A Day in a (Un)Sustainable Life is a 10-year research and policy project studying differences in individual perceptions of sustainable consumption around the globe. The project is a collaboration between Dr. David Alexander, Assistant Professor of Marketing at the University of St. Thomas, and the Net Impact student chapter at the University of St. Thomas’ Opus College of Business. Each year around Earth Day (April 22nd), we invite members of Net Impact chapters around the world to participate in the project by wandering around their communities with a digital camera and a journal. We are focused on Net Impact chapter members because they are a global group who have already developed individual perceptions of sustainable living practices. As they wander, participants take photographs of what they personally see as examples of the best and worst in sustainable living practices in their communities. As they compose their photos, participants capture their thoughts and feelings in their journal. They then share their photos and thoughts with the project.
2010 marked the first year of the project and saw contributions from India, Europe, and the U.S. Thirteen people contributed 61 photographs to the project with a wide range of subjects reflecting the diversity of perceptions of sustainable living. The bulk of the submissions can be viewed via Flickr.com at www.flickr.com/groups/adayinsustainability2010. To develop this summary of the 2010 project submissions, we looked at the photographs and their associated journal entries to identify the sustainable living practices being highlighted. As we reviewed the 2010 submissions, two broad themes emerged around consumption patterns. One set of sustainable living practices allowed people to maintain their current consumption patterns while seeking ways to increase pre- or post-consumption sustainability. A second set of sustainable living practices required people to change their current consumption patterns in order to achieve sustainability.
Consume the same
Among participants’ examples of sustainable living practices, we found four general practices that sought to increase sustainability without changing consumption patterns:
1) Increase sustainability of production & distribution
2) Take actions to offset the impact of one’s consumption
3) Take actions to repair the effects of one’s consumption
4) Increase recycling
Of course adopting these practices could be accompanied by changes in consumption, but such changes are not required to increase the sustainability of one’s consumption. For example, there were a number of submissions related to personal or community gardening which allowed people to take a more direct role in the production and distribution of the food they consume. Assuming sufficient yields, people are able to participate in these gardening activities while consuming at the same or even higher levels.
Among participants’ examples of unsustainable living practices, we found two general practices that were not being enacted even though they would not require changes in consumption patterns:
1) Increase recycling
2) Decrease littering
Particularly troubling to participants were the lack of recycling options in the US and people’s apparent unwillingness to take advantage of recycling options when they did exist.
Change consumption
Most of the general practices we found in participants’ submissions increased sustainability by requiring changes in individuals’ consumption patterns. Among participants’ examples of sustainable living practices, we found seven general practices seeking to increase sustainability while changing consumption:
1) Extend the usable life of a product (e.g., through re-use)
2) Buy less, use less
3) Restrict access to natural resources
4) Use shared and self-powered transportation options
5) Encourage society's sustainable consumption
6) Alter one's lifestyle to increase sustainable consumption
7) Alter one's consumption to reward businesses facilitating sustainable consumption
There were a number of submissions highlighting people’s efforts to reduce their consumption of resources (e.g., by taking public transportation or shopping second hand). There were also a number of submissions highlighting the need to change social norms in the US to increase expectations that individuals will adopt more sustainable living practices.
Among participants’ examples of unsustainable living practices, we found six general practices that were not being enacted perhaps because they require changes in consumption patterns:
1) Reduce over-consumption
2) Extend the usable life of a product (e.g., through re-use)
3) Be more careful in the pursuit of natural resources
4) Adopt more “Earth friendly” social norms
5) Make sustainable consumption less ambiguous
6) Reduce waste resulting from poor planning
Perhaps the most ironic example of unsustainable practices came from a photo taken at the Go Green Conference in Seattle where poor planning led the organizers to fill a room with energy gulping flat screen TVs so that attendees unable to get into the main conference room were able to view the presentations.
Sustainable Consumption in the US vs. outside the US
While the bulk of submissions were from participants in the US, we were able to collect some insights from outside the US. Perhaps most striking are the differences in social norms around recycling in the US vs. Europe. In Europe, recycling appears to have become much more integrated into individual behavior. This is much less true in the US where recycling options are more limited and recycling behavior is much more casual (e.g., people in the US often ignore distinctions between recycling bins for cans vs. bottles, mixing the contents of both).
Future Earth Days
We were very happy with the level of participation we were able to achieve in the first year of the project. In 2011, we are hoping to increase the participation of Net Impact members especially those outside the US. The 2010 submissions have given us a number of insights into what people perceive as sustainable living practices. In the coming years, we expect to extend these insights by identifying regional differences and changes in perceptions over time.
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