Green Distractions? Examining the Rise of the Personal Responsibility Frame

• In Event: US Interest Group Tactics, Framing, and Influence

Abstract

Americans take a range of voluntary actions—such as recycling waste, buying “green” products, and limiting meat consumption—in the hope of reducing their “carbon footprints.” As we demonstrate in a recent paper, mainstream environmental organizations made the strategic framing decision in the mid-1980s to heavily promote this type of consumer behavior. This personal responsibility frame displaced more expressly political, collective action frames.

In this conference paper, we develop a theoretical framework that explains the causes and timing of its rise. Our framework—which is part of an ongoing book project—distinguishes a pragmatic group tradition from a more ideologically inflexible prefigurative tradition. We discuss why the mainstream environmental movement and associated organizations—namely, the Sierra Club—have adopted the pragmatic tradition and note some of its long-term advantages. We then argue that the application of the pragmatic tradition in response to three key political shifts—deepening political polarization, new organizational maintenance challenges associated with movement growth, and the rise of corporate-driven green consumerism—led to the movement’s adoption of the personal responsibility frame in the 1980s.

Strategic framing choices are among the more consequential decisions that political associations have the capacity to make for themselves. This paper helps shed light on the constraints and considerations that inform such decision-making, and points to the path-dependent consequences that result.

Authors

• David A. Karpf, George Washington University

• Matthew Lacombe, Case Western Reserve University