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Successfully meeting the ambitious targets of the Paris Agreement on climate change calls for both social change and systems change. How can political will and timely action be activated to meet these targets? This chapter explores the potential for linking both cognitive and quantum approaches to climate politics and social change. Approaching climate change as a multiscale process of meaning making, the chapter discusses quantum social change as well as cognition in climate change governance. It presents three brief case studies to describe the importance of language in climate politics, highlighting the nonlocal effects and pointing to the importance of being able to imagine and enact alternatives meanings, as well as the power of individuals to influence the social wave function. The chapter concludes with reflections on the complementarity of quantum and cognitive approaches to climate politics.

The 2015 Paris Agreement established a new logic for international climate governance: the pledge-and-review system. In 2009, the same idea had been proposed in the Copenhagen Accord, but was then forcefully rejected by the negotiation community. Explaining this turnaround, I analyze the role of the United States in the international climate negotiations, using Putnam’s two-level game framework and Snidal’s k-group theory. U.S. domestic politics imposed significant constraints on the terms of the Paris Agreement, contributing to the emergence of the new treaty architecture. Until 2015, U.S. negotiators were either unable or unwilling to bring the demands of political actors at the domestic and international levels in alignment. President Obama achieved this alignment in 2015 by creating international support for a treaty without legally binding obligations that could circumvent a Congressional ratification barrier. The latter required a surprising move: the proactive engagement of China despite the structural context of hegemonic transition.

Persistent divides among American voters regarding climate change, especially climate skepticism among conservatives, have long been explained with reference to ideology, vested interests, and trends of political polarization. More recently, an alternative set of explanations for the opinion gap between conservatives and liberals has been gaining traction, arguing that these divisions are generated by social identities and their effects on individual beliefs and attitudes. Here, we focus on global citizenship as a specific social identity. Seeking to connect ideology and social identity approaches, we study how the interaction between a person’s ideological leanings and their social identity as a global citizen relates to beliefs and risk perceptions regarding climate change. Analyzing two kinds of survey data, we find that a global citizen identity moderates the relationship between a conservative ideology and a person’s climate-related beliefs and risk perceptions, while it does not seem to have the same effect for liberal individuals. In other words, a global citizen identity is associated with a potential decrease in the ideological divide between conservatives and liberals regarding climate change. We explore the implications of these findings for climate change communication and policy and other issue areas.

International audience; Tipping point dynamics are fundamental drivers for sustainable transition pathways of social-ecological systems (SES). Current research predominantly analyzes how crossing tipping points causes regime shifts, however, the analysis of potential transition pathways from these social and ecological tipping points is often overlooked. In this paper, we analyze transition pathways and the potential outcomes that these may lead to via a stylized model of a system composed of interacting agents exploiting resources and, by extension, the overall ecosystem. Interactions between the social and the ecological system are based on a perception-exploitation framework. We show that the presence of tipping points in SES may yield counter-intuitive social-ecological transition pathways. For example, the high perception of an alarming ecological state among agents can provide short-term ecological benefits, but can be less effective in the long term, compared to a low-perception condition. This work also highlights how understanding non-linear interactions is critical for defining suitable transition pathways of any SES.

The pledge-and-review architecture of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change has been praised as a new model of global environmental governance. Instead of internationally agreed-upon emission reduction targets, the agreement relies on countries’ repeated, voluntary pledges and actions. A key mechanism for monitoring progress toward shared global goals, putting pressure on countries to live up to their promises, and increasing ambition over time is the global stocktake. The stocktake’s twin-purposes to act simultaneously as a review and ambition mechanism render it a global governance innovation. Absent a clear institutional precedent, the global stocktake presents a design challenge for the climate negotiation community. This paper develops a number of lessons for designing the stocktaking process based on a review of relevant scholarship and an analysis of the 2013–2015 Periodic Review as a limited precedent within the climate regime. While we cannot predict what will make the stocktake successful, these design principles could increase the chances for its effectiveness. These lessons offer potential guidance for decision-makers with implications for the future effectiveness of the Paris Agreement.

