Abstract
Introduction
In Asia, and particularly in countries like India, the swift pace of urban expansion has brought about the promise of immense economic growth. With its distinct geographies and diverse communities of people, India is poised to be among those at the forefront of this expansion. However, this growth also brings extensive challenges. Rapid urbanization has resulted in stress on civic infrastructure, overcrowding and urban sprawl, worsening air and water quality, waste mismanagement, and regional inequality. By 2050, India alone is projected to add about one-fifth of the 2.5 billion increase in the world's urban population (United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, 2015). As such, with one of the highest urbanization rates, there is even more urgency to meet the demands of the country's urban areas because of the increasing concentration of population and limited resources.
Despite this urgency, it is alarming that Indians are largely unaware of climate change. A Gallup survey found that only 32 percent of Indians reported that they knew at least something about climate change (Ray & Pugliese, 2010). A local survey by the Hindustan Times also confirmed that a majority of Indian youth were not aware of the negative effects of greenhouse gases; nor did they understand how sustainable options could help save the planet (Banerjee, 2017). Even among those who were aware of climate change, they were divided on the government's efforts to reduce emissions. Unlike respondents in other developing countries such as Brazil, South Africa, and China, nearly half of the Indians who claimed to be aware of climate change held the belief that the government was doing enough to reduce emissions (Ray & Pugliese, 2010). Similarly, a recent study by the Pew Research Center found that nearly half of the respondents in India continue to report that the government is doing the right amount (15%) or doing too much (32%) to address challenges related to climate change (Funk et al., 2020).
The foregoing evidence is worrisome because there is a large literature dealing with urban spaces from around the world that stresses the need for engaging urbanites on climate change and effectively communicating with them the challenges faced by their cities (Carley et al., 2001; Hagen et al., 2016a; Hagen et al., 2016b; Hughes et al., 2020; Immerwahr, 1999; Masud et al., 2015; Moser, 2006a; Moser & Dilling, 2006; Seacrest et al., 2000). The literature underscores that, given the objective of generating an effective social response to climate change, it would be counterproductive if the concerned people are busy, distracted, unaware of the situation at hand, and only marginally interested.
Effective communication with urbanites is important for at least two reasons. First, urban residents being aware of their city's climate-related challenges would help them mobilize policy changes at local and higher levels of government and build political pressure. Second, in their capacity as consumers of energy, material goods, and environmental resources, informed urbanites would also be better positioned to enact behavioral changes that are in line with mitigation and adaptation measures (Cheshmehzangi & Dawodu, 2019; Grunbaum, 2015; Kassahun, 2015; Koehn, 2016; Moser, 2006b; Rayner. 2010).
This Commentary explores the awareness of urbanites about sustainable development in their city by analyzing two indices that were developed by India's Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs. The first index is the Ease of Living Index (EoL) 2020, which was developed to quantify the livability of citizens within cities. The second, the Citizen Perception Survey (CPS), is a public opinion poll that takes into account the perception of the city's residents and allow them to evaluate the quality of development in their respective cities. Crucial for this discussion, both indices include questions on sustainable development such as quality of air and green cover in the city. These indices are based on data from a representative set of 111 cities spread across all regions of India and include major metropolitan centers, cities belonging to the Government of India's Smart Cities Mission, and the capital cities of Indian States (Smart City & Ministry of Housing, 2019, 2020, 2021).
Ranging from 0 (worst performance) to 100 (best performance), the average performance of cities was much higher in CPS (76.08) vs. EoL (53.51). Importantly, comparing the top scorers in the CPS and those in the EoL index, there was no overlap at all in the top-scoring cities across these two indices. The top 10-ranked cities did not necessarily perform as well on the EoL. Similarly, cities that performed the highest in the index did not rank as highly in the survey. This indicates that the residents' evaluation of the performance of cities was better than their actual performance and that there were significant gaps in effective communication about sustainable development with urban residents (Mohammed, 2023).
What can explain the inconsistency between citizens' perceptions of their city's performance and the city's evaluation based on objective criteria? Is it related to their socioeconomic status? Does it relate to where they live? Is it related to the type of media that they are exposed to? The rest of this Commentary explores these and other factors that could reconcile the differences in urban residents' perceptions and reality.
Why Do Urban Residents Have a Different Perception Than the Reality?
Size of the City: Million-Plus Vs. Less Than a Million Population
There is an interesting pattern in the inconsistency as measured by the size of the city. Participating cities were placed in two groups based on their population, with one group of more than a million and the other less than a million. The top-scoring cities in the CPS are all in areas with less than a million people. The top 10-ranked cities from this group of cities did not necessarily perform as well in the EoL. Similarly, cities that performed the highest in the EoL did not rank as highly in the CPS. Interestingly, while the correlation between the rankings across EoL and CPS is very low, the correlation between these two sets of rankings is relatively higher when compared with other cities in the same population group. One explanation for this inconsistency could be that cities with fewer than one million residents have a lower benchmark for evaluating, say, air quality and green cover, while residents in million-plus cities demand more of their local government to provide services related to sustainable development, and therefore are more critical and thus gave lower ratings.
Is the Inconsistency Due to Sample Selection among CPS Respondents?
Is the inconsistency between the two rankings due to selection of the pool of respondents participating in the CPS survey? Despite efforts by the administering agency, it is possible that the respondents participating in the survey were not representative of the underlying population of the city. For example, citizens voluntarily participating in cities with a negative correlation between EoL- and CPS-based ranks may be differentially selected compared to cities showing a positive correlation.
