How do we turn people’s widespread concern about climate change into similarly widespread support for the policies and actions needed to prevent it?
This is a critical question for responsible investors, because both business and government can’t – or, at least, won’t – do what investor engagement is asking them to do at a meaningful scale without public support. And it’s a question that the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL) and Zero Ideas set out to answer in a new research report, Restoring human progress: Winning citizens’ support for actions on climate and nature.
The path from caring about the climate issue to supporting policies to fix it is tortuous. Planetary boundaries dictate what we need to do at a planetary scale, but at the scale of specific people and places, and specific policies, it’s not so black and white. It’s easy for people to argue why “we don’t have to do this” in response to any particular policy; it’s hard to rebut that response convincingly head-on. Someone and somewhere else can always carry the burden.
But what if people want to support something, rather than being told they must? What if “we want to do this”? This is the critical pivot: from burden to desire; from obligation to aspiration.
In most of the world, this pivot works because people are optimistic and energised about creating a better future. When Lord Stern, in the title of his new book, calls the opportunity of climate action “the growth story of the 21st century”, he is talking primarily about emerging markets and developing economies.
But in the G7 and other similarly rich countries, that desire and aspiration are elusive. This matters for investors who, whether for risk, currency or mandate reasons, are committed to those markets.
Our research across 23 countries shows that the richer a country is, the more despondent its people tend to feel about the future. In G7 countries, most people believe the world will be worse for their children – a view far less common in emerging economies. Yet paradoxically, they are also less open to change.
This combination is dispiriting: we feel the world will worsen, yet we resist the actions needed to improve it.
When societies are this pessimistic, we live for today and don’t invest in tomorrow. We borrow from the future, regardless of whether we will be able to repay. We resist change to protect ourselves from the future. We care about the future, but we don’t attend to it.
We crave stability, and fret when it is disrupted, whether by climate change, populism and geopolitics, or artificial intelligence. This is the defensive and reactive mindset that makes us interpret what is happening as a “polycrisis”. It puts us on the back foot, ill-prepared to shape our future in a fast-changing world. We may want stability, but at a time of rapid change in technology innovation and geopolitics, hiding from the future is a route to decline, not stability. Especially when the rest of the world keeps looking ahead.
Overcoming the despondency is therefore critical not only for the climate. It is foundational for economic growth in rich countries. Risk-taking, innovation and investment all require belief in the future and openness to change. Investors share with business and mainstream political leaders a self-interest in rebuilding people’s belief in the future. We have a common and urgent need to restore human progress as people’s aspiration and expectation for our societies.
This shared self-interest should guide what investors look for when they engage with policymakers. It’s not enough to advocate for policies that would help address climate change in theory if our despondent electorates won’t give governments the mandates they need to introduce them.
So how can investors encourage policies that can win popular support, restoring human progress as the norm and expectation for our societies? Look for a policy that:
1. Advances towards a sector vision, rather than an emissions goal
Emission reductions may be one of the end impacts we are looking for as a consequence of a policy, but they don’t make a good goal. People need to support something more specific and directive: not “climate policy” or “nature policy”, but climate and nature embedded in “travel policy”, “food and agriculture policy”, etc. Envisioning a better future for each sector can be more motivating, painting a picture of a better world people want to live in. It is also more practical, because it builds in from the outset the relationships (tensions and synergies) between the different interests and objectives within each sector, such as security, freedom, economic success, cultural practices, affordability, all competing alongside sustainability.
2. Plays to a country’s strengths, rather than following a shared, universal approach
The goal of restoring human progress is universal, but not uniform. Playing to a universal playbook, with a mindset of sharing the burden rather than seeking opportunity, is neither motivating nor effective. To build people’s confidence in and excitement about the future, leaders need to focus on where their countries can thrive, lead and, potentially, win.
This is what China has been doing so effectively in solar, wind, batteries and electric vehicles, building not only on their natural endowment of rare-earth minerals but also their unmatched manufacturing and learning curves. It is what Germany could be doing in industrial electrification, heavy transport and non-fossil chemicals; or France in nuclear energy and sustainable aviation; or Japan in high-efficiency and precision technologies. Every country has familiar strengths to build on.
Success is not guaranteed, but playing to national strengths allows different countries to contribute effectively in ways that work best for them, and crucially, this is a narrative frame that grounds climate action in a relatable vision for people. It helps the shift from problem-solving and damage limitation to opportunity, choice and ambition.
3. Offers salient solutions to people’s real-life problems, rather than transactional or indirect solutions
Yes, people do need to see meaningful gains. But not as contractual compensation, such as cash handouts from offshore wind to make up for the disruption of building them. And not from theoretical or remote solutions that are not effective solutions, even if the problems they address are real and immediate. (For example: jobs matter, and solar farms create some jobs, but other activities may be more effective solutions than solar energy if the problem to solve is local job creation.)
Instead, the opportunity is to combine solutions for climate and nature with advances in what people will experience in each sector, offering benefits that are covenantal: intrinsic,
shared benefits from collaborative involvement, such as the local jobs and prosperity from an economic zone built around access to local offshore wind, which is a very different motivator than cash compensation.
4. Offers freedom of choice, rather than social engineering
To accelerate the transition beyond what we are achieving voluntarily, it is tempting to propose policies that withhold choice or availability, depriving people of what remains their preferred option. Knowing that people generally oppose bans, this may be pursued through prohibitive pricing rather than an explicit ban. But the public reaction to this can be even worse. People understand such pricing as a de facto ban for them, and a licence for the rich: the principle of “polluter pays” becomes the practice of “pay to pollute”.
Instead, restoring human progress demands policies that respect people’s agency
and independence, shifting demand by substituting technology solutions that people
will choose, either for an intrinsically superior experience or better value for money.
5. Protects the vulnerable locally, rather than globally
It is hard to pass policies that aim to achieve climate justice on a world scale, if that imposes a cost – whether in cash or in loss of competitiveness – on the electorates that must approve them.
The concern people feel for those most disrupted and most financially vulnerable is real, and a big driver of whether they will support a policy. But that concern typically operates at the level of the electorate of a nation-state. It may be a bit narrower (a state within a nation) or broader (the EU), but it rarely extends globally.
6. Inspires a feeling of being part of something bigger, beyond any direct value proposition to the consumer or worker
Focusing only on the tangible value that people receive as individuals ignores the intangible value of belonging, priden and community.
Among UK adults, only about 10 percent play football, but about 40 percent watch and follow it. Many of those identify strongly with the players, wearing their team kit and saying “we” when talking about their team’s selection, tactics and performance. People don’t have to be actively doing something directly to feel part of something bigger, purposeful and winning.
These guidelines are not all achievable in every case. But the more that policies follow them, the more they will win citizens’ support, by playing to our collective, societal self-interest and helping to build a future that people want to be a part of.
For investors shaping their policy engagement, our research suggests these guidelines can help to bring about a more enabling social and political environment not only for corporate climate action, but also for national flourishing and economic growth.
Simon Glynn is founder of Zero Ideas and co-author of the CISL research report Restoring human progress: Winning citizens’ support for actions on climate and nature.
