The attitudes of governmental officialin terms of sustainable environment

Abstract

The inhabitable environment for all living beings is the first condition of the continuity of life in the world. The environment is an indispensable setting for all individuals and the damage to the environment is of utmost importance to every sector. The increase in population and the environmental problems it brings are forcing countries to take measures and to raise more environmentalist individuals. In particular, environmental degradation done involuntarily and wastes resulting from excessive consumption pose a big problem. Although the environment is a setting where all creatures live together, the greatest impact is made by human beings. Studies on environmental issues often focus on educational environments including educators and students. However, all positive or negative environmental activities are followed carefully by the whole society. It is known that individuals' attitudes towards the environment are generally either human-centred (Anthropocentric) or environment-centred (Ecocentric), or totally anti-environmental. This study was applied to 300 personnel working in different branches of the public sector in order to determine which of these three attitudes they are more inclined to, and what demographic characteristics affect them. The applied questionnaire is a 7-scale Likert type with 27 articles consisting of 12 articles that measure environmental-centred attitudes, 8 articles that measure human-centred attitudes, and 7 articles that measure antipathetic attitudes towards the environment. In addition, more detailed information about the individuals was obtained by applying another questionnaire with demographic features. It has been determined that ecocentric attitudes in governmental officials’ behaviours towards the environment is higher. In antipathetic attitudes towards the environment, on the other hand, the situation is in favour of males. There was no significant difference observed in the environment-related ecocentric and anthropocentric attitudes in the place of residence variable.