Climate Change and Political Blame

• In Event: Public Opinion and the Environment in Global Context

Abstract

We demonstrate that changes in the global climate cause individuals to punish national governments but not international actors. We provide a theoretical framework to articulate the various mechanisms that could result in this observed pattern. Leveraging a wealth of survey data from more than 160 countries, we show that citizens are less likely to approve of national and local but not international political actors during periods of climatic distress, and these results are especially pronounced in the developing world. Because the effects of climate change are endogenous to factors that would influence political attitudes, we compare political attitudes measured in El Nino years relative to La Nina years for countries affected by the El Nino/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) system. In so doing, we compare countries in years of climatic stress to themselves in more placid years and can causally identify the effect of climate change. We show that individuals consciously associate societal changes with climate change and hold their national governments accountable for these outcomes. Our finding is remarkable considering that international actors are more often responsible for these climatic changes. This suggests that chains of accountability may be disrupted when political problems transcend borders.

Authors

• Lindsay R. Dolan, Wesleyan University

• Quynh Nguyen, Australian National University