How information about historic carbon emissions affects support for climate aid: evidence from a survey experiment

Abstract

In recent years, international climate negotiations have reached increasing consensus that the wealthiest countries should make significant financial contributions to offset the damages caused by the climate crisis in poorer countries. Proponents have justified such action based on wealthy countries’ disproportionate responsibility for global warming in the form of past emissions. However, in democratic countries such as the United States, it remains uncertain whether such messages can affect public opinion, especially across partisan lines. We conducted a pre-registered survey from a national online pool (N = 5,002) with a built-in experiment to evaluate the effectiveness of alternative communications strategies associated with historic carbon emissions in increasing support for climate aid. We find that specific attribution claims that reflect a climate justice perspective do boost support for more generous climate aid, but the effects are largely driven by Democrats. We also find that global solidarity frames emphasizing shared responsibility did not affect support for climate aid. Our results have important implications for climate advocacy and our understanding of climate-related attitudes.