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FEDERAL STATE AUTONOMOUS EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTION

FOR HIGHER PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION

NATIONAL RESEARCH UNIVERSITY HIGHER SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS

St. Petersburg School of Social Sciences and Area Studies

BACHELOR'S PROJECT

Field of study: 39.03.01 Sociology

Degree programme: Sociology and Social Informatics

Eco-friendly communities of St. Petersburg: motivations and practices of participation

Ilona Igorevna Elizarova

Supervisor: Candidate of Sociological Sciences (PhD)

Y.N. Krupets

Saint Petersburg 2020



Content

• Introduction
• Chapter 1. Literature Review
• 1.1 Activism - its forms and purposes
• 1.2 Involvement in activism offline and online
• 1.3 Eco-activism and factors affecting people's attitudes towards it
• 1.4 The history and specifics of eco-activism in USSR and Russia
• Chapter 2. Methodology, methods, and empirical base of the research
• Chapter 3. Experience of Eco-activism in Saint-Petersburg: Results of an Empirical Analysis
• 3.1 Environmental involvement
• 3.2 Practices of Participation
• 3.3 Difficulties faced by activists and communities
• 3.4 Relationship with people around
• Conclusion
• References
• Appendices


Introduction

activism petersburg motivation

In recent years, environmental issues have become one of the most discussed and complex topics for the whole world and for modern Russian society particularly. Every day, an increasing number of people begin to pay attention to environmental problems, to be interested in the causes of their appearance and ways to prevent them. Often, seeing the lack of involvement of the authorities, interested people organize themselves to attract public attention and join efforts to solve these problems (Shiryaeva, & Lenskaya, 2017).

The increased attention of Russian citizens to environmental problems was influenced by two main reasons. On the one hand, civic identity in modern Russia is gradually being formed, and, according to studies, since 2011 the level of social activity of citizens, although quite slowly (about 1% per year), is increasing every year (Petukhov, V.V., Barash, Sedova, & Petukhov, R.V., 2014). The next reason that contributed to increasing the activity of citizens in environmental issues is the state initiative to devote 2017 to the problems of ecology and environmental protection. It is important to note that this decision was a consequence of the economic crisis in previous years, due to which many enterprises had to use old equipment, which subsequently caused harm to the environment. In 2017, each budget institution was to hold an event dedicated to environmental issues. A lot of different videos and films were created, there was a saturation of information with both citizens and the media. As a result, according to the Ministry of Natural Resources, in total in 2017, more than 33 thousand events took place in the country, bringing together almost 22 million participants. The main achievement of the year of ecology was called a successful attempt to draw the attention of citizens and mobilize them to preserve the environment. Further, the consolidation of the result was affected by the events of 2018 in Russia, which was designated the year of Volunteering, which also contributed to increasing the level of citizen involvement in solving socially significant problems.

Also, one of the global environmental problems in the Russian Federation is household waste. According to Rosprirodnadzor (Russian Committee for Nature Protection), an average of 400 kg of municipal solid waste per year is attributed to each Russian citizen (TASS, 2019). The only way out is recycling. There are a limited number of companies operating in the field of waste management or recycling. This is another reason that leads to an increase in the number of communities and civic initiatives.

The Russians began to speak more actively and openly about various eco-problems in the country, especially online (Holbraich, 2016). Russian activists and simply not indifferent citizens of different ages, users of various social networks share the news about any problem and its details, thus causing a public outcry. Then, when the number of discussions and dissatisfied citizens increases, petitions are sent to the competent authorities or committees, describing the dissatisfaction of citizens and the rationale for the problem. The petitions are followed by rallies and pickets calling on the authorities to help solve the problem or to draw attention to it. One of the examples of such activism is the SHIES (ØÈÅÑ) conflict when for more than a year activist from different cities have been conducting environmental protests against the construction of a landfill in the Arkhangelsk region near the Shies railway station. According to the plan, the landfill should have been designed to store solid household waste exported from Moscow. It was assumed that its construction will take place in a swampy area, which means a danger to the inhabitants of the region, as this can lead to pollution of surface and underground water sources. Besides, all pollution from the landfill can enter the Scandinavian countries through the northern rivers and the sea. The SHIES conflict is one of the most high-profile over the past few years on the Internet for several reasons. Firstly, the disclosure of this conflict has become enormous, since protests against the construction of a landfill took place in 30 regions of the country, and, according to statistics, 34 of the 56 environmental protests that took place in the second quarter of 2019 were dedicated to this conflict (Center for Social and Labor Rights, 2019). Another reason for such publicity of the conflict is that the activists took a lot of time and effort to draw the attention of the authorities to this problem, which caused a lot of protests and actions.

