Public Demand and Climate Change Policy Making in OECD Countries: From Dynamics of the Demand to Policy Responsiveness
| Autor: | Bianca Oehl |
|---|---|
| Přispěvatelé: | Bernauer, Thomas, Häusermann, Silja, Schäfer, Mike |
| Jazyk: | angličtina |
| Rok vydání: | 2015 |
| Předmět: |
010504 meteorology & atmospheric sciences
OECD-MITGLIEDSLÄNDER (ORGANISATION FÜR WIRTSCHAFTLICHE ZUSAMMENARBEIT) 0207 environmental engineering GLOBAL CHANGE + KLIMAERWÄRMUNG (KLIMATOLOGIE) 02 engineering and technology 01 natural sciences ÖFFENTLICHE MEINUNG (SOZIOLOGIE) BUSINESS CYCLE KLIMAPOLITIK (UMWELTPOLITIK) MASS COMMUNICATION + MASS MEDIA (SOCIOLOGY) MASSENKOMMUNIKATION + MASSENMEDIEN (SOZIOLOGIE) 020701 environmental engineering 0105 earth and related environmental sciences MEMBER COUNTRIES OF THE OECD (ORGANIZATION FOR ECONOMIC COOPERATION AND DEVELOPMENT) 1. No poverty PUBLIC OPINION (SOCIOLOGY) Natural resources energy and environment CLIMATE POLICY (ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY) 13. Climate action 8. Economic growth ddc:333.7 KONJUNKTURZYKLUS GLOBAL CHANGE + GLOBAL WARMING (CLIMATOLOGY) |
| DOI: | 10.3929/ethz-a-010432416 |
| Popis: | Climate change is one of today’s major political challenges. The Kyoto Protocol assigned national emission reduction goals for the developed countries however national governments in these countries have implemented policies varying widely in range and ambition over time and across countries to meet their goals. Can this variation in policy making be explained by dierences in the typically taken for granted – but empirically often neglected – influence of public demand for climate protection? Public demand is addressed from four angles in this thesis. First the influence of the business cycle on public demand for climate protection is examined for 27 countries between 2004 and 2013. Conventional wisdom very often portrays climate protection as a luxury good meaning that during economic booms public demand for climate policy should rise with the opposite holding true during recessions. This relationship is supported by existing theories such as the postmaterialist theory or Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. The results however indicate that neither survey based consumer confidence indicators nor unemployment rates – which is expected to best reflect citizen’s economic situation – could explain rises in demand for climate protection only rather general business cycle indicators and the inflation index show the expected eect. The second angle from which public demand is examined is the media. News media have an information monopoly with regard to climate change and the reporting of climate change is likely to influence how people think about it. For this reason the second part of this thesis focuses on the convergence of newspaper content and examines reporting on climate change in six countries between 1995 and 2010. The findings confirm that convergence is moderated by the media system types – as they present the environment within which news are produced – and the facet which is examined. The more action oriented the facet the more national rigidities and domestic political interests matter and the less content convergence is likely. This is particularly the case for a measure of published opinion which builds on claims made in the news. While the concept of public demand is rather intuitive its empirical measurement presents a challenging task to policymakers and social scientists. The third part of this thesis proposes new alternatives: taking published opinion and media salience as a proxies for public demand. In order to validate this measure US data on published opinion and salience are compared with already established demand measures such as surveys and search engine requests both typically limited in availability. It turns out that published opinion and media salience can indeed serve as a useful measure of public demand. Finally the fourth part examines if and under which conditions public demand – measured by the published opinion and media salience – impacts climate policy making in six countries between 1995 and 2010. The results show that published opinion and salience influence the sheer number of policies adopted but only the salience matters for the scope of climate change legislation. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
| Externí odkaz: |
|