The meaning of environmental work - An analysis of current discourses in the Swedish housing sector

Abstract

A gap between desired environmental performance and actual performance can be seen in the Swedish housing and building sector. Local and national environmental objectives are predicted not to be reached. Being a big contributor to the national environmental impact, the housing and building sector has a large responsibility in this. In this study, including both a document and an interview study, discourses present in the housing and building sector have been identified. By structuring the empirical findings according to level of knowledge, and values, discursive patterns have emerged. The discursive patterns have been analysed and put into context by relating to a factual platform, which was also established as a part of this study. Through that exclusionary effects have emerged, and possible consequences of those exclusionary effects have been discussed. The study concludes that the environmental impacts are substantial and generated both from upstream and downstream processes. Different types of impacts are created from different parts of the housing stock. However, the exclusionary effects of the discursive patterns identified are excluding certain aspects from environmental practice. All impacts are not considered and all possible solutions are not used. The most dominant conceptualisation of environmental work is to equate environmental impact with operational energy use and to focus on municipal housing, thereby excluding other phases of a buildings lifecycle and other parts of the housing stock. The results from this master’s thesis should be seen as a basis for discussion of how environmental work is being performed in the housing and building sector today. The study contributes with an increased knowledge of how current discursive patterns are influencing environmental practice. It also gives an increased understanding of how strongly discursive patterns influence what we perceive as possible, and highlights key points of interest for future research.