Ecological habitus intergenerationally reproduced: The children of Czech ‘voluntary simplifiers’ and their lifestyle

Abstract

The intergenerational reproduction of values and lifestyles has been at the centre of attention for the social sciences for several decades. However, only rarely has this topic been examined from the perspective of environmentally friendly lifestyles. In this article, we build on unique longitudinal research that includes generations of parents and children from Czech ‘voluntarily simple’ families. Drawing on sociological theories of consumption and the Bourdieusian concept of habitus, we deal with the question of whether and how the intergenerational transmission of eco-habitus emerges. The original research with the parents – called ‘the Colourful’ – was conducted by the Czech sociologist Hana Librová in 1992, 2002 and 2015. We participated in the third wave, conducting 12 in-depth interviews with the Colourful and supplementing it with 21 interviews with their adult children, focusing on how they look back on their childhood and in what respect their lifestyles and attitudes differ from those of their parents. We describe the reproduction of the Colourful’s habitus and identify the main lines of influence that may play a role in this process: positive reflections on a non-affluent childhood, awareness of the values behind simplicity, a liberal model of upbringing, the higher cultural capital of the families, the family atmosphere, religiosity and diverse experiences among siblings related to their birth order. We show that while for the Colourful it was typical to revolt against parents, their own habitus has been reproduced relatively successfully.

Narratives and Practices of Voluntary Simplicity in the Czech Post-Socialist Context

“…The New Colourful interpret their life paths as a result of a gradual transformation of their lifestyle based on their faithfulness to their values, not as a radical lifestyle transformation, like in the case of the 'back to the land movement' [see Elgin 1981: 20] or the 'simplicity movement' [see Alexander and Ussher 2012: 8]. Overall, these findings suggest 22 The other research findings of our team, regarding the relatively successful intergenerational reproduction of the Colourful's habitus to their children, suggest that higher cultural capital could facilitate the reproduction of a modest way of life [for more on these results, see Pelikán et al 2017]. 23 Bourdieu understands habitus as a nonlinear process, which, while being anchored in class, also grows out of imitation and one's personal experience, thus opposing, with regard to consumption, the perspective of homo oeconomicus [1984: 183].…”

Intergenerational transmission of environmental household practices among South Korean families: continuity and change

“…Several qualitative studies disentangle the processes involved in the transmission of environmental practices within families (Gentina and Muratore, 2012;Collins, 2015;Gentina and Singh, 2015;Gram and Grønhøj, 2016;Pelikán et al, 2020). A special issue of Families, Relationships, and Societies discussed various dimensions of environmentalism within and beyond families (for example, Boddy et al, 2016;Jamieson, 2016).…”

“…In line with the idea of centrifugal forces, we identify a declining involvement across generations (see also Figure 1). Although environmental practices of family members resemble each other, they decline in frequency and engagement due to period and time differences, and possibly the impact of age (Krahn and Galambos, 2014;Pelikán et al, 2020). While G1 revealed a high degree of environmental engagement, G3 admits that in some circumstances convenience and lifestyle preferences surpass habitual environmentally friendly action.…”

“…Extending Bourdieu's (1984) notion of cultural habitus as a set of embodied, generalised dispositions that generate individual's attitudes and practices, environmentalism at the family level can be described as environmental habitus. Environmental habitus includes awareness to, and critical reflexivity about, one's environmental lifestyle (Carfagna et al, 2014;Kennedy and Givens, 2019) and daily practices (Haluza-DeLay, 2008), such as household gardening or simple living (Pelikán et al, 2020). A combination of family dispositions toward pro-environmental practices, with age and period effects (for example, frugality versus affluence contexts), shape individuals' environmental habitus.…”

Inconspicuous adaptations to climate change in everyday life: Sustainable household responses to drought and heat in Czech cities

“…Since the 1990s, qualitative studies on the voluntary modesty of Czech households revealed their motivations, as well as practices they developed (Librová, 1994). A recent continuation of this research, which interviewed children of these families from the 1990s, further analysed how the habitus was acquired in the family and the environmental values which have been reproduced throughout their lives (Kala et al, 2017; Pelikán et al, 2020). Yet, several studies point out that different sustainable everyday practices have been historically present in this part of Europe, although there are not necessarily motivated by environmental sensitivity, such as, for example, growing food.…”