User:Coffee4cup/Media coverage of climate change

United Kingdom Media Coverage of Climate Change

In 1988, was the beginning of the increase on media coverage of climate change in the United Kingdom.

<<guardian 1988 newspaper headline>>

The significance of government officials to address climate change and its future impacting issues is needed in shaping public action. Some examples of media based governmental communications result as follows, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher acted on the topic of climate change and provided a lot of influential information to the confused and concerned citizens of the UK. She made many speeches on the goals and concerns of global warming and what it meant, specifically one she performed to the Royal Society which is the oldest academy of sciences in the UK, in September 1988. In this speech, Margaret Thatcher pointed attention to the topic of how we, mankind, assumed the engineering and scientific advances we have made would not affect the condition of earth and its atmosphere but in reality it has been increasing many issues, all relating to a volatile climate. Due to Prime Minister Thatcher having a strong lead in the introduction to climate change, it created a huge increase in Green Party votes during the 1989 European Parliament Election which broke records during that time. (Hulme and Turnpenny)

Important comment presented by the UK’s Government Chief Scientific Advisor, David King, stated that the most difficult situation we are in today is climate change and that its effects are worse than terrorism. David King made sure to establish that reducing the carbon levels wouldn't just benefit the environment but also for the collective wellbeing. King's personal focus was precisely on climate change and he produced innovative thinking tactics and negotiations for the eyes of the media. (Shanahan)

The United States and United Kingdom can be easily compared in regards to their media coverage of climate change (Gavin). They are two countries that have the most developed coverage, and have had a similar trajectory through history. Beginning as early as the late nineteenth century, when the human-made impacts of climate change started to be acknowledged, both countries began releasing newspapers covering the topic. However, the media coverage did not become significant until 1988. Prior to then, the two decades before had very little coverage (Boykoff). In 1988, both the people in both the United Kingdom and United States became more concerned. In the UK, Margaret Thatcher expressed that “we have unwittingly begun a massive experiment with the system of the planet itself” (Boykoff). As the Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher’s words drew attention to the issue of climate change. At the same time, in the United States, James Hanson, a NASA scientist, claimed his certainty that global warming was man-made, and not entirely a natural process. With both of these events, the amount of media is seen to increase. However, before this time, the United States and United Kingdom were similar with both producing little coverage, but significant variation is seen after 1988.

<<graph>>

This graph shows the number of newspaper articles produced by the United States and United Kingdom after the events of 1988 caused them to increase. For a short period in 1988, the United States had slightly more coverage, but the two countries were quite similar. However, in the following years, the UK consistently produced more articles, and in 2003, it spiked, producing a significantly larger amount of articles. 2003 was a year where the UK and much of Europe experienced the hottest summer to date (The Heatwave of 2003). Temperatures reached up to 38.5℃, which is 101.3℉, resulting in 2,000 deaths in the UK, and more across Europe. This significant event drew the attention of newspapers, therefore increasing the amount of articles produced. For example, in the year following the heatwave, The Guardian released an article in March, 2004, warning about even more severe summers that would come. This article included a quote from Dr. Luterbacher, who stated, “We don't know if it will get warmer every year, but the trend is certainly in that direction.” The article also claimed that this extreme event was not due to natural causes, suggesting that human activity was responsible (“2003 Heatwave a Record Waiting to Be Broken.”). This fear of worse summers on the way and growing understanding of the human causes continued to increase articles following 2003.

An examination into the community of the UK and their perspectives of the climate change movement is important for the progression of change. In 2001, the National Survey of Public Attitudes to Quality of Life, created a poll to create an understanding of what the public viewed as the most important concerns, in the moment, relating to the local to global environment. The outcome was that the public listed global warming as their 8th on their list of current concerns. The office for National Statistics then constructed an additional poll asking the same question but reflecting 20 years ahead. In which the community stated that in 20 years time, the concern of the congestion fumes and noises relating from traffic was more concerning than the significant impacts of climate change. (Hulme and Turnpenny)

Along with heatwaves, other problems that arise from climate change tend to generate more media coverage. Specifically, the issue of flooding as a result from the changing climate draws attention, and therefore, causes media to report on the issue. The UK has had over a hundred articles per newspaper specifically on flooding in a six year span (Gavin). The UK in particular has articles that tend to frame the issue of climate change as being the fault of humans (Gavin). Therefore, climate change is generally touched on when tangible effects can be observed such as floods or heatwaves.

<<info about articles + flood + CC>>

There is a diverse range of types of articles the media companies in the United Kingdom are presenting to the public. Specifically looking at The Guardian, The Observer, The Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday, Sunday Telegraph, The Times and Sunday Times. In one article, newspapers are categorized into running from anthropogenic global warming only contributes to climate change to anthropogenic global warming negligently contributes to climate change. In this study, it is clear that on average, these news sources have increased in scientific credibility. McAllister

In 2006 Futerra published research to determine if feedback from the UK community on the topic of global warming was either positive or negative. The results were that only 25 percent of the climate change newspapers were positive. A huge media company that participated in the positive feedback was the Financial Times in which it contained the most coverage relating to the truth of climate change, even mentioning that it opens up business opportunities. That specific comment from the Financial Times created a movement that made businesses act faster than the government in brainstorming solutions for the related problems. The commuters of London, reaching to the amount of a million participants, on the date of October 25, 2007, they were provided a free metro newspaper which contained an important article with the headline “We’re in the biggest race of our lives.” which encompassed the details of the fourth report of the United Nations Environmental Programme’s Global Environment Outlook (GEO). The contents of the GEO presented how the actions placed on climate change were critically insufficient. A surplus of UK citizens were not ready for a change with the present facts of scientific uncertainty. (Shanahan)

The Sunday Telegraph specifically has a history of producing anti-climate change articles and news. The media publication did a major publication of Christopher Monckton, who is well known for his denial of climate change. They wrote this in one of their articles:  McAllister/Bird

“When this global warming madness passes, future generations will remove this derelict solar and wind infrastructure and return to the only reliable and economical electricity options—coal, gas, hydro and nuclear.” (The Sunday Telegraph, London, 2010, 'Officials & climate'). McAllister

George Monbiot, a weekly column writer for The Guardian, says specifically in Birtian he sees, there is a prevalent discourse of unity and collaboration when it comes to environmental concerns in media outlets such as: The Guardian, The Times, the Sun and the Independent. He also claims to have read “utter nonsense” in The Daily Mail or The Sunday Telegraph. Bird

A specific case of the community's reaction to climate change can be seen in the YouthStrike4Climate movement, specifically UK Youth Climate Coalition (UKYCC) and the UK Student Climate Network (UKSCN). According to Bart Cammaerts, there has been an overall positive media representation of the climate movement from United Kingdom media outlets. It is significant that 60% of the Daily Mail’s articles written about the climate movement were in a negative tone. While the BBC had over 70% written in a positive tone. There are a range of media outlets covering climate change, and they all have different opinions on the movement. Cammaerts

A noteworthy moment in the movement for climate change in the United Kingdom is Greta Thunberg. Starting in September 2019, she emerged as a global activist celebrity and media outlets began covering her more and more. From September 17th, 2019, to October 3rd, 2019, 21% of all media coverage on specific people were about Greta Thunberg. Young climate activist’s prevalence in the media continued to increase and thus so did the amount of media on the subject. Cammaerts

With more attention Greta Thunberg also led to an increased number of misogyny on women in climate change. According to Bart Cammaerts, “These disparaging discourses of belittlement also serve to deny children the right to have a voice on environmentalism and politics.” In the United Kingdom, the youth activism movement played a key role in the increased production of media coverage of climate change. Cammaerts