State and local pressures drive plastic pollution compliance strategies

Environmental harm from plastic pollution partly results from compliance failure at the individual level. Three prevalent non-compliant motivations for polluting plastics include economic gains, ignorance of the rules and unlikely penalization from inadequately enforced rules. Given compliance is primarily the responsibility of local waste management, we conducted interviews to gain insights to the factors driving changes in the crucial onground controls of plastic pollution. We expand on non-compliant motivations and provide a theoretical framework to test the aforementioned. We show that compliance strategies are strongly driven by state judicial and economic controls, specifically new plastic legislation and levies. Furthermore, the priorities of waste managers and the socio-economics and population density of their constituents drove changes in local management efforts. Our findings support the view that the growing global attention on plastic pollution shapes not only what happens at a state level, but also importantly on-ground at the local level.

Automated summary

Plastic pollution's environmental harm is partly due to non-compliance at the individual level, driven by motivations such as economic gains, ignorance of rules, and unlikely penalization due to inadequate enforcement. Compliance strategies are primarily influenced by state judicial and economic controls, including new plastic legislation and levies, with waste managers' priorities and constituents' socio-economic status and population density also playing a role in driving changes in local management efforts. The global focus on plastic pollution not only impacts actions at a state level, but also significantly influences on-ground implementation at the local level.