RealClimate: Balancing the Engagement Model with the Deficit Model

I promise you a day will come when our children and grandchildren will look back and they will ask one of two questions. Either they will ask, “What in God's name were they doing? Didn't they see the evidence?” or they may look back and say, “How did they find the uncommon moral courage to rise above politics and redeem the promise of American democracy?”
—Al Gore, 2007 The American people are not connecting the dots. They don’t understand the interplay between climate and energy. [5]
—James Rogers, CEO, Duke Energy, 2008

Want to brush up on global dimming, solar forcing, past climates? Visit RealClimate.org. RealClimate represents a new breed of science information sharing. For a long time, scientists operated under what some call a “deficit model” in which the lack of science knowledge among the public created the necessity of explaining all the basics. The need still exists, of course. But operating on solely that basis can make scientists sound “preachy” or just plain “know-it-all.” A stronger method involved bringing the audience into the discussion by seeking to tailor the information doses to the specific questions and responses of an audience who wants to learn more. The ability of a Weblog to create such information exchanges enables scientists to take advantage of the benefits of the engagement model. In this regard, RealClimate is a site that balances engagement-model benefits with deficit-model necessities.

RealClimate  is a commentary site on climate science by working climate scientists for the interested public and journalists. The organizers of the site aim to provide a quick response to developing stories and provide the context sometimes missing in mainstream commentary. The discussion at the site is restricted to scientific topics and avoids getting involved in any political or economic implications of the science. As such, the site’s founders want to provide sound scientific information with which to both debunk the non-credible stories and bolster the use of facts in the decision-making process. One excellent page on the site is called “Start here” and offers visitors a list of Web resources on climate change, organized by the level of prior knowledge of the visitor.  And, as a Weblog, the site and this page also contain responses from visitors and the site’s contributing editors that are often as interesting to read as the main articles themselves.

In addition to science sites such as RealClimate, there are many good climate policy sites that do get involved in discussing the political or economic implications of the science. For example, Natural Resources Defense Council actively takes stands on policy issues, while relying on the knowledge base in the science community to determine which policy outcomes might have which effects. Other policy sites include The Nature Conservancy, Sierra Club, and Environmental Defense Fund. These sites often have a “Policy” tab that is quite visible.

Bibliography

1. AAAS (2008) Center for Public Engagement with Science and Technology: Science Insights and News Service. American Association for the Advancement of Science (read October 15, 2008). http://www.aaas.org/programs/centers/pe/news_svc/
2. AAAS (2008) Global Climate-Change Resources. American Association for the Advancement of Science (read October 4, 2008). http://www.aaas.org/news/press_room/climate_change/
3. Batten K, Goldstein B, Hendricks B (2008) Investing in a Green Economy. Center for American Progress (read October 10, 2008). http://www.americanprogress.org
4. Eurakalert! (2008) An online, global news service operated by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Washington, DC. http://www.eurekalert.org
5. Grantham Prize (2008) The Climate Policy Puzzle: Piecing Together the Solutions. 2008 Grantham Prize Seminar on the State of Environmental Journalism. http://dl2.newmediamill.net/media/metcalf/flash/080908d/080908d.html
6. Jones SA, Fischoff B, Lach D (1999) Evaluating the science-policy interface for climate change research. Climatic Change 43(3):581?– 599. http://www.springerlink.com/index/NG60835839642511.pdf
7. Lohwater T (2008) Great Expectations for Science Multimedia as Print News Shrinks. American Association for the Advancement of Science (read December 26, 2008). http://www.aaas.org/news/releases/2008/1224pio_seminar.shtml
8. Milinski M, Semmann D, Krambeck HJ, Marotzke J (2006) Stabilizing the Earth’s climate is not a losing game: supporting evidence from public goods experiments. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 103(11):3994?– 3998. http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/103/11/3994
9. NPR (2007) Climate Connections. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=9657621
10. Potter D (2008) “Locative” News. Advancing the Story: Broadcast Journalism in a Multimedia World. May 16, 2008. http://advancingthestory.wordpress.com/2008/05/16/locative-news/
11. Pulwarty R (2008) Symposia: Climate Scientists and Decision-makers: The Communication Interface. National Conference on Science, Policy, and the Environment: Climate Science and Solutions. http://ncseonline.org/2008conference/
12. Pyke C (2008) Green Buildings & Climate Change: Best Practices to Demonstrated Performance. CTG Energetics (read September 30, 2008). http://ctgenergetics.com
13. Rogers J (2008) Keynote: Climate Change: Science to Solutions?— The Case for Business Leadership. National Conference on Science, Policy, and the Environment: Climate Science and Solutions. http://ncseonline.org/2008conference
14. Romsdahl R (2008) Addressing institutional challenges to adaptation planning for climate change impacts on the northern Great Plains: a case study of North Dakota. Interdisciplinary Environmental Review (in press). http://www.ieaonline.org/ier.htm
15. Rosenberg H (2008) Reducing GHG Emissions: Report from Projects in California. Urban Land Institute 2008 Fall Meeting and Urban Land Expo. http://ctgenergetics.com
16. Rosenberg S, Cowman D, Vedlitz A, Zahran S (2007) Climate Change: A Profile of US Climate Scientists’ Perspectives. Institute for Science, Technology, and Public Policy Working Paper. http://bush.tamu.edu/istpp/scholarship/
17. Rosenberg S, Vedlitz A (2007) Climate Scientists and Decision-Makers: Exploring the Communication Interface. Institute for Science, Technology, and Public Policy Working Paper. http://bush.tamu.edu/istpp/scholarship/
18. Rosenthal E (2007) “UN Report Describes Risks of Inaction on Climate Change.” New York Times, November 17, 2007. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/17/science/earth/17climate.html
19. Schneider SH (2005) Mediarology (read October 1, 2008). http://stephenschneider.stanford.edu/Mediarology/MediarologyFrameset.html

Online resources

• Communicating climate change motivating citizen action   
• Global land use models
• Landscape ecology: Its role as the scientific underpinning of land-use planning
• Land-use and land-cover change
• More articles on environmental policy
• American Association for the Advancement of Science
• AAAS Communicating Science
• AAAS EurekAlert!
• progress.org Center for American Progress
• California Air Resources Board
• Climate Central
• .copusproject.org Coalition on the Public Understanding of Science
• Communication Partnership for Science and the Sea
• Dot Earth (Andrew Revkin)
• Earth Portal
• E-print Network
• Global Warming Art
• Internet Scout Project
• News Lab
• North American Environmental Atlas
• .oaresciences.org/en/ Online Access to Research in the Environment
• Open Education Resource (OER) Commons
• Real Climate
• World Changing

Action items

• Action 30: Should There Be a National Climate Service? If So, What Should It Do and Where Would It Be?
• Action 31: Communicating Information for Decision Makers?— Climate Change at the Regional Level

Instructor resources

(password required)