Between the Mastery of the Environment and the Culture of Fear: Shifting American Values in a Slovak Context

Since the start of the new millennium, the American way of thinking about nature and the human relationship with the natural environment has undergone a marked shift, with increasingly influential civic and political environmental movements finding new ways of confronting the public, representatives of industries and political actors with the direct and the anticipated consequences of the heedless exploitation of non-renewable natural resources. The generations born in the first decades of the 21st century demonstrate a strong affiliation with these new environmentalist movements and are drifting towards more radical – sometimes even destructive – acts of environmental activism. This growing movement is international in scope and has also begun to make itself felt in Slovakia. This study discusses the extent to which the new generations of Slovak teenagers and young adults follow and identify with the American view of environmental radicalism. The research examines the process of Americanization and anti Americanism among young Slovaks, applying methodologies used in the social sciences to determine whether the culture of fear is influencing the new generations’ way of thinking.