Metaphor as a mechanism of global climate change governance: A study of international policies, 1992–2012

Abstract

This paper explores the emergence of a global climate change mitigation regime through an analysis of the language employed in international science-policy reports. We assume that a global climate regime can only operate effectively on the basis of a shared understanding of climate change which is itself based on a shared language of governance. We therefore carried out an in-depth thematic and metaphor analysis of 63 policy documents published between 1992 and 2012. Results show that global climate science-policy discourses universalise the myriad impacts of a changing climate into a single dichotomous impacted/not-impacted scenario and aim to govern this world according to economic principles of cost-benefit analysis. These discourses use metaphors that draw on narrative structures prevalent in the wider culture to produce and legitimate a reductionist representation of climate change. This representation undermines public understanding of and engagement with climate change by marginalising subordinate policy framings which do not align with the prevailing dichotomous framing. The types of documents we analyse in this paper represent important sources for journalists reporting on climate change. We therefore suggest that any attempt to improve public communication of climate change should include revisions to these organisational discourses.

Systems thinking and environmental concern

“…One way that journalists and policy makers have simplified discussions of the global ecosystem is to use economic, cost-benefit terms, which often portray a straightforward trade-off between sustainable environmental policies and economic growth (Shaw & Nerlich, 2015). This practice represents an additional hurdle to mobilizing support for mitigating the dangers of climate change, as people tend to prioritize immediate economic issues (employment, budgets, taxes, trade) over long-term environmental issues (e.g., in a September 2015 poll of US adults, 35% of respondents identified some aspect of the economy as their primary concern facing the country, whereas only 2% named the environment; Gallup, 2015;Leiserowitz, Maibach, Roser-Renouf, Feinberg, & Rosenthal, 2015).…”

Conceptualizing Change in Communication Through Metaphor

“…Scholars interested in mesolevel processes have used organizational documents (Cheng & Ho, in press; Tourish & Hargie, ). Scholars focusing on macrolevel processes, finally, have often used policy documents (e.g., Shaw & Nerlich, ) or media content (e.g., newspaper reports; Charteris‐Black & Musolff, ; Nerghes et al, ; O'Mara‐Shimek, Guillén‐Parra, & Ortega‐Larrea, ).…”

Serving the public good: Empirical links between governance and research investment in the context of global environmental change

“…Even slower, perhaps, are understandings of whether and how these science-based formulations relate across the wide diversity of nations that are expected to implement them (Hulme, 2010). A recent review of science-society interaction models, for example, (Kirchhoff et al, 2013) noted that greater appreciation of the diversity of governance contexts is needed in order to engage broader audiences in climate action (see also Cornell et al, 2013), while Shaw and Nerlich (2015) point out that the dominant technical and economic framing of climate change marginalizes alternative, non-Western perspectives.…”