Environmental citizenship: liberalism, cosmopolitanism and sustainability

Abstract

The debate about the concept of environmental citizenship in the literature of the Social Sciences is currently marked by a conceptual dispute. Against this background, the text develops a critique of the concept of liberal environmental citizenship, using the concept of cosmopolitan environmental citizenship as the basis for this critique. The text examines the meaning of the concept of liberal environmental citizenship and then compares it to the cosmopolitan interpretation of the concept. Unlike other works that address these issues, this text allows us, among other things, to examine the connections between liberal environmental citizenship and national liberalism. Through this analysis, we hope to clarify some of the limitations that affect the concept of environmental citizenship, while exploring the possibilities that the cosmopolitan perspective offers for our understanding of the concept of environmental citizenship. Examining the concept of environmental citizenship proves to be fundamental to the analysis of environmental public policy, where the pursuit of sustainability is generally viewed as a process of public participation. This is particularly evident in areas such as environmental education, where environmental citizenship is generally seen as an essential dimension that constitutes it.