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The Environmental Home Guard
Miljøheimevernet

Citizen Mobilization for Environmental Protection and Sustainable Consumption

Dag Endal

The Environmental Goals of the Project

The activities of the Environmental Home Guard (EHG) aim to achieve the following important environmental goals:

To achieve its goals, the EHG focuses on two major types of change:

The Main Tasks

The work of the EHG is concentrated on four main tasks:

People in the age group 25-50 years are the main target group for the EHG's activities.

The Approach

The environmental challenges of the 90's demand a concerted effort not only from experts, environmental activists and politicians, but from each individual citizen. This is why the EHG also asks "ordinary people" to get involved in environmental activities. While the environmental movement has traditionally been exclusive, mainly involving people with a high level of competence, commitment and involvement, the EHG aims at being inclusive. The movement aims to mobilize those who have the will to contribute towards a better environment, but do not feel that they have the knowledge or skills to become activists.

The EHG's approach to environmental problems is different from the dominating philosophy of the 1980's. During the past decade, environmental protection has, to a large degree, focused on emissions of harmful substances from factories and how to reduce such emissions. Much has been achieved along this line. Emissions have been drastically reduced from production processes. Today an important share of pollution from production sites are simply being brought out through the factory gates - in the products themselves. Consequently, we face thousands and thousands of small sources of emissions in our everyday lives. The use of consumer products, and the accompanying disposition of waste, is in itself a major source of environmental problems.

This approach brings the individual consumer into a much more important position. The EHG intends to take advantage of this position by organizing consumer power for the sake of the environment. If large numbers of consumers make the same choices at the same time, we can gradually eliminate the products which do the environment most damage. At the same time, we create a demand for more environmentally friendly alternatives.

This does not imply, however, that the EHG believes that all environmental problems can be solved by each individual "shopping green ". Many issues will continue to require that politicians and industry make the right decisions on behalf of the community (legislation, taxation, development of better products etc.). In this perspective, the EHG is only one of several tactics to be employed within a broader strategy.

"Dugnad" - the Norwegian Way

The Environmental Home Guard is not designed as yet another environmental organization or a federation. It is more of a network. In Norwegian, we call to the activity of the EHG as a dugnad; a concept which has roots going back many centuries in Norway. Dugnad means a collective effort, a work sharing activity where people contribute as volunteers.

The EHG has no local branches, annual general meetings, minutes or any of the usual trappings of organizations. The focus is on ad-hoc activities and local action, rather than on the type of formalities which have taken a firm grip on so many other large-scale organizations.

The Name "Environmental Home Guard"

The EHG has borrowed its name from the ordinary Home Guard - Heimevernet in Norwegian ("National Guard" in American) - and is, to a certain extent, based on the same principles. Each participant is expected to perform his or her task where they live, in their family, neighbourhood or local community. Everyone takes responsibility for their immediate environment, and everyone is "armed". As consumers, club members and employees we have the "weapons" needed to defend the environmental against damage. Finally, by using the Home Guard concept, we wish to focus on the belief that we are today more seriously threatened by "invasion" and "conquest" from the ills of pollution and over-consumption, than by the threat of military attack.

The Norwegian Setting

The EHG is based on many of the same principles as those found in "green-consumer" movements in a number of Western countries. The organizational set-up has, however, been adapted to a Norwegian context, which can be briefly characterized by the following points:

This is the background for the structure and methods of the EHG which are described in the following sections.

Commitment by Voluntary Organizations

The EHG is an attempt to combine the competence of the environmental movement with the vast networks of the traditional voluntary organizations. Fifteen of these organizations are formal partners of the project through their membership in the Advisory Committee of the EHG. These organizations are:

In total, these organizations have a network of 3,8 million memberships in more than 24.000 local clubs and associations.

The organizations which have been granted membership by the Advisory Committee have committed themselves to contribute to the development of the project by:

The role of the Advisory Committee is to give guidance to the Governing Board in the planning and implementation of the project. Two of the four Board members are elected by the Advisory committee. The two others are appointed by the Norwegian Society for the Conservation of Nature (NNV).

NNV has played a key-role in the establishment of the EHG by (1) being responsible for the financial and administrative management of the project, and (2) guaranteeing high standards for the advisory assistance and information materials available from the EHG

A Network of Committed Individuals

Large numbers of the population are willing to make more environmentally friendly choices in their daily life, but many do not know where to start. The EHG wants to show them the right direction. The key tool is the Action Plan. It suggests 15-16 ideas for what the individual can do in everyday life. Prospective participants are asked to choose 10 of these points for their own personal or family Action Plan. Although each individual's contribution may be small, the results will be significant when numerous people take part.

People are also very different, however, and the EHG tries to take this into consideration. Not everyone wants to, or has the time to, hunt down barrels of toxic waste, or to study local waste disposal plans in depth. Most people have family commitments, jobs and numerous spare-time activities, but they would still like to make a contribution. The EHG aims, therefore, to split the great, global challenges into smaller tasks that everyone can cope with.

