Perceived Collective Efficacy and Trust in Government Influence Public Engagement with Climate Change-Related Water Conservation Policies

ABSTRACT

Water insecurity, induced or intensified due to climate change, has emerged as a key policy challenge in poor and developing countries such as India. Drawing on social cognitive theory, this paper examines the role of perceived collective efficacy—people's shared beliefs about their group's capabilities to accomplish collective tasks—and trust in government as factors influencing Indians' engagement with government water conservation policies. Using a national survey of Indians (N = 4031), we found that individuals with high levels of perceived collective efficacy and trust in government are more likely to support government water conservation policies. Moreover, for individuals with low trust in government, higher collective efficacy is associated with greater policy support. Perceived collective efficacy is also associated with activist behaviours, while distrust is not. Increasing collective efficacy beliefs, for example through mass media channels and targeted campaigns, could help increase citizens' engagement with climate change adaptation policies.

KEYWORDS:

• Water conservation
• climate change
• policy support
• collective efficacy
• trust
• risk perceptions

Acknowledgements

We thank the anonymous reviewers for suggestions.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Jagadish Thaker http://orcid.org/0000-0003-4589-7512

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Shakti Sustainable Energy Foundation and the Rice Family Foundation.