The India Human Development Survey (IHDS-II) could be useful in investigating the sample selection. IHDS-II is a nationally representative, multi-topic panel survey of 41,554 households in 1,503 villages and 971 urban neighborhoods across India. This survey is one of the most popular datasets used by researchers working on topics related to India.
Relevant for this analysis, IHDS asked respondents to report their perception of various institutions ranging from state government, politicians, military, police, courts, banks, media, schools, and hospitals to local village-level governing bodies. If the IHDS-based ranking of 111 cities is also inversely related to the rankings based on EoL, then it suggests that sample selection is not driving these findings. Reassuringly, this analysis finds that citizens in poor-performing cities (in terms of EoL) have a relatively higher perception of the aforementioned institutions. Moreover, related to this discussion, the inverse relationship between the ranking of cities based on EoL and citizens' perceptions of institutions in the IHDS is stronger in cities with a population of less than one million. Thus, given that IHDS is a nationally representative panel dataset, these findings suggest that the inverse relationship between EoL and CPS is not entirely driven by the selection of participants in the CPS.
Inconsistency by City-Level Attributes
Using city-level attributes in the IHDS data, the correlation between the ranking of cities based on EoL and CPS is relatively more positive in cities where citizens are better acquainted with other key service providers in the community (e.g., politicians, military personnel, police officers, government employees, teachers, school workers, doctors, and health workers). This finding makes sense as the familiarity of citizens with members of society involved in various walks of life allows them to develop informed perceptions about the performance of their city, which allows them to have a perception that is better aligned with rankings based on EoL.
Similarly, the correlation between ranking of cities based on EoL vs. CPS is relatively more negative in cities where citizens are least exposed to media outlets and other sources of information and communication (e.g., radio, newspapers, television, computers, cellphones). Interestingly, how often urban residents listen to radio in a city is found to be a strong predictor of the inconsistency between perception and reality. This finding makes sense because urban residents spend a significant part of their day listening to radio, especially while commuting, and it is well documented in the literature that radio networks in India play an important role in raising awareness about climate change (Abdulai et al., 2021; Sharma et al., 2018; Velayutham & Srividhya, 2011).
In addition, the correlation between ranking of cities based on EoL vs. CPS is relatively more negative in cities where poverty is more prevalent, total and per capita consumption is lower, total and per capita income is lower, and educational attainment is lower. Overall, these findings suggest that cities where citizens are well-off and have access to better information are more likely to develop informed perceptions about their city, which align well with their city's objective evaluation based on EoL.
Discussion
An interesting feature of the ranking of Indian cities based on EoL and CPS is that they do not overlap with each other. Tellingly, the correlation between the rankings of cities based on these two approaches is only -0.04. Based on the rich amount of information available in the IHDS data, the disagreement in rankings of cities is more prevalent where citizens are poor, have less education, have less income, have less access to media outlets and modes of communication, and are less acquainted with key service providers in their constituency.
Often times, opinion polls are inadequate because they do not represent the underlying population, and in a large population setting like India, the self-selection of respondents in opinion polls could introduce bias on many levels, including such factors as their geographic and socioeconomic background. Even when opinion polls are based on a representative sample, respondents' inaccurate perceptions of reality could perpetuate the status quo. For example, the sustainability pillar in the EoL and CPS datasets includes questions on total tree cover, quality of air and water, and hazardous waste management. If urban residents do not have an accurate perception of their city's performance on these crucial indicators, then they would have no incentive to pressure their political representatives to adopt appropriate measures or to make personal behavioral changes that contribute to mitigating and adapting to these challenges.
A natural question that follows is whether conducting opinion polls regarding sustainability and climate change is a useful exercise. As long as opinion polls are representative of the underlying population, they can be a useful supplementary resource even when the respondents have an inaccurate perception of reality. As discussed, generating an effective social response to climate change necessitates engaging urbanites on climate change and effectively communicating with them the challenges faced by their cities. As such, learning about misperceptions among residents via opinion polls can guide policy makers in overcoming these disadvantages and helping urban residents make their cities sustainable.
What can policy makers do to bridge the divide between perception and reality? The first step would be to increase awareness among urban residents about their city's performance with reference to sustainability and climate change. If urban residents are ill-informed, apathetic, or uncaring about their city's track record in terms of being inclusive, safe, resilient, and sustainable, policy makers are less likely to generate an effective social response to climate change.
Next, it is crucial to recognize that increasing awareness is only a necessary condition, not a sufficient condition. A large number of studies have documented the gap between the values that people hold and the actions they take. One might value sustainability and environmental justice yet not take appropriate actions that would support these values. As such, policy makers must also focus on adopting suitable strategies that could help bridge the gap between values and behavior in response to climate change (Clayton et al., 2015; Doherty, 2014; Wolf & Moser, 2011).
Additionally, cultural orientation may also differ across economic classes. This is consistent with the findings that show that the inconsistency between EoL- and CPS-based scores is more prevalent in cities with higher poverty and lower consumption and income. One reason for the difference in orientation may be because poverty introduces a trade-off in which poor people become more concerned about living today than protecting the environment. Also, as least-developed countries demand that affluent countries shoulder a greater responsibility for sustainable urban development, individuals belonging to lower economic classes may have the same level of awareness as others, yet expect individuals from higher economic classes to bear a greater responsibility for carrying out that mandate.
Effective communication and engaging urban residents alone are going to be ineffective in addressing climate change if, at the macro level, there is a tension between national policies and sustainable urban development. It would be unfeasible to attain sustainable urban development if, in its race to attain a higher growth rate, governmental policies result in poverty, inequality, loss of forest ecosystems and wildlife habitat, air/water/soil pollution, and other outcomes that lead to further deterioration of the environment.