The Social Construction of Climate Change

Abstract

Contents: Foreword Introduction: power, knowledge and the social construction of climate change, Mary E. Pettenger. Part I Norm-Centred Perspective: Measuring the domestic salience of international norms: climate change norms in American, German and British climate policy debates, Loren R. Cass The Netherlands' climate change policy: constructing themselves/constructing climate change, Mary E. Pettenger The rise of Japanese climate change policy: balancing the norms economic growth, energy efficiency, international contribution and environmental protection, Takashi Hattori Constructing progressive climate change norms: the US in the early 2000s, Cathleen Fogel. Part II Discourse Analytical Perspective: Climate governance beyond 2012: competing discourses of green governmentality, ecological modernization and civic environmentalism, Karin BAackstrand and Eva LA vbrand Singing climate change into existence: on territorialization of climate policymaking, Matthew Paterson and Johannes Stripple Trust through participation? Problems of knowledge in climate decision making, Myanna Lahsen Disrupting the global discourse of climate change: the case of indigenous voices, Heather A. Smith Presence of mind as working climate change knowledge: a totonac cosmopolitics, William D. Smith Conclusion: the constructions of climate change, Loren R. Cass and Mary E. Pettenger Index.Individuals, international organizations and states are calling for the world to confront climate change. Efforts such as the Kyoto Protocol have produced intractable disputes and are deemed inadequate. This volume adopts two constructivist perspectives a norm-centred and discourse a to explore the social construction of climate change from a broad, theoretical level to particular cases. The contributors contend that climate change must be understood from the context of social settings, and that we ignore at our peril how power and knowledge structures are generated. They offer a greater understanding of why current efforts to mitigate climate change have failed and provide academics and policy makers with a new understanding of this important topic.