As citizens we can influence decisions made in society in many ways. We can vote in elections, join political parties and support all kinds of campaigns. However, our money also gives us power. Money can be used as a more generalized form of the ballot. Every penny spent in the shops is a "vote" for a particular producer and a particular product. This gives us the right and the market power, to make demands regarding the environmental qualitiy of products.

The tasks of the Action Plan touch on many important environmental issues:

The Action Plan is reissued yearly or bi-annually, and is the only agenda the participants have in common. Apart from this, the EHG has no platform to deal with political environmental issues. This type of activity is left to the other actors in the environmental movement. As previously mentioned, the EHG's strategy is based on a division of both labour and responsibility with the other environmental organizations in Norway.

Poeple who take the challenge to pledge themselves to the Action Plan, are invited to join the dugnad formally by sending in the enrolment slip and being registrered as participants. It is emphasized that this is not a registration of "membership", since the EHG is not an organization, only a network. Participants are not charged membership fees, but are invited to give voluntary contributions to the project.

Some of the points of the Action Plan are carried out by the individual participant alone, either at home, while shopping, or in other areas. Other tasks are carried out jointly, either by families, in clubs, at work or in neighborhood associations.

To make it easier for participants to act effectively, a green handbook, "Step by Step" (Bit for Bit), is forwarded to them as soon as their registration form has been received. This handbook demonstrates how the points on the Action Plan can be implemented. It also informs as to why it is important to change our lifestyle and develop greener habits. Furthermore, the participants receive a quarterly Newsletter which provides uptodate information on green alternatives, lists of products which the EHG either recommends or advises against, reports from local activities, and new ideas and challenges to the participants.

The EHG also encourages participants, after an initial period of activity, to join a local refresher course. Here they meet other participants from all walks of life. These training courses provide new information and give the participants a chance to exchange and further develop ideas. Such cultural and social experiences are an important part of the programme's goal to renew and maintain interest and inspiration.

Participants who wish to contribute more to the project, can register as local contact persons. These contacts are then further schooled in the ability to spread the idea in their respective communities and to recruit new participants.

The EHG does not expect people to actively request challenges. The network tries to engage people where they're "at", at home, at work, in women's clubs, at church gatherings, in their neighborhood associations, at the angling club, a Red Cross meeting or in any other club or association. After giving a presentation of the EHG and the Action Plan, everyone is invited to pick their own points from the Plan and to join the programme.

A Chain of Service Bureaus

For the time being the EHG operates a chain of seven "service bureaus", one of them being the national headquarters in Oslo and the other six located in various regions of Norway. Each bureau services one or two counties (fylker), while the rest of the counties are served from the Oslo office. The regional offices are staffed with a single salaried employee. The staff members have their background and experience from social, cultural or political work in other fields. They are given a brief initial training program and then launched into "on the job" training.

The service bureaus of the EHG are expected to perform the following tasks:

The services of these regional bureaus have been offered to all relevant partners: organizations, schools, churches, municipalities, companies etc. with the following slogan: "Call us! If you plan environmental activities we may be able to help you with material, ideas, advisors, etc. Present your needs, and we'll see what we can do."

Partners of the Environmental Home Guard

The EHG itself has relatively few activities of its own. Most of the campaigns, meetings, seminars, conferences etc. under the umbrella of the network are being organized by the respective organizations, clubs, schools, churches, kindergardens etc. This gives them the possibility to carry out activities in their own name, profile themselves through these environmental activities, and develop a feeling of "ownership" and responsibility for their success. The role of the EHG can be equated with that of a "gardener", where the task is first to spread the seeds and then tend and water the plants from time to time.

This division of labour makes it possible for the EHG to work with a broad range of partners on a number of different projects. Some of the more important of these are as follows:

The EHG has not developed its own materials for these purposes, as this is not a priority area, and such materials are already available from related public-private campaigns such as "The Green Office", "The Green School", etc (see below).

Collective Action

When the EHG was first launched, the main focus was on recruiting individuals who were willing to commit themselves to changing their habits, step by step, towards a "greener" lifestyle. During the course of the pilot period from 1991-93, this strategy has been complemented with collective activities. Practical manuals are produced to make it simpler for the participants of the EHG to bring the ideas of the Action Plan into other groups and organizations they are members of, e.g. their families, local housing associa-tions, workplaces, schools, clubs and churches.

Such collective action has several positive effects:

Tools for Change

An important task for the EHG is to develop the necessary tools for helping individuals and collectives to change to more environmentally friendly patterns of consumption. The materials developed are placed at the disposal of any person or group which wishes to contribute to the dugnad. Some of the materials are jointly produced with other organizations, and some are produced solely by other organizations and then distributed through the EHG-network. Among the tools thus far developed are:

Each of these projects has triggered off various types and numbers of local activities.

Information Profile

The overall information profile of the EHG can be summarized in the following points: