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In an open access paper published in the journal Nature Communications, a large sample of the German public (more than 24,000 people) was surveyed before and just after major climate protests/civil disobedience took place.
Following what the authors describe as ‘confrontational’ protest acts, levels of reported concern about climate change rose by just over 1% (not a huge number, but a meaningful uptick nonetheless with a sample of this size and given the high level of pre-existing concern in Germany).
Interestingly, there was no sign of political polarisation either. And although the political context in Germany differs in a range of ways to the UK, the study offers direct evidence that significant protests do ‘cut through’ in terms of national public opinion. This is not always easy to demonstrate without his form of ‘before and after’ study design.
In another new open access paper on a similar topic, researchers asked US participants in an online experiment to give their views on a range of civil disobedience tactics. They concluded:
Most Americans view climate-related NVCD as appropriate if it is non-violent and targeted towards those companies or entities which are responsible for taking actions to the detriment of the climate. This could be in the form of promoting fossil fuel use, or even accepting fossil fuel financing. Conversely, actions that are violent, or targeted at entities not seen as being responsible for exacerbating climate change are seen as inappropriate targets.
Gradually, the evidence base on how contemporary protest tactics are actually landing with members of the public is building. Studies like these are important for checking assumptions about the way in which people react to protests involving civil disobedience.
Concern levels are likely to temporarily tick upwards when protests capture the media spotlight, even if the elite commentary that gets the most bandwidth is high critical of demonstrations. But the more that protests can do to focus in on ‘valid’ or ‘legitimate’ targets, the higher the chance of bringing the wider public along.
What impact do visual representations of climate protesters in the media have on audiences? A new study has addressed this in light of the recent media trend towards depicting more young and female protesters in news stories.
By comparing audience responses to 10 different images (photo-edited to make comparisons in the study), the researchers found that images showing climate protestors and the police together, as well as images of younger protestors, tended to lead to more negative emotional responses amongst audiences. This included feelings of guilt and shame about climate impacts affecting future generations.
The content of the protest images did not deeply influence audiences’ broader climate attitudes and behaviours after viewing them. But the researchers did find that feelings towards protest images were influenced by a range of factors, such as the audiences’ gender, and suggest that the viewers’ worldview may play a role too.
What’s in a name? The question of what the best – most persuasive, or least polarising – term for climate change is, has a long history.
On the one hand, small tweaks to individual words or short phrases are unlikely to be driving big differences in perceptions one way or another. People’s values, worldviews, political ideology and increasingly the perceived fairness of different climate policies, are what drives public engagement.
But whether its the editorial choices made by leading international newspapers, to the framing of campaigns that drive media coverage of climate activism, linguistic choices do carry some weight. Previous research has argued that some terms (e.g. ‘global warming’) are more emotive; campaigners have criticised ‘climate change’ as a term for lacking urgency.
In a new open-access paper, researchers tested a wide range of different terms, including ‘climate change’, ‘global warming’, ‘climate crisis’, climate emergency’ and ‘climate justice’, in a survey of over 5000 US residents and concluded:
Overall, “climate change” and “global warming” were rated as most familiar and most concerning, and “climate justice” the least, with ratings for “climate crisis” and “climate emergency” falling in between.
Moreover, we find no evidence for “climate crisis” or “climate emergency” eliciting more perceived urgency than “climate change” or “global warming.”
We therefore recommend sticking with familiar terms, conclude that changing terminology is likely not the key solution for promoting climate action, and suggest alternative communication strategies.
The ‘alternative communication strategies’ might include identifying tangible ways in which audiences with different moral and political values could benefit from specific climate policies, or ensuring communities impacted by new energy infrastructure, or changes to urban travel systems, feel adequately consulted.
Confirming previous research around the general lack of familiarity with the term ‘climate justice’, the paper also noted that willingness to support climate-friendly policies and eat less red meat were lowest for ‘climate justice’ (which was the least familiar term tested).
This isn’t an argument for downplaying the importance of the issues the term refers to, which are central to both international climate governance and the implementation of specific in-country policies. But it does underscore the lack of recognition of the phrase among many public audiences, a finding which has also been observed in UK research.