Evangelizing Climate Change

Abstract

Any effective response to climate change must address greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from individuals, who are responsible for nearly one-third of total annual emissions. A leading proposal for doing so, developed by Michael Vandenbergh and Anne Steinemann, advocates the disclosure of information about an individual's emissions, resulting harms, and steps that can be taken to reduce emissions. Providing information on individuals' contribution to climate change will be important in countering common misconceptions that individual activities do not matter to the environment. Such proposals, however, give insufficient attention to the role of personal values. Values matter to efforts to change individual behavior in at least two important ways. First, values underlie beliefs and norms, providing motivations for behavior. Because behavioral norms such as environmental protection are far from universal, efforts to change behavior will have to operate at a deeper level and tap into altruism and other values. Second, values influence how individuals process risk-related information. Efforts to provide individuals with information about GHG emissions and climate change must account for the effect of values on risk perception. This Article proposes a climate change strategy that accounts for the role of values in behavior and examines steps for motivating changes within a particular community, American evangelicals. The suggested steps are patterned after evangelical techniques, which in turn can inform efforts to achieve behavioral change in the broader public.

Keywords: climate change, global warming, environment, natural resources, evangelicals, behavior, behavioral change, individuals, values

JEL Classification: K32