Climate (In)Action and (Dis)Engagement

Question 1

The two functions of language

Answer 1

1. Ideational (representing objects, phenomena, concepts etc.)
2. Interactional (constructing the roles of and relations between people)

Question 2

Discourse gives people…

Answer 2

Different roles to play and different capacities to act

Question 3

How does depoliticization affect people’s ability to act politically?

Answer 3

Depoliticization corrodes political subjectivity and shuts down contestation by universalizing a particular position as the only reasonable one

People aren’t positioned as political actors with agency and thus do not know how to act politically or why that might be important

Question 4

What happens to citizens when environmental political discourse is depoliticized?

Answer 4

People are positioned as “passive spectators” to eco-politics that is already preset; instead of being active participants in finding a solution to climate change via politics, citizens are merely recipients of messaging by others

Question 5

4 ways environmental political discourse is depoliticized

Answer 5

1. Scientization
2. Economization
3. Moralization
4. Naturalization (the sum of the others, dominant positions coming to seem natural)

Question 6

Scientized environmental discourse - what it is, how it depoliticizes, and what it encourages (3 points)

Answer 6

1. The widespread claim that the politics of climate change is nothing more than the translation of the established consensus within physical climate science into a political consensus - e.g. we know scientifically what causes climate change and what must be done to stop it - politics should reflect this
2. It predetermines the content of environmental politics and positions citizens as having nothing to contribute
3. Encourages inaction and disengagement

Question 7

Economized environmental discourse - what it is, how it depoliticizes, and what it encourages (3 points)

Answer 7

1. Creates a context in which technical market-based policy responses are justified by a logic of economic calculation, e.g. politics must mirror mainstream economic consensus of green growth, carbon markets
2. It predetermines the content of environmental politics and narrows the debate, and silences citizens by positioning them as having no role to play in creating politics
3. Invites citizen inaction and disengagement

Question 8

Moralized environmental discourse - what it is, and what it encourages

Answer 8

1. Predetermines some perspectives as good and others as bad and insists that environmental politics must reflect this
2. Invites passivity by threatening those who disagree with criticism and social censure -> silencing people who want to avoid being labelled a bad person

Question 9

Why is it important to keep people politically involved, according to Carvalho et al.?

Answer 9

The failure of political options tested up until now suggests that different climate politics may be necessary and citizen political engagement can play a key role in bringing this about

Question 10

2 activist efforts to give citizens an active role ti play in constructing environmental politics

Answer 10

1. Acts of resistance (e.g. blocking open-pit mining projects)
2. Prefigurative action (e.g. community-based renewable energy initiatives)

Question 11

3 reasons why repoliticizing environmental practices haven’t gained widespread uptake

Answer 11

1. Climate activism struggles to be seen as a broad-based mass movement, is instead seen as a countercultural lifestyle choice
2. Climate activism struggles to connect with people’s existing realities and understandings (e.g. Global North does not connect with ‘climate debt’ so it not activated by efforts regarding that)
3. Not all climate action aims to be political

Question 12

Scheuerman: two trends of environmental action

Answer 12

1. Environmental non-violent disobedience (NCD)
2. Environmental block and disrupt activism (BD)

Question 13

What 3 things characterizes environmental non-violent disobedience?

Answer 13

1. Politically motivated law-breaking carried out with civility and consciousness
2. Drawing on traditional nonviolent civil obedience (e.g. Gandhi, King)
3. Goal of gaining attention of otherwise indifferent political peers to get them to support change

Question 14

What are the 2 advantages of drawing on traditional nonviolent movements for NCD?

Answer 14

1. Morality
2. Familiarity

Question 15

Scheuerman’s 2 concerns about NCD

Answer 15

1. Tactically, it has a too optimistic assessment of the power of non-violent action which is based on political science regarding non-violent revolution against authoritarian government - demanding policy change in a democracy vs. overthrowing authoritarian regimes are not the same thing and confusing one for the other can create backlash (e.g. blocking London underground did not make sense as public support move)
2. Politically, some NCD activists call for political institutional change in the form of an assembly with vast authority to counter global warming, also based on misapplied deliberative democratic theory. But this would be democratically deficient as they are not beholden to the citizenry at large and there is an incentive to rig the process if the assembly comes up with solutions that NCD’ers don’t like

Question 16

What 4 things characterizes environmental block and disrupt activism?

Answer 16

1. Largely rejects peaceable nonviolence, replacing it with militancy and self-presentation
2. Broader action, sometimes undertaken in secret, such as vandalism and sabotage
3. Believes that reform is impossible and public persuasion will take too long and are impatient with the democratic process that cannot act quickly enough to address climate change emergency
4. Dedicated “avant-garde” must take matters into own hands

Question 17

Scheuerman’s 2 concerns regarding BD

Answer 17

1. A small avant-garde cannot cripple an entire complex fossil fuel economy - only mass action can, which BD abandons the hope of
2. In abandoning the need for public persuasion, BD abandons democracy, and they allocate a lot of authority and power to themselves

Question 18

Which is the better choice - BD and NCD, according to Scheuerman?

Answer 18

NCD, as they at least retain commitment to mobiziling and engaging people, constituting less of a threat to democracy (although language of emergency and democratically questionable proposals means it is not entirely free of worry)

But the current selection does not leave us with a rich and robust set of options to save the planet