Climate Change Communication in Australia: The Politics, Mainstream Media and Fossil Fuel Industry Nexus

Fossil fuel divestment activists re-imagine how the war metaphor can be used in climate change action to transform thinking around what will lead to a sustainable society. Through the naming of a clear enemy and an end goal, the overused war metaphor is renewed. By casting the fossil fuel industry in the role of enemy, fossil fuel divestment activists move to a re-imagining of the climate change problem as one that is located in the here and now with known villains who must be challenged and defeated. In this scenario, climate activists move away from the climate and national security framing to a climate and human security way of thinking.

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Climate Justice: Holding Governments and Business Accountable for the Climate Crisis

Proceedings of the ASIL Annual Meeting ◽

10.1017/amp.2019.184 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 113 ◽

pp. 197-201

Author(s):

Kristin Casper

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Human Rights ◽

Fossil Fuel ◽

Business Leaders ◽

Climate Justice ◽

The World ◽

Fossil Fuel Industry ◽

Fuel Industry ◽

Climate Crisis ◽

Impacts Of Climate Change

People around the world are already experiencing the impacts of climate change, and their human rights are under threat. Greenpeace's Climate Justice and Liability Campaign is collaborating with a growing number of communities to reclaim their rights through strategic climate litigation. Three themes run throughout these efforts. First, the climate breakdown is a human rights crisis. Second, political and business leaders must take immediate action or risk being sued. Third, there is mounting evidence that the fossil fuel industry is significantly responsible for the climate crisis and will ultimately be held accountable. Before exploring these themes, it is useful to understand the origins of Greenpeace International's climate justice efforts.

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A Climate Change Solution Does Exist

Passive Remote Study of the Aerosol in the Upper Atmosphere of the Earth ◽

10.47363/jeesr/2020(2)124 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 1-3

Author(s):

William John Montague ◽

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Carbon Emissions ◽

Fossil Fuel ◽

Human Life ◽

Plastic Pollution ◽

The Earth ◽

Viable Solution ◽

Fossil Fuel Industry ◽

Simple Technology ◽

Fuel Industry

If anyone cares to stop the fossil fuel industry producing countries from destroying the ability of the Earth to support human life, now is the time to demand an alternative. Inaction on eliminating carbon emissions and plastic pollution have all but sealed the fate of our planet. These efforts should have been well underway more than twenty years ago. It is not too late if we act now. I have found a simple technology which can provide a viable solution. This means it is within the means of every nation on Earth to have and implement a simple ‘public domain’ technology.

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Climate Change Communication in Ireland

Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Climate Science ◽

10.1093/acrefore/9780190228620.013.459 ◽

2016 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Emmet Fox ◽

Henrike Rau

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Media Coverage ◽

Extreme Weather Events ◽

Ecological Modernization ◽

Climate Change Communication ◽

Mainstream Media ◽

Change Communication ◽

Governmental Organizations ◽

Non Governmental Organizations ◽

Weather Events

Climate change communication research in Ireland has only recently emerged as a distinct field of inquiry. Research to date reveals the marginalization of climate change in the mainstream media, which is further amplified by its segregation from closely related topics of major public concern in Ireland such as extreme weather events, flooding, energy resources, or economic recovery. Content analyses of media coverage from the late 1990s until today show the coexistence of different narratives, with ecological modernization emerging as an increasingly dominant discourse that is supported by powerful actors in Irish society. In contrast, more radical and alternative perspectives on the subject of climate change, including those associated with class-centered and growth-sceptic views of society and economic development, remain largely absent. Efforts to date by key public figures, environmental non-governmental organizations (ENGOs), and environmentalists to promote a more nuanced and citizen-centered climate change debate have concentrated on both traditional and nontraditional news outlets in an attempt to reach diverse audiences. Conventional media such as the national broadcaster RTÉ or the broadsheet newspaper The Irish Times nevertheless continue to fundamentally shape public debate in Ireland, making their future involvement in nuanced and balanced climate change debates central to any effort to shift thinking, policy, and action.

