Environmental Responsibility: Teachers' Views

This research paper investigates the views of the teachers of elementary and secondary schools in Greece with regard to who bears the responsibility for the state of the environment, as well as who should bear the cost of its protection. The research was carried out at the Environmental Education Centre of Kissavos-Mavrovounio. The research subjects were 144 teachers undergoing training in environmental education. The teachers believe that today the quality of both the natural and the urban environments worsens with those most responsible, in order of importance, being the industrialists and businesses, public administration and control mechanisms, politicians and laws, the citizens as consumers, judges and the judicial system and the farmers as producers. According to the respondents, the parties less responsible are the journalists and the mass media, researchers and scientists and, finally, teachers and the educational system in general. With regard to who should bear the cost of environmental protection, the vast majority think that the government should be the one to pay. The ideas of indirect and direct taxation, the adoption of a lower standard of living are much less accepted.