However, speaking of the conflict on the SHIES, we are talking about situational eco-activism, when it is important to solve the problem here and now. Regarding regular activism, many communities and activists in our country often encounter misunderstandings from the authorities and law enforcement agencies and unwillingness to meet them, but citizens continue to promote their ideas and values, despite the difficulties. That is why it is important to study this topic.

In this regard, the research question of my thesis is "For what reasons do eco-activists engage in environmental activity and what are the features of eco-activism in St. Petersburg?". The aim of this research is to identify and find out these reasons as well as to study the practice of their participation in eco-friendly communities.

The main tasks identified to achieve this goal are:

1) find out the reasons for involvement in eco-activism.

2) describe the practices of participation of eco-activists in eco-friendly communities.

3) learn about the possible difficulties faced by activists and communities during their activities.

4) learn about the relations of eco-friendly communities with authorities and people around.

The object of this study is activists from St. Petersburg of different ages who take part in the activities of eco-friendly communities. The subject of the study is their motivation and practice of participating in the activities of these communities.

The empirical basis of this study consists of 14 semi-structured leitmotif interviews. The informants were male and female eco-activists of different ages participating in the activities of various communities of St. Petersburg.

This paper consists of three main parts: the first chapter is devoted to the analysis of the literature on forms and purposes of activism, factors of involvement into activism online and offline, eco-activism and factors affecting people's attitudes towards it and also the history and specifics of Soviet and Russian eco-activism; the second chapter describes the methodology, methods and empirical base of research; the last chapter describes the results of the study.



Chapter 1. Literature Review

This chapter successively examines the forms and goals of activism, the reasons for participating in activism, eco-activism, and various classifications of eco-communities and environmental behavior, people's attitudes to eco-activism, as well as the history and specifics of Soviet and Russian eco-activism.

1.1 Activism - its forms and purposes

Activism (or civic activism) refers to the self-organized activity of people uniting to realize a common goal, regardless of state power (Petukhov, 2014). Such activities can be aimed at changes in many different areas of society, for example, in the economic, political, environmental, social, and others.

Civic activism may vary in purpose and form of organization. In terms of goals, activism is divided according to spheres, but sometimes specific activist activities can touch upon the problems of several spheres of society. The most popular and massive “goals” of activists at different times are the struggle for the rights of any social groups (for example, feminism or the struggle for queer rights) and dissatisfaction with the existing state and social system. One of the young, but very common areas of activism is environmental protection, which now also includes fairly young areas such as "conscious consumption" or "Zero Waste" and vegan/vegetarianism, which are also referred to eco-activism or environmentalism.

In terms of the form of organization, there are several main forms of expression of activism that are mentioned in the Constitution of the Russian Federation. Among them are rallies and pickets, marches and demonstrations, as well as peaceful meetings without weapons. Another special form of expression of civic activism is civil disobedience. Civil disobedience is a deliberate violation of the law to create public outcry and pay attention to the problem, as well as presenting requirements to the legislative bodies to amend the legislation (Thoreau, 1996). It is worth noting that this form of expression of discontent is applicable and effective only based on such a social model as an “open society”. This is a society in which rational changes are discussed and compared, first of all, following the current goals and needs of citizens, and not just with the constitutional order (Thoreau, & MacLeish, 2001).

Also, along with these forms of expression of activity, there is a new and popular form in the modern world. This form of civic activism, unusual due to the principles of its placement, is digital activism (Obar, Zube, & Lampe, 2012). It is usually expressed, for example, in writing petitions, letters of protest and also being a member of ad-hoc groups [groups which are formed or arranged when it is necessary for a particular purpose] (Basheva, 2020).

1.2 Involvement in activism offline and online

In the context of the involvement of people in activism, it is important to note that researchers discussed various mechanisms of this phenomenon even before the appearance of activism on the Internet.

Initially, it was believed that to attract someone to activism, it was necessary to establish and have “strong ties” (McAdam, 1986). One of the key works devoted to the discussion of this problem is research, the main purpose of which was to explain the participation of people in social movements and describe the mechanisms that influence a person to make such a decision (Passy, & Giugni, 2001). To do this as accurately and correctly as possible, the authors tried to combine explanations of the structural and individual levels. In the course of the study, a survey was conducted with the participation of members of a large activist organization. As a result of this survey, it was possible to establish that participation and the intensity of participation in social events are based not only on strong connections but also on the participant's ideas about specific activities, interests, and involvement. It was also found that for a person, before deciding to involve in activism, there is another important factor. This factor is the person's idea of ??how he can be useful and effective in this activity and what contribution he can make. In other words, if a person did not have any knowledge of a common problem, then even the presence of strong ties did not contribute to his participation.

