Limited Attention to Climate Change in U.S. Sociology

Abstract

Climate change is increasingly recognized as not only a biophysical and technological problem but also a social one. Nonetheless, sociologists have expressed concern that sociology has paid relatively little attention to climate change. This deficit threatens to limit the frames available to understand and imagine solutions to the climate crisis. In this paper I report the most up-to-date and expansive empirical assessment of attention to climate change in sociology in the United States (U.S.). I find little to no mention of climate change across leading sociology journal articles (0.89%), conference sessions (1.5%), and faculty biographies (2.8%) and course listings (0.2%) in the 20 top-ranked departments in the U.S. Two leading journals, the American Sociological Review and American Journal of Sociology, have cumulatively published just three articles focused on climate change to date. This level of disciplinary attention appears low compared to the field’s engagement with other important social problems. My findings thus suggest that climate silence is persistent and pervasive in U.S. sociology. I discuss the implications of this silence and outline opportunities for sociologists, funders, journalists, and policymakers to embrace social science perspectives in climate change teaching, research, and policymaking.