Societal transformations are necessary to address critical global challenges, such as mitigation of anthropogenic climate change and reaching UN sustainable development goals. Recently, social tipping processes have received increased attention, as they present a form of social change whereby a small change can shift a sensitive social system into a qualitatively different state due to strongly self-amplifying (mathematically positive) feedback mechanisms. Social tipping processes with respect to technological and energy systems, political mobilization, financial markets and sociocultural norms and behaviors have been suggested as potential key drivers towards climate action. Drawing from expert insights and comprehensive literature review, we develop a framework to identify and characterize social tipping processes critical to facilitating rapid social transformations. We find that social tipping processes are distinguishable from those of already more widely studied climate and ecological tipping dynamics. In particular, we identify human agency, social-institutional network structures, different spatial and temporal scales and increased complexity as key distinctive features underlying social tipping processes. Building on these characteristics, we propose a formal definition for social tipping processes and filtering criteria for those processes that could be decisive for future trajectories towards climate action. We illustrate this definition with the European political system as an example of potential social tipping processes, highlighting the prospective role of the FridaysForFuture movement. Accordingly, this conceptual framework for social tipping processes can be utilized to illuminate mechanisms for necessary transformative climate change mitigation policies and actions.

Over the last two decades, scholars have developed an increasingly sophisticated range of approaches to studying the complex relationship between popular culture and politics. This article addresses three major weakness in this expanding body of research: (1) the analytic focus on the pop-cultural artifact itself rather than political actors and scholars doing the causal-political or pedagogical work, (2) a lack of attention to the question whether different culture consumers’ interpretations and experiences of a pop-cultural artifact match those of scholars, and (3) the dearth of empirical studies verifying theoretical claims. I address these weaknesses by introducing the concept of pop-cultural mobilization to capture the active and deliberate appropriation of pop-cultural resources for a specific political purpose by political actors. I support my conceptual argument with empirical data for a case study on the TV show Game of Thrones (GOT): a qualitative content analysis of 55 political commentaries published between 2013 and 2016. The authors of these political commentaries purposefully contributed to a process of meaning-making among the American public by publishing their own interpretations of the TV show, especially what they perceived as strong parallels between the GOT narratives and climate change politics in the real world. The analysis demonstrates the interpretive openness of the pop-cultural artifact GOT, challenging the often-assumed interpretive authority of scholars’ readings of a cultural narrative. There is even the potential for political opponents to make use of the same pop-cultural material to advance different policy agendas.

Societal transformations are necessary to address critical global challenges, such as mitigation of anthropogenic climate change and reaching UN sustainable development goals. Recently, social tipping processes have received increased attention, as they present a form of social change whereby a small change can shift a sensitive social system into a qualitatively different state due to strongly self-amplifying (mathematically positive) feedback mechanisms. Social tipping processes have been suggested as key drivers of sustainability transitions emerging in the fields of technological and energy systems, political mobilization, financial markets and sociocultural norms and behaviors. Drawing from expert elicitation and comprehensive literature review, we develop a framework to identify and characterize social tipping processes critical to facilitating rapid social transformations. We find that social tipping processes are distinguishable from those of already more widely studied climate and ecological tipping dynamics. In particular, we identify human agency, social-institutional network structures, different spatial and temporal scales and increased complexity as key distinctive features underlying social tipping processes. Building on these characteristics, we propose a formal definition for social tipping processes and filtering criteria for those processes that could be decisive for future trajectories to global sustainability in the Anthropocene. We illustrate this definition with the European political system as an example of potential social tipping processes, highlighting the potential role of the FridaysForFuture movement. Accordingly, this analytical framework for social tipping processes can be utilized to illuminate mechanisms for necessary transformative climate change mitigation policies and actions., Comment: 24 pages, 4 figures

Unidad de excelencia María de Maeztu MdM-2015-0552 The search for decisive actions to remain below 1.5 °C of global temperature rise will require profound cultural transformations. Yet our knowledge of how to promote and bring about such deep transformative changes in the minds and behaviours of individuals and societies is still limited. As climate change unravels and the planet becomes increasingly connected, societies will need to articulate a shared purpose that is both engaging and respectful of cultural diversity. Thus, there is a growing need to 'raise the temperature' of integration between multiple ways of knowing climate change. We have reviewed a range of literatures and synthesized them in order to draw out the perceived role of the arts in fostering climate transformations. Our analysis of climate-related art projects and initiatives shows increased engagement in recent years, particularly with the narrative, visual and performing arts. The arts are moving beyond raising awareness and entering the terrain of interdisciplinarity and knowledge co-creation. We conclude that climate-arts can contribute positively in fostering the imagination and emotional predisposition for the development and implementation of the transformations necessary to address the 1.5 °C challenge.

