Encouraging Collective Action

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Ashford’s Integrated Alternatives Encouraging Encouraging Collective Action Collective Action Bradford University Rachel Macrorie & Liz Sharp The governance of domestic water & energy systems

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Ashford’s Integrated Alternatives. Encouraging Collective Action. The governance of domestic water & energy systems. Bradford University Rachel Macrorie & Liz Sharp. Ashford’s Integrated Alternatives. Presentation content. Local demand management policy perspectives - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

Transcript of Encouraging Collective Action

Page 1: Encouraging  Collective Action

Ashford’s Integrated Alternatives

Encouraging Encouraging Collective ActionCollective Action

Bradford University

Rachel Macrorie & Liz Sharp

The governance of domestic water & energy systems

Page 2: Encouraging  Collective Action

Ashford’s Integrated Alternatives

Presentation contentPresentation content

• Local demand management policy perspectives

• Resource users’ understandings & experiences

• How can we explain differing perspectives?

• A complementary approach

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Case StudyCase Study

Ashford’s Integrated Alternatives

• Domestic water & energy retrofit: Advice, easy & harder measures

• Trial in Kennington & Bybrook

• Roll-out across Ashford Borough to be funded by Ashford Carbon Fund

• 25% CO2 reduction & 10% water reduction in 60% properties & 60% CO2 reduction in 5% properties

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Ashford’s Integrated Alternatives

Research approachResearch approach

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Ashford’s Integrated Alternatives

‘Responsibility for delivering water efficiency is highly fragmented and ultimately depends upon the individual...user’ (AIWMS, 4-6)

Local policy perspectivesLocal policy perspectives

Governance Construction of the resource user

Regulatory approach

Passive – delegates decisions

Citizen Right to resource

Sharp, 2006

Economic approach

Active Individual consumer

Commodity

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Ashford’s Integrated Alternatives

Local policy perspectivesLocal policy perspectivesFacilitate user engagement:

‘...by making it simple and easy to do the right thing...[we need to give] people the means to [use resources wisely] without impacting dramatically on their lifestyles’

Behaviour change vs. technical/structural fix:

‘It’s the behaviour of the people that’s most important....if you improve the building, but provide absolutely no awareness to the benefits of that, they can be as wasteful ...as if they were in a really leaky house with lots of gaps between all the doors and windows’

Commercial governance:

‘the role for the public sector is..packaging up the various private sector offers ... in a systematic, community by community [way]’

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Ashford’s Integrated Alternatives

‘‘Savings at Home’ retrofitSavings at Home’ retrofit

More than 2,000 gadgets and advice, worth around £300 in total were given to participating residents to help save water, energy and money (AF press release)

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Ashford’s Integrated Alternatives

Resource users’ perspectivesResource users’ perspectives

Collective challenge:

‘The costs are part of it but environmentally, the fact that it’s going to run out...we’ve really got to do our bit to save what we can’

Information & encouragement:

‘This is what we should be doing more of, actually giving people information, encouraging them,

reducing our resource use’

Technical focus:

‘The visit was mainly around the technical

measures...we didn’t get onto any broader issues’

Goal-orientated behaviour:

‘I’m not trying to get down to a particular unit of

electricity usage per week’

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Ashford’s Integrated Alternatives

A B CAttitudes Behaviours ChoicesAttitudes Behaviours Choices

Explaining the differencesExplaining the differences

Shove 2010

Consumers ‘locked in’ to unsustainable resource-using practices by a complex set of interlinked factors

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Ashford’s Integrated Alternatives

Resource Efficiency AlternativesResource Efficiency Alternatives

Governance Construction of the resource user

Community approach:(engagement & contestation)

Active Citizen Right to communal resources

• Reliance on changing practices

• Indirect sustainability benefits

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Ashford’s Integrated Alternatives

Towards sustainable consumptionTowards sustainable consumption

Encourage public debate about resource use practices

Emphasise collective action as well as goal-orientated behaviour

Shift understanding of our roles and responsibilities: active user engagement & partnership working

Acknowledge different perspectives so society can renegotiate our demands on water & energy systems

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Ashford’s Integrated Alternatives

Encouraging Collective Action

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The governance of domestic water & energy systems

Thank youThank youAny comments or questions?Any comments or questions?