Climate and the Revival of Political Hope

During the 2025 world climate summit, known as the Conference of the Parties (COP), the UK climate community was more interested in the Green Party and its new leader Zack Polanski. This is a welcome sign of the times – COP meetings have become emblematic of an era we can only hope is ending. For decades there has been a vacuum of political vision but an immovable political establishment. Each year, a hive of officials has convened—amid ever-waning enthusiasm—to ‘solve’ a profound crisis that requires deep political, economic and indeed philosophical shifts. Meanwhile, the accelerating breakdown of both Earth’s climate systems and our political systems has become undeniable. A large majority recognises this, and our collective shift of attention from diplomats to politicians (with vision) suggests our growing will to become an effective political force.

Humanity’s survival may depend on the formation of such a movement.

The question facing those who’ve lost patience with COP is: how can we speed the rise of such a popular movement? Certainly organising must feature action on economic issues that dominate most people’s daily lives. But can environmental initiatives actually strengthen those efforts to build a unified political majority? What steps can we take toward an overarching response to an overarching crisis?

Years of learning from climate action show that the challenge is as psychological as it is political. Namely, the public must draw motivation from understanding that we are in crisis, rather than being paralysed by its enormity.

A Framework for Mobilisation

The Climate Majority Project (CMP) proposes that four interlocking goals are needed for a mobilisation:

1. People must believe that others share their deep concern, fostering confidence that change is possible.
2. Emotional support must allow people to manage their stress without overwhelm.
3. Deep understanding of what is at stake must connect climate facts to personal and collective meaning.
4. People must believe there are effective actions that people can take to protect their future — including by building towards the three goals above.

Climate action and system change efforts have failed to spread to the majority not because people don’t care, but because the first two dimensions— a sense of collective efficacy and emotional support—are weak or missing. Climate action has focused almost exclusively on knowledge and action. But without support and collective confidence, facts can be overwhelming – so we often avoid the worst facts.

To remedy this we need concrete, pragmatic steps that can build morale and shared purpose, allowing us to be motivated (by our dire situation) at scale.

Three Priority Areas for Immediate Action

The actions below do not pretend to be a formula for ending the civilisational crisis. Rather they are suggestions for steps that climate-concerned people can take now to aid the rise of a movement capable of achieving real systems change.

1. Strategic Adaptation for Emergency Resilience (SAFER)

As climate impacts intensify, communities must prepare for floods, food insecurity, and extreme weather in general. Adaptation is no longer optional.

CMP’s SAFER campaign promotes adaptation as the partner of, not the substitute for, decarbonisation. Local resilience efforts allow people to take climate action that directly changes their own future—making them more motivating than distant ‘mitigation’ targets. They strengthen communities, create emotional support, and decrease denial of our crisis. Perhaps most importantly, this action can make deep public concern visible, helping the majority see itself. However, if misused—as fossil-fuel interests will attempt—adaptation could become an excuse for more inaction. That’s why this issue must actively be engaged with or or ‘owned’ by the people who are realistic about risks.

CMP links local efforts so they can learn from each other and advocates a National Climate Resilience Plan.

2. Emotionally Literate Climate Education (Climate Courage Schools)

Young people are the most climate-concerned generation, yet schools still teach as if stability were guaranteed, when that is probably the opposite of the truth. Teachers are expected to prepare students for the future while receiving little to no training or support to address the realities of our planetary crisis or the emotions it provokes. Four hundred thousand young people leave school every year; education could meaningfully build a sense of common cause, mutual support and understanding among the majority.

Climate Courage Schools calls for a nationwide training of every teacher in climate and emotional literacy and to embed these values across school life. Research shows that when teachers gain these skills, students’ anxiety decreases, resilience increases, and understanding deepens. This preparation can happen across every subject – from science and history to maths and PSHE – helping students feel supported in their concerns, connected to each other, and prepared for an uncertain future. That means:

• Making climate and emotional literacy a core expectation of teaching, with every teacher – whatever their subject – trained to address reality with confidence and care.
• Requiring school leaders to prioritise Earth crisis learning as a central duty of their role.
• Supporting schools to become community hubs for hands-on adaptation and wellbeing projects.
• Building national networks of champions to connect schools, share learning and scale successful approaches to wellbeing and resilience.

3. Activating the Majority

Many people across Britain—and globally—share concerns about ecological collapse, inequality, institutional failure, and consumerism. Yet many assume their views are marginal. CMP seeks to make this silent majority aware of itself through campaigns that “break the silence,” as past movements like #MeToo or early trade unionism once did. When this majority on the margins realises its numbers and power, new political dreams can take hold and replace ailing institutions.

Even business leaders – especially insurers – privately acknowledge that a hopeful future requires new economic rules. The CMP has incubated an initiative called the Transition Lobby which builds safe spaces for businesspeople to advocate for systemic change, treating climate reality with the same rigour expected in financial risk assessment. By making business people visible partners in truth-telling, this movement could signal a new era in which economic actors openly demand the rules needed for long-term survival.

Many others could greatly help the silent majority see itself, such as farmers, teachers, firefighters, and anybody who would seem to be an unexpected ‘face of climate action’.

Political and Global Strategy

Education and adaptation offer politically feasible entry points for mainstream climate legislation in the UK because of:

• Cross-party appeal: Both Green and Labour parties could adopt such measures, even conservatives could back them,
• Swing voter potential: Adaptation and education can appeal to voters beyond the traditional green base by framing climate readiness as a national security and moral responsibility issue.

Internationally, the UK can leverage its global influence by promoting adaptation and emotional honesty in climate communication. Visible domestic resilience efforts could inspire similar mobilisation abroad, especially in Europe and the Global South, and increase the potential for international alliances (including climate clubs ). Britain has a moral duty to aid vulnerable nations, honouring historical responsibility while fostering global cooperation for fair and effective decarbonisation.

A transformation of climate politics will come when the majority on the margins becomes a self-aware political force. The approach sketched here—combining adaptation, emotionally literate education, and campaigns that awaken collective efficacy—offers practical, hopeful steps toward that outcome. These measures build both inner resilience and outer mobilisation, enabling societies to face the truth without despair and to act together for survival. The needed vision is not utopian but pragmatic: to turn widespread private concern into visible, organised, mainstream power—capable of steering humanity towards a liveable future.

Liam Kavanagh is a Cognitive & Social Scientist devoted to using his understanding of human motivation, ideology, and economics to aid more effective responses to the climate crisis. He has worked on three continents over 20 years doing applied social research, co-founded Life Itself, a community for responding to the poly-crisis, and written a book on how Western ideology contributes to climate change inaction.