Natural versus anthropogenic climate change: Swedish farmers’ joint construction of climate perceptions

Abstract

While previous research into understandings of climate change has usually examined general public perceptions, this study offers an audience-specific departure point. This paper analyses how Swedish farmers perceive climate change and how they jointly shape their understandings. The agricultural sector is of special interest because it both contributes to and is directly affected by climate change. Through focus group discussions with Swedish farmers, this study finds that: 1) farmers relate to and understand climate change through their own experiences, and 2) climate change is understood either as a natural process subject to little or no human influence or as anthropogenic, 3) various communication tools contribute to the formation of natural and anthropogenic climate change frames. The article ends by discussing frame resonance and frame clash in public understandings of climate change, and by comparing potential similarities and differences in how various segments of the public make sense of climate change.

Who Framed Climate Change? Identifying the How and Why of Iowa Corn Farmers’ Framing of Climate Change

“…For instance, adaptation attitudes of Iowa farmers in this sample seem be reflected in a subcategory of German farmers (Eggers et al . ) and among Swedish farmers (Asplund ). Farmers in both nations were skeptical of climate change or humans’ role in it, yet favoured adaptation practices.…”

“…In two regions of New Zealand between 37–46 per cent of farmers see it as anthropogenic in nature (Prokopy et al 2015). Again, studies of EU farmers have been less specific, though findings do suggest skepticism in humans’ contributions (Asplund ). For instance, only 25 per cent of Scottish farmers said their actions contribute to climate change (Barnes and Toma ).…”

“…Some analyses have suggested farmers perceive climate change as the result of natural variations in the environment (Arbuckle et al . ; Asplund ), but few US studies have offered detailed insight into how farmers rhetorically frame their perception of climate change and its causal drivers. In the first layer of this study's analysis, I explore how farmers are framing climate change as not related to human activity.…”

Controlling Sustainability in Swedish Beef Production: Outcomes for Farmers and the Environment

“…Despite the significant climate impact of beef production the farmers in our study only acknowledged their environmental impact to a limited extent. This resonates with research on the topic which indicates that many Swedish farmers downplay the role of anthropogenic causes of climate change and do not see a great need to implement climate change mitigation measures (Asplund 2016). We would like to suggest however, that the limited focus on the negative climate impact of beef amongst farmers seen in this study might not necessarily mean that farmers do not acknowledge these negative effects, but rather that they see themselves as being unfairly cast as the actors who are mainly responsible for the environmental impacts of our common food choices, and unfairly burdened with the economic cost of reducing environmental impact.…”

Just don’t call it climate change: climate-skeptic farmer adoption of climate-mitigative practices

“…A number of studies indeed indicate that farmers agree that the climate is changing; however, even in comparison to general public samples, farmers also stand out in their particularly high levels of climate skepticism, preferring to attribute observed changes in climate to natural causes [9][10][11][12][13]. Farmers might thus be quite willing to invest in adaptation [11,14], but mitigation is another matter [9,12]; if climate change is deemed a natural process, then there is no reason to reduce greenhouse gases [14], particularly if doing so comes with a cost.…”