came and anumber of cows were led into a paddock in whichthe 'supergrass' was growing luxuriantly. But toeverybody's consternation the cows took one biteof the grass and headed straight for the ordinarygrass growing in neigbouring paddocks.

Of the many lessons that can be drawn from thisstory I only want to point out two. The mostobvious is that we should attempt to find out whatflavours are delectable to the bovine palate beforeembarking on the production of a supergrass: theother lesson Is that instead of changing the grass,we could alter the cow to produce a supercowthat finds the supergrass tasty.

In many ways we can extend these two moralsinto the human context. If we are to plan humanand natural environments (the bio-social environ~men!) in the future, should the professionalenvironmental manager consciously attempt todiscover people's preferences for different land-scapes, urban densities, or outdoor recreationalfacilities, ete.. or should he 'manipulate' people'sjudgments and values in such a way that what theprofessionals dedde is a 'desirable' bio-socialenvironment is what the people are persuaded towant?

One of the recent resolutions by the PhysicalEnvironment Conference proposes that the Nat-ional Development Council consider the conceptof optimum population and optimum distributionof economic activity and social services for thefuture New Zealand (National DevelopmentCouncil 1971). Tn effect this resolution requests

"' Present address: Department of Geography, SimonFraser University, Burnaby 2, British Columbia,Canada.

that certain professional experts produce a blue-print for an optiJIlum bio-social environment. Howare they. to. set about doing this? Whose opinionswiil be asked? How broad a cross-section of. thepublic will be involved? Upon what bases willa1ternative courses of action be weighed? Econo-mic? Social or ecological?

THE ROLE OF THE PROFESSIONAL RESOURCE

MANAGER IN ENVIRONMENTAL DECISIONS

The environment in which we live has beenmoulded and re-created in accordance with humanmotivations, faith and preferences. Tt is the pro-duct of countless millions of judgments taken atvarious levels as to what is desirable or undesir-able. economically efficient or wasteful, beautifulor ugly. However, in the case of major environ-mental decisions, society has entrusted a relativelyelite group of politicians and professional exp~rtswith the resolution of such judgments. It is gen-erally believed that they, like all of us, hold threemain kinds of beliefs regarding environmentalresources, namely those attitudes which they them-selves hold, their opinions as to what others prefer,and their opinions as to what others should prefer(White 1966). Rarely does anybody attempt tofind out what others actually do prefer.

Generally speaking, the process of planning thebio-social environment involves judgments madeon the basis of rather flimsy evidence as to whatthe community really wants. This can lead tomajor errors. In the 1950s the City of New Yorkwent to enormous legal and financial trouble todivert water for its future public water supply fromthe headwaters of the Delaware River. This deci-sion not only involved an expensive aqueduct butaffected the multi-purpose use of the DelawareRiver system downstream. Yet right on the City'sdoorstep is the Hudson River with more thanenough water to meet future requirements. The[rouble was that the Hudson was badly polluted,and New York water supply officials did notbelieve that the public would like to drink treated

O'RIORDAN: COMMUNITY ATTITUDES TOWARDS ENVIRONMENTAL RESOURCES 19

sewage. So without public consultation theysearched for a pure river source, and presented thevoters with a "take it or leave it' choice. The resi-dents of St. Louis drink treated water from asource that, In its original state, is far more pol-luted than the Hudson, and it app~ars that, pro-

vided tap water is palatable, most people do notworry very much about the original quality of thesource water (Mciver 1970).

A second example relates to a proposal by theCanadian Province of Manitoba to dam and divertthe Nelson River southward to help provide powerand sufficient fresh water to flush pollutants downthe Red River which flows through the city ofWinnipeg. The proposal meant flooding an existinglake, the shores of which were inhabited by anIndian Band whose ancestors had settled in thearea many hundreds of years before. No one hadapparently consulted the public as to whether theyconsidered the price of dispossessing the Indianswas worth the gains of cheaper power and adeaner river, until a ]ocal conservation groupadvocated the Indians' rights. The matter deve-loped into a major political issue, and, with achange in government, the project was stoppedin favour of preserving the Indians' heritage.