As for digital activism, the issue of involving people in this type of activism has been raised by many researchers from different angles. The fact is that only a few will not agree that the phenomenon of digital activism is unique. However, the main and most obvious reason is that the Internet unites almost all spheres of society. There is some disagreement as to when the Internet user becomes involved in any activity, for example, some believe that one “likes” per post on a certain topic is enough for the user to become “activists” (Tyutyunji, 2012). Others believe that just “like” means nothing and that you can talk about involvement in digital activism when a person, for instance, signs online petitions and distributes them through their social networks (Matveeva, 2018).

Despite these differences, there are many researchers who in their works share the point of view that the Internet has a very beneficial effect on the work and existence of activist organizations. For example, Lim (2012), in her work on Internet activism, examines a case study of members of the opposition movement in Egypt. The author describes the activities of various opposition organizations, including one of the largest called “Kefaya”, during several riots, and in the course of the study concludes that for several years only those organizations that used social networks were successful. By highlighting their activities and grievances by creating communities on Facebook and Twitter, activists were able to expand the scope of their activities by involving new dissatisfied citizens, as well as pre-plan riot scenarios. In the end, it is important to note that these organizations managed to translate their activities from online space into reality.

A similar effect of the impact of the Internet on civic activism is described in a study whose purpose was to find out if social networks are a good mechanism for engaging their regular users in activism (Galera, del Hoyo Hurtado, & Muñoz, 2014).

An online survey was conducted in a popular social network, according to which as many as 80% of users were first involved in activism via the Internet, and they continued to engage in it in real life. As the main reasons for such strong participation, the author calls the emotional and social response from users.

However, not in all cases, the creation of special communities in the online environment has contributed to improving the effectiveness of offline social movements. Like the studies mentioned earlier, this work is devoted to defining the role of the Internet in maintaining and organizing activism (Gladarev, & Lonkila, 2012). In their article, the authors compare the influence of two social networks, Facebook and VKontakte, on the activities of similar campaigns against urban development projects. But unlike the results of the previous studies mentioned, in this case, the role of social networks was limited. Community members mostly used them only to express their points of view regarding the problem, building collective ties, and eventually reaching consensus. Amazingly, fewer people reached offline activity.

After reviewing many various studies on this issue, we can safely assume that on the whole, activism more often involves those people who are somehow personally affected by a particular problem. That is, most users began to participate in social activities and became interested only in those situations that they resonated with. Thus, even though at first glance, activists quickly mobilize in an online environment and form a community, almost every one of them was involved in this activity for their special reasons that could be empathy, identification with a problem, a conflict of values, or simple solidarity. Only then, in second place, many have reasons such as the credibility of the campaign leader, creativity, and other collective values.



1.3 Eco-activism and factors affecting people's attitudes towards it

Eco-activism (or environmentalism) is a self-organized activity of people aimed at improving the environmental situation around them, creating a more comfortable living environment for their own and subsequent generations. These concepts are closely related to the concept of "ecoculture". Gakaev and Chataeva (2015) determined ecoculture as an inherited experience of a human interacting with the environment, which is helpful for a healthy lifestyle life, sustainable socio-economic development, environmental security of the country, and each person.

There is a classification of types of environmental behavior, made by Stern (2000):

1. Environmental activism - participation in environmental communities, rallies

2. Non-activist public behavior - donating money to environmental communities, signing petitions, willingness to pay environmental taxes

3. Private eco-activism - environmental behavior in everyday life, everyday life

4. Making environmental decisions in professional activity.

There are also several basic types of classification of ecological communities. For example, Dunlap and Mertig share the types of environmental activism according to their political orientation, which can be neutral, reformist, or radical, as well as according to the form of civic action - scientifically oriented, reformist and protest. (Dunlap, & Mertig, (Eds.), 2014). Also, other Western authors often highlight in their works such a form of environmental activism as "ecological diplomacy" and call it the leading form in the context of globalism.

It is known that for Russia, such phenomena as eco-activism or environmentalism are quite young, and therefore the approach of Russians to environmental problems is fundamentally different from the western one since conscious consumption is still at the initial stage of development. The environmental movement in Russia originated in Soviet times since it was then that the mass mobilization of citizens was commonplace. Studying the Soviet and Russian environmental movements, Henry identifies three types of public organizations in the field of ecology:

1) organizations of the local community - informal small volunteer initiative groups that do not receive money for their activities;

2) professional scientists who are engaged in solving global environmental problems at the international level, and can receive funding from foreign partners;

3) organizations that enjoy government support - do not have international support but have funding from state or municipal authorities (Henry, 2010).

Based on this classification, it can be said that in my study the main focus will be on the first and third type communities. It is important to find out the motivation of those activists whose activities can be characterized to some extent as voluntary and not professional, as well as to learn more about relations with the authorities.

