Seeking sustainability discourses with Q methodology

This paper outlines the potential benefit of Q methodology for the study of environmental issues within ecological economics, based on research into LETS (Local Employment and Trading Systems) in the United Kingdom. Q methodology is a qualitative but statistical approach to enable the discovery of a variety of discourses concerning how individuals understand their behaviour, and how they understand the social and environmental worlds in which they live. Q methodology thus has the capacity to allow a more effective form of policy making and implementation process. The paper introduces some of the basic tenets of Q methodology, illustrates these with results drawn from the study mentioned above, and concludes by indicating the potential this methodology holds for ecological economics research. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.