Data Session: 11th March, Mirko Demasi & Søren Beck Nielsen: “It’s not the end of the world”: climate anxiety as the topic of public debate

DARG will run at 13:00-14:15 UK time as a hybrid data session:
Room SCH1:21 (Schofield Building Building, Loughborough)
Zoom registration link: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZMpcOqgrjgiHtTW1buxXxCdo2SK5iFfK3iV
(NB: we are now collecting some basic information on who comes to DARG)

Session details: One of the robust findings of climate change communication research is that debates tend to reveal disagreements about implications rather than facts themselves. That is, debates predominately evolve around the climate crisis’ implications in terms of possible responses: do we really need mitigative actions? Who should ‘step up’ and take the lead? Who should pay the price that conversion costs? Etc. This study examines another type of implication that is debated in public discourse: how to psychologically respond to the climate crisis and its prospects of various degrees of rising temperatures, sea level rising, and increased occurrences of extreme weather events depending upon how much and how fast we collectively decarbonize. More specifically, we examine how climate anxiety is made the topic of public debate and with which consequences.

For the DARG data session, we would like to share data from a Danish public service television progam called Debatten (i.e. “the debate”). It is somewhat comparable the UK’s Question Time, but without questions from the audience. Each week, Debatten picks up a current political topic that is debated among interviewees who are constituted by prominent politicians (e.g., ministers, leaders of the opposition, MPs etc.), scholars, stakeholders, various representatives (e.g., representing interest organizations, unions, policy institutes, particular businesses) etc. Spatially, the show is organized to form a a right angle. Producers place panel participants with values, which are typically associated with left wing ideologies, on the left axis, whilst occupants on the right axis are participants with values that typically associate with right wing ideologies. We have selected excerpts where a very prominent neoliberal Danish politician debates with young climate activists whether or not younger generations should fear the future.

Transcript on request.