These examples are not unique, yet it is not easyto stop this kind of situation from occurring. Wedo not have adequate techniqucs to determinepublic opinion in such matters and, in the .absenceof this knowledge, tend to leave the decisions toqualified experts. Unfortunately the environmentalramifications of many such decisions are so widethat no single group of experts can reasonablybo expected to predict all the consequences. Inaddition, until recently at least, such decisions havebeen made hastily, often under considerable poli-tical pressure to resolve a crisis, with the resultthat ther~ has not been time to seek alternativesto well tested and politically acceptable techno-logical solutions.

COMMUNITY ATIITUDES TOWARDS NATURE

One of the interesting aspects of the currentenvironmental "revolution' is that it is causingthe ordinary man in the street to explore morecarefully his attitude towards nature. But man hasalways had some attitude ["wards nature; it's justthat only a few people have ever really analysedthese communal attitudes (White 1967). A num-bor of scholars have explored the man-nature

theme by studying how landscapes were formedand perceived through the philOsophy, art andliterature of human cultures (Glacken, 1965, 1967;Huth, 1957; Tuan, 1967). The import of theirstudies has been to show that 'landscapes arcformed by landscape tastes': in other words land-

scapes evoke images and regiSler symbols in lheminds and hearts of men according to their desiresand imaginations, their hopes and fears, and gen-erally in accord with the cultural setting in whichthey act.

Glacken (1965), for example, has traced outthe important theological connotations associatedwith the man-nature theme. "One of the mostimportant and deep-seated ideas in Westernthought," he notes, "is that the earth and thearrangements of living nature observable on it arethe products of divine effort and design" (ibid,p. 158). The question of "design" and "meaning"attributed to nature is significant, for it under.lines the important teleological belief that thoughman is but a temporary occupant in an uncertainand sometimes hostile world, there is a greaterand more purposeful "'grand design" in the pro-cesses of nature within which he can identify histransient role. White (1967) extends Glacken'sconclusions and notes that Christianity broughtto Western philosophy not only a divine interpre-tation of nature, and hence the belief that throughstudying and worshipping nature man was in factcommunicating with God, but also an anthropo-centric attitude that God made nature to serveman, and that man as steward of his earthlydomain could and should "improve" on His divinehandiwork where it "failed" to meet man's needs.Thus, deforestation, drainage, irrigation, dam con-struction, river diversion and other anthropocentricmanipulations of the earth's ecology were con-sidered not only useful actions but dcsirable alter-ations of an imperfect nature. With the mergingof science and technology in the nineteenth cen-tury, this philosophy was extended to the wellknown 'man dominant' and 'technological fix'approaches to environmental solutions that haveheld sway in Wcstern culture for over a hundredyears.

Another interesting attitude orientation towardsnature is that curious dichotomy which is exhibitedby many people where nature untouched by man'shand is seen as harmonious, while the results ofman's activities are usually considered ugly andshortsighted. Man the destroyer, nature the healer.

20 PROCEEDINGS OF THE NEW ZEALAND ECOLOGICAL SOCIETY, VOL. 18, 1971

Lowenthal ( 1960) contests this argument andpoints out that moral judgments concerning theroles of man and nature are made on the basisof flimsy and often inaccurate evidence. "J udg-ments about the way things ought to look," hewrites, "are conditioned by how things have comeinto being, how old they are, what they arc used

for and how well they fit into their surroundings"(ibid, p. 24). For example, in the United States,the wilderness is now cherished and protected(largely by the upper socio-economie elite) partlybecause of its symbolic associations with thenation's heritage. partly for its scientific interestand partly for its aesthetic qualities. But this isa twentieth century attitude. In nineteenth centuryAmerica a wilderness was feared for its wolvesand its Indians, and presented a challenge to landsettlement that had to be conquered. There waslittle love of the wilderness in those days, andcertainly no wish to protect it.

