Moral arguments for supporting climate change policies

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Abstract

Historically climate change policies have been justified economically, and this financial cost used as a justification for climate delay discourses and arguments. Research has shown that people can be persuaded to change their environmental behaviour and support environmental policies, when presented with various moral reasons for why the change is necessary. However, a systematic analysis of various types of moral arguments for climate policies and their effectiveness has not been conducted so far. With this study, we aimed to understand which types of moral arguments are best at convincing people to adopt and accept more climate-friendly policies, and whether people of different socio-demographic/political background differ in which arguments they find convincing. These moral arguments are based on the moral foundation theory and will include compassion, fairness, purity, authority, in-group loyalty, and ancestral legacy.

The Speaker

Dr Nicole Nisbett is a Research Fellow in Climate Politics at the School of Politics and International Studies, University of Leeds. She researches social movements and the normative change required for us to tackle the climate crisis, mainly through computational research methods. Nicole earned a PhD in Computational Social Science and an MSc in Data Science, and has previously worked in the public and private sectors.