ABSTRACT
This book is about the question: Why is it hard for people to engage in sustainable action? Despite the fact that we believe that climate science is true and that we as current people ought to live up to our obligations towards future people, we seem seriously hampered in changing our behaviour. Within philosophy, little research has been done on this topic. The book investigates motivational problems that are peculiar to taking sustainable action. It takes the phenomenon of the agent’s experience of her own actions as the starting point. On the basis of the well-known Rubicon model of human action phases from psychology, a hypothesis is developed that explains the motivational difficulties in each of the phases. Concrete situations of agents involved in morally significant action situations are used as material for the analysis, together with philosophical and psychological theories. The diagnosis of the motivational problems leads to proposals (‘pathways’) for developing capabilities in individual agents. It also leads to proposals for institutional policies that help with overcoming the motivational issues. Finally, the situation of agents who continue with their non-sustainable behaviour, despite being aware of and agreeing with the science and ethics of climate change, is discussed.