But in addition to the cultural interpretationof nature, man derives biological and emotionalsatisfaction from the natural environment. Deepin our subconscious we all hold a feeling thatnature is good. and worthwhile. no matter howmuch we exploit it for our short term selfish inter-ests. Why do we seck solitude and beauty in nat-ural landscapes and require time for peace andreflection? Though we don't really know theanswer, we do know that in order to remainresponsive and creative. man needs to interactwith the non-human environment for stimulationand recreation. Despite the advances of moderntechnology which have provided us with increas-ingly homogeneous artificial living environments.man cannot shake off his primeval links with theearth (Dobos 1968).

PROBLEMS IN THE ASSESSMENT OF COMMUNITY

AITITUDES

1. The lack of consensus

However. to sound out community attitudes toenvironmental resources more precisely will notbe easy, even though in Ihe long run it will pro-bably be rewarding. Part of the problem is that itis quite difficult to achieve any consensus ofopinion, because each of us reacts differently toapparently similar things. For example, threepeople may stand on the edge of a lake. One mayconsider the water grossly polluted and refuseto swim in it; another may think that the water

is polluted but is prepared 10 swim in it for lackof other swimming facilities nearby; and the thirdmay feel that the water is not polluted and willhappily plunge in. Unless the manifestation ofpollution is clearly identifiable by sight or smell,public reaction seems to be inconsistent and unpre-dictable; and even if the pollution is obvious thereis never any complete community consensus asto the severity of the problem or the appropriateremedies. Thus two people may see the same lakewater and be of the same opinion as to its deter-iorated condition; but one may resign himselfto the fact saying that this is the price we pay forprogress, while the other may protest to the localcouncil or join a local environmental action group.Because of varying social, cultural, educationaland economic backgrounds we all judge environ-mental resources differently. and because ourmotivation. desires and cognitions shift over time.so our reactions will not remain consistent. Inci-eentally, this factor has implications for planningoptimum bio-social environments. since what maybe considered desirable or undesirable today maynot be judged in the same way by future genera-tions.

2. "Environmental Schizophrenia"

A second problem in assessing community atti-tudes is that, in the past, people have usually foundit difficult to visualise the environment as a linkedsystem" of complex biological processes and thushave often failed both to relate cause and effect,and to understand completely the wider ecologicalrepercussions of their desires. Thus it has beendifficult to persuade some members of the publicthat there is a relationship between laundry deter-gent and eutrophication, (and hence that the desirefor 'whiter than white' leads to algae infestedlakes), or between their wish for worm-free applesand the deaths of scores of seagulls from pesti-cides.

This tendency for 'environmental schizophrenia'seems to be partly founded on inadequate know-ledge. and partly upon the degree of personal(especially financial) commitments perceivednecessary to achieve preferred environments. Thusmany urban dwellers may be willing to protestvigorously in favour of the preservation of partof a NaIional Park, or for the protection of aparticular wildlife species where such commitmentinvolves little personal loss (though such an actionmay have considerable social and economic impact

O'RIORDAN: COMMUNITY ATTITUDES TOWARDS ENYIRONMENTAL RESOURCES 21

in the area in question). Meanwhile, these same

people may be willing to put up with excessivenoise, fumes, smog and biliboards (the reductionof all or any of which might mean an increasein taxes) in their own day-to-day living environ-ments. Conservation issues appear to be moreimportant the greater the distance from urbancentres and the lesser the number of peopledirectly affected. This is implied in the statement:H

Preserving ecological habitats is fine 'out there'but let's get on with the business of economicdevelopment here!"

Thanks largely to ecologists, this attitudeappears to be changing. Many people now seemto be more aware of the concept of 'eeo-system'and of the more obvious interrelationshipsinvolved, and an increasing number of urbandwellers are expressing concern over the qualityof their living environments. But the process ofpublic education takes time, and the educationalimpact of ecologists has by no means penetratedall sectors of society.