An important aspect of the activity of eco-activists is not only relations with the authorities, but also relations with surrounding people. Thus, it is important to study what affects people's attitudes toward eco-activism.

First of all, we will consider the relationship between humans and the environment. Many studies on this topic show a general tendency, which is that often people who live closer to nature lead a more conscious lifestyle and are more reverent and accurate about the environment. For example, one study describes people who began to live in nature and eco-settlements (Pickerill, 2018). Their lifestyle became eco-friendly, they tried to reduce consumption and do whatever was in their power to preserve their environment.

But it is important to note that there are also groups that have not so easily accepted changes in their lifestyle. Chan (2013) in his work on the analysis of the so-called "green hotel" describes the behavior and attitude of different people who have been living in such a hotel for some time. People, by the type of their attitude to environmental problems and ideas about caring for nature, were secretly divided into 3 completely different groups. The first group, as the author himself called it "ecologically apathetic," included those hotel residents who believed that any environmental problems should not concern them, but the state and the industrial sector. The second group, the “environmental group”, is similar to typical modern consumers who consider ecology fashionable and are willing to pay several times more for environmentally friendly products and products. There was also a third group, “sensitive”, the main thesis of which was a lack of time to change their lifestyle to a more environmentally friendly one, although they regret the existing environmental problems.

Another type of group was described in the work on creating an ecosophical ñommunity whose members were taught an environmentally friendly lifestyle (Anderson, 2017). In the course of the activity of such a community, the hostility of community members to other people who are not members of it began to be clearly expressed. The participants began to feel their superiority over the rest of society, although there was no negative attitude towards them.

Perhaps this was since they were able to change their habits quite quickly, and began to live “right”, although their actions were strictly local, in contrast to the participants in the study on ecotourism in Thailand (Walter, 2009). People living in many Asian countries are somewhat dependent on external factors, including the state of the environment and the ocean. So, in Thailand, there was a movement whose members were educating tourists about the ocean ecosystem, environmental efforts, local culture, and traditional livelihood activities. It is interesting to note that there was also an environmental movement in Thailand in which Buddhist monks were mentors (Darlington, 1998). Thanks to this, this eco-movement had many adherents since a sufficient part of the population is religious.

As for city dwellers, their commitment to an ecological lifestyle is often forced. In most cases, it becomes popular only when the scale of the problems caused by industrial achievements increases and becomes noticeable to a larger number of citizens, and it begins to cause any discomfort. One study describes the critical situation in Beijing in 2008 related to air pollution and the actions were taken by the authorities to resolve this issue (Xu, 2017). Despite the criticality of the situation, people did not come together to demand that the authorities resolve this issue, but the media came together. It was they who started writing about the pollution problem and caused a public outcry, during which some plants were moved to more distant places from the city.

Such an environmental situation, due to a large number of factories, exists not only in the cities of China but also in many other countries. Therefore, the concepts of eco-cities were developed (Pow, 2018). Eco-city projects are developed locally to best meet political and economic goals. In general, the idea of eco-cities is based on observing the urban principles of the “right” cities, which will contribute to environmental, social, and economic improvements (Cugurullo, 2016).

I must say that the concept of eco-cities is not the only and certainly not the easiest way to make the city comfortable and clean. Often city activists are engaged in urban landscaping. This trend in eco-activism is one of the most common for the urban environment. Laage-Thomsen and Blok (2020) in their article describe the relations of members of the green community with the authorities. It is important to note that this direction is also one of the most "harmless" since the activities of which members of green communities are engaged are welcomed by everyone and considered to be a "good deed."

By analyzing and comparing the above works, we can say that basically, people tend to take care of their place of residence. That is, people who live closer to nature, outside the city, are less often limited only to the house and do not separate themselves from nature. When urban residents, on the contrary, are more likely to change their attitude to the environment when it becomes a necessary measure.



1.4 The history and specifics of eco-activism in USSR and Russia

As mentioned earlier, Russian eco-activism is a very young phenomenon and originated in Soviet times, and more precisely in the early 60s, during the "thaw". According to Khaliy (2008), it was a very favorable time for such an initiative, since there were no departments in the state that would deal with the real solution of environmental problems, and not just study them. Initially, the main ecologically active group was students. It was the students who were the first to organize squads that fought against poachers and other people who damage the nature. The environmentalist activities of the squads gradually expanded, new participants and initiative groups appeared, for example, protecting forests, lakes, opposing the construction of environmentally hazardous enterprises (Yanitsky, 2015).

Then Soviet eco-activism took root and began to involve more and more people in connection with the Chernobyl disaster. It was this event that influenced the so-called greening of the consciousness of many people and made them look at the environment through another prism.

