BehaviourWorks Australia has been collaborating with some of Australia’s leading government agencies since 2011. These partnerships have helped to change the way Australians go about their lives and make decisions that benefit themselves, their families and the community as a whole.
While we’ve solved many partner problems over the years, in 2018 we began to ask, ‘What if we brought leading government agencies together to find behavioural solutions to some bigger challenges – issues that impact the environment and the amenity/liveability of our cities?’
Members of the BehaviourWorks Consortium recognised that they could be ‘greater than the sum of their parts’ and agreed to trial a new way of working, using the Collective Impact model as a framework for collaboration.
In 2018, Australia faced up to a number of challenging issues in our waste and recycling systems. At the time, BehaviourWorks had conducted almost 40 waste projects with its partners since 2011 (see below). Our partners felt that, by working together, they could have a greater impact on addressing some of major waste issues.
Five of our Consortium partners – the then Australian Government Department of Agriculture, Water, and the Environment; the Victorian Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning; Sustainability Victoria; Environment Protection Authority Victoria; and NSW Environment Protection Authority – agreed to come together to form the Waste & Circular Economy Collaboration.
The broad objective of this major research program was to identify which behaviour change approaches could be most effective in encouraging households, businesses and the whole Australian community to avoid, reduce, reuse and recycle waste as we transition from a linear system to a circular economy.
In 2018, BehaviourWorks Australia had conducted almost 40 waste behaviour change research projects, in areas including:
Got questions? Contact our Program Founder, Dr Stefan Kaufman directly, here, or email us at behaviourworksaustralia@monash.edu.
Please also consider giving feedback at the bottom of our overview page once you have reviewed the outputs; and if the research made a difference for you or your organisation, please share the story at the bottom of the page.
