Everybody's Talking About It

I noted two news stories of environmental significance this past week. The first was President Obama’s speech on climate change, in which he emphasized the need to control emissions of carbon dioxide and to invest in renewable energy. Notably, he dismissed climate change deniers, saying “We don’t have time for a meeting of the Flat Earth Society”.

Of course, many Republicans immediately criticized Obama’s suggestions and we shouldn’t have any illusions that it will be easy to implement these policies. But the speech was significant in the way in made climate change part of mainstream political discourse. As more and more public figures talk about climate change as an accepted fact, the belief becomes normative – one of the things that everyone takes for granted, other than the extremists. And once it is taken for granted, it will be easier to talk about realistic ways to address it.

The power of norms is displayed in the second story, a New York Times essay by Bonnie Tsui

about the increasing rejection of shark’s fin soup by the Chinese public. Shark’s fin soup was always valued more for what it said about social status than for its taste. But its social message has become mixed: it doesn’t just connote high income, but also a lack of concern about endangered wildlife. That’s not a message that many people want to convey. For the most part, society has accepted the fact that species are endangered and that protecting endangered species is a good thing.

We talk a lot about the importance of social norms in creating more sustainable behavior. But it’s hard to know how to change the norms. This is how: more and more people talk about a topic, and it gradually becomes a majority opinion. We saw this in a third news item this week: the Supreme Court’s decisions about gay marriage.