In general, eco-activists interacted with the authorities for quite a long time and successfully, but after the collapse of the Soviet Union, their relations began to change for the worse. The main priority of the new authorities was the restoration of the economy and the construction of a new state. Environmental issues have faded into the background, which has led to the fact that representatives of environmental communities are no longer listening. But a complete change in the vector of action of environmentalists was the emergence of government organizations whose activities were contrary to the ideas of NGOs. To protect the interests of the ruling elite, government organizations had to seize the initiatives of activists. It was this that led to the fact that eco-activists began to focus not on the authorities, but ordinary citizens and their loyalty (Khaliy, 2008).

If we compare the trends of post-Soviet eco-activism and the activism of modern Russia, then you can see many preserved trends. The main similarity is that, like in the post-Soviet era, the activities of eco-activists are more oriented towards the population, but this happens for a different reason. If in the early 90s this was due to a change in power and the political structure of the country, now it is due to a decrease in confidence in the government and, as a result, the desire of citizens to act independently (Petukhov, VV, Barash, Sedova, & Petukhov, RV, 2014).

Às for the composition of eco-communities, initially they were students of biological, geographical, and soil universities, who, due to special education, considered themselves professionals and placed themselves above others (Usacheva, 2011). But with the advent of new environmental problems, intelligence also became a part of Soviet environmental organizations, namely, creative people, doctors, scientists (Khali, 1992). Gradually, the “barrier” of entry into the eco-organization has weakened, and in modern Russia, it was not only people with special education or status that began to deal with environmental issues.

It is also important to note the fact that behind the scenes eco-activism is associated precisely with young people, one of the reasons for which may be the origins of eco-activism in our country. On the other hand, youth is the most active group ready for change (Heger, A.E., & Heger, S.A., 2018).

Based on these features of Soviet and post-Soviet activism, it will be interesting to compare the current practices of the interaction of eco-activists with the authorities and the nature of their activities, as well as to learn about the composition of participants in eco-communities and their characteristics.



Chapter 2. Methodology, methods, and empirical base of the research

A qualitative methodology was chosen to conduct this study. The study is considered to be qualitative if the data for this study were obtained by qualitative methods, and the information is contained in words, not in numbers (Straus and Ñorbin, 2007). The main advantage of a qualitative methodology is that it allows you to find out the opinion of an informant based on his personal experience. (Semenova, 1998).

As a method, a semi-structured leitmotif interview was chosen. This method allows you to follow the story of the informant, ask clarifying questions during the conversation, thereby identifying important points for research and revealing the topic in more detail. Also, one of the main advantages of this method is that it allows you to focus on a specific aspect of the informant's activities.

In the framework of this work, the topic of eco-activism and its various components were studied, such as the biography of informants, the history of their involvement in environmental issues and their motivation, difficulties encountered by informants at the beginning of their journey, their activities within the community, difficulties of communities, relations with authorities and surrounding people who are not related to the environment, as well as plans related to the environment.

Initially, it was assumed that the informants will be participants in the largest separate waste collection community in St. Petersburg, “Razdelniy Sbor”, (Separate Collection). Then, to avoid obtaining uniform data, it was decided to shift the focus from participants in a particular community to participants from different communities with different lengths of participation in activism to get a more complete and diverse picture of activist practices and the specifics of activism in St. Petersburg.

At the beginning of the recruiting of informants, I had to choose the community which could help me with the list of informants. The choice of communities was based on two key criteria. The first criterion was the diverse activities of the community in which the informant is involved. To understand this, I looked for the mentions of any offline events in official community groups. The second criterion was how “live” the community was. Active maintenance of the community page and regularity of publications was supposed. The same criteria were taken into account to select informants found by the snowball method.

Thus, the first two communities which matched the criteria were “Razdelniy Sbor”, (Separate Collection), and “Musora Bolshe Net”, (Garbage No More). Since the “Razdelniy Sbor” community did not reply to messages, it was decided to contact the next community, “Musora Bolshe Net”. The community president was asked to share the contacts of the most active participants, both volunteers, and organizers. There were accounts only of those people who were interested in participating in the interview or were simply ready to help. Then, after conducting several interviews with members of this community, I asked them to share the contacts of their familiar activists. Thus, we can say that the entrance to the community was carried out vertically, and the “snowball” method was used for the subsequent recruitment of informants.

Regarding the specifics of communities, almost everything is directly or indirectly related to the problems of informed consumption and waste reduction. Among the communities of which the respondents are part were a separate waste collection, mobile waste collection, landscaping, conscious fashion, education of neighborhood communities, as well as the enlightenment of children in the children's ecological camp.

