POTENTIAL FOR DEGROWTH: ATTITUDES AND BEHAVIOURS ACROSS 18 EUROPEAN COUNTRIES

Avoiding a whole-scale collapse of the civilisation-supporting ecosystems within this century will require a change in the social metabolism, as well as expectations, aspirations, behaviours and attitudes of the majority of the global population, especially in the Global North. In absence of the technological innovation to allow maintenance and expansion of the current energy utilisation by the global society, but without the collapse-inducing byproducts, the societies will require a transformation along the lines of a degrowth scenario. The main goal of this paper is to explore to what extent is environmentally motivated degrowth potential present among European populations on the level of attitudes and evaluation of behaviour. In order to do so we use the ISSP research module Environment survey data from 2011, analysing comparative findings for 18 European 'old' and 'new' democracies. Our findings indicate the prevalence of common awareness of environmental limits to growth among all participating European national populations, but a different potential to apply them in a degrowth scenario between 'richer' and 'poorer' states, as well as between younger and older European degrowthers.