Surviving tough times: an investigation into environmental voluntary sector organisations under austerity. (30th March 2019)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Kirsop-Taylor, Nicholas
• Is Part Of: Voluntary sector review. Volume 10:Number 1(2019)
• Page Start: 19
• Page End: 37
• Publication Date: 2019-03-30
• Subjects: AUSTERITY -- ENVIRONMENTAL VOLUNTARY SECTOR ORGANISATIONS -- UK ENVIRONMENTAL VOLUNTARY SECTOR; Voluntarism -- Periodicals; Voluntarism -- Research -- Periodicals; Associations, institutions, etc -- Periodicals; 361.3705
• DOI: 10.1332/204080519X15537864298355
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 2040-8056

Abstract

Abstract : The UK environmental voluntary subsector plays a key role in national environmental governance, yet little is known about it, the organisations that comprise it and how these organisations have been affected by the current period of public austerity. How have these organisations been fashioning operational responses to austerity and how do these relate to wider understandings about the contemporary voluntary sector? To address this, 18 semi-structured interviews were conducted with 12 organisations within an English UNESCO biosphere reserve in the summer of 2016. The findings led to an inductively constructed typology of organisations' operational responses to austerity, comprised of 'diversifying', 'restructuring', 'specialising', 'ignoring' or 'cooperating'. These are ordered on a hierarchical model, correlated to organisational size and institutionalism. This article advances our broad understandings about the voluntary sector under austerity and offers new empirical insights into the under-researched environmental voluntary subsector.