Educational policies can strengthen climate coalitions

Abstract

Building public support for ambitious climate policies is a central challenge for governments seeking to decarbonize their economies. Many climate change mitigation policies pose visible material costs on citizens, while fiscal constraints limit governments’ abilities to use compensatory incentives. Education is used as a tool to build public awareness about climate change and support for mitigation policies, but the political effects of climate education policies are not well understood. We evaluate the effects of a real-world climate education policy through the study of a large-scale educational intervention: a three-hour interactive workshop which has so far been implemented in over 500 French universities. We employ a randomized control trial reaching 1,845 students across 167 workshops. Students who took the workshop expressed 7 percentage points higher support for costly climate policies, including a beef tax, short-haul flight ban, and meat-free university canteen, compared with the control group. The workshop increased beliefs in the effectiveness of these policies and elicited more positive emotions about climate action. Evidence from a sub-sample of follow-up survey respondents suggests these effects may persist for at least six weeks. We find no evidence that the workshop increased willingness to donate to a climate NGO. Overall, the results suggest that well-designed climate education can play a role in broadening public coalitions for ambitious climate policies by strengthening perceived policy efficacy and support for costly policies.