Climate change is a global issue, affecting every corner of the globe in varying degrees of severity. Patterns of inequity have emerged in terms of which countries produce greater greenhouse gas emissions and which countries face the impacts. This inequity requires the global community to address the compounding forms of injustice in the realm of looking at social, economical, racial and environmental justice concerns. Furthermore, the scientific consensus requires urgent action to lower carbon emissions. In order to bring about the swift change to lower carbon emissions, public insistence can play a role in moving governments to act.
People must also alter their actions to lower their own carbon emissions, especially in developed countries, however, we need more than personal actions to bring about the scale of carbon reductions necessary. Moving people to act on climate has many challenges, yet through collective action and building active support, pressure can force governments to act as we have witnessed through previous social movements. Successful social movements provide strategies and insights for building the climate justice movement. Furthermore, extensive research has examined the communication efforts of climate education and people’s perceptions to climate change. Understanding what aspects of climate communication are more effective in generating active support for climate action helps organizers with their messaging for public engagement in order to increase collective action while movement building. Continued research is needed to better understand how to counter-act the media pressure from the fossil fuel industry that continues to manufacture doubt and influence policy makers and the general public, in order to move people towards public insistence. In the U.S., it is evident that under the current administration, climate policies must be instigated and supported at the local and state levels.
While this problem is global in scale, action at the local level through climate communication and increasing public engagement is essential, everywhere. Addressing climate justice also means taking a look at the current system and considering system change to capitalism. One could argue that climate change can be solved by capitalism alone, but it can also be argued that the capitalistic model does not take into account the societal inequities involving racial, social and environmental concerns. The business sector also plays a critical role in advancing technologies and implementing solutions; and civil society, too, can support sustainable business solutions through their purchasing power. Civil society can also make shareholder choices and divest from companies whose business models put profits before principles and invest in companies and organizations promoting solutions toward a just transition to a clean energy future. In terms of what governments can do, there is not much time to plot one global course of action, only little time for mass mobilization demanding climate justice in order to force governments to swifter action.
End Notes — Conclusion
1. Lane, Phil Jr. (2000). Developing the Wisdom of the Heart. In J. Gardner (Ed.), Architects of peace: Visions of hope in words and images (p. 46). Novato, CA: New World Library.