Resource Type: Research & Articles

This post includes climate and environment headlines, data points, and key takeaways from recent public polls – including new polling about Build Back Better, a new Yale/GMU report on consumer activism, and a comparison of how strongly partisan voters on both sides care about the government’s approach to climate change.

A focus on individual actions can distract from the larger climate movement goal of system change. While many activists in the UK-based group Extinction Rebellion (XR) call for “system change,” what is missing is an understanding of what kind of system change is necessary—and how it might be achieved. XR activists still engage in personal pro-environmental behaviors, even though their political goals are aimed at systemic change, and the group continues to argue that blaming and shaming individuals is counterproductive. This article argues that accusations of hypocrisy (based on their personal choices of climate movement activists) are used to discredit, divide, and undermine the climate movement—and those accusations by opponents work, to some degree.