3. Indifference Over Environmental Change

Few people are very articulate about theirappreciation of, or their disgust with, environ-mental phenomena. Unless environmental mattersare entering into their consciousness frequently,people tend to be preoccupied with more pressingpersonal or community problems and rarely stopto think about the nature of their bio-socialenvironments. Thus they generally express onlymild preferences for or against environmentalquality, especially where the issues are complexand difficult to visualise. However, come a specificcrisis - say a dense urban smog, a severe flood,or a threat to a national park by some proposeddevelopment - and attitudes often suddenlyharden and focus sharply. It would appear thatthere is nothing like a major conservation issueto crystallise public concern and clarify an evalua-tive stance.

4. Evaluation of Environmental Quality

A fourth difficulty is that of weighing up therelative merits of longer term intangible gainsagainst the more obvious advantages of immediatetangible (usually economic) benefits. Take, forexample. a recent Canadian case - a proposalby a mining company to remove copper from asmall part of a national park and to dump themine tailings into a lake which was used as a

public water supply source. The company waswilling 10 pay hali a million dollars in taxes forthis privilege and promised to provide employmentfor many in the lOcal population for a minimumof ten years. How docs the average citizen weighthis proposal against the effects on scenery, andupon the drinking water supply, against the ethics01 exploiting a national park or against thepleasures derived from visiting the park or simplyknowing that it is there in its pristine state?

When confronted with such a situation manypeople appear to prefer the guarantee of short-term economic gains in the hope that the longerterm, potentially deleterious effects won't harmthem, or that science and technology will findan answer before it is too late. Thus people tendto be unwilling to take anticipatory action or tosupport a far-sighted proposal, especially whenit means short-term economic loss. when the futurereputed gains are difficult to measure and uncer-tain in their occurrence. Not infrequently thisattitude creates a conflict when conservationgroups are so successful in seeking to protect land-scapes that potential economic progress isretarded. In the State of New York, for example,conservation groups have blocked a proposal toconstruct a hydro-electric generating station atStorm King Mountain on the Hudson River.Meanwhile the City of New York was operatingon 93% power during a recent heatwave becauseof the extra power requirements of air-condition-ing units. The preservation of this historical andscenic river site may not seem so desirable in thesweltering humidity of a Manhattan apartment.

Many people are caught in the horns of a moraldilemma over such questions since the variouscomponents of an individual's sense of values areinconsistent. For example, in order to reduceenvironmental pollution, there must inevitably bea conflict between the values of profit-making,individualism and the right of air, land and water,and those of health, community spirit and environ-mental quality. There is a fine line here separatingthe means of resource use with the duties of socialobligation, the desire for selfish economic gainand the broader responsibility for the environ-ment, but its location is obviously extremelydifficult to determine.

5. Adaptability to Environmental Change

The human being appears to be equipped withremarkable adaptive powers which enable him to

22 PROCEEDINGS OF THE NEW ZEALAND ECOLOGICAL SOCIETY, VOl.. 18.1971

adjust to changing environments as long as these

changes are not too sudden or extreme. Thisprocess is somewhat analogous to the biologicalconcepts of adaptation and to the physiologicalnotion of homeostasis, though in addition tomorphological, physiological and behavioural

factors humans have also developed social and

psychological processes of adaptation. Thus, whilethe body may adjust physiologically to increasing(but sub-lethal) levels of air pollution (forexample by inflammatory reaction of lung tissues),the human being as a social animal can play downhis concern over air pollution by stating "it's notas bad as in place X", or "the city may be pollutedbut my neighbourhood is clean"; or he may searchfor confirmation that the air pollution problemis really not all that bad, e.g. by eagerly acceptinga mollifying statement by a respected publicofficial or industrial representadve as to what isbeing done.Reactions like this, which involve psychological

and sociological processes that arc not as yet fullyunderstood, seem to playa vital role in helpingthe individual to cope with the many thousandsof environmental stimuli he receives every day.For they somehow guide him into patterning andevaluating these events. help him to maintain asatisfactory self image, assist him in dealing withcomplex and ambiguous situations and permit himto relate his own beliefs and actions to those ofhis friends and society in general.So the individual and the community seem

to be capable of tolerating increasing environ-mental stress when the stress is of a low order.The longer term effects of this process arc notknown but may be serious especially if theenvironmental stress effects are cumulative andsynergistic in impact. Rene Dubos (1967, 1968),an eminent microbiologist and humanist, is deeplyconcerned that not only do these adaptive mech-anisms provide a false sense of security (so thatwhen violent environmental change occurs we areill-suited to cope with them effectively), but alsothat society may become more tolerant of lowerorders of environmental stimulation and diversityso that the basic reactions to peace, solitude,beauty, variety and pollution will become dulled,with deleterious consequences to the dignity ofman's spirit and the quality of human values.

