«Green? Cool. yours»: The effect of sports mega-events in post-soviet Russia on citizens' environmental consumption practises (cases of 2013 Universiade in Kazan and 2014 Sochi Olympics)

Abstract

The study provides insights on the influences of sports mega-events in post-soviet Russia on the citizens' environmental consumption practices and adaptation of new green infrastructure and technologies. Based on the representative survey of the citizens, semi-structured interviews with city's stakeholders and discourse analysis of the local and national mass media, the research portrayed the dominance of the "Declarative" type both among Kazan and Sochi residents. The environmental consumption practices among Kazan and Sochi residents are mainly driven by social-altruistic values, self-egoistic values, monetary incentives and costs, habitual practices and community expectations. Findings suggested that after the sports megaevents citizens became more environmentally friendly and run more environmental green lifestyle that could be partly linked to the increase of accessibility of green infrastructure. The main green initiatives that citizens suggest to correspondent their cities with the international standards refer to new types of environmental infrastructure: the widespread implementation of containers for recycling, development of cycling tracks, introduction of green technologies, environmental certification of products and goods.