As world leaders begin another COP climate conferenceit can be easy to be cynical, scared or overwhelmed by the sheer scale the effects that climate change has (and will continue to have) on our world.
After all, its realities sea level rise and more frequent and severe storms are terrifying prospects.
However, along with the bad, it is also important to recognize the good, such as the recent mission from the International Energy Agency showing that we may still be able to limit global temperatures to 1.5 degrees Celsius due to record growth in green technologies.
Read more: Reducing ecological stress is a critical step in achieving any climate action
Why should we care about good news in a world so clearly doomed? Don’t these distract us from more pressing matters? Simply put, the lack of good news is bad for our health and leads many to assume that all is lost, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy that prevents effective climate action.
A dark world?
Journalist David Wallace-Wells he opens his book, The uninhabited land with the line “It’s worse, much worse than you think.” This sentiment typifies the constant diet of bad news that in recent decades has instilled fear and anxiety in much of society, especially young people.
It manifests as ecological stress and explains why in a recent survey of 10,000 young people and children around the world, 7 percent of respondents felt the future was scary with over half feeling helpless or powerless. One in four of these respondents hesitate to have children for fear of bringing a child into a threatening or doomed world.
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If we add to these feelings research that shows that trust in institutions worldwide has declined in recent years, then the picture looks even bleaker. However, a 2019 Pew poll in the United States found that 71 percent of respondents even saw a decrease interpersonal trust.
This reality echoes the symptom of anxiety that communications professor George Gerbner coined in the 1970s as “moderate global syndrome.” Such a state sees violence and self-centeredness as embedded in society, which, not surprisingly, leads to increased fear and mistrust of the world and the future. This scenario is worrisome for two important reasons.
First, while some level of fear can spur action it can also lead to ecological paralysis. Ecological paralysis is the stress that can make people feel hopeless and disengaged, feelings that more than 10,000 young people probably feel.
Such fear can breed more than apathy, as Gerbner warned long ago. It can also leave individuals feeling, as he says, “more dependent, more easily manipulated and controlled, more prone to deceptively simple, strong, harsh measures and harsh attitudes…[who]…may welcome repression if it promises to alleviate their insecurities.”
(AP Photo/Noah Berger)
An authoritarian world will not be the answer to our climate crisis, because it is civil society that drives healthy change.
The second reason for concern about this bleak representation of the world is that such a depiction is not accurate. Yes, it is true—to continue the above example—that worldwide democracy has been eroded in many cases, which is not conducive to a just transition to a post-fossil fuel world. But democracy has also shown some notable successes in terms of civil liberties and political participation in countries such as South Africa, Indonesia and various other states such as Benin, Botswana, Ghana, Namibia, Mauritius and Senegal.
These cases should remind us that our negative perceptions of an “evil world” are not always well-founded, which can foster hope, something we badly need.
Negative biases
Howard Frumkin, professor emeritus at the University of Washington School of Public Health, reminds us that Hope is central to human flourishing. Hope, however, is not an easy concept to grasp.
Frumkin conceives of hope as a perception that we have agency or, more simply, a sense that we are capable of taking action. Add to this the psychological research that shows that can learn, even encourage, watching others, and we can see why environmental thinker David Orr defines hope as “a verb with the sleeves rolled up.”
What this tells us is that if we are to tackle climate change, we will need to listen to and follow the myriad stories of individuals and groups who, with agency, are actively pursuing a sustainable future.
Take his job Project Withdrawal, a nonprofit organization that uses climate science strategies to stop and even reverse climate change. His findings are remarkable: Chief among the strategies to address climate change is ensuring that girls around the world receive an education.
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Project Drawdown research shows that with more education Girls are more likely to manage their reproductive health, earn higher wages, have fewer cases of disease and contribute positively to feeding their families. All outcomes that have clear social, individual and environmental benefits.
Examining public perceptions of the state of girls’ education around the world reveals an important phenomenon: people doubt that such a goal is achievable. A 2018 study consisting of thousands of surveys around the world found that when asked “In all low-income countries around the world today, how many girls finish primary school?” Most people answered only 20 percent, when in fact, 60 percent do.
Simply put, our beliefs about girls’ education are not only negative but dangerously flawed, and this inability to conceive of the goal as attainable is another barrier to effective action to address global problems. From girls’ education to climate change, negative perceptions of futility and powerlessness have serious consequences.
Staying optimistic
Announcing the good news does not mean denying the bad. The trick to proclaiming the good news is not to ignore the darker realities of our time, for example, with projecting naïve or ideological optimism who would prefer us to embrace some thought groups or populist leaders. This way of thinking only delays action and perpetuates an entrepreneurial approach to climate change.
Instead, we have to think dialectically. Dialectical thinking it simultaneously holds us to seemingly opposite realities, such as the fact that still very few girls receive an education and that already 60 percent of girls in low-income countries today complete primary school with many working to increase that number. Or that there might be positive climate news in a world on fire.
The hope we need today is dark, to be sure. It recognizes the tragic realities of our time and it also seeks out, learns from and defends its successes. It is an active hope supported by the belief that reality can be paradoxical, both good and bad.
Engaging in the act of hope can help us be less terrified of the future and more confident in our belief that it is possible to build a better and more just world. We would all do well to remember this if, or indeed when, our leaders fail us at COP28.
