[A-List] Climate change: Why we don't believe it

[Bill Totten]

by Lois Rogers

New Statesman (April 23 2007)


What does Britain really think about global warming? We reveal an unreported
gulf between the pronouncements of campaigners and politicians and British
public opinion

Global warming is a threat that is going to wipe out civilisation as we know it.
The liberal elite and political classes are signed up to the message that,
unless we take urgent action within ten years, we are all literally doomed 
to burn up.

But who else believes them?

Beyond the corridors of Westminster and the offices of environmental pressure
groups, where global warming and sustainability are buzzwords of the moment,
British consumers continue flying, driving and buying with unchecked enthusiasm.
The gulf between the pronouncements of our politicians and what the majority of
people think and do, could scarcely be wider.

A survey by the polling organisation MORI, published at the end of last year but
unreported by the mainstream media, found that about a third of the population -
32 per cent - still knows little or nothing about the threat of climate change.
Of those who had heard of it, half thought it was at least partly a natural
process, and only eleven per cent of those questioned thought it was up to
individuals to change their behaviour. MORI's head of research, John Leaman,
acknowledges that the battle for public opinion is not only not won, it has not
even seriously begun: "The question of how you persuade people that it is to do
with them is a very interesting one", he said. "We need to know whether people's
attitudes are the consequence of ignorance, disbelief or personal self-interest
and inertia. Even among those who do know about climate change, there is a
yawning gap between what people say and what they do. I don't think there is any
simple answer." As an organisation, MORI is keen to be seen taking this problem
seriously. It is planning its own forum in June, to contribute ideas for ways to
promote awareness and behaviour change. (Ironically, the identified key speaker
appeared to be away on a foreign holiday and could not be contacted for comment.)

How then are our leaders going to engage our hearts and minds in the green
debate? What will be the tipping point that will lead people not just into
giving the fashionable answers in opinion polls, but to actually change their
behaviour?

At the moment we are mired in a bog of confusing messages. In a portentous
speech to the Green Alliance last month, the Chancellor Gordon Brown talked
about the need for "new global partnerships and multilateral networks" to tackle
the environmental challenge. The recent climate change review by the economist
Sir Nicholas Stern predicted hundreds of millions of "climate refugees"
streaming across the world in an effort to escape from drought, flood and famine.

Yet opinion polls for the BBC and others indicate that the reaction of people
hearing these pronouncements is that they are simply relieved to hear the
problem is nothing to do with them. An ICM poll last month found about half 
the people questioned in some parts of the country were quite clear about their
unwillingness to change their lifestyle at all. Elsewhere, there is growing
scepticism that any of it is true, and the dissenting voices are getting louder.
A recent editorial in the Daily Mail told millions of readers that it is
pointless to alter drastically the way we live simply on the "vague possibility
of an ecological disaster".

In March, Channel 4 broadcast a documentary entitled The Great Global Warming
Swindle, which notoriously ridiculed the whole basis of climate change. 
The programme was furiously condemned by leading scientists as misleading and
badly researched. Yet Channel 4 reported that it drew more than 700 comments
from viewers, with those supporting its sceptical line outnumbering critics by
six to one. "People appreciated the fact that the questioning approach was being
given air time", said a Channel 4 spokesman. "We are planning a discussion
programme on the whole issue for June. The best time to have a debate is
generally when people say there is no further need for one."

Around the same time, a lone protester from an obscure lobby group called the
Association of British Drivers (ABD), garnered almost two million signatures 
for an online petition protesting against the introduction of road pricing as a
means of limiting car use. Hugh Bladon, a spokesman for the ABD, claims that he
reflects the views of many people in his conviction that discussion of global
warming is simply an excuse to raise more taxes from everyone, and motorists in
particular. "I enjoy driving", he said. "Lots of people do. It is total nonsense
to suggest that it will make a difference if we reduce mileage by a small amount
a year."

While it is hard to find anyone - outside the airline industry - to advocate air
travel as fervently as Bladon advocates the right to drive, the right to fly is
another area of confusion and mixed messages. Even those who regard themselves
as "responsible tourists" want to carry on flying. Typical is a comment by
travel agent Chris Bland on the GreenTraveller website: "While I agree with
trying to limit gratuitous flying by second-home commuters or business travel
junkies, I don't want genuine travellers and adventurous tourists to be
dissuaded from exploring the world. For me, the message would be: 
fly less and make it count when you do."

From politicians, however, there is a collective reluctance to take on any of
those in the wealthiest and most influential sector of the electorate - whatever
their reason for getting on a plane. "Doing anything about global warming is
going to hit the middle classes first", says Peter Ainsworth, the shadow
environment secretary. "A lot of them do support the Daily Mail view that this
is just another means of imposing more stealth taxes. Convincing them that being
more energy-efficient is actually going to save money - it is not easy."

Sir Jonathon Porritt, chairman of the Sustainable Development Commission, also
points to government resistance to any discussion of limitations on car travel
or foreign holidays. "Politicians are preoccupied with trying to keep the same
level of consumption with a lower output of carbon. In fact, we will end up
paying so much for high-carbon goods that rationing will come in because of
price rather than government mandate." Porritt himself believes our collective
desire for self-preservation will soon win through because of the evident
warming up of our world. Mark Lynas, the New Statesman columnist and author 
of the book Six Degrees: life in a hotter climate {1}, argues, however, that
government action is imperative. "It doesn't make sense for people to make
individual sacrifices while the world goes on around them. The unwillingness 
of people to act just reinforces the need for government to do something
collectively."