Since the beginning of the 20th century, the understanding of the relationship between science and policy making has altered significantly from one that separated the ‘truth seeking’ domain of science to one characterized by an increasingly close integration of science into the domain of politics, complete with contested values and opinions. Resilience scientists have only recently entered this discussion, but a coherent approach to purposeful institutional change and policy remains elusive, despite core theoretical concepts focusing on the scale and ‘fit’ of governance institutions for complex social–ecological systems. While the appropriateness of value-driven science is highly contested across all scientific fields, this paper argues that articulating a coherent position is of particular relevance for resilience scientists and others, who use a theoretical framework that is infused with a specific value-set, such as ecosystem and species protection, conservation, inclusiveness and participatory governance processes. Outlining both the challenges of navigating the science–policy interface and a set of approaches resilience scientists could take in response to these challenges, we seek to initiate reflection and debate within the resilience science community concerning their own role in growing the middle ground between science and politics, and conducting science within that hybrid space.

The BASIC countries (Brazil, South Africa, India, and China) play an increasingly prominent role in global climate negotiations. Climate governance spotlights burden-sharing arrangements, asking countries to take on potentially costly actions to resolve a global problem, even as the benefits are generally indivisible public goods. This article examines the BASIC countries' own Joint Statements and their individual and collective submissions to multilateral climate negotiations to identify the rationalist and principled arguments they have made about the climate burden-sharing requirements that developed countries, developing countries, and they themselves should face in global climate governance. It argues that their expectations for their own role are particularly unclear, with greater national action than international commitments to do so.

The term tipping point has experienced explosive popularity across multiple disciplines over the last decade. Research on social-ecological systems (SES) has contributed to the growth and diversity of the term's use. The diverse uses of the term obscure potential differences between tipping behavior in natural and social systems, and issues of causality across natural and social system components in SES. This paper aims to create the foundation for a discussion within the SES research community about the appropriate use of the term tipping point, especially the relatively novel term 'social tipping point.' We review existing literature on tipping points and similar concepts (e.g. regime shifts, critical transitions) across all spheres of science published between 1960 and 2016 with a special focus on a recent and still small body of work on social tipping points. We combine quantitative and qualitative analyses in a bibliometric approach, rooted in an expert elicitation process. We find that the term tipping point became popular after the year 2000 - long after the terms regime shift and critical transition - across all spheres of science. We identify 23 distinct features of tipping point definitions and their prevalence across disciplines, but find no clear taxonomy of discipline-specific definitions. Building on the most frequently used features, we propose definitions for tipping points in general and social tipping points in SES in particular.

Philosophers, political theorists and cognitive scientists have applied the traditional distinction between deontology and consequentialism to determine ethical responsibilities – usually of states – to take action in response to climate change. Most of this work is either purely conceptual or based on experiments with individuals, who are not part of the global political process. This paper makes two contributions to this debate. First, based on interview data I describe existing patterns of ethical reasoning among global political actors rather than groups selected for lab experiments. Integrating theories of risk perceptions, international relations and moral philosophy, I identify both deontological and consequentialist cognitive patterns, and examine their constitutive elements. My second contribution concerns the role of emotion in moral reasoning. Using the same qualitative data, I offer support for a controversial argument about the emotional nature of deontological reasoning. Further, I argue that many negotiators experience climate change not as an impersonal threat posed by the environment, but rather as an “up, close and personal” threat, over which other negotiation participants have significant control.

The BASIC countries (Brazil, China, India, South Africa) have played a major role in recent climate negotiations. We argue that a focus on identities—both their individual national identities as emerging powers and their joint identity as the BASIC coalition of emerging powers—is useful for understanding the coalition’s negotiation stances and the larger negotiation dynamics between 2009 and 2011. BASIC countries maintain a hard defining line between themselves and developed states in terms of their climate obligations but accept some differentiation between themselves and other developing countries, thus adding a destabilizing third category of countries to the climate negotiations.

The scale, rate, and intensity of humans’ environmental impact has engendered broad discussion about how to find plausible pathways of development that hold the most promise for fostering a better future in the Anthropocene. However, the dominance of dystopian visions of irreversible environmental degradation and societal collapse, along with overly optimistic utopias and business‐as‐usual scenarios that lack insight and innovation, frustrate progress. Here, we present a novel approach to thinking about the future that builds on experiences drawn from a diversity of practices, worldviews, values, and regions that could accelerate the adoption of pathways to transformative change (change that goes beyond incremental improvements). Using an analysis of 100 initiatives, or “seeds of a good Anthropocene”, we find that emphasizing hopeful elements of existing practice offers the opportunity to: (1) understand the values and features that constitute a good Anthropocene, (2) determine the processes that lead to the emergence and growth of initiatives that fundamentally change human–environmental relationships, and (3) generate creative, bottom‐up scenarios that feature well‐articulated pathways toward a more positive future.

