Measuring sustainable culture among construction stakeholders in Hong Kong

Robin C P Yip, Chi Sun Poon, James M W Wong

Research output: Chapter in book / Conference proceedingChapter in an edited book (as author)Academic researchpeer-review

Abstract

The construction industry is a leading contributor in improving the quality of the built environment, but concurrently it is a main producer of solid waste and greenhouse gas that damage the environment. Stakeholders of the construction industry thus have a decisive role to play in enhancement of sustainability and suppression of environmental damages. In the process of performing sustainable construction, stakeholders changed subconsciously their attitudes and behaviours towards a more sustainable culture. This paper aims to examine the extent of these attitudinal and behavioral changes by caterizing these changes in four sustainable cultural components. The attitudinal changes are classified into awareness and concern, while the behavioral changes are classified into motivation and implementation. The investigation was carried out by means of two surveys conducted in years 2004 and 2006 among different stakeholder groups of various disciplines including the Government, Developer, Consultant, Contractor and the frontline construction supervisors embracing site agents, site supervisors and foremen. The findings indicated that different stakeholder group carries different influential power to contribute sustainability. The consultant group and the frontline participants group demonstrated readiness in compliance by their willingness to adopt new practices favorable to sustainable construction. On the other hand, although embracing high influential power, the developer group had yet a relatively lower apprehension on sustainability, particularly in motivation and implementation aspects. Holding the highest influential power, the government group had a remarkable awareness and motivation on sustainable construction but inadequate in implementation when compared with other industry stakeholders. Although the contractor group exhibited an overall improvement in sustainable culture, but the improvement of various cultural components are relatively low. The results of investigation that reflect such a social phenomenon is an important reference for decision-makers in the government and in private sectors to formulate policies that couple with universal demands for sustainable development. The means of measurement so developed may also serve as a valuable reference for other industries.
Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationEnvironmental Management
Subtitle of host publicationSystems, Sustainability and Current Issues
PublisherNova Science Publishers, Inc.
Pages159-178
Number of pages20
ISBN (Print)9781613247334
Publication statusPublished - 1 Dec 2012

Keywords

  • Cultural component
  • Culture
  • Stakeholder group sustainable culture
  • Sustainability
  • Sustainable development

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • General Environmental Science

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