Disruptive Environmental Communication

This book proposes a radical change in communication strategies about environmental problems, advocating for more active and emotionally engaging methods that drive people to action. Based on new theoretical developments and research, the book provides a new framework for designing such communication strategies and suggests practical implementations of these ideas for practitioners, policy-makers, and scientists. Among the topics discussed: • The psychology of change and why disruptive communication is necessary • Virtual reality technologies used to communicate complex ideas • Reflections on the value of science fiction and climate fiction in addressing environmental issues • Analyzing the impact of youth climate activism Disruptive Environmental Communication provides an innovative new framework for designing effective communication strategies to address large-scale environmental problems, challenging the assumption that environmental problems can be communicated and handled through non-disruptive methods.

As society has become increasingly aware of environmental issues, the challenge of structuring public participation opportunities that strengthen democracy, while promoting more sustainable communities has become crucial for many natural resource agencies, industries, interest groups and publics. The processes of negotiating between the often disparate values held by these diverse groups, and formulating and implementing policies that enable people to fulfil goals associated with these values, can strengthen communities as well as tear them apart. This book provides a critical examination of the role communication plays in social transition, through both construction and destruction of community. The authors examine the processes and practices put in play when people who may or may not have previously seen themselves as interconnected, communicate with each other, often in situations where they are competing for the same resources. Drawing upon a diverse selection of case-studies on the American, Asian and European continents, the chapters chart a range of approaches to environmental communication, including symbolic construction, modes of organising and agonistic politics of communication. This volume will be of great interest to researchers, teachers, and practitioners of environmental communication, environmental conflict, community development and natural resource management.

This handbook provides a comprehensive review of communication around rising global environmental challenges and public action to manage them now and into the future. Bringing together theoretical, methodological, and practical chapters, this book presents a unique opportunity for environmental communication scholars to critically reflect on the past, examine present trends, and start envisioning exciting new methodologies, theories, and areas of research. Chapters feature authors from a wide range of countries to critically review the genesis and evolution of environmental communication research and thus analyze current issues in the field from a truly international perspective, incorporating diverse epistemological perspectives, exciting new methodologies, and interdisciplinary theoretical frameworks. The handbook seeks to challenge existing dominant perspectives of environmental communication from and about populations in the Global South and disenfranchised populations in the Global North. The Handbook of International Trends in Environmental Communication is ideal for scholars and advanced students of communication, sustainability, strategic communication, media, environmental studies, and politics.

This edited collection focuses on theoretical and applied research-based observations concerning how experts, advocates, and institutions make climate change information accessible to different audiences. Communicating Climate Change concentrates on three key elements of climate change communication – access, relevance, and understandability – to provide an overview of how these aspects allow multiple groups of stakeholders to act on climate-related information to build resilience. Featuring contributions from a wide range of scholars from across different disciplines, this book explores a multitude of different scenarios and communication methods, including social media; public opinion surveys; participatory mapping; and video. Overall, climate change communication is addressed from three different perspectives: communicating with the public; communicating for stakeholder engagement; and organizational, institutional, risk, and disaster communication. With each chapter focusing on implications and applications for practice, this book will be of great interest to students and researchers of climate change and environmental communication, as well as practitioners interested in understanding how to better engage stakeholders through climate change-related communication.

Multi-Stakeholder Contribution in Asian Environmental Communication focuses on how diverse actors can come together to promote sustainable environmental practices. Bringing together 25 environmental communication scholars and practitioners across 15 innovative chapters, this book explores the dynamic roles of stakeholders – ranging from governmental bodies and non-profit organisations to local communities and industry players – involved in advancing environmental communication across the Asian continent. Drawing on a rich tapestry of case studies and interdisciplinary perspectives, the book sheds light on the interplay of religious, cultural, political, and economic factors that shape environmental communication strategies and public perception in Malaysia, Indonesia, Bangladesh, China, Thailand, Iran, Japan, and Pakistan. It probes into contemporary issues such as Islamic environmental communication, gender roles, social media, political communication, the role of games and gaming companies, as well as the portrayal of ecological messages in film. Overall, this book aims to bridge the gap between theory and practice and will make a significant contribution to the growing literature on multi-stakeholder contribution in environmental communication, particularly in the Asian context. This volume will be of great interest to practitioners, policymakers, and researchers working in the field of environmental communication.

This volume interrogates the intertwining of the local and the digital in environmental communication. It starts by introducing a wave metaphor to tease out major shifts in the field, and situates the intersections of local places and digital networks in the beginning of a third wave. Investigations that feature the centrality of place and digital communication platforms show how we today, as researchers and practitioners, communicate the environment. Contributions identify the need for critical approaches that engage with the wider consequences of this changing media landscape, unpacking local and global tensions in environmental communication research. This empirical case study collection from different parts of the world shows that environmental activists and citizens creatively use digital technologies for campaign purposes. It identifies new environmental communication challenges and opportunities, as well as practices, of environmental activists, NGOs, citizens and local communities, in the fight for social and environmental justice.

Voice and Environmental Communication explores how people give voice to, and listen to the voices of, the environment. This foundational book introduces the relationship between these two fundamental aspects of human existence and extends our knowledge of the role of voice in the study of environmental communication.

The acceleration of global climate change creates a nexus for the examination of power, political rhetoric, science communication, and sustainable development. This book takes an international view of twenty first century environmental communication to critically explore mediated expressions of climate change.