This chapter explores the possibility of strengthening people's imagination skills with the help of an unusual tool: climate fiction. It uses three novels that are paradigmatic of the climate fiction genre to explore whether and how they might offer insights that help people reconceptualize their responses to climate change. The chapter discusses potential problems when using fiction as a decision-aid for example, the question how valid or correct the scientific base of fictional texts ought to be for them to be useful. It clarifies the prospects for integrating climate fiction in political processes. The chapter examines the potential power of climate fiction a growing literary genre that deals with climate change to stimulate, aid, and enrich the political imagination. It also examines an invitation to scholars working at the boundary between social science, arts, and humanities to start exploring the phenomenon of imagination and the impact of climate fiction on climate politics empirically.

To succeed, the hybrid model of international climate policy embodied in the Paris Agreement requires countries to deliver their nationally determined contributions (NDCs) and to progressively increase collective and individual efforts over time. The effectiveness of this type of regime will require international review processes that provide robust information about countries’ efforts and trajectories and give substantial opportunities for state and non-state actor engagement with this information. The Paris Agreement creates three different review processes, but leaves critical details regarding each to future decisions: It provides for a review of implementation of individual NDCs under an “enhanced transparency framework”, comprising a technical expert review and multilateral consideration (Article 13). It puts in place a global stock take every five years to assess the collective progress towards achieving the purpose and long-term goals of the Agreement (Article 14), preceded by a mitigation-focused facilitative dialogue in 2018. It establishes a mechanism to facilitate implementation and promote compliance through a committee that is expert-based, non- adversarial and non-punitive. (Article 15). It is essential for Parties to develop effective modalities, procedures and guidelines, as mandated by Decision 1/CP.21, for each of these processes. To this end, this discussion brief highlights essential considerations and potential options for each process.

The purpose of the United Nations-guided process to establish Sustainable Development Goals is to galvanize governments and civil society to rise to the interlinked environmental, societal, and economic challenges we face in the Anthropocene. We argue that the process of setting Sustainable Development Goals should take three key aspects into consideration. First, it should embrace an integrated social-ecological system perspective and acknowledge the key dynamics that such systems entail, including the role of ecosystems in sustaining human wellbeing, multiple cross-scale interactions, and uncertain thresholds. Second, the process needs to address trade-offs between the ambition of goals and the feasibility in reaching them, recognizing biophysical, social, and political constraints. Third, the goal-setting exercise and the management of goal implementation need to be guided by existing knowledge about the principles, dynamics, and constraints of social change processes at all scales, from the individual to the global. Combining these three aspects will increase the chances of establishing and achieving effective Sustainable Development Goals.

Using a cognitive approach to the study of conflict that conceptualizes the mind as a network of mental representations, we make three arguments about the role of collective identities in the emergence, persistence and resolution of conflict. Collective identities are subsystems of larger networks of mental representations that make up an individual mind. Because they manifest the group within the mind of an individual, but also connect and align the individual mind with that of other group members, collective identities are an essential element of a complex, multilevel process that constitutes the group in the first place—they are necessary for the emergence of the social group phenomenon. Finally, collective identities are “sticky” in the sense that they are more resistant to change and trigger stronger—more emotional—defensive responses than other mental representations when challenged.

We propose a complex systems approach to the study of political belief systems, to overcome some of the fragmentation in the current scholarship on ideology. We review relevant work in psychology, sociology, and political science and identify major cleavages in the literature: the spatial vs. non-spatial divide (ideologies as reducible to a spatially organized set of dimensions vs. as complex conceptual structures) and the person-group problem (ideologies as driven by psychological needs of individuals vs. by institutional and power structures of society). We argue that construing ideologies as conceptual networks of cognitive-affective representations embedded in social networks of people may provide a path for bridging these existing gaps and epistemological disputes. Tools from cognitive science and computational social science such as cognitive-affective mapping, connectionist simulations, and agent-based modeling are appropriate methods for a new research program that substantiates our complex systems perspective on ideology.