ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLY BEHAVIOR AS COLLECTIVE ACTION - SOME ASPECTSOF NONRATIONAL MOTIVATION

Environmental problems often exemplify what has been called ''the trag edy of the commons'', - that is, that collective rationality suffers w hen actors act rationally only with no regard to their individual prio rities. However, in traditional communities characterized by social so lidarity, such as in many Norwegian fishing communities, natural resou rces are (or were) not exhausted to the extent that the thesis of the tragedy of the commons would seem to imply. This suggests that collect ive action cannot be fully explained solely from the standard assumpti on of ''rational egoism''. With reference to Hechter and Elster it is argued that this assumption should be supplemented with ''non-rational '' motivational factors, such as altruistic motives. The analysis of a ltruism takes as a starting point Schwartz' concept of ''personal norm '' and Elster's typology ''utilitarianism'', ''every-day-kantianism'' and ''the norm of fairness''. On this basis a conceptual framework of both ''rational'' and ''non-rational'' motivational factors is develop ed. The empirical fruitfulness of the framework is illustrated by mean s of data from two Swedish mail surveys: One directed to board members and ordinary members of the environmental organisation SNF, and the o ther to Swedish citizens.