Integration of environmental education and environmental law enforcement for police officers

Abstract

© 2016 Bovornkijprasert and Rawang. The purpose of this research was to establish an integrated model of environmental education (EE) and environmental law enforcement (ELE) to improve the efficiency of functional competency for police officers in Bangkok Metropolitan Police Division 9 (MBP Div. 9). The research design was mixed methods of quantitative and qualitative approaches including survey research, in-depth interview, focus group and action research. Data collection was performed firstly by questionnaire from 350 police officers, and in-depth interview from 3 advisory level officers, before designing the integrated model, then doing focus group, and evaluating the model efficiency by actual implementation with 50 police officers from 10 stations in MBP Div. 9. The data were analyzed by percentage, mean score (ܺ̅), standard deviation (S.D.), and t-test. The research findings revealed that most of Thai police officers were knowledgeable and skillful for the ELE, but low actualization on their role and responsibilities for the EE to preserve natural resources and environments. This is the reason why the integrated model to solve this problem was composed of 6 main factors including (1) Environmental Education: concept, principle, objective, approach, resource, and evaluation; (2) Policy; (3) Leadership; (4) Incentive: finance and non-finance; (5) Networking: associated worker, and environmental network; and (6) Environmental Law Enforcement: knowledge, and practice. After the model was available to 50 police officers for evaluating its efficiency, it appeared to be the effective model because its mean score after was higher than before implementation with statistically significant difference at 0.05. The practical recommendation is that most police officers need to obtain the EE to inspire their empowerment before performing the ELE to improve their functional competency on natural and environmental conservation.