ABSTRACT
In making the case for the connection between egalitarianism and environmentalism, Aaron Wildavsky has pointed to a variety of egalitarian statements made by environmental activists. The relationship between egalitarianism and environmentalism is even more impressive if authors turn to our sample of the general public in Salem and in Yamhill County. Egalitarianism is strongly related to each of the ten environmental statements authors offered to the general public. The individual-level correlations between cultural biases and environmental attitudes are generally supportive of Wildavsky's thesis, but a fuller test of that thesis requires also comparing the mean levels of support among environmentalists and the general public. The cultural biases of the general public and environmentalists do indeed diverge sharply, with the general public consistently less egalitarian and more supportive of both hierarchy and market individualism than members of any of the environmental groups, including the more moderate Audubon Society.
