Befragung zu umweltpolitischen Einstellungen und Wahl der Verkehrsmittel im Kanton Zürich - 1994

Empirical studies on the conditions to be met are also missing so that the fundamentally cooperation-oriented communicative rationality can take effect. Problem 1: Environmental problems are largely cooperation problems because they have the character of social dilemmas. Problem 2: The connection between communicative rationality and environmentally responsible action is not empirically proven.

Problem 3: Environmental policy lacks a clear and comprehensive concept for the so-called "cooperation principle". The work has both scientific and practical political significance. One of the most important concerns of the work proposed here is to build a bridge between scientific-theoretical insights and everyday practice. a) The practical political significance: - The study proposes concrete practical instruments to promote environmentally responsible action. - It provides an easy-to-understand yet scientifically based concept for supplementing the environmental policy guidelines with the so-called "cooperation principle". - It offers a perspective (model) for a variety of different environmental policy instruments based on cooperative rationality (for environmental authorities at federal, cantonal and municipal level) and thus enables better coordination of these instruments.

The effectiveness of these instruments should be significantly enhanced by their coordinated complementary use. - This study should offer concrete suggestions for environmental education and therefore, above all, start with the younger generations of importance for the future. - The modelling of cooperative behaviour in the choice of transport modes in the Zurich area should represent a more targeted policy both to promote the switch to public transport in particular and to promote cooperative behaviour in favour of the environment in general. b) The scientific significance: - This study should deepen the scientific insight into the basic decision-making processes regarding environmentally responsible behaviour.

In particular, the normative and expressive decision bases and the decision context should be explicitly considered. A mathematical decision model was developed and empirically tested in the form of structural equations. - Such operationalization, mathematical modelling and empirical testing of the core elements of the theory of communicative action had not been carried out up to now and thus represented a turning point in the area of rational choice modelling. - In the juxtaposition and empirical examination (using structural equation models) of behaviorist and action-theoretical concepts for linking "attitudes" or "action dispositions" and action, a deeper insight into human action processes should be achieved and a bridge between action-theoretical and behaviorist approaches enabled.