REASONS FOR INCORPORATING PUBLIC ATTITUDES

So why should managers bother to sound outpublic attitudes towards environmental decisions?

Apart from the obvious democratic principlesinvolved - the right for the public to be informedabout and to participate in environmental manage-ment decisions- there appear to be two majorreasons why the public pulse should be taken.The first is that in most if not all environmentaldecisions value judgments of amenity must be

made. The measuremenl of such values cannot bemade satisfactorily in monetary terms, as themarket place is unable to resolve such issues.Furthermore, the incidence (in both space andtime) of environmental side effects is not uniform,so certain groups of people are made better offat the expense of the values of others. Thus in ourimperfect society, it appears that the only meanswe have adopted to cope with the differential inci-dence of values is through the political forum, theproper workings of which require a broad expres-sion of public preferences.

A second reason for ascertaining public wantsis simply that many decisions as to the desirablelevels of environmental quality arc made byexperts who are working on the basis of imperfectscientific knowledge and largely on the assumptionof public preferences, or at least what they thinkpublic preferences ought to be.

lt is interesting to note in this connection thatmany present day conservationists believe that theonly salvation for the world is to inject a new setof values into society. This takes us back to thesecond lesson of the cow and the supergrass story,namely the design of a supercow. The impliedaim in the "new' conservation is to create a newbreed of man - a super-race of environmentallyconscious citizens living in harmony with naturein a recycling economy (Caldwell 1970). In thisconnection we must distinguish between environ-mental health and environmental amenity. Theformer is valued by all society, the latter predom-inantly by the middle class. To say that everybodyshould be in favour of environmental amenity isto impose middle class values on all, an actionthat would only be justifiable if the conversationmovement were linked to the goals of incomeredistribution and greater social equaBty.

We should seek to devise means whereby thepublic is able to make more conscious and delib-erate choices over environmental issues, wherethe probable effects in the widest possible senseare estimated for the largest possible number ofdifferent courses of action. In this way the total

O'RIORDAN: COMMUNITY ATTITUDES TOWARDS ENVIRONMENTAL RESOURCES 23

costs and gains and their spatial and temporarl

implications could be more adequately judged

before final decisions are made. This would

renuire a new form of participatory democracy.While the Commission of Inquiry or public hear-ing arc fairly effective devices, they are cumber-some and expensive procedures and thus can only

be used to resolve major public issues. In any

case the testimony of experts and advocate groups

does not necessarily represent wider communityattitudes which remain largely unsounded.

Somehow I think we shall have to develop better

linkages between the public and the decision

makers (politicians,planners, consultants, etc.) totry and create a continuous two~way flow com-munication. One flow would be 'inward', emanat-ing from the environmental managers. informing

the public of the wider issues and of alternative

courses of action. The other flow would form'outwards' from the community via representative

groups, opinion surveys, teach-ins and the like

where reactions to such proposals could beexpressed. Coupled with this there would needto be a broader environmental education pro-gramme in the schools, colleges and universitieswhere the background to environmental problemswould be more fully discussed. Thus public par-ticipation would be as much an educational deviceas a new experiment in democracy. These propo~sals may perhaps sound a bit fantastic,but we

already have communications techniques (tele-

vision, computerised simulation models, compu-terised voting) which have an enormous potential

in this field.

