How the grass grows: The social dynamics of preservation/conservation grassroots environmental organizations

Many aspects of the environmental movement have been examined by social scientists in great detail, but grassroots environmental organizations that focus their efforts on preservation/conservation goals have not been adequately analyzed. Historical analyses of the environmental movement and studies of the social dynamics involved in grassroots environmental organizations' formation and actions do not give direct attention to preservation/conservation grassroots environmental organizations in their analyses or theory generation. This study examines whether preservation/conservation grassroots environmental organizations are well understood through the application of existing sociological analyses of the environmental movement. Qualitative data from in-depth interviews with leaders of preservation/conservation grassroots environmental organizations (n = 41), from participant observation at grassroots workshops, and from analyses of secondary data from organizational publications are used to evaluate the utility of existing theories for analyzing the social dynamics involved in the actions of eighteen different preservation/conservation grassroots organizations' groups based in Northern Utah and Northern California.; The results from this study indicate that preservation/conservation grassroots groups are not well accounted for in existing works. These groups often have a place-attached community component throughout their inception and operation, which is an element not well documented in previous analyses of environmental movement organizations. Preservation/conservation grassroots organizations also use a diversity of tactics to achieve change, many of which are not based on the use adversarial approaches, a condition that stems from the place-based, community-driven dynamics in these group's operations. The use of science is very important to preservation/conservation organizations, and plays a role in many of their tactics for change and affects their internal dynamics, including influencing who becomes involved in running the organizations. Examinations of grassroots organizations linkages with other environmental organizations indicate that working within the grassroots level of the environmental movement yields primarily positive results, but that when grassroots organizations work with national-level groups there are common and frequent problems. The implications of these findings for analyses of the environmental movement, for people who are directly involved with the actions of these groups, and for social movement theories are interpreted.