From the very beginning, the sample size was not determined and depended on theoretical saturation. As a result, the empirical base consisted of 14 interviews with an average duration of 75 minutes. The respondents were women and men eco-activists of St. Petersburg aged 25 to 48 years. A gender balance was observed since the chosen topic is not related to any gender specifics (Tindall, Davies, & Mauboules, 2003). As for age - it was not a criterion for the selection of informants, but during the recruiting process it turned out that mainly environmental activists in St. Petersburg were adults.

Recruiting respondents occurred on the VK network. In connection with the coronavirus pandemic, all interviews, except for 3 of them, went via Skype and Zoom audio calls, as these sites are equipped with a built-in conversation recording, which all respondents were also aware of. It is worth noting that 3 interviews were conducted and provided by my colleague Inna Prokusheva, who is a second-year student. During the project “Civil and Social Activism: Initiatives of Grassroots Cities in St. Petersburg”, we studied the motivation of eco-activists involved in garbage collection in St. Petersburg. For most informants, eco-activist activity is not basic and does not generate income. Some informants work both remotely and in person, but despite parallel employment, many of them are the creators of various environmental initiatives.

As for the additional socio-demographic characteristics, most of them have higher education, and some do not even have one, and half of the informants have two or more children.

List of respondents

	Sex	Age	Experience in eco-activism (in years)	Type of interview	Interview duration (in minutes)
Respondent 1	Male	33	13	Skype	63
Respondent 2	Female	38	3	Skype	64
Respondent 3	Male	38	14	Skype	148
Respondent 4	Ìale	38	3	Skype	69
Respondent 5	Female	25	1.5	Skype	55
Respondent 6	Female	38	15	Zoom	67
Respondent 7	Male	48	6	Face-to-face	95
Respondent 8	Female	43	4	Face-to-face	50
Respondent 9	Male	38	6	Face-to-face	104
Respondent 10	Female	32	12	Skype	113
Respondent 11	Female	39	8	Skype	71
Respondent 12	Male	27	8	Skype	65
Respondent 13	Female	29	4	Skype	43
Respondent 14	Male	31	1	Skype	55



Before the interview, a guide was developed. It was tested through two pilot interviews and then adjusted. The guide contains 6 blocks: 1) The eco-community in the city, 2) The beginning of activism, 3) The practices of eco-activism, 3) The state, 4) The attitude of friends, 5) Plans for the future. (Annex#1)

Data collection was carried out during March and April 2020. Further, for the analysis of the data, the interviews were transcribed, and then the interview texts were processed using open coding. This method allows highlighting in the conversation the main topics that were discussed by the informant and then compare the codes from different interviews with each other. As a result, it is possible to identify the broader categories that were encountered in all interviews, and based on this, identify general or differing trends (Strauss and Corbin, 2007).



Chapter 3. Experience of Eco-activism in Saint-Petersburg: Results of an Empirical Analysis

This chapter is devoted to the results of the analysis of empirical material obtained during data collection. The results are divided by topic and step by step describe the involvement of informants in the environment, their motivation, the practice of their participation, the difficulties faced by activists and communities, and their relations with the authorities and citizens.

3.1 Environmental involvement

The first task was to identify the reasons for the involvement of informants in an eco-activist activity. Everyone clearly remembers the moment when they became actively interested in ecology. Many informants note that, until a certain point, informants had nothing to do with ecology. But at some point, interest in environmental problems appeared and turned out to be quite strong, as they began to try to learn more about it on their own.

“Às part of my initiative, once I watched the film“ Garbage ”, well, I just got carried away with this topic, just read some posts, and so on and movies and this film impressed me quite a lot. There was already some kind of awareness and understanding that we are part of the biological system, and that the planet is our home, and that it is not so big, and that our resources are limited, and if we don't do anything, the situation will be very soon it will be very deplorable. ” (Interview 2, Female, 38 years old)

“This, probably, was connected with the crisis of 30 years. At this moment, people are rethinking what they are doing, why they are doing it, why, and what they generally want to fix in this world. And I realized that environmental awareness is one of those solutions that suit me because it matters to me how my country lives, how my planet lives, and now the eco-community gives it a variety of solutions.” (Interview 11, Female, 39 years old)

There are also those informants whose involvement in eco-activism was “gradual”. This refers to those activists whose educational or professional activities were previously associated with the natural sciences, geography, and sometimes directly with the environment. Among them were those who remembered their childhood or school years. Informants said that they always loved the lessons of biology or ecology and thought about the state of the environment, and when they grew up, they realized that they could do something useful for nature. In this case, the respondents themselves consider their enthusiasm for eco-activism a logical consequence of their main activity.

