Against the backdrop that most political economies across the globe need to promote transitions towards more environmentally sustainable public policies and economic practices, we ask what factors explain public support for and opposition to such trajectories among people living in different institutional and socio-economic contexts.
To study this, we used survey data on individual attitudes from the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) 2020 module on the environment. The dataset included a random sample of adult population in 28 countries. The analysis was organised in two steps. First, we examined whether improvement in living standards for people should now be prioritised over the preservation of nature for future generations, commonly referred to as the trade-off between economic growth and the environment. Next, we studied public support for and opposition to three specific environmental policy instruments: higher prices, higher taxes and decreased standard of living across numerous countries in the Global South and Global North. The countries differ greatly both in terms of human development, welfare systems and vulnerability to climate change. The motivation is to examine how these variations influence individual priorities in transition processes.
The analysis results showed that the correlation between individual-level variables and pro-environmental attitudes varies across countries, and the results from the regression models were only partially in line with previous literature in this field. Importantly, typical explanatory factors identified in previous studies using data from Europe and North America explain, only to some degree, the variation in attitudes in other parts of the world. The explanatory power of our models is particularly weak in the case of acceptance of environmental policy instruments that facilitate the transition to more sustainable societies in countries with low rankings on the Human Development Index.
The objective of the Sustainability Performances, Evidence and Scenarios (SPES) project, funded by the European Union’s Horizon Europe Programme, is to better understand the interconnections between economic growth, human flourishing, and sustainability. The ambition is to equip policymakers with information that will guide their strategies for achieving sustainable human development, using new evidence about past, present and future performances of the sustainability transition.
\nThe SPES project will aim to bridge productivity and growth with inclusiveness and environmental protection, to ensure shared prosperity and wellbeing for all. It will do so by focusing on five pillars of sustainable human development:
\nThe SPES project will tackle this question through extensive, collaborative research, focusing on the following four axes:
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