Elsewhere, there is plenty of support for the view that, barring a Katrina-style
hurricane catastrophe hitting Britain, consumers will not change. "It's very sad,
but I actually think we might need a whole series of disasters in different
countries before people make the connection", said Brian Hoskins, professor of
meteorology at Reading University and a fellow of the Royal Society. "There has
always been a conflict between social behaviour and selfish behaviour, but the
environment is bearing down on us. It is a huge challenge to see if we can do
something twenty years before it bites. We have to be optimistic about it,
because otherwise we might as well give up.

"The political parties have taken off on this, but they have left behind them 
a considerable proportion of the electorate who are still wedded to Margaret
Thatcher's notion of individual freedom to do your own thing."

According to Solitaire Townsend, founder of Futerra, a company specialising in
sustainability communications, the obvious way to affect public opinion is
through what she terms the cultural media - television soaps such as EastEnders
or Desperate Housewives: "It is quite easy to 'de-status' things by presenting
them as un-aspirational", she says. "If a big 4x4 is such an embarrassment that
the kids don't want to be dropped off at school in it, then that's a success for
us. The environmental movement has always focused on news and policy-makers, and
forgotten how you change what people want. You can't stop people wanting status
symbols, but you can make them aspire to different ones."

Numerous studies of collective psychology demonstrate that the greater the
threat, the more people are inclined ignore it. John Elkington, founder of the
think-tank SustainAbility, pointed out that, after the bombing of Pearl Harbor
when America entered the Second World War, Ford went on making cars because they
said people needed them. It was only when government intervention forced the
company to turn its production lines to munitions, that Ford joined the war
effort. "People almost enjoy being confused about big issues because it gives
them the excuse to do nothing", Elkington said.

He does not think any major change will be orchestrated by government: 
"All governments are hopelessly conflicted by the pressures from industry and
business. My hunch is that climate is going to give us some powerful nudges,
which will cause people to panic. Ultimately though, I don't think change will
come about through consumers either. It will be the result of colossal pressure
from the financial markets. The costs from natural disasters caused by global
warming, which are being born by the reinsurance giants such as Swiss Re and
Munich Re, are simply going off the scale."


Unanswerable question

There are still those, however, who maintain that acceptance of the need to
change will filter gradually through society. "It is an incredibly interesting
social phenomenon", said Tim Jackson, professor of sustainable development at
Surrey University. "I think we are at a turning point in the relationship
between mankind and the environment, but people so far still don't see the
responsibility as theirs. They think it is the job of government and big
business. At some stage, society as a whole is going to have to enter the
discussion."

The unanswerable question of how to do that still remains. Last month, the
Market Research Society celebrated its fiftieth anniversary with a conference
discussion heralding the age of the "ethical brand", which it predicted would be
embraced first by the "bourgeois bohemians", the economically conservative but
socially liberal baby-boomers who are the new establishment. In the absence of a
climate-inspired natural disaster, however, it seems unlikely that the threat of
global warming will cause the rampant materialism of even the most socially
conscious sector of society to be suddenly replaced by a set of long-lost
pre-industrial values.

Earlier this month, the 800 scientists involved in the UN's Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change produced their latest report. The 1,572-page document,
with its predictions of death and destruction in the developing world, provided
plenty of reassurance for stubborn westerners that none of it is anything to do
with them. So how will the IPCC convince them of the need to accept their
responsibility? Its spokesman was baffled by the question: "They just have to",
he said.

Not on the evidence so far. Back in London, civil servants at the Department for
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) were last week labouring over their
own "behaviour change strategy" - what it would take to get different sections
of the population to change their behaviour. Next month, a "citizens summit" is
being planned to decide on the shape of this strategy. When Defra was asked for
the agenda, however, it was clear that the department still did not know what it
would be.


Trying to get the message across ...

Defra has been running pilot "recycling incentive schemes" across the country,
giving vouchers to good recyclers or entering them into recycling lottery prize
draws.

Ken Livingstone is offering Londoners GBP 100 cash back if they accept cut-price
insulation for their homes.

The Department for Transport's "Cycle to Work" scheme lets employees buy
tax-free bikes and accessories through their employers.

Toyota has released an attractive (believe it or not) hybrid car. 
The part-electric, part-petrol Prius is also exempt from the London 
congestion charge.

Tesco is attempting to tackle plastic bag wastage with its "Bag for Life" scheme.
The hard-wearing bags cost 10 pence and customers are encouraged to reuse them
until they finally wear out (when they are replaced free of charge).

Pop stars including Madonna, Genesis, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Razorlight
(Johnny Borrell, pictured right) are climbing on board with a series of Live
Earth concerts planned across seven continents on 7 July. The intention is to
raise popular awareness of climate change. Organisers promise to keep the gigs
as carbon-neutral as possible.

The Real Nappy Campaign is trying to persuade parents that giving up disposable
nappies will save them at least GBP 300, as well as being better for the
environment.

Property sellers now need to provide a "Home Information Pack" to prospective
buyers, which includes a certificate on the home's energy efficiency.

Research: Sarah O'Connor


http://www.newstatesman.com/200704230025


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