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Climate change and fossil fuel: An examination of risks for the energy industry and producer states

MRS Energy & Sustainability ◽

10.1557/mre.2017.3 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 4 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Jim Krane

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Natural Gas ◽

Fossil Fuels ◽

Fossil Fuel ◽

Coal Industry ◽

Low Carbon ◽

Climate Action ◽

Fossil Fuel Industry ◽

Fuel Industry ◽

Developed World

ABSTRACTThis article compiles and categorizes the various forms of climate risk facing the fossil fuel industry. The type and intensity of risk differs greatly among the three forms of fossil fuels, as well as between countries in the developing and developed world. The paper finds heightened risk for the coal industry and reduced risk for oil businesses, due to its lack of substitutes.Burning coal, oil, and natural gas is the source of two-thirds of the world’s emissions of greenhouse gases. Sales of these fuels also represent the economic underpinning of resource-rich countries and the world’s largest firms. As such, steps taken to abate emissions undermine commercial opportunities to monetize fossil fuel reserves. Risks to the industry correlate with progress on climate goals.This article analyzes recent literature on climate action strategy and finds that a new or intensified set of risks has arisen for the fossil fuel industry. These include government policies and legislation, financial restrictions among lenders and insurers, hostile legal and shareholder actions, changes in demand and geopolitics, as well as the onset of new competitive forces among states and technologies.The exposure of carbon-based businesses to these risks and the potential for loss is neither distributed uniformly across the sector, nor adheres to a uniform time scale. Shareholder-owned firms in the developed world will be incentivized to react sooner than large state-owned resource owners in developing countries. The fates of the three fossil fuels also appear likely to play out differently. Demand for oil appears insulated by its lack of viable substitutes, while coal businesses are already undergoing climate-related action, pushed by decreasing social acceptance and constraining financial regulation. At the other end of the spectrum, climate action has improved the medium-term viability of low-carbon natural gas. What appears clear is that, as effects of climate change grow more pronounced, the industry faces a future that is less accepting of current practices.

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Visualizing the Paris Climate Talks on Twitter: Media and Climate Stakeholder Visual Social Media During COP21

Social Media + Society ◽

10.1177/2056305118782687 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 4 (3) ◽

pp. 205630511878268 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Jill E. Hopke ◽

Luis E. Hestres

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

News Media ◽

Fossil Fuel ◽

Ghg Emissions ◽

Trade Association ◽

Visual Framing ◽

Fossil Fuel Industry ◽

Movement Organizations ◽

Fuel Industry ◽

Domestic Support

In 2015, meeting in Paris for the Conference of the Parties (COP21), representatives of 195 nations set an ambitious goal to reach net zero greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by mid-century. This research uses the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which took place in Paris during 30 November to 11 December 2015, as a case study of Twitter coverage of the talks by mainstream and alternative media outlets and other climate stakeholders, including activists and fossil fuel industry groups. It compares the British Guardian with other media and climate stakeholders’ visual framing of climate change on Twitter during COP21, because the publication had launched an advocacy campaign in March 2015 promoting fossil fuel divestment in the lead-up to COP21. Findings show that individual activists and movement organizations functioned similarly in climate change visual framing in Twitter posts, as did individual and organizational multinational representatives and scientific experts. The news media categories varied by type of news organization. The major outliers were the fossil fuel industry and trade association accounts. Industry stakeholders largely focused on former US President Barack Obama’s climate policy, promoting the perception of a lack of domestic support for his climate policies in their visual Twitter postings.

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The Environment, A Bipartisan Issue?: Partisanship Polarization and Climate Change Policies in the United States

British Journal of American Legal Studies ◽

10.2478/bjals-2019-0017 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 8 (3) ◽

pp. 483-506

Author(s):

Valentina Dotto ◽

Anne Richardson Oakes

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Federal Government ◽

Fossil Fuel ◽

State Level ◽

The United States ◽

Climate Change Policies ◽

Party Members ◽

Democratic Parties ◽

Fossil Fuel Industry ◽

Fuel Industry

Abstract Responding to climate change presents significant challenges on both international and domestic fronts. The current U.S. federal government disclaims a connection between climate change, and human activity, and embraces an environmental program that includes withdrawal from the Paris Climate Change Agreement at international level and retrenchment from regulation domestically. This Article comments on the rollback of Obama-era environmental regulations now taking place at federal level and locates these policies in the context of the domestic polarization and partisanship that now characterizes U.S. politics. It notes that environmental regulation divides the Republican and Democratic Parties but that the response of individual party members may be more nuanced, particularly amongst younger voters. The Article comments on state level initiatives to counteract the effects of climate change that have gathered bipartisan support but are now subject to partisan actions by the federal government designed to limit their effectiveness. The Article concludes with the observation that as the combination of an aging demographic and alignment with a declining fossil fuel industry shrinks the GOP traditional constituency, it is to be hoped that far-sighted politicians from both parties will embrace credibility on this issue as a key component of enhancing their own as well as the planet’s survival.