However. despite these innovations in communi-cations and institutional decision making, it wouldbe naive and unreaJistic to envisage mass publicparticipation. Apart from electoral voting (whenrarely more than 70% are involved) fewer than2% of the population is politically active. But

representative public groups would become moremore responsive in such a situation, and. in thesubsequent dialogue with the decision makers,would voice the preferences of their constituents.There is, of course, a paradox here in that whilecitizen participation is undoubtedly desirable,public opinion is difficult to guage accurately forthe reasons already described, and any proposal,no matter how carefully considered, will have itsopponents. But if there is wider and more accurateinformation concerning the issues, plus improved

means of allocating compensatory payments,decisions regarding the planning of the bio-social

environment would probably take no longer lhan

they do now and hopefully would be less conten-tious.

The present period of heightened environmentalconsciousness is not merely a fad; but it is notyet established on firm ground. For successfulenvironmental decisions to be made in the futureboth the public and lhe experts will have to makesacrifices. The public will have to reeognise thatto protect environmental resources means highertaxes and increased prices p]us greater effort inunderstanding the issues involved and being polit-ically response when the situation demands it. Theexpert will have to accept that his special trainingdoes not provide the answers, only the guidelinesfor public choice. Too often there is confrontationbetween segments of the public and the expert:too rarely is there a recognition that the two

groups are really part of the same team. As yetthe public hasn't really been given a chance torespond. The fact that there is already so muchconcern over man's use of his environmenta]resources, despite the various impediments coun-tering the expression of such concern, is all themore reason to break new ground.

REFERENCES

CALDWELL, L. K. 1970. En-/ironment and the shaping ofcivilisation. In Cooley, R. A.. anrl Wandesforde-Smith, G. (eds.) Congress and the environment.University of Washington Press, Seattle. pp. 244-260.

DARLING, F. F. 1951. The ecolc,gica1 approach to thesocial sciences. American Journal of Science 39:244-256.

DUBOS, R. 1967. Man adapting. Yale University Press.New Haven, Conn.

DUBOS, R. 1968. Man and his environment, adaptationsand ,-Iterations. In Smithsonian Institution. The fit-ness of mall's environment, Washington, D.C., pp.231-250.

GLACKEN, C. 1. 1965. The origins of the conservationphilosophy. In Burton, I., and Kates, R. W. (eds.),Readings ill resource management and cOI1.,ervation.University of Chicago Press. ChiC<1.go,pp. 158-163.

GLACKEN,C. J. 1967. Traces Oll a Rhodial1 shore. Univer-sity of California Press, Berkeley.

HUTH. H. 1957. Nature and the American. Three cen-turies of changing attitudes. University of CaliforniaPress, Berkeley.

LOWENTHAL,D. 1960. Nature and the American creed ofvirtue. Landscape 9: 24-26.

24 PROCEEDINGS OF THE NEW ZEALAND EcOLOGICAL SOCIETY, VOL. 18, 1971

LOW~NTIIAL, D, 1962, Not ~v~ry pro.pect pl~a.~. ~

What is our criterion for scenic beauty? Landscape12:18-23.

MdvER, 1. 1970. Urball water supply alternatives: per-ception and choice in Jhe Grand Basin, Ontario.University of Chicago, Department of GeographyResearch Series. '. -- "

NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES - NATIONAL RESEARCH

CoUNCIL, J966. Alternatives in water management.

Publication No. 1643, Washington, D.C.

NATIONALDEVELOPMENTCoUNCIL, 1971. Proceedings ofthe Physical Environment Conference. GovernmentPrinting Office, Wellington.

NATIONAL ACADEMY OF ScIENCES - NATIONAL RESEARCH

CoUNCIL,1968. Water and choice on the Colorado:An example of alternatives in water management.Publicatie,a No. 1689, Washington,D.c.

TUAN, Y. F.. 1967, Attitudes towards environment,themes and approaches. In Lowenthal, D. (ed.),Environmental perception and behaviour. Universityof, Chicago, Department of Geography ResearchSeries No. 109, pp. 4-17.

WHITE,G. F. 1966. The formation and role of publicattitudes. Jarrett, H. (e.J.). Environmental quality ina growing economy. John Hopkins Press, Baltimore,pp. 105-127.

WHITE, L. J. 1967. The historical roots of our ecologicalcrisis. Science 155: 1203-1207.