“Initially, from school I was interested in ecology, then I received my second education at the Institute of Ecology in Herzen. I have always loved biology at school, it's been interesting since childhood.” (Interview 1, Male, 33 years old)

“I graduated from the Hydrometeorological Institute, I am a hydrologist and hydro-ecologist. Then she entered the Arctic-Antarctic Institute, worked there, and then taught at the Polar Academy. Later I went through a retraining for teaching ecology and nature management. Then I went on maternity leave, quit the research institute, and now there is a lot of free time, and I took up environmental activities.” (Interview 8, Female, 43 years old)

“I had a wonderful book in my childhood, the Planet Earth encyclopedia, and quite a lot has been written about ecology. It described how the Earth's ecosystem works. I was so interested in this, and in the natural sciences too, that I later decided to become an ecologist.” (Interview 12, Male, 27 years old)

Many informants to get acquainted with environmental problems were inspired by someone else's example. In their narratives, informants spoke only about positive examples of other people. In this case, the positive example for informants were those people who inspired them with their way and attitude of life, a view of the world, as well as those people who shared common values ??with the informant.

“In 2011-12 I became an observer in the elections. Then one day I got into the open space at Dostoevsky, various projects come there. There came "Garbage. More. No" to hold an annual party, and more people came to them than they expected, and there were not enough mugs. I remember at some point I say: “Oh, listen so you can get these glasses like under the coffee.” I remember that the activist reacted like this: “What?! Paper cups at an environmental community party ??”. Well, that is, laughter, laughter, but after that, I realized that it was funny for me, but people lived this way.” (Interview 11, Female, 39 years old)

“During my studies at the university I made friends with Masha Sinichka from Eco-minded, this is a VERY energetic person! We loved to hang out with our mutual friend, and she kept taking all the empty bottles with her all the time, and it made me start to do it too.” (Interview 12, Male, 27 years old)

“I have one good friend, she probably pushed me. One day I just went for a joke with her to a separate gathering, looked at all this, and it started”. (Interview 14, Male, 31 years old)

These examples are evidence of what McAdam (1986) wrote about in his study. For many informants, the primary cause of involvement in eco-activism was their acquaintances or friends, which indicates the importance of the role of “strong ties” in engaging in activism.

It is important to mention that many of the informants note that they became interested in environmental issues at an adult and conscious age. In their narratives, informants associate the appearance of interest in ecology with the appearance of children. It was at this moment that the realization of a new responsibility came, not only for themselves but also for their children. Then the informants began to think about whether they could somehow improve the living conditions of their children, and therefore began to get involved in eco-activist activities and change their established habits, including to set an example for their children from an early age.

“The motivation for doing something and introducing some changes for me was the fact that I am, as it were, the mother of three children. That is, I have three daughters, and I also think about their future and how to improve the environmental situation in general and for all generations, and for my children in particular ”(Interview 2, Female, 38 years old)

“Sooner or later, after 50-70 years, all these natural riches that we still have now, then may not be. Even if I do not see it, I would not want my children to live to see it. I have such a purely parental approach - I wish my children the best. I'm not just verbally wanting, but I take the resources that I have and do my best to have this “best”.” (Interview 3, Male, 38 years old)

“Definitely children. Maybe it is enough for our century, but something must remain after us. You can earn millions for your family, but if the eco-system is destroyed, it is useless.” (Interview 6, Female, 38 years old)

Thus, if we return to the question of motivation and the reasons for changing the lifestyle, the appearance of children turned out to be one of the key points in involving informants in eco-activism. It is important to mention that on the global agenda, eco-activism is considered to be a youth movement (Melnikov, 2019). This study shows that eco-activism is not only characteristic of youth and that adult activism has special goals, and for many, it becomes the “parental path” of eco-activism.

Having received informants' answers to the question of what eco-activism means for each of them, it was possible to identify other reasons for their involvement. Other motivators included a sense of duty and a desire to take care of the planet, a desire to inspire more and more people to be an example, and to be useful to others, as well as the fact that eco-activism is a good way to meet interesting people. Also, many said that for them eco-activism is not just some kind of activity, but first of all a full and very important part of their life.

“This is relaxing. I spend my free time like that, relax. <...>. First of all, it's fun. You can communicate well with interesting people. Secondly, you really understand that you bring some benefit to others, benefit yourself, benefit nature. I know a lot of people who also have a rest like that.” (Interview 1, Male, 33 years old)

“For me, this is a piece of my life. The piece is significant, the piece is large. This is the maintenance of our planet, the maintenance of the order in which one wants to live. “I want to enjoy the world so that everything is clean, beautiful.” (Interview 10, Female, 32 years old)

“For me, this is a mix of personal and global. That is, I am a citizen of the planet, I am responsible for what I consume, how I consume, what ecological footprint remains from me. I try to do this for myself and for my inner circle. This is as if personal. And global - I clearly understand that the planet is one and, accordingly, the plus-minus problems are the same everywhere.” (Interview 11, Female, 39 years old)

None of the informants mentioned reasons that could characterize the activities of activists as a protest. This is consistent with the conclusion of Khaliy (1992) that often the goals pursued by environmental activists are altruistic.