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Regulatory Chill in a Warming World: The Threat to Climate Policy Posed by Investor-State Dispute Settlement

Transnational Environmental Law ◽

10.1017/s2047102517000309 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 7 (2) ◽

pp. 229-250 ◽

Cited By ~ 19

Author(s):

Kyla Tienhaara

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Dispute Settlement ◽

Fossil Fuel ◽

The Public ◽

International Obligations ◽

Fossil Fuel Industry ◽

Warming World ◽

Fuel Industry ◽

Investment Agreements ◽

Trade And Investment

AbstractThe system of investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) found in over 3,000 bilateral investment treaties and numerous regional trade agreements has been criticized for interfering with the rights of sovereign states to regulate investment in the public interest, for example, to protect the environment and public health. This article argues that while much of the public debate around ISDS has focused on a small number of cases that have arisen over the regulation of tobacco packaging, there is a far greater threat posed by the potential use of ISDS by the fossil fuel industry to stall action on climate change. It is hypothesized that fossil fuel corporations will emulate a tactic employed by the tobacco industry – that of using ISDS to induce cross-border regulatory chill: the delay in policy uptake in jurisdictions outside the jurisdiction in which the ISDS claim is brought. Importantly, fossil fuel corporations do not have to win any ISDS cases for this strategy to be effective; they only have to be willing to launch them. The article concludes with three options to reform trade and investment agreements to better align them with climate change mitigation efforts: (i) exclude ISDS provisions; (ii) prohibit fossil fuel industries from accessing ISDS; or (iii) carve out all government measures taken in pursuit of international obligations (for example, under the Paris Agreement on climate change) from challenge under ISDS.

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Carbon Geoengineering and the Metabolic Rift: Solution or Social Reproduction?

Critical Sociology ◽

10.1177/0896920520905074 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 46 (7-8) ◽

pp. 1233-1249

Author(s):

Diana Stuart ◽

Ryan Gunderson ◽

Brian Petersen

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Global Warming ◽

Social Reproduction ◽

Social Order ◽

Fossil Fuel ◽

Metabolic Rift ◽

The Social ◽

Negative Emissions ◽

Fossil Fuel Industry ◽

Fuel Industry

Using the concepts of metabolism and metabolic rift as a framework, this paper examines carbon geoengineering technologies as a solution to climate change and explores if it is possible to mend an ecological metabolic rift without fundamental changes in the social metabolic order. Carbon geoengineering technologies have become a key component of scenarios to limit the extent of global warming and are being discussed as a means to sequester carbon and, therefore, mend the carbon cycle. However, most applications of carbon geoengineering thus far do not result in net negative emissions. Strategies to make operations profitable result in neutral or positive, rather than negative, emissions. While these strategies have the potential to reduce greenhouse gas concentrations, the current social order constrains their use and effectiveness. Instead of being applied as part of the solution to climate change, carbon geoengineering is being strategically promoted by the fossil fuel industry in ways that serve to reproduce and maintain the current social order.

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Guilt and Shame in U.S. Climate Change Communication

10.1093/acrefore/9780190228620.013.575 ◽

2017 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Jennifer Jacquet

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Fossil Fuel ◽

The United States ◽

Scientific Uncertainty ◽

Washington Dc ◽

Climate Change Communication ◽

Change Communication ◽

Corporate Advertising ◽

Change Behavior ◽

The One

Some of the major misconceptions in the United States about climate change—such as the focus on scientific uncertainty, the “debate” over whether climate change is caused by humans, and pushback about how severe the consequences might be—can be seen as communications battles. An interesting area within communications is the contrasting use of guilt and shame for climate-related issues. Guilt and shame are social emotions (along with embarrassment, pride, and others), but guilt and shame are also distinct tools. On the one hand, guilt regulates personal behavior, and because it requires a conscience, guilt can be used only against individuals. Shame, on the other hand, can be used against both individuals and groups by calling their behavior out to an audience. Shaming allows citizens to express criticism and social sanctions, attempting to change behavior through social pressure, often because the formal legal system is not holding transgressors accountable. Through the use of guilt and shame we can see manifestations of how we perceive the problem of climate change and who is responsible for it. For instance, in October 2008, Chevron, one of the world’s largest fossil fuel companies, placed advertisements around Washington, DC, public transit stops featuring wholesome-looking, human faces with captions such as “I will unplug things more,” “I will use less energy,” and “I will take my golf clubs out of the trunk.” Six months later, DC activists reworked the slogans by adding to each the phrase “while Chevron pollutes.” This case of corporate advertising and subsequent “adbusting” illustrates the contrast between guilt and shame in climate change communication. Guilt has tended to align with the individualization of responsibility for climate change and has been primarily deployed over issues of climate-related consumption rather than other forms of behavior, such as failure to engage politically. Shame has been used, largely by civil society groups, as a primary tactic against fossil fuel producers, peddlers of climate denial, and industry-backed politicians.

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