No (sociological) excuses for not going green: How do environmental activists make sense of social inequalities and relate to the working class?

Abstract

Some environmental activists occasionally use the argument that poverty is ‘no excuse’ for not going green and denounce discourses putting forward social conditions as unduly exculpatory. Employing participant observation among middle-class activists mobilising to diffuse environmental lifestyles in socially diverse suburbs near Paris (France), the article explores their relation to the working class and examines the consequences of their endeavours on local class relations. It describes the tension between their goal of mainstreaming environmental reflexivity and the stubborn existence of material inequalities and constraints. While their efforts are configured by a moral economy of environmental responsibility which assigns an undifferentiated moral obligation to consume sustainably to all individuals, they make sense of social differences by drawing on culturalist representations of poverty and folk social theories. These sense-making practices enhance rather than alleviate attributions of blame against working-class people and contribute to reinforcing the activists’ dominant symbolic position.

Risky plastics and the limits to consumer responsibilization

“…Through blame dynamics, corporations contain responsibility for plastic risk mitigation within households, which in turn reinforces the rollback of government authorities as guarantors of the public good (Cherrier and Türe, 2022). Blame is also in the discourses of antiplastic advocates and activists who assign an undifferentiated moral obligation to reject plastic to all individuals (Malier, 2021). Through blame, social groups who might not be able to modify their consumption habits are accused of polluting the oceans and exposing their household members to toxic plastics.…”

Is it sustainable consumption or performative environmentalism?

“…As green lifestyles become more prominent in both the political and cultural milieu, examining the class politics of sustainable consumption is an important research agenda. Several studies have established that sustainable consumption and green lifestyle activism are predominantly performed by middle-class, highly educated and White individuals (Alkon, 2012;Anantharaman et al, 2019;Kennedy and Givens, 2019;Malier, 2021). But, what does the performance of green consumption by these groups mean for other social groups and for social inequality more generally?…”

Social science as apologia

“…Hadrien Malier’s (2021) contribution to the special issue addresses the problem of how explanatory accounts travel via various media channels from academia to political organisations and social movements. It looks at how his own sociological reflections on the middle-class overrepresentation in French environmental movements were reported in the press and on social media and how they were interpreted by some readers as handy excuses working-class people could use for not adopting eco-friendly lifestyles.…”