Interestingly, almost all informants have introduced various environmental practices into their daily lives. Among these practices, separate collection and subsequent processing of garbage, the desire to minimize the consumption of clothes and energy, the use of second-hand and various sharing services, and more. It can be said that this is precisely the reason and confirmation that eco-activism is indeed an important part of the life of informants.

“Directly in my specifics - I go to second-hands, dress there, hand over clothes for recycling. That is, everything that relates to my activity, I really practice and implement all this myself.” (Interview 5, Female, 25 years old)

“I try to buy products with a minimum of packaging, I go with my little fruit bags. In general, I try to buy shops where you can come with your own packaging. Well, another separate collection and plant nutrition. I'm not wasting water in vain and buying energy-saving light bulbs.” (Interview 6, Female, 38 years old)

“My husband and I have a complete set of eco-bags and eco-bags, we don't have plastic bags at home. Then we have a box for paper, we collect glass and plastic separately, because we have put containers near the entrance. Separately, we collect tetrapack, metal, and we donate all this to shares of separate collection, well, this is what it is. With organic waste it is still hard, but we have a chopper at home.” (Interview 11, Female, 39 years old)

Thus, it is obvious that the practices and environmental behavior of informants can be immediately attributed to two types identified by Stern (2000). In this case, this is the first type - “real eco-activism” and participation in eco-communities, and the third type - “private eco-activism” and environmentally friendly behavior. Judging by the informants' narratives, the initial eco-practice for all of them was just participation in eco-communities, and only then, in the process of immersion in the topic, they began to change their habits to more environmentally friendly ones.

Also speaking about the topic of habits - according to the informants, it is the main difficulty that they encountered at the beginning of their experience. Since all informants are adults with an established lifestyle and habits, for many, immersion in the environment has also become a huge work on themselves and leaving the comfort zone. However, along with changing habits, many called this difficulty as a lack of knowledge about the environment and what is considered right.

“The main problem is a small amount of knowledge and a low level of environmental education in our country. Because of this, all the problems. Some cannot bring a bag of garbage to the site, others go to all kinds of environmental lures, eco-shops and the like, and think that they are doing something useful.” (Interview 1, Male, 33 years old)

“Actually, there were quite a lot of difficulties, starting with the fact that at home you start sorting garbage. For me, the first month was just shocking, when I didn't understand where to put it all, I understood the markings, I began to study some types of plastic, what is being processed, what is not being processed, where is it taken at all. This is generally quite a difficult period when you change your habits, your usual way of life, when you bring something new. It takes time and resources, it is necessary to sort this out somehow, implement it. These are also certain obstacles and work on oneself.” (Interview 2, Female, 38 years old)

“These difficulties have not yet been fully overcome until now, it is that you are still different from others, and this dissimilarity of very people, well, at the first stage, stops. People begin to look at and disrupt the dissimilarity. These are purely psychologically even complex things.” (Interview 11, Female, 39 years old)

Thus, according to informants, a lot of motivation and willpower is needed to go through different difficulties at the beginning of the journey and make environmental practices a daily norm.

3.2 Practices of Participation

The next task was to identify what practices activists carry out in community activities, whether there are any differences between communities and their participants, what difficulties informants encountered as participants and organizers of communities, and what role relations with authorities play.

Based on the informants' stories, many eco-activists are people with higher education, wealthy from secondary and above, as well as an active lifestyle. Many informants have two higher educations, work remotely, and can afford to devote time to environmental activities, and are also involved in other types of activities.

«In general, I participate a lot: I vote for animals and go to the anti-fur march, now there will be a march for animal rights on May 1. I'm going to animal shelters.” (Interview 6, Female, 38 years old)

“I am not only involved in environmental projects, in fact. I'm simultaneously involved in the promotion of donation, urban defense, and, well, environmental education too.” (Interview 9, Male, 38 years old)

According to informants, their activities as participants in eco-friendly communities are very diverse: many have social media pages on their communities, at the same time they are eco-speakers at various venues, organize various events (events, festivals, quizzes), some of them even implement their projects. At the same time, activists note that in general there is no competition in the urban eco-community. Even though eco-communities differ in scale, objectives, and practices, most of them have a common ideology. The informants said that the communities are trying to support each other, because, firstly, they have one global goal, and secondly, "there will be enough problems for everyone." Some cannot attribute themselves to any one community, because they interact